Ya can't run off an' drag 'im back. He'll jus' go back t' Val th' second ya step away. He'll come back; it's jus' gotta be his choice.
That-- or some version of it, was what Cherri had told Tyco nearly every day since Vox's pathetic attempt at dictatorship ended in the ruination of... everything.
Yes, everything. The overlord couldn't bring himself to care that the good guys had won that day. He didn't care that redemption was proven possible. He didn't care that Charlie's dream was coming true, and the hotel was flooded with new souls instilled with a spectacular sense of hope.
If anything... he resented it all. He couldn't stand to be in the same room as Charlie as she flitted about and welcomed her new guests. She didn't care that Angel was gone. She didn't care that Angel was subjecting himself to eternal torment because of what Vox had him do to her.
Like everyone else... she used Angel long enough to get what she wanted: Clout, recognition, proof of concept... now that there were dozens of sinners at the hotel, what did one matter?
Tyco sighs as he kicks a stray bottle down the sidewalk. He had to get out of that hotel before he raised his hand to her again. Angel wasn't there to stop him, and Cherri was busy on her weekly video-chat with Heaven. He would be able to get away with it this time... and then Vaggi would stab him.
Why does he bother staying there? He never believed in redemption. His only reason for supporting that place was gone...
... But Cherri's words kept ringing in the back of Tyco's head. He'll be back.
... Tyco needs to be there when Angel comes back.
"...How could I be,
Oh, so naive?
Foolishly thinking there's more to this life for me?"
Tyco mumbles into his scarf in a singsong voice as his half-lidded eye takes in the empty street before him. Was it truly empty, or had he conjured an illusion? As soon as the thought enters his mind, it fades. It doesn't matter either way.
His mindless stroll stops as he turns his gaze to a shop window. Behind the veil of glass, he watches as a butterfly flutters into a spider's web.
"Two broken hearts,
Right from the start,
Watching the dreams that we have as they fall apart."
He presses his palm to the cold glass.
"This will... never work.
Even trying feels insane...
This will only... hurt,
Don't you feel the same?"
A loud cracking sound rings out-- almost as if in response to that sing-song question. Tyco's half-lidded eye opens wide as a painfully familiar voice follows the sound. He doesn't take the time to ask if he's so desperate to hear Angel's voice that he's hearing what he wants to hear. He doesn't take the time to think about anything at all. He simply darts across the street and into the alley where the voice came from.
The world is a blur. An angry, desperate blur. He lunges forward, grasping onto the wrist of the sinner who's toppling over Angel. As he shoves the man into a wall, his fingers flicker to life with a prism of lights. His torn wings flare out and flap, pushing him away from the other before he can strike back. Now, standing between the spider on the ground and the sinner against the wall, Tyco holds his hands out, channeling that rainbow of light into a red ray that, upon making contact with his love's attacker, sets the man on fire.
As the scent of burning flesh fills the air, Tyco glances down to his hands... and then takes aim again, this time with an orange ray of light that, upon making contact with the burning sinner, seems to transform into some kind of skin-melting acid. Then again, a yellow ray that seems to transform into a jolt of electricity when it makes contact.
As the nameless man's charred, half-melted body crumples to the ground, Tyco slowly lowers his hands. His eye remains fixated on the body, his own rigid and ready to fire again if what remains somehow manages to rise again.