Archive of Our Own ^beta

Back when Backup had first come to Wammy’s house, he had been only the second to be brought in to the orphanage. At that time L was a child too but being several years older than Backup they never really interacted, especially since L remained in his own room most of the time either studying or investigating cases even at a young age.

L was a pre-teen, but he was already showing promise as an exceptional investigator and Wammy devoted most of his time to teaching him. He got whatever he wanted; even attending mainstream lessons for tennis and other sports when he became briefly interested in that competition. Even back then Backup had looked up to L, but he had seen him getting everything that Backup never had, and he had resented him for it.

He wasn’t called Backup then of course. The name that hovered above his head when he looked in the mirror was a name he wanted to be rid of as soon as possible; a name that followed him from the family who could not cope with his “challenging behaviours” before the courts labelled him as a “child out with parent control” and shipped him through the social work system until at last he was brought to the house by Wammy.

B, as he quickly began calling himself since L had a single-letter name too, saw emulating L as a quick and easy way to gain favour in Wammy’s house. Without other children around and with that goal in mind, his outbursts of aggression were less frequent and it became possible for B to begin to learn.

It was only when Wammy decided B was settled enough to deal with another child being brought in that he met A.

A, or as he was known then Ali, was brought to Wammy’s house from one of the other connected orphanages. He had also been stuck in the system for a year, and he had suffered the effects of some less charitable homes before Wammy had taken him in. He was small, for his age, and thin as a rake, his mixed race hiding the pallor of his skin but emphasising the bags around the eyes and not hiding the scar on his cheek from where he had been struck with a bottle by his mother, an act which had been the final straw that made social services take him away from her care. He was a quiet boy, happy to follow wherever B would lead, and never challenged him when he wanted to do something. Gradually B decided that he liked him.

B hadn’t liked anyone before.

Ali was different. When he first arrived, B had been unable to tolerate the way A would hang around him, never leaving him alone even when he yelled at him, even when he hit him. A was like a desperate lost dog, cowering when B hit him but the moment he calmed down he would come back seeking the presence of any human being, even if that was B. It happened again and again until B began to feel bad whenever he would strike A, and those blows began to be replaced by harsh words and eventually even those would fade away. Eventually, and B was not sure when the line was crossed, he began to consider A to be a friend.

A was a damaged child, abused by his mother before B and he dealt with this by backing down from any fight. Even when other children began to be brought in to Wammy’s house, A didn’t stand up for himself and so B became his protector, his champion. Behind closed doors B began to lose count of how many times he sat with A while he cried, how many times he found A curled up on the floor of his room with some form of blade and blood running down his thighs or his upper arms where the clothing would cover the cuts. He lost track of how many times he cleaned and bandaged those wounds, how many times he hid the sharp objects that A had found, how many times he vowed that this would be the last time.

The other children saw A as an easy target; they continued to bully him, and B continued to fight them away.

Before long, B realised that the best form of defence was to attack. He began to strike pre-emptively, began to get a reputation as the bully of Wammy’s house. Soon, no one would dare to hurt A, to cross B.

Still, A would cower away from anyone but B. Still, more weeks than not, B would find A upset and comforted by the spilling of his own blood, and he would hold him while he wept and wait for the shaking to stop.

B was afraid that one day A would cut too deep, and his careful bandages wouldn’t be able to help.

Back then, B had seen A’s numbers, seen that they were lower than the numbers of Wammy or any of the staff, but he didn’t really understand what that meant. No one understood when he talked about people’s names and numbers, the way they always counted down and never up, and he hadn’t yet worked out what that meant.

Once he did understand, once he knew what happened when the numbers reached zero, he began to calculate what the numbers meant.

It wasn’t as simple as counting minutes, hours, days, weeks and years. The numbers seemed to work on an entirely different clock to the ones on the wall, to the calendar he knew. If he hadn’t been so intelligent it would have taken weeks to work out the cipher that these numbers provided. As he was a genius, he had it figured within the week.

A was going to die when he was a teenager, and B had to stop it happening.

He would start by finding others with numbers that were counting down even more quickly and try to save them. If he could work out a way to change the day of death he would be able to save his friend.

Within a year there was a child in the orphanage with small numbers, and B began to observe him through the last weeks of his life as those numbers ticked away. There was nothing wrong with the boy, nothing to suggest that there would be a reason for him to die. B stayed close until the very last day of the boy’s life.

It was a freak accident; a car swerved to avoid colliding with a cyclist. It hit the curb, mounted it, and before B could do anything to stop it the other boy was beneath the vehicle.

It was the first time B had seen death, and he vomited his lunch onto the pavement.

He was glad that A hadn’t been with him, glad that A hadn’t seen the boy’s body being frantically pulled out from under the car by passers-by and heard the screaming from the crowd as they saw the mess where once a face had been. He reminded himself that he had known this child was going to die, steeled himself against the sight, and moved closer to learn what he could.

It didn’t help. There was nothing he could learn from this, except that death was just as cruel as life, and that he was powerless to stop it.

Still he would try, for A.

The next person he found with short numbers was a new member of staff. They were young, but they did not look well, and B managed to convince them to give him some of their blood, claiming he was doing an experiment for his studies.

He investigated the blood under the microscope, performed several tests, and concluded that the staff member was suffering from HIV. He told Wammy and the staff member, and they went to the hospital that same day to be tested.

He was right, but the numbers didn’t change even when the man had treatment. In the end the man died not of the HIV, but of suicide. B questioned whether the man would even have died if he hadn’t made him aware of the diagnosis.

He tried twice more to save people whose numbers were decreasing. Twice more he failed.

He became bitter, and perhaps a little crueller, the more A’s numbers ticked down. He used the other children from Wammy’s house as an outlet for his frustration, in particular the sheep.

Near, as he called himself now, had the fortune of having a very good friend in Mello, and Mello in him. Both of them were blessed with long numbers, and B resented them for it. He had always seen something alike to himself in the young Mello, and something of A in Near. Why should Near have a charmed life when A was going to die so soon? B decided he hated him.

The first time A ran away, B wasn’t worried. A still had numbers to spare, he would be back, and then B could convince him to never leave again. He wondered if that would change his numbers.

He knew it would not.

A ran away; again and again, every time ignoring B’s begging that he shouldn’t go, that it was dangerous, that he had all he needed at Wammy’s house.

B wasn’t enough for A. He wanted his family, he wanted somewhere he could call home, and that wasn’t Wammy’s house.

B tried to tell him, told him all about the numbers and that A’s were running out.

A didn’t care. In fact, after B told him, B caught him smiling more, eating more and laughing more. If anything, A seemed… happy, glad that his time was running out.

“It’s tomorrow,” B told A sadly after sneaking into his room that night. A was sat up in bed reading The Raven, his favourite book.

“I know,” A smiled at him. B wanted to punch that smile off his face, wanted to shake him and knock some sense into him.

But this was A, and he wouldn’t hurt him.

“It doesn’t have to be,” B pleaded, sitting on the end of A’s bed and taking his hand, his own pale skin a stark contrast against A’s bronze shade. “You can stay in the house, and I can look after you.”

“You’ve always looked after me,” A squeezed his hand. “Thank you for that, B.”

“I didn’t mind. You’re my friend,” B assured.

“And you’re mine,” A pulled him closer, hugging him. If it had been anyone else, B would have shoved them away, punched them, but not A. He held A close, tightly, as if afraid to let go.

“What’s the point of all this, if it just has to end?” B asked A, who laughed.

“I don’t know,” A shook his head. He itched at one of the most recent scabs on his thigh, breaking the top and the drop of blood hardly showing on his deep brown pyjamas, but he brought the finger to his lips and cleaned it of the stain. “I’ve never known.”

“We should do something,” B suggested. “Tonight, if it’s going to be the last.”

“Like what?”

“Something for you. Something you’ve always wanted to do, but been too scared,” B tried.

“That’s tomorrow,” A told him, and B bit his tongue to stop the protest that wanted to burst forth; pointless, now, and A would only kick him out of the room and he would lose this time with him if he argued.

“Please, A.”

“I suppose we could raid Roger’s liquor cabinet,” A considered. “I’ve never been drunk before.”

“There are lots of things you haven’t done before,” B pointed out, leaving unspoken that there would be lots of things he would never do if he would die the next day.

“Well, maybe we could do some of them then? I haven’t ever done this either,” A abruptly pulled B close and kissing him. B froze, stunned.

“Why would you…?”

A shrugged. “I’ve always wanted to do that. Sorry.”

“Ali…” B trailed off; what could he say? There were tears in his eyes that threatened to fall. He didn’t cry, he was the strong one, he hadn’t cried since he was a toddler. “Please, don’t leave me tomorrow. Stay, promise me you’ll stay, and I’ll kiss you again.”

“I can’t,” A hesitated before answering, but sounded resolute. “It’s my time, B.”

“I won’t let you go,” B warned as A leaned towards him again, lips inches from his own.

“You have to,” A reminded him. “You have to forget me, B.”

“Then you shouldn’t have kissed me,” B argued pointlessly. “Shall I tell you a secret?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve always wanted to kiss you, too,” B closed the gap between them. Unlike A, whose kiss was sweet, gentle, and close-mouthed, B was demanding, devouring, possessive and A responded in kind.

“Stay with me?” A asked B when they finally parted, lifting the covers back from the other side of the bed, an invitation. B hesitated.

“The liquor cabinet?”

“Alcohol makes you forget,” A reminded B. “If there’s any chance of a life after death, I want to remember tonight. I don’t want to forget this.”

“You’re cruel to me, A,” B got into the bed anyway, pulling the covers over them both and pulling A into an embrace.

“I’m sorry,” A rested his head on B’s chest. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be more than this, that I couldn’t be what you needed.”

“You’re all I need,” B reminded. “You just need to stay.”

“I’m all you have,” A argued. “But I’m not all you need, B.”

“I won’t sleep,” B promised. “I won’t let you go.”

“Yes, you will,” A sighed heavily. “Tomorrow, B, you have to. It’s my time.”

B fell silent, removing A’s glasses from his face and folding them, setting them carefully on the bedside table. He rarely saw A without them, the frame covering the scar on his cheek, hiding the bags under his eyes. Without them A looked even more fragile, and B was careful not to hold him too tightly, afraid that he might break or bruise.

“Goodnight, A,” B spoke softly, resolving to remain awake all night even though he hadn’t slept the previous four with fear of what was coming, and even though the warmth of A’s presence was lulling him to do so.

“Happy Birthday B,” A murmured softly. B stilled, surprised that A had remembered; he glanced at the clock. Five minutes past midnight, the thirteenth of April. B hadn’t celebrated his birthday since he had counted A’s lifespan, since he knew that his birthday was not a day to celebrate.