Walter lumbered over and took a seat opposite him. Then he just sat there. Brandon knew that the Guardian was waiting on him to speak....but words refused to form.

Until Walter lifted a hand and gestured at Brandon capturing his eyes as he said. “Brandon listen to me. It is clear that you care for him or you would not have sat down with me. You’re both troubled. The peace of your souls is so loud to me. I know what is upsetting my brother. Tell me what is upsetting you.”

“I dont want anyone to be upset! Ezekiel...he just doesn’t understand!” Brandon reluctantly, but strongly replied, his heart seizing as he spoke. “I....I have no idea what the hell I am or where I come from ....I Just...I can’t be with him...” Brandon stopped and felt the stones in his stomach churn. The more he thought about his circumstances the more he felt them cursing anything and everything between him and Ezekiel.

“You can’t? Why? Is there a physical wall blocking you? Or perhaps is it because of your past...and because of the Flame you feel this way?” Walter inquired softly, settling forwards on his elbows, balancing them on his knees and putting his hands to his chin. His brown eyes still holding Brandon’s.

“Yes, the Flame and the Alchemists, and a Trillion other things!” Brandon sharply nodded. “WE shouldn’t get involved with each other. I know it won’t work! I cant get involved.”

To this Walter raised an eyebrow, the act reflecting no emotion, but in his eyes there was a spark of something like annoyance. What was irritating him Brandon couldn’t be sure. Hell, he couldn’t even be sure he saw anything like emotions flickering in the twin brown pools of silence that were Walters’s eyes.

“Ezekiel said that he told you that none of that mattered. Not Flame or the Alchemists.” Walter slowly and surely replied, speaking the words Ezekiel must have told him. “Ezekiel told me that WHAT you are doesn’t make up WHO you are to him. He just wants you beside him. So? Why turn away from potential happiness? Why do you believe these things still matter if they don’t?”

“Because they DO! I fucking eat things Walter!” Brandon suddenly screamed at the emotionless wall, but he knew he was only taking his anger and pain out on the wrong person.

“I feast on energy with a creepy weird white light that grows out of my soul somehow!” Brandon began to rant, listing all of the things he had been telling himself ever since Ezekiel had first spoken out his feelings.

“Then if people eat my blood they heal...or they die, depending on how much they ingest! AND now I can make people explode if I concentrate really really fucking hard!” Brandon shook his head and tightened his fists in the arms of the chair. “I don’t know what the fuck I am! I only know that I’m not natural Walter. I’ve hurt so many people who didn’t deserve to be hurt! I’m a monster! THINGS LIKE THAT FUCKING MATTER!! OK!?”

Suddenly, and with the most human snarl that Brandon had ever herd Walter utter, the eldest Guardian rushed out of his seat, reached out and nearly plucked Brandon from his chair, and held him up by the front of his shirt. Fists like hams twisted the clothing up over Brandon’s stomach and back, rubbing him painfully around the collar, as Walter balanced him on air and on the tips of his toes. Walters face was a granite mask of pain and hatred....no it was more like self-loathing.

IT transformed the man that Brandon had perhaps foolishly believed to be gentle, dull and calm into a vibrating mass of barely concealed raw and dangerous emotion.

" Then be a Monster no more! It only matters if you are unwilling to fight for more! Do you want to sit here comparing fucking sins with me Brandon!?” Walter growled in Brandon’s face harshly. The intensity behind his question was like a sizzle of fire.

Even his voice had transformed in a matter of seconds. It was fuller, richer. No longer did Walters’s voice have the emotionless rumble of before. This furious deep growling sounded like the real Shifter behind the mask that Walter wore. A man with passion and feelings.....consumed by misery.

“Do you think that crying to me about your pains somehow make you less of a fool for letting your past control you!? Well then I want you to listen to me. Listen to every word that I say...and when I finish....you will never get me to speak of this again. Now nod if you understand me....” Walter stopped and stared at him intently, waiting, until Brandon nodded back at him unable to do anything else.

Brandon was shocked to see such intense emotions swirling in the normally distant elder brothers brown heavy eyes. And he was more than unsure about what was about to happen next.

Once Brandon nodded, signaling that he understood, Walter dropped a terrible bombshell in a voice so cold and ragged it seemed as if he was holding back a mountain.

“Once before you asked me to explain my Innate Abilities to you...and I told you that I simply tell others what to do and that they obey me Right? I let you believe that I hypnotize people and they do as I ask.” Walter stopped inhaled and explained. “But the truth is that I command others to obey me. I break their very soul and ben their minds yo my will. Honestly I can make a man set himself on fire if I truly wished to. This is the extent of the power inside of me. It is dangerous and more tempting then all the temptations of the flesh and the soul combined to me.” Walter swallowed thickly.

He seemed to be working up to something, and when he finally found his words, they came from him in the form of a ragged whisper and with haunted misty eyes.

“I once succumbed to the temptation in my youth.” He softly conveyed his eyes drifting into some old memory. “I liked the power of being a puppet master. I used my Abilities to abuse people at times, to play with their minds and torture their hearts. It was fun to terrorize those weaker then me ”

Walter shuttered and continued. “Then in my jealousy and pride I killed my best friend, my unborn child and the mother of my unborn child with my own powers.....because I was consumed with the darkest of feelings. Lust.”

All while Walter had spoken his fists had slowly unfurled from Brandon’s clothing until the Guardian suddenly dropped his hands to his side and Brandon was left standing inches in front of him.

Brandon was unable to move or speak at this point because he was too busy watching Walter, listening to the terrible things spilling from his suddenly animated mouth.

Walter was shaking now, his body trembling as if he were fighting something inside, and then to Brandon’s intense shock....tears began to slide from the tortured and downcast eyes of the eldest Guardian.

“I killed them all Brandon.” Walter slowly outlined. “I took the life of my child and the woman that I loved. I...I did these terrible things. I’m the monster. I can’t even....let myself feel anything anymore because if I did!? Then all I feel is the Temptation calling me. The compulsion to break people....like stupid toys around me! So!? Tell me who is worse? Does our evil compare!?” Walter choked, as he put his face in his hands and sunk down to his knees, completely overcome and overrun by his emotions that seemed to be slamming into him like trains derailing.

“Walter I didnt know...” Brandon swallowed and lapsed back into silence. He stood, watching Ezekiels brother and feeling his heart tumbling in pain for him. He wanted to speak, but....

What could he say to a confession like that? Especially when Walter had already expressed in no uncertain terms that he was not going to rehash the events. Brandon couldn’t ask for clarification....or bring himself to care about it. He didn’t need details or the names of the victims of even to understand exactly how Walers power, his Temptation worked. He simply believed this raw dramatic show of guilt.

Brandon understood the tragedy in Walters mind all too well. Brandon knew this kind of pain....he had lived it. He was still living in it.

Guilt and shame were far worse than any hell. Looking at Walter was like looking down at a broken mirror. So many painful shards reflecting back pieces of Brandon’s own misery.

Suddenly Brandon whished that Ezekiel was there. His Bossy and gentle Guardian had always been able to speak the words that had somehow managed to soothe Brandon’s soul. And In that moment Brandon knew that Walter needed someone to help him. To pull him back from that terrible dark inner demon.

So stuck in moment of sympathetic horror Brandon could only look at Walter with new eyes.

But.....looking at Walter breaking apart before him soon called something up inside of Brandon that he wasn’t prepared for. The overwhelming urge to sooth and to calm him.

Brandon had never felt such a rush of powerful emotions before directed at anyone except for Ezekiel. This was so unlike the constant anger and hatred and fear he was always feeling for the Flame and for his enemies. Himself.

Brandon squeezed at his heart as a rush of warmth cascaded across his mind, urging him forwards.

So with a small flare of inner surprise Brandon found himself dropping down next to Ezekiels brother and soundlessly embracing him. Brandon wrapped arms around Walters neck from the side and held his face to his chest.

The soft brush of his black hair on Brandon chin was surprising and his size made the act seem almost comical but Brandon just held on. Walter was a giant trembling furnace of muscle.

He seemed to be made of heat, and his entire form was ridged as silent sobs rocked him. Unlike Ezekiel, Walter did not smell of sweet pine and soap, smells that had chased Brandon into his dreams at night. No, Walter smelled of fresh air and sweeter fresh earth.

Still if Brandon was expecting his touch to help Walter calm down, he would have been dismayed to witness the Guardian simply start to cry harder and harder, as if Brandon’s touch were causing the larger Guardian pain.

But....Brandon hadn’t really know what would happen when he touched Walter.

So when the large man simply bowed deeper into himself and cried more intently, Brandon took that in, he let Walter break down and soon enough he had Walters head in his lap. Walters face was turned into his lap, his arms cradling his head. His large and long body leveled past Brandon. His breath and touch was solid and a shock, but not unwanted. Instead Brandon felt more wanted and needed in that moment then he truly knew how to describe. He had never given another living being comfort before and he found that the experience was compelling and overwhelming.

Unable to feel anything but the warmth in his heart...or pain for Walter, Brandon didn’t think too much as he calmly caressed at Walters crown. Stroking the short black locks against the back of Walters scalp and down his thick strong nape.

Because Brandon was currently wearing his leather gloves the touch of Walters’s hair didn’t register to his senses, all he felt was the hot rush of his temperature, and the gasping cries that he was holding back.

The large Shifter held him tighter though, seeming utterly unprepared for the tsunami that had been unlocked by his truth.

*HMMM....Are you surprised about Walters confession? Do you think hes just as much of a monster as Brandon thinks he is?*