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[necessary_child]

Sam's small London flat usually looks like a bomb's hit it, but in a comfortable, cosy kind of way.

This is neither comfortable, nor cosy.

Sofa and chairs are over-turned, their stuffing ripped out; the TV is not much more than a smashed, smoking pile of scrap metal; food is everywhere and there's a very disagreeable-looking (and smelling) stain in the middle of the carpet.

Sam enters edgily, though his magical senses tell him there's no-one here any longer. No-one other than mundane, at any rate. His face is even paler than usual, and his black eyes are glittering in a way that bode no good at all for the person or persons responsible as he props the door to Milliways open with what remains of a table chair.

"Well, it's not quite the makeover I'd been hoping for." Voice unnaturally calm.

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[necessary_child]

Sam hears the door slam and breathes a momentary sigh of relief. But only for a moment.

He approaches his brother; Apollo, more resistant than any human, is picking himself up with a groan. Magic picks him up again and hurls him once more against the wall, so hard he makes not just an imprint this time, but a man-shaped dent.

"I suppose it's you I've to thank for the charming new decor?" Sam enquires conversationally, though there's a hard note like steel in his voice. He kicks Apollo's golden sword away from him. This is not the Sam Linnfer Guppy knows, this is Lucifer, bastard Prince of Time.

Apollo pushes himself painfully up on his elbows to find the tip of Sam's own sword at his throat. "Seemed it would suit you, Princeling dear." Through a voice strained with pain. "Not that there was much to do to get it this way."

The sword presses harder. "Was that you in Bangkok as well, brother mine? Firedancers seem like an appropriately cowardly choice for you. Never did like coming down from your ivory tower and getting your fingers dirty, not when your sister could do it for you."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

Sam's smile is almost a shark's. "I think you do, brother. And I'll use the Light to prove it, if I have to."

A glint of something that could almost be fear in Apollo's eyes. "You... haven't got the nerve, it's all over Heaven how terrified you are... of yourself."

Hard black eyes meet his gaze, forcing Apollo to look away first. "Will you take that chance, Apollo? Dare me to discharge, to read every single secret thought you ever treasured, to see your soul?" He kneels to be on a level with his brother. "You invade my flat, you threaten my friends and the only brother I've ever called friend... Don't think I won't do it. Don't ever think I won't." And the black eyes tell Apollo that he speaks the truth. "What were you after, brother? What made you send Firedancers to Bangkok and mortal vandals to my flat, then come yourself when they failed you?"

Apollo has lost all his suave charm now, snarling like a wounded animal. "Bugger off, bastard prince. You want no part of my mind!" Bright golden light sweeps up, taking Sam by surprise and sending him sprawling blindly backwards to the floor, desperately trying to uncloud his vision as Apollo scrabbles for his sword and finds it, bringing it sweeping down in an awkward arc towards Sam’s chest. Sam brings his own sword up just in time, using magical senses to see as best he can as he stumbles to his feet. Magic picks Apollo up for the third time, more weakly now as Sam tires, hurling him through the gap where the front door was and down the stairs to the front door where he falls in a broken heap like a rag doll and eventually crawls off into the London darkness.

Sam’s never yet killed a sibling, close as he’s come at times. He wants to believe he's better than they are, needs to believe. So the only thing that follows Apollo down the stairs is his crown as Sam slumps, gasping, to the floor. He does not move for a long time.

Guppy won’t be seeing him again tonight.