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“Fuck you, Anders.”
It’s not the first time he’s heard those words, but Axl’s pain and rage fills them with a fierce kick behind the ammunition they typically lack. All his life, Anders has had words to defend him. Even before Bragi, words got him out of the house and away from his father’s fists and his mother’s madness. Twenty-one meant more power, but he never knew how to use it without pissing off the people around them.
Mike turned towards responsibility, Ty towards cynicism, and Axl towards ignorance.
Anders went blindly into denial.
Being Bragi is possibly the one thing that keeps him going. He can talk women back into his bed and keep them there long enough to distract from a miserable life where he doesn't give a fuck about keeping clients and has to cope with the fucked-up shit his family goes through. Eventually, even being Bragi starts to fall apart, too. Suddenly, he’s coping with a dead goddess on his hands, her spirit in a new mortal vessel that Axl’s furious about, and his family’s on Axl’s side.
“I haven’t even done anything!” he shouts at Axl, pounding a fist on the door that separates them. He’s at Axl’s place, trying to offer some kind of olive branch, but no one will let him in. It’s like they don’t even trust him. “Fuck!” he shouts, screaming to the universe. “How is this my fault?”
The door’s opened, but it’s Mike standing there. “Anders, go home. The last thing we need is your dick complicating the situation.”
Any other day, he might have shrugged it off. Any other day, Anders could sink back into that blissful denial he finds when fucking someone gorgeous. The trouble is that a day ago, he had Helen for that and now she’s dead and Anders nearly died, too.
Suddenly, Anders figures it out.
“Fine,” he says, exhaling heavily. “Fine.”
If Gaia’s Idunn, there’s nothing written that says Anders has to be Bragi. What’s the point in having all the powers in the world if your family doesn’t even want to be around you? Sure, it’d be nice to be all-powerful and all-successful, but the drugs and the women will fade and he always counted on his brothers to be there for him, given that they'd managed to do so throughout all his power-grabs.
Mike keeps looking at him. “Get out of here,” he says.
“Do you remember when you turned twenty-one? And Mum left,” Anders asks, caught on a thread of a memory bringing him back to how helpless he’d felt that night and how relieved he’d been the day that Dad had left, like that, like there was nothing left to keep him around. “What happened?”
“Things changed,” Mike says heatedly. “Anders, go home.”
Anders walks the distance, feet aching by the time he gets there. The emptiness of his house makes him feel like calling Dawn, but she’s put up with too much of his bullshit over the years. It’s hard to turn it off once you’ve erected a wall that stands between you and your true self to keep from getting hurt. Anders had never really thought about the casualties of using people so cavalierly to keep himself out of pain.
Now, when he needs someone most of all, he’s feeling it.
There is one person that stays there through the thick and thin, though. He doesn't even think about how bad an idea this is until his mobile's in hand and he's made the call.
“Ty,” Anders says, ignoring how dull his voice sounds. “I need to see you.”
That arrow would’ve solved everything. Anders sits on the couch with his head in his hands and sets up what he needs on the table. The solution to the Johnson family problems is simple when Anders really thinks about it. He’s not Odin. What happens to him doesn’t affect the world and maybe Bragi’s spirit will be reincarnated in someone better – someone who doesn't use the gift of gab to build a barrier between them and the world.
“Anders?”
Predictable Ty. Half an hour after the call and despite the apparent family's united front against him, here he is. Anders has set up a few bottles of wine and a butcher’s knife on the table – actually, that might be Eva’s, he can’t really recall.
“What the fuck?” Ty gapes at the display.
Anders turns and looks at his brother apologetically. It’s got to be Ty. “Ty,” Anders starts, pouring everything he’s ever kept held back into his voice. Bragi’s dulcet tones work on mortals and Ty belongs to that category. “You were never here. When Mike or Axl ask you where you were, later, you’re going to tell them that you were out running.”
Ty’s slipped into a steady trance and Anders feels terrible that it has to be him. Of all his brothers, Anders might say Ty loved him the most, but Anders had to keep testing him. He got crude, he lied, he was as despicable as he could manage to see how far he could push and Ty kept loving him.
This is his reward.
“You’re going to take the knife and you’re going to cut me open,” Anders says, gripping the knife and putting it in Ty’s hands. “I’ve taken pills, so it’ll help,” he continues, his words beginning to grow slurred. “I can’t do this anymore, Ty,” he explains, exhaustion in every movement and word. “I can’t keep going when the only thing people see is a wanker because the real me is a pathetic waste of space.”
Ty’s hand is trembling, so Anders reaches out to steady the knife. “It’s okay. When this is over, you’re not going to remember and you’re going to be fine. Tell Axl that I hope Gaia loves him even with all this crap. And you…be happy,” he pleads, cupping Ty’s cheek and kissing his forehead. “Do it.”
One last command before the sharpness of the knife presses against his skin.
What he didn’t think to take into account is the effect of Bragi’s words when Anders is half-unconscious.
“Shit,” he hears Ty. “Shit! Anders! Anders, wake the fuck up…”
**
When he wakes up, he’s in the hospital surrounded by his family.
“What the fuck did you think you were…”
“Mike, shut up,” Axl says uncomfortably, standing there visibly trembling. “Anders…” Anders looks around the room and down at his bandaged arms with dismay. He really thought he was getting out of this, but he feels the same as ever. …or, he does, but there’s something missing. Anders ignores Mike and Axl, looking to Ty.
“How long?”
“Dead for three minutes. I watched it go, so I guess your proximity to Yggdrasil was enough for the universe to lubricate Bragi on the way out. Welcome to the club,” Ty says dully. He must think that Anders is miserable and there’s a part of him that’s scared shitless. He doesn’t even have the ability to lie his way through life anymore, not with the added oomph of the gods. “Anders, why did you do it?”
“Odin lives. I don’t fuck up his life and I’m no longer the burden on Mike’s shoulders,” Anders says, shrugging like he’s detailing a schedule for his day rather than his reasons behind trying to kill himself. “It’s not like I’m depressed. It’s not even like I was planning it. It just…seemed better.”
“What the fuck,” Mike growls. “Anders…”
“Growing up in this family was horrible,” Anders spits out, anger settling in a lump in his throat. “Dad beating us whenever you left with Rob for parts unknown? Ty having to fight for Mum and getting caught in the crossfire, all the while we tried to keep Axl in the dark because he had a chance of getting through it unscathed. How the fuck were we supposed to come out of that? And then to find out we’re gods? The only thing I ever had going for me were my words. Can you blame me when I used them to build myself a wall?”
“Anders, you use women, you use drugs, you abuse alcohol…” Mike grits out. “What the hell were we supposed to think?”
“I didn’t want your pity. I just…”
“What?”
“I’m not good at showing it, worse at saying it, but all I’ve ever wanted was for you, the lot of you…I wanted a happy family. I wanted you,” he says to Mike, “happy and you to avoid getting hurt," he says to Ty, "and Axl to stay innocent. Sex? Sex kept me company. I don’t know,” he admits, rubbing his hands over the gauze. “I guess that’s over. Bragi’s gone. Two down, three to go,” he says, looking around the room. “You can leave. I know you don’t want to be here. Go cope with god shit.”
“Anders, you’re our brother,” Mike says heatedly. “And sometimes…sometimes you make it so easy to be mad at you.”
“We never wanted you to leave us,” Axl says, fraught with despair. “I was angry about Gaia, not you. I forgot about Helen, I forgot about everything. Anders, please, don’t think you’re alone because you’re not. I’d never let you be.”
“None of us would,” Ty says firmly. “Incidentally, you’re moving in with me.”
“What?”
“Or I’m moving into yours,” Ty continues. “We’ve all been occupied with our own lives for too long. It’s time for us to be brothers again before anything else. Do me one favour, though?”
“Yeah?” Anders manages.
“Drop the fucking wall,” Ty pleads. “Sure, we might hate you, but at least then it’s you. What’s the point in us being frustrated with the mask you wear? Be yourself, Anders. Be you. I still remember him from when we were kids and I liked that brother of mine. He was a good playmate and a better ally. You were the only one who could occasionally talk Dad out of beating the shit out of me and Mum.”
Anders scoffs and tries not to feel the pit of despair in his gut. “And all the times I fucked with you about Dawn?”
“Okay, yes, you were an arse about that, but even if she and I got serious, despite your meddling, nothing would have changed between us,” Ty points out. “Besides. Don’t you remember? No mortal knows who you or I are,” he says. “Anders, you have a fresh start. Do not fuck it up and I will be there at your side every step of the way.”
“And I’ll…I’ll make an effort to be around more,” Mike promises.
“I’ll make sure no god shit touches your life,” Axl insists. “And Olaf…”
“Anytime you need a break from reality,” Olaf promises, squeezing Anders’ hand. “I’m there, grandson.”
“We’re all here,” Ty promises, squeezing Anders’ shoulder.