#ive forgotten all shapes and all colors ive never drawn anything in my life

[deheerkonijn]

When I’m in an art slump I draw Legolas being pretty on social media. 

[out-of-jams]

Press Play || knj

Summary: You didn’t mean to. Didn’t intend to fall in love with a dying man.

                         Pairing: Namjoon x Reader.                       

                         Word count: 9k

                         Warnings/Genre: Fluff, alluded smut, cursing, angst, character death.

All of my works are purely fiction. Everything I write is my intellectual property and therefore belongs to me. ©out-of-jams. Do not copy or repost without permission.

                               | | Masterlist | |

Beep. Beep. Beep.

With a sigh, you shifted on the uncomfortable chair’s hard plastic. It creaked beneath your weight in protest, as if judging you for the powdered donut pressed to your lips. The obnoxious beeping from the heart monitor belonging to the patient behind the curtain next to you continued on, blaring loudly over the annoyance wafting off you in waves.

You hated hospitals, hated everything about them. From the sterile smell of disinfectant, to the unnecessarily bright walls and fluorescent lighting, and all the way to the way the stench of disappointment hovered right on the precipice of hope. The sound of footfalls could be heard from outside the door of the room, left half-open as if to try and air out the reek of hopelessness.

Another breath of hot air left your lips as you attempted to relax further back into the chair that apparently had some sort of vendetta against your numb rear. The crinkle of the plastic wrapped mini donuts was the only sound that could be heard over the beeping of the heart monitor behind the curtain. The white sheeted bed to the left of you was empty, the covers drawn down messily.

Somewhere in the cold building they called a hospital was your sister, hooked up to the same machine that was trying to save her life, only to pump deadly chemicals into her bloodstream. She’d left you alone thirty minutes ago, practically stiff arming you into staying behind while she got treatment. Soohee, your sister, absolutely refused to allow you to see her in what she liked to joke was her cyborg form.

Even though the joke made no sense, you didn’t have it in you to refuse anything that came out of her mouth. Especially when that request came at the cost of you not having to witness her skin turn a sickly, pallor white while the machine at her side filtered her body with the white hot fire that they called medicine.

While your tongue flickered across your lips to collect the white powdered sugar at the corner of your mouth, you hand stayed busy absentmindedly scrolling through your Instagram feed. It was right as you were liking a vacation picture of some old highschool acquaintance that the door to the room swung the rest of the way open. Just like the chair under your ass, the door protested at the movement.

You were going to ignore it, you really were. You knew it couldn’t be your sister, seeing as how she still had a little ways to go to finish her treatment. But a flash of silver caught at the corner of your eye and refused to let go. So there you were, the final half of your last powdered donut pressed to your parted lips, that you saw it. No, not it.

Him.

He shuffled through the door in a pair of white slippers the same shade as the boring walls, with one hand holding on to the IV pole wheeling along beside him. Dressed in a pair of comfortable looking black sweatpants and a baggy grey hoodie, the boy’s attention was somewhere over his shoulder. You couldn’t make out any facial features from the way he was turned, but his mop of messily styled silver hair caught the fluorescent light almost teasingly. His tan skin that poked out from the sleeves of his hoodie looked a little pale, the veins in his hand standing out as it grasped onto the IV pole.

“Really, don’t worry.” Even without seeing his face, you knew that his voice matched him perfectly. It was deep, but with a rasp to it that made it soft around the edges. “I’ll be fine.”

Somewhere outside of the room someone responded. Your ears couldn’t make out who it was or what they said, but the slightly high pitched lilt of the voice told you it was female. A nurse, probably. Or a doctor. Whatever, that wasn’t really what was important. What was important, however, was the scratchy chuckle that flowed from the boy’s mouth like water.

“Promise.” He lifted his free hand in a wave, jokingly shooing whoever was on the other side of the door. “I’ll ring if I need anything.”

The nurse, or doctor, or shaman, or whoever the hell it was, must have taken the boy’s word because his hand reached out to draw the door back to its half-shut position. You really should have averted your eyes, or politely looked away or something as he finally turned, but you couldn’t bring yourself to move.

You didn’t believe in love at first sight or in soulmates or whatever mumbo-jumbo bullshit people liked to put their faith in to feel less lonely. Attraction at first sight though? You definitely believed in that. It was hard not to. Especially when your eyes caught the dark brown ones of the boy standing in the doorway.

Almonds. That was your first thought. Almonds that had been left out to sit in the sun for too long and now radiated warmth. He may not have had long eyelashes that brushed gently against the apple of his cheeks or whatever stupid bull that was written on the pages of romance novels. But god, he didn’t need them anyway.

Your second thought was of the perfectly shaped slope of his nose right above plush pink lips. And the natural golden, sunkissed hue of his skin that should have clashed with the color of his hair, but somehow didn’t.

His ears were pierced. Small silver hoops dangled from his earlobes, catching the light. Not all men could pull of the whole pierced ear thing without looking like a giant, raging douchebag, but somehow he managed to make it look soft, handsome even.

The boy stood frozen in the doorway like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car, eyes wide and lips slightly parted in surprise. He must not have been expecting to see you there. Not when the room was normally empty or at the very least usually had the curtains around the few occupied beds drawn closed in a semblance of privacy. He must have been new. You’d never seen him before.

“Uh,” the sound left his lips as he blinked slowly, short eyelashes dark against his skin. “Hello.”

God, he must have been freaked out by the weird ass girl with powdered sugar clinging to her lips with the staring problem. But it wasn’t like you could help it. Not like it was everyday that you got the privilege to lay eyes on a boy--no, man--who looked like he could grace the cover of GQ magazine.

His voice snapped you out of your silent analyzation and you gave your head a light shake to bring yourself back to the present. You lifted your fingers in a little wave with the hand still holding on to the mini donut, powder flaking off onto the hard tiled floor. “Hey.”

He gave an awkward smile at that. Either he didn’t know how to respond or didn’t have the desire to. Because that was the end of that short conversation. With a small nod of his head, the man shuffled further into the room, the squeak of the wheels of his IV pole trailing after him.

Your eyes dropped from him at that point so that he didn’t think you were some sort of weirdo. But you couldn’t help but glance at him out of the corner of your eye while you pretended to scroll through Instagram again. It wasn’t like the beach photos from Gabby’s vacation four months ago could spark your interest anyway. Especially not while the first splash of radiant color that you’d seen in that dreary hospital shambled towards the bed right across from you.

How cliché.

It would have been at least, if the man’s slipper hadn’t caught on the edge of his IV pole. With a yelp of surprise, the man stumbled forward, free arm pinwheeling in attempt to regain his balance. Whatever backwater physics he was trying to pull failed him and down he went, sprawling across the full-sized mattress with limbs splayed in the most undignified manner you’d ever seen.

He’d somehow managed to drag the pole down with him. It rang loudly as it fell half-onto the bed and the floor, the bag of fluids swinging wildly. One of the man’s slippers left his foot with the fall to take shelter underneath the metal bed frame.

The deathly silence that overtook the room was brief, but voluminous.

“Are you okay?”

You shot to your feet, almost empty donut package forgotten as it fell. The soles of your shoes scuffed against the tiled floor as you raced over to his side of the room. You stopped at the foot of his bed, hands awkwardly hovering over his prone form.

He was tall. So tall that his legs hung halfway off the bed and dragged against the floor. His lips were parted in surprise as he gaped at the IV pole like it’d insulted his mother. Like he couldn’t believe what just happened.

“Blink once for yes, twice for no.” Your concerned voice must have snapped him out of the confused daze he’d been left in, because he blinked once and lifted his eyes to you. “Ah, I’ll take that as a yes then.”

“Yeah. I’m..,” he cleared his throat awkwardly. “Yeah.”

“Nice to meet you, Yeah.” The corner of your lips perked in amusement at your own joke, eyes trained on him as he scrambled to sit up. “Sure you’re okay? Need me to call someone?”

“I’m okay.” He finally regained his balance to sit up properly, feet planted firmly on the floor: one slippered and one bare. His slendered hands reached out to return the IV pole to its proper upright position. Though he kept his eyes averted from you, likely in an attempt to hide the heated pink blooming across his cheeks.

“You sure, Yeah?” You crossed your arms across your chest. The fabric of your denim jacket did little to chase away the cold air conditioning that the hospital somehow insisted be blasted on high at all times.

“Namjoon.” His voice sounded muffled as he bent over to retrieve the lost slipper underneath the bed.

“What?” The tilt of your head couldn’t be helped as you stared down at him in confusion. A golden ring on one of his fingers caught your attention as he slipped his footwear back on.

“My name.” The man finally looked up at you, a small smile tilting at the corners of his plush lips. “It’s Namjoon. Not Yeah.”

“You sure?” The expression on your face was deadly serious, mouth pursed. “I think Yeah kind of suits you. Very unique.”

The man, Namjoon, lifted a dark eyebrow in response. His smile grew in amusement, forcing the two dimples on his cheeks out of hiding. “You saying I’m unique?”

Namjoon’s warm eyes glistened teasingly and now it was your turn to feel warmth blossom across your face and down your neck. You cleared your throat. “Well, you sure know how to make an entrance, that’s for sure.”

Eyes widened in shock at the words that just spewed from your lips, you clamped your jaw shut. Why the universe had cursed you with the sarcastic humor of a bitter 90 year-old widow, you had no idea. But wow, talk about putting your foot in your mouth. With an internal cringe, you waited with bated breath at the offended look that was sure to overtake his face.

Namjoon groaned, both hands covering his face in embarrassment. He didn’t explode in anger however. A chuckle left his lips and he shook his head back and forth like he could wipe the memory from his mind. “Please pretend you never saw that.”

You sucked in air through your teeth jokingly and shrugged in fake apology. “Sorry, no can do, dude. It’s seared into my brain. Cursed to forever play on repeat.”

“Talk about embarrassing.” Namjoon’s voice was muffled by the palms of his hands.

“Nah, don’t worry about it.” You leaned your thighs against the metal bed frame, hands finding the pockets of your jacket. “I’ve seen worse here, trust me.”

Those seemed like the magic words, because Namjoon finally freed himself from the cage of his fingers and lifted his eyes back to yours. His dark eyebrows shot into the messy bangs that shifted with his fall and now fell across his forehead. “Worse? What could have possibly been more embarrassing than what just happened?”

“Well,” your tongue ran across your lips, eyes raising to the white ceiling in memory. “There’s this old woman in one of the rooms a few doors down. I’ve heard some of the residents call her Crazy Shorts Cathy, but between you and me, I think that’s kinda rude.”

“Crazy Shorts Cathy?” Namjoon interrupted your story with a snort of amusement. “Why do they call her that?”

“Trust me, once you see her, you’ll know.” You nodded sagely, a smile gracing your lips as you reached up to twirl a piece of your hair around a finger absentmindedly. “But anyway, back to the topic at hand. So, Crazy Shorts Cathy had surgery a little while ago. And afterwards she was so doped up on anesthesia that she was somehow convinced that she was a medieval knight.

“Poor woman tried to joust the nurses with an IV pole. Caused a huge commotion in the hall. Like, there were doctors and nurses everywhere trying to wrestle the pole from her without opening her fresh stitches. So many casualties. Too many. May they rest in peace.”

A loud laugh left Namjoon, filling the cold room with warmth. It didn’t sound like bells, or windchimes or some other stupid romantic simile. No, Namjoon’s laugh was a roaring, throaty ha-ha-ha! Like it couldn’t leave his lips without forming each syllable perfectly.

“What?” His eyes were wide in disbelief, staring up at you with shoulders shaking in laughter.

Your own ugly, obnoxious laugh joined his, sounding more like a squeaky toy than anything else. That only seemed to spur his amusement further until no sound left him, just quiet intakes of air as he completely lost himself. Namjoon was bent over at the waist, elbows braced against his knees and eyes squeezed shut with mirth.

“That can’t--” He had to pause in order to get the breath to speak. “That can’t be true.”

With teeth biting into your bottom lip to try and contain your giggles, you shook your head. “It’s not.”

“What?” Namjoon lifted his gaze back to you, eyes shining with unshed tears of glee. He pointed a finger at you and tried his hardest to give you a stern look, but the silent laughter shaking his chest gave him away. “You lied!”

“Ah.” You pointed your own finger back at him. “But I made you feel better though. Just don’t tell Crazy Shorts Cathy that I’ve been soiling her name.”

“Oh, so she’s real?”

“She most definitely is.” You nodded in fake seriousness.

A short silence overtook the room once again. But instead of being filled with awkward air, it was comfortable, infused with a homey warmth that threatened to chase away the chilled ice of the air conditioning.

“Hey.” Namjoon’s voice had sobered and he leaned back on the bed on his hands, head tilted back to look at where you still stood at the foot of the bed. “You never told me your name.”

You simply shrugged one shoulder in response. “Maybe I’m the mysterious type.”

He snorted, silver hoop earrings glinting teasingly. “Mysterious people don’t go around telling people that they’re mysterious. That kind of goes against the whole ‘mystery’ thing.”

“Does it?” You wiggled your eyebrows playfully, slowly shuffling backwards and towards your  abandoned hard plastic chair.

“It definitely does.” Namjoon sat back up properly at your retreat, a frown pulling down the corners of his lips. “Where are you going?”

“That’s a mystery, Namjoon.” You were almost there, feet away from your sister’s bed.

“Ah, of course.” He nodded knowingly, as if you’d just told him the answers to the universe. “Whatever you say, Sugar.”

That halted your feet. “Sugar?”

Namjoon hummed and shifted himself on the bed so that he could lie down properly, even though the bottoms of his slippers still hung over the bed. Long-legged giant that he was. “That’s what I’ll call you.”

Your eyebrows drew together in confusion, head tilting to the side like a dog waiting for a command. “Why Sugar?”

He tapped the corner of his mouth and his eyes glinted with amusement once again. Your own widened as you quickly reached up to brush away the powdered sugar still clinging to your face.

God damnit. Talk about embarrassing yourself. “Please pretend you never saw that.”

Namjoon simply propped himself up on the wall behind his bed.  “Sorry, no can do, Sugar. It’s seared into my brain. Cursed to forever play on repeat.”

You groaned, foot stomping against the floor in protest at his mocking words. How dare he. “I cannot stand you.”

His plush lips parted to give a retort, but Namjoon was abruptly cut off as the door to the room swung open. Your attention was immediately pulled away from the adonis across the room and to the girl that stumbled through the door.

Whatever fire that Namjoon had ignited in the room with his presence disappeared with the entrance of your sister. Her pale skin seemed even more sickly underneath the ugly fluorescent lights. The top of her head was covered with a pretty pink, sparkly scarf, as if the bright pop of color could somehow chase away her sickness. And the grey sweats and matching sweater she wore that drowned her tiny frame did nothing to help either.

Soohee sent you a shaky smile once she caught your eyes. She dragged her own IV pole behind her as she slowly shuffled inside. You met her halfway, arms extended to wrap around her and guide her back to her bed.

“I’m fine, really.” She tried to reassure you, but the weak, frail way her voice left her throat told you otherwise. Soohee followed without further protest however, and let you tuck her into bed until the covers were pulled up to her chin.

Your fingers brushed the end of her scarf away from her face with gentle fingers. “You should get some sleep.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Soohee rolled her eyes, but let them slip closed anyway. Her treatment always seemed to suck the energy right out of her until only a lifeless shell remained.

With a sigh, you leaned back once more into your uncomfortable chair. Your eyes flickered up to glance at Namjoon, only to see him with his head on his pillow and a book open between his propped up knees. The cords of white headphones flowed from his ears and connected to his phone in order to give you a semblance of privacy.

As you distractedly thumbed through Instagram once again with eyes glazed over, you couldn’t help your thoughts from circling around the man across the room.                                         

Silence greeted your ears as you slowly pushed the door open. It let out a squeak and you grimaced at the sound, turning your gaze to glare at the rusty hinges. You’d think that someone would have fixed that already, but alas, noisy doors weren’t exactly a priority in a busy hospital.

Your eyes lifted to scan around the room, the curtains around all of the beds were closed, shielding the residents from view. The tips of your boots creased as you tip-toed into the room, slowly closing the door behind you. Whether the occupants were awake or asleep you didn’t know, but it was the thought that counted at least.

The charms on the bracelet clasped around your wrist shook as you reached up to brush back your sister’s curtain. All of the lights above her bed were shut off and you could just barely make out her figure underneath the pile of blankets on her bed. As you shuffled to your normal seat, you couldn’t help but reach out to gently brush your fingers against her prone form.

The time on your phone read that it was only 3:37 pm. While that wasn’t exactly prime time for sleeping, you knew your sister tended to take frequent naps due to the exhaustion that constantly overtook her.

Your jeans hit the cold, plastic chair as you slid the bag on your back to the floor at your feet. You tried your best to muffle the sound of the zipper in order to pull out your laptop. There was a seven page English paper just begging to be written. Well, the paper wasn’t begging, but the 11:59 due date definitely was. And of course you hadn’t even started.

It wasn’t until the small digital clock in the corner of your laptop read 4:53pm that you finally heard a noise other than the clicking of your laptop keys. Your fingers paused, hovering over the keyboard as you heard the sound again.

A curtain sliding open.

You tried your best to ignore the feeling of...something pulling at your chest and set your laptop carefully on your chair once you stood up. The soles of your boots squeaked as you snuck over to the curtain and peered out. Across the room stood the very person that had been unrelentingly having a one man show in your thoughts since the day previous.

Namjoon stood next to his bed, hands patting the pockets of his Adida joggers in search for something. A grey beanie was on his head, unknowingly matching the same shade of his hair until both blended into each other. The too-long sleeves of his red hoodie hid half of his hands from view as he continued to search for whatever it was that he’d lost.

A noise left the back of his throat as he finally located the wallet that he pulled out from in between his bed sheets. He slipped it into his pocket and turned abruptly, coming to halt as he caught you peering at him from behind the curtain. Your eyes widened in surprise, having not expected him to turn so quickly. And once again, you felt the burning heat of a blush spread across your cheeks.

Namjoon’s mouth quirked up at having caught you. “Hey.”

His voice was quieted in an attempt to not disturb anyone. But god, someone really should have told him that he was shit at whispering.

Your hand rose on its own accord, fingers wiggling in a wave. “Hey.”

Namjoon slowly made his way over to you with his hands in his pockets, this time wearing actual shoes instead of hospital slippers. “How long have you been here?”

“A while.” You finally slipped free of the curtain separating the two of you, head tilting back in order to maintain eye contact.

He hummed and jerked his head towards the door in silent invitation. “You hungry, Sugar?”

 “Maybe you should wear a bib.”

Namjoon glanced up from his tray of lukewarm hospital food to give you a dry look. But you only raised an eyebrow in response and glanced pointedly down at the barbeque sauce stain that now graced the fabric of his hoodie. The piece of chicken that he’d speared onto his fork was barely hanging on for dear life, threatening to take a nosedive onto the wood table at any moment.

“Maybe you should take your own advice, Sugar.” Namjoon smirked at the feigned insulted look on your face. His deep, raspy voice threatened to drown itself in the loud chatter of the hospital cafeteria and you had to lean a little closer to hear it clearly.

People were scattered throughout the room, queuing behind glass covered food and seating themselves in the tacky chairs and booths. Whoever designed the cafeteria must have been going for a 70s-disco-meets-retirement-home look. It took all you had to keep the high school lunch-esque pepperoni pizza down.

Why hospital food had to be as depressing as the atmosphere, you had no idea.

“I came here to have a good time and I’m honestly feeling so attacked right now.” The cardboard, plastic free straw of your chocolate milk was pressed between your lips.

“Uh-huh.” Namjoon shrugged. “Then I rescind my invitation.”

With a fake gasp of anguish, you slammed your container of choco milk down onto your tray, just narrowly missing the edge. “But then who will I grace with my clever, astounding wit?”

He tilted his head side-to-side as if contemplating your question. With a hum, Namjoon finally, finally saved the piece of chicken on his fork by shoving it into his mouth.

“Crazy Shorts Cathy.”

Namjoon just had to say that right as you were taking a sip of milk. He did it on purpose and you knew it.

You couldn’t help the snort of laughter at his stupid joke, which of course, caused the milk to get caught in the back of your throat mid-swallow. A yelp left your lips at the cooling sensation of milk shooting from your nose. Coughing, you covered your face with one hand and hastily reached over for a napkin from the pile in the center of the table.

Namjoon’s obnoxious ha-ha-ha! drew curious onlookers and you hurriedly attempted to wipe up your embarrassment before it could further stain your non-existent reputation. The silver haired man was bent over, elbows and hands supporting his weight against the table as he laughed himself into hysterics.

“You did that on purpose!” You dropped the used napkins onto your tray and glared up at him. Or you tried to at least. It was hard to stay mad at a man that laughed like a happy baby.

“Maybe you should wear a bib.” Namjoon only slipped harder into laughter at the unamused look on your face.

But the accompanying smile slowly slipped from your face as his laughter turned into coughing. And then the coughing turned into vicious hacking, until the hands that once braced himself against the table now clung to the edge to dear life.

“Namjoon?” You questioned, concern lacing your tone as worry began to take over as his coughs ceased to end.

He shook his head, reaching out to grab up a handful of napkins to press against his mouth. Leaning across the table, you laid a hand on his one that was still grabbing at the table, eyes wide and panic catching in your throat. “Namjoon!”

The man shook his head once again, attempting to take deep breaths to stop the coughs from racking his frame. You were about two seconds away from jumping up from the table to try and help him somehow when he finally stopped. The coughs turned into wheezing and then finally ceased altogether.

“Namjoon?” His name left your lips once again. You tried to catch his eye, but he averted his gaze to a flower print booth across the cafeteria.

“I’m fine.” Namjoon’s voice came out scratchy, the normal rasp accented into something deeper. He took a deep, shuddering breath and moved the now crumpled napkins away from his mouth.

“You sure?” The knit of your brows spoke of your concern for him, lips parted and voice quiet.

“Yeah.” He sent you a weak smile, finally lifting his gaze to yours and dropping the crumpled up napkins onto his tray. “What were we talking about?”

It wouldn’t take a genius to see it. The same look that sometimes graced your sister’s eyes shone in his. A pleading, begging look for you to just forget about what happened and move on. To ignore what you’d just witnessed as if that would somehow erase the memory from your mind.

A smile that didn’t meet your eyes lifted your lips. “Crazy Shorts Cathy.”

“What are you reading?”  

Namjoon glanced up from where he was lounging across his bed, back pressed up against the headboard. His warm eyes met yours as you sat on the end of his bed, legs folded under yourself. Your fingers had paused on the keyboard of your laptop, lips pouted in a desperate attempt at drawing the man into conversation.

“You already asked me that.” Namjoon flapped his book and raised an eyebrow. His plush lips lifted in amusement as you huffed and leaned your head back to glare into the ceiling. “Three times.”

“Amuse me.”

“Paper that rough?”

You finally moved your harsh glare from the ceiling and to the man across from you. Eyes softening unknowingly, your shoulders jerked up in a half-assed shrug. “Maybe.”

“Maybe?” Namjoon chuckled in amusement, now raising both eyebrows to give you the look. His bullshit detector look. You’d been on the receiving end of it a multitude of times throughout the month that you’d known each other.

A mumbled response left your lips accompanied by a put upon sigh.

“What was that, Sugar? You’ll have to speak up. Couldn’t hear you over all that grumbling.”

With a stretch of your leg, your kicked at his thigh playfully with a socked foot. “I just don’t understand why a 10 page paper is necessary. Who gives a flying fuck about why some stupid author transformed his stupid character into a cockroach.”

“Stupid author?” You didn’t even have to open your eyes to see the look he was giving you.

“Sorry,” though the grin that overtook your face negated your apology. “Did I offend thee, thine book nerd?”

Instead of receiving a verbal answer, you felt the tickling pressure of Namjoon’s fingers against the bottom of your foot. With a squeal, you jerked your foot back out of his range.

“Hey! You know I’m ticklish, you traitor!” You ignored Namjoon’s laughter to send him a glare instead. Who cared if it lacked heat? It would get the point across anyway.

He merely rolled his eyes before placing his bookmark into the spine of the book and slipping it closed. The glossy cover hit the end table next to his bed and he reached out a hand to wave you over.

“Come here.”

“All the way over there?” You really hoped the sarcastic tone of your voice drowned out the loud pounding of your heart beating against your rib cage. Hoped that it hid the butterflies that took flight in your stomach.

“Yes, all the way over here.” Namjoon wiggled his fingers in invitation. “Or do you want to keep writing your paper?”

The lid of your laptop closed in response to his question and you shifted to your knees to slowly crawl your way to the head of the bed. With the mattress dipping at your weight, you settled on top of the rumpled blanket and leaned your back against the wall to mirror him.

While you’d been friends with Namjoon for weeks, that was the closest you two had been in proximity to each other. If you shared the same bed, you’d be at one end and he’d be at the other. Not side by side. Not so close that the skin exposed by his short sleeved shirt brushed against yours. Not so close that you could smell the scent of fresh laundry that wafted off of him.

You weren’t sure whether you wanted your sister to wake up from her nap or not. Weren’t sure if you should be feeling how you were feeling. Weren’t sure whether the frantic beating of your heart was from the way Namjoon’s voice caressed your eardrums, or if it was from fear.

“Here.”

Held in between his slender fingers was one end of his earphones. The other was already pressed into his ear closest to you. You took his offer without hesitation, pushing the bud into your ear until half of the white noise in the room disappeared.

“What are we watching?” You asked, eyes tracking as his thumbs flicked across the bright screen of his phone held up between you.

“Not watching.” Namjoon opened up Apple music and didn’t even pause to read over the song titles like he could navigate his playlist blindly. “Listening.”

“What are we listening to then?”

His thumb finally stopped on whatever song it was that he was looking for. Seeing him move to look at you out of the corner of your eye had you turning to meet his gaze. His almond eyes shone with something, something, before his dimples revealed themselves with a smile.

“Just listen.” The warmth of his voice blended in with the gentle, melancholy song that drifted in from your end of the earphones.

You slipped your eyes closed in an attempt to block out Namjoon’s soft, soft, soft look and concentrate on the harmonizing vocals. At least that’s what you told yourself. Your head found his shoulder, bringing with it the scent of his warmth.

And if his cheek pressed onto the top of your head and his breath ghosted the baby hairs brushing your forehead, well, at least your eyes weren’t open to witness the heavy sigh leaving his lips.

But you could feel it.

You could feel it.

Something.                                                   

“I’m so sorry for ever doubting you.”

The disbelief in Namjoon’s tone was almost palpable. You leaned back into the vending machine behind you, back pressed to the glass and shoulders shaking as you held back a laugh. Namjoon’s expression mirrored his tone, dark eyes wide and mouth gaping.

You hummed, unscrewing the cap of your iced tea to take a sip. “I told you. But you didn’t believe me.”

“I-” Namjoon’s voice stuttered in his throat as the topic of you conversation passed by once again.

With long salt-and-pepper hair pulled back into a low ponytail, the short woman pushed open the door across from the alcove of vending machines. She looked normal, sounded normal, hell, even smelled like normal flowery perfume. But the knee length shorts covered in a multitude of rainbow colored horses spoke otherwise. The door shut behind her, taking both her perfume and loud shorts with her.

“Holy shit.”

Pushing off of the vending machine, you reached up and closed Namjoon’s gaping mouth with a finger. His wide eyes flickered over to you as you leaned in close as if telling him a secret. You told yourself that you didn’t care when his gaze moved to your mouth for the briefest moments. Told yourself that he didn’t lean his head closer to yours. Told yourself that you didn’t want to close the distance and see for yourself if his lips were as soft as they looked.

“If you want.” Your lowered voice brought Namjoon’s attention back to your eyes. “I can buy you a pair.”

Namjoon groaned in exasperation as you leaned back onto the heels of your shoes, hands clasped behind your back, eyes wide and expression innocent.  

“Let’s leave the crazy shorts to Crazy Shorts Cathy please.”

Your laugh echoed down the hospital hallway, drawing glances from some of the passing nurses. But you ignored them in favor of the fake annoyed expression that crossed Namjoon’s face. For the soft smile that graced his lips. For the way his tongue caressed your name to pull you back to the hospital room.

For the way your heart pounded a tattoo into your rib cage. 

“Joon.” Your voice was whispered, stretching out across the nonexistent space between your bodies.

“Hm?” Namjoon’s sleep filled hum filled the darkness encompassing the room. The curtain hiding the two of you blocked out the light from underneath the hospital room door. Soft breaths could be heard from the few occupied beds in the room, accompanied by the beep, beep, beep of the heart monitor hiding behind another curtained section.

The blanket thrown over the both of your shoulders shifted as you turned onto your side. Barely, just barely, you could make out Namjoon’s profile in the dark. The soft slope of his nose turned a little in your direction as you moved.

“Why..,” you took a breath, voice fading as you tried to find the words that failed you.

Namjoon’s fingers trailed a line of fire against your shoulder, his thumb drawing light circles onto your skin. The sound of his heartbeat was calming and you slowly inhaled his comforting scent, the soft cotton of his shirt caressing your cheek.

“Why?” He prompted. You felt the deep rumble of his chest more than you heard his actual words.

“You never told me.” The fingers of the hand thrown across his waist plucked at his shirt helplessly. “Why you’re here.”

Silence.

The beeping of the heart monitor.

A sigh.

“Sugar.”

You shook your head as much as you could with your limited range of movement. The fingers of your hand fisted the material of his shirt, bunching it in a way that you knew would wrinkle. “No. Don’t coddle me.”

“I’m not--”

“You are.” Your nose met the soft skin of his neck, the warm breath of your words causing him to shudder. “We’ve known each other for six months. You know you can tell me anything.”

Namjoon’s fingers halted their movement against your shoulder. He let out another sigh, turning his face and burying it into the top of your head. “I can’t.”

“Why?” If your voice broke, neither of you mentioned it.

“Because, Sugar.” He threaded his fingers into your hair, burrowing themselves in the glossy strands. “I don’t want to ruin this.”

“Please, Joon.” The words were more of a shaky exhale than anything else. “Please.”

Namjoon’s chest shuddered. His nose buried itself further into your hair, his lips brushing the crown of your head. The silence was stifling, lingering so long that you thought he wouldn’t respond. Thought he would deny you of the one answer that had been tormenting your mind for months. That had been mixing fear into the euphoria that churned your stomach.

But finally, finally his voice met your ears. And you’d never wished for someone to take back words more than right then, in the darkness pressed to his chest.

“Cancer. Lung cancer.” Namjoon’s fingers tightened in your hair to where it was almost painful. But you couldn’t complain, couldn’t move away. Forced to face reality. “Terminal.”

“Joon.”

“Sugar.”  

“Why don’t you do chemotherapy? I’ve never seen you go. You’ve never--”

“Sugar.”

“It could help. It could--”

“Sugar.”

The hitch of your breath brushed the skin of his neck and your fingers tangled themselves even further into his shirt. As if that could somehow force him to take the words back. Force the reality back into something else. Anything else.

“It won’t help.” Namjoon’s lips pressed to your forehead and they lingered before he pulled away. But only so he could pull you harder against him. “It won’t do anything. I’m too far gone.”

“How long?” You weren’t sure if you wanted to know. But you needed to. Had to.

“A few months, maybe. At least that’s what the doctor says.”

Not even the beeping of the heart monitor could drown out the cries that fell from your lips. The salty tears that left a trail of anguish down his neck. The sound of your heart slowly breaking. 

The soft scritch-scritch-scritch of pencil on paper filled the room. It was almost masked by the hard beat that bled from the speakers of Namjoon’s phone.

“Stop corrupting my little sister.” Your voice was filled with amusement as you looked up from the book open on your lap. Something that you normally wouldn’t have read, but did so at Namjoon’s insistence.

The gray haired man sent you a smile, dimples revealing themselves. It was bright in the room for once. The curtains spread across the window looking outside that were normally closed were pushed open to let in the sunlight. It filtered in, bringing its warmth with it.

Namjoon shifted in his hard plastic chair, amused eyes throwing you a look that said not my fault. “Hey, she’s the one that told me to put this on.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t have to listen to her.”

“She can make her own decisions, thank you very much.” Soohee didn’t look up from the sketch pad settled across her lap. The pencil in her hand continued to move as she drew the portrait of the main sitting in a chair at the foot of her bed.

“She also has taste.” Namjoon didn’t even try to hide the cheeky smile he sent your way.

“You saying I don’t have taste?” You narrowed your eyes at the man as the opening sound of another 2Pac song flowed from his shitty phone speakers.

Namjoon’s eyes creased into half-moons as a blinding grin graced his lips. The white of his teeth was almost blinding in the sunlit room. Or maybe that was just Namjoon himself. You didn’t know. “You said it, not me.”

“Hey!” You looked around for something to throw at him, but failed to find anything that wouldn’t accidentally break his perfect teeth. So you settled for crossing your arms across your chest instead, pout overtaking your features. “Bully.”

“You love it.” Namjoon teased, slouching further down in his chair in an attempt to get comfortable.

“Stop moving!” Soohee ordered, slapping a hand to her sketchpad in exasperation.

“Sorry, sorry.” The man apologized, his warm eyes moving back to meet yours.

You couldn’t avert your gaze. Couldn’t move. Didn’t want to.

Only hoped that the look in your eyes expressed all of the things that you couldn’t.        

“If you could be anything in the world, what would it be?”

Namjoon hummed in thought, his face so close to your own that you had to close your eyes to avoid going cross-eyed. It was dark yet again, the curtain around his bed drawn to a close. You liked to imagine that it could stop time. That the flimsy material hanging above your heads could freeze you in that moment forever.

“A rapper.”

“A rapper?” You opened your eyes in disbelief, mouth falling agape. “Really?”

He shifted, fingers tapping out an imaginary beat against your hip. “Yes really.”

“Hm.” Your own fingers traced nonsensical shapes against the skin of his exposed collarbone. “Wouldn’t have expected that.”

“Is it really that far fetched?”

You paused in thought, tongue flickering out to wet your lips. “Nah, I guess not. I could see it. You get all poetic sometimes.”

Namjoon’s breathy laugh fanned against your face. “What would you be?”

A small shrug lifted your shoulders. “I dunno. I’d like to travel, even though that’s not really a career.”

“Where would you go?” His hand moved from your hip and upwards, his thumb caressing the apple of your cheek. Your eyes slid closed on their own accord as you leaned into his touch.

“Anywhere. Everywhere.”

“That sounds nice.”

You smiled. “Yeah. But only if you came with me.”

“I’d like that.” Namjoon’s thumb drifted to your bottom lip and you shuddered at the feeling of his skin against yours. "For you to take me with you."

“Yeah?” Your question ghosted against his thumb. “Where would you wanna go?”

“Mm. Seoul.”

“Korea?”

“Yeah.”

“Why there?”

“My parents were born there. I think I’d like to see it. See where they came from.”

“I think I’d like to see it to.” Your breath hitched when his head shifted against the pillow, breath mingling with your own.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Soft.

Namjoon’s lips were softer than you imagined they’d be as they pressed gently against yours. He tasted of the strawberry chapstick he loved to use. Tasted of hopelessness, of heartbreak turning bitter on your tongue. You threaded your fingers through his hair and pulled him closer, pressed your lips harder against his.

His kiss forced the thoughts from your mind. The feeling of his hand sliding up your shirt extinguished the cold rush of despair from your veins. His shirt hitting the floor buried the soul crushing anguish. The feeling of skin-on-skin spoke of desperation. His mouth on yours stifled the moans that threatened to escape your throat as he made you feel what neither of you could say aloud.

The darkness swallowed up the heat of his gaze as the curtain shielding you from the rest of the world stopped time.

“So, I’ve been thinking.”

“Wow, that’s a surprise.”

Namjoon snorted at your sarcastic reply, lips pressed together to try and hide his mirth. But the happy gleam that sparked behind his eyes gave him away. “As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted.”

“If this is you trying to get into my head, think again.” You mumbled distractedly, shuffling around the cards in your hand. The fact that you didn’t even need to look up to see Namjoon’s eye roll was scary.

“Like I even need to. You’ve lost the past five rounds.”

“Shut up!” Tongue in cheek, you glanced up to see his amused expression before looking back down at your cards. “Got any 3s?”

“Go fish.” Namjoon smirked at your groan of exasperation, ignoring your mumbled you’re cheating. “As I was saying. I was thinking.”

“About what, cheater?”

He paused before answering, eyes lingering on you as if gauging your response to what he would say next. “I want to show you something.”

Looking up at him over the tops of your cards, you wiggled your eyebrows. “Yeah? Like what?”

Namjoon gave a deep, put upon sigh that only you could pull from him. He jokingly called it annoyance, but you called it an accomplishment. He shook his head at you, the purple of his newly dyed hair clashing violently with the orange shirt he had on. Why that man chose to dress like a chic hobo with no fashion sense was beyond you.

“You know what? Nevermind.”

“No! Tell me!” The cards in your hand dropped to the table between you and you leaned forward, hands outstretched to grab onto his forearms.

The two of you were in one of the lounges in the hospital’s ICU. The other chairs were empty, leaving just the two of you together. You would go there together sometimes to escape the boring white walls of the rest of the hospital. At least here someone had thrown up brightly colored wallpaper. Even if it didn’t match the ugly polka-dotted upholstery of the couches.

Whoever the interior designer of the place was really needed to be fired.

“No, now I-” Namjoon cut himself off, a hand pressed to his lips to try and stop the sudden coughs from forcing their way out. They overtook him, his wheezing, violent coughs.

“Joon!” You stood from your chair in alarm, rushing around the small table separating you. Knees hitting the carpeted floor painfully, you kneeled in between his legs, hands coming out to rub at his shoulders.

Namjoon bent at the waist, wet coughs hacking their way out of his throat. His forehead met your shoulder and you raised a hand to run through his hair. “I’m here, Joon. I’m here.”

You didn’t know how long his attack lasted, but it was too long. Too long that he was without breath. Too long that he sat there coughing and wheezing and shaking. But like everything, it eventually came to an end. And Namjoon sat back, swiping a hand across his lips and smearing blood.

“Joon.” Your voice came out choked. Alarmed. The red on his skin didn’t belong there. Shouldn’t have been splattered down his chin.

“I’m okay, Sugar. I’m fine.” But Namjoon’s voice didn’t sound okay. Didn’t sound fine. His breath shuddered as he inhaled, like his lungs were protesting against the intake. “I’m okay.”

He wasn’t.     

“This one’s a favorite.”

“You’ve said that about all of them.”

“Duh. That’s because I mean it.”

“They can’t all be your favorites.”

“Yeah, Joon? Says who? You the favorite police?”

“What even is that?”

“Exactly.”

Your fingers flipped the page, eyes reading over the words penned into the white spaces. Namjoon’s neat handwriting stared back up at you, the poetic lyrics drawing you in, pulling you deeper into his thoughts. His hopes. His dreams. His fears.

“Let me see which one you’re reading at least.”

Jerking the leatherbound journal out of Namjoon’s line of sight was harder than one might think. The tall, long-legged giant had height on you. But you managed, somehow. “Nope. Now let me read in peace.”

His sigh harmonized perfectly with your laughter.  

Namjoon’s dry stare bore so deeply into you that you swore you could feel his gaze in your soul. He rolled his eyes skyward as if asking the divine why he was forced to deal with you.

“Why?”

“You don’t like them?” You pouted, kneeling onto the mattress of his bed to peer up at him with puppy eyes. Your lips met the soft skin of his cheek. “Don’t want it?”

Namjoon sighed as you kissed your way across his jaw, stopping just before you reached his lips. “Want me to take it back? My gift that was so painstakingly difficult for me to get?”

“For fucks sake.” He rolled his eyes yet again, ignoring your your face will get stuck like that. Namjoon turned his head and captured your lips in a chaste kiss. “I’ll keep it. Happy?”

“Will you wear it though?” It was hard to contain your giggle, even between the pecks he littered onto your mouth.

“Don’t push it.”

Your giggles turned into full blown laughter, eyes landing back on the ugly, rainbow colored cat printed shorts drooping in his grasp.

It was raining.

That much you could remember.

The icy droplets had poured from the sky suddenly as you hopped out of your car and rushed into the hospital. It pelted your skin, drenched your hair, dampened your clothes. But you didn’t feel it. Didn’t care.

The white tiled floor squeaked underneath the soles of your shoes as you ran straight past the reception desk. The white painted walls blurred together as your chest heaved with the effort of running. You knocked into a nurse. Or a doctor. Or a shaman. Fuck, you didn’t know. Didn’t care. Didn’t stop to check.

It wasn’t until you saw the familiar door. Until you flung it open with so much force that it bounced into the wall and ricocheted back towards you. Breath leaving you in pants, your eyes stared, stared, stared at the empty bed. At the curtains drawn neatly back as if taunting you that there wasn’t enough time. That there had never been enough time.

Your feet were glued to the floor, stuck as if you could rewind time if you didn’t move. As if reality wouldn’t come crashing down on you.

Movement caught your eye and you whipped your head around to stare at the small frame of your sister. She stood by her bed, hands grabbing at her own curtain like a lifeline. Soohee stared at you, eyes filled with a sadness that you didn’t want to see. That you refused to accept.

“When?”

“Last night.” Her voice was small, but the words were obnoxiously loud, filling the room with dreadful silence.

“Why?” You may as well have been screaming, but the question barely even left your lips. The room was cold. So cold.

“He didn’t want you to see it.” You could have sworn you saw her move, inching her way over to you. But you weren’t sure. Couldn’t see past the blurring of your vision. “Said that he didn’t want you to remember him that way.”

“That’s bullshit! It’s bullshit and you know it.” You were screaming now, hands clenched in the damp fabric of his hoodie drowning your frame, as if holding something of his would bring him back. “Why didn’t you tell me. Why?”

“I’m sorry.” You couldn’t see her. Couldn’t see anything. Nothing but darkness. And it was cold. God was it cold. Why was it so fucking cold? “I’m sorry.”

The headphones pressed over your ears and buried into your hair drowned out the sounds of city life. Around you people shuffled, brushing against each other as they hurried to their destinations. But you stood still, eyes glued to the silver device resting in your palm. It’d taken you a long time to hunt one down.

But you’d been determined. He’d always said you were obnoxiously stubborn.

The thought brought a small smile to your face, the sharp twang in your chest reminding you that it’d been real. That he’d been real. Your fingers ghosted over the plastic warmed by the time it’d spent in your pocket.

A family rushed past you, the youngest child almost ramming into you. But you ignored it, blocked it all out. Instead, you took a deep breath, eyes closing to brace yourself. The voice of your sister rang in your ears as if she was standing right next to you, voice carried by the wind.

He left this for you. Said he’d wanted to show it to you someday.

With one last inhale, you opened your eyes once again to gaze down at the device in your hand. The black cassette tape rested innocently in the slot of the small cassette player. Written messily across a piece of gray duct tape was one simple word: Mono.

And beneath that, scrawled on another piece of tape that looked newer than the one above it.

Take me with you.

Your thumb hesitated over the play button.

He made it for you. Spent hours holed up in one of the hospital lounge rooms. Writing out the lyrics. Recording on some equipment he borrowed from one of the nurses. Your sister had said as you stood on the front steps of your shared apartment. Her short hair had been on full display, likely her way of showing the world that she was in remission. He’d want you to listen.

Eyes looking back up to the sidewalk in front of you, at the storefront signs written in foreign characters that you couldn’t understand, you paused.

The streets of Seoul were busy.

You took a deep breath and stepped forward.

And pressed play.

[evien-stark]

✧I Need You✧ Chapter 75

Fear turned into rage all too quickly. While you were completely susceptible to Tony’s sudden overload, your mind was racing for other reasons. Why was the Mandarin going after your family? That had to be it, right? Though, not because of you, it must have been because of Tony. The Mandarin was involved with the Ten Rings. An organization that had worked with Obi to try and snuff Tony out way back when. They’d double-crossed Obi and asked for more money when they realized it was Tony Stark who they’d been asked to target. 

They asked Tony to build weapons for them- Obi had been selling weapons to them- and it all came to a head with Obi triple-crossing them (that was how it worked, right?) by killing one of their top leaders all while Tony had made it his own mission to find and destroy the weapons that did not rightfully belong to them. Sure. Sure they had reason to target Tony. The people close to him. But why now? Tony’s flights to the middle east to try and clean that whole mess up himself had been quite some time ago. The two of you have been far more preoccupied with other worldly needs. 

...why now? 

The question wouldn’t leave you alone. Before this, there apparently had been nine random bombings that had nothing to do with you or Tony or Stark Industries, or any of it. Nine. Nine separate random bombings in nine random separate places. Then the bombing on the air base that Rhodey had been stationed at. And now the bombing last night- nearly claiming a completely innocent life in all of this. 

Happy had never done anything to anyone. So what, he was Tony’s security- your security- Stark Industries’ security. So what? Rhodey, maybe, you could understand. He’d probably been on more than one mission to clean up the Ten Rings nonsense, and he may have been keeping an eye on the Mandarin’s activities when the first few bombings occurred. That made sense. 

But now Rhodey and Happy? Why? How did this all fit together? It was killing you, not to understand it. That it just didn’t make any sense. But it had to, right? It couldn’t all be completely random nonsense. The Mandarin had a target- he had a message. God knew he wouldn’t shut up about it on national TV. His message seemed centered around America’s failings- and President Ellis most of all. So then why Tony’s closest confidants all of a sudden? Because Ellis had a direct line to the both of you? Was that it? He was trying to circumvent his final plan of taking out Ellis by taking you and Tony out first? 

Was that how this all made sense?

It took a long hour after JARVIS’ initial report for the two of you to stop clinging to one another and get out of bed. After that there had been an onslaught of questions, as the two of you put on clothes, that JARVIS couldn’t answer. How critical was Happy’s condition? Was he going to be okay? What had happened? Why had it happened? The bombing had been at the Chinese Theater. Happy had asked for the night off- had he been meeting someone there? God damn it, none of it was making any sense. And that was probably part of the reason Tony was so agitated. 

Aside from the fact that the Mandarin had put one of his closest friends in the hospital, for seemingly no reason. There were really two things that could piss Tony off more than anything else in the world. Going after his family- and not being able to make sense out of something. It was culminating in an angry black storm brewing in his heart. And he was sucking you in with him. 

You’d called ahead in those early morning hours to put extra extra security at Happy’s doors- assuming he made it out of surgery. But he would. Of course he would. There was no planning for a scenario where a doctor came out of those hospital wing doors and told you we’ve done all we could. You and Tony weren’t preparing for that. Because it wasn’t going to happen. Happy would pull through this and tell you what the hell happened. Who attacked him. And why. 

In your haste to prep a security team for Happy’s room, you’d forgotten, stupidly, to get a squadron for yourselves. Though it was barely five in the morning, media was parked out in the front of the hospital, hemming and hawing at each other for top spots as Tony pulled the car around. It was a tough slow crawl, wading through them, hand in hand, keeping your heads down. Now was not the time to answer any questions. You didn’t even have any answers. You had nothing to say. Tony seemed to feel the same way. 

Their shouts died down behind the hospital sliding glass doors in the lobby, and you took up the arduous task of filling out a million pieces of paper. Tony was too busy pacing around, waiting for news. Waiting for anything. There was no point in asking him to sit still or to just calm down. It was just a shame that every time he crossed in front of you again, it ticked your nerves. Now was not the time for that. You had to be stronger than ever before. For him. You had to hold this together. Because from the feel of him he was a few pulled stitches short of breaking apart completely. 

It took absolutely too long for a surgeon to finally arrive- and- ...thankfully, as planned for, she let you know Happy was going to make it. He’d had internal bleeding, had had ruptures and needed sutures and-... was lucky to be alive, so close to a blast zone. But he was alive. The most important part. So at eight in the morning, the two of you were allowed to go up to his very private and closed off room. The walls were a darker color. It was cozier than that medically pristine white everyone else had to live with. 

Happy would like it, you thought. It would be a good environment for him to be awake in. Once he regained consciousness. He was hooked up to a few different machines, and had an IV drip going. While you sat aside him, Tony took to pacing for another half hour before dropping to sit in a chair by the door. Then getting up to pace some more. Then turning on the TV. Then sitting again. 

A few nurses came in and out, mumbled condolences and took too long a look at all three occupants in the room before leaving again. What were the two of you doing here? How long would you wait for? Was it likely that Happy would come to soon? How long could you afford to sit here? You could tell Tony was wrestling with the same questions. Sitting here idle was making him anxious and angry. But he didn’t want to go if there was a chance Happy was going to wake up. Not just because the two of you desperately needed answers, but because you didn’t want him to be alone when he did. 

The next nurse that came in just at twelve in the afternoon tended to Happy’s IV and looked at the recordings on his machines, took some notes… 

Tony finally found his voice. Tired and drawn. “He gonna wake up soon?” 

“It’s hard to say. If I had to guess…?” 

“Please do.” You were surprised how tired you sounded. 

She sighed. “Probably not for a while yet. Maybe not until tomorrow. He needs rest, anyway.” As she turned away, she stepped over to the TV and reached up to turn it off. 

Tony waved a weak dismissive hand at her. “Uh… mind leaving that on?” 

Quickly she dropped her hands and gave him an understanding smile. “Sure.” 

Finally he found his feet again, and motioned for you to stand. You had a much harder time. It felt like your body was just on the verge of giving up, really. Tony turned to look at happy, and spoke to no one in particular. “Sunday night's PBS 'Downtown Abbey'. That's his show, he thinks it's elegant.” Even though the TV was showing a rerun right now. It crushed you- that he knew that. You didn’t even know that. “One more thing...make sure everyone wears their badges. He's a stickler for that sort of thing, plus my guys won't let anyone in without them.” 

It killed you, in fact. Not so long ago Happy had been questioning whether or not Tony needed him. Maybe whether or not Tony even cared anymore. But Tony had never stopped. Because that was just who he was. Happy was part of his family. Close to his heart. Nothing would change that. You just wished Happy was awake to hear it. 

But he would be, you reminded yourself. Sternly. He would. Soon. 

Hand in hand you and Tony walked back down through the halls. In the elevator he slipped on his sunglasses. Probably a great idea, considering. ...considering the media nightmare was probably still poised on the sidewalk waiting for any sort of sound byte they could get their hands on. 

Reaching up you squeezed the left side cuff on your ear. “LUNA, can you just give me the sunglasses?” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

A function you had not utilized. But if she could do the visor, you were sure she could shape the little whatever it was into colored lenses. Which she did promptly after you asked. 

Returning your hand to Tony’s, you gave him a squeeze as the elevator doors opened. “Don’t say anything to them. We’re not prepared to make a statement. We don’t have enough information. Alright?” This was a very sensitive issue. Too close to the vest. To the both of your hearts. And before you could start saying anything to the press, you had to try and understand the deeper meaning behind all of it. 

His weak murmur of understanding was not particularly convincing. His car was waiting for the both of you outside on the front walk- as were the terrible flashing lights and mounting voices all crying over one another so that they could be the one that got the story. 

Tony clutched your hand harder, and already you could tell. “Tony-” Trying to quietly, calmly warn him not to give in. 

But he was riled. His core was shaking. He was angry. Bleeding with fury. And he needed to put it somewhere. 

They were all crying the both of your names, shoving recorders in your faces. Trying to get your attention. His attention. The two of you physically had to push through them to walk to the car.

 It wasn’t until a scruffy looking reporter- with just his cell phone recording- shoved through the crowd, the both of you looked at him. A mistake. You should have just shoved everyone aside and put Tony in the car- and yet-

“Hey, Mr. Stark! When is somebody gonna kill this guy? Just sayin'.” 

You tried to volley that bait away from Tony. “At this time, we-” 

Tony’s hand let go of yours and he turned to the kid. “Is that what you want?” That’s when you knew it was all over. Something stupid was about to happen. You just severely underestimated the limits of how far Tony’s anger would push him. The voices all died down and Tony stared directly at him. “Here's a little Holiday greeting I've been wanting to send to the Mandarin. I just didn't know how to phrase it until now. My name is Tony Stark and I'm not afraid of you. I know you're a coward, so I've decided-” 

In one clean move he removed his sunglasses and you barely glanced up at him. It was hard to know what to do. Speaking like this was giving him a sense of catharsis. It was healing him. But it was also such a terribly stupid mistake to be making. 

You kept your head held up. Standing in solidarity with him. Trying to be strong. The two of you couldn’t fall apart now. Especially not with what he was saying- 

“You just died, pal. I'm gonna come get the body.” He suddenly looked back and forth between all the cameras pointed both your way. “There's no politics here- it's just good old-fashioned revenge. There's no Pentagon- it's just you and me. And on the off-chance you're a man, here's my home address: 10-8-80, Malibu Point, 90265. I'll leave the door unlocked.”

You were so very glad you had darkened lenses covering your eyes, blocking the image of your reaction from the public, because you were quite sure they just bulged out of your head. What the fuck was he doing? You grabbed on to him harder. Both because you were suddenly pissed he’d do something so wildly dumb, and also now more terrified than you ever had been before. 

Tony reached up, yanking the cell phone out of the guy’s hand. “That’s what you wanted, right?” Then turned suddenly, chucking it against the nearest pillar, shattering it into a million pieces. Turning back, he looked the guy square in the eyes, opening the door for you at the same time, guiding hand at your back to help you in. “Bill me.” 

It became a literal media frenzy after that, voices shouting, crying, complaining- all after something. But he shut your door, silencing them, only slipping in for a few seconds as he got in on his side. He was quick to rev the engine pointedly and screech out of the lot, probably leaving tire marks on the pavement. 

You wanted to hold it all together. You really wanted to try and rationalize this and come up with a plan. Calmly. But that’s not what happened. As soon as you were clear of earshot and possible picture shots, you turned to him and yelled. “What the fuck are you doing, Tony?!” 

Did he really just do that? Were you asleep right now? Just having a nightmare? One could hope.

One would also be wrong. 

His hands clenched on the wheel. “I don’t- I know, okay? I’m sorry. It’s done. It’s over. We can only move past it.” 

“No! I think we need to talk about what you just did!” 

“I know what I did- I was the one doing it-” 

“Really? I don’t think you do. You just fucking threatened a terrorist that’s been bombing every place to kingdom come- and gave him our fucking address- you basically just told him to come and blow up our house!!” 

“I know!” 

The two of you had very suddenly entered into a screaming match in the very small space of the car. And his voice thundering out from him like that not only startled you, but it unearthed the loose ground you’d been clinging to throughout this entire ordeal. Way before this. Way before Happy was put in the hospital. 

Your hands shot up to your face as the tears started, and an unintelligible string of weeping words escaped you. Even you weren’t sure what you were saying. The car stopped, Tony pulling to the side of the road, realizing the utter devastation- the sheer damage he’d caused. 

Without a second thought after the car was put in park, his shifted to wrap his arms around you, pulling you half over from your seat, not an entirely comfortable position- but it hardly mattered, as you sat in his lap with his seat angled back and hit your face in his chest. Clutched to him. Just letting that darkness that you’d been bottling up for so long just stream out of you. It hadn’t had your permission to come out like this, but it really hadn’t never needed it. 

Just waiting for the right moment. 

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry…” He kept saying it, over and over while you struggled through tears and hyperventilation. Struggling to find a good place to stop, if you even could. The worst part about it all was that it didn’t make you feel any better. 

Tony was ill, Happy was in the hospital. Your life was falling apart. And he’d gone and threatened a terrorist with the absolute means to try and destroy all of you. 

Why had he done that? Why? 

But you knew why. Because he was lashing out. His unwinding over this situation was on the opposite extreme from yours. And he was realizing it now. How devastating his anger was. The destruction it had caused- and was about to, even further still. 

It took you a long time to stop. He’d been talking you through the whole thing. Asking you to try and find your breaths in between continually apologizing. Telling you that he knew how stupid he was. But over your own sounds you were just getting wisps and murmurs. Half sentences. You understood the meaning. 

Felt it in his sorrow. He really was sorry. He really was just as broken over all of this as you were. 

But there was no point to this. Just like there had been no point in arguing in the first place. It was over. Done. What would come of it was what you should have put your attention to. Not what had gotten you there. Even if you knew the two of you had to work through all of that. You had so much work to do, didn’t you? This, and the other thing you’d talked about just the brief day before- and… the rest of it… 

It felt like it was never ending. Like it was just never going to stop. 

“What are we going to do now?” Your voice was hoarse when you finally found it. You felt about as dead as a living human could, just sitting there against him. 

“We’ll figure it out.” 

An easier way of saying I don’t know. 

How could he? How could you? How could either of you even truly begin to understand? 

[slut-for-fandoms]

Paint me yours (kth x reader) PART 1

Pairings: Artist!Taehyung x reader

Genre: smut, fluff, angst (in the following chapters) 

Summary:  You are an art college student who struggles with finances. Until one day, on an exhibition of the arising artist Kim Taehyung, when the same boy offers you a job as his model. Would it be just a simple job or would it complicate your life in ways you have never thought it would?

Warnings: none in this one (perhaps my bad writing and lots of mistakes?) 

A/N: So here is the first chapter. I really don’t know what to think about it as i haven’t written anything in more than a year (so sorry guys but now I am back, yey) I really do hope you like it and please let me know what you think and whether you would like to be tagged in the series ♥ Enjoy 

Euphoria. Excitement. Happiness. Exaltation. A complete symphony of colors and emotions. Blue, purple, violet, azure - blended in such a way that glues you to the masterpiece. At places it seems unfinished, raw, as though the creator has been in a hurry. But at the same time it is so detailed that you wonder how long it took him to create it. It represents a woman, or to be more precise, a young girl. Long hair composed with ochre, amber, honey and a hint of gold, covers half of her pale face. Her lips are the perfect combination of red, cheery, wine and auburn. An orderly chaos of colors.

While everything seems just as raw painting, the most capturing features are the eyes. They are so detailed and express the condition of the girl. The sparks that make her look tangible grabs you on a roller coaster of thoughts and feelings and somehow makes you even experience the same state.  I move to the next painting.

Sadness. Affliction. Pain. Torment. The contrast between the used shades is much deeper. Pale yet dark. The more I look at it, the more it captivates me. All of the creations I saw were beyond amazing, complete masterpieces but this one… This one is different. One look and I got this strange feeling in my guts when we anticipate something bad, something that might hurt us.

The background is composed of dark shades, while the girl is sculpted of the pale range of colors. Again, the most detailed parts are the eyes. You get the feeling as if a soul was trapped inside the drawn girl that shows how much she suffers. The more you contemplate, the more you assume that the darkness around her represents the cruel world, while the bright yet shaded colors shows how fragile and broken she is. Is it from the world? What destroyed her? Who made her look like a shattered vase which parts are no longer going to form its beautiful shape?

Holding my glass of champagne I took some steps back and sat on the settee opposite the painting. Thanks god it wasn’t that low as they use to be in other galleries. I crossed my legs which caused the hem of my black dress to roll up slightly. As an art student, I tend to visit many exhibitions in order to get inspiration, gain knowledge of the new and unorthodox styles and improve mine. I can’t say I am complaining as we are given free access to any kind of such events. This is beyond amazing as now I am contemplating the art of one of the rising artists – Kim Taehyung. Honestly, I have never seen him but the critics consider him the new Van Gogh and now I understand why.

When I came I was so uneven about it, all the people here were rich and classy and I, a broken student with a cheap dress borrowed from her friend, had no place here. Everything was out of my league and I felt like garbage disfiguring this place.

“You seem really immersed into the picture.”, someone chucked, bringing me out of my thoughts. I looked up and saw man in golden suit and two glasses of champagne in his hands. His smile was so bright, genuine, that it made me blush slightly, “May I?”, he titled his head towards the settee as if asking if it was free.

“Ye- yeah, of course”, I stuttered and put a lock of fallen hair behind my ear.

His smile grew bigger and he took the free seat next to me.

“Here.”, he gave me one of the glasses. I looked up at him confused, “I saw that you have already finished yours so…”, I looked at my glass which was empty. I might have stayed there for a way longer time that I have thought. I left the glass on the floor next to the settee.

“Thank you.”, I gave him a smile, although inside I was feeling embarrassed, “Very fond of you.”, I said after taking the offered glass.

“Well, I just wouldn’t have forgiven myself if I have left such a beautiful lady sitting here by her side. The champagne was just an excuse to approach you.”, I bit my lip and tried to hide myself due to the blush that crept on my face.

“You are even more appealing when blushing.”, okay, I have never believed I could become so red but here I am.

“Please, stop.”, I stuttered through the smile that just grew bigger on my face.

“Why?”, he tilted his head and asked me with that sweet smirk still placed on his face, his eyes never leaving my figure, “you don’t like honest people?”, as a response I chuckled and tried to gain my dignity and look at him. Why was I such a blushing mess around this… stranger…a handsome stranger?

“It is just that you are the first one to approach me this evening.”, a slight feeling of sadness made my stomach turn as I recall the events, pardon, the lack of them from this night. I started playing with my hands as something as pity overwhelmed me.

“Well-”, his deep baritone voice made me look at him. This time he was facing the painting in front of us which gave me the opportunity to survey him. Soft pink lips, sweet roundy nose, medium long light eyelashes. Skin in the color of bronze and a golden suit that make him look like a god. Aristocratic hands with long fingers, adorned with rings. The way he is holding the glass gives you the thoughts that a prince is sitting oppose you, “It is their lose.”, he states after locking his eyes with mine. And then I’m completely lost. They are just like the sad girls’ in the paintings – full of emotions. I see the same spark that leads directly to his soul. It captivates you. There is love, care, tenderness that make my heart skips a beat. But also you can spot something wild and intriguing. An abyss of feelings kept locked deep inside.

He took a sip of his champagne which caught my attention and made me break the eye contact. How could such a simple action as drinking makes me wanna grab the brushes and paint this gorgeous creature on the canvas?

“I can’t say I am complaining of that.”, I followed his movements and took a taste of my drink, “They seem like they are here only for talking. All of them are just chit-chatting and just at times spare a glance at the paintings. It – It just looks like a gathering of the rich and bitchy class.”, suddenly he burst into laughing. Oh that sound… It was like a soft melody for my years I could listen to all day. It was so infectious and addicting.

“What?”, I asked confused but with a smile plastered on my face.

“I couldn’t have said it more correctly. I’ve met everybody in the gallery and yet you are the only one contemplating the works.”

“Isn’t that what we are supposed to do on an exhibition? But apart from that, these paintings, these masterpieces…”, I took a breath like looking at the sad girl opposite me, “they are captivating. There is life in them, there is soul. Undoubtedly the artist is one of the best I’ve ever come across. Many have the ability to draw, few have the talent to create a masterpiece, something that makes you stop and think. And these here, they indeed convey more than a hundred words.”

“And where do you think that comes from?”, he asks me in that deep voice of his. I turn my attention back on him to see the man already looking at me with a stern expression showing nothing.

“The ability to make a painting live?”, he nodded his head in agreement, “Pain.”

“Pain?”

“Pain. It is always the pain. Why do you think the greatest artists are those who have suffered the most?  Sadness, sorrow, ache, agony… they are different than the other feelings. When something good happens to you, you are happy for a short moment. Usually those moments tends to be forgotten way easier than the moments that our soul was in pain. It is just that the affliction we bottle inside us ruins us in the end. The knots in our stomach, the suffocating feeling in our chest… they are tormenting us and we all need a way to express them somehow, to try to get them out of us. And the answer is always the art. It doesn’t matter whether it would be with a brush or a pen in our hands, if we are going to compose a poem, song or just draw something.  We just want the pain away. For its tight fist around our hearts to weaken, for its dark thoughts to leave us at peace at night, for the tears to stop rolling down and choke us.”, I paused in order to take a sip of my champagne, feeling his eyes following my movements, “That is one of the reasons why I like this one so much.”, I continued pointing at the work before us, “It look as if not only the model had been sad, but also the artist.”, when I turned around he had a sad smile on his face. For a moment I saw the abyss – full of sorrow and regret, pain and affliction.

“You can’t be more right.”, and once again, as he looked up, the door to his soul closed with that stern expression, “That is why I don’t know whether I like this work or not.”

“It recalls a bad event?”

“It recalls the day I painted her.”

My eyes were so wide that surely they were going to pop out of my head. I opened my mouth, then close it, then opened it again. I was so shocked that I could say nothing.

“I still remember how heartbroken she was.”

“You- you are the artist?”, my voice raised an octave higher and I cursed myself.

“Surprised?”, he asked smiling at my shocked expression.

“You just caught me off guard.”

And then the rest of the night kind of slips my mind. I don’t really know how long we’d been talking through various topics. Whatever felt like hours had only been half an hour once I saw the watch on my hand.

“Unfortunately, as a host, I need to make a speech. It was nice to meet you -”

“(Y/N)!”, answering I took his hand as he helped me get up from the settee.

“(Y/N).”, he said tasting my name and I could not miss the way his tongue rolled and the deep voice that sent shivers down my spine, “A beautiful name for a way more gorgeous girl.”

“Why are you trying to make my blush so hard?”, I asked trying to hide my face.

“I don’t know. I just like it.”, he shrugged with a smile, “Can I ask you something, (Y/N)?”, is it just me or he just lowered his voice on purpose while saying my name.

“O-Of course.”, out of nervousness I started playing with my own hands which only made his smirk grow bigger.

“Would you like to be my model, darling?”

[vitavitale]

drabble IV  —  Nightmare (At His Core)

It took me over a year to write about V’s encounter with Nightmare and I will genuinely not understand why. In any case, I’ve finally gotten around to it. Remember that this is all headcanon-based since my V isn’t, you know, canon. Except in my heart. Beware of 13,038 words, whew. I tagged it as “coming of age” because that’s how I interpret this event even if it may not play out that way. For easier reading, find this on AO3.

Trial after trial, failure after failure were not sufficient deterrents to a man driven by a greed that was unbecoming of him. He had never been so fixated, so stubbornly determined, so mad while he dedicated almost all of his time to the study and practice of necromancy. To resurrect life from death was a risk, and a business few had the guts or the aptitude for. This was a craft better left untouched, but he trifled with tests and from each failure he learned, improved, and tried again. The cycle continued for many nights; between jobs he would make the time for study, and of time he had plenty to dedicate to his obsession. A desire for strength was born in him from his apparent lack thereof. To have tasted power, however, in the aid of his familiars was almost like poison to the mind, for he had seen within his new means a potential for invulnerability. The illusion of becoming untouchable, undaunted, and subsequently intimidating and dangerous was too powerful for him to dismiss. Rather, he indulged in fantasy. Griffon and Shadow protected him as they attacked for him, and while he loathed his reliance on others he saw the opportunities such help would yield for him, and he saw value in becoming as threatening to others as others had been to him. There was something like revenge in his fixation on power.

It was not only his familiars he'd gained from, but he had conjured demons in the space of a couple of years from whom he would make further gains, draining their diabolical energies to amplify his own. Rite after rite he performed, drawing a demon to the mortal plane only to take from it before returning it to its Hell—or to slay it entirely. This really did appear to work, and every success tainted his expectations for himself. He saw his potential grow, day by day, until an idea was born—and this, he thought, would be the thing to make him more frightening than any demon alive in Red Grave City. This he sought not out of malice, but for self-esteem. Pride, worth, a need to be useful and effective when he believed himself useless and weak.

Perhaps Griffon had been at fault for the decision his master made. Indeed, it was from Griffon's mouth that V had learned of the demons dwelling in the underworld, those that lived and even those that had died. Among the deceased was one so destructive, so terrifying that even its name told of the menace it posed: Nightmare. Once in service to a devil of an emperor, the beast was slain by a man with only half the blood of demons in him. But it was this creature that haunted the warlock's mind for many a night, so it might have been only inevitable that the idea was spawned to return to it life, to conjure it for his own, and to his body bind it as he did Shadow and Griffon. V was only a child when he first heard of Nightmare, and then took only superficial interest in it. Years down the road brought it back to memory, for better or worse, and it was at the age of one-and-twenty that he'd decided to resurrect the demon. Necromancy was necessary for this, a skill not known yet enthusiastically learned while upon the idea the young man brewed.

So it was many nights, many tries and many failures later when it seemed a breakthrough was at hand.

Neither Griffon nor Shadow held very much esteem for their master's plan. His descent into obsession concerned them, but it was his decision to conjure so formidable a demon that worried them above all. While V may not have noticed, his familiars certainly had: the forces with which he surrounded himself had been detrimental to his body. He was far more human than anything, and his human body could only take so much that was well beyond its capabilities. Forces of a supernatural nature were hard on any human's body and mind, but V had gone a step further with his exposure to them. He would have more than enough on him, only now he sought to add too much to the load all too quickly. He was already frail of health, but he saw fit to weaken his bones and muscles as well. He had begun tiring as of late, and he tended to chalk it up to overwork, sleeplessness, and an almost nonexistent diet. But his demons knew better, and ultimately so did he. Or, at the very least, he had a hunch—one he didn't heed. That was his first mistake, but V insisted on making another. Griffon let him know as much, arguing that V had no need to take pointless risks, but men like him were not easily swayed. There was some kind of art to stubbornness like his.

Oh, but to be so young and foolhardy! The boy knew so little of the world, yet he'd known that it was rife with all manner of peril. Two familiars were not enough. He would head out into the desolate country under the cover of night to practice his black craft. A sigil was drawn up for the purpose of conjuring, a symbol of the demon he hoped to bring forth. Night after night, he tried. Tried and failed. But a step he'd been missing for weeks became clear to him. Infernal or otherwise, the soul was intangible. Its body had been destroyed completely, and V would not have been content to conjure a ghost. With magics old and new would he craft a body, and it would be with or without his demons' help that he would conceive of a form he hoped the soul, if in existence at all, would inhabit. Born in the mind's eye, but taken form in the flesh. V would resurrect the demon he sought, believing firmly in strength of will and the blending of techniques.

“I think I have it,” he said when he had his next epiphany. He was all enthusiasm, eager in the eyes, jotting instructions down in a notepad in an effort to preserve what he'd learned before memory would lose it. These would be looked over and memorized. It was late into the night, and he had the audacity to wake his slumbering familiars for the news. “I've finally figured out how to reconstruct the body!”

Griffon awoke with a start, though held on to his perch on the sofa's backrest. “Huh? What?” Barely gotten his eyes open and already V strode to his side, pad in hands, noticeably excited given the tone of his voice. “The what now...?”

“Nightmare's body, for its soul.” It'd been all V would talk about the past several days. It surprised him that Griffon had forgotten so readily, but that was like him. V had left the lights on through the night for his work, and the yellow glow to the sitting room was bothersome enough for his drowsy familiar. Nevertheless, the warlock would pester him to open his eyes. “I've been going about it the wrong way, but I think I now know what I must do.” His eyes fell upon the page he'd scribbled on. “I have to create it, shape it, with my hands. You know how Jewish folklore tells of mystics imbuing golems with life? Think of it that way, only I'd be...borrowing that part of the process. Then...I should channel the soul to the new vessel during a rite of resurrection. If I'm right, the demon should accept it.”

“Never heard of that part before,” the demon mumbled.

“I'll be improvising.”

“Oh, so that's your big discovery? That you've gotta make it up as you go?” Griffon was being sarcastic with him, likely because he was chafed that he'd been woken up for no good reason.

“I'm at least one step closer.” V was resolute when he countered, frowning his disapproval at the demon who'd appeared to think so little of V's ambition. “You could be a little optimistic.”

“I don't see why I've gotta go along with this utter fuckery. You're only hurting yourself.”

V didn't want to hear that. It was fortunate that he'd stepped beside Shadow, who was not dead to them but ignored their discussion while she rested on the floor, with his back to Griffon by the time the criticism was delivered. He would not acknowledge it, not even Griffon, and it was to his detriment that he kept silent. Though he did not agree, he also did not argue, and that must have been the plainest evidence of his conscience weighing more heavily than he'd let on. But he did think of something to say, and with it stepped into his own bedroom after turning off the lights. “Good night.”

V would sleep as peacefully as his subconscious allowed, for the few hours that were left of the night. But the sun was set to rise before long, and soon he would resume his practice until night again would fall.

He'd fallen asleep fast, curled on his side as was his habit. His study had exhausted him, both physically and mentally, but that didn't stop memories from reshaping themselves, painting themselves in fresh colors, and stitching together pictures that the sleeper had no desire to see. Still, they would appear to his mind's eye and wrench his heart from its boney confinement and wring it dry. There suddenly was the face of a demon with rows of pointed teeth, a short, stout abomination snapping mad like a rabid piranha. He fled from it, the white of his hair blurring his vision as he scrambled from its wrath. He saw a broom closet, hid in it and held on to the door knob for dear life. In his panic he could not grip it firmly, and his soul quaked from the snarling and the thrashing and the clawing against the door. His whimpering barred any screams for help, but all the same he heard his mother's voice outside. A great dread sickened him but fear left him petrified. He could not understand her. The door was left alone, he heard part of his name called and the sounds of flesh tearing and a thud on the floor—and he awoke with so violent a start that his heart raced, he cried out when he shot right up, and he caught the first light of the morn peeking through his window. His chest heaved with every labored breath, and he felt his eyes wet with sorrow. Just like it'd been the first time, like it was new, like he didn't see it coming.

But with the memory he was intimately acquainted, frequently re-introduced to it, and was fast to realize that it was yet again a dream. One of several nightmares.

A nightmare.

It almost seemed a calling at this point, to obsess over a demon so appropriately named. V hated to cry, but here his psyche took advantage of his helplessness to draw the tears forth. He wiped them away, sniffled through a stuffed nose, and sat silently as sleep was as good as forgotten. No use in trying again; he preferred to set to work, do whatever he could to forget that which haunted him for seven years going. But loneliness was not his safe harbor now, for a shadow had crept into his room to observe. To find that he had suffered no physical harm, the demon took form and joined his side on the bed. Like a cat she purred her concern, her inquiry and her comfort. V was not surprised to see her, he knew this was her way. Like a pitiful child he pouted and shed his tears, looking at her with some reassurance behind a curtain of grief. Guilt was too strong for so wretched a youth, and here he was sick with it. Seven years was virtually the same as seven months. With Shadow offering her comfort like a parent, V could not help but appreciate her—and feed his misery with memories of feelings he'd had once before, before even the seven years. It was a double-edged blade but, all the same, he ran his fingers through her crown to comfort her in turn. He whimpered, “I'm fine,” sniffling still. And she knew he would be: she'd seen this too often to assume different.

V would get up after all and give himself a good wash. He didn't care for breakfast but forced himself to eat a single slice of toasted bread. Over his routine, thought of his nightmare and his mistakes diminished, and while they remained present, they'd at least lost enough intensity to allow him to get on with his work. He could think about his goal, his rite, his approach to it all and how he'd shape the demon's vessel. By noon, he was all but absorbed in his crafting of the thing. A very simple shape was drawn among his notes, which would serve as the foundation for the model he sought to shape from earth. So, he would go outside, look for mud or deliberately make it, and wear down his haunches as he crouched from his secret labor. No devil-hunting or charm-making today. As desperately as he needed income, he seemed to need a new familiar even more. But he was wise to hide himself from his neighbors and had gone a distance to where no man should eye him and peg him as an unstable eccentric. V did very well wear the look of a youth who was touched, his hands deep in wet soil and incidentally rubbing some on his face whenever he had an itch to scratch.

Now, it didn't take long to make mud. To craft from it, however, was the tricky bit. V had never played in the stuff before, he'd never known what it was like. He thought he hated it the moment his hands mixed water with soil; the sensation was cause for repulsion. He should have brought a pair of gloves with him... Alas, he wasn't the sort to think things through, though that didn't stop him from pushing on. He was quick to learn how much water to use for the softness of soil he required. Once he'd gotten the hang of it, he knelt on the grass to alleviate the aches in his joints, more or less settling to mold the form that would be his golem.

Griffon had peeled from his master's body to observe him, sat almost right beside him beneath the canopy of a thin tree. If he had any criticisms or advice, V would largely ignore them. The frown on his brow was hard and it drew clear shadows beneath the deeper wrinkles on a face too youthful for any grimace. V didn't need his notes to begin forming the soil; he'd had the image clear and ever present in his mind's eye, and guided by little else but that and his drive he pressed and pinched and rolled chunks of dampened soil, and dunked his hands into the pond he'd knelt beside to wet the earth even more. He needed it all to stick, and if it wouldn't then he'd spend the entire day, possibly even night, out on the desolate field. Fortunate that the week had been so rainy, but if showers should fall in the middle of his work he would be foiled. But, weather notwithstanding, he'd gotten his pieces to stick. Very nearly mud, the consistency, while solid enough to hold form. V's fingers would easily become difficult, caking in dirt as long as he'd work over the forming vessel. Bits would come off and others would stick where they shouldn't, and V had constantly to dip his hands in the water.

“V, why the hell are you going to all this trouble?” Griffon watched him toil away, unimpressed by the boy's wasted effort. He couldn't approve of the way that warlock was tiring himself out, testing the limits of his own patience, and running headlong toward ruin. Because that was all the good Griffon saw coming out of this wild goose chase: a pained, miserable, defeated V.

The young man on his knees saw different. He spared Griffon a sharp glance to communicate his feelings. However, when his eyes settled upon the amorphous lump in his hands, he felt his confidence shaken. He stood to relax his legs, staring at the unfinished vessel that was crumbling in places, losing form beneath the pressure of his fingers in others; and though his snowy-white hair fell to conceal one half of his face, he felt Griffon's several eyes on him anyway. He knew what that bird was thinking. Still, he stepped back and took a seat very near the trunk of the tree to shade himself beneath its leaves. Against it would his back rest as over the muddy object his eyes would rake. It was half formed, the top molded more completely than the bottom; legs were harder to build than he thought, and the arms...were not quite separate from the body yet. Frustration suddenly dawned on him as he realized this may well go nowhere. But he'd lost hope so fast, after only a few minutes at work.

He had one deep frown come upon his countenance before getting up from the grass. “This is stupid,” he relented at last, exhaling irritably as he stepped toward the pond to set aside his craft and rinse off his hands. Griffon must have believed he'd finally gotten through, because he'd begun assuaging V's concerns with useless, likely hollow words of solace. V was perhaps cruel to ignore him, but something like the devil was in him and he knew that, one way or another, he had to have the one called Nightmare.

With his hands soaked and as clean as he could get them, he shook the excess water away to grab the shapeless figure of dirt—but not before he stilled where he stood, examining the thing and thinking a little more about it. While his hands dripped, Griffon watched him, blinking his golden irises at the perplexity of man.

“Uh, V? You're awfully quiet.”

He was thinking.

“Don't tell me you're mad.”

Mad? Funny. He'd certainly felt mad, at times, and he supposed he was. A madman. But even a mind gone beyond earthly bounds had its plans to complete and successes to achieve. V was not finished here, not by any stretch. When gray began to creep beneath the sun to steal away the blue of the sky, he knew his dirt doll would turn to pure mud. He'd have no use for it if it could not keep its shape. Time was, however, still his to act upon, the heavens clear and peaceful, affording him the chance to make refinements. His own impatience would not best him. To be so young and pressed for time—an oxymoron in the flesh.

“V, come on, you're gonna get soaked out here. That lump of dirt ain't worth it. You don't even really know what you're doing.”

The warlock had picked it up after all. “I think,” he answered while rounding out the form, “it's worse if I don't try. If I fail, it should be because...this simply isn't the way. I...don't want to have put in so little and that be the reason for failure.”

“Why don't you not look for this demon? There are about a zillion others—”

“That,” he snapped to cut off his friend, “is not an option.” At least, not for now. V frowned at Griffon, but any inkling of anger was a hollow one. The boy was determined, not angry, and he'd made that plain with a wistful sort of tone and some distant, far-off pain in his eyes. Griffon had no further argument. The pair descended into silence; but nature would not leave well alone. More gray crawled overhead, eventually ushering in the first droplets of another summer shower. When they tapped on V's nape and sent a chill through his paper-thin body, he shivered instantly. The decision to retreat had come and Griffon was returned to the warlock's skin. With his prize, however misshapen and incomplete, in his hands he abandoned the little pond to hasten home. Maybe to build there.

It was only a drizzle that speckled his clothes and hair on his walk back. But upon returning to the sanctuary of his flat, a proper shower broke that kept him homebound. He had mud on his face, on the ends of his hair, stuck to the soles of his shoes, and entirely in his hands. With his familiars retiring to the small living space, V set about a thorough cleansing of his person. Before he'd known it, he spent his day at home when he should have been out in the field; but the day was gray, even with the rain having cleared, and it matched his mood. Somber, morose. He'd gotten a dish on which to place his vessel and stored it in the refrigerator to keep fresh. Meanwhile, his bedroom was where he isolated himself, well cut off from the raptor and the jaguar lazing the afternoon away. He supposed they could afford it: what else had they to do? They could be so much like pets, obligated to nothing and owing no one.

The grimoire had been opened to the last page, where the original content of the book ended and his own notes began. Several sheets and scraps of paper, that's all they were; but on each were written spells, instructions, all manner of information he would have needed on call. Among these were his latest notes, the ones on Nightmare, on necromancy, and on golems. It should have made sense, yet here was his brain revolving around things anyway. With the book laid out before him, his legs folded on the bed and his knuckles to his cheek, he thought about failure. He thought about what it would mean, since his vessel was shit, and he'd never conjured life from death, if he couldn't claim the demon he sought. It wasn't only a matter of principle—he could get over botching a rite. It had more to do with what it would entail, the fact that he'd have dashed his hopes for acquiring the power he believed he needed: the power to protect himself, to turn the tables and prove that he was not all prey but predator, too. He was easily intimidated, easy pickings, and he loathed that with a bitter passion. It was why he needed another demon. He needed the strength, he needed the confidence, even if it came from beyond himself, but he needed it. And he loathed also to be as needy as this. He loathed his weakness, his appearance to others and how he was regularly perceived by them. If he wasn't a freak for his white hair, he was effeminate for his body, childlike for his behavior, stupid—

Weak to demons. But...if he had a familiar like Nightmare, he didn't have to be any of those things anymore. Didn't he? Quarry and foe alike could no more undervalue him or judge him a creature too meek to take them on, or to take from them: because one of their own made of seemingly unstoppable force, a weapon of mass destruction itself, would be doubtlessly perceived by them; and, if necessary, would annihilate them. According to what V had heard, Nightmare was beyond any lesser demon he'd known of. Incomparable to even Griffon and Shadow, combined.

How he would ever subdue and tame such a beast was rightly beyond his imagining. The boy had gall to think that he could dare at all. Or maybe it was that he didn't think.

He still didn't, even poring over his notes and mentally constructing the outcomes on his bed, he didn't think far enough ahead. But if he did, he would only shake himself up at the size of the task, and he didn't need that. He had to enter the rite undaunted, possessed by conviction, and wrench the demon from its lifelessness with that same vigor he'd conjured Griffon and Shadow. So he mulled over other things, and briefly considered going out tonight if the weather permitted. Frankly, he wanted to. To delay was pointless. Ready or not, his vessel was finished—and so was he. To live this kind of life, in the kind of shape he was in, was not something he'd been looking forward to for however many years remained for him. Even if he would die by the conjured colossus' retaliation upon resurrection, he would at least go out in a way that would not leave him feeling unfulfilled. If lightning was to strike him squarely, in a month, it wouldn't happen until he'd had Nightmare spread across his body. It may have been more a matter of life and death than even the warlock realized. Regardless of the circumstances or the consequences, V was a man of a settled mind. Sitting as idly as he did, boring himself over the information that'd become monotonous to read so repeatedly—well, he supposed he'd made up his mind at some point.

Grays and yellows colored the sky when V bothered to peek out the window of his sitting room. He'd had a whole two of them, one by the front door and another in his bedroom; but the blinds to the latter were always kept shut. Privacy concerns, as he lived on the bottom level of his building where his neighbors and his absent landlord would walk about. Birds drawn by the rainfall called out on the rooftops, among the trees beyond the property, and on the street. While the bulk of the shower had passed, still heard was the pitter-patter of rain drops just beyond the glass. The weather was clearing, the sun shining like a hunk of polished citrine behind the scattered cloud cover, bidding its radiant goodbye to the day that closed. The moon chased it not far behind, nightfall near.

Griffon and Shadow were at as much peace as afforded by the event-free afternoon, and they appeared dead to their master's arrival. When he turned from the window to get a look at them, he could only think that they were sweet to snooze on the sofa—one taking up all the seat, the other perched atop the backrest cushions. Such a shame that they were so against his endeavor.

V had his supper early and offered to his familiars scraps of old cold cuts he didn't want. It was clear to them that he'd intended to do something, because he was all astir in his bedroom as he'd dressed himself for the night. Only, he was donning not sleeping clothes but something else entirely. On his legs were a pair of utility pants, slim, and a belt around the waistband; a wallet chain consisting of skulls of a silver tone; on his feet were gladiator sandals with straps that were thin along the length of his feet, and bore buckles at the ankles; leather cuffs adorned his left wrist, an unconventionally long, silver-plated signet ring the middle finger; a fingerless leather glove covered his right hand; and, in a daring move, he chose to garb the upper half of his body with a sleeveless, knee-length coat held together only by laces affixed to the garment's inner lining across the abdomen. No shirt, no nothing underneath all that leather: only his skin and the tattoos that adorned it. It was brave of him, to cover so little of himself—he partly regretted it already, looking himself over in the bathroom mirror—but people would change, and tastes would evolve, and V was just another one of the many young adults on the Earth who would experiment with fashion. Still, he'd never before worn anything so revealing, and his chosen outfit was quite modest in that as it stood, but it felt comfortable and that had to be the most important thing when it came to clothing. His qualms notwithstanding, he thought he liked the way he looked. His signature choker remained where he'd always worn it. His hair was the only contrast to all the black he'd dressed himself in. Every single article was black, as was the string of his choker, but his hair seemed to...set things askew, a little. So white like freshly fallen snow while all the rest of him could easily blend into shadow. Well, that wouldn't be a great issue tonight: he sought to walk out the door under the cover of darkness. He wasn't sure he'd wear such a get-up during the day.

When he emerged from the bathroom and walked into the sitting room, Griffon was the first (and, in fact, only) to voice his impression of the night-clad youth.

“Whoa-ho! What the hell is all that?” For the sake of a better look, the hellion descended from the sofa to hop right up to V, and eyed him up and down in a very rare moment of silence. “You gonna go out slumming or what? You look like hell in those rags.”

“Don't we already live in one?” V reminded, bored with his critique. He was messing with his collar, undecided whether to flatten it down or wear it upturned.

“Not only that, but don't you think you're gonna catch a cold walking around with your, uh, chest out?”

“It–it is not,” V argued bashfully, suddenly tugging on his lapels. “You can hardly see it.”

“No, I see it. Think I see your nipples too—”

“No you don't!”

“Oh! So I guess all six of my eyes are wrong. Am I wrong about that thing being too big on you, too? I think you gotta tighten those laces, kid.”

“Are you finished?” V was completely flustered when he had no need to be. Suddenly, the styling of his collar was unimportant. He had a blush he fought hard to suppress tinting his face, and he thought he would resent Griffon for the rest of his life for spoiling what little confidence he'd managed to scrounge. If Griffon could see such unflattering things, others were likely to see the same. But V wasn't about to change his clothes. Night had fallen, he had no time to waste now before the sun was up again.

Out of sheer defiance, the warlock marched to the kitchenette. His treasure of dirt had been taken from the fridge and given some water to keep from crumbling some little while ago. He hadn't needed the thing too fresh; he would water it like a plant, only with drizzles and drops intermittently. To little effect, however, as it would, as if out of spite, continually chip away regardless of his efforts. Looking at it again made his subconscious frown. He still hated it. Maybe he hated it more than he did at the start. He hated himself for being impatient enough to hasten his work on it. It could have turned out better if he'd learned, gone through trial and error, in due time; but he felt he didn't have that same time to lose. The impetuousness of youth, the desire for instant gratification—it ruined him thus far. But he needed supplies, and he at least had the wisdom to gather them beforehand. Even if Griffon had utter shit to say, V would walk all around him and dodge his bullets.

Thankfully, the raptor did not moan for long. He was left to loiter in the center of the room, watching V dart in and out. Shadow couldn't have cared one way or another; or, perhaps, she was wiser to simply let the boy be. Lounging on the sofa suited her. Ruby-red eyes blinked every so often. V had made a little pile of materials by the front door: a lantern, a canister of salt, five wax candles, a matchbox, a vial of ritual oil, an athame, and of course the grimoire.

Oh, and the vessel in its dish. It was the final item V had retrieved, and with it collected he was prepared to head out. Ultimately, he didn't give a damn about the state he was in, his appearance to demons either allies or foes. It was not his dress that would determine his success but himself: spirit, drive, skill, smarts. All materials minus the dish were placed in a rucksack. V slung it over his shoulder and carried the dish in both hands the minute he'd locked the door to his flat, familiars dissolving into soot-like particles and attaching to the warlock's body as if ink. He wore his coat's collar upturned after all.

A terribly long walk would see him to his destination. It was the same spot he'd been going to for the past fortnight, every night he wanted to try to conjure Nightmare. He'd memorized the path by now, and he would always go in shadow, at night. The poor, unfit thing would have to trek from beyond property grounds to a hilly area backed by a meager woodland out onto the fringes of town. The border, as it were, between named places. Red Grave City was one, to which V lived closest, but the means to move cities were not his. It was always a long walk anywhere for him. Tonight, he would benefit from clear skies and quiet townsfolk. While midnight had not yet struck, the residents around here were generally of mild manner and disinterested in goings on. They would be in their homes, doing as country families do. If they should spy a lanky young man traversing beyond their overgrown yards and vacant lots, they wouldn't give it a second thought. V realized he went through a lot of trouble for a whim, but what was one more night to try?

It might not have been midnight when he set off, but once he'd arrived at the designated spot he was certain that it could not have been earlier than eleven. The exertion tired him out, so all he took was a short breather with his eyes full on the patch of dirt and grass on which he'd made his previous attempts at summoning. He could certainly recognize it under the cover of night; but of course he'd been here countless times already. He remembered where, upon the hill, he would stand, and where the forested wall opened to the east. He remembered the trampled grass underfoot made by his coming and going, and the placement of lit windows in the town in the far distance.

Surrounded by such perfect seclusion, Griffon and Shadow could emerge from their hideaway. Of Griffon this was expected, but not so of Shadow: she was not in the habit of being present during her master's rites, and for her to suddenly sit beside her infernal comrade was a genuine surprise to the young warlock. Her reason was understood, however, and it filled him with some palpable regret. Shadow may not have been as vehement in opposition as Griffon was toward his goal, but her feelings were the same, and still she would let him know with scarcity and subtlety. As evidenced by his being here, he was not swayed by their shared concerns. For her, more so than for Griffon, V had a look of nigh-unreadable apology. In the darkness, her eyes were almost luminous rubies. A contrast to his dimmed peridots.

The dish was placed on the ground by his own trodden path. He fetched the lantern from the sack and switched it on—nothing quite so archaic as an oil lamp, but battery-powered for ease. The rest of his materials were laid out before him; and taking the dagger and lantern, he stepped carefully about the area to find the precise spot where he'd cast his prior circles. They were not hard to find, the etching in the soil still visible even after days of rainfall. V cleared away any debris that'd fallen during the day before setting the lantern between both the circle of summons and the circle of protection. He didn't want to think about the potential pitfalls he'd encounter once the rite would begin, but he would call himself a liar if he'd ever claim he wasn't nervous. He had never before practiced necromancy and there were about a dozen ways his inexperience—along with his deliberate improvisations—would foil him. This was not merely a game of chance he was playing, but one that involved real risk to his flesh and soul. He may not have anticipated failure, but he did fear from it nevertheless.

All those other instances when he'd failed to conjure the demon were failures only because the demon was deceased, and had no physical form with which to manifest. But now V would provide one for the spirit to inhabit, and that was entirely new to him. What's more, he hadn't bothered to practice at any point prior to tonight. His first shot at necromancy would also come as the real thing.

He didn't think about much, as a matter of fact, apart from the steps he was to take and the outcome he so desired. It was his intent that he should, and would, focus on, with nothing more to distract him. So, he cast his circle with salt before casting that of the demon, using his athame to carve the circle in the soil, its blade lightly coated with the necessary oil. It also carved an inverse pentagram within the circle, and the five candles were then arranged to sit on each point of the pentagram. The wax was dabbed with oil as well, and the candles were thus lit. Before the young sorcerer would enter his circle, he set what he'd need within it, and his familiars were wise to sit by the rest that was unnecessary so as not to interfere with the rite and its air. A strange stillness came upon the three, the wind dead and not one of them uttering a sound. Perhaps they knew it: what was about to take place would either ruin him or free him from his obsession.

It was also possible that such freedom could ruin him. Maybe he didn't consider that, but the raptor and the shapeshifter did. They watched their master outfit his circle, blade and oil left of center, grimoire and dish right. The vessel he'd prepared was taken into his hands, its dish abandoned beyond the circles as he had every intention of needing the molded dirt no longer after tonight. If the rite didn't work, he'd try another way. He was already decided on that.

Before V would step into his circle, he gave the lump of soil his final attentions. It wasn't like mud anymore, and it hadn't ever been since he'd brought it home; he knew that was the first mistake, remembering that golems took life from mud or clay—but both came of the Earth, were earth, and V would believe that plain soil would serve its intended purpose. So, he was satisfied before long with what little he'd managed to do with it and gently placed it in the middle of the inverted pentagram. Hands were wiped off, he took in a long breath, and entered his own circle at last.

“V.” Griffon.

“What?”

“Just... Watch yourself with all that, all right? We're right here if shit goes to shit.”

Gratitude needn't come across verbally. V felt it, his familiars knew it without knowing it, and nothing else was said between them. Eyes closed and incantation in mind, palms turned upward at his sides, he steeled himself and spoke words which were new. The candle flames did not waver, and neither did V. “To the lords of Hell and its kings and masters, I ask that a soul stripped of form and life hear my voice, and I implore unto thee, most fair and wise and powerful, with all of my humility, to send unto me thy lost and lifeless kin: that which is singularly named and so bears the name of Nightmare, once brought into being and commanded also by thine banished emperor-kin Mundus; and to this soul I offer life from death, death to rebirth, all powers and wisdom restored, and a vessel for its material form, and every liberty to refuse my supplication.”

His voice was loud and clear, firm and mature; he thought he felt electricity round his fingers. The young man did not yet open his eyes as he honed on the name, the image of the demon in his mind's eye, and the essence of the very thing he wished to will into being. His body was numb to the world around him, his mind ignorant of all things in existence apart from himself and the vessel, and the demon to inhabit it. Not a draft caused the grass to stir or the trees to wave their limbs, not a part of his body seemed alive but the easy rise and fall of his chest. But something had changed, something between the circles, and V felt it like a great oppressive eye, watchful from above. He did not lose his nerve to it but remained focused, knowing and feeling the adjudicators who had come to assess the sorcerer. From the very outset he sought permission to restore one of their fallen. He'd come to learn that it was sound practice to offer every respect to the forces he'd bargained with, and to resurrect an infernal spirit was no different. If V should open his eyes, he would find the flames twitching in the deadened night. But with his body so faintly tingling now, shoulders to waist, he knew it right, only then, to put into sweet, soothing words more of his modest, magic, flattering intent; and for this, he spoke gently as a poet recites to one who is beloved.

“How sweet is the Shepherd's sweet lot! From the morn to the evening he strays; He shall follow his sheep all the day, And his tongue shall be fillèd with praise.

“For he hears the lamb's innocent call, And he hears the ewe's tender reply; He is watchful while they are in peace, For they know when their Shepherd is nigh.”

He meant himself the shepherd, the demon he sought his flock—or a member of it, and while he was aware of the religious symbolism loaded into Blake's poem, he hadn't a fear of dashing his hopes as he had used these very words to summon in his presence a score of other, lesser demons. He needn't his grimoire to check his memory: he remembered every line, every foot, syllable for syllable. In this, V was experienced. He had come to learn that infernal creatures quite enjoyed poetry, often as much as he.

If the demons were decided in his favor, the spirit of the deceased should find its way to the proposed vessel. But V need only open his eyes if he wished to spy weird, dark miasma twist and dance about the earthen offering; and if he had, he'd have disrupted the flow of things and his concentration would break. That which went unseen was surely felt, however. In the subconscious were sensations translated into images before the mind's eye, sufficient communication that informed the sorcerer of what went on around him. He could feel the darkness, the infernal curiosity and diabolical greed filling the space within the summoning circle. While it was all aware of him, he'd protected himself expertly to allow no evil thing any passage through his barrier. The anticipation was beginning to find room in his mind, and that was a flaw to be entirely avoided. But while he tamed his own spirit, focusing on his intent and his breathing, the energies swirling above the dirt vessel were joined by another. A faintly thing to V's tuned senses, and when left alone it was far weaker than anything he'd sensed before. Lifelessness!

“The demon, Nightmare,” he acknowledged politely, “I bid thee come.” Truthfully, he couldn't have known what it was. The boy clearly was not beyond taking such liberties; but if he should be welcoming, peaceable, and respectful, the spirit should take to his voice—his vessel most importantly. His will remained strong, his intent clear, and with both combined he visualized with all of his psychic prowess the soul pouring into the desired golem. This, too, was new to him, but he sensed it came without challenge. Through mental murmurs he invited the soul to find its comfort and refuge within the earthen form. His hands had begun to move toward one another, palm to face palm but never joining when they hovered before the warlock's center. Calm as he could manage to be, now was when he opened his eyes. To his surprise, a diluted mist hovered above the crafted soil, black like smog but flecked as if with glitter of a violet hue. That was his own magic at work. A heartening sign.

His power, small as it was, had a color to it.

There was more to V's work than will. The closing of his hands was not plain pantomime. Envisioned between them was the soul and its designated vessel, and by drawing his palms closer together he suggested he'd been helping merge the two. The power of suggestion, backed by the power of will, could have been an unstoppable force if executed correctly. If V were any master sorcerer, he'd have doubtlessly infused the vessel with all of the demon's soul in less time than this. He could be patient when it mattered, however, and in this instance he was collected and determined not to fail. The oppressive air that'd permeated the environment amplified the nearer V's hands drew to one another, and there came a point when wind began to stir and blow against the warlock, pushing his hair from his face and disturbing his garments. This tipped him off against pushing any further: he remembered he had to be respectful, to allow the soul a chance to refuse him. He'd never forced his will upon the demons he wished for familiars, never felt it right, and he would not make that mistake now. Griffon and Shadow were his by choice, by mutual agreement, and they'd become friends, even like family for it. V remembered this, knew said friends' eyes were on him all through the rite, and he was prompt to correct himself—and thus the pressure was eased off the miserable spirit, as yet undecided about the offering of renewed life. Perhaps it wasn't impressed with its gifts, with him. That...had to be all right, to the conjurer. He'd have to accept that and let the spirit return to its plane, free.

With the slow separation of his hands, a curious shift in air tickled at his consciousness. He hadn't realized he'd been frowning, but the moment he did he softened immediately. The phantasmal wisps before his eyes, along with their violet glow, had begun to bleed into the misshapen vessel.

So...it had accepted! But of course, the allure of life was irresistible. V did not think for a moment, instead focused entirely on his work. He was absorbed by the sight of the soul feeding into the lump of earth, to fatten it up with life and grant it the gift of sentience. V's hands would come together only when the last of the entity entered the vessel, and this he did to signify the finalization of the first phase. He'd eased off on his psychic influence only for this step so that it would be Nightmare's decision to enter the vessel, not his. Once that was done, however, V would wait. To observe the outcome, to see what would go wrong. His hands rejoined his sides as he watched with, now, apprehension, the vessel illuminated only by the dancing candle light. As he understood it, he was not to engage yet, not until the demon was fully formed and in control of itself. Only then could he attempt to tame the beast, and then bind it to him through the awaited rite of bondage. His heart was as strong as he could have made it, but it still alarmed him to watch movement within the inverted pentagram. The soil once lifeless stirred and shifted, and before his very eyes began to deform itself. It was abrupt, violent, and it had stricken V with genuine nervousness with every motion across the ground, fidgeting left and jerking right, and sometimes nearly flipping itself over—and all the while changing shape, gaining mass, growing. The flames snapped wickedly in the air, and even V could feel it, a sudden explosion of demonic energy that flooded the circles and the area surrounding. It was smothering, but V held fast. He fought it like an ocean, as if wave after wave crashed down. If he'd lose his footing, he'd be pulled into the sea of darkness and potential malevolence, and forced to suffer the torment of a likely vengeful spirit. How was he to know that it was not already at peace, and that he'd come only to disturb its eternal slumber?

Uselessly, he put his arms up like a shield in front of his face as if that would have any effect over the whipping winds. Griffon and Shadow could only watch while on pins and needles, but they were in agreement that the second things turned south, they would charge in to his aid. That young man could get himself into such messes, but he hadn't quite learned to learn from that. One could call him stupid for it, but he preferred to think of it as drive. The grit to stand firm and unflinching was necessary in the face of adversity, and it was proven to him now that such a necessity came twice as strongly when dealing with a demon of so much size and power. Based on what he knew, Nightmare was built like a tank and commanded like one, an annihilating force V should have been wiser not to play with. And when he saw just how large it'd grown, taking on an amorphous form that exceeded even that of the vessel it claimed and turned inside-out to make it unlike any useless heap of anything he'd seen before—and when he realized it hadn't stopped expanding—he understood, finally, that he'd bitten off more than he could chew. And he paled a little at the sight of it now, beyond the obfuscation of his arms, stretching to a height far beyond his own and eclipsing the circle it should have fit into.

Large and bulbous, glossy and flowing as if wet, black as tar, no more resembling the dirt in which it was reborn. It claimed a human shape, as much of one as V could have crafted out of earth, but appeared to re-imagine itself of its own accord. Parts of it were not as V had built, but he didn't have a care for the shape. He supposed he never really did. He simply needed the thing alive, and here he'd achieved it. His golem, his golem, alive! And in the center, toward the top of its...whatever V would think was a head, glowed an orb like a great violet eye, and like an eye it darted in all directions as if it saw for the very first time. Like a human it stood upright on two legs, two disproportionately large arms hanging at its sides. No digits, but broad, round ends like clubs for “hands.” By the candle light, he could note several hooked claws protruding from the thing's arms. Parts of its body looked craggy, almost unnatural, as if shrapnel or rocks had wedged into its hide. This was the demon he'd brought to life from eternal death. This titan called Nightmare, a thing of destruction. It towered above the sorcerer, a dark and hulking thing that could easily snuff him out with its weight alone. His heart was fast in his chest.

It jumped at the sight of the demon's sudden movement and V felt he'd almost folded to the instinct to step back. Ungainly on its smaller legs, slow and heavy, the beast lumbered with every dragging step forward it took. Forward, unto the protective circle!

With its restless eye it perceived him, his body language and the demons not far from him. All things were new to it, like it had the whole of life to relearn. When V's arms came down and his eyes pierced the dark, it was perceived that there was no defense, no offense, and full attention. Ah, but here it seemed to remember—some memories had not gone, and with them had also come the memory of mercy. If Nightmare had remembered any more, it would have likely tried to kill him for his intent. But the demon was almost like a newborn: it knew too little of others, and itself, and regarded the black-clad warlock beneath it just as an infant would fix its indeterminable gaze on a thing of interest.

If V had had the opportunity to savor the success of his first resurrection, he might have. He might have patted himself on the back for once, admired the golem as a thing of beauty, but as he was uncertain and on high alert, he could not think of anything but the very real chance that the demon might retaliate after all—or go berserk. But he remained in the circle, watched the demon hesitate before the uppermost grains of salt on the ground, and felt his heart skip a beat. The demon stalled, right outside the protective circle, and stood motionless as its eye looked in all directions. Perhaps it wondered what stood in its way. V needed to find his nerve or he'd lose the demon to its untamed instincts: he could not afford complacency now that he'd gotten so close, with work still needing to be done in order to claim the demon for his own. So, he would appeal to it, with a voice that came across more meekly than he'd intended. “Nightmare...?”

His voice surely caught its attention. If only he knew it was perceived as only noise.

“Do you understand me?” he probed. “You are alive. You've come back from death.” That stirred nothing. “It was my voice you heard that guided you here. To me.” He was gentle with his words, cautious as he assessed how they'd affected the golem—but no indication of its awareness, of its comprehension, gave him next to no encouragement. He wondered if Nightmare had ever understood spoken language. But, if that hadn't gotten through to the demon, then he supposed something physical might. Much to the horror of his watchful familiars, V pushed himself forward to extend an arm, to reach out his bare hand, to...touch.

“V, what're you doin'?!” The raptor could not have left well enough alone.

Violet pulsated.

The small warlock had stepped beyond the perimeter of salt. He broke his protection and exposed his vulnerable soul to infernal powers for the sake of connection. And he sensed it. At the back of his mind, a tingle; at his fingertips, something sentient and...perceiving, at least, cool to the feather-light touch but so very warm with devil's blood at its core. The silence might have unnerved him, but to know that he was not dismissed gave him heart. “You can feel me?” he wondered with his eyes cast up, searching that deep and indecipherable purple for his answer. Whether or not it was a product of psychic communication, a sense of calm ran through his fingers, and comfort grazed at the very door to his mind. That dark and obsessive demon within him smothered itself the instant man touched demon, demon touched man, and in its place was born a tender affection. His hand was soft over Nightmare's arm and free from its claws.

Now...he admired it, just a little.

But if he could get inside that titan's mind, he'd know what he looked like to it. And to be acknowledged by the thing that gave it new life was new, also, in this way: because it was novel to feel warmth, respect, and to sense that no subjugation would come from the pale little hand that seemed also to lay claim. And it was a strange contradiction. Nightmare seemed to remember something familiar, something like dominion and disregard that came with a claim of its own over the newborn. But these impressions were faint and centuries distant, and Nightmare was not roused to belligerence by a perceived wrong but remained placid and curious before the human boy it almost, almost could have known as a father. It felt, it understood, in its own innocent way, and therefore it sought. But why, why did the black-and-white figure that so kindly welcomed it suddenly peel away in retreat? The demon only wanted to know him, experience him, and mimic his gesture with an arm of its own. It tried to graze him with the claws on its arm, but the human stepped back with a change in his demeanor. Was this rejection? Was this human false?

V's circle was breached by inhuman hands and feet, its protectiveness nullified when V had broken it. He found that his salt did not burn when the demon walked through it. He was swift in collecting his grimoire and scrambled out of the circle entirely, ignoring one familiar's calls to cease and desist as he still so stubbornly held his ground to win favor he didn't know he already had. “Nightmare!” he called with firmness, attempting to command its attention. He was so sure he'd angered it. The grimoire was opened to the page he needed and he, in utter darkness, recited more from memory than from print. “How sweet is the Shepherd's sweet lot! / From the morn to the evening he strays; / He shall follow his sheep all the day, / And his tongue shall be fillèd with praise.” He glanced to find Nightmare had stilled before him, within his broken circle. That's good. He inhaled a breath to steady himself, to soften, to finish. “For he hears the lamb's innocent call, / And he hears the ewe's tender reply; / He is watchful while they are in peace, / For they know when their Shepherd is nigh.” In a maddening mix of apprehension and anticipation, V watched the violet orb spin: the demon was thinking. Even if such a creature could not understand the human, artful tongue, he knew that a creature could still sense emotion, and from within words so delicately crafted and sweetly delivered, emotion was the only intent he'd meant to convey. Like music soothed savage beasts, poetry soothed soured demons.

Nightmare appeared to like the sound of those words. Its confusion was dashed for a moment, and now only watched V with its same curiosity. When a fleeting moment of broad silence passed, Nightmare wanted to inch closer to him—and was again stilled when another string of pretty words touched its consciousness. Was it meant to stand still when the human talked so affectionately? It decided not to move again.

And this, V determined, was a sign of domestication. He thought he'd tamed the beast, at least halfway, so quickly!

“V,” the raptor persisted, “I don't like this! That thing's an accident waiting to happen!”

“Quiet! I know...it knows.”

“It knows you're a chump—!”

“Shhh!” V pressed a finger to his lips when he'd turned to Griffon but donned a friendly, inviting air when again he faced the colossal golem. He smiled, his eyes glimmered, and he approached it with calm. “Nightmare,” he said quietly, intimately, “will you...be my demon? Will you bind to me?” Predictably, no response, so V reached his hand out again to connect—and tried again, focusing on intent rather than speech with a harder, genuine look over his countenance. “I need you, and I...hope...you need me, too. Will you be my familiar?” His palm was firmer on the demon's flesh this time, but not at all merciless or pressuring.

V never believed he was telepathic, but with Nightmare on the other end of the communication, he could have sworn his feelings had been answered. The demon stood still, as did he, and here he would perform the rite of bondage. His technique evolved, every time, and he'd come upon the simplest form of claiming a familiar to date. If magic was all about intent, then for ceremony there was little need. Through incantation and intent, and mutual agreement, the warlock would bind the demon to himself as effectively as he'd ever done. Griffon swallowed every last complaint to let his master be; Shadow had been wise from the start to observe.

Nightmare was still as it watched the little creature who'd given it life. His words it understood vaguely, but his touch was the easiest language it'd ever known. The golem it came to be was nothing at all like the machine of chaos in its previous life. Whether or not that had something to do with the man who'd willed it into being would ever be a mystery. But it, like him, was calm and patient, and listened to a language it largely heard as noise. He uttered words on and on, and some were pretty while others were fair, and some were soft while others were hard; and when he would speak the same word, “Nightmare,” he was warm with his intonation. And the demon, within, felt a warmth as well that had come upon it quite suddenly. A whole change in the air confused it. But so long as the giver of life held his touch and gave it comfort, the golem would be peaceful in its trust.

Magic leaked into the air from his lips, every syllable of incantation imbuing the forces of life and nature, Earth and Hell, those that were human and diabolical—all, combined, alive with the distinctive violet hue of his art, would grant the warlock that which he sought in all fairness of practice. There was power in the atmosphere, a presence of miasma that was inherent in all demonic dealings, but V was no stranger to the forces whirling about his body or the sensations bouncing and dancing all across his skin. This was a power only he could wield, which only he understood in the way that was so personal and individual, his and his alone. His eyes had been closed for concentration; and as he felt the demon's spirit closer to his own, he bridged the gap by granting the demon knowledge of his sacred name. “My name is Vitale.”

Vitale, not V, who he really was, whom he would always be. All his familiars knew it, and now, too, did Nightmare. He'd forbidden anyone else the privilege—to such an extent that he would forget a moniker was only a moniker.

And maybe, with the bond formed and the final pledges made, he could be less of V, more of Vitale.

“Come, on wings of joy we’ll fly To where my bower hangs on high; Come, and make thy calm retreat, Among green leaves and blossoms sweet.”

It shot through him—power, life, trust, a connection. All of Nightmare, all at once, vanishing from sight as the finest black particles to join with its master on his body, new markings alongside those previous, fitting snugly between each one to fill more of his skin, claiming him for itself in so doing. But this demon took more than the warlock had counted on. It cloaked hair so white in its embrace and painted it black, a deep, true ebony that could have contested even the darkest of shadows. It startled him when his eyes opened, and he grabbed at the strands and his scalp as if to make sense of what had just happened. With the demon finally bound to him, the air fell flat. Magic, left; power, absorbed; spirits, gone. Only V now, and his familiars.

The changes in him were not only skin-deep. Somehow, in some way, he felt Nightmare's weight on him. He felt its strength, too, albeit faintly in his psyche; and he felt his strength, greater than it had been minutes ago, spiritually, but still quite subtle materially, in presence. It was like Griffon's or Shadow's, but Nightmare was a demon on an entirely elevated level. And it must have been for that sole reason that V could feel his body suddenly so tired—and this to such a degree that he slouched a little as a result. His two familiars neared him, relieved to see that he'd survived his experiment.

That's right... He'd succeeded. He hadn't even remembered what hell he'd put himself through for the past several weeks. It all paid off. But he didn't think of it. He used his foot to clear away the casting on the ground, the salt spread in all directions as it was rendered ineffective anyway. When he took one solitary step forward to pet his doting shapeshifter, he felt a weakness in the knees that nearly downed him. It was a stumble, that was all...! No one pointed it out to him, and he was thankful for that.

He'd never felt that before, not even when he'd run himself ragged.

“I gotta hand it to you, kid,” Griffon praised, “you stuck to your idiot guns and got what you wanted. You've gotta be feeling so good about yourself.”

V couldn't help answering distractedly. “Yeah.” He ran his hands through Shadow's fur all the while she circled him, offering fond nudges as though to comfort him. “It's...kind of strange.” He did not eye Griffon.

“What? Too much power for you?”

Was that it?

The answer had to wait as V spent a moment collecting the candles, pouring salt over the area, and defacing the inverted pentagram. This circle, too, was cleared away. But his silence often spoken volumes, so he did not doubt that his demons were already forming conclusions in their dark minds. Their eyes were certainly fixed on him as he had his back turned. When he should have been feeling joyous and fulfilled, he found that, instead, he was...undecided with his feelings, ultimately.

“What about your hair, anyway? I've never seen that happen before.”

“It's strange. I don't know if I'll get used to it,” the warlock admitted, knitting his brows as he caught sight of a strand of black hair falling in front of his eye. What a change—and now he was as if a perfect shadow, black on the bottom and black on top. God, that must have screamed something about him.

“It's not that bad on you, actually,” the chatty demon observed, his tone impressed. But he wanted to know about Nightmare, and he wanted to know that V was satisfied and had finally gotten over his obsession with it. “But we're avoiding the subject, aren't we? Tell us how you feel. I mean, after everything you went through, was it worth it after all? Sure, the big lummox agreed to entering the rite and all—and I'm still shocked it didn't go berserk on us—but it didn't exactly strike me as the intelligent kind. I'm not saying you gotta talk to be smart, but—”

“Sometimes talking less masks stupidity.” V flashed a fleeting smirk. “I guess...I feel all right. Exhausted, but...all right. I think the pressure's just finally catching up to me.” A soft breeze rustled the canopies some feet away. What time had it been? He packed up his materials as Griffon continued to talk his ear off. V blocked him out for the most part, concerned by the strange sensation in his legs. It wasn't tiredness, it wasn't pain. He knew the difference. Lacking a better idea, all he could compare it to was weakness; and all he could figure was that it was his fault in the end, because he'd been so desperate and power-starved that he threw all caution to the four winds for the sake of summoning a demon that was potentially out of his league. Maybe what Griffon had said, about “too much power,” was right. Maybe it had been too much for V, but he'd never given that the kind of thought it deserved. All he wanted was some semblance of self-reliance, the knowledge that he could really hold his own and fold in fear to no one, not man nor demon. It was all he wanted and he'd found it. He had it. Nightmare was his. A demon once under the command of an emperor was now in V's bony hands, and it should have gratified him more.

If anything, he came to realize that he was in error for believing that he could just take from demons as much as he'd wanted, without repercussions. The essence that was Nightmare's which he'd felt through his touch was felt in the back of his mind, only now it was perpetual, and he thought that demon might read what he was thinking, might even influence him if he was not careful.

Because he did, he did feel different. Physically and psychologically. He felt the weight on and the weakness in his body. He felt an intangible strength, and with it an unusual sway to his psyche. While his thoughts remained his own, and he felt himself his own man, he too sensed that there was suddenly more to him. In heart and mind where his inner demon dwelt, he felt it with more clarity than ever. All that was demonic in him, purely of him and from which he was born, seemed more alive now, so suddenly, after Nightmare joined with him to serve him as intended. But it was not Nightmare's doing: V knew, with every familiar claimed, that the demonic blood in him which was so diluted had gained some amplification; and after every demon bound to his skin, more and more of the devil liked to play. It was no wonder that he'd gotten so much more impertinent and stubborn and dark-humored, and that he more and more enjoyed slaying the infernal interlopers who had no place upon the Earth so long as they posed as threats to it. It was no wonder that V was more and more a devil in his own right. Puberty had brought that on, but surrounding himself with demons helped it along. And even that was no such concern for him, because he still believed he could stand a change in character. He hated his meekness.

Maybe there was something more to it all. A change in character would suit the change in his fashion—he'd forgotten he'd been wearing something new, and only when he slung his filled rucksack over his shoulder had he remembered that he'd not worn sleeves. He felt good in what he wore, and comfortable, and he liked that the loneliness of the field afforded him a peace of mind with which to walk freely. No one around to judge him, watch him, or try to break the ice with him. And even if there had been, he liked to believe that the devil inside shouldn't have to care anymore. When he used to be a boy who'd been too frightened to make decisions and take first steps, tonight he'd proven that he was dauntless and relentless, and impossible to sway when he'd had his mind set; and though he showed recklessness, he often paired that with a quick resourcefulness and the ability to rebound. In his teenage years he was too shy to function, but the coming of age brought about a kind of daring that was, more than anything, born from his own distaste toward himself and a desire to mature, evolve, improve. And he had. Every year that passed, he grew up a little more, learned better of the adult world, and adapted more nimbly to things that were outside of his control. And though he had still a ways to go, he was getting there. He was only twenty-one, still too naive and fresh-faced, inept and awkward with people, and continually healed where his trauma was concerned. Emotional scars ran deeply, and they hadn't quite closed. They didn't. That's why the young man, though still a boy for all intents and purposes, bled from his hidden wounds to the present day.

Perhaps there was something more to be gained from Nightmare than simply its alliance. V had finally realized that he'd met his goal—probably his hardest one to reach yet. He'd resurrected a demon from death! He formed a vessel for the spirit to inhabit, to use as its own body and reshape it as it pleased. He tamed the demon with the art of the spoken word, nothing more, and successfully bound it to him, himself to it. Things that he had not even practiced before had all worked on his very first attempt, and if that in itself was not a sign of growth and experience, then nothing else could be. Before his own eyes he improved upon his craft, gained a new skill while mastering older ones, and granted a second chance to a soul which, in its previous life, had been used as a tool only to be slain by its master's foe. That couldn't have been any kind of life to live and it certainly wasn't any kind of afterlife. Here, V showed he was merciful, too; and it may have been by sheer coincidence that things had turned out that way, his intent originally to bind the most powerful demon he could host on his body, but ever since he'd laid eyes on the thing—touched it with heart and soul—he felt differently. He wanted more than what he bargained for, and in several ways he'd gotten it. Nightmare was to be as much a friend to him as Griffon and Shadow, as much a part of their small family unit as anyone else in it. More than power and bravado, he wanted connection, and comfort, and someone more to trust, and someone to trust in him, to need him, to value him as he'd value them. And he found it in Nightmare. He found a lot in Nightmare. When the demon joined with his body and the cloud of maddened obsession lifted from his psyche, the warlock could finally see it all: his mistake, mistakes, his flaws and talents, his honest needs, what he was and who he thought he wanted to be, should be, and how he ought to be it. There was a truth revealed to him in bonding with Nightmare and in everything he'd done to get there in the first place. Everything from his devotion to his dress, from his guts to his tenderness.

V thought he'd found himself, through this. He'd found at least a part of Vitale—and he'd chip away at himself to find even more until he was all out in the open. Still so young, he had so much time for it.

As he walked back the path he'd taken, Shadow had melted to darken his form along with Griffon shortly after. There was no conversation to be had between man and devil; and V got away with leaving many of Griffons' questions unanswered. Fatigue, he'd explained. Partly true. Already was he tiring himself out, pushing more than he was used to just to keep on the path. If he expected to stand on his own two feet with his head held high, confidence on his brow and the steadfast backing of his infernal friends, he wouldn't do it looking and feeling so tuckered out. But he'd done wrong to reflect on it now. V had inevitably seen himself home.

Griffon and Shadow were freed to sleep where they pleased the moment V locked the door. Sleep was not often something that he looked forward to. Given the frequency of his nightmares, he would start in the middle of the night with his traumas and insecurities brought to the forefront of his mind as if he'd lived through every painful experience all over again. But he was too tired to care when he flung himself on his bed, and he likewise did not fight the fading of his consciousness when he slipped right off to sleep. He always would, and horror would reliably wake him. Only, tonight, it didn't. He didn't wake. He'd slept in unintentionally when dawn broke. It was strange to him that he'd felt mildly rested in the morning, when he would oft feel sleepy. He didn't remember any disturbance in his sleep. But the black of his hair made him wonder; and, still, the tiredness in his body hadn't left him. He would go to the same field that night in an attempt to call Nightmare from its hideaway for the first time, but the demon did not come. Try as he did, driven to worry and exasperation, thinking even that he'd betrayed his new friend in some irreversible manner, the familiar would not emerge. Griffon suggested a thousand things to try, and those that were sensible resulted in failure.

But...V did think of one thing before quitting for the night. He thought to be playful, as if coaxing a child from its hiding place, when he poured his will and his warmth into a snap of his fingers. From the sky came crashing down a meteorite, V's hair suddenly white.

Ah, so that's how it is.

[limitedrevolverworks]

My Mother 2.0 [2]

[Chapter 1]

Above all else, it’s the silence that that he cannot comprehend.

A deep quiet fills his ears, flooding with a silence so paradoxically deafening. Mere instinct reaches out as best it can, grasping for the slightest vibration it could feed to eardrums sorely starving for that hint of familiarity, but all it can scoop out of the stale air is an utter anomaly it doesn’t know what to make of. The frightening shadow of an indecipherable unknown looms over him, daring his powerless, broken shell to do something, anything about it that he obviously cannot. He could chalk it up to the numbness that seems to envelop his entire being, from the smallest atom to the very thoughts produced by his half-comatose brain, but even in his stupor, the boy knows better. And of all the interrogatives pressing down on him, this one feels the most daunting precisely because he can blame it on himself, rather than some factor outside the scope of his perceptions. It’s a minuscule, vibrant spark of audacity that the very mind culpable for its creation regards it with cautious hesitation, unable to fathom its own ability to birth it. For a time that his diluted consciousness desperately stretches into a seeming eternity, the child refuses to acknowledge the one truth he could process, choosing instead to wallow in an uncertain oblivion that is at least partially of his own making. It’s a long, drawn out, tiresome battle, a silent war fought without weapons, a peaceful, stubborn conflict where nothing happens aside from waiting, waiting.

Waiting.

He doesn’t realize the gradually shifting tide of his struggle until his sole serviceable eye timidly spreads open to brave the unknown sight that has been waiting all along for his acceptance.

Now, the boy finally admits it: that the very unknown he should fear, he very much welcomes far more than anything he’s ever been acquainted with.

And so…

At last…

Time begins to flow anew.

“Hey now, awake alread-D-D-D-D-D-y? Go figure.”

The rapidfire barrage of glitchy reverb is interspersed between words that sound like they’re rattling within a box made of thin metallic sheets. The auditory concoction stampedes its way through the child’s hearing with all the grace of a bombardment and hurting twice as much.

It’s odd, though.

Common sense etched deep inside tells him that the optimal response should involve either lots of thrashing and screaming, or curling into a ball and quietly begging for it to end. There’s the fact that the neural pathways in charge of his muscles are currently fueled with a thick, uncrossable gel paste-like form of paralysis, but that’s not the whole of it. The pain is far from pleasant, yet it conveys a clear message - that he is alive, and not anywhere he would recognize. One of these two conclusions fills him with something akin to relief; the other, not so much.

It’s hard for the boy to decide which corresponds to which. He decides that, for the time being, a better way to keep busy what few of his brain cells are awake would be deciphering exactly what it is that he’s staring at.

Through the fog blanketing his vision, the child sees grey lips, framed by a shade of dull blue well on its way to fading into the latter color. The plated shape gives him the impression that it must be a helmet covering the rest of the stranger’s face, but the two halves hug each other so harmoniously to form a solid mass that he questions this interpretation, despite any other making little sense. He seeks answers in the single black strip cutting into the superior portion: the bright red dot swimming inside it, however, dumps only more questions onto a pile that has already grown rather healthy.

His eye begins to burn, reminding him of such a basic need as blinking that he’d seemingly forgotten in his stupor. The boy’s eyelid trembles: will it manage to arise once more, after it’s fallen? The darkness was daunting, but he felt safe within its embrace. It tasted different from the one he’s grown accustomed to - ah, hold on, that’s not quite right.

As more and more of his consciousness tears itself free from its sleepy cocoon, the child begins to make sense of his own thoughts. He understands that it’s not quite that his unconsciousness felt safe in and of itself - rather, it’s what he feels now, after he’s already gotten out of it. Knowledge informs his less rational side, rewriting his immediate past in light of the present. It’s the fact that he knows what comes after the darkness, that leads him to trust it for the first time his short, young life. And for how utterly fruitless his attempts at making heads or tails of his present predicament may be, he has no doubt that he prefers it to the routine that preceded it.

Lingering for a long, drawn-out second more on the thing that may or may not be a face, the boy tells himself that he has nothing to lose anyway. And in the simple act of blinking once, he perceives the rush of an emotion he’s never known he could harbor.

If he’d ever had any conception of it, the child could relish in his first taste of freedom.

“Do yourself a fa-A-A-A-A-A-vor and don’t move, will you?”

More words come out from a mouth that doesn’t move to spell them. The boy speaks his obedience with silent immobility: at the end of the day, old habits are too stubborn to lie down and let themselves die; he receives a nod for his effort, or lack thereof.

“Not that you can move an-N-N-N-N-yway.”

From the corner of his vision, the boy witnesses what seems to be a shoddy impression of a shrug from a pair of stiff shoulders that must have been made for anything but.

“Had to strap you good in case these aneS-S-S-S-S-thetics failed to do their job, and what do you kno-O-O-O-O-w? Never trust chemic-C-C-C-C-als a couple centuries past their expiration date, kid.”

Peeling off the various layers of noise and glitching haunting it, the voice digs out the impression that he’s been talked to by a woman, despite his eyes’ struggle to acquiesce with this conclusion. If what she’s wearing is a protective suit of sorts, it’s nothing like the ones he’s seen.

Panic threatens to seize him. Could they have transferred him to another research facility?

No! No!

He’d just begun to warm to the idea that perhaps, finally, it had all ended, but now that his lucidity has wrestled back control of his ability to process things properly, he wonders how he even came to that conclusion. His path had never, ever strayed from its repetitive course until that fateful day. Why, exactly, should he believe it to be the case now?

Foolish. Stupid stupid stupid! He dared dream for the first time ever, and he knows that all it did was set him up for greater anguish than he’s ever known. Because now, he has tasted hope. It’s far too late to retrieve the resignation that he cast away at a whim. He’s left himself vulnerable, discarded his fragile shell in the spur of a momentary madness. For all he knows, he’s left himself bare against a realm of suffering that could surpass anything he’s experienced. That is… that is…!

He wants to cry. To scream atop his lungs until his throat will have burned away along with what’s left of his sanity.

Burning…

His throat is burning. He feels a lump in it that has nothing to do with the one born from his desire to cry his heart out. The distraction is a tiny one, yet he clings to it as best he can, a minuscule island in an ocean of self-made terror. He notices now that the noise he was picking up while barely conscious is his own breathing. A ragged, drawn out sound like dusty wind sweeping off a gravelly path. The boy’s eye moves down on its own, seeking an explanation. It can only manage to pick up the vague shape of a cylindrical shape, jutting out of the edge where his pupil meets his lower lid. The woman bends aside so that her masked face can meet his gaze again, her head tilted even further to express what her “face” simply can’t.

“Yeah, that w-W-W-W-W-W-W-ould be the reason why you’re tied like a b-B-B-B-B-undle of rations. I can’t have you thrashing all ov-V-V-V-V-er the place with a tube sticking out of your throat… wait, hold on. Does it hurt? Those painkillers I stuffed you w-W-W-W-W-W-ith are three decades older than the anaesthetics.”

There’s a long, drawn out pause filled mostly with one-sided blinking, and little else.

“Oh! Right! Can’t move! Sorry, this one’s on me. hA-hA-hA-hA!”

For a moment, the boy thinks his… caretaker? Captor? Whoever that may be, the way her voice spazzes out at the end and her whole body shakes, it looks and sounds dangerously close to a seizure. It comes to an abrupt conclusion and a return to her very relative normality, which means… what exactly was that supposed to be?

“That’s a face you’re making there… well, half-F-F-F-F-F a face. Did I startle you, maybe? Sorry, faulty voice m-M-M-M-M-odule. Gave up trying to fix it a couple centuries ago, not worth the has-S-S-S-S-S-S-sle. You don’t find many conversational partn-N-N-N-N-N-ers around these parts, you know?”

He doesn’t, but then again it’s not like he can point that out.

“Anyway, anywa-A-A-A-A-A-y, I’ve just told the IV to inject you with another sleepytime cocktail, so sit tight and relax. You’re g-G-G-G-G-G-oing to be doing a lot of that, honestly, at least until I’m done downloading all this medical training software for the surgery.”

A metal-clad arm raises: at the end of it, fingers lightly curl around a wire that begins somewhere outside the boy’s scope, and ends in a rectangular protrusion connected to a similarly shaped hole in the side of the mysterious stranger’s neck. It makes about as much sense as anything else the child has learned about her, and he’s given up trying to put together all the clues he’s been given into a cohesive, discernible whole.

“I mean, a thracheos-S-S-S-S-S-tomy’s a piece of cake by itself. But anything beyond going stabby-stabby on your tr-R-R-R-R-R-R-achea is a tad more complicated than that. I haven’t half a clue what they’ve d-D-D-D-D-D-one to you up there in that big floaty world of theirs, but whatever it was, it made a mess of your throat. There was enough goop stuck in there I had to spend an hour drain-N-N-N-N-N-ing it to make sure you wouldn’t choke on it. I reckon that when my scanning module’s been updated, we’ll disc-C-C-C-C-C-over that the rest of your body’s even worse for the wear.”

Silence falls anew at the end of a series of informations that the boy tries to digest all at once. Half of his features are still perfectly usable, and could lend themselves to expressing what a metal visage cannot. But the child does not visibly react to the news given to him. His lips do not smile. His eye does nothing but look at the one speaking to him with a half-lidded stare, unsure of what to make of any of it, less of all his worry that this may be a prelude to a nightmare.

The boy is tired. He closes his eye, deciding to thrust himself to the darkness, and the infinitesimal chance of salvation hiding in it.

If he has any hope left in him now, it’s the old, familiar brand that cannot wait for his body to do away with itself.

Sensors that were state of the art back when they were made do their best to try and do what they weren’t built for. The staticity on the little human’s face brings up correspondences with old, untouched corners of her databases. Visual data from times long forgotten by those they begot, visions of broken husks of flesh and bone, deader than the corpses of their comrades. Some of those fallen to the very same iron-cast hands that have done their best to keep a lone boy from biting the bullet, based on what can only be defined a whim.

The automaton born of war kneels besides her guest, and wonders. She does so by sending microscopic sparks across a net of data swimming inside her artificial brain, in search of an act that no medicine or surgical procedure could emulate - a way to heal something other than a body.

Something comes up. A tiny possibility buried among billions of others, at the very edge of her range of intended abilities. Fragments of culture acquired for mere curiosity and to stave off whatever form of boredom a machine could even feel to begin with, knowledge thought obsolete until it came up in this very moment, suggesting a pattern that seems convincing enough to be put into tentative, awkward practice.

Thunk. Thunk.

The child raises his eyelid, startled. A gelid, hard sensation is spreading on his head, where his forehead gives way to his disheveled hairline, right next to where the chitinous substance has overtaken the rest of it.

His view is obscured by something. A shadow that robs his sight of light, only to let him seep through again, cyclically going through the motions while the sharp feeling becomes more defined against his skin. It’s only after the fifth time that the shadow finally relents and draws back enough for him to find its source, staring at him through a red, unblinking light.

“How is it? I’m not entirely confident since it’s my f-F-F-F-F-F-irst time, but apparently headpats are supposed to feel g-G-G-G-G-G-ood for young humans like you.”

Her hand approaches again, stopping short of reaching him. It reels back just enough that he can see the black band where her eye resides, and the mouth whose lips cannot flap, nor curl.

“You want me to stop?”

He hadn’t noticed it before, taken as he was with pretty much everything else assaulting his senses, but… there is something about this voice. Beyond the metallic-sounding raspiness, aside from the occasional slip into an ear-piercing torture, there is a tone about this voice that feels unmistakably reassuring.

It’s a rough, alien-feeling sort of softness.

The boy’s eye lingers on the hand hovering above him, shifting to the person staring back with what he decides must be expectation, then back to the hand.

The lid falls like a curtain, letting the centuries old anaesthetics do their job. If he wishes to protest, he doesn’t make the slightest attempt to show it.

As sleep beckons him back to its thoughtless cradle, the child hears it again. Thunk. Thunk. It’s cold, and hard, so much so that at the epicenter of it he can feel a sharp, prickly pain.

Yet somehow, he doesn’t mind.