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gcthvile · 7 months

Text

You're losing me.

Pairing: Cole Lensherr (OC) x Helmut Zemo

Fandom: Marvel

Warnings: angst

Summary: Cole and Zemo's love ends when Zemo leaves, despite Cole's desperation to stay connected. Alone and hollowed, Cole mourns what could have been as his broken heart surrenders to the loneliness.

Cole sat on the bench in the empty public park, Zemo's call haunting his thoughts. He wanted nothing more than to forget his partner's words, that it was over, they had to part ways. But Cole knew that moment would come, as Zemo's quest for vengeance against those who took his family consumed him.

Zemo approached quietly, as was his way. Cole didn't turn, didn't meet his eyes, afraid of what he might see - or not see - in their haunted gray depths. "You've said your piece. Now say what you really came to say."

Zemo sighed softly. "There is nothing more, you know my path. But know that what we had..." he trailed off, as if the words pained him. Cole wanted to beg, to plead, but his pride held fast.

"Will you not even look at me?" Zemo asked. Cole turned then, seeing the conflict, the regret, but also the resolve. He knew nothing would sway Zemo from the course he had set himself upon.

"Some days, it's like I'm someone else," Cole said bitterly. "I watch you walk away, leaving me out here on my own, and it feels like you're taking everything. Guess I didn't realize everything means you."

Zemo reached out a brief moment, fingers brushing Cole's cheek, before dropping his hand once more. "Perhaps...when this is over..." he suggested, though they both knew that was a promise neither could truly make. With a sad half-smile, Zemo turned and walked away, disappearing into the gathering dusk as Cole fought the tears threatening to fall, feeling as though his heart was being torn from his chest with each step Zemo took, knowing he may never see him again but unable to call out, to stop him, pride and pain holding his silence.

"We thought a cure would come through in time, now I fear it won't"

Cole watched Zemo walk away until his figure was lost to darkness. A solitary tear finally escaped, sliding slowly down his cheek. They had believed, somehow, that Zemo's quest could be sated, that vengeance would salve the wound in his soul and set him free to live again. But watching Zemo retreat into the night, Cole knew with sinking certainty that would never be the case. The pain and loss ran too deep, and Zemo was drowning in it, lost to the dark currents with no hope of surfacing again. This parting was no temporary one, but a final goodbye, as Zemo gave himself over fully to the shadows and Cole was left with only memories, and the knowledge that Zemo's cure had proven fictional - the damage was done, and nothing would heal the scars on both their hearts.

"Remember lookin' at this room, we loved it 'cause of the light

Now, I just sit in the dark and wonder if it's time"

Cole returned to the home he and Zemo had shared, now empty of all but memories. He sat in the darkness, not bearing to turn on the lights that had once illuminated their joy and intimacy. How many hours had they spent in this very room, talking late into the night by the fire or curled together on the couch, each taking solace in the other's embrace?

Now loneliness pressed down with suffocating weight. Cole glanced around at familiar furnishings that seemed foreign and cold without Zemo's vital presence to give them life and meaning. He thought of simpler times, not realizing back then how fleeting they truly were. Zemo had always kept his past and future close, sharing little of either, and Cole wondered now if some part of Zemo had known even then how brief their time together would be.

Was it time to let go, to accept it was over and face the empty house and hollow future alone? The shadows held no answers, only specters of the past that mocked his solitude. With a weary sigh Cole rose, unable to endure the ghosts of memory a moment more. He left the darkness behind, but it remained imprinted on his heart.

"Do I throw out everything we built or keep it?

I'm getting tired even for a phoenix

Always risin' from the ashes

Mendin' all her gashes

You might just have dealt the final blow"

Cole wandered the empty house once more, still unsure what to do with the remnants of his life with Zemo. So much of who he was had been entwined with the other man - should he simply purge it all, as if Zemo had never existed? But the thought of erasing their history together was its own anguish.

Yet staying here, surrounded daily by reminders of what was lost, threatened to break him further. Cole had risen from ashes before, reinvented himself when all seemed lost, but this loss cut deeper than any other. He was tired of fighting only to have hope ripped away yet again.

Zemo had done more than break his heart - he feared the other man may have destroyed Cole's very ability to heal and begin anew. Always before when battered and wounded, Cole had found resolve to fly once more. Now, he knew not if any power resided within him, any flames remained to be rekindled.

In the end, Cole decided to take one box of treasured memories, leaving the rest for another day. For now, survival would require distance from these rooms steeped in their shared history. Whether any ash-scattered phoenix could manage even that, Cole did not yet know.

"Stop, you're losin' me

Stop, you're losin' me

I can't find a pulse

My heart won't start anymore

For you

'Cause you're losin' me"

As Zemo spoke of leaving, Cole felt himself dying inside. He struggled to comprehend how the man before him, who had given Cole purpose and passion, could walk away as if what they shared meant nothing. Zemo met his gaze briefly but offered no true explanation or reassurance, only vague words that did little to quell Cole's rapidly intensifying terror.

Cole's heart pounded frantically, feeling as it if threatened to shatter within his chest. His pulse echoed in his ears, the only thing he could hear over the roar of blood and mounting panic. With eyes pleading, desperate to glimpse even a hint of doubt or regret in Zemo's cool gray stare, Cole reached out a trembling hand to grasp Zemo's wrist weakly.

"Please..." Cole whispered, his voice cracking. Zemo gently but firmly removed Cole's grasp, and Cole saw with crushing finality that nothing he said or did would change the inevitable. With that, the last flame within Cole's heart was snuffed out, leaving behind only the charred remains of what once beat strong and sure. Zemo was truly lost to him now.

"Every mornin', I glared at you with storms in my eyes

How can you say that you love someone you can't tell is dyin'?"

As Zemo turned to leave, Cole grasped his arm once more. "Say it," he begged brokenly, the pain and desperation in his eyes cutting deep.

Zemo hesitated, knowing the words were but bitter ash now. Yet he owed Cole this final kindness at least. "I loved you," Zemo said softly. "More than you knew."

Cole laughed mirthlessly. "No, you didn't. Not truly. If you had, you would see what this is doing to me. Every day I stared at you hoping, praying you would finally see. But you were always too busy planning your vengeance to notice me slowly dying inside from keeping this secret."

Tears glistened in those stormy eyes Zemo had always admired, the eyes that now saw him with such anguish and betrayal. Zemo had no defense, no explanation Cole would accept in his agony. Some pains were simply too deep for words to soothe.

With a heavy heart, Zemo gently released Cole's hand. "Farewell," he whispered, and was gone. Cole sank to his knees amid the wreckage, shattered beyond any hope of repair.

"And the air is thick with loss and indecision

I know my pain is such an imposition"

Cole sank down on the couch, his body heavy and aching as if every muscle had been pulled taut to the point of snapping. Grief and anguish swirled thickly around him, almost a tangible thing he could reach out and grasp in his fist.

He knew his turmoil and distress must be weighing on others as well. How selfish he was being, wallowing in his own pain without thought for how his suffering affected those around him. Zemo was gone - they all lost something with his departure, and yet here was Cole drowning in his private sorrow as if it was the only thing that mattered.

It was an imposition, he knew, to expect others to bear witness to his unraveling or pick up the pieces of his broken heart. He should be stronger than this, carry his grief silently as Zemo would rather than make a public spectacle of his despair. But strength had fled, leaving only hollowed-out ruin in its wake. All Cole could do was succumb to the darkness steadily strangling him from within.

"And you know what they all say

You don't know what you got until it's gone"

Cole sat alone in the silent darkness, memories of his time with Zemo drifting bittersweet through his mind. He recalled lazy mornings waking in Zemo's arms, feeling sheer contentment in those quiet stolen moments before the demands of the day. Nights spent pour over old books or discussing philosophy and history by firelight, Zemo's passion for knowledge kindling Cole's own intellect.

Small touches and gestures that had simply been part of their everyday before now seemed precious - a hand guiding Cole's in a dance, fingers threading through his hair, the warmth of Zemo's smile, rarely shared but capable of lighting Cole's world when it appeared. Only now, through the harsh lens of loss, did Cole truly grasp how much he had taken for granted. These days of intimacy and understanding were behind them now, the realization leaving only emptiness in its wake. You never do know what you had, Cole thought sadly, until you find yourself with nothing at all.

"How long could we be a sad song

'Til we were too far gone to bring back to life?"

Cole recalled the subtle shifts in Zemo in the weeks and months preceding their parting. There had been an increasing distance in Zemo's eyes, a hint of darkness creeping into his gaze that hadn't fully lifted even in their most intimate moments. His smiles came less easily, and he seemed to pull away emotionally when once they had been open books to one another.

At first Cole had tried to draw Zemo back out, concerned something weighed on his mind. But Zemo remained resignedly silent and aloof, no longer willing to share the thoughts that so obviously plagued him. As the distance between them stretched each day, Cole feared he was losing the man he loved to some interior abyss he could neither name nor navigate.

Each morning it took more effort to rouse even a glimmer of warmth from Zemo's cold exterior. Cole wondered how long they could continue like ghosts drifting past one another, until the sadness encircling them became something inescapable, and the men they used to be faded beyond any power to restore. It seemed Zemo had walked that line and crossed over, leaving Cole alone on the near side, grieving for what was lost.

"I gave you all my best me's, my endless empathy

And all I did was bleed as I tried to be the bravest soldier"

Cole sat among the debris of his shattered world, exhaustion like lead in his bones. Though he tried to hide it, Zemo had always seen straight through to his core - and what had he found there? Only a man straining under the weight of another's burdens, doing all he could simply to keep standing as blow after blow fell.

He had spared nothing in caring for Zemo, holding his fractured soul in gentle hands and easing what pain he was able. In turn, Cole's own seams had slowly begun to tear under the pressure, leaked agony seeping through the cracks in his facade of strength. Always he strove to remain stalwart, a solid foundation for the other to lean on.

But foundations can crumble under enough strain, as Cole had finally at length done. Now surrounded by ruins, he questioned all that had come before - had he truly offered solace, or only served as another burden for Zemo to bear? Perhaps in caring so deeply for another, he had neglected his own wellbeing until there was nothing left to give. Cole wept now not only for their lost love, but for all the ways he may have failed the one person whose regard had meant most.

"And I wouldn't marry me either

A pathological people pleaser

Who only wanted you to see her"

Cole knew that if he were to look within himself with brutal honesty, he too would not have chosen such a broken mate. All his value had been placed in another's hands, leaving himself neglected and wanting. He knew now that his endless deference to Zemo's every pain and need, however well-intentioned, had been borne not from pure caring alone - there were uglier motives entwined.

In pleasing Zemo so completely, in making himself indispensable, had he simply sought validation and purpose? Had he wrapped his own insecure soul in the guise of selflessness, so that Zemo's favor became the lens through which he viewed his worth? No wonder such a foundation proved perilously unstable, cracking under the slightest pressure once Zemo's regard began to waver.

"And I'm fadin', thinkin'

"Do something, babe, say something" (say something)

"Lose something, babe, risk something" (you're losin' me)

"Choose something, babe, I got nothing (got nothing)

To believe"

Cole knew Zemo was resolved to leave, yet in his eyes he dared to hope that some part of the man he loved remained, a part that could feel Cole's pain and be swayed. As Zemo turned to go, Cole's gaze bored into him with exhausted desperation.

"Please," Cole whispered, voice cracked and fraying like his ravaged heart. "If there is any part of you that can be reached...do something. Say anything to make this agony stop. Or if you cannot stay your hand, at least grant me some small sign that what we had was real to you."

A tear broke free, tracing the exquisite torment on Cole's face. "I have nothing left to sustain me if you go like this, without a word of comfort or care for what becomes of me. One word is all I ask to ease this void threatening to swallow me whole. Then I can let you walk away in peace."

Zemo met his pleading eyes but a moment. Some words passed between them, unspoken yet understood, before Zemo turned once more toward the darkness and was gone.

"Stop (stop, stop), you're losin' me

I can't find a pulse

My heart won't start anymore"

His heart shattered beyond repair, Cole withdrew into a pain so profound he could no longer bear another's touch or kindness. While friends reached out in concern, their words and comforts seemed hollow echoes that could not carry through the dense fog enveloping his soul.

Each day Cole faded further, going through motions of living while inside he ceased to do more than merely exist. His vibrant spirit had been severed from this mortal shell it once animated; only an echo remained, drifting wraithlike through the ruins of what was.

No pulse of life or hope stirred in the ashen wasteland Cole had become. His heart, once so full of passion and longing, lay stilled; no force of will seemed capable of jolting it to beat again. And so Cole dwelt as one already dead, wandering a purgatory of his own shattered making, lost to all in this world and the next.

decided that one of our OG couples deserved a fanfic of how the things ended between them, so there you go!😁

tags: @missstrawbs2001 @jackiequick @blueboirick @cherrysft @meiramel @purpleprincessonfyre @ask-missparker @askstevella @therealdaydreamstark @rickb-chaos @luna-d-marsh @rooster-84 @gaminggirlsstuff

#oc post #oc rp #oc rpg #marvel #marvel roleplay #marvel oc #marvel x oc #cole lensherr #helmut zemo

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