baby brother
Of course there was the concern about him. Time had seen it coming, but admittedly had no idea what to do about it. There wasn’t a lot that could convince his brother, other than sheer necessity. Even then, there tended to be protest.
“But this is partly my fault,” Time said. “Maybe something could have been done about this sooner if I had said something. I shouldn’t leave you to pick up the result of my mistakes.”
Time wasn’t sure if that would work, but he was going to try, at least.
“It ‘ain’t so much your mistake as it is my failing, Time. I’m the one who’s supposed to take responsibility for you, makin’ sure you’re okay– and it took me this long to find out something was seriously up with you, nevermind to do something about it.”
Oil hated to think about it, but… Time had even said so himself. You’re my problem. Still, he didn’t want to bring that up now. He wasn’t about to guilt trip him for being a little indirect with what was wrong. Oil sighed and knelt down, bending his knees without sitting on them.
“Real talk: I don’t want you to come with me. Mostly ‘cause I don’t want you to put yourself in danger, but also because I’m scared of what it’d mean if you did get hurt. It’d mean I screwed up protecting you. So if you’re serious about coming with me, I’m going to be as annoying as possible about keeping you safe.” Oil’s lip quirked. “You realize that, right?”
What? Oil's failing? Oil never failed him at all! Time wasn't sure how to address that, as he didn't know where that line of thinking came from. Maybe it was just the fact that he was the older of the two of them?
Time figured that Oil didn't want him to come. In fact, Time didn't want to go. Being nearly killed recently made him more afraid of it happening again, and now that he didn't feel like he had to put up a tough facade, his fear felt more difficult to overcome. He didn't know if Oil could see that, but he hoped not.
There was a new factor to consider now that he wouldn't have bothered to consider before: how Oil felt about this. Oil could be as annoying as he wanted, but that was irrelevant to Time's concern. Was it really worth straining him emotionally, given he recently saw his little brother nearly die? Was the physical danger so great that it overrode any feeling about the matter?
Time looked down and sighed. At the end of it all, he still didn’t want to leave his brother alone to clean up his mistakes, the results of his silence, when this could have been cleaned up much sooner if he had said something to someone, to anyone. This was his error, and he couldn’t leave Oil alone to clean it up if he could do something about it.
"... I know,” Time said reluctantly, looking up at his brother again. “And it’ll be your right to be as annoying as possible about this, because I’m coming with you anyway.”










