The snow fluttered down, soundlessly and endlessly. The white snow falling from the sky was as beautiful as despair that filled both heart and soul, as tyranny, as the world itself rejecting everything and anything.
Rei lay on his back in his Juggernaut's exposed cockpit. The canopy blowing off had, at least, given him a view of the sky, as he looked up at the snow oozing out of the darkness of the night.
"…Shin."
When his younger brother was born when he was ten, Rei saw him as a gift, a precious little brother he'd awaited for so long. He would pamper him more than their parents did, which was why his brother would grow up to become something of a spoiled crybaby. Rei, who could do anything and knew everything, always kept him safe and cherished him more than anything. He was his little brother's hero.
When Rei was seventeen, the war broke out, and Rei, his parents, and his brother weren't considered human anymore. Their motherland turned its guns against them, herded them onto trucks, and then loaded them onto a freight train. And through it all, Rei's arms were always wrapped around Shin, who cried and clung to him the whole way there. He swore he would protect his brother, no matter what came their way.
The internment camp consisted of a small barracks and a production plant, surrounded by thick barbed wire fences and land mines. When they received a notice telling them they could have their civil rights restored in exchange for military service, Rei's father was the first to enlist. He smiled, saying he had to at least send them back home, and he left, never to return.
No sooner had the message that their father had died been delivered than their mother received a directive requesting her enlistment. The rights they should have gotten back hadn't been restored to them. The government's derisive excuse was that one person's service could restore only one person's rights, and from their mother's perspective, she had two children to protect. That was how their mother went to her death, and just as they received the notification of her death, Rei's enlistment directive arrived.
Rei stood still in his assigned room, his eyes darkening with the violent anger that tormented him. An enlistment directive. That horrible piece of sophistry—that one person's service could restore only one person's rights—had been proven false. Just how low would they sink? The government, the Alba… The very world.
Why didn't I—? I already had a vague idea this would happen, so why didn't I stop Mom back then…?!
"Brother…"
Shin.
Stay away. Just go somewhere; it doesn't matter where. I can't be bothered with you right now, not the way I am now.
"Brother… Where's Mommy? Isn't she coming back?"
I already told you. Don't make me say it again.
His brother's dim-wittedness irritated him to the core.
"Why…? Why did she…die?"
Rei felt as if something had snapped.
It was you.
It's because there were two of us.
Grabbing Shin by the neck and pushing him down on the floor, Rei wrapped his fingers around Shin's throat and squeezed with all his might, trying to strangle him.
Yes, break. Break, dammit! Let me rip his damn head off!
Spurred by wrath, he shouted, blaming Shin for everything.
That's right—Mom died because of Shin. If he wasn't here, if my stupid brother wasn't here, Mom wouldn't have died trying to make him a human again.
Battering him with condemnations one after another was pleasant. He hoped it was unbearable. How he wished the stupid boy wouldn't be able to take any more and would just die.
"What are you doing?! Rei!"
Someone grabbed him by the shoulder, tearing him away from Shin and sending him tumbling to the floor. Rei came to his senses.
What was I…doing…just now…?
All he could see was the back of the priest's cassock as he leaned over Shin and checked his condition. He placed his hands over Shin's mouth, touched his neck, and began resuscitating him, his pace weak from terror.
"…Rever—"
"Get out."
That growl set Rei's eyes darting about in bafflement. But Shin, he's not moving. Turning one silver eye to Rei, who was standing still, stupefied, the priest bellowed at him.
"Do you want him to die?! Get out!"
That shout of true, unadulterated fury sent Rei scurrying as if the sheer force of the shout had flung him from the room. Rei sank to the floor.
"Ah…"
The Alba had lost the war and oppressed the Eighty-Six, who oppressed other, weaker Eighty-Six. Rei always loathed that never-ending chain of oppression. The vulgarity of using someone weaker than yourself as an outlet for the pain and cruelty you endured… And he had done just that. He took his grief from the loss of his parents, his indignation toward the Republic, his frustration at the absurdity of this world, and most of all, his anger at and hatred of his own helplessness…and vented them all at someone much younger and weaker than himself: his younger brother.
The weight of that sin sent shivers through his body. He fell to his knees, grabbing his head.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!"
I… How could I…? But I was… I was supposed to protect him…!
Thankfully, Shin had resumed breathing shortly after. He'd come to, but Rei couldn't bear to see him. The priest had cautiously forbid the two from interacting, and Rei was afraid to face him. He accepted the directive, as if to run away.
When he left, the priest saw him off with Shin, but Rei still couldn't say a word. The idea of turning to look at his brother only to find a frightened expression he'd never seen before terrified him. He couldn't afford to die. He had to live at all costs and return home. That thought spurred him to cling to life even as companions died one after another around him.
However…
The onslaught of powder snow chilled him to his very bones. Rei realized, through the haze of blood loss clouding his mind, that the end had come. His eyes caught sight of the emblem emblazoned onto his Juggernaut's crushed armor. A skeletal, headless knight. It was an illustration from a picture book. A fairy tale's protagonist.
Rei had always thought it was creepy, but for some reason, it was Shin's favorite. But now he wasn't even sure if he could remember the book or having read it to Shin every night… Neither that nor any of his other precious memories.
Rei grimaced in agony. He should have said something the day he departed. He should have told Shin and made it clear it wasn't his fault.
That night, Rei had laid a curse on Shin and run away, leaving him carrying it. Those words, those accusations that his family's deaths were all his fault, would probably go on to torment Shin for years to come. The knowledge that he'd killed the family he loved would twist his heart to no end. His parents' deaths and Rei's violence had likely driven him to tears countless times. Was he even capable of smiling anymore?
"…Shin."
A gray shadow spread over his white field of vision. The Legion. They'd come after him. Out of the corner of his eye, he could make out that skeletal knight. The hero of justice who always came to the aid of the weak.
If only he could have stayed his brother's hero. He'd crushed that chance with his own two hands, and yet he wanted to see him again, to extend a hand to him…
That final moment would go on to define his form.