When you meet the team, it's far from what you'd expected. You need to keep distant, objective - but when you first see Neil, something balls up in the pit of your stomach. Some part of you can't look away; can't finish your own sentences. You push it away. You've learned your lesson on why some secrets need keeping.

The first month at Camp X is awful. You've never really belonged but this is worse, this is being with the same people every day, growing closer to them, knowing that it'll all be gone soon enough. You do your best to keep your distance, but there's something about them that draws you in. Aurora's calm persistence, Rene's unwavering confidence, Harry's boyish humor, and Neil's quiet strength - they seep their way under your skin, and you find yourself thinking that this is what you've always wanted.

The first time you all fight is after a particularly hard week of training. Matthieu, one of the soldiers who had occasionally joined you for drinks after a rough day, was found hanging in his bunk. No one knows why, just that his fist was curled around a note saying I'm sorry. He'd just gotten back from France. You don't know what he saw that made him do it.

You don't really know what happens, except that Neil is talking about him and you're thinking about how much you envy the dead soldier (you won't have a legacy like that when you're gone, no one is going to miss you), and you can't stop thinking about endings, and you mention something about how everyone should stop mourning, it's going to happen to you all eventually - and the next thing you know you and Neil are shouting, screaming things you don't mean, and suddenly you can't think about anything except how close you are, how easy it would be just to reach your hands into his hair and -

You storm out. Out of the camp, past the gate (you found an unknown exit ages ago), into the dense forest. You're surrounded by the silence and the muted bird cries and your hands are shaking and God, God you should not have gotten into this.

You don't go back until night falls, until the destruction has poisoned your veins and your heart and your eyes and you know what you have to do. (you don't want to. you've never wanted to. you're sorry you're sorry you're sorry)

Neil meets you at the door, fury in his voice and worry in his eyes. You think he's going to hit you, but instead he pulls you into an embrace. "With the way you were talking, we thought you -" he breaks off. "Don't do that again."

You don't answer. You've always been one for promises you won't keep, but this is different. (you're sorry. you're sorry. you will always be sorry.)

After that, you've accepted what needs to happen. So you pull away from everyone; ignore their concerned looks and gestures. You don't think about Harry's hurt look when you told him sorry, you're just not interested in making friends here; or about Neil's half-desperate, half-angry expression when you lash out at him for nothing at all. Aurora and Rene, at least, have each other - and they've never been much for giving into their emotions. You get the feeling that they're hurt, regardless.

You settle back into a rhythm of keeping your distance, focusing on the mission, clutching onto some last desperate attempt at sanity. But when Rene jumps, it's the first in a catalyst of events that will spin everything into a tornado; will suck you into the very pit of hell; will take away everything you hold dear. You know this. You know this. It will never change.

When Alfred joins the team, you send your first message. You hate yourself as it leaves your mouth, climbing its way up like a snake; slimy and filthy and repulsive. I'm so sorry, you think on your way home, I'm so sorry.

And then - radio silence. Nothing. You convince yourself that maybe, maybe you're finished. Maybe you've outlived your usefulness.

Months later, you receive a single message. Agent Kittyhawk engaged. Backup if necessary.

You've met the agent once before - when Harry was bleeding out on a kitchen table, when you were supposed to be gathering intel but you were really just thinking this should have been me.

You know what's going to happen; so you prepare your destruction. You pick a fight with Neil (he thinks he's the one picking it; he doesn't know you have a body count longer than he could ever imagine), carefully selecting the words you know will hit the hardest. It's better this way, you think, but that doesn't stop the vomit from rising in your throat once you're away.

"Forget honor," you spit, when you have the gun slick in your hand and a pounding in your ears, "forget decency," and Camp X didn't teach you this - this is from before, from when you were shackled to a chair as they made you watch your family tortured, from when you sold your soul to the devil.

You don't know how you make it through the next few hours. You keep the gun close to your side, and there's more than a few times you have the desperate urge to put the barrel to your head and pull the trigger. But then, they'd be dead. They'd all be dead. And it would all be for nothing.

When the police start shooting at Neil, you take them out. One by one. Dead. Dead. Dead. You hear Neil shouting, but you turn and run. You're sorry. You're sorry. You'll always be sorry.

When you reach the warehouse, Kittyhawk is gone. They suspected it. This is why they sent you.

You take on Aurora first - she isn't ready for the hilt of the gun when it connects with her forehead, and she falls to the ground before she can utter a sound. (Not before you see the shock and hate reflected in her eyes, though. You know. You deserve it.)

You step into the warehouse, round the corner. There he is - caught in a hailstorm of gunfire, tucked behind a barrel of hay. You wait until they notice you, until the gunfire stops. You step towards the man who should never have trusted you, and you swallow the desperation.

"Tom? What are you doing here?" Alfred looks up at you with an expression of complete, blind ignorance. Your hands are steady. You raise the gun.

"Come with me," you say, and watch as surprise and then betrayal cross his features.

This is your level of hell.