"It isn't the same! You and I both know we're lost without him! He was the face, the, the hope." Knucks bellows into the scarce meeting room. It hadn't been this empty since they'd fashioned it from loose metal and dreams.
Rebel levels a sympathetic stare at him, and he balls his fists in response.
"He would have wanted you to keep going at it, and I think you know that." The bats voice is soft, comforting.
"It was in his will and everything. Come on..."
He shakes his head, tugging the fabric of his beanie over his eyes so he can drown in the darkness of it all. Rage he doesn't know how to manifest into anything useful bubbles under his skin, and he can only focus on the sounds of Rebels heals clicking closer under the blanket of his denial.
A hand rests on his shoulder, and he doesn't have the energy to shake it off.
"I keep expecting to see him, waltzing through the doors like it was all some big joke." His voice rasps, and he swallows back the pain with gritted teeth.
"An insensitive joke," Rebel adds on, a sigh on her lips.
Knucks laughs, choked and shameful and so, so raw.
"Yeah. And I'd bite his head of for scaring me, send him to the med bay myself."
Rebel laughs back, gentle and measured.
Knucks grunts, sliding a glare from beneath his hat.
'If he's not dead, I'll kill him myself'
[Animatic scheduled release: 16th September]