Work Text:
Wesley Cross huddled close to the bathroom's tub, knees bent close to his chest as he stared vacantly at the man submerged in its watery depths. His father's face was calm, restful, at peace in a way that made Wes's stomach twist, fingers clutching fiercely at the chipped porcelain edge. This wasn't fair.
This wasn't fucking fair.
His father – his father – was supposed to be dead. Was dead. Almost dead. The man that was supposed to be his father was supposed to be dead. Gone. Annihilated. By Cross. By this man. By his father. His real father.
Curling his fingers closer to the watery concoction, fingertips dipping beneath the hardening surface, Wesley trembled. Nothing in his fucked-up little nothing of a life could have prepared him for this moment. This fucking moment, where Wesley Gibson – no, Wesley Cross – sits trembling like a little boy next to his father's submerged body, waiting to see if the man lived or died.
Because of him. Because of Wesley. Because of his fucked up little vendetta against the man that had supposedly killed his father and was supposedly trying to kill him.
Another shudder, another tremble, and Wesley choked a laugh.
Pekwarsky had said only time would tell. That if his father wanted to live, he would, and if the man wanted to die, there was no stopping him. Bullheaded his father was, the man had murmured as he'd tucked a towel around Wesley's dripping shoulders. Bullheaded and determined to give his son a better life than the one he'd had: a faceless existence of an assassin.
'Your father wanted something more for you, Wesley,' the man had told him, softly. 'He wanted a different path for you, one that had things he could never have. A home, a family, peace; things that the Fraternity could never give you and he'd hoped, by protecting you, that you could find your own way.'
His own way. His own little fucked up little way, with his own little cubicle, and his own little cheating bitch of a girlfriend, and his own little bottle of pills that made the anxiety that burned through his veins fizzle until he was a fragile fucking shell of himself. His own way? His own way was a pile of steaming fucking horse shit.
Forehead pressing against the cool tub edge, Wesley's fingers twitched beneath the solidifying surface. The urge to submerge his hand, to touch healing flesh, to run his fingers over skin that was everything and nothing like his own, was nearly overwhelming but he fought down the impulse. The man had to heal, had to survive, and disturbing him before it was time would only make things worse.
"I'm sorry," Wesley whispered, voice quivering. "I'm sorry for what I've done but I can't change. Sloan – fucking Sloan – made me what I am and I can't, I won't..." Lifting his head, he stared at ��the waxy surface, the hard white build up that meant whoever was within was healing. "I won't change, even for you, because I'm going to kill them all."
With that promise, Wesley pulled his fingers from the watery film, wiping them haphazardly on his jeans before picking up his father's jacket, the leather buttery and soft, and sliding it over his bare chest.
He had work to do.