maskormenacelogs | {Got a war going on in my head [OPEN]

"Of course," he huffs, an almost annoyed sound. Couldn't they at least get less... repetitive threats to face? This was hardly new, especially only a few months out from the Tahoe problem.

But... Well.

"You sure you even need me?" There's something so off about a question like that even passing his lips, something diametrically wrong, somehow. Diego rarely ever shows anything even vaguely shaped like nerves to anyone on the surface. "Am I even who you want out there with you, or just who's convenient because I'm who you came across first in the house?"

"I—"

Luther's mouth is already open, before he grinds to a halt and snaps it shut again, thrown for a loop. He'd gone to Diego because out of all of them, Diego was the one who'd kept closest to their training, to staying a hero and diving recklessly into danger to save people. They were on the same page about it, to the extent of the idiot even going out and doing it unregistered. He always ran straight towards trouble, blades first.

So this question, this reluctance, it just doesn't compute, and Luther stares at him.

"What, do you have something better to do?" Sarcastic. "A hot date or something? There's trouble, Diego. We go fix it. That's what we do."

Out of all the siblings, this was the last one he'd expect to have to talk into it.

The reluctance doesn't even feel right to Diego. This is what he does, has always done, but somehow it's different, suddenly. Why? He can't explain it, or won't, perhaps. Instead he just stares at Luther and says, "You don't need me, though. Not really. You haven't in a really. long. time."

The words are simple. Short. Clipped. But they carry a weight that seems discordant to the rest. Out of step and off-balance in ways Diego really ever allows himself to be seen as. Something is definitely wrong. That wrongness is starting to show in more than just his words and the way he holds himself, too, something in his eyes. Or maybe it's just reflection of the sun from the window, right?

Luther's still staring, his jaw taut; biting back on all the comebacks that might've slipped their reins and rolled out if he had a quicker tongue and if he was anything more like Diego in that respect. What crawled up your ass and died.

In the end, it's just a simple question instead: "What's your problem today?" A fair question for Diego most days, honestly, but Luther's left scrounging his memory, trying to pinpoint what he said to Diego last time they spoke, what Luther might've said or done to accidentally piss him off.

And, oddly, this time there's actually nothing.

"You woke up on the wrong side of the bed or something?"

Still trying to sidestep the thing Diego brought up, because it feels too much like something real and serious, and a subject neither of them try to broach much. (But of course, today isn't a usual day, and little does he know this isn't the usual Diego—)

"Nothing," he snaps, and it's true, really. Nothing Luther had done or said recently could possibly land them here. It's years upon years of things out of their control, and of pressed upon roles. And the fact that this isn't the proper version of his brother certainly makes things all the more different. "I just don't think you actually need me. You're really good at choosing for convenience sometimes."

Luther exhales through his teeth, rolls his eyes a little. The smallest signs of irritation nipping at him.

"You're Number Two, Number Two," he says, and it's hard to tell exactly what tone he means to take with that. But he tries to clarify a second later: "That means you're my second-in-command. My lieutenant. I go to you." ... All those times he didn't go to Allison, anyway, which were far more plentiful.

"We all need each other. What makes you think it's convenience?"

Everything after that double repetition of his number, his place in line, his rank may as well have fallen on deaf ears for all the good that it does Diego in this moment. Those words-- that name-- only serves to make him absolutely explode, suddenly jumping from mild irritation to irrationally provocation.

"Goddamit, Luther, does it always have to come down to that for you? Don't throw my rank in my face! Don't you ever get tired of it?" He doesn't notice (or maybe he doesn't care) that his eyes are glowing a bright gold at this point, and throws one hand up in a dismissive wave, face all scrunched up in disbelief, "And stop trying placate me, because I think we all know that if it really came down to it, you'd choose Allison, but you're still too faithful to Dad's bullshit to change it after it's been this way our entire lives."

Those words hit their mark, just like Diego intended them to. He can see the muscle leap in Luther's jaw, the tightening in his neck. Luther knows exactly how true it is, how sore that still-healing wound was, and yet he still tries to deny it and spit back, "The man is dead, I'm not really sure how I can—"

But then.

The eyes. Luther's quick to notice when things are different about his teammates and siblings in particular, considering they were the only seven human beings he'd grown up knowing, his entire formative life. Diego's eyes flare gold and Luther's own blue eyes widen, then narrow in confusion. Suspicion.

It could be an illness. A fever, maybe. Stranger things have happened here in this world.

"What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing!" He shouts, all defenses on their highest settings. "I'm just sick of this. I am so tired of being second rate! It is all I have ever been my entire life. And you are always the first one to bring it all into focus."

Maybe it's stupid-- no, actually, it's definitely stupid, not to mention pointless-- but the resentment is leading at this point. Diego marches up and shoves Luther, hard. Except it doesn't do him one wit of good, because his brother is as solid as a rock.

Luther just looks... exasperated, unimpressed at the sheer waste of time, and that in itself is probably the most infuriating thing for Diego. How completely unaffected Luther is by the shove, how it glances off him like a gnat nipping at a mountain.

"The more you yap about it, Diego, the more time we're wasting time where you could be doing something useful and helping me save the day," he says, the irritation rising in his own voice — and for a moment, despite all his best efforts, old instinct rears its head and Luther's voice sounds like a pitch-perfect reproduction of Reginald's tone, all withering scorn. He'd been taught to copy it, to echo it. That voice and all its criticism had burrowed its way deep under his super-durable skin like it had the rest of them, taking up residence where blades and bullets couldn't.

"Shut up! For one fucking second-- just... stop trying to be Dad!" He shouts, desperate and biting in a way that Diego can always have at the tip of his fingers in an instant. "You're not him. You're never going to be. And I can't believe you still want to be, after everything!"

Those eyes, though. They just seem to burn brighter, more intense, the more emotional he gets. The anger fueling whatever is affecting him right now.

This is not, at all, what he expected when he'd gone seeking out Diego to ask him to tag along on this mission. It was a simple thing. He just wanted to fight some zombies!!

As ever, Diego goes for the metaphorical jugular and squarely hits his mark. The words drive the breath out of Luther in a way that the shove hadn't, in a way that even his knives never could have. Maybe that's why Diego developed that acid tongue. To have a weapon that could actually get under that inhumanly tough skin.

Stop trying to be Dad. You're not him. You've never going to be.

Luther's hand snaps out, lodges around Diego's neck, lifts him briefly off the floor. "What," he says, slow and steely, each word gritted through his teeth: "the fuck, is wrong, with your eyes."

It's easier to focus on that than the words. What he said.

There's a choked up bubble of laughter that escapes him around the grip Luther has on his throat, and his next words seem to have a double, an echo, as they churn out of him. "Go ahead and do it, Luther." A nearly sinister smirk spreads across his lips. "Be the monster." It's spoken like a dare-- go ahead, kill him, see what he cares.

And he could. He could. That's the thing. All it would take is a slightly too-hard flex of Luther's thick fingers, and he could pinch Diego's aorta shut, collapse it. Snap his spine. Or simply press inexorably harder and harder until he suffocated all the breath out of his brother, like he had done to Vanya—

Luther's aware of how little it would take. Each iota of force he has at his possession, and knowing what amount would kill an enemy. How many years he's carefully-honed his control and strength, so that there's rarely a slip anymore, not a loss of that tight rein he has over himself.

And yet. How easily he could let that all go, and instead simply pull the other man apart. How fragile human bodies are. They're just a loose collection of sinew and blood and bone. He could crack it open, spill that blood on the floor.

The thoughts come automatically, just like their father trained him to — those ruthless calculations, how to apply that strength to most lethal force — but then through the ringing in his ears, Luther hears that word monster and he stops instead. Shoves Diego against the wall, driving the breath out of him, but then drops him back to the ground. Luther's expression furious, but also— confused. Suspicious. They've fought before, they always fight, and yet...

"Something's up with you," he says.

He slides down the wall and takes a long moment to catch the breath that Luther had knocked out of him. But he looks more amused than anything else, staring up at the looming figure several feet away with a smirk on his face.

He gets to his feet again a few minutes later. "Oh, noticed that, did you?" He asks with a laugh, and it sounds so odd and sinister with that weird echo that makes it all sound doubled and reverberated. "I wondered when you might catch up."

This is not his brother.

Luther's brain immediately snaps into action mode, starts sifting through plans and contingencies. Either Diego's possessed, or maybe this is a doppelganger, or—

With those strangely-glowing eyes, Luther's money is on possessed, which means he has no fucking idea what to do about this. Maybe Klaus would be able to take a crack at it, but god, demonic possession isn't really up his wheelhouse, either—

He needs to knock Diego out, tie him up, buy themselves some extra time to figure this out.

He's getting real tired of knocking out his siblings.

"What did you do with Diego?" he demands, before he suddenly lunges forward and tries to catch the yellow-eyed man in a proper grapple. With that forewarning, though, he's not as quick as Diego — the other man is lean and swift where Luther's all brute strength.

Luther is all force, the kind that can take down buildings with little effort if he so chose, but the sacrifice in that power is speed-- and while the other man does manage to wrangle this Not-Diego into a tussle, it's a short one. A bit of a back and forth between them before he gains enough purchase to slip just outside of Luther's grip. And that's all he needs to dart around his Real's brother and scamper away. Running God-knows-where to cause more havoc, surely.

Luther goes haring after him — or at least tries to, and lets loose an uncharacteristic "Fuck" as he collides with Diego's bedroom doorway instead. Almost rips the frame out of the wall just with the sheer force of his impact (he doesn't even feel it, himself), before he squeezes himself through and goes thudding through the house after his not-brother. He's slow, and made even slower by his attempts to not break every single damned thing he passes in their house.

By the time he's gotten out to the landing, down the stairs, the front door is already slamming shut and Diego is gone, just gone, as if he was never there.

Luther's left standing in the foyer, his hand on the banister.

"What the fuck," he breathes.

{Got a war going on in my head [OPEN]

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idk how to end this but maybe they grapple for a bit but then persona!diego flees/escapes??

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