Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

A shattered, fragmented, glass-like and star-scattered kaleidoscope of warm gold-hued whisky is the color of the rage that boils underneath his finger tips, burning, blistering and sizzling. Ravishing rage that is the texture of laminated paper and the smell of those who are ill (who have yet to pass on, but are far enough gone that the best thing to do is to leave them on the winding trail through wet, damp and bitterly, bitingly cold forest floors as they run from something he was incapable of understanding at that age. The fresh-burning anger, glinting like whisky-fused broken stars alone in a galaxy of nothing but disappointment, desperation and regret - all of which is muddy, washed out soot-gray and smells of smoke (from his camera or fire it doesn’t matter). 

His anger- bright orange frustration mixing with the whisky hues of anger and bitter gray-black smoke of disappointment, is choking him. Enough that he doesn’t care how shattered, fragmented, broken, hurt, cracked and discarded he looks when he storms out of the studio that is adjacent to his room. All of which is plastered in photograph after photograph- picture after picture of everything under this blood-orange sun and green-tinted greed and envy- no matter that greed tends to favor blue- because he always wants, wants, wants and wantsan dwantsandwantsandwants and then some more. Blue is the color of peace and sometimes joy. Blue is the color of satisfaction- blue is the color of Claude , someone he doesn’t want to let go and someone he wants back with a deep, dark blue-black of longing. 

Within the woven threads, confines and shackles of his amber-hued anger and green-tinged yellow en vygreedjoy and jealousy, it seems that he had fumbled, slipped, dropped and lost his stability- Oh there goes all his colors, falling out of cracks and crevices, leaving him black and white and no better looking then a shattered, abandoned and forgotten porcelain doll with the value of none. Slipping out of the wraps, swathes and fabrics of life only to not be embraced by death either for the entity recoils from his very existence. 

All of the fog, smoke and smog that compile and create the entity known as Death was never one to fancy him all the while as it fancied Claude, enough so to grasp his ankles and drag him into an early grave, only to be buried by nothing but the elements. (It’s not like life had favored Joseph as well, however, a true nowhere man who can only exist in relation to those who discard his existence and disparage his being- not enough however to cut him loose for it, for they won't take him into either of their grasps- their caressing hands, cradling his face and then falling through his skin, muscle, bones and marrow as nothing more than a whisper of wind and a skuttle of cold-hot sparks that danced up and down his spine and scalp.)

Perhaps this midnight blue longing wasn’t something he should try to paint on anything else, but he cannot help that this longing, yearning, loathingloving vilecruelandhatingandmissingimissyouimissyouimissyouimissyouimissyou , bleeds into everything else that Joseph had ever done and, likely, will ever bother to do.

He had talked to the bitter yellow resentment of Ann one time, and she had told him to let go, somewhat. Perhaps he would be happier once he had come to terms and let go of everything that had been his driving passion behind his science, art and projects for this past eternity. However, those words are somewhat hypocritical coming from one such as herself, one who wears a mask and who had sworn to become the sun in the face of none, pure spite and lavish wrath and hate driving her very being and every step she has taken, henceforth. 

However unfair it might be to hold it against her, for her trauma is her own and not his to behold, he cannot help but be slighted and have bitter chamomile-flavored and pink-gray despair, anger and spite coat his tongue. The texture of that conversation felt like Violettas needles lined up in neat rows only for him to fall onto them face-first, the points driving all of these feelings and betrayals home. 

Some part of him wonders if that was how Claude had felt when he was left on the side of a river bank, nestled between two trees and under a bush as he watched everyone he loved abandon him for the gods, wolves and dogs. In the moonlight bathed twilight of midnight he nurtures the hope and desperate craving that Claude doesn’t hate him for it.

For he didn’t know that his parents were condemning Claude to death when he died from illness on their odyssey, journey, adventure, retreat from France to Italy. They had left him in the woods with assurances that he had gone on ahead and that Joseph would be able to talk to him again, with his warmth, paint stained fingers and clinking laughter as he brushed off all of his responsibilities for his art. He had always been the artist, Joseph never was.

He remembers his parents getting admittance into his mother’s parent’s foyer. His grandparents stood tall and imposing, not even questioning where Claude was and only responding with a look of mocking pity when he inquired and the only response was ‘gone’.

Joseph remembers the crushing, swirling red-orange-gray of his stomach dropping out and falling into the hell that resided beneath his feet, because there was no ‘Claude’ anymore. All that he had left of ‘Claude’ were carefully tucked away photographs in his breast pocket along with some pictures his brother had sketched from when they were kids and from last week. 

A brother no longer, for he was gone. A twin, another half, a loved one, a sibling, a child, a person- a human who is no longer one because ‘he’ is just a corpse lying forgotten in the bed of leaves a forest in the borders of Italy and France provides him in his last, dying sickness filled breaths.

Something that perhaps some would understand better than he, but something he isn’t willing to open up and speak about in anything beyond rose and lavender scented letters he keeps under lock and key in a box under the loose floorboard beneath the bed. Meandering within the state of a shattered, discarded and forsaken doll causes the few people that are between the hall and the foyer of Oletus manor to part for him in waves or scuttle away like he has personally bitten their hands like a dog teaming with teeth and foam-filled rabies. 

Once he reaches the entry to the foyer, he somewhat wishes he had never left the confines of his studio and room in the first place, because, the complete humiliation and limitless scorn that comes in the flavor of wine purple isn’t appreciated as he forges his way through the throes of too many people, and too much life , Antonio's scathing tongue rings in his ears, but he pays it no mind and he remembers no words that fall off of his spiked devil-borne tongue. For the pathetic violinist peasant can keep his lips sealed, even if they no longer touch carved into an everlasting smile, because his greasy head of lank black hair has no business in any of Joseph's own .

The only thing holding his tongue from dripping out venomous blood-orange tinged poison-laced sugar-filled tea is the half-way self-aware knowledge that he’d absolutely regret anything that came out of his mouth, especially when his vision is tinged red with anger and the whisky-stars are still twinkling in the corners of his eyes. When all he wants to do is pull out his eyes and slam his sword into Antonio’s fucking looming face, with its teeth-bared smile and black-painted lips. 

The Violinist, Joseph is one-hundred-percent positive, was revived and introduced into this manor by Baron DeRoss and Miss Nightingale purely to infuriate and berate Joseph. Turn his lips loose, when they otherwise wouldn’t have been. For Joseph had dropped drinking when he had picked up the threads and throes of research the photo world provided. Only when he was alone and unheard would he dare to let his lips touch the rim of a wine glass. When someone- anyone- was addled with things like alcohol or drugs, they did things that they otherwise wouldn’t do, and it added some sort of layer of red-pink shame for Joseph to think that when he was drinking wine by the barrel that he said and did things that were too close to his heart- to home. Because with those inebriations permeating every crevice, crack and gouge of his being, he found that layers, walls and boundaries he had previously established had peeled away to reveal something he’d much rather keep hidden .

As such with policies such as these, he always finds it quite distasteful when he sees Antonio and others drinking their health away every hour of the day in public areas. 

Sitting in the lounge, finally having slinked away is Antonio in his wine purple glory of absolute damnation and intentional vexation to people of noble standing such as himself. The only one who was in any sort of higher standing that Joseph’s seen him get along with his Mary. But that’s to be expected somewhat, as she’s quite the polymath and seems to have some sort of advice or word for everyone she encounters. She makes a delightful conversationalist, even if she’s willing to converse with the riff-raff and rabble such as Antonio .

However, he really should get out of here before that damnable devil’s kissed tongue loosens his lips enough for him to say something that will ruin his standing with everyone here. Making his way out of the foyer and into the yard. The gardens, of which he’s seen a fair assortment of people- both expected and unexpected- care for are starting to wilt, wither and die. All in the shades of brown that Joseph's own anger is colored as. 

Finding himself on a rough-hewn wooden bench in a little alcove of trees is something that is to be expected when he doesn’t quite realize where he was going as long as it was away . What wasn’t quite as expected is the fresh blood he sees walk through the impenetrable and impassible gates of Oletus Manor. Someone he wasn’t expecting to have so much life wrapped around them like swathes of fabric and shimmering air and hopelessly intoxicating beauty, but look exactly as one would expect of a corpse. Someone that, perhaps, in a different time and a different life Joseph wouldn’t have paid any mind to. 

Joseph is moving to the man before he registers quite what he is doing. Behind the pale, and roughly cut gem, Joseph reaches out his hand in hopes that his extending fingers might be able to feel how having anything akin to life is like. How having favor from one or the other is. Because he’s known for quite some time now that he has been scored from both ends of the scale whereas everyone else here is favored in some way or another. Something that he can read off of their movements as the holographic shimmering sheer silk of life is an after image of every movement or when the translucent black-green-purple-blue of death that looks like a thousand-and-one dead universes chasing after those whom he had found a claim. And perhaps it is selfish and it is irrational and impulsive, but Joseph desperately in gray-colored clouds that smell of the smoke of villages being burned and plundered, wants to know what having that much teaming life is even like. 

(Maybe if he catches some of the silken tendrils around his fingers it might become his, and maybe it won't rot and decay like life and death tend to do when he tries to grasp even an ounce of either one of them… there’s so much here … surely… surely, he won’t miss or notice a swatch or two of the dancing, blooming weaves of life’s fabrics missing.)

Chapter Text

Per me si va ne la città dolente,
per me si va ne l'etterno dolore,
per me si va tra la perduta gente.
Giustizia mosse il mio alto fattore:
fecemi la divina potestate,
la somma sapienza e 'l primo amore.
Dinanzi a me non fuor cose create
se non etterne, e io etterno duro.
Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch'entrate

— Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Inferno (Canto III, Lines 1-9)

Andrew Kreiss doesn’t even bother to open his eyes when his face hits the wet dirt that lies below him. The storm that surrounds him is something fierce, with the rain cold and sharp and wind howling loud enough that it would be hard to hear the Town Crier (had one existed anywhere near here) reciting the latest news and gossip despite how loudly he screams.

Although, as it stands, it is not as though Andrew has the privilege to have enough presence within his mind to worry about the fickle weather. Much less about how it always seems to howl about how Andrew is damned, and regardless of how miserably hell-born his situation seems to be regarding this damned manor, he deserves so much worse.

But he’s not thinking about that right now. Andrew is instead focusing all of whatever shreds of his mind that remain within his pitiful grasp on trying to breathe. He’s still choking on his last taste of death, which was some sort of bastard child born from crucifixion and the mistress it made of witch burnings. They had driven railroad spikes into his hands, through his shoes and feet, and strapped his shovel to the cross in such a way that the spade would melt over his head.

He’s still choking on the memory of the heavy and bitter soot and ash lingering in the back of his throat. His mind is still trying to process that the smell of charring flesh and blood coming to a boil is not actually present any more. Still trying to come to terms with the taste of charred copper tinged with sour fear that comes part-in-parcel with being burned alive.

He can still feel his blood coming to a boil in his veins, and the subsequent exit it makes from his body. He’s still agonizing over the residue feeling of the fire, having long since eaten through the soles of his boots and started devouring his legs. Can still feel the hot ash and coals that his many layers of clothes had become, long since having decided to either fuse to his skin or bounce away and set light to the gardens joined with the wedding grounds of the Red Church. He can still feel those railroad spikes they had driven through his hands heating to the point they were melting and trailing their molten tears down his hands and arms.

And despite knowing, rationally, that the fire does not exist, at least not anymore, and neither does the melting metal of those railroad spikes. The feeling of the spade of his shovel melting over his head, falling into his hair and setting it alight, is now an illusion created from his own tormented mind. Andrew’s own mind had made itself into a prison, refusing to release the memory of his most recent death (Not that it ever fully released the others).

Regardless of Andrew’s insistence to himself that it’s over now, and he’s not actually burning, it still takes Andrew longer than he’d like to admit to remember those breathing exercises he once learned from the toy merchant, Anne Lester. Takes him even longer to actually get enough control over himself to actually do them.

By the time Andrew finally found the willpower in himself to get into an upright, albeit sitting, position, Andrew realizes that somewhere around thirty-five minutes or so must have passed. He hollowly reflects that while this one might have been one of his worst deaths yet, at least he hasn’t had to suffer through being buried alive… yet. What a harrowing thought. Andrew struggles to his feet and stares at the double gates guarding Oletus Manor. Sighing through his nose, Andrew pushes the doors open.

As Andrew steps through the gates and is hit with the nausea he associates with whatever blood-soaked magic the manor harbors, his thoughts wander. He wonders if the manor has decided to present Joker as the hunter, Smiley Face, or as the survivor, Weeping Clown. He wonders if Luchino Diruse will appear as the survivor, Professor, or as the hunter, Evil Reptilian. He wonders if Orpheus will actually be present this time, and if so, as the survivor Novelist or as the hunter Nightmare. It’s generally a fifty-fifty chance on which one will end up being present, for the people Andrew has figured out have both a survivor and hunter identity. Although Andrew has experienced the rarer occasion where both forms of someone are present, as if through some unholy paradox, although they are never in a game together. He’s also seen someone start out as a survivor and, if by some miracle Andrew hasn’t died yet, end their journey through Oletus as a hunter.

He wonders if the weather will continue to condemn him within the manor’s unhallowed grounds.

Regardless of the weather’s temper and its eternally present judgment upon Andrew’s character, Andrew has found that he likes spending time out and about during days such as this. It could be argued that Andrew actually prefers to subject himself to nature’s harsh treatment, yet otherwise tranquil company, rather than subjecting himself to forging bonds among the other manor residents.

When the nausea created from the transition between reality into the "reality" Oletus Manor has crafted subsides, Andrew blinks and finds himself greeted by a not-exactly-heavy-but-not-light-either rainfall and a smell that suggests that the worst of an angry storm has passed. And as though whatever sentience Oletus Manor possesses wanted to remind Andrew of the power it has (enough to control the weather), the absolutely abysmal amount of heat of the day contradicts the rainfall and strong winds. Andrew almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all. As if he could ever forget the fucked-up rules of the manor and the rivers of blood that sustain it. As if he could forget the foul magic cast by some ghastly deity and whatever infernal “scientific” creations of man that run the place. As if he could forget their power. Enough rotten and ill-gotten power to play the role that only God should possess. Enough to send Andrew back in time again and again and again, leaving nothing to indicate anything had ever happened previously. Well… nothing aside from scars gained within the manor’s grounds and his own derelict and decrepit mental state and the memories trapped within.

As per usual, ever since Andrew did whatever the fuck he did to garner Oletus Manor’s misguided and honestly rather vitriolic favor, Andrew feels as though there is something or someone watching him with the kind of intense fascination that makes Andrew’s skin crawl. Although, as Andrew absently notes, it feels as though there is one more set of eyes than usual watching him today, although that’s probably just a byproduct born of his own paranoia and exhaustion.

The ability to sleep is another thing that Andrew has found to flip back and forth seemingly at random, or perhaps the switch is simply dependent on factors unknown to Andrew. It’s always one extreme or the other, and Andrew is always either entirely unable to sleep for more than three-to-five hours or less for days to weeks at a time, or he is unable to manage to stay awake for longer than two-to-five hours for days or weeks at a time. It’s either he’s so drained that his brain can not actually form any coherent thought outside of wanting to sleep again, or his brain refuses to shut up for long enough to allow him rest, whatever exhaustion he feels be damned.

At the moment, Andrew is in the limbo present between his brain not turning off and wanting to shut off entirely. With each step towards the grand double-doors marking the front entrance into Oletus manor, however, his brain is favoring sending him face-first into the dirt for a surprise nap. As a result, Andrew is channeling every ounce of any mental capacity he owns into staying awake long enough to at least reach the doors and knock. Perhaps Andrew’s decision to single-mindedly focus on reaching those grand doors that mark his eternal hell, spatial awareness voided with the intent of not using more energy than needed, that makes him so startled when he feels a hand on his shoulder.

Andrew feels so unbalanced by the absolute bastard that decided to walk up to him and touch him, probably to talk to him, that he can’t even turn around to look at the piece of shit that decided to invade his space. No, Andrew just freezes up for long enough that his brain registers that someone touched him without him realizing that anyone was walking up to him in the first place, and then Andrew’s brain promptly decides that it’s time for lights-out and sends him into the oblivious void that is sleep. Or whatever being mentally checked-out enough that he just topples over without being mentally present in the slightest is.

Andrew makes the dull assumption, right before his mind meets the black void that he associates with meaning that he’s been sleeping, that it was probably entitled and privileged Edgar Valden who decided to touch him out of nowhere. Edgar. Edgar, who for some reason, without fail, always develops some sort of fascination with him (Edgar once told Andrew that it was due to his “unique” appearance. Andrew is inclined to disagree; Edgar probably just wanted to marvel at the fact that Andrew is such a freak, devil-spawn that Andrew is, like Andrew is an animal caged at the zoo.). Regardless, Edgar always wants to paint him, which is confounding in itself, unless Edgar's reasons for wanting to do so are contradictory to what he claims.

Chapter Text

This... situation... tastes like the sharp and sweetly bitter tang of blackberries. Something that is colored in crystal fractured purple-blue-black of metallic, blackberry surprise, disappointment, fading anger and a faint subtle hint of fondness. This situation (this living, breathing life-smeared sparking bright and shining corpse of a man) smells of the same citrus-peach cologne that Claude had so favored, once, so long ago. Something (knowledge) that has been lost to eternity but always surfaces back up beneath still rose-hued, paint-splattered waters when any connection to positivity is to be experienced. Smoking gun-powder is replaced with the faint floral scent of iris' and a heavy, damp smell of dirt which feels like grit and riverbed sediment between his teeth that he can't get out no matter how much river water he spits out.

The smell of petrichor always is colored in an off hue orange-brown-red, rust, is what Claude would chide him with.

"Forgetting such a simple color, Joseph?" A chuckle, "my, how the mighty have perished, Joseph! Your lacking memory is something to truly behold!"

His voice creeps around the back of Joseph's neck and combs fingers through his hair, a breath on his ear- too cold to be alive, but the air is too still for it to be wind. Joseph, if he loses himself enough within the worlds hidden beyond emotion and under the layers of his existence, presence, life- humanity or inhumanity, perhaps- he can feel Claude's paint flecked hands, covered in the rainbow- yet too small and too soft to belong to anything (anyone) but a child. And a child he is.

A child Joseph longs to be. It has a certain hilarity, after a fashion, that of all times now it is that this desire, wish, wantfantasyneed, decides to burn the brightest. When he is a man, chronologically, of over seventy. When he understands, fundamentally and all too well, that he will never be seven, six, twelve, seventeen, or five again. (He will never be with Claude again, unless he unravels and re-weaves a way through the photoworld.) A man over seventy, with all of the youthful beauty of seventeen, who will never be seventeen again- not truly, not in any way that matters.

However, ever since when did Joseph ever care about himself? Perhaps once, when his single-minded goal, devotion to those long dead had not, did not yet, consume him (corrupt him and corrode him. Eating him away within the span of six, three, nine, ten or breathless and endless eternaties, Claude and the dead swallow him whole and his guilt about this all is comprised of a coloring of cobolt blue that is bleeding into a nice plum purple only to fade to a glassy whiskey brown, leaving him empty, again, in the end).

Soft fingers trail along his collar bone through six layers of thick cloth. Dainty, soft, petit and childlike only quite large enough for a child of age seven or six, for that is the age of Claude when he giftef Joseph the treasure of God, acting carefree as it happened. His picture from then hangs up above his bedframe within this manor in a gold plated frame encrusted with jewels, it doesn't feel like enough, because there isn't anything he could do to display Claude's first masterpeice properly. These fragile hands arw enough to unnerve him and snap his attention to the here and now instead of the then and there. The man, who oh so disarmingly and despairingly resembles one who's freshly dead, or perhaps, long since dead and bled dry for the crows.

This man who's compiled of everything he has always hated (everything he must hate or he's been perusing a goal for nothing at all, a meaningless goal, a meaningless existence and a meaninglessdeathsacrificekillingslifeartresearch. What would be the point of it all- of anything at all- of everything... His denial of life and death of existence and disappearance if not for the single-minded goal of bringing Claude back. For surely, surely Claude should be the one who stood well Joseph was the one who would have been abandoned to the dryads and nymphs. In the tender embrace of leaves and forrest foliage. Not a lover. Not family or friend. Just himself and the stars above.)

Somehow, and he doesn't quite remember how, he finds himself back in his studio with the Life-blessed-corpse laying on the sofa he had placed within the confines of this studio for drinking wine, exclusively. If only so he (for every once in an eternity- once, just once, per blue painted moon) may pass out upon the stiff velvet-rough upholstery adorning it in a shade of deep night-sky blue. And perhaps Joseph would have (should have) hated the deep unfathomable almost-black blue of the too-stiff too-ornate sofa and perhaps he would have (should have) once upon a time gone for a luscious wine red. The color of seduction, roses, romance and love. After all that's who he was, although perhaps no longer. He yearns for approval bequeathed upon him by the one who no longer can (by Claude).

The way his mind fixates on Claude is not perhaps normal, nor the way he so desperately searches (and finds) Claude's beauty and wit in the face of this man, who would be better off dead in the ways of his tragic appearance. He's nothing like Claude- all sharp edges and scars, nothing even resembling soft, doll-like features, smooth, clear skin and bright eyes. Something akin to Joseph's own appearance, though better.

(Claude has always been better, a bitter, invasive thought permeates his mind and bitter hues of just-off orange, split-pea green and putrid yellow color his vision bleeding in quickly from the corners and sliding across his vision like water does to a window pane in a heavy-handed pour.)

He blinks and all he can see is the dazzling swathes of silken life wrapped around this man, making him too bright to look at. Even when Joseph is standing 20 or 10 feet away (away enough that he can convince himself he's not prone to brakes in self-restraint and pointless self-indulgent breaths of moments.)

Through the time spent carrying him here and laying him out upon the sofa like a broken, discarded doll, Joseph feels like he has collected more of his wits then he has had for a slab of time he can no longer remember or count something that bled together and swirled, mingled and mixed with other (no longer) clearly defined moments.

A break in his restraint surfaces. So lost in his own thoughts (a grave of his own making) he doesn't realize he has wandered closer until his fingertips touch this warm-blooded corpse, delicately resting just beneath his eye, that this man intakes a sharp breath.

Whatever whits Joseph may have swept and gathered are now no longer but specks of dust and debris in the wind.

He finds himself frozen unable to move, even as ruby hellfire eyes blink open.

Chapter Text

We wonder — and some Hunter may express
Wonder like ours, when thro' the wilderness
Where London stood, holding the Wolf in chace,
He meets some fragment huge, and stops to guess
What powerful but unrecorded race
Once dwelt in that annihilated place.

— Horace Smith, Ozymandias

Andrew has never been someone with interesting stories, nor has he ever had anyone tell them to him. He can’t help but consider at this point, though, that perhaps he can say that he has lived an interesting life now. As morbidly tormented his life has been, perhaps there’s a story hidden somewhere within. Andrew idly wonders what kind of shitty moral theme his life story must contain, for it to be so devastatingly thrilling to Oletus Manor’s infernal perversions.

Maybe that’s why his past comes to torture him even when freed from waking hours. Andrew gets a distinct feeling, when he’s dreaming, that someone’s trying to capture his entire life on some far too expansive film roll. Like it is something worth that much money. Like the nameless eyes have some sort of ghoulishly perverted and frankly snotty feeling of entitlement to every single detail of his past. This excessively obsessive entity has some weirdly intense fixation on his life story and every single detail within, regardless of how small, regardless of how intimate. It demands to know everything.

The feeling pushes Andrew into some previously uncharted territory beyond being angry. While he’s naturally prone to annoyance and bouts of harsh anger, Andrew feels that this goes beyond that. This goes beyond wishing someone would finally meet death through some well-placed (well-deserved) bullet or getting their skull bashed in. This type of anger is fundamentally different, to Andrew, because it can’t be directed at anything with a tangible form. It can’t be taken out on anything with a physical body or even a name. It is the anger directed towards Oletus Manor and It’s insatiable addiction to privacy invasion on the deepest level. Oletus could care less if he burns down the rose bushes or forces the courtyard fountain to lay in twenty-thousand pieces on the ground. It always seemed to laugh at him a little (a lot) whenever he tried to make It suffer before. It would laugh because It knows that his efforts to inflict some infernally-leveled pain upon It will always fail. The fountain will be repaired within the span of four seconds, and the bushes will grow back within the hour, wilder than before.

Andrew does not know who or what controls Oletus’ whims, the most that he knows is that It is weaved into the very air. It’s essence makes up the strange veil that shrouds all of Oletus Manor’s grounds and all of the Oletus Game’s grounds by extension. Anything that It claims has It’s twisted veil wrapped around it (them?) so thoroughly that it becomes impossible to remove. Andrew hasn’t ever found another instance, aside from himself, of Oletus having staked a sort of morbidly weird property claim on a living creature. Living creatures can claim Oletus but Oletus doesn’t claim them. Andrew can’t help but wonder if Oletus simply doesn’t (refuses to) claim anyone who claims to own It or even anything within It. It refuses to actually care for and harbor anyone who claims to be the dominant force opposed to It. It rejects anyone who claims to have dominion or ownership over It. Anyone who speaks of Oletus in such a way that it is implied that It is their home and not just some temporary Hell, or even the juxtaposition between fading into obscurity, forever forgotten, and Purgatory. Maybe anyone who decides that they have any sort of entitlement to anything fabricated by Oletus or provided by It is something like an instant turn-away for the nameless intelligence behind It.

Papers are not what binds Oletus and It’s hellfire desires. Andrew has a sneaking suspicion that it’s far more complicated than he can ever hope to comprehend. Maybe Oletus binds Itself to It’s chosen owner through some fucked-up blood rituals and magics nameless to him. Maybe Oletus binds Itself to It’s Chosen through some ghastly and mangled version of the wedding vows that Andrew never held out hope that he’d ever get the privilege to participate in. Maybe it’s just as simple as Oletus infiltrating your psyche, like how Yhidra penetrates dreams. Maybe Oletus just chooses someone out of amusement and has never actually held any real intentions on obtaining a permanent owner.

Maybe that’s why Oletus has It’s morbid adoration turned towards him. He’s never claimed anything that It provides to actually belong to him. He’s never fully submitted to Oletus either though, he’s never rolled over and just took the punches that It tried to give. Maybe Oletus simply wants to break Andrew into submission before killing him for good. Maybe Oletus simply wants Andrew to stake claim over it in some weird ownership ritual. Maybe Oletus just really really fucking hates him and wants nothing more than to see him suffer. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Yet, Oletus is insistent on providing things for Andrew and whoever else lands themselves in the cat-and-mouse games. It gives clothing and food, but none of it is ever quite right. It’s off-putting in the same way that hearing a loud bang from the newly-established locomotives while thinking that someone must have been shot. Or similar to feeling that something must be real food when it’s made of paint and plaster. It’s the feeling one would get when being so convinced that something must be true but it’s actually something entirely different.

It’s fabrication of belonging and receiving gifts that are not expected to be repaid in tenfold is not something he will fall for. Andrew refuses to fall for Oletus’s ghastly tricks, he refuses to believe that even with It’s ungodly favor, the abomination that Oletus Manor is would ever make an actual effort for him. It will never make an actual move of sincere care for anyone. Andrew is not even sure if Oletus is even capable of caring about anyone, or anything, other than Itself and It’s own sick amusement. Maybe It’s just a sadist and adores seeing everyone suffer. Like when It drove the gardener, Ms. Emma Woods, to set more than one restrained person ablaze. She’d always cry for months afterward. Or when It tricked the faux-prisoner (inventor), Luca Balsa, into getting stuck in the lake, only to inevitably drown. Andrew still remembers when the batter, Ganj Gupta, found Luca’s water-bloated corpse. He became despondent, and apathetic, always with an empty look in his eyes. Andrew has a suspicion that they were lovers, with the way Ganji would cry alone. Andrew actually sat with him sometimes.

Luca and Ganji were on the list of the few people Andrew would seriously always consider to be his friends.

Andrew thinks that Oletus is actually really fond of vandalizing a person’s sense of self. Beyond driving people as far away as possible from who they are at their core, Oletus likes to make people empty-eyed. How everyone deals with it is their own, but Andrew’s taken to noticing whenever the fire to fight has died in someone’s eyes.

Andrew thinks that Oletus is really fond of pulling jokes of the worst kind. The kind that only serves to harm the target, that only serves to boost their own narcissistic ego.

Which is why, when his brain finally decides to connect to his motor skills in a coherent way, he immediately almost crashes into the hopefully dreamless abyss again. The first thing that he processes, before even opening his eyes, is that he’s on something that could be considered soft. A sort of weird firmness that lends itself to dipping to support his weight.

The next thing that he processes is that someone just decided to stick there, frankly, hellfire-freezing fingers under his eye. It gives Andrew the very distinct feeling that he’s being examined. It makes Andrew sick with stress and anxiety. It makes him immediately take in a sharp breath, give a violent flinch, and snap his eyes open to stare at the offender.

Andrew’s expecting an array of who he could consider the worst.

He’s expecting Jack, who so loves to torment people like this. Jack adores any opportunity to examine people like their pieces of art, just to mutilate them little by little for the same purpose. He loves to maim people just to see their response.

He’s expecting Edgar, who’s never understood the concept of personal space and to an extent, privacy.

He’s expecting Mr. Luchino Diruse, who would so adore to tear him apart for studies if it struck his fancy. If Oletus finally decided It was done with him, who would ever know if it gave the reptilian (hell, Andrew wouldn’t even put it past Mr. Diruse as the professor) a little push towards examining Andrew. To experiment and poke and prod at him the same way one would a scientist’s sacrificial gerbil.

He’s expecting hunter Joker, Smiley, with his penchant for bloodlust and hatred for anyone that reminds him of his misfortune. And.. well… Andrew’s a freak, with white hair and infernal red eyes, which would surely remind Smiley of the circus. From what Andrew understands, Hullabaloo was full of freaks.

He’s expecting someone like Orpheus, who would so enjoy pulling him apart no matter what. Andrew thinks that Orpheus is either eternally hopped-up on whatever drugs that Oletus can provide, or he’s just prone to doing a swan dive into insanity.

Andrew even anticipates Mr. Aesop Carl, blinded by his own stubborn beliefs and trauma. Convinced that death is the most beautiful place. Not that Andrew can disagree, with how much of his life was… is dedicated to making his death something nice. With how much work Andrew has put into making sure that his corpse will be laid to rest somewhere nice. With how much of Andrew’s life was spent looking forward to his eventual death, Andrew doesn’t think that he is anywhere near qualified to fight Mr. Carl on that.

Andrew does not expect one Joseph Desaulniers looking at him, at Andrew, like Andrew holds one of the universe’s most coveted secrents. Andrew does not expect Joseph Desaulniers to be staring at him like Andrew is the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. Andrew gets a vague impression that while this is coming off as similar to Orpheus when he’s obviously inebriated (be it through alcohol or drugs) it’s something a little different. A little off.

For starters, Joseph still hasn’t moved his hand off Andrew’s face. If anything, he’s decided to move it closer, now instead of just fingertips, Joseph’s whole palm is pressed flat on Andrew’s face. Joseph’s hair is down and he’s also somewhat dressed down. Despite being in his costume that Andrew vaguely remembers being titled something like Faust, Joseph’s hair is not brown, and he does not wear the cap. The doublet’s front is undone, exposing the simple white shirt underneath, he’s not wearing gloves or any of the other accessories. Andrew doesn’t even think Joseph is wearing shoes, if the boots clumsily kicked off next to the couch is anything to go by.

Andrew opens his mouth and then closes it again after a few minutes of shared silence. His mind is failing to compute this situation. Andrew gets the feeling that if he tries to move something terrible will happen, like immediately falling onto Joseph (Which he’s sure will snap Joseph out of his uncomfortable trance, and Joseph will then stab him). Or having an all-too-early sensual meeting with the floor.

Joseph has never taken an interest in him before, aside from giving Andrew the distinct impression that his appearance pisses Joseph off after a few loops. Alas, the most Andrew can bring himself to do is stare at Joseph, already as sunk into the cushions as the couch will let him be.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Andrew can’t honestly say that what is happening right now makes any sort of sense to him. His only coherent thought about it all is distant. The thought is one that meets him halfway between his spirit leaving his body (hopefully forever, as farfetched as wish that is) and his mind becoming far too fixated on Desaulniers’ quick breaths fanning across his collarbone. His other thought is that this couch is awfully small. His shoes are hitting the floor, even when flung over the arm, and his neck is starting to ache horribly from his own weird positioning. Andrew knows that his back will hate him when he tries to stand, whenever that happens.

Andrew can almost let himself believe, with all of Joseph’s shaking and quick, shallow breathing, that Joseph is panicking. He can almost let himself believe that Desauniers is having one of those shows of weakness that plague Andrew, himself. One of the ones that always has Andrew struggling to think of anything beyond his sins and undeniable damnation. Of his Mother, in chains, and on her deathbed, because the townspeople were always so rotten. Of Mr. Marshall and his rotting breath and teeth. His own hunger, so strong it had Andrew eating whatever could even be minimally considered edible. Anything that he could find. Hunger… Aches and pains, and that terrible hunger and thirst that became exacerbated by hard labor in the middle of winter. The kind that made Andrew certain the cold would kill him because his hands were shaking too badly to rekindle the fire.

It has Andrew thinking of all the times he has cursed his mortal vessel. Spat upon his ‘temple’ (As one of the Good Nuns Andrew has met would call it), and wished himself to die. As if God does not have a will for him to follow. As if his death could be by his own hand without taking away his only shot at salvation.

Of course, it is his own failure to sway these thoughts away from himself. It is never the panic that makes him think of these things. The panic is not sentient, it can not control him, and it would be committing a lustful sin to pass off his own actions onto something like that. It would be lustful, because to lust is to build a desire for unaccountability, to yearn for the absence of responsibility.

Just as Francesca and Paolo can not pass off their acts of adultery on their passion for love (For it was their own action, their own choice.), Andrew can not pass off his self-loathing and self-destructive thoughts that sometimes bleed into his actions as anything but his own failure.

But Andrew can’t let himself believe that of Desauniers. He can not believe that Desauniers could ever sink to that, he would never show such weakness as Andrew. He can not. Desauniers was always so put-together previously, so pompous and overbearingly prissy. Andrew has hoped more than once that someone would forcefully feed or trick Joseph into eating maggots. Force him into experiencing real hunger. The kind that trips between the line of life and death, too close to starvation, too close to dehydration. Show Joseph what it’s like to struggle, to suffer, for your life because almost no one has ever thought you deserving of it anyway.

Desauniers has always made Andrew irrationally angry. Part of that might be because he’s old money, wealthy born into wealth. Part of it might be the fact that Andrew knows. He knows what it’s like to lose someone so dreadfully dear to you (For Andrew it’s his good Mother, for Joseph, his dead brother.). Yet… yet Desauniers did not choose to work for his brother’s memory. He chose to sink into self-pity and drink. And his wealth enabled him. His wealth enabled, and perhaps it still does, his selfish (sinful) drive to turn away from the past and present. Joseph wants nothing more than to complete his own fucked up desire, damn everything and everyone else.

Andrew thinks Desauniers is pathetic. He hasn’t known suffering, because he can’t know it. He does not know poverty and hate. Desauniers doesn’t know, he can’t know, what it feels like to be the recipient of hate, dreadful, passionate, and relentless. Hate that is consistently justified by what is presented as a petition signed by God himself. Bottomless hate, hate from everyone that’s still alive around him. He doesn’t know how deeply people can wound you just by despising the fact that you exist at all.

A thought strikes Andrew of Sodom and Gomorrah, as he watches Joseph slowly, languid and exhausted, curl into his chest. As he sees Joseph’s knuckles go white on the lapels of his coat. As he seems to halfway react to Andrew’s angry breathing with small but violent tremors and small hitches in his breathing. The lack of sound, as if Joseph is afraid of even speaking. He thinks of Sodom and its uncharitably, Sodom’s people’s choice to embody the denial of compassion. Sodom’s pride for its people’s sin and the fallout thereof and therein. Gomorrah, for it’s lack of care. No empathy to extend to the deserving, always so envious of what is not and can not be theirs. Egotistical, entitled.

Andrew should not judge Joseph’s suffering based on his own. Suffering is not comparable, because no matter what, suffering hurts. No pain is worse than another, the only thing to judge is the coping that comes after.

The thought makes Andrew deflate. The anger Andrew carries with him simmering down a little. Boiling down into something more containable, less vitriolic. Andrew does not want to damn himself to hell, even if it’s already been done for him. The possibilities that death provides has always been one of Andrew’s biggest motivators. He wants to do well and live by God, because maybe, just maybe, when he dies he’ll see his Mother again. Even if he’s destined for Hell anyway, maybe God will see his efforts and allow him some time with her and her good spirit.

Death still is a motivator for him, just more intensely, now.

Joseph smells like what he remembers from his one-time trip out of Laz into the big city. A run for one of the monks at Laz, to collect some papers and supplies. Andrew halfway thinks that it was an excuse to try and get him killed on the road. Away from Laz, so the residents won’t have to worry about his burial.

It was a four-day ride, even more so with the reluctance from the carriage driver to haul Andrew around. It was Andrew’s first and only experience with a real cathedral, big and grand and beautiful. Joseph smells like all those old tomes they had in the library there, ancient and knowing. Wise and eternal, if treated properly. He also smells like something sweet and slightly savory, a smell Andrew associates with the few weddings he was in the background for at Laz. He faintly remembers one of the nuns calling it vanilla.

They liked having Andrew in the choir for weddings and funerals, despite hating him. Andrew supposes that when one of the monks told him, harshly, that while they’d rather not see him, but they can't avoid it for this. They can't avoid it because he has a decent voice sometimes, that was true.

Andrew slowly frees his hands from Joseph’s weak grasp, and awkwardly maneuvers his hands to hover over Joseph’s back. He’s not sure if this is a good idea. Andrew knows he’s fucking terrible at comforting people, he’s never had reason to do it for anyone but himself before. And even with himself, he’s fucking terrible. But as Andrew starts to feel the tears beginning to roll down Joseph’s cheeks, he lowers his hands, slowly, unsurely.

For whatever it’s worth, he pats Joseph on the back. It’s awkward and Andrew can’t imagine it being anywhere near comforting. His other hand travels to Joseph’s hair, which he is now realizing is missing the ribbon. Andrew tries to recall what his Mother would do when he was upset as a small child.

He, slowly and hesitantly, starts to thread his finger through Joseph’s hair. Petting him in a similar way as Andrew vaguely remembers his Mother doing to him. He presses his hand on Joseph’s back into his spine, firm, almost protective. Andrew can’t count the number of times he’s wished that someone would have the heart to hold him in a way that said that they cared, sympathized even. So he tries to emulate that desire for Joseph.

After a moment, Andrew starts mumbling sweet platitudes into Joseph’s ear. Things about something and nothing at all. Mostly just things Andrew has a sneaking suspicion that he’s hoped someone would say to him for the longest time. Not that he’s going to think about that. Not right now, anyway.

“‘s okay, J-J’seph…” God, Andrew hopes that Joseph won’t murder him for using his first name, “‘m not- ‘m not sure wha’ it is you’re so scared of, but it’ll o’ly hurt you as much… as much as you let it.”

He can only plead to God, forevermore watching over him, that his attempts are having their intended effect. Andrew knows for damn sure that his voice isn’t always the most pleasant. It almost never is. He sounds fine singing, but that’s also the only time he puts real effort into clear articulation. It’s the only time his voice is worth anything, after all. The only time he can be heard… because it’s the only time people want to hear him. They won’t just shut their ears.

“‘m sure it’ll go ‘way soon, J‘sph. ‘s not like all them can tormen’ you fore’er…”

He refuses to voice any hopes or pleas to Oletus, damn It to the lowest circle of Hell.

Andrew can only hope that when Joseph regains his senses that he won’t kill him. Andrew doesn’t think that would do anything to appease Oletus, and he’s also sure that dying in the manor is much more painful than in a game. Instead, Andrew hopes that Joseph will gather himself and then force Andrew into agreeing that they will never acknowledge or talk about this again (not that Andrew would want to).

Andrew stares at the ceiling, it’s painted differently from the other room’s, a dark purple instead of cream. He remembers burning buildings and their screaming. The screams from creaking old wood beams as rubble and fire eat away at its integrity. The screams from those caught within. The fire’s victim’s ashes scattered in the wind as the flames died, the survivors too grief-stricken to do much to save whatever is left. Andrew remembers someone tried that on his Mother and him once. They tried to burn down their little home on the outskirts of town.

It didn’t do much other than make his Mother’s cough worse. They never had much, no real possessions to call theirs. Their little home was not much more than a rented shed. But it was home, it was home because they were together.

The fire didn’t do much, other than blacken her lungs with the smoke and soot, things the sickness already roosting in her chest didn’t take kindly to.

“...‘s OK J’sph.”

Chapter Text

Flitting throughout the manor recently, there is this little, annoying buzzing gnat. A little monstrous gnat that has become the progenitor of a detrimental amount of headaches and wizzing, grating whispers . Whispers that are seemingly trailing after Luchino wherever he goes within this damnable place. Oletus Manor may have been- still is, in a way- the forebearer of his dreams and the host of the Dream Witch Yidhra and her, somehow, undead and undying follower, Yima. The Eldritch Being that had been the one to grant him this reprieve of becoming something more than he had been, a balm on his soul, a boon for his research and something that gave him at least a little bit of meaning. Yet despite this little gnat becoming an, almost, required factor for some particularly, painfully aggravating murmuring rumors. Little whispers flitting about Oletu, feeding the mill and the great, vast grape vine.  The little gnat possesses the most irritating little buzz eventually coming around to him stating that he , Luchino Diruse, had eaten the newest arrival to the manor. He knows intimately that this little rumor is based on little more than his reptilian appearance and the razor sharp teeth that comes with it.

The residents of the manor that he had interacted with these past two hours have been infuriating enough, thriving on this gnat, where this ‘gnat’ translates to, this horribly aggravating rumor . Even though there is a specific portion of Luchino’s brain, afflicted from the kiss of The Dream Witch’s tiny blessed messenger. Her beautiful lizard, that wants nothing more than to elongate and lash out his tongue and consume . A portion of his brain that is hardly less basic and barbaric than the lizard of which he had shared a kiss, this portion- this part , is a section that Luchino does his utmost to not let devour and ravish his rational thought, for however much being part reptile soothes an aching, deep, broken, shattered and sharp hole burrowed in his soul… Luchino still  doesn’t wish to become fully a lizard in all he is. Sacrificing his mind, body and soul.

Though his visage unnerves the weak of heart, in other words, amounting to almost the entirety of the residence of Oletus Manor, as if that wasn’t grating enough . This is something he has always absentmindedly noticed, through small or large statements. However it has been shoved in his face, slapping him across his face, now more than ever. Because now whenever he walks into a room he sees small Tracy Reznik, who is a newer arrival, a girl who cannot begin to hide the disgust and distrust on her face when she catches a glimpse of his tail. Or his scaly skin and the webbing contained between his fingers. He assumes, for little more than the stability of his emotions and to not look further into how all the others treat him for going from human to reptile, that she simply cannot fathom the sharp gratifying, refreshing and reassuring feeling that accompanies the smoothly rough and dry texture of scales laid on top of scales. Something he can compare to a comforting blanket forever resting on top of his sensitive skin.

Remembering how the appalled looks of little Miss Tracy Reznik has started spreading and infecting the rest of the manor, seeping into their psyches along with that fat, juicy gnat of a rumor that spread entirely too quickly and far too fast. There isn’t anything pleasing about this development, especially when he had been in the midst of sterilizing his lab from a recent batch of experiments and had a flurry of people peering into the tall, wide glass windows that cover his lab from ceiling to floor to let in natural light. They all had expressions varying from morbid curiosity to full out disgust. Suspicion overflowing in all of their bones and their bodies, clearly thinking he had done something horribly, horribly wrong. 

Speaking of which, it seems here the itty-bitty Mechanic is now, pushing her way past the door and into the manor’s kitchen, a sour look twisting up her face. He can feel his lip curl in distaste without his consent and turns back to the counter with a sharp swipe of his tail before small Tracy Reznik can see his expression of distaste, for he would never go so far as to label it hate. Looking back at the cutting board where he had been making his lunch, a serving of steak diane, he feels his stomach lurch. Igniting a small yet ravaging flame of self-loathing, his black-talloned hand curls around the knife, he thought he was better than this and the look of hatred upon her petite, pretty face. She looks so delicate and doll-like even when her face is covered and smeared in oil and muck, Luchino cannot help but hate her for it. Some deep, dark and dank part of him is screaming and hissing "everyone may love you for your delicate, traditional beauty but at least I am more complete than you . Even when everyone cowers in fear I am who I was meant to be . You're kicking and crying like a bullied child, a grown woman of twenty-one and not less . You crave for your father and Baron DeRoss said he'd cure your aches and your ills but he didn't and he never will ." There is satisfaction in her suffering as she practically spits on him with every glimpse he receives, it's petty and cruel. Yet he cannot, like her, bring himself to be anything else.

Little tiny Tracy Reznik so stuck in her past, much like Joseph Desaulniers, though oh so much worse . For she is a child in everything but form, she should be presenting as eight going onto nine and not twenty-one. Joseph Desaulniers, who is blurring out reality at best and not there at worst, is stuck in his past to the point of being forever lost . Stuck and staying little more than trapped through whatever ‘magic’ he’s conjured through his photos, camera and solutions, it is quite impressive really. Luchino doesn’t exactly believe in magic… But with what had occurred between the Dream Witch Yidhra and himself, he finds, distastefully, that he’s more often than not stuck one foot into science and one sunk into the obscurity of magic. Tracy Reznik, lurking in the corner and like every time before this, scrunches her nose in distaste looking as if she’s just smelled the compost that the Gardener, Emma Woods, keeps out back near the flower patch. Although she looks like she's just swallowed a rather foul soup, Tracy Reznik doesn't bother to acknowledge his existence beyond the side-eye, her gaze is far away and glazed over, it seems like she's thinking something over. Likely that gnat and Luchino cannot bring himself to give her the gift of the benefit of doubt because he knows deep in his bones that she's the one who spun him into this mess, the creator of that ever so pesky gnat .

Her thin lips part as he glances at her out of the corner of his eye, "Wha's that?" She says, gesturing to the cut of beef steak, "wha's left o' the newbie?" 

Luchino who had been, even now, fighting to keep a neutral face to not launch himself into her corner and rip apart her squirrely, chubby cheeks, just like Naib Subedar, though his are so much more comforting and enthralling as he only ever gazes at Luchino with little more than indifference and a raised eyebrow once in a blue moon. His lips curl back to showcase his fangs in an animalistic display and he revels in her flinch back as he slowly turns to look at her sweet little face. Normally, normally, normally Luchino prides himself on being a gentleman through and through. He keeps his baser instincts in a vice-like grip and never lets it loose caged within his mind, leashed on chains to a wall. Yet now he cracks open that door, if for nothing more than to see her cower . "If it was, Miss Tracy Reznik, I would hardly tell you ." His fingers are locked around the knife as he points it at her, his tail curled up behind him ready to strike and slide between her huge kitten gray eyes with their long curling lashes. 

Luchino finds that he rather vindictively enjoys the way fear flicks through her eyes, pupils blown wide. It feels like some sort of fundamental karma finally reaching around to shove a steel-toed boot up her ass, for all the times she’s been less than polite and for spreading that nasty rumor around that he likes his meat closer to bipedal origin than not. He lets his tongue snake out and flick out at her face from between his teeth, his hard scaly lips still peeled fully off of the pearly white sheen of his fangs. For even if they’d never fully cover his jagged teeth, they were still there. He moves stiffly away upon seeing a remote in her hand, a small light on the top flashing red. Slamming the large steak knife on the counter, he robotically walks away from the cut of beef that he had been preparing and seasoning for his lunch. Pushing his way through the kitchen door he leaves her behind and hopefully there, in the kitchen, she will stay .

Emma Woods is in the garden next to the hallway windows as he walks past into the parlor and to the stairs that lead to the hallways of rooms, for recreation and sleep. He watches as she pales so quickly he’d have thought she was bleeding out with her artery cut. Only there is no blood and there is no knife to her neck, thus only leaving the aggressor of her reaction to be the sight of himself. He climbs the stairs in the hope that maybe he could find some sort of peace . He is almost uncaring about how his tail is thrashing behind his back, the rhythmic seize and release of his muscles contracting and relaxing to let out the steam in a somewhat less destructive way. If he hits a painting of a landscape there, a still life here and a young woman dressed in black with a veil covering her face right here and right now, nobody needs to know. He stops, somewhat pathetically, when he sees an untrusting glance directed at him from Bane Perez.

He stops and stares, completely still, much like those statues of Galatea Claude’s. He had thought that if anyone could remotely understand at least somewhat, what he was going through it would have been Bane. They had gotten on rather well, but it seems that had been all for naught, for even he was suspecting that Luchino had eaten the new arrival before anyone could even meet the fresh blood. However, despite knowing that wasn’t true and knowing that there isn’t a way in the seven rings of hell that he could have done it and being hardly less than polite to the fellow residents of Oletus Manor, Luchino finds himself wondering if he was truly that monstrous. Is he truly someone who looks and behaves like he would partake in the consumption of human flesh? Once he sees Bane slowly making his way to him, a heavy step in his stride hinting at the fact that he believed that ugly rumor , pushing through a hedge and tilting his head in the same fashion Luchino has seen him use before placing a survivor upon the chair, he flees. 

He finds himself leaping and bounding throughout the manor and into a room, one that he doesn’t much care who it belongs to, only the fact that it is far enough away from his own that nobody would quite think to look in here. It is only belatedly that he realizes there is another resident, and he is in the survivor wing of the manor- no wonder he’s so far away from his own. Still in the throes of slight panic that is enough to overwhelm, certainly, for he does find Bane terrifying, he can’t find it within himself to search and see who this room belongs to. Only when a hand lands on his shoulder from where he has curled up in front of the door does he look up, anxiety sending a spike through his gut. He sees green, brown and scars, enough to relax for he knows at least somewhat with the way there is only a single raised brow, that Naib Subedar doesn’t believe that pesky stupid little gnat .

Chapter Text

The moment Reptilian decided it was a great, fantastic idea to climb into Ithaqua’s West-Wing room unannounced was the moment Naib almost lost it. Scratch that, he did lose it, for a moment.

He was in the middle of a conversation with Ithaqua. One of the many about some random religious mythos, law and justice, and whatever other odd ponderings they think up. Naib, for his part, finds the randomized talks Ithaqua likes to surprise him with rather entertaining.

Ithaqua has a way of saying things in the way a leader would. With all of the conviction and charm of someone who can lead a nation and then some. With great intensity and some level of joy, Ithaqua has a strange sort of happiness that Naib has never met anyone else with. Ithaqua also has a callous cynicism to them, a bitter bite of nihilism.

Ithaqua’s just as patient as they are assertive. Just as dominant as malleable.

It's an interesting divide. Ithaqua’s been patient enough with Naib to work with him through how to best help him with his fucked-up brain. They taught him sign language from a language that has been forgotten by everyone, save Ithaqua themself. They said their beloved dead mother taught them it, and they’re more than delighted to share it with someone. Especially when that someone is so enthusiastic about it. Feels special, like sharing a beloved culinary dish from your childhood with someone else. Doubly so when you learn that they loved it.

They're never totally optimistic, but with very particular matters, they'll only believe in the ideal outcome. Ithaqua never gave up on helping Naib, told him that they see something in him.

Ithaqua once told Naib that they do not really believe in life or death. Or at least, they don't believe in those concepts in the way everyone else does. They don't really think an individual, while alone, can make a difference with anything. Unless given mass public attention, one person simply can't do much. Not politically. Not historically.

Ithaqua also said that, in much the same way, people who think too hard about the future and the past aren't really living. When the worth of every breath birthed from your lungs is debated by you… are you really living? Are you really breathing in any way that matters? Especially when you're constantly questioning its worth?

Naib told them that their sentiment is an interesting one. Just as freeing as it is damning. A unique brand of nihilism that can be molded to empower or disparage, depending on who's interpreting it. Who's advertising and promoting it? Ithaqua told him that was the point. What good is a perspective, a point, if not something substantially debatable? If it's not something to make people think and possibly change their behavior, what's the point of it? Why passionately defend your preference for buttered or unbuttered toast?

Naib could only tell them that he wouldn't know; he doesn't understand others most of the time, anyway.

Ithaqua just nodded and told him, "I understand what you think, and I see it too. In your actions, in your speech. But I also understand you have been through war and combat. You've lived it. I believe that does something to a person. Gives them an understanding most don't have. Or perhaps it's an understanding most simply don't care to develop."

Ithaqua has an odd sense of what the truth is. It’s like they can smell lies. Like they just know, somewhere within themselves, intrinsically, what is right and wrong. Predicting what can happen and what can not. Like when they believe absolutely in one positive outcome, it's usually the one that happens.

Regardless, Ithaqua's here now, and so is Reptilian. Naib can feel the walls closing in around him, and his immediate response is to distance himself. If not physically, then mentally. So his brain places a fuzzy feeling barrier around him that makes him feel like he's somewhere else. Not physically present, severed from mortality, if only for a moment. An unmoored ship, moving but still.

He's fairly certain that Ithaqua knows what routines Naib’s mind is running through. Ithaqua knows, because they know trauma and pain from warfare (Or, as Ithaqua would say, "The false idol they made of Dutchess Justice and the violent plight they make in her sullied name."). But Ithaqua doesn't respond to the anxiety coming off of Naib in a similar way to Doctor.

Doctor has the same amount of subtly for some issues as a hunting dog that found a flock of birds. When she sees that something is wrong and that she can do something about it, she’ll do it, sure. But the issue is that she struggles with dividing what works best for different people sometimes. Like Naib’s anxiety versus Gardener’s.

Dyer… Because it’s Dyer, not Doctor. Woods, not Gardener. Diruse, not Reptilian. Because Naib can’t whittle these people down to their titles and tools like he would in the military. Can’t do anything to soften the blow when they will eventually die because that’s all that ever happens to people around him. Can’t because the Manor likes to make sure that Naib knows for damn certian that these are people, not titles. And they won’t really die until this cursed place wants them to. They just have to suffer death after death after death after death.

Dyer can’t understand that when attention is drawn to the fact that Naib is mentally dissolving for a moment, it spirals out of control.

Woods may do well with multiple outlets for support and communication, but Naib does not. He can’t handle everyone asking him different things and expecting verbal responses. Naib doesn’t know how to explain to the fools that he can’t figure out how to give them one over half the time.

His voice never works properly unless he’s in some extreme situation that he goddamn knows requires it, like the Manor Games. Or when working with a team in the army. Not that it ever did him any good. All his teammates died. All but him, and he still can’t figure out why he’s still here when they’re not. What fucked-up diety decided that he deserved to live when they didn’t? They had families to go back to. Naib knows his family died with his pride. He knows, he knows he knows he knows.

Ithaqua slides over in their silent way and taps him on the shoulder, firmly and harshly, but quickly. Backs away just as quickly and seamlessly. Rough physical stimuli, make his brain tether itself in reality, but not enduring enough to trigger an aggressive response.

Naib feels it but can’t quite force his conscious mind to connect to his body in a way that means anything. He’s still somewhere between wondering why, why, why, and grappling with his immediate combat-oriented calculative thoughts. His eyes have locked onto Diruse, and he knows his hands spasm where he’s locked them onto his knees. Because even in his unmoored state, he can’t figure out whether to punch or hug Diruse.

Diruse, who’s currently curled in front of the door (The only exit outside of the twenty-eight-foot drop out the window), hyperventilating. And Naib can’t decide whether to have empathy or distrust.

Ithaqua gives Naib another tap, a quick one-finger wave in front of his eyes. Getting him to look away from Diruse, they give Naib some slow sign language. More or less hidden strategically with their cloak, something meant only for Naib’s eyes. Just as much a show of trust and understanding as it is a check to see if he’s coherent enough to respond. If he’s found his tether.

He hasn’t.

Ithaqua figures it out faster than they have any right to. Just as Naib stands up with the intent to kick Diruse, forcefully, out of the door, Ithaqua quickly maneuvers him to a new seat. They push him down. Firmly, with a grip that even in Naib’s drifting state, gives a message he knows means he has to stay.

Naib fixes his gaze on some point near the bookshelf on the far wall. Next to one of Ithaqua’s little potted plants. This one is the saffron crocus. All of Ithaqua’s plants have some sort of purpose to them, medicinal or otherwise. It occurs to Naib that this is the east wall of Ithaqua’s room. The west is the one with the door, where Diruse is.

Ithaqua must have put Naib here intentionally. Especially because he also has to intentionally turn his head to look at the south wall, where the still-open offending window is.

Ithaqua watches Naib for a moment before he leaves Naib’s line of sight. They come back quickly, with a stick they told him one time they carved themselves. It looks like a mess, aesthetically, but Ithaqua told him it wasn’t ever supposed to look pretty. They carved it for textures. Something to help them ground themselves when the world becomes too much.

They gently take Naib’s wrist and flip his hand so it’s palm-up and put the stick in his hand. It’s large like it came from a big tree, not particularly long but with weight and circumference. He thinks Ithaqua told him once that he got the branch off of a sycamore tree. Naib runs his thumb over a portion where Ithaqua carved a few cutesy animal designs in. There are other sections in the branch, with some covered in varying degrees of random cross-hatching. Some with calculated divots and bumps, utilizing the natural formation of the branch. Ithaqua carved some rings around the branch and circles somewhere else, and a bunch of moons and star designs in another spot.

Slowly, as Naib makes use of the branch and its purpose, he finds his footing in reality again. The thick fog cloaking his senses starts to lift. Ithaqua starts signing to him again when they notice the light come back into Naib’s eyes.

Ithaqua has their mask on, per usual. Naib has never asked them about it, and never asked them to take it off either. Ithaqua has never offered. It’s one of the many silent rules between him and Ithaqua, to not ask about things like that. Just accept the oddities as they come, because sometimes it’s there for a reason. And the reason will be something that becomes known when the time is right, but for now, it doesn’t matter.

Ithaqua is also more-or-less dressed down, although still with the cloak, the hood is down. They’ve foregone their quilted vest (it’s draped over the back of a chair, somewhere). They don’t have their bladed stilts on, nor the boots, instead opting to go barefoot. Naib has quickly come to realize this is Ithaqua’s favorite footwear. Nothing. They told him the one time he raised an eyebrow at it that the boots are more-or-less to prevent unnecessary strain and injury with their stilts.

Naib told them that he doesn’t understand why they need stilts in the first place. Ithaqua’s already tall enough Naib’s certain that he could name several military generals and noblemen who would hate them for that alone. Because they all have some weird complex with staring down their nose at everyone, they’d falter and crumble when it’s not physically possible.

Ithaqua just gave him a breathy little laugh and told him that it must be their fate to piss off the nobles. As it should be. Their albino fox ears and tail gave Naib the absolute impression they were pleased with that more than anything.

Naib nods at them, and Ithaqua speaks for what must have been the first time in a few minutes.

“Your battles with the Minotaur in your Labyrinth of Anguish have not yet failed you. You have become quicker than even their fastest.” Ithaqua’s voice is quiet. It would almost be soft if not for the undercurrent of conviction, strength, and rage that burns underneath every word they ever speak.

“Now we must deal with the intruder upon my sanctuary, and I do not think we should be rash. Although,” Ithaqua gestures with their full hand at Diruse and nods at Naib. “I believe it will be best for you to approach Mr. Diruse.”

Ithaqua pauses and continues when Naib throws them a glare, “I shall keep my distance from the enlighted Professor for but a moment. I do not believe that my presence was the one sought after. Additionally, I will recognize that I am not always the most comforting to the ones in need.”

Naib can’t give more than a voiceless sigh and turns to face Diruse. The man’s still curled in on himself, more so than before. Naib gets up after gifting Ithaqua another dirty look and walks over to Diruse.

Crouching in front of the oversized lizard, Naib tries to ask him what he can do to help, only to receive a clicking sound from the back of his throat. Realizing quickly that he’s not getting anywhere with that, Naib instead just places his hand on Diruse’s shoulder. Firm, grounding. Similar to what Ithaqua does to him, just more skin (his whole palm versus Ithaqua’s single-finger jab) and longer. Something in Naib’s gut tells him Diruse needs extended contact.

When Diruse finally looks up at him, Naib just raises an eyebrow at him. He knows it must look a little ridiculous, with Ithaqua’s room being a weird version of freakishly organized. There’s the dozens of walking sticks and the like lined up on the wall behind him, leaning against that bookshelf with the saffron crocus. Ithaqua has a hammock instead of a bed, and there’s more than one, strung high up in the corners of the south wall. Near the window. Naib knows Ithaqua frequents the southwest one, to better keep an eye on the door.

There are also more furs and leathers than not. Ithaqua once told him he doesn’t have much in here that he can not make himself. Hence all the old wood and bone furniture, rough ropes, and fabrics. They have the small round high table (it’s only big enough to comfortably seat up to four people of average size) with the two different chairs pulled up to it. A wooden-bone wingback that more-or-less looks like it’s a traditional wingback chair fused with a rocking chair. Along with a far more simplistic stool with fur cushioning.

The wooden-winged back has a patchwork fur quilt slung over it.

Another chair has been dragged from its previous location along the north wall to be directly in front of Diruse. Facing the east wall. It’s a chesterfield chair, made with hide. It’s usually more or less near the fireplace in the wall that Ithaqua maintains. They also keep all their cooking utensils and supplies there in various cupboards and shelves.

There are more contained gardens and plants than Naib’s sure Ithaqua knows what they’ll do with. But it’s also meticulously clean, with the wooden panel flooring with strategically placed handmade carpets being miraculously clean.

Naib knows that he likely looks out of place in Ithaqua’s room. But it’s where they all are, and now they have to deal with it.

Diruse doesn’t do much outside of looking at him with wide-blown eyes. Naib furrows his brow and opens his mouth again. He’s praying to whatever fucked-up deity that took a shine to him will hear him and listen this time, that his voice doesn’t fail him again.

“Diruse.”

It’s about all he can get out before his throat locks his voice in again, so he shuts his mouth so as to not look like a fool. He can feel Ithaqua’s gaze on his back, but it’s not heavy or judgemental. It’s something more like worry and reassurance.

Chapter Text

Luchino finds, as he has his talon-tipped fingers wrapped gently around a delicate floral teacup, that he doesn’t mind the soft noise around him as much as he usually does. For noise means people and people mean distractions, judgment and mutters. Noise means that there is someone watching him and waiting for a mistake, and they are eagerly lapping up any sign of him being less than what he knows himself to be. He knows, logically, that he is monstrous to the masses, his penchant for caring far too little about life and far too much about his experiments landed him into that category far before his blessing from Yihdra. Something that alienates him from the others, a state of isolation that he knows should bother him more than he has found it to do. He enjoys his silence with nothing but the sounds of his lab, nature and the habitats he’s crafted for his lizards, snakes and reptiles around him. It is soothing and the sound of the stream just out the door never ceases to ease the tension out of his muscles and help him wind down after the day is said and done. After a match and after a killing, he’s never quite had a palate for the games as some of the others do. Though his reptilian appearance brings about the shunning and orchestration from his peers, he does not care. Their feelings are also something that he cannot bring himself to care for, if they are too weak stomached to see him then they shouldn’t have come to this manor at all.

He watches his tea cool down to a less than acceptable temperature as Ithaqua and Naib whisper around him, his ears picking up the noises but not the meanings behind the sounds expressed from their respective lips. He has somehow been moved to a small plush chair that he is finding himself falling into as he watches the still and smooth amber surface of his tea well Naib throws yet another soft blanket onto his shoulders saying something to Ithaqua well doing so. Luchino hasn’t ever talked to Ithaqua so his opinion on the fellow hunter is null, he has never found a reason to do so and nothing about him had ever quite piqued his interest enough for him to search for the elusive Night Watcher. 

Perhaps hunting him down would have been in his best interests sooner but there had never been enough of a reason. The Night Watch pulls a book off his shelf and offers it to a stony Naib Subedar who takes it with stiff fingers and a stiffer posture. Luchino worries at the porcelain in his hands rubbing his thumb along the smooth glossy surface, he thinks that he might have fucked up and that it was a mistake to be here and is prepping himself for the mortifying ordeal of apologizing and leaving when there is a soft tink that sounds like the loudest crash and shatter in the world as Luchino finds himself with a lap full of cold tea and soft blankets. He sits there frozen for what feels like a little over an eternity, waiting for some sort of reprimand for breaking the delicate floral teacup, there may have been some sort of ironic symbolism with this all hidden within the paint of those blue flowers, but he has never quite been one for flora that doesn’t link into what he fixates and studies on. 

For example, he knows that rose mallow is edible, the primary aspects being the leaves and petals. The stocks are something most people avoid, but after running a few tests Luchino knows that he can stomach them. They grow in more swampy areas due to the fact that they are heavy feeders and thus require nutrient and hummus rich soils to flourish properly. The primary reason as to why he researched rose mallow was because he was crafting a habitat for himself in his room, plants, a small lake and the like. Something to make him feel more at home and less on edge, it helps somewhat, he thinks- or maybe it is more of a hope that what he does is not done in vain- that he is prone to eating some of the flora that he has cultivated as well. Sometimes what is in the pantry of Oletus doesn’t appeal to him in the slightest. 

Despite his inner monologue of trying and failing to identify these small blue flowers; small petals that are a deeper blue and it looks like some sort of shrub. The leaves are a softer and brighter green than what he is used to and he cannot see the pistil or stamen of the blooms. He doesn’t know and it is driving him slightly mad, and yet throughout this all he cannot bring himself to look at Naib or Ithaqua as he stares at the remains of the once teacup, now about ten porcelain shards lying in rest within his fingers and palms. There is frustration beating a tune in his chest and he feels tears build up in his eyes, which is embarrassing all on its own. There is a hand on his shoulder again, grounding him, once more, to reality and the here and now. Following the arm, he knows the hand belongs to Subedar and he cannot be more thankful for the ashy blue-eyed Mercenary and his presence. 

Clearing his throat, he works a few times before any words spill out, “Thank you.” Is all that comes, and it is embarrassing because, really, that's it? That’s all he can come up with? A small little ‘thank you’ cannot add up to all that much and he can feel a spark of self-loathing because there isn’t any possible way that a simple, ‘thank you’ could cover what he actually wished to say to the mercenary. He can feel his face heat and though he knows they are unable to see the blush due to the scales covering him from Yidhra’s blessing he cannot help but duck his head in a futile attempt to hide from this all. It feels shameful to be so suddenly, frustratingly and distressingly dependent on someone he has never spoken more than monosyllabic answers to and is likely more uncomfortable in his presence than not. 

He shifts slightly, somewhere halfway between curling up on himself (again) and stretching out in preparation to leave for when he inevitably gets kicked from this room that he is finding himself less and less sure of if it is Naib’s or Ithaqua’s abode within the halls of this manor or perhaps the room belongs to neither of them and it is an unfortunate third party that his playing host to this madness and his panic. There is another beat then two and Luchino finds himself melting, slightly, into Naib Subedar’s touch before he pulls away. He wilts at the loss of contact in a way that he hopes was subtle, although he doesn’t really process that he has slumped and curled over himself and the shards of that small ceramic teacup before Subedar’s hands are pulling his out from beneath his stomach and taking the ten-or-so shards of the cup away from his grasp. A soft towel is used to soak up the tea that hasn’t already made its home in the blankets that he has found himself wrapped in. 

Luchino swallows before opening his mouth enough to speak, with what somewhat feels like a fruitless hope that words will come easier to him, this time. “I apologize,” a pause as Naib simply looks at him with the same impassiveness as before, a look that sparks enough courage in his gut to continue forth, “for the teacup. I did not- I didn’t- it wasn’t-” another pause, and Naib simply places the tea-soaked towel to the table, during his fumble and fight with words. After all the small fluffy off-white towel had done its job, “It wasn’t my intention to break it.”

A small nod of understanding, something that seems to have the underlying meaning of; it’s okay and I know.

It’s comforting even if it wasn’t said aloud. 

The bliss of the small quiet, only filled with the sound of another pot of water put onto boil and Ithaqua grabbing a spare cup is broken when someone rather rudely throws open the door to the room that they have all congregated in. It’s Edgar Valden and what could have Luchino ever expected from the painter descended from nobility but rudeness and entitlement. Because, really, he should have knocked and Luchino’s interactions with the small man have always been less than pleasant. 

“Michiko wants everyone in the foyer,” Edgar Valden pouts openly to the three people in this room with a paint-stained face, “she is on a rampage, I only wish she hadn’t done it now. But finding the newest addition takes priority above all else, I guess.” He pulls back his lips in a scowl tossing his brown hair over his shoulder in a sharp movement that would have thrown off his hat had it been on his head. “Anyways,” he continues in a sulky manner that is grating on Luchino’s already frayed and tired nerves, “foyer. Now. Or she’ll have my head next and I’d rather keep it attached to my neck and shoulders.”

He pushes himself off of the doorway and sways away stomping and dragging his feet ever so slightly as if that will show the true weight of his displeasure.