Legendary // H.S

67.

'Don't you wanna be my toy?'

*

Harry

It could be anyone. No matter how many possibilities I go over in my mind, no one stands out more than the other, because they all have a motive. Money, greed, escape; there will always be something that draws a person to the dangerous and forbidden. That's why we all involved ourselves in heists to begin with. But now, that gamble has been placed upon a man that wishes to kill me and everyone I care about, all because he couldn't get what he wanted all those years ago.

Whatever Hugo has promised them, it won't last. I know him. I'm accustomed to the games he plays, the manipulation tactics he uses, how quickly he disposes of everyone in his circle when their task is complete.

Desired, but momentary flashes of brilliance.

Of course, they could be trapped. Most people under his control are. I once was, and Joe was too before he was murdered. It's not easy to get out, and most things are done out of fear for your own life. But I have created a space of safety for the team, I have promised them protection and care, time and time again. I would have thought that if something like this were happening, they'd come to me. They'd tell me the issue and we'd work it out together, just as we've always done.

How wrong I've been. How naïve my beliefs are if I have placed my faith in those that took a prize I also dangled in front of them. It is in their nature to want after being promised something magnificent. Something as powerful as the safety of their families in exchange of their cooperation. Something as desirable as money that exceeds what I can give them, so they can truly start new lives. I cannot punish them, yet, I feel I must.

Loyalty is the most important thing to me. It is no shade of grey or bright technicolour, nothing in between. It is black and white. You are either true to me or not. But when I have been betrayed, when I have placed my trust in someone, and it has been manipulated; that is the greatest crime of them all. Like a murder, it severs the life I once knew. There is only life before a betrayal and after.

Whoever it is that has moved against me, I will never forgive them. My heart isn't as pure as others in this regard. Atlas may find it within her. She did after Joe died. But she knew him for years; these people she's only known for over half a year. Will she retaliate in a way that I would? Or will she close in on herself and search for other options?

Since the team left, she's ran me a warm bath and made some food for while I washed off and relaxed, letting my mind ease in the comfort of the water. Everything in my body ached after the fight, and while the muscles are relaxing slightly, parts are still pounding in anger, still tensing in worry. It's the loss of control that caused me to spiral; the sudden realisation that everything I have done to protect those I love has been for nothing, and we'll never overcome the person that causes it. For Hugo to not be in that office today, it felt like a sick joke being played on me. Perhaps he knew all along, told by whatever informant he has under his grasp as I raced with time to try and kill him. To stop his reign of terror. But it was useless.

Over dinner we didn't discuss the events of the day. We didn't discuss anything. Atlas was still reeling from what showed up on the doorstep and I had been fighting the emptiness that threatened to consume my mind as I slipped into the darkness of my fears. As long as I have Atlas, I'll be ok. I have to remind myself that. In the toughest of times she brings a softness. In the coldest of winters her rays warm me. In the backdrop of chaos she brings calm.

I love Atlas, not because a fate brought us together, but because it is the simplest thing to do. I do not know any other way of living than this. Under such strange circumstances, we seem to have found each other, and in the madness we have become one. When I wake it is her eyes that open, and when she breathes it is my lungs that inhale and exhale with each beat. It wasn't a case of falling into it, or even walking towards it. My love for Atlas just happened, and the moment I realised it I refused to deny myself of the divine pleasure of it any longer.