#afterhours.

[mimix-music]

[lookafteryourmermaids]

[lookafteryourmermaids]

[allincl]

// Afterhours. - Ebb // "Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free." - Jim Morrison Thanks fro this great quote and beautiful Track!

[hafmitt]

(il tuo diploma in fallimento è una laurea per reagire.)

[dracodigiamazzi]

[Shots Fired?]

/Although every detail of your dream clambers to escape you within the first ten seconds of wakefulness, you manage to keep your last thought: Who the hell really bothers killing men like you by the blade./

You sit up suddenly, startled awake by a pain entirely unfamiliar to you. The acute spasm lances right through your chest and wholly subdues you. For the handful of minutes that the inexplicable failing of your muscles — or your mind? Perhaps your organs? Where might this originate… aren’t you a touch too young for cardiac malfunctions — warps your respiration and you don’t notice how cold you feel, or where you are and what you’d planned on doing this morning. Your focus is entirely consumed by it; you’re shakily reaching into a pouch beside the bed to pop the pills that could help you determine whether or not this was all in your head. You take two, as usual, to ensure that old demons, from dreams and with sable eyes darker than the emblem of your Kingdom (no, not kingdom, organization is what you mean to say — is what you mean to think; the kingdom behind your eyelids that steals your skin and sharpens your teeth until the bites of old, burly associates are strong and vile enough to decapitate dissenters, is not real, for the love of Derse, you’ve got to stop doing this.) or multicolored and rolling billards bulging out of the brolic, impossibly sculpted skull of the Green One that owned the Timekeeper (Dignitary, don’t you dare associate the two: the Green One that had plagued your worse hallucinations since adolescence and the good Doctor that owned you for months, in your real, fantastically tangible life, in that awful, frigid hotel, have never and will never meet and it is irrational of you to connect them, BREATHE) do not actually exist and you can’t blame Them for your current injury.

. …Injury? “That’s exceedingly d-dramatic,” You whisper, hoping to squash the squall of irresponsible and absurd worry that keeps rising up the back of your throat. You cannot possibly be injured, why, you’re pulling the silk of your sleepshirt away from your chest, where the pain is so central that you are convinced that They have lodged a sword into your sternum — Dignitar— Draco, /goddammit/, no one that would harm would bother using a sword, so you check for bullet holes — and you find no entry nor exit wounds. Your skin is just as taut and painted as it had been before you laid down for bed yesterday night. You swallow the pills that you’ve been holding on your tongue during the entirety of the self-examination. Were it not for the common sugar coating melting off and revealing the bitter, chalky prescription’s true form, you might have forgotten to finish taking it altogether. How could you possibly be so distracted, you wonder, while throwing your legs over the side of your bed and flexing your feet into the slippers that occupy the same space as they had before you’d closed your eyes last night. Your toes curl into the plush, familiar soles and you are grounded. You actually exist in this space. You have weight, presence and autonomy. You are presently unharmed. After removing your phone from your charger and scrolling through your messages, you know the time, the temperature, and the weather.

It’s not snowing, you are in the States and your darling employer, Snowman, does not know where you are.

All is relatively well.

So why hasn’t the pain abated? What must you do to distinguish it? You could take a painkiller but you’re not sick, you’re not injured and you don’t need it.

…Where is everyone of consequence to you?

Your buxom-cruel Queen should be in Madagascar this week, if she’s on schedule.

Jack is actually in the process of texting you, given that you can’t articulate in English well enough to respond to the first three messages he sent you and he’s an impatient motherfucker.

Biz has been quieter than usual this week, but you have faith that he’s not putting himself in harm’s way. He doesn’t fuck around with anyone expressly dangerous (other than yourself) or unpredictably troubling (other than Jack, who is actually in Texas with him now) for the hell of it. You trust his judgment.

Gabriel was beside you when you laid down, but he’s since moved to a different part of the house, in which you can still smell yesterday’s fire wafting up from the brittle wood in the den.

David had caught up with you before you slept, and although his current circumstances are questionable, he is still mostly safe.

Dirk just sent you wine and honey from Bermuda. He is definitely fine. You are envious of the island’s warmth.

Bro was supposed to be managing those threatening David. He had reassured you that he would return soon, which is why, some half hour later, you are wandering through his home in Texas, checking all of the bathrooms and floors to receive him.

He’s not here.

You leave his home and return to Gabriel’s in time for lunch. You figure that padding your stomach with something solid, like you should have done prior to the panicked pill-popping an hour and twenty-eight minutes ago, would be your best course of action. After washing the dishes and reluctantly acknowledging that, yes, you had swept all of the tile and hardwood on the first floor (bathrooms inclusive), mopped, dusted and vacuumed in order to shake the feeling of unease still sharply pulsing through your chest, you give in and call him a few hours into the afternoon.

Bro doesn’t answer.

"[Lantern Eyes?]" You begin softly, the halted Mandarin rolling off your tongue with an ease that does not reach the rest of your body. "[When you receive this message, do note that you owe me a response. Where are you?]" You end the call, pocket your phone and slip the elastic cinching your hair back out. You proceed to put your hair back up no less than five times. You are now extraordinarily concerned.

[dracodigiamazzi]

You returned to your apartment. Dave's long since moved out, so you torched the place. It was never yours anyways. You've already moved your clothes, money, transportalizer and food to another temporary location.

Something has to give.

You've got to get out of the organization's pocket.

[dracodigiamazzi]

You step out of the shower onto a clean mat. You finally got all of the blood off and you hope that Draco won't mind. You'll clean it up later or something, but you want to be here when gets back.