Alto was taking a bath in their peach-scented bathroom when Nero opened the door, eyes vacant and black. He quietly shut the door behind him, and Alto had the same feeling, the same feeling at their wedding, when he looked upon a monster, about to be eaten whole.

“ I don’t like it when people hurt children, ” Nero and Unas said.

“I have no—”

“ You said we would be honest with each other, but you lied to me, Alto. You’re lying right now. ”

“I’m not—”

“ You’re nothing but a born liar! ”

Nero grabbed Alto and easily flung him against the wall like a pillow, with one hand, his fury giving him strength, and he slid down the wall like a piece of wet meat. He staggered up, and ran into the bedroom, but tripped on the green rug on his way inside.

Nero chased after him, pushing the door off its hinges, stepping over it, and glaring down at him through his nose.

“Where is my son?”

“I don’t know!? With Rosaline!?”

“Is he dead? Just tell me!”

He dropped the sword, and Alto was grateful the sword extinguished its flames the moment he let go. Slowly, Alto moved away from Nero, to the other side of the room, and he watched him like a hawk, waiting for another attack, but instead, he broke down in tears.

“He’s just a baby. He’s so small. He can’t win against you.”

“Nero, what the fuck are you talking about, ” Alto screamed.

“You took him and left a note, you know I can’t read. Why would you—”

“If I fucking took him, why would I leave a note? Why couldn’t I just tell you myself or fucking bring him here!”

“I don’t know!?”

He stomped his feet and Alto saw his chance, now that he dropped the sword, and rushed over to him. He grabbed it, grit his teeth through the pain, and ran towards the balcony, chucking it into the pool before Nero could take it back from him.

“You can’t—”

Alto picked him up by the back of his shirt, threw him on the bed, locked the door, and took slow, deep breaths, calming himself, but it didn’t work. Another hole was made in the wall that evening, right next to the first, and Alto made it clear that he was in charge.

The two holes in the wall stared at them, like angry eyes, little chunks as tears, falling out onto the floor, crying as the fight continued.

He quickly put on a pair of red briefs, and Nero came over to him, but Alto pushed him to the ground, and they started screaming at each other, kicking and biting, but it wasn’t a fair fight.

With one swift smack, Nero saw stars, and he rolled over onto the floor, bruised and bloody. Alto crouched over him, grabbed his pants, and rifled through his pockets, finding the note.

He wanted to make sure Nero wasn’t finally having a psychotic break.

Pushing him aside, Alto quickly read the note, sighed, and looked at his husband in utter disgust.

“This note says, ‘ you took everything from me, now I’m taking it from you.’ Why would I ever write this shit?”

Nero stumbled over his words, unable to find a good reason, his bloody lip not helping, and he couldn’t come up with a proper answer, nor another question to ask because nothing made sense.

“You’re angry with me...you never liked him…”

Nero plopped onto the bed, still searching for answers, looking around the room as if they would give him any. His one-track mind could only come to one conclusion.

Rosaline mentioned the police, so Nero went to the next person he thought could have taken his son.

“Almuz took him. That has to be it.”

“Does he know you have a child,” Alto asked.

“Yes, because he took him . We have to go.”

Nero got up, ran towards the door, but his husband pulled him by his shirt, and pulled him back inside, ignoring his screams of anger.

“I don’t think that’s right. He was at the Triangle building yesterday, all over TV, but that doesn’t mean he knows about your kid,” Alto said.

“Yes, it does! He’s angry because I killed his stable of pigs.”

“I know you’re angry—”

“No. You don’t. You have never liked him, never asked about him, you didn’t even want to go to his party. ”

Alto groaned and let go of his shirt, and was punched in the chest, feeling nothing, used as a punching bag, the closest thing at that moment. Nero kicked his leg, and Alto gave him a dull look, remorseless and apathetic.

Still kicking and grunting, Alto sighed and didn’t even try to hide his lack of remorse.

“I’m sorry—”

“No, you’re not!”

“—that someone took him, but I never got involved because he is not mine and—”

“This is proof that you hate him!”

“I don’t hate him, I just don’t care for him. ”

The kicks stopped, and a giant chunk fell out of the wall, another giant tear.

“I forgave you, but you wanting me to be around him is an entirely different thing,” Alto said.

“I assumed—”

“You never asked how I felt about that baby.”

“I shouldn’t. If you wanna be with me, he comes along too.”

Alto didn’t like that, he didn’t want someone in his life that didn’t give him something. Nero gave him adoration, complacency(sometimes), helped him kill rival gangs, and gave him sex.

A baby gave him nothing.

“Get dressed. We’re going to kill Almuz, and I’m going to split his body in half, from the bottom first, so he can feel it all, then find my son. ”

“He’s not there ! Crassius and Araka are still alive, it would make more sense to search in Kiruna!”

“You know what I think ,” Nero asked, jabbing his finger into his chest.

“No, but I think your lack of sleep and food is affecting your cognitive reasoning and functioning skills.”

“Stop trying to use words I don’t know when you want to win an argument,” Nero whined.

“Stop insinuating that I killed your son. ”

Nero had no proof that anyone took his son, so he went with what he knew.

“ I know what the business trips are really about!”

Alto nodded his head and grinned because now the student had surpassed the master.

When'd you find out” Alto asked.

“You forget to take the tickets out of your pockets once. When I needed a lighter, I searched through your pockets on the floor and found some…”

Alto lovingly picked up his husband, who was shaking like a tiny dog, placed him on the bed, and whispered into his ear what he was going to do about it.

"They're not alive, like us," Alto laughed. “Why are you so upset? You think I killed your kid because of my  hunting trips?"

“I mean...yeah…”

Nero couldn’t meet him in the eyes and Alto felt so good, this new high was a pleasure unlike none other. He would always stare into the core of his soul in defiance, but without his magical flaming stick, he was powerless.

“We kill people all the time. Why are you upset about this?”

“The people we kill hurt us, so it's okay that we hurt them,” Nero explained. “ That’s how this works.”

“No. What the fuck ever gave you that idea? ”

Sitting in a destroyed room, cold air filtering through the open patio door, Nero finally realized he was a murderer and he was married to a murderer, and that yes, he might have been wrong all along.

He cried, the emotional turbulence shaking his body because this was not how it worked.

“We hurt the people that hurt us,” Nero insisted.

“Why would I wait for someone to hurt me first? I kill them before they even think of touching me first.”

“But you don’t do the other stuff, right,” Nero asked.

“What other stuff?”

“You don't… do the things they did to me, right?”

“I mean... not personally… ”

“No. You said you would never do something like that. ”

Alto nodded, slowly, stretching out his words, enunciating them properly so Nero would fully understand.

“ Yeah. I wouldn’t. People who work with me do. You say your mom killed my family, I sell people. We can call it even.”

He gave his husband a hefty pat on the back, and Nero used the bottom of his shirt to rub the snot off his nose. It didn’t do much good, and he was disgusted with himself before he tried cleaning it off.

“Why did you take him,” Nero asked.

“I didn’t take that baby. Why would I, ” Alto shouted.

Nero cocked his head to the side and shrugged.

“Cuz you’re a sick fuck that hunts people for vacation and sells people.”

“Babies have barely grown. I have no need for him.”

“ Gods above and below you’re disgusting. ”

The look of disgust, anger, utter disdain, and the one word, the d-word, was the worst word in Nero’s black-and-white mind.

Things were clean or unclean.

Right or wrong.

No in-between.

“If you tell me where the body is I might forgive you one day,” Nero said quietly.

“I don’t know why I care so much about your approval. You’re not fun anymore,” Alto replied.

Nero stood up, looked his husband in the eyes, and smiled.

He smiled back, confused, and then flailed as he stuck his hand in his mouth.

No weak points on his body meant that Nero had to be creative, and he shoved his hand as far in as he could, throwing Alto for a loop, and then crashed to the ground. He covered his nose with his left hand, and Alto thrashed on the ground in confusion and then relaxed because he didn’t cover everything and he could still breathe.

Embarrassed and petrified, he pulled his hand out of the monster’s mouth and mumbled a quick apology underneath his breath.

“I was wrong. You’re still a lot of fun. Come back home alive,” Alto said.

He coughed, and Nero smacked in the face, and he laughed, mocking his anguish, and laughed harder the more he smacked him. He stopped laughing when the tears returned, and Alto groaned, because to him this was another day like any other, another tantrum .

“Don’t be like this,” he mumbled.

“Didn’t you save me because you love me?”

“Yes, no one takes what’s mine. ”

Mine, mine, mine, mine.

Two men who never grew up didn’t want to share, confusing it for affection.

Mine.

“If I find the baby will you stop acting like this,” Alto groaned.

“I know you ate him,” Nero shrieked.

Alto didn’t reply, as he was completely hysterical and pushed Nero off. He rummaged around their once beautiful bedroom and heard the door shut behind him, listening to Nero say that he won’t return unless he’s alive.

Alto, standing only in his boxers, frustrated, jealous, still thinking he was losing a fight to a baby when there never was one, to begin with.

Swearing under his breath, he called Nero repeatedly, but he never opened the door. With no patience left in his bones, Alto ripped the bedroom door off its hinges and saw Nero climbing out the balcony and down to the pool. Nero striped down to his boxers, dove into the pool and retrieved the sword, and screamed that he would be next. 

"Everyone has hurt me," Nero and Unas screamed. "Everyone must die!" 

"I'm going to put you in a place if you say shit like that again," Alto shouted back.

Nero grabbed all his clothes and ran off in the dark before he could be committed.