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The sun was getting low as most people began to leave the mountain top. Xisuma stayed, how could he not? This was the last time he would ever see his brother's face, albeit a much cooler and dull version. His skin had grown cold long before, leaving it sickly looking, but anything was better than nothing Xisuma presumed.
He had asked everyone to leave him alone to his thoughts until he was ready to close the casket. Everyone was unsure if it was safe to leave him be, seeing how his brother died, but most were not willing to say anything. Most.
"Shishwammy, are you sure you don't want anyone here? I just want to help..." Karalis' voice drifted off but still felt comforting even with the silence that followed. There was always something about his presence that put Xisuma at ease, not necessarily peace, but always ease.
There was a clear knot in Xisuma's throat, the tears he was holding back had been putting him through enough physical pain for Keralis to pick up on it. "No no, you can leave." The words were choked out as Xisuma refused to make eye contact, knowing the tears would flow if he dared to look up.
"Suma..." There was honey dripping from his voice, there never was a man Xisuma would ever find as sweet and kind as Keralis always strived to be. "I don't want to leave you here Suma. No person should ever go through something like this alone."
"But I'm not a person, now am I?" The question was clearly rhetorical and lined in anger that Xisuma never intended to direct at Keralis, or anyone for that matter, and yet the words still slipped out before Xisuma could think not to.
Keralis didn't respond, he knew he was technically right, but also so very wrong. He looked to the open casket, where EX layed still. Keralis wished he knew EX better than he did, but it was too late now, all he really ever learned was from a couple of brief interactions and the words Xisuma would say.
The harsh response Xisuma gave sat on his tongue for noticeably too long, before he corrected his actions. "Sorry, Keralis, I didn't mean for that to come out so rude, or at all if I can be honest." His voice remained strained seeing as how he refused to let his tears slip past his eyes.
"You can always be honest with me, I've always been here for you, and I always will." Keralis wanted to respond to more of the statement Xisuma gave, but he didn't want to accidentally stop Xisuma from opening up, even just a little more, Keralis knew he needed it. He lifted Xisuma's head up from the bottom of his helmet, wanting to make eye contact with the man he cared about.
Xisuma broke instantly, tears pushing past his eyes as he stumbled over his breath. If anyone was going to see him cry, he was glad it was Keralis. He fell forward into the arms of his friend, Keralis hugging him without hesitation. They stood in a sobbing silence while the sun set lower and lower. The grave was empty, the casket was open, but the crowd had left, letting Xisuma to finally feel his emotions.
Keralis may have been slightly shorter but his head rested atop of Xisuma's who had let his head collapse into Keralis' shoulder. "You know, you don't need to be human to be a person," Keralis informed with the same love as before.
"I just- I just wished he could have understood it like that..." Xisuma lifted himself up to look back at his brother's still body. "But it's too late for that, I didn't do a good enough job at telling him before." Xisuma's tears had slowed but were far from stopping. His voice had gotten cold, he had no warmth left for himself.
"Don't blame yourself, Sumie, there is nothing you could have done." Keralis lightly grabbed onto Xisuma's forearm, keeping him close and keeping him loved.
"It's not like he died of natural causes, Keralis. We can stop pretending it would have been impossible to help." Xisuma's voice was harsh before quickly softening again. "I knew he wasn't in a good place, I just didn't realize it was this bad."
Xisuma always tried to be nice, Keralis knew that, meaning the sour tone threw him off for a good few moments before Keralis could respond. "Okay, maybe we could have done something, but blaming yourself won't bring him back." Keralis didn't know if he agreed with his own words, he knew suicide was preventable, but he also knows that people are hard to change. Once someone has their mind made up, it would always be hard to tell them to do differently.
"How could I not blame myself? All he ever wanted was to be seen for who he really was, but no one here even knows his real name! Yeah, maybe he was a bit of an *sshole, but that doesn't mean you can just call him 'evil X'. I feel like I forced him into my shadow and everyone played along." Xisuma was getting mad, not at Keralis, or EX, or anyone in particular, but at the world in general. Or maybe he was mad at himself, it was so hard to tell nowadays.
Keralis refused to shy away from the shouting, he had heard worse, never from Xisuma, but he had still dealt with worse before.
Xisuma pulled out of Keralis' hold before walking to the casket, allowing Keralis to follow right behind. "I just know that if we stayed in the void, if I didn't want to leave so badly, if we stayed home, none of this would have happened." Xisuma looked into the box at his brother without his needed helmet. "He literally couldn't have died if we had stayed in the void..." His voice drifted off as he let his fingers brush against EX's cold tight skin and soft white hair.
"Maybe yes, but there is no way you would have known that, especially all those years ago." Keralis gave EX's body a good look over. He wondered how he got all his scars, he admired his hair, he noticed how malnourished his dead body was.
Xisuma chose to stop responding to Keralis, opting to continue talking about his brother instead. "He wanted to come here too, just not as much as I did. But he never could have prepared for the feeling of not being human and everyone seeing that." The tears had stopped, but that did not mean they were gone. "It's still hard for me, but EX wasn't as strong in the end."
Keralis felt guilty, he knew he had probably made Xisuma feel that way many times before. All of the times he accidentally reminded him that he couldn't take off his armor. All the times Keralis was made known that his best friend was less than human.
The silence settled in, making the tears falling from Xisuma's eyes again obvious. Neither of them mentioned it, but both of them knew it. The mountain top had gotten cold, too cold for Keralis, but he was sure Xisuma was fine. The void was surely colder than this, and he had heavy armor that certainly kept him insulated.
He was cold, but Keralis was staying. He would stay as long as Xisuma stayed.
They sat on the ground now, first Xisuma, and then Keralis, sitting a little too close, but Xisuma didn't mind. The close comfort was quite welcome in fact. The stars slowly became visible, even from behind a purple visor. Their twinkling light gave comfort to the both of them. The one thing the void and the overworld had in common, distant stars that felt like home.
Keralis, getting tired, leaned his head against Xisuma’s shoulder, the metal acting as an uncomfortable pillow. Xisuma rested his own head atop of Keralis', letting the exhaustion from his crying finally take over as he joined his best friend in some well needed rest. Maybe in the morning he would be ready to lay his brother to the ground, but for tonight, he was glad to spend it together, the stars watching over the three of them one last time.