blue veins

D --> My name is Equius Zahhak D --> If you're here I assume you followed the link from my professional site for whatever reason D --> I may be contacted here if you so desire D --> Alternatively, if you stumbled across me by a%ident, hello

[florus]

(via Untitled | Flickr - Photo Sharing!)

[toxophilic-blog]

January 12th, 2012

[toxophilic-blog]

Mutant in strength? This could be a rarity fit for someone like himself. Darkleer pondered the thought for a moment. Weeks? He wasn’t sure if the pathetic little slave in his basement was to last that long. Still, this was an opportunity that he did not want to pass up. Having access to a unique find such as this was the sort of prestige Darkleer had raised his “son” to deserve and require. Darkleer led Equius into the kitchen where an outstretched finger indicated the coffee machine. 

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[centaursterminal-blog]

Bitter. Equius inclined his chin pointedly, not that little bit that would make him seem fearless but no, all the way back so that his throat was bared and his horns were tilted uselessly away. It was a movement of both understanding and subtle, respectful submission, albeit more subconscious than a motion he'd intended to make. Irritating his father was not on his list of things to do. He folded his hands neatly behind his back, falling quiet for a five count of heartbeats as he considered and watched the other. In and out went air as the gears in his head turned, hidden by his glasses, and then he nodded sharply. 

"The psionic is of a STRENGTH that even our mutual associate has never seen, despite his young age," Equius finally said, still quiet and slow with his words. He always was; some found it unnerving, but it was a thoughtful quality. "A psionic parallel to our own family, as it were. I found the irony of the situation most suitable. I will be watching him personally until we are certain when we can retrieve him. If you're interested, father, I'll go speak to our associate and learn more about the lowblood in question."

He had thought of every single item his guardian had noted, certainly, but it still made him flinch just a little, inwardly (he would never show outright weakness, never never never to Darkleer). Equius fell into step behind the larger troll, oddly quiet on his feet for his bulk, and continued in his usual quiet bass. "I've acquired a replacement for you in the meantime, of course, father. I didn't mean to imply that you would be living short of anything you rightfully deserve. I only desired to inform you of my intentions." He swallowed a little, eyes darting to either side of the hall, and ducked into the office behind his father. 

Blueprints. He had brought them, right? Yes, he had; they weren't as excellent as he had hoped but they would do for preliminary designs, and Equius found he always fell short of his own expectations regardless of his own efforts. "Yes, father, I have. One for the Derby, as you requested, and another that I wished to suggest for the company at large. Perhaps not mass production, but at least the military might find it intriguing. Possible designs for the reinforcement of tank armor, and their weaponry, so as to sustain higher levels of heat, damage, or pressure without warping. It's a minimal increase, but notable enough that I thought it worth investigating."

His breath caught briefly in his throat, hesitant and nervous, when he finally fell silent. He had this tendency to talk too much sometimes, when his brain was working so quickly and papers full of lines and graphs were clutched in his hand. Equius lay them each flat on the table, glancing up over the rims of his dark lenses, maybe a touch more hopefully than he would have liked.

[centaursterminal-blog]

January 20th, 2012

> 10:32 PM, PST

With every step he took down the street, Equius felt self-loathing penetrate every pore of his body and pour out of him like a waterfall, thick and awful and sickening to a great number of his organs. It tasted like bile in his mouth and he was certain he could drown in it if he acknowledged it even once, because if he did he’d never be able to lie to himself and continue to say he was strolling through this part of town by chance. He was not, in fact, here by chance; the only people who lived down here were lowbloods and humans, who stained the area with their very existence, and he would never have accidentally made his way there.

No, if anyone asked him, he was here to check on the clock he’d asked to get repaired, and had chosen to walk for the sake of exercise. That was not an entirely untrue statement, and silently he applauded himself on being able to even delude himself.

He was most certainly there to pay the shop a visit, perhaps just to glance through the window and catch a glimpse of his either repaired or unrepaired keepsake. But there was another motivation he hated to even think about, a powerful one that told him against all his judgments to skip his class for the first time in his life and walk down through the parts of Los Angeles he usually preferred to pretend did not exist. Its name was Aradia Megido, and he was loathe to admit that she was quite possibly the most stunning and entrancing creature he’d ever had the misfortune to meet. At first Equius had brushed the strikingly elegant lines of her face aside, dismissed it as an uncontrollable reaction to the undeniably exquisite symmetry of her features. But no, they had followed him back to his apartment and he had spent an entire night doing nothing but staring into the fireplace, letting the flames dance and trying desperately not to see red-tinged lips or raven hair in them, searching for the inexplicably familiar switch in his head she had hit so that he could turn it back off.

It had been a lost effort, though, and so here he was.

The moonlight was more than enough to see by, and the windows were not tinted like he had feared they would be. The lights within the shop were on and it brought him some small flicker of hope, and he feigned interest in one of the window displays, some kind of antique clock. The dark lenses over his eyes hid his true intentions, the almost frantic dart of his vividly blue eyes over the inside of the shop. No, there was no ‘almost’ about it; he was searching for her, that vile rustblooded girl who had called him back here like some twisted siren. He could hardly help himself, and he drank in every corner of the barely serviceable shack of a shop and its practically ancient wares, things that harkened back to an older time, a better time if you asked him – as did her craft, her almost laughably outdated craft, and that alone could make his mouth a little dry and his palms a little damp.

He hardly even knew her name.

Perhaps, he reasoned to himself as he searched between the shelves and clocks and dim lights, if he saw her again he could pinpoint just what had entranced him so. Some resemblance to someone far her better, or maybe some mannerism, some style of her hair or some way she laughed that reminded him of someone else. Maybe he had just developed some depraved fascination for her trade, falsely attributed it to some yearning for the old days when things were still in their proper order because there was no way a rustblood gave a good gosh darn about any of that.

A flurry of skirts and fabric within seemed timed well enough as to be laughing at him, and he darted away from the window as quick and quiet as though he’d never been there at all. Equius shoved his sweaty hands into his pockets and when was the last time he’d perspired like that, that was a horrifying and embarrassing realization to make, and he practically raced down the street with heavy steps in his haste to get away. His chin had gone low low, horns tipped downwards in an unspoken bodily threat; no one got in his way. He was grateful for that. His shoes dragged against the pavement and his horns, one broken but the other no less impressive for it, led his strides, all the way back to where he’d parked his car several blocks away.

The drive home was excruciating. No, the traffic was no worse than usual, the car was in perfectly wonderful shape because he very much liked his car and took excellent care of each part of it, so it could not have been the drive. It was his own mind, his treacherous fucking thinkpan that wrung his beatpump in multiple directions at once and taunted him to explain himself now, to find another excuse for his unspeakably poor behavior. And oh, what would Darkleer think of his taste, of how he somehow remembered the graceful lines of her unworthy rust-tinted mouth from the one glimpse he’d gotten, how exactly it had looked when it repeated his name?

It was not until he returned to Ocean Avenue, dropped the key twice on his way in and stumbled over his own carpeting, and threw an exceedingly heavy chunk of metal off of his balcony that he realized quite how badly his hands were shaking. 

[toxophilic-blog]

January 12th, 2012

[toxophilic-blog]

Darkleer had just hung up his cell phone when he heard the knock on the door. It was lucky that he was in a room close enough to the door to hear it. Even luckier was the fact that he’d finished his phone call in time. His appointment to visit a farm up north was set. It wasn’t an appointment he cared to share with Equius, especially since it was such a personal errand. Darkleer penciled in the date on his smartphone as he walked to the door. He was in a particularly good mood now, the thought of his visit to the farm clouding his thoughts. 

There, at the humble little farm up north, was a kitten waiting to find a home with Darkleer. He imagined the little whiskers twitching as it would sniff the furniture in its new abode. The gender of the kitten was unknown, as there was still an entire litter for Darkleer to choose from. With a small smile still haunting his face, Darkleer opened the door for his son. 

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[centaursterminal-blog]

There was a terrifying moment where Equius wasn’t quite sure how to react, because Darkleer very rarely smiled at him and it was a good thing that the widening of his eyes was hidden behind his glasses. But then it became clear that he was not in trouble, and it was not an unpleasant smile, so Equius dipped his head politely and offered a brief smile back, stepping inside. Whatever was on his father’s mind, it clearly pleased him. That would make this conversation a little less harrowing, for which Equius was overwhelmingly thankful.

“Thank you,” he murmured courteously, slipping off his shoes at the door like a proper, civilized troll who didn’t want to risk tracking dirt inside his father’s hive. He wasn’t sure if he’d even learned it from Darkleer himself, but it was a good practice, he thought. “They have, but I wished to speak to you on the matter, if you don’t mind.” Equius waited patiently for the response, because he knew it would be one that urged him to continue, as he made his way out of the front hall and into the hive proper. It was nice to be home, even if it was all spacious finery but nothing that really felt like home to him, not unless he was in the workshop or his own bedroom. It was silly, to have sentimental attachment to things like those, so he never spoke of them, but that did not make them any less real.

The psionic. Of course he hadn’t forgotten. He admitted to himself that he’d been wrapped up in blueprints instead, in plans for the Derby and ideas for the company and all the things he very abruptly felt like he hadn’t thought through nearly enough to present them to Darkleer. What if they weren’t good enough? They most likely weren’t, he hadn’t done nearly enough research on certain joints, the forming of the metal was all wrong, he hadn’t even drawn the plans up yet they were just ideas that rolled around his head and gnawed at his thinkpan—he had to stop this. He’d been addressed. He could fret later.

“I spoke to our contact, and he brought up an interesting proposition.” Our contact. He never got more specific than that. What was the point? His father would know who he was talking about, and just because it wasn’t illegal didn’t mean that some sorts didn’t frown on it, so why be crude? He didn’t see the point of being coy about the rightful enslaving of psionics, really, but he had been taught social niceties and taught them well. “He has become aware of a particularly powerful psionic – mutant in strength, no older than myself but grown into his power – and wished to offer the opportunity to us first.”

Because who else would be interested, said a part of his thinkpan, that part that nagged at him uncomfortably sometimes with things he knew he hadn’t learned from this house. He waved it aside, and it quieted, like it always did.

“It would take perhaps a week, give or take a day or two, to prepare, however. I wished to ask what you would prefer.” A younger psionic would last longer, but Darkleer was not… patient about these things. Then again, everything Equius had learned, he’d learned from his father. And his father had always been one to think things through. 

[toxophilic-blog]

January 12th, 2012

[toxophilic-blog]

Darkleer hung up the phone, satisfied. He then left his desk to sit at the drawing table. After picking through a few of his in-progress designs, he selected one of his more spectacular projects involving modern speed-tanks. These were designed to move faster than any land artillery and to be used in the place of groups of soldiers. It would spare the lives of hundreds of trolls…and he supposed humans…

However, that was not the main concern in Darkleer’s design of the speed-tanks. Their sleek and powerful design was sure to impress the men he meant to please from the military. Another contract under his belt. Another job well done. Not that Darkleer needed the money. However, his latest contract through the military was up for renewal and he was sure his genius would grant him an effortless renewal.

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[centaursterminal-blog]

Equius would have liked to be able to brag that very few people made him nervous, but that wasn’t entirely true. Setting him off was a hilariously simple feat, an immutable fact that he nevertheless tried to pretend did not exist throughout his daily life. Even so, no one could quite measure up to the way conversations with his father – even ones over the phone – made perspiration bead on his brow and his tongue dig into his teeth just to keep some semblance of his composure. He was doing no better now, as he retrieved his keys from the valet at the desk and slid into the front seat of his waiting vehicle. He’d had to reinforce the wheel copiously, too. Just like everything else he ever wanted to be able to touch. Sometimes it still didn’t help.

The call had been made, though, and that brought him some small comfort. Psionic acquisition was starting to get a little more troublesome, particularly considering the recent upswing in political activism. That made Equius’s lip curl and his hands flex on the wheel, a wheel he was a little unused to handling for himself even after being out of his father’s house for a couple years. Political activism was such a vague, kind word for what they were doing; he preferred to think of it as what it was, a form of rebellion against nature itself, for placing some of the lesser beings in positions they didn’t like. But it didn’t matter. Their chances of success were minimal, and he had good news to bring to his father. Darkleer liked good news. It would improve Equius’s day significantly, he was certain of that.

There was also the matter of legitimate work to attend to; contracts to fill, blueprints to draw up and chasses to build. Darkleer had made his decision about his heir long ago, and that decision largely added up to his ward doing a ridiculous amount of work in addition to his studies. But Equius didn’t mind. Work was something he had trouble screwing up. That would be a nice change.

Darkleer’s Malibu home was not very far from the apartment Equius had found for himself. It was a short drive, a quick turn into one of the more luxurious neighborhoods, and- and suddenly Equius found himself grateful for his medication again, even as his hand reached up to wipe at his mostly-dry brow. It was, unfortunately, still morning, he noted to himself as he clambered out of the vehicle, dreadfully careful. Of course his father had to call him in the morning, when the sun stung his skin and would have made his eyes ache if not for his dark, cracked glasses. But fine. That was just fine. He knocked on the door as cautiously as possible (and was relieved when it did not bend or dent), for fear of the doorbell not functioning, knowing that the psionic’s power was waning. No need to add to the strain.

He’d get Darkleer a proper one soon. The most powerful he could find. That was, in fact, something he dearly wished to talk to him about.

[infinite-contradictions-deactiv]

281222-R1-17-7 on Flickr.

[cookingathomeandeatingout]

[road-rash-19-blog-blog]

~PReilly

[bluntlyobvious]

[centaursterminal-blog]

January 13th, 2012

[achronism-deactivated20120707]

For her, she could only find a distaste towards the highbloods if, in turn, they did the same to her. Otherwise she would treat them as nicely as she would to other people she had learned to befriend. But then again, she doesn’t find herself associating much with people higher up on the spectrum, such segregation wasn’t unusual, and she’s come into terms with that.

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[centaursterminal-blog]

He had never had a conversation with a rustblood in his life, Equius realized with a start. Segregation had always shielded him, segregation and the reputation of his father. Public schools had never been an option for him, and no crass lowbloods dared to attend the places he had gone as a child; even at the university, where there were far more of them, he was perfectly capable of staring down his nose in silence and they were usually willing to oblige him and look in the other direction. But he was speaking to her, and even as it made his stomach turn with utter disgust it was a kind of thrill, a sick thrill that twisted his beatpump and made his head spin.

Quietly, of all the things he did not admit to himself, he did allow himself the thought that when her face was twisted in thought and consideration, swept up in the challenge he had presented her and somehow still more well-mannered than some highbloods he knew? She was exceptionally pretty.

“It is,” he admitted, but did not explain further. There was no use in lying to her. He had rightly annihilated the clock for simply being in his way, for having two little pieces that appeared just a fraction too much like nubby horns. “I look forward to seeing it fixed. It was important to me.”

Though he could never have said why. He withdrew a notepad from his jeans pocket and a pen (he carried them for just such an occasion) and Equius was loathe to admit to himself that he was nervous, her looking at him made him nervous and he wasn’t certain why. But his face was as impassive as ever and he scribbled out his name and number with a precise, meticulous hand that was reflected in his handwriting, sliding it over to her rather than push it into her hands. Too dangerous. He’d barely avoided breaking the pen as it was.

“My name is Equius,” he told her, though she could well have figured that out from the paper, and couldn’t quite help but smile politely back. The voice of Darkleer in his head was still wordlessly berating him, torturously so, for his softness towards some rustblood girl who happened to know her place.

Good god, he was going to need a shower and a couple clean towels as soon as he got home. That and a lot of time to think.

[centaursterminal-blog]

January 13th, 2012

[achronism-deactivated20120707]

She, of course, with nothing else better to do rather than tinker around with clocks— to disassemble one completely and to rearrange it back together, as if it was the most fascinating thing ever —would be seen inside her shop once more, her nose buried in a book and a discarded play for her English class laying carelessly right next to her. Of course, there are things she had to attend to but she couldn’t find it in herself to even attempt to try. Business was slow so it didn’t hurt for her to hide away beyond the back of the shop and mind her own business, simply waiting out the day but keeping an ear out for customers.

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[centaursterminal-blog]

Equius so very much hated the daytime. Sunshine had only just left him behind, for which he was grateful; it was much darker in here, another telltale sign that it was largely a troll establishment. It was a nice place, in its own right. There was a sort of rustic charm to it, small and dim with plenty of clocks that looked older than him, with- with little delicate mechanic bits scattered around, pieces disassembled everywhere. That drew his attention, even made his brow furrow just a little with an abrupt appreciation for the things. He supposed, in the end, everything came down to gears and wires, one way or the other.

"Oh! Hello there!" 

And it was the stupidest thing, but her voice reminded him much more of a song.

It jerked his attention away from the clocks and his own irritation with the world around him, made him look at her instead of the gears or his own ruined item. His eyes were hidden behind his sunglasses, the ones he never had much desire to remove, but hers had no such protection, and there was such a rusty tint to them that he felt an abrupt desire to hit something for their transgression of even existing. Vile, filthy- 

But she had a very pretty smile, even with lips tinted reddish-black instead of blue. It was all polite and friendly and inquiring at once, the kind of well-mannered smile he saw on trolls far greater than she. Somehow, he doubted they ever meant it.  

“Hello.” There was something familiar in her face, in every line of it that he swore for just a moment that he somehow knew, shapes he could have promised anyone he could recreate faithfully if they’d just give him a second; but it was gone, and he hadn’t the faintest idea where he could have met anyone of her ilk. Listen to him, he interally admonished himself with a voice that sounded entirely too much like his father, and the part of him that had been so transfixed cowered. Standing there like an idiot, so busy staring at some rustblooded girl; he’d seen prettier, and each one of them better-bred. Equius inclined his chin faintly, and had not noticed he had been gritting his teeth until one of them felt in danger of cracking. He relaxed his jaw immediately and motioned to the broken clock he had set down, instead. It was best to keep his association with filthbloods purely professional.

“There was an… accident. I wish to know if you can fix it.” He settled upon that, staring down at the smaller troll with a kind of aloof, vague interest that belied the way he otherwise watched her, almost curious.

[toxophilic-blog]

January 12th, 2012

> 11:30 AM PST

This was the second pot of coffee brewed in the last half hour. When the house’s psionic-run AI had brewed the original pot at 11:00, Darkleer was not ready for it. He’d demanded a second, as he felt that stale coffee, even slightly stale coffee, was an insult itself to Darkleer from his slave. Darkleer sneered at the coffee machine as he poured himself a cup and retired to his seat at the kitchen table. On it already sat his daily newspapers, each with the business section bookmarked for easy access. He gently placed his mug on a coaster beside his papers and pulled the business section from the first one. 

His collection of papers in the morning was probably a bit much. He had the Los Angeles times, the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post. Still, Darkleer insisted on spending the money to stay on top. He opened the business section from the LA Times first, taking a long sip of his coffee. It was almost amusing to read. None of the other companies attempting to produce anything remotely robotic with artificial intelligence stood a chance against the might of Omega Nebula Industries, also known as ONeb. The military, the political powers, even the average shopper were all in his back pocket. Darkleer read these sections like most read the comics section. For the laughs. 

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[centaursterminal-blog]

Equius did not recall falling asleep. Rather, he was fairly sure that he hadn’t, not for more than a minute or two at a time; his fourth mug of coffee that morning (and oh, how he hated the morning, the time when the human sun liked to peek through his windows and sting his eyes) was warm in his hands and he vividly remembered drinking the three before it. That he was certain he had done, while his hands had assembled bits of metal only to tear them apart again, while he’d dearly wished he could just slam his face into the desk a few times for the sheer value of the stress relief. But that was an activity for a lesser man. His frustration was something to be tamed, to be channeled and used to make his machines better and his creativity thrive.

It was a shame he had never quite gotten a handle on the subtleties of that. His coffee mug cracked under his hand and began to stain the floor, and then shattered altogether. It was a good thing that the carpet was dark, and well-reinforced, at that.

He emitted a guttural, telltale hiss of rage even as he delicately picked shards of fragmented plastic from his hands, careful not to bend them too much for fear of driving the sharp bits deeper. This wasn’t all that painful, not really. The waste of coffee nearly made him vomit, though, and- and there was Aurthour, his wondrous pet, only up to its master's waist but already cleaning the mess that had been made. Equius’s wounds were his own responsibility; the spilled drink and ruined rug were not.

“Thank you,” he gritted from between his teeth, not due to an unwillingness to say it but rather his own desire to break holes in things that Aurthour could not so easily fix. The lususpet simply continued on with its work, but that didn’t matter very much. Equius retrieved the last of the bloodied pieces from his hand, dropping it into the trashbin. Blue streamed down his fingers and onto his shoes, all over the floor; it threatened to stain his jeans, but he quickly held them over the sink instead, searching for bandages as best he could with the use of only one finger per hand and his elbows. This only served to irritate him further. The cupboard door broke as he yanked it open, falling off one of the hinges.

No matter, he told himself, even as he felt perspiration brought on by fury beading in his bloodied palms and on his furrowed brow. He would fix it later. Right now, the bandages he’d located were the most important thing.

His smartphone – reinforced personally by him, like every other damn thing he owned - began to vibrate against his thigh as he bit the cloth and tore, making a relatively neat rip in the fabric bandages and tucking the end in halfway up his left forearm. The other hand would have to wait, he decided, and let it drip with sickening steadiness into the sink. He judged this an excellent decision upon actually answering the phone.

“Good morning, father,” Equius murmured politely, but did not interrupt further. Darkleer did not make social calls. This was no different. It did amuse him that his father knew he must still be awake; perhaps they weren’t so different. He had to admit, it had occurred to him before just how many of the greater man’s habits he had picked up throughout his youth. That was right, his father still had a psionic, too. Oh, how he missed those conveniences. Learning to do things for himself had been… unpleasant, but perhaps that was why Darkleer had insisted he learn how as an adolescent at all. What a clever man, his guardian.

Equius cleared his throat. “Yes, father. I will make the proper arrangements.” And ha, how his car keys were already in his hand, how he was already scrambling to bandage the still-bleeding one over the sink! He was such a well-trained boy, even now. “I will leave my apartment immediately. I should be there within the hour.” It was funny, how he called it an apartment; Ocean Avenue only had a few of those, and his balcony apartment was absolutely nothing to sniff at. But if you asked him, it would never compare, could never compare, to the grandeur of his father’s hive.

He hung up – after letting his father get the last word, and a polite ‘goodbye, see you soon’ – and shouldered the door aside, rifling through his speed dial with little clicks of his finger until he found the contact he wished to reach even as he handed his keys to the desk valet.

After all, no highblood worth their salt dirtied their hands with the acquisition of psionics. Equius had found he always preferred intermediaries.

[blu3rsx]

“Ekso Bionics”

Ekso Bionics is committed to applying the latest technology and engineering to help people rethink current physical limitations and achieve the remarkable. Originally Berkeley Bionics, Ekso Bionics was founded in Berkeley, California in 2005. Since inception Ekso Bionics has forged partnerships with world-class institutions like UC Berkeley, received research grants from the Department of Defense and licensed technology to the Lockheed Martin Corporation. Today Ekso Bionics continues to pioneer the field of exoskeletons, designing and creating some of the most forward-thinking and innovative solutions for people looking to augment human mobility and capability.

[centaursterminal-blog]

January 13th, 2012

> 11:20 AM PST

He had not meant to break the clock. In truth, Equius rather regretted it now; it had been a gift, though for what or from whom he could not quite recall (he would consult his notes about such things at a later date, just to be certain), and had served him faithfully since he had been given it. The clock had done him little wrong, save for accurately telling the time in precisely the wrong place when its owner had shouldered into the house with molten fury roiling in his gut. But he had broken the clock. He’d only just avoided snapping it in half, as a matter of fact, and the delicate mechanics within had not survived him shoving it unceremoniously across the room and into a wall.

But it had been a gift, he was sure of it. He could not simply replace a gift; the sentimental value was worth more than the actual item, even though he hadn’t the faintest idea who it was from, and if it was someone he knew well then the chances they’d notice it was gone were very high. Equius had a reputation to keep. He could not afford to upset anyone, not a single person who might have a clue… nor did he desire to. And so here he was, standing in the cold in the ass end of Los Angeles, at a pathetic –looking shop that was nevertheless the only one he’d been able to find. Well, there had been one another, a possibly more suitable one near the borders of Malibu. But it had been run by humans. He would rather deal with other trolls – even rustbloods, if it was truly necessary, though oh how they made his stomach turn – than humans. Equius inhaled a long, steadying breath, because he felt that he would truly need it, and shifted the broken item under his arm as he shouldered open the shop door.

He had no idea why he was so attached to fucking clocks. The lengths he was going to was, quite frankly, ridiculous. But oh, how he wanted so very badly to keep this clock.

So he would do what he had to.

“Excuse me.” The warmth of the shop was welcome; he did not deal well with even the mildly cold temperatures of winter in LA. It couldn’t be less than fifty, but he had still bundled himself up nicely in a heavy sweatshirt and thick shoes, and he was not remotely sorry about it. His eyes darted around the shop behind his dark-lensed glasses, somehow unbothered by the cracks, and he rested the damn clock on the counter just so it would stop impeding the folding of his arms across his chest. He sincerely hoped there was an employee here to actually assist him. Equius had always had a reputation for his volatile temper, and today it seemed more like a time bomb.

[lxchin]

[ccoffeeandtea]

(by omheart)

[neandrewthal-blog]