Chapter Text
Everything is… sluggish. The slow drip of his brain from his ears is the consistency of honey on a spoon. When was breakfast? He doesn't even know if it's been, or coming.
The asylum never changes much, and the worst part about coming back here is waiting to be let back in with the general patients. Out of the padded cell, so to speak.
At some point, the door opens, and a figure comes in, bending down and down and down. Long limbs fold like origami, a complex crumpling he can't keep track of.
Ha. Paper Crane.
"Edward. How are you?"
"I feel like a Dali painting," he slurs out, irritated by the clumsiness of his mouth, but not able to concentrate for long enough to hold onto the annoyance.
"That makes sense, with the cocktail you're on," Crane's voice seems to come from everywhere at once. There's the scratch of a pen on a clipboard. Ballpoint. Fine tip. Light, spidery strokes. "Could be worse."
"I fail to see how."
"Could be a Bosch."
Edward shudders, involuntarily watching Crane's hand suddenly emerge from layers of flesh over and over, like a flower bursting from it's bud again and again. "At least there were some delights in that garden, however unearthly," he manages, slow on the words, but still sharp in his tone.
"You know they gotta keep you in care until we pass the first two weeks," Crane says, with all the patience of someone talking to a very small child. Ed sighs.
"Because before that, you all think I'll try to break out again."
"Empirical evidence suggests that's exactly what happens. You have to be prevented from fixating on your revenge plans until we have you settled in here, then we can bring you back down safely."
"You ever been on the moon, Crane? Without a space suit? It isn't fun."
"Fun ain't the point, Eddie. You're back in Arkham."
"The thoughts are all odd shapes. I can't stack any of them together nicely. Do you know how much I hate things that don't tessellate properly?"
"If you want, I can slip a little of my latest batch into the mix. Spice it all up for ya."'
"Only if you hold me through the nightmares." He tries for a sarcastic leer, but it just comes across as a goofy smile. Fucking synkinesis, devaluing his attempts at humour.
"I'm touched, Eddie, truly," the pair of glasses in front of him says, clearly meaning none of it, and Edward shifts slightly in his straitjacket.
"Touched in the head, maybe," he says, petulant now.
"Any side effects you need me to beware of?" Crane asks, scrawling that light, looping doctor's handwriting on the clipboard.
"Do hallucinations count?" Edward asks the empty room with a sigh, flopping backwards against the wall again.
It was going to be a long two weeks.