flatlined

i'm a war of head versus heart; it's always this way. my head is weak. my heart always speaks before i know what it will say.

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Dorcas

[d-aine]

With the lighter expression on his face, Dorcas felt a little pressure lift off of her chest. At least he had some sort of humor still. "Of course they don't, they're not THAT thick," she replied, shaking her head slightly. "You would be shocked what they say in passing while walking to a meeting or eating their lunch, though. After a while, you catch enough pieces to put a decent picture together."

His question was weighted with unspoken concerns, and Dorcas truly felt sympathetic. "I don't know how long it's been since the last person came through, but I do know they don't believe it's finished. All of us died during the war, but we're not the only ones that did." She was sure she didn't have to remind him of that. "There's been no change in the magic levels around the veil, according to one of the aurors monitoring it. I'd say that's a good indicator that more will be joining us soon." She wasn't as sure as she sounded, but was hoping to give him some sort of peace.

[flatline-fabian]

The news was... less than exciting. Fabian frowned, narrowing his eyes at her. There was something inside him (the voices?) that told him Gideon was still on the other side of the veil and "soon" wasn't nearly good enough for him. He needed more solid data. Perhaps he shouldn't have expected her to know specifics but someone had to know the frequency of the events. The Ministry would be stupid not to look into it.

"That doesn't mean anything," he decided out loud. No change meant nothing different; nothing different meant no Gideon. Internally, he made another decision, he was going to have to go and see this veil for himself. He hadn't even seen the thing, despite (apparently) walking straight out of it, he deserved an eyeful. Of course, the Ministry wouldn't agree, he'd just have to find a way around that.

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Lily

[repotted-lilyflower]

"Oh, so you think I should have handed my son to Voldemort to kill so that I lived instead!?" Lily asked, throwing her hands in the air with an exclamation of angry exasperation. "That would have been better, because I wouldn’t have ‘given him pain’ by ‘abandoning’ him? Never mind that he would be dead, yes, of course that’s the better option!” Lily shook her head, thoroughly disgusted with the idiot in front of her. “What kind of soft-headed, idiotic, false-moralizing bullshit is that?”

She thought about turning her back on his circuitous venom, but Lily Potter had not earned her position on Voldemort’s list of “most hated” by turning away from fights and arguments. Instead she said, “As a matter of fact, I did go to your funeral, although I’m regretting that now. If I’d known that you were such a waste of space, I wouldn’t have wasted my time.” Lily shook her head, her lips curling back in a grimace. “I didn’t ask for a fucking medal or a statue; you’re the one who cares about being remembered. I don’t want to be canonized; all I bloody well said was that we fought and died for a cause that mattered, and I thought it would make more of a difference to the world at large, all right? You want to tell me I didn’t do enough? Well, I did more than you, and I had more to lose, so sod that.”

Lily stepped closer to him, her green eyes snapping sparks that, if she’d held a wand in her hand right now, would not have been metaphorical at all. “Now you’re going to stop talking about my son, because I don’t know what fucked up shit you are trying to project onto me and Harry, but I am through with it. Your life sucks? You’re jealous, or guilty, or whatever the hell you’re circling around with your bullshit? You want my pity? You think I should care more about you and your sad life and death than I do my own son? Well, that’s not happening, not in a million years. I don’t give a damn about you. You’re an idiot, an imbecile, and if you bring your bile anywhere near my son—my son—I’ll kill you again, and then you won’t have to be miserable any more. How’s that sound, Prewett? Does that cheer you up?”

[flatline-fabian]

Fabian took a half step backward, leaning on his back foot and then forward. He licked his lips again, feeling the agitation internally, even through his amusement. She was so obviously touched in the head from her journey to death and back he wouldn't dare take her seriously. But despite her obvious lack of clarity and refusal to accept his logic he continued to open his mouth. "No, then you might as well have killed yourself anyway," he spoke with a matter-of-fact tone. "Wouldn't it have been much better if you'd learned from those who went before you and stopped listening to that crackpot of an old man? He pretends as if he knows everything but all he ever did was get people killed, yeah? All while he sits behind a fucking desk and smokes a pipe like he never did anything wrong."

He rolled his eyes, "I don't care what I did or didn't do. It doesn't matter. That's the point, none of it mattered. In fact, maybe I'm better off, I didn't work as hard as you did to achieve nothing, if you want to argue that you did more." He shrugged and tilted his head at her, despite the urgent whispering in his ears and the angry redhead in front of him, he did his best to remain outwardly casual. "At least I can sleep well at night knowing I died fighting rather than hiding like a coward." He thought about it for a moment before letting out a little laugh and adding, "not that it means anything, either way you're dead, yeah?"

In response to her threat, Fabian laughed louder. He hoped it would annoy her and he doubted she was capable of dealing as much damage as his first killers had. "Thanks for the concern over my good mood, but I'm perfectly content. You on the other hand, sounds like you might benefit from a visit to St. Mungos. Could be they can remove that stick someone shoved up your arse." He wagged his eyebrows at her and grinned.

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Dorcas

[d-aine]

For a moment, Dorcas was concerned by the reaction she saw cross Fabian's face. She hadn't known him very personally in her previous life, but it wasn't hard to recognize the change in him. Part of her felt pity, the other part worry. It seemed everything she encountered these days related back to her returning to her norm, and what might impede that opportunity. Finding herself more concerned with her own potential future than Fabian's rocky present, she wondered if she'd taken a negative turn herself, but wrote it off as desperation. "I know things because I don't go to bed when the Ministry tells me it's time for grown up talk. You can pick up a lot just by wandering around."

[flatline-fabian]

"Right, so you just stand around when they have their little meetings and they don't give a damn that you're there? Somehow I don't believe that." Despite his skepticism there was a grin on his face. Clearly, Dorcas was being a sneak. And Fabian had absolutely no issue with that, it was something he would much rather encourage. Any information she could provide was better than the nothing he had heard thus far. If the Ministry wasn't interested in sharing the information he would have to get it from some source.

"Are people still coming out?" It was the question that was really on his mind. Is Gideon coming back? And if the answer was no, can I make him come back?

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Lily

[repotted-lilyflower]

Lily rocked back as if slapped. She could feel the blood draining from her cheeks at the same time it roared through her veins, carrying adrenaline. She wanted to tear the bastard’s freckled face off and prove him wrong but she knew he was probably right; knew there was very little chance that Harry remembered her at all. That empty feeling settled in her guts like lead weights, holding her arms stiff and frozen at her side, her eyes wide and mouth fixed in a rictus of shock and hurt. She could  barely force the words out: “My son is not a symbol,” she growled through clenched teeth. “My son is alive because I died, and that’s meaning enough for me. If you’d ever been a parent, if you’d ever loved anybody else more than you do yourself, you’d know that that matters. That that’s all that matters. There is no better reason to die than saving someone else. My death is the reason my son is alive today, and I would die a thousand times again to keep him that way.”

The flare of anger that coursed through her burned through the frozen shackles of ice on her heart enough for Lily to feel the bite of her fingernails in her palms. If she licked them she’d have tasted blood from where she’d pierced her own flesh in small, half-moon imprints, but she didn’t uncurl her fists; couldn’t unclench a single one of her overly-tense, practically vibrating muscles. “I did not abandon my son, you self-absorbed, childish, moping bastard. And how dare you say that I did. I didn’t leave Harry to go gallivanting around, I died standing between him and a monster. My son spent the last two years without me because I was murdered; I missed seeing two years of his life. Two years that I will never get back, never get to experience. You want to sneer and scoff and talk about symbolism? Fuck you, Prewett. I lost my baby, you selfish little twat. I don’t give a shit about your fucking symbolism. What did you live to ‘see through’ then? Oh right—nothing. You died just like I did, and you can mope about that all you want, but I died saving the person I care about most in this whole world. Maybe if you ever pulled your head out of your idiot schoolboy arse enough to give a damn about other people, you’d be able to imagine what that’s like. But I can see that you’re far more concerned about yourself. Well, I’m not. I don’t give a shit about you, Prewett, or about your existential crisis. Go back to Hogwarts and start a diary; the rest of us have real life to deal with. And real death. I have to try and re-introduce myself to my son and explain where I’ve been, and why it wasn’t with him. Because like you said—he probably doesn’t remember me. But at least he’s alive to forget, and now to be reminded. So fuck you.”

[flatline-fabian]

Fabian gave a little smile and licked his bottom lip. Women. Molly had always been the same way. "I love my brother," he spoke much more calmly now. Well that might have been a stretch, the sensation he felt was more akin to loneliness. But he probably loved Gideon at some point. "That's why I do know. Dying for someone you love is only giving them pain. I would never have abandoned Gideon by choice because I care about my brother." He raised an eyebrow at her as if he were daring her to challenge his perfect logic. He couldn't even imagine what it would have felt like if Gideon had left him. In part because it was unthinkable, in part because he could hardly remember the feeling of being with him. Ever since he had stepped out of the veil Fabian had been swinging back and forth between feeling strangely connected to his brother and, at the same time, feeling entirely alone.

"Who do you think you're calling selfish?" Fabian gave a little laugh to emphasize just how ridiculous he thought she sounded. "You think you're the only one who lost something precious? Do you know how I died? Did you go to my funeral? I doubt they had an open casket for that one." His smile was oddly wide for someone speaking of his own death. "I bet Molly saw what was inside, so you can ask her what it was like and what exactly she lost. I doubt it was very pretty. Never got to see it myself but I hear they couldn't have told us apart even if we hadn't been identical. And I didn't cry or beg for my life or his. And, now that I'm back, I'm not sitting around whimpering about how I sacrificed myself for a war and nothing changed because of my death. You didn't do anything other than die so how can you expect that you changed anything? How can you expect the Ministry to change when you never tried to force that change, when all you cared about was killing some bloke who killed too many people? And in the end you couldn't even manage to do that, could you? You think I'm selfish? All you care about is a fucking baby that isn't even yours anymore. What about all the people who died for a bullshit cause that never accomplished anything other than getting people killed? Your kid is lucky he doesn't remember you. There are plenty of people who never even got to have children to forget them and plenty of families who will always remember how the people they cared about died, even when they walk through the front door."

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Lily

[repotted-lilyflower]

Lily raised her eyebrows coolly. “Well, it seems to have kept my son alive,” she said. “Pardon me if I think that ranks a little higher than caring about who remembers me.” She bit back on the rest of her bitter words, but couldn’t deny that the scornful look in Fabian’s eyes made her bristle. Trust a pure-blood—even a good one like the Prewetts—to care more about leaving a legacy than actually making a difference.

She took a deep breath and tried to let go of her bitter thoughts. Dying would mess with anyone’s head, as Lily well knew; she oughn’t to blame Fabian for being cynical about it now. She couldn’t feel the same, though; but then again, she had living proof that her death had mattered in the form of her son—although having not seen him made it a little harder to wrap her head around the idea that her and her husband’s sacrifices had somehow saved Harry.

"I’m not saying anything about glorifying death," Lily said, as calmly as she could. "That’s absurd, it’s always been absurd. But just because death isn’t glorious doesn’t mean it can’t have meaning, if you die doing what you believe is right. You can make a difference—anyone can. And sometimes that means standing up against impossible odds, and sometimes that means…well, it means falling down in front of impossible odds. But just because we died doesn’t mean we died in vain. You can’t think that way. You’ll eat yourself up if you do. We did make a difference. Just…not as much of one as I’d have hoped, that’s all. But it still mattered, that we fought—that we died. It did.”

[flatline-fabian]

“Yeah, and I’m willing to bet your son doesn’t remember you either.” He narrowed his eyes at her. She thinks she’s some fucking hero for saving one infant? One life saved in a sea of thousands lost. “Dying doesn’t mean anything. It’s death. This isn’t a fucking novel, it’s real life. No symbolism here. The people who make the difference are the people who live to see it through.” Fabian finally released his own arms, leaving fingernail prints in the soft skin there.

Why was she trying to convince him that death was worth it? What did he get for dying? He hadn’t protected anyone or changed anything. He died in a stinking forest covered in blood and biting his tongue so he couldn’t beg for his life. And what about Lily? Dying at the hands of a man who couldn’t even kill an infant. How embarrassing. She’d have been better off saving herself.

“The shit you make up in your head doesn’t become true just because you need an excuse to feel better about abandoning a child.” At least he and Gideon had never abandoned one another. That was something he could be proud of. Even on the verge of death they stuck with one another. None of this sacrificing your life bullshit. One life wasn’t worth it without the other. All or nothing.

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Dorcas

[d-aine]

“That’s the magic question, isn’t it?” Dorcas glanced at Fabian’s paper again, grateful that the front page didn’t seem to mention the Re-Animated for once. The more aware the magical community was, the harder it was to stay under the radar with some of the people she wasn’t ready to reintroduce herself to. “Apparently there was some crazy happenings in the Department of Mysteries, and then all of a sudden we started rising from the dead through the veil. At least, that’s what the Ministry says.”

[flatline-fabian]

Fabian furrowed his brow in thought and stared down at his shoes. Did that mean it was an accident that they had all come back to life? Had the Ministry regained control over this “veil” and prevented more from coming through? Is that why he hadn’t heard anything about Gideon? How did Dorcas know about this anyway? When he had been in the Ministry no one would tell him anything useful at all. They hadn’t even told him Molly was coming to pick him up until he was in the room with her.

“How the hell do you know anyhow?”

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Dorcas

[d-aine]

The thought caused Dorcas to laugh, even though it really wasn’t that funny. She knew that Fabian had been different since coming back, but hadn’t really spoken with him directly before now. Hopefully Gideon would show up soon and balance would be restored between them. “God, no,” she replied, making a face. “We’re nowhere near married, but I think we snogged once or twice possibly. Who knows. The veil is the mystical object that somehow brought us back to life. Do you remember when you came through and were suddenly in the Ministry?”

[flatline-fabian]

Fabian tilted his head and took a moment to examine her. Somehow he doubted he would have made out with someone like her. Then again, there were a lot of things he had done in his past life that he would never consider doing now. It didn’t matter.

His thoughts turned to his resurrection and the brief moment of consciousness he’d had in the Ministry right after he’d woken up. There hadn’t exactly been time for him to look around when he opened his eyes. He mostly remembered a dark room, hitting the floor... hard, and then waking up in a cell. “Not very well,” he admitted. It was something he had wondered about but the Ministry workers hadn’t been very keen on telling him how he got her or whether it was intentional or not. “How did it do that?”

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Lily

[repotted-lilyflower]

Lily nodded, hoping that she’d managed to suppress the urge to flinch; she still hadn’t gotten used to the idea of being dead, and Fabian’s question made her twitch even though she’d been talking about that very thing herself calmly enough moments before. It was just having it laid out so plainly by somebody else that made Lily uncomfortable, she decided, but she was so numb these days anyway that it hardly mattered.

"No," Lily said, grateful for the quick push onto the subject that mattered, even if it wasn’t a pleasant one either. “No, they really aren’t. I’m not sure if that makes things easier or harder; on the one hand, we don’t have as much to adjust to as the Ministry keeps telling us, but on the other…well, I’d really have thought that dying for the cause would have changed more things. Maybe I’m just naive,” she sighed, “but I would have hoped that more things would be different. Not that things aren’t better,” she hastened to add, “because they are, of course—not least because Voldemort himself is gone. But I guess that if I’d ever stopped to think about dying and the results thereof, I’d have hoped for…well, for more.”

[flatline-fabian]

Dying for the cause? The only thing dying for the cause had done was get him killed. Fabian rolled his eyes. "What did dying ever get you but a hole in the ground?" It was strange to know that at some point in his life he was happy to die for a cause that he cared for, he jumped head first into danger more than once before for the sake of the Order. "It's not worth it. Dying because of something some old geezer told you to do? Fuck that. You're not a fucking martyr, never will be. How long do you think it will take after you die before no one remembers your name?"

Fabian kicked at the ground in frustration. "What prick decided to glorify death like that, anyhow?" Death was blood, vomit, shit, and mud. He crossed his arms over his chest, holding onto himself tightly. He could feel his blood boiling now, fingernails digging into the soft skin of his arms. "There is no more, death is nothing." The nothing between the torture and rage and the pain of smacking his head on the Ministry floor. Nothing.

[yesterdays-felo-de-se]

Reality Is What You See | Para | Regulus + Fabian

[yesterdays-felo-de-se]

"No," Regulus slumped back down in his uncomfortable chair. "Amelia Bones found us before we could reach the casket." Story of his grave-digging life, apparently. He got further this time, though. Maybe a foot of dirt had been scraped off before they’d been found out and carted off. He wondered, vaguely, what happened to Evan—but didn’t care enough to ask anyone outright. The only thing that was obvious was the fact he wasn’t in Saint Mungos.

Behind them a door banged against a wall—shoved by a medi-witch wielding a cart. Regulus flinched and, unthinkingly, grabbed Fabian’s wrist to shove his hand upwards—making a rather pitiful barrier between his face and whoever was passing through. He wasn’t unaware of how strange the movement was. He seemed to realize it right as the cart squealed its way past them—if the wide-eyed ‘well fuck’ look on his face indicated anything. As the door behind him opened and closed he dropped Fabian’s hand and slumped further backwards against the far armrest. “That was weird.” Understatement. “Sorry. I panicked.” And so thought a strangers hand would do … anything in making sure he wasn’t observed and taken back to the ward of boredom.

[flatline-fabian]

Fabian nodded and let out a grunt in recognition of Regulus' failure. He was somewhat disappointed but wasn't sure if it really mattered. What if Regulus had found something? Would it change anything, really? Perhaps his own opinion of himself and the rest of the returned. He would never tell anyone if he found something he didn't like to see. Fabian shrugged it off.

The sound behind him was loud and unexpected. Fabian flinched and his mind panicked as too many things happened at once. He tried to pull his arm away from Regulus, simultaneously turning to verify the source of the noise. As a result, neither action was particularly successful. Fabian glared at Regulus and wrenched his arm away as the other let go, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Panicked? You practically shat yourself." His tone was somewhere between joking and irritation. He ignored the fact that his own reaction had been somewhat over the top. Maybe Regulus had been too distracted to notice. “What the fuck was that about?”

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Dorcas

[d-aine]

“Oh, come on, Fabian,” Dorcas exclaimed, moving to stand in front of his chair instead of behind. “I know it was lame, but it was at least a little bit funny. You can’t tell me the veil left your sense of humor behind.”

[flatline-fabian]

Fabian stood suddenly, pushing the chair slightly backwards and causing it to scrape angrily across the floor. He didn't like to be so far beneath her, preferring to be on a more even level. "I have a sense of humour, it's just not awful." It wasn't meant as an insult, despite the way it came out. "What the fuck is 'the veil'? I'm not married to you, am I?" His pre-death memory wasn't the best, but he was certain that was something he would remember. Right?

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Lily

[repotted-lilyflower]

"Yeah—so over that Death Eaters are breaking out of Azkaban and the Ministry is telling lies again," Lily said drily, raising a skeptical eyebrow. "Sure, I know what everybody says, and how they’re all acting…but it doesn’t feel over. Not to me, anyway,” she stated again with a grim shake of her head. “I don’t know how you managed to adjust so fast. You were dead longer than me, anyway,” Lily added, with an unamused little smirk. “I might have to get jealous, if you get used to everything faster.”

She wanted to tell him that she was glad he wasn’t dead, that she’d been horrified when she’d learned he’d died; wanted to ask if it was just him, or if he’d seen his brother yet; wanted to ask which brother he was, because she’d never got the hang of telling them apart, but that seemed a tasteless question when she wasn’t sure if they were both alive again (although surely no fate could be that unkind, even the one that had sent James through the Veil weeks before her). Instead she just shrugged unhappily and said, “They’re after the wrong enemy. Again.”

[flatline-fabian]

"You died?" It shouldn't have come as quite a shock if he'd been paying more attention when he was locked away in the Ministry. They had told him the story behind Voldemort's defeat before releasing him, something about helping him adjust. But he had been so distracted by the noise in his own head all he got was "Voldemort dead" and "chosen one." He hadn't really considered that the fantastic story had meant the Potters had died (even though they probably said so directly).

In a second he'd already decided it didn't matter. She was here, so was he, and Voldemort wasn't. "Well, things aren't so different from when I died, are they? Death Eaters on the loose, people being persecuted for what they are, and the Ministry is still a bunch of fuck ups." Fabian rolled his eyes. Perhaps, if he had paid attention to his own words, he would have realized that undeserved persecution was exactly why he had joined the Order before his death. He'd just answered the question he'd been asking since he'd been told about his role in the Order and his death. Why would he die for a cause that didn't have anything to do with him? Really, it was his actions before he died that he didn't understand. Why had he acted one way or another when logically he should have done something entirely different? He could never quite puzzle out the answers, it frustrated him to no end.

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Dorcas

[d-aine]

"It’s sort of like the apocalypse, if you think about it." Dorcas peered at the paper in Fabian’s hands, though she’d seen it herself earlier that day. "People coming back from the dead, breaking out of Azkaban… next thing you know, the giant squid’s going to declare himself Minister and ink us all into submission."

[flatline-fabian]

"Right," Fabian nodded slowly, folding his paper as if her reading over his shoulder made him uncomfortable. He leaned away from Dorcas ever so slightly. Considering the hypocrisy he resisted the urge to inquire about her mental state. "If you say so."

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & Lily

[repotted-lilyflower]

Well I am. Everyone’s been making such a big deal about how “the war is over”…but it doesn’t seem to be, does it?

Not with Death Eaters on the lose again. I just wish I felt like the rest of the world gave as much of a damn about that as I do. What about you? You “taking it in stride,” or…?

[flatline-fabian]

"Seems to me the war is over." Really, it had been a strange thing to walk into Diagon Alley and see people shopping and laughing when it hadn't been so long ago (from his perspective) that people hurried through the streets, not daring to look up from their paths. Being told the war was over was one thing, witnessing it was entirely different.

"I give a damn because the Ministry is so worried about people like me that they can't keep a few murderers locked in their cells."

[yesterdays-felo-de-se]

Reality Is What You See | Para | Regulus + Fabian

[yesterdays-felo-de-se]

Regulus shrugged, he really didn’t. Be it because it was a lie or because it really didn’t matter in the long run and he wasn’t going to proselytize to Fabian. “You have family to celebrate Christmas with.” That, at least, seemed obvious to him. Why was he here if, doubtless, he had six nephews and a niece to celebrate with. Regulus supposed he could have arranged for Christmas with Narcissa—but that seemed oddly uncomfortable and he didn’t want to force interaction that might not be wanted. He didn’t even bother to consider Sirius, the idea that there’d be a happy Christmas event was laughable. His mother… was something else entirely and he didn’t even wnat to think about how he really should visit.

The mention of the graveyard and what he was doing here made Regulus brighten and he laughed outright, “Oh, sorry, that’s my fault.” He shouldn’t have felt so very pleased that his actions had had a wider-spread result but he did. He pulled his right foot up onto the chair and leaned into it. “Evan Rosier and I went to dig up his grave—seeing as theirs a body in his and not in mine. Anyway. Apparently that is not acceptable.” He shrugged again, eyes on the wall ajacent to them. “So I’m under observation until sometime tonight and you got picked up for walking in a graveyard.”

He might have been able to get out if he kicked up a fuss but he saw little reason to. He glanced back over at Fabian, “I don’t mind. But the food kind of sucks.” He frowned a moment and then snapped his fingers in front of the other man’s eyes. “Are you drunk?”

[flatline-fabian]

Fabian flinched and pushed Regulus' hand away from his face. "No," he leaned back in his chair again, "I haven't slept all night." The truth was always the easiest excuse for acting strangely. Going without sleep is almost as bad as being drunk, really, so it shouldn't be much of a stretch to say so. "And I wasn't planning on digging up anyone," he added for clarity, "I was looking for my brother's grave." Fabian would much rather spend Christmas with Gideon than with a family he felt little connection to.

It was a bit irritating to think that Regulus was the reason Fabian hadn't been able to find his brother's grave. But he was curious as well. Plenty of questions had crossed Fabian's mind before. Why had he come back? Why didn't Gideon come back? What was going on in his head? And now, at Regulus' suggestion, was his own body still buried? Visiting his own grave hadn't even crossed his mind (although it was highly possible his body had been buried under Gideon's name).

"Well?" He asked, looking at Regulus with genuine curiosity. "Did you find anything down there?" It was all he could do not to turn to the voices that were just barely too far away. Was he crazy or had they started speaking more quickly. No those were footsteps. No? He couldn't help but turn his head toward the door again. Perhaps someone walking by? Before he could discover the source of the sound he turned his attention back on Regulus. He needed to pay attention.

[flatline-fabian]

Some Other Guy // Fabian & ???

"Two people escape from Azkaban in less than a week? Wish I could say I'm surprised."

[yesterdays-felo-de-se]

Reality Is What You See | Para | Regulus + Fabian

[yesterdays-felo-de-se]

Regulus stared at him a long moment then shrugged carelessly and slumped back in the uncomfortable hospital chair. “That’s okay.” It was better than ‘okay’ given that it was a lie but he tried not to look so pleased about it. “I don’t really mind.” Which was probably not the sanest thing to say but Regulus really didn’t mind having been dead. Maybe if he really had died under the circumstances he dreamed up he would have been upset but… as it was it seemed stupid to him to rail against the reality—or supposed reality.

This wall wasn’t any better than the one in the Janus Thickey Ward but at least he had company while he killed time. If he had known it was going to be this boring he would have asked Severus to turn up the next day. “So why are you here?” If he recalled correctly the Prewetts were now tied to the Weasleys’ and even before his death they had had a number of children. They were the wrong sort of pureblood circles to run with but that didn’t keep them from being known. “It’s Christmas. Don’t you have like… four Nephews?”

Maybe there was a niece in there somewhere but Regulus honestly hadn’t paid that much attention. He sat up a moment later and leaned forward to look down the hall. He felt slightly anxious, unable to simply sit still and relax even though he had finally found the perfect distraction in Fabian Prewett. “This is the wrong place to go for Christmas presents. The gift shop is awful.”

[flatline-fabian]

“You don’t mind that someone killed you?” That was probably a good thing, Fabain himself didn’t particularly care whether he had been involved or not. He had no reason to dislike Regulus and whether or not he had done it, the Ministry wasn’t going to do anything about it. He bit at the dead skin on his lip absently, tearing a bit too much away. The small pain was enough to pull him out of his thoughts and he looked back at Regulus again.

The words finally clicked in his head and he took a second to count out the number of nephews he actually had. “Six,” he corrected Regulus, leaning forward in his chair and propping his arms up against his knees, “and a niece.” Molly had still been pregnant with Ginny when Fabian had died. That he remembered. And he remembered complaining about how many children his sister had and how she didn’t need another. That might have been a joke though, he wasn’t so sure. He did like the distraction they provided but they made him too uncomfortable to endure their company for long amounts of time, Fred and George in particular. He frowned at the thought, “what has that got to do with Christmas?”

Fabian leaned forward further, grabbing the back of his head and pulling it toward his knees, running his fingers through his hair in a vain attempt to rid himself of the headache that had been plaguing him all night. “Fuck if I know why I’m here. Waiting for someone to get off their ass and tell some other prick I’m not mental.” He pressed his hands into his face, breathing in deeply, trying to focus, to resist the urge to turn and look again and again. “Apparently a dead guy walking around a graveyard is reason for suspicion.”

[yesterdays-felo-de-se]

Reality Is What You See | Para | Regulus + Fabian

Christmas day wasn’t the same when it broke with the shift change of healers and mediwitches. Regulus woke early and squint eyed to watch the paperwork trade hands, the low murmured conversation. Severus had eventually had to go home—there was little point in the man holding a bedside vigil for something as ridiculous as this twenty-four hour hold—and Regulus was able to at least pretend to be adhering to a given healer. He was less enthused about the attempt at giving him potions, however, and refused on the belief they couldn’t hold him longer no matter what he ingested so long as he didn’t try to eat the walls, other patients, or healers.

By ten am Regulus was both bored and irritated. There was still a good twelve hours to go and walking around peering at other patients only worked so well for so long. Spell damage, he thought, was the sort of thing that was lasting and pervasive. It was obvious. Not something as ridiculous (or understandable) as a innate desire to dig up graves to find out what was in them. The other symptoms that had been described were nothing more than parts of his personality.

How Regulus left the Janus Thickey Ward was questionable, though if you asked him he would say he simply walked out. The shoes and robes he had been given were quiet on the tile and not having a wand didn’t bother him so much as knowing someone else had it. He had no plans to leave Saint Mungos and he figured if he didn’t leave the hospital entirely it still counted as staying for the full time.

And running into Fabian Prewett was unexpected but strangely exhilarating. It might have been the lack of sleep, the simmering irritation, the long drudge of things not being quite right and knowing they’d never be right at all—but seeing the one Wizard he hadn’t expected to come back to life at all sitting in a hospital chair looking bored was a delight. He didn’t think anything at all about slumping down next to him and leaning back against the further arm rest. “Did you know you killed me?”

He probably would have appeared more reliable if he wasn’t in patients robes.

[flatline-fabian]

It was too early for this. Fabian rolled his head back and around, letting out a silent sigh of relief when his neck cracked loudly. Maybe it would relieve the pounding headache that had been plaguing him. He should have known he would end up here, waiting and waiting for them to clear him to go home. People begin to suspect you’re not quite right in the head when you go on a walk... at five o’clock on Christmas morning... in a graveyard. He hadn’t been sleeping and he’d had the sudden inclination to visit Gideon’s grave (he hadn’t considered that perhaps he would see his own by default).

Maybe this was better than being stuck with his sister’s children all day. He still hadn’t decided. But they would let him go back to the Burrow in the end (so long as he continued to feign sanity). Molly would make a fuss about holiday and family. He’d already been to the Ministry and now he was stuck here, waiting for someone to have a look at him, a healer who would likely clear him out of desire to go home to their own family. He nodded to himself as he ran over the scenario of how it would all play out in his head. Yes, just like that.

“What?” He asked in an irritated tone, turning to look left, past the small grouping of chairs and down the hall. No one was there. He slumped in his chair and bit at his bottom lip for lack of anything better to do.

Regulus Black wandered in, making little more sound than the humming in the back of Fabian’s skull. His heart leapt slightly at the sight. He hadn’t seen anyone in a good five minutes yet he was looking up every few seconds in response to— you know, whatever it was.

Fabian watched the young boy sit down beside him with mild curiosity but it wasn’t until Regulus spoke that he was able to connect the dots. Did you kill Regulus Black? How many times had he been asked that question at the Ministry as they showing him a picture of the boy in question? This boy. He didn’t remember doing anything of the sort. But then again his memory was clearly on the fritz.

“I don’t recall.”