The Lucky One

[Niall Gallagher]

"God, I need a long, hot bath," Niall sighed. All he wanted to do was sink into the tub back home and just sink into the heat, letting it envelope him. Actually, he would like to just sit on the couch and cling onto Ken until he fell asleep but he didn't know where they stood anymore. Friends? Were they even that anymore? Niall had been through a full-on rollercoaster of emotions regarding Ken since the moment he realized who he was looking at.

Niall let himself be walked out of the brewhouse, feeling weirdly as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. That was what happened after an ugly cry. All the negativity escaped and all that was left was exhaustion. God. He was so emotionally exhausted. He didn't think he could handle one more swing of the mood right now.

"I just told you, dummy," Niall said patiently. "Off Center." He pulled Ken in the opposite direction and pointed ahead, as if they could sight the apartments from where they stood. They were down the hill aways, though. They wouldn't see them until they headed further down the street. Lucky for Niall--who would have been a liability behind a wheel and didn't want to waste money on transportation--it was within walking distance.

"Cyprus Oaks," he said again slowly. "3-B."

As they walked--or rather, as Ken walked and Niall stumbled drunkenly in a weaving pattern, he tilted his head back and looked at Ken for a long moment.

"Carry me? I can ride on your back! Like old times."

[Kenneth Branagh]

"I thought you were making a comment on the current state of affairs," Ken said as he gave Niall a Look--a Look that said that off-center was exactly what Niall was right now. But he said it with a soft smile, a teasing little smile, and his tone was not unkind. It was like being back in their teenage years again, the irreverence and the jokes and that little glimpse of an impish side that Niall was subjected to.

But, duly noted, he turned around on his heels and strode confidently off in the opposite direction. Hazleton was only so big, anyway; they would eventually have circled around to Niall's hovel (his words, not Ken's). As they walked, Ken was painfully aware of a pair of red-rimmed eyes on him but he tried his best not to appear self-conscious about it.

A lot of time had passed. A full decade, nearly. They had grown up, and grown apart in many ways. Niall's transformation was wildly drastic and Ken wasn't the same young man he used to be, either. Niall was still drunk, staggering into him at times and away from him at others, and Ken's mind was reeling at everything that he had been confronted with. He needed time to process everything and he couldn't do that while Niall was staring at him.

"No." Ken did look, but he Looked. "You're too old, too tall and too heavy for that." Anyway, 'like old times' was fine when they were teenagers and horsing around (and Ken did his fair share of riding on backs too) but as grown men, it wasn't quite as acceptable. If Niall had broken a leg, Ken would have acquiesced. As he had not, however, no ride was necessary. The gentle pull or push of Ken's hand in his was more than enough to guide him along the street when he wobbled.

[Niall Gallagher]

"HA-HA. Off center, is that what you mean?" he said, inadvertently reading Ken's mind. "I've been off center since the day I was born. 'Boy was born looking like a Gallagher but not acting like a Gallagher!' Come ON, dad. Five kids, you know one's going to be all ~off-kilter~, right?"

It wasn't like his father tried to help him rebalance himself, either. He saw he was off center but his methods to push him into the center only pushed Niall further away from it. Maybe he just didn't know how to take care of a kid like Niall. Niall didn't even know how to take care of Niall, to be fair.

"Allllso," he said indignantly. "I take offense to that. I am not old and heavy, thank you very much."

He patted his stomach, which was at least lean and smooth and not some disgusting potbelly. Part of that was because he skipped meals. Not on purpose, it was just that damned racing mind of his. He just... forgot to eat sometimes. Although he'd been turned down--and he pouted at the rejection for a few seconds--he bounced back with a serene smile as he looked up at the sky and the new moon. The action was a dumb one; he stumbled briefly against Ken before wobbling his way back to his weaving pattern.

"I could be an alien," he said earnestly and in the moment, he really believed it. Because there was something he had been hiding for a while, for a long time. A long, long time. The... the rabbit thing. When he arrived in Hazleton, he thought maybe he was a shifter but there was something very, very different about himself and shifters. The rabbit form was... magic. It could float. Like a space rabbit. It wasn't a real earth rabbit. It was something else.

"I wish I was," he said wistfully, stumbling on a bit of stuck up concrete. They were over the hill now and the apartments were within sight. Niall stepped closer to Ken for some reason, like he was a shield. "That's mine," he said, pointing out an apartment that was currently darkened but the curtains were pulled open to reveal shadows of the room within. Then he pointed to the one next to his--3-C. "And that's Jordan. He's a prystal dealer. And I think he just knocked up his girlfriend so he's been upping his prices, so he says but he's probably lying."

Pointing to the one on the other side, he added, "And that's JC in 3-A. She's mean so just ignore if she says anything to you. Especially about vampires."

[Kenneth Branagh]

Niall wasn't old (older than Ken, though), nor was he heavy, but he was tall and he was fishing for pity, and Ken saw right through his attempts. Ken pulled him back when he veered dangerously away, looking up to see what Niall was seeing. The star-strewn sky. A round, pale moon. Maybe a bit of a cloud now and then, scuttling by on a breeze.

"You could be," he agreed--some of Niall's flights of fancies didn't belong on Earth. Not in a bad way, though. His mind just worked on a different plane than most people's. It was a sharp mind when Ken last knew him, and an intelligent one. But also a silly one. It was a mind that he didn't think he could ever fully comprehend and... perhaps that was all for the best. A bit of mystery kept things fresh, as they say.

He looked to the apartment building looming up before them and dutifully noted each window. Niall's neighbors sounded about right for the sort of housing that he was looking at. Low-income, cheap flats for junkies and the mentally imbalanced and poor single mothers and fathers struggling to make ends meet. It saddened him to see Niall mingling with these people, when he had come from such a revered family back home. The fall from grace seemed to have been a long, hard one.

"Now why would she tell me, a stranger, about vampires?" He lifted his brows at Niall. At the clear puncture marks on his throat, exposed now that the shirt covering it had been shrugged off--and was still in Ken's hand. Ken took in several deep breaths. Now wasn't the time to discuss that. He had a long list--and counting--of things to talk about with Niall. Drugs. Alcohol. Vampires. Hunting. Painting himself up like a raccoon. Even despite how much Niall had changed, Ken just... didn't think this was him. Not really. Not the version of himself that he wanted to be back when he was younger.

"Come on," he said as he tugged Niall down the hill and towards the apartment building. 3-B, Niall had said. The elevator was clunky, creaky and smelled like death and worse. Ken didn't let go of his hand the entire ride up, until he reached a door with peeling paint and a rusted handle. He had to fight with the key to open the lock, and as the door swung open, he gently nudged Niall inside.

"A bath, then straight to bed. We'll talk in the morning." When Niall was sober.

[Niall Gallagher]

Oh yes, how the mighty had fallen. From a beautifully manicured garden and tall, intricate gates, and a manor with enough rooms for a bevy of boys to... this. A crumbling, low income housing structure made from an old department store. Ken probably thought it was disgusting. Niall was so far beneath him by now that it killed him a little inside.

"Because," Niall said in a tone of surprise, as if Ken ought to know. "She is one."

It was nice, being nestled between a prystal dealer and a vampire dealer. Actually, being there was how Niall sunk so low in the first place. First came the low income housing because what else could he afford on his nothing salary? And then came the temptations. Try this, buy this, have this. Oh, they love you, come back for more. Niall wanted to be loved and he wanted to be happy. Those things filled the voids inside, they quieted the vicious voice inside that told him how worthless, unloveable, and pathetic he really was.

And he was superman. On top of the world.

Niall was too drunk to notice the look cast toward his throat so he just looked up ahead and half trotted toward home. If it weren't for Ken's steady hand, he probably would have eaten concrete a few times.

"Talk about what?" Niall asked, fumbling for the light switch. Ah! And let there be light! The dim lighting revealed the main room of his place, which was less than impressive. There was the couch bed, always in bed form because Niall grew tired of popping it in and out each night. The sheets were rumpled and there were about six different blankets piled on top along with the same number of pillows. The coffee table was pushed under the window and covered in various paraphernalia of the illegal kind. Condoms still in their packaging littered the top of the television, which was one of those great big fat ones that weighed a hundred pounds.

There was no stove--Niall didn't cook. But there was a mini fridge and a microwave in one corner. There was no dresser, either--just a half open closet with clothes spilling out of it.

"The hovel, sir." Niall bowed for Ken and barely made it back up. As he let go of Ken and headed for the bathroom, he added, "Don't worry, the bedding's clean. If you're hungry, there's leftovers in the fridge." He paused at the bathroom door, though, kicking off his sneakers and resting his cheek against the door.

"Are you... staying?" Or was he going to come out of the bath to find himself alone again?

[Kenneth Branagh]

"We'll talk about the things that need talking about," was the evasive answer, as Ken stooped to pick up a few things and relegated them to the overflowing bin. He took a good look around, but he already saw enough to confirm what he already knew. Drugs, alcohol, trace evidence of the supernatural—all of the things that, as young children, they were warned against. Niall had become everything that his family stood for and against.

The place was livable, though. He noted a convenience store at the corner, and another one selling some basic household items. One or two trips ought to do it, he thought as he set his bag down on top of the couch bed. Then he looked up at Niall, with his cheek on the bathroom door, and his meaningful pause before he finished asking the question.

Ken walked over to him and gently took his arm. "Go on," he said softly, urging Niall inside. "Be careful with the cast. Don't get it wet," were his parting words, before he closed the door.

Ken waited until he heard water running, and then walked slowly over to the table by the window. He looked sadly down at all of the things cluttering it, the needles, the smears of some unidentifiable powder, the empty liquor bottles. Gingerly he picked up some of the bottles and transported them to the trash can. With light hands, but a heavy heart, he set about clearing the table and put everything that was on it into one large bag to be disposed of later. Then he pushed the clothes back into the closet, hung up the one he had brought back from the brewhouse, and made the bed. Mounded the pillows—three each—and straightened the sheets.

A cursory glance into the mini-fridge revealed microwave meals and some takeout boxes. He wasn't hungry and he doubted that Niall would want to eat, either; the hour was far too late for a full meal. Ken cleared the mini-fridge as best as he could, and then went to the bed to unpack his bag.

Weapons came out first, then the detectors that he relied on to warn him of impending danger. His gaze slid to one of the walls. 3A. Vampire. 3C. Drug dealer. The building was likely infested with the supernatural and they wouldn't take kindly to a hunter in their midst. More importantly, they might decide to target Niall, who was vulnerable and unable to defend himself. Ken's eyes narrowed into a dangerous, determined look. 3A. He'd have to keep an eye on her.

He slid his trusted blade under one of the mounded pillows and then sat down to wait for Niall to come out of the bathroom.

[Niall Gallagher]

He couldn't tell if that was a yes or no. Ken didn't say, just urged him into the bathroom, closing the door behind Niall like he thought Niall was going to keep it open. (Well... he would have. Modesty wasn't a part of his vocabulary these days.) Niall stared at the closed door and the robe that hung on the hook screwed into the back of it. Ken's intentions were nebulous; he just sort of appeared and Niall was trying to decide if he was doing it out of duty or desire. Not like... sexy desire. But because he wanted to.

Turning to look at himself in the mirror, he let out a huge, soul-wrenching sigh. Well, he looked like absolute shit. Crying and makeup were a disgusting combination. He looked away from himself, hardly able to stand the sight of the man in the mirror, and he slowly walked over to the tub and switched the water on. Sitting on the edge of the tub, he stared into the rising water with blank eyes.

"How are you so good at it?" Niall asked, with his usual jaunty step as they cut a path through the greenery toward their favorite lake. Ken was good at being a hunter, like the others. He could have been a Gallagher, actually, if it weren't for the light coloring. They could switch places, him and Niall. Niall's dad liked Ken because he was one of the good ones and obedient on the field.

Niall didn't wait for an answer, though, because he was too busy running ahead of Ken with an impish grin. Even as he ran off, he was shedding clothes. Back then he dressed like a person, tank tops, jeans. He stumbled on the leg of his trousers but didn't trip. Niall was at least somewhat graceful and athletic from training, even if he wasn't much good at the actual hunting part.

He leaped straight into the water in his underwear, curls flying, voice echoing across the lake as he shouted wordlessly. The water was cold as he sank into it and the whole world slowed down as he plummeted toward the bottom of the lake. Niall always thought being underwater was the same as being in a dream. Floaty. Quiet. Serene. He swam back up to the surface and gasped as his head broke the surface.

"IT'S FECKIN' FREEZIN'!"

Niall made sure the water was as hot as he could get it before he threw his clothes off and slid into the bath. Another long-suffering sigh as he sank in, closing his eyes. He kept going until his face was under the water. God, it was scalding. He grasped the sides of the tub and he stayed under until bubbles issued forth, until his lungs burned. When he came up for air, he was gasping and he threw his head back. A swear softly passed his lips and he splashed his face with the water, scrubbing at his eyes.

His mind was still fuzzy and drunk, comforted by pills and alcohol but he was feeling a little more sober than he would have liked. He eyed the medicine cabinet.

Forty minutes later, Niall emerged from the bathroom, absently tying up the front of his robe. Normally, he would have tripped over the sneakers he left by the door but they were no longer there. Niall expected to face an empty apartment but Ken was sitting on the couch bed, which looked all... neat and tidy now.

"Didn't think you'd still be here," Niall admitted as he plopped onto the mattress in exhaustion. He yawned, then dropped down onto his side and watched Ken. "So... what do you want? ...did you change your mind?"

[Kenneth Branagh]

Ken stirred once the bathroom door opened and he lifted his head to see Niall. Not the painted creature with dark eyes and a fake smile-- his Niall. Even though time had passed, he saw the youth in him now and unconsciously, he smiled.

The bed jostled as Niall threw himself onto it and Ken, after a moment, turned to look at him. He remembered this face. Those curls. Niall's face was a little younger in his memories, with fewer lines, but he felt as if now, he saw Niall for the first time. He barely recognized the man in the diner earlier.

Ken remembered the way he used to laugh, as if his whole being went into it...

"No NO that's NOT how you DO it!"

Niall had a strange way of emphasizing words. Ken frowned at him, puzzled, frustrated by his lack of skill with the crossbow. He knew that good hunters had to be familiar with all manner of weaponry and he wanted to be good at this, too.

Lifting the heavy instrument, he took careful aim. A tin can on top of a wooden fence provided the target. He breathed in, held it, closed one eye...

THWUMP!

It hit the wooden fence instead and in a rare burst of anger, Ken kicked out at a dandelion, beheading it and sending the bright yellow bloom flying. He looked up, scowling, to see Niall laughing at him.

"'S not funny!!"

He remembered when Niall cried...

"I didn't kill him Ken!"

Niall was curled up on the mounded earth, as though he wanted to be there with Lorcan. As if he could no longer bear the agony and the pain. If he could have taken Lorcan's place, he might have tried.

Slowly, Ken bent and gathered him up from the green, green grass and the damp, fertile earth. He wrapped his arms around Niall's shaking body, his own grief beyond words or tears, and held him tightly.

"I know."

"I don't know." He reached out to touch the cast lightly, running his fingertips along the length of it. Past it. To warm skin.

"What do you want?"

[Niall Gallagher]

"I don't know."

He didn't know. Ken didn't know. Niall didn't know. What were they doing? Niall wasn't sure if he should be slinging a leg over Ken and pulling him in for some romantic tryst--was that what he wanted with Niall? Or if he ought to be pushing him out the door to tell Jem that spying on Niall was pointless. All he had to do was ask for information; Niall wasn't hiding the fact that he lived in a den of supernatural entities. He even pointed them out to Ken on the way to the apartments, one was a witch, one was a vampire. Of course, he was drunk, so those types of things would slip out.

Niall stood on uneven ground with this Ken. There was something familiar about their interactions, glimmers of their past selves. At the same time, there was nearly a decade between them where things happened without the other's knowledge. Nearly a decade worth of secrets and stories that should have been shared between best friends that had flittered away with whatever took hold of their new lives. What did Ken do in all that time? Hunt, probably.

What did Niall do? Niall ran. Niall discovered the beauty of oblivion. Everything was a blur. There was the depths of depression, then there was the stealing to get by. There was the small town full of black sheep, the apartments where JC approached him for the first time and introduced him to her friends. He knew his throat was openly visible now. Ken knew; he had to--he was too smart not to. He was a hunter and he knew exactly what to look for. Niall was his lead to the rest of them, to vampires.

He looked down at the hand on his arm. This seemed to him like the prelude to something sexual. Coming from anybody else, he was certain that was what it meant. Ken, though... Did he become more open sexually in that missing decade? Because he never used to be the super sexual kind, not like Niall. He couldn't just do it any time, any place the way Niall could.

Only way to find out was to go for it. Niall reached out for Ken's shirt to pull him in closer.

"Ken, Ken, Ken," he sang as he straddled his hips. They were already half clothed, having ended up that way during a rough and tumble impromptu wrestling match after Ken called him some dumb name like Wooly or some shit. It was always dumb shit. They'd passed a paddock full of sheep and it just seemed to go from there.

"You should have been paying attention."

Ken was supposed to be the superior hunter. But now Niall was on top and it felt pretty good. He lowered his head, lips meeting Ken's with a smile. His voice went low, husky. "Now I've got you right... where... I want you..."

His nose brushed Ken's. His eyes closed. He breathed in the past. Oblivion wasn't the only thing Niall met after he ran away from his past. He met violence. Abuse. Use. Niall was an easy target; he wanted and needed and they supplied. His lips touched Ken's lips, light as butterfly wings. Nothing like the kind of kisses he used to exchange with Ken whenever he got half a chance.

"Is this going to hurt?" Niall asked nervously as he followed JC into her weird... dungeon. Seriously, what else could he call it? It was actually some underground... thing at the back of Hazleton Cemetery. What did they call these things again? Mausoleums? But it went down, stone steps that seemed to go on forever and then a long stone hallway that also seemed to go on forever. Niall was pretty sure he'd just signed himself up for some death cult torture. They were going to lure him underground and he would never be seen again.

Isn't that what he wanted, though?

Not if it hurts!

Shit, he was getting wrapped in something bigger than himself again, wasn't he? He pulled his coat closer to his body. It was freaking cold down here.

"No, no," JC said with a laugh as she looked back at him with her cat shaped eyes. "It's going to feel so good you're never going to want to leave."

Niall abruptly pulled away from Ken, letting go of his shirt and grabbing onto the front of his own robe instead.

"I don't know!" he said, immediately dragging blankets on top of himself so he could nest himself. "I want nothing! I want nothing. No, no, that's not true. I want everything that I can't have. I want my brother back. I want my parents to love me. I want to be good at something and to be needed but I'm not, I'm not!" He dragged in a breath and laid back down, covered in a blanket shield.

"I'm not. I'm not necessary. I'm like... like that stupid organ that exists just to burst. The... damn appendix. Some leftover relic. I'm a wisdom tooth, Ken! You got rid of me. You should have left it that way."

[Kenneth Branagh]

Neither of them knew. Their relationship--such as it was--existed in a nebulous place. A lot of time had passed but nothing had been resolved between them. They didn't leave on good terms. Niall ran and Ken ran and now they were together again but the tenuous relationship that they once had no longer existed.

He lowered his gaze to Niall's wrist, to the way his hand extended, grasped at the front of his shirt. He leaned in but... it didn't feel right. It didn't feel like something he should be doing. Not right now.

Not like this.

But some part of him still wanted it. Him. Niall. With his bright eyes and bright smile and everything that used to remind Ken of sunshine--blinding, intense, joyful and warm. The kind of warmth that soaked right on through him, past the skin and the flesh, down to the very marrows of his bones.

"Niall... don't..."

He didn't know if he said the words aloud or if they only existed in the throbbing of his heart as their lips touched. Ken lifted a hand to Niall's chest, to push him away, but Niall veered off himself and suddenly that warmth was gone. Niall was gone, covered in blankets, a torrent of self-loathing pouring from his lips.

Again, Ken reached for him. For his hand, to twine their fingers together. To hold on tightly, where once he let go and pushed away.

"...that was a mistake." Letting him go, forcing him out of his life, was a mistake and he had waited ten years to say it. But somehow, the words still felt trite and Ken closed his eyes to alleviate the sting behind them.

[Niall Gallagher]

Niall shook his head vigorously.

"No. It wasn't."

But his needy, clingy little self still held onto the hand that held his. Why couldn't that decade just disappear? Why couldn't they just be back then, before everything crumbled apart? If they'd never been caught, Niall would have... he didn't know. He was still strange and marched to the beat of his own drum but he would have been with family and Ken. Maybe the whole family didn't care about him but he liked to think at least Daniel would have looked for him. It hurt too much to think nobody came after him when he left.

Because of course, like a defiant five year old, he had hoped somebody would miss him enough to come looking for him. Niall didn't exactly leave like a good little hunter. He left so many trails behind that it was a miracle that he hadn't been tracked down before this.

He understood though. The wisdom tooth had been removed, the appendix was gone and the Gallaghers could finally be the solid force they always should have been. And Ken... Ken could be normal instead of being dragged down into Niall's odd little world.

"I was only dragging you down," he said quietly, looking down at their hands. They could have been partners, if Niall only kept hunting. They were partners on several missions. Sometimes just them, sometimes with others. Niall might have hated killing but he was at least good at running and climbing. He was a biter, too. Get a hold of him and he'd bite so hard that he might as well have been a werewolf himself. He knew how to kick, elbow, headbutt. He had been taught and trained just like the others.

He just...

He didn't like it. He didn't like the violence. He didn't want to fight. Killing anything made him sick, that was something he never developed a taste for. Plus, there was the unvoiced fear that he held so close to chest ever since Lorcan died. He looked back up at Ken. Just looked at him for a long moment.

"I would've just got you killed, too."

[Kenneth Branagh]

Didn't Niall want the apology? The admission that throwing him under the bus was the greatest mistake of Ken's life? Didn't he want the contrition and for Ken to realize fully his own hand in driving Niall away?

Or were they past all of that? Was it enough to hold his hand and curl their fingers together and be without judgment? Ken sighed, a heavy and bone-weary sigh. After a moment, he laid down on his side, facing Niall.

"No, you wouldn't have." Ken's voice was firm and sure. He squeezed Niall's hand tightly as though he could bring home his point that way. Through contact--something snatched in fits and starts, in fear and in secret.

"Not everything has to be your fault." He shifted closer, until a knee bumped a knee, and he remembered the little old thrill he used to get when their legs touched in church, on Sundays.

[Niall Gallagher]

Saying it aloud made it so real that he felt his eyes water. He... would have gotten Ken killed. Sooner or later. Even if they were never found out and they were partners and they hunted together, something invariably would have happened and Niall would mess up and Ken would be just like Lorcan. Limp and glass-eyed. The night terrors were filled with the thousands of way Ken would have been killed if they were still together in any capacity. And they didn't spare him from Lorcan's death, either. Because if it hadn't happened that night, it would have been another. Niall was a tick-tick-ticking time bomb, mistake upon mistake until the big and inevitable ka-BOOM!

Part of him relaxed, though. He blinked away that awful burning behind his eyes as he watched Ken lie down beside him. No matter the fears or the words that came out, Niall didn't really want Ken to go anywhere. His presence represented a stability that had been absent for the better part of his life out here. And he felt warm, protected by the blanket fort and the hand that held on tight like it promised never to leave again.

Ken said no. He wouldn't get him killed. His surety quelled Niall's fears, at least in the moment. His lips slowly formed into a smile, mostly hidden by blankets but his eyes might have given him away.

"I know," he said, somewhat exasperated as he fussed with the blankets to bring Ken under them, too. If he'd been on ecstasy or prystal, he would have been horny and he probably would have tried a little something-something with Ken down under. But he wasn't; the alcohol and the pills together just made him feel sleepy, coated in comfort, dreamy.

He didn't know how to make Ken understand how deeply that fear ran but at least for the moment, it was quieted.

"...remember that fart bomb I set up for Junior? But Jem broke it instead? I swear, he went blue in the face, yelling to everyone that there was a ghoul in the vicinity. 'Get Paddy,' he said, 'we're gonna take this stinker out.' All serious and his face when I accused him of just farting and blaming it on ghouls." Niall laughed, just remembering that Look. "Oh my god, he was so mad at me." He tilted his head in thought. "Come to think of it, don't think he ever did realize it was just a fart bomb."

[Kenneth Branagh]

"Right," Ken replied as blankets flew over him, enveloping him too. His tone implied skepticism, though. Same type of tone he'd take when Niall pointed behind him and yelled that there was a GHOSTIE behind him! But when Ken invariably turned, he'd be jumped onto and half-strangled with affection.

Well, there was no point arguing with a drunk man, was there? He was glad that Niall was returning to normal (somewhat). There had been a tentative smile earlier; he saw the way Niall's eyes crinkled. Ken smiled too, and slipped his other hand over their held hands.

"Jem... hasn't grown up much since I last saw him." He remembered Jem being more or less a bully. He was skilled, though, and he had enjoyed killing. It seemed to fill him with a sense of purpose--or he found one in it.

"I hope you're not planning to do that to him again," Ken said with a slight laugh, imaging a grown-up Jem insisting that a fart bomb was a supernatural and forcing all of his men to hunt for it. The more he imagined it, the funnier it seemed to get, and finally he burst out laughing.

[Niall Gallagher]

"You're telling me," Niall complained, remembering the crack of his wrist and then the derisive comments thrown at him. Jem was still a big bully only now he was taller and had more muscle. Also, it sounded like maybe Ken hadn't seen Jem much until recently, either, which made Niall feel better. At least they weren't best friends, the way Niall assumed earlier.

"What? Tricking him with a fart bomb?" Niall asked with an irrepressible laugh. Adult Jem versus the fart bomb would be HILARIOUS, he had to admit. Innocently, he said, "No. Never. Why would I do that? I'm an adult, remember?"

But it was hard to keep a nice, straight face with Ken laughing the way he used to as a kid. Niall laughed, too. It was hard not to, not just because of the image but because Ken's laughter was so sorely missed that something in him immediately reacted to it. Some days, it was hard to make Ken laugh, when he was having a bad day with the family and things were stressing him out. But usually Niall could find it--some way to make his best friend crack a grin. Laugh.

Niall laughed so hard that he couldn't breathe, kicking Ken under the blankets for starting the whole thing. (Except he didn't--that was all Niall, wasn't it?)

"Would they really hunt for it?" Niall gasped through bursts of laughter. "I want to see them do it. Hunt for a fart bomb."