[Albert lets the marks be explored, sins that they are, one layered atop another and atop another still. He'll never escape them, and these are sins he'll go back to willingly and with love. William is, after all, his life.
How does he explain this? The pain borne from good intentions? Knowing the path led where it did? He hesitates... but looks deep into Ignis' eyes.]
Our first victims--my first--were my mother and younger brother, William.
[Somehow just voicing the unspeakable takes a weight off Albert's shoulders that he had no idea was so heavy. How can Ignis draw this out of him after over a decade? How can he make him want to be whole again?]
...When I was a child, I did work at an orphanage. I read to the children there, visited them constantly. Two new children arrived, and I... I fell in a deep fascination with his ideals. I would've called it love then. These two children were adopted into the Moriarty family at my behest, but my family loathed them. They were horrific to them, though they paid for a life saving surgery for Louis, they worked him to the bone, and abused the other constantly.
[He takes a deep breath, quelling the years-old rage he still feels. Death was too good for them.]
I asked if murder was an acceptable route to an ideal world, one where no noble could trample another commoner again. I killed them with my own hands, ultimately, and we burned the house down... killing my father as well and the household servants. William took my younger brother's name and identity. We trained as teenagers to fight, to survive and to reach those ideals.
[He smiles, sad and sincere.]
Everything I've done has been for William: my military service, my work with MI6, everything I've done here as well. I love him. I always have. And Louis... I wanted to protect him as much as William did. But somehow... he has my position now in his time, and I am no longer in the picture. I don't know how I feel about any of it.
no subject
How does he explain this? The pain borne from good intentions? Knowing the path led where it did? He hesitates... but looks deep into Ignis' eyes.]
Our first victims--my first--were my mother and younger brother, William.
[Somehow just voicing the unspeakable takes a weight off Albert's shoulders that he had no idea was so heavy. How can Ignis draw this out of him after over a decade? How can he make him want to be whole again?]
...When I was a child, I did work at an orphanage. I read to the children there, visited them constantly. Two new children arrived, and I... I fell in a deep fascination with his ideals. I would've called it love then. These two children were adopted into the Moriarty family at my behest, but my family loathed them. They were horrific to them, though they paid for a life saving surgery for Louis, they worked him to the bone, and abused the other constantly.
[He takes a deep breath, quelling the years-old rage he still feels. Death was too good for them.]
I asked if murder was an acceptable route to an ideal world, one where no noble could trample another commoner again. I killed them with my own hands, ultimately, and we burned the house down... killing my father as well and the household servants. William took my younger brother's name and identity. We trained as teenagers to fight, to survive and to reach those ideals.
[He smiles, sad and sincere.]
Everything I've done has been for William: my military service, my work with MI6, everything I've done here as well. I love him. I always have. And Louis... I wanted to protect him as much as William did. But somehow... he has my position now in his time, and I am no longer in the picture. I don't know how I feel about any of it.