“W-What?” Hero asks, their eyes flitting to where Villain, (their workmate, their partner, their close friend) had the gun’s safety off.
They were both on top of a rooftop, on a cloudy night as Hero pushed theirself up to the wall. Supporting his bleeding side.
“No, no, no. This isn’t right, Villain.. You.. You never were like this! Why are you acting like this? This isn’t you.”
“Unfortunately for you, it seems that this is very much, well, me.” Villain dryly laughs, their hands covering their mouth innocently, but there was nothing funny nor innocent about the situation.
Villain had climbed their ranks within the hero society, joined Hero’s ragtag familial hero team, and became Hero’s partner. He had been there for them all (their team, where did their hero team go? How would they take to the news that someone who they practically treated like family.
Comforting each other as each life was lost. As mourning about how they couldn’t do better. Crying about they were almost, barely there. was... Was... All that fake?) through all tough and dark times, for what? Because he was a fucking-- Spy?!
“I refuse, you’re not.. You’re not...”
“I’m not a villain?”
“...”
Silence took over.
Hero did not know what to say as they looked at Villain’s horribly blank, lifeless eyes. They had been trembling just earlier, why?
“Then.. Then what are you then?” Hero tries to reach out once more, with a pleading look that Villain had badly wanted to take up on their offer. Eyes shining, telling Villain to ‘Come back, we can all fix this. We can do this together.’
That’s what Hero wanted to convey to Villain. Villain knows what they’re trying to say. Their lips pressed into a thin line before they started laughing. “Oh man, this is.. It’s much harder to keep my act together when you say it like that.”
Hero was heaving, reeling back and still in the process of accepting what had just happened to them. But hearing Villain’s laughs, it felt.. If one would to hear that, they’d call them a pyschopath.
Hero heard a voice with nothing more left to lost instead.
“Man! I’ve been so good not breaking from my character though.” Villain pouted, gun still cocked at them, as Villain started talking more. Each sentence with a honey laced voice filled with poison.
“Breaking.. Character?”
Villainn grinned and stepped forward to Hero, gripping on one of their shoulders. “”You were asking earlier, who I am. Right?” Villain repeated again.
Hero hesitantly nods,
Villain’s soft laughter from earlier started to turn into loud, giggling outbursts. With eyes wide and crazed. “I’m an actor! It’s what I do best, of course!” Villain proclaimed.
Hero did not know how to react to this. Never had they seen Villain act like this before. Or maybe their just showing their true colors now, now that they had revealed that all the times with them and their family team is gone and dissipated.
“It was a new challenge! I have never been given such a mission that long-term! Usually all of my infiltration missions are quick and easy! In and out!” Villain clapped his hands together as best and as dramtically as he could, seeing as he was still holding the gun.
Hero gulps, not liking where this was going. So.. It really was.. Fake?
“Hey, hey, hey. Did I do a good job?! My acting skills are great! You didn’t even notice!” Villain smiled gleefully as they twirled the gun before rolling the barrel, and pointing it at Hero’s head at gunpoint, much closer than ever before.
Hero’s breath hitched, wanting to say something. But words died on his lips with his mind not knowing what to do, and what to make of everything.
“Lets play a game”
“In this gun. there is 3 bullets inside of it, the other three spaces are empty.” With a flick of their hands, the barrel rolled around. “If you live, I let you go.”
They explained simply.
“And if I get the bullet..?”
It was a stupid, rhetorical question. Honestly, in Hero’s opinion. But he just had to say something damn it--
“I think we both already know what’s the answer to that question.” Villain giggled, as they gave the barrel one more roll, before stopping.
“Now, little hero. Do you want to roll again or take your luck here?”
Hero couldn’t do anything. They were already paralyzed and immobilized from Villain’s power. (It was chemical manipulation, how they could control chemicals in the air and just make a new... A new shot, a new material, a new weapon at a moment’s notice.)
Hero didn’t say anything for a while, their head downcast and looked directly up into Villain’s cold eyes. They still remembered. How their eyes glimmered with joy when the team had remembered their birthday.
Whenever something domestic or tooth-rottingly fluffy were ever to wrap them up in the group’s chaos. They remember how Villain had such a bright gleam in his eyes and a happy demeanor.
Hero refused that to be fake. And so, he stayed silent.
“I’m getting bored of waiting, you know? Giving you five more seconds to decide!”
5..
Hero looked at them in the eyes.
4..
They opened their mouth to speak.
3..
Villain looked at them, expecting their answer.
“We’ll be waitng for you, you know that?”
BANG
A loud noise had boomed, Hero flinched, all too prepared for their death, when they realized. They were still here.
Villain softly laughed once again.
“I guess you won, huh.”
Villain says, pocketing their gun to their pouch.
“Well, I’m a person of my word. I’ll be letting you go. The paralysis should wear off in about 30 minutes or so.”
Villain hums gently, as they controlled and adjusted the particles in the air and the ones within Hero’s body.
“Well then, I guess this is where we say goodbye?” Villain says, walking over to the edge of the rooftop. Their grappling hook already in hand.
Hero smiled, even if it was strained.
“I’ll make you realize where you really belong the next time. You deserve so much better.” It was Hero’s turn to grimly laugh.
Villain stopped dead in their freeze tracks.
A couple of seconds passed.
“Yeah, well lets see about that.”
As Villain hopped off from the rooftop, escaping.
__________________________________________
Villain sighed.
They looked at the gun which he filled with white powder to make a loud sound at. Yes, three slots had ammunition, but none of the barrels ever contained bullets.
It was just a prop for the character on stage.
Villain took a look at their book they keep in their secret compartment, listing all different personas they usually took depending on the mission and people.
They did this to survive, they did this to keep them an their family and loved ones alive.
So why had it felt so much more gripping now more than ever?
Villain always knew their real personality had always been lost to the pages, blending in with the personas they created. The pyschotic maniac one, was one he pulled of earlier. They read the contents of the pages.
‘Dead, crazed eyes. Make sudden movements and twitches. Change tone of voice frequently. While it’s not really the definition of being clinically pyschotic, it should be enough to offput anyone and make them think their crazy.’
Villain sighs as they closed the notebook, looking at another item they had stored in the secret compartment. It was a picture of them and Hero, along with their hero group all eating food happily together.
Those moments were the times they had felt real, not just a fabricated part of personality they had. But well, those had to go down the drain.
‘Hiraeth.’
Their mind supplies.
The feeling of homesickness or longing for a home you can never go back to.
Villain sighs, as they put both items back in the secret compartment, and locking it and making sure it was out of sight.
They had a new mission.
They were an actor, after all.
