InsaneJournal

There were few times since he'd lost his leg that Moody had wished he could have it back, but sitting in one place or limping around in circles was were not the options he wanted most on this particular evening. He wanted to walk or run, not sit and watch his journal for updates or pace until this feeling went away. Death was not particularly foreign to him -- his own mother had died not a month earlier, but this was different. This was harder. God damn it, Marlene.

So many years had passed and only a handful of losses ever came close to grazing what must have been some underlying ability to emote, perhaps because it was difficult for him to acknowledge that anyone's existence meant something to him beyond what symbiosis required. It had always been easier that way, particularly in his line of work. A partner could die at any given time, so as long as they were able to work efficiently and effectively, there was no need for closeness. No need for compatibility.

He'd spent so long thinking of everything in his life as an extension of work and duty that he hadn't even noticed when those around him began to slowly infiltrate the narrowness of his compassion and had become permanent fixtures that he was loathe to lose. Marlene had become more than an associate in the time they'd known each other -- more than a person with whom he'd shared a series of casually intimate moments or harrowing experiences that could potentially nurse a bond to fruition.

He might not have admitted it, even to himself, she had become a friend. No, even more than that. She was like the daughter Moody would never have -- even moreso now that she was gone.

It was the kind of loss that he had never felt before and had never intended to experience at any given time in his life. There was some alien mixture of anger and desperation that disarmed an aging man, made him vulnerable to whims and fantastical plans of vengeance. He wanted to kill them all. Every last one of them. But mostly him, the maestro behind these puppets. And though it took everything in his power to restrain the fanciful urge -- no, need -- for tangible reparation, Moody forced himself to sit the fuck down. Tonight was not the night, but they would pay for what they'd done -- what they'd taken from him, and from the Order.

And even though he couldn't walk or run, he could still fly. The broomstick he'd discarded in favour of more instant transportation would still work, even if he felt as though it were wrong for anything to be in working order now that he himself felt as though his structural integrity had been compromised. He'd get around to the safehouse later, but for now he needed to be alone.