#tangpulse

There's an itch under his skin, stings and fizzes like redstone powder rubbed against his palms. He sits underground and he waits and he waits and he waits for the chatter to die down and when it doesn't something breaks, shatters, explodes.

Here are three facts, in no particular order:

1.) Tango couldn't kill Impulse, even when he asked.

2.) Impulse once killed Tango because Bdubs asked.

3.) Bdubs once killed them both, no questions asked.

They haunt Impulse like an old ghost, like sand in his shoes, like blood under his fingernails. He digs and he's found out and he screams his throat raw because where are his teammates and he feels like he's repeating himself but he doesn't really know why.

The funeral needs to go on.

The red T stands. Not tall and definitely not proud, but it stands. And Impulse calls Ren and everyone else over but Jimmy doesn't come and nobody sits on the chairs. Impulse clears his throat but Etho speaks and it's all jokes and Impulse feels something sparking in his throat, shooting stars in his lungs.

Because Impulse knows how to be forgotten and he knows very little about being remembered. He knows how to join groups but not be in them, knows how to stand tall but not proud and how to obey but never praised. So Impulse thinks. He thinks about cooling corpse near a fortress of snow and how Bdubs said "He loves me." but not about him. He thinks of Tango's rage and he thinks of a clock that was always his and how it never mattered that they were teammates, did it?

Because a knife loves a turned back the way an axe loves a tree. How blood spurts like splintered wood blasts apart like shrapnel. And maybe Tango wasn't important enough to them but he said not my teammate when faced with lava and a willing face, so Impulse plans Tango's funeral.

Because he deserves it. To go out with a bang.

(Impulse lets himself laugh. Tango would have as well.)

So Impulse delivers his speech. It's sincere and the crowd aw's, claps, and—

BOOM!

.

.

.

.

.

The dust settled, the baffled laughter subsides. Impulse's disappointment tastes like gunpowder and ash.

The casket remains empty, dirtied with soot.

Ren looks at him with blood-red eyes. Impulse sits on the grass, then lies down.

Here are some facts, in no particular order:

1.) Tango is dead.

2.) Ren died.

3.) Impulse died.

Here's a fact, to nobody else but Impulse: