#he'd still look out for a fellow night owl.. they're all in this together 😔

[vullcanica]

@cryptidsdad cont. from x

Even he has to admit there's an irony to this. Something about glass houses and rocks, he who casts the first stone, so on, so forth. Pots and kettles and all. Like any man aware of his vices, though, the sting of hypocrisy eludes Angel. They both look like shit, he can say it with chest.

"Fuckin' pedantics." he scoffs instead - a low, tired noise. Stood in line behind Robert at the coffee shop, he palpably sulks in kind, devoid of the energy needed for genuine arguing. "'Good looking' and '6 am' rarely go hand in hand." Admittedly, Robert almost manages by a margin, strong-jawed, dark and brooding that he is, but the unfocused gaze knocks him down a peg. Angel tells him none of this.

It's far too early on a Wednesday and the poor shopkeep's just let them in off the street like dying strays. There's few of them, all in varying stages of zombification prostrated over the café furniture, quiet and regretful of whatever choice landed them there. For Angel it's work, as always. His head pounds and his eyes ache from the onslaught of morning sun after poring over a computer screen all night. He feels far worse than he looks. But certainly looks it. Fits right into the ambience of what seems like, by and large, a congregation of the undead. Robert still stands out, bleary eyed and unsteady. So that certainly means something.

"You, though, measure somewhere around 'dead on your feet'."

Sure enough, Robert's axis visibly tilts again and he sways a little. Not dangerously, granted, it's just a slight lean but Angel's instincts still kick in on automatic and an unnaturally strong hand steadies the man by the forearm.

"Night shifter?" he asks, sympathetic. He knows. He understands. To be fair, staying up to work on a case out of his own volition does make his suffering feel more self-imposed, but commiseration doesn't always require perfectly matching circumstances. He pats Robert's arm anyway, before relinquishing it. "Word to the wise, coffee won't help."