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Wylan's heart had never seemed to be so loud. Maybe it was a survival instinct, not to overwhelm his senses so he was always aware of his surroundings when in fear, veins pumping with adrenaline. Now, though, that idea was out the window.
Wylan was afraid, and all he could hear was the blood rushing through his head, flushing his face in embarrassment to mask the terror that flooded his being.
His heart, pounding in a staccato he knew uncomfortably well, beat the tune of his own personal horror music into his veins, strung taut with tension and discordant notes. The bass was in his blood, the melody in his too-quick breaths, singing run, run, run!
And so he did.
Jesper took a couple steps back so he could lean against the table beside him. "How do we know Van Eck will pay up? He's a mercher."
Kaz had gone on a monologue about a mission prospect regarding some up and coming drug, jurda parem. Breaking a prisoner out of the Ice Court, Wylan thought. Ghezen.
In response to Jesper (or, so Wylan assumed), Kaz turned around slowly. His flair for dramatics was something to marvel at. Not that Kaz would admit he had one at all, but the point still stood.
Kaz stood facing them, hands clasped behind his back. He glanced between them all, Jesper, Wylan and Nina, before his gaze settled on Wylan.
"Meet Wylan Van Eck, Jan Van Eck's son and our guarantee on thirty million kruge."
Wylan's breath caught, and he stared at Kaz unblinkingly, sight beginning to go unfocused with the force of it. Kaz stared back.
He could feel Jesper's eyes at his side, burning an imprint into his temple where before it would've been sweetened with a kiss, could feel Jesper shifting away from him where before he would've moved closer. He could hear Jesper scoff in disbelief where before he would've laughed and tugged Wylan into his arms.
Kaz had- he'd just-
That fucking bastard.
He hadn't even gotten to tell Jesper himself, even after finding out about Jesper's powers, even after Jes had shared his powers with Wylan. The key was colder against his chest than he remembered it being. The chain he'd attached it to almost pinched his skin now, even though Wylan didn't think that had ever happened before.
He couldn't breathe.
Wylan had run before. Quite a few times, actually. Why shouldn't he do it again? Running from his fears had always been a kind enough experience—until the crash, at least.
He'd ended up at Fifth Harbour, somehow. Fifth Harbour. Always Fifth Harbour. Even now, panicked and not thinking straight, he gravitated to where he was most likely to be safe. He always had; the music room, that one window seat in the alcove hidden by a thick, dusty curtain. The garden. The library, if his father wasn't desperate to find him and teach him what he needed to learn.
Never his room. Too cowardly, too predictable of him. Never his mother's favourite chair in the room she used to teach him to paint and draw in. Too sentimental, too soft of him. Never the depths of the Barrel. Too chaotic, too foolish of him.
So, he went to Fifth Harbour. Harming him on this soil would be like balancing a spike beneath your chin and waiting for someone to come and shove your head down on it. Especially now that he was apparently Kaz's key to thirty million kruge. Even if all his potentially good friends and his boyf—had they ever put a label on it?—hated him now and Kaz (his boss) probably didn't trust him at all (if he ever did), Wylan doubted any of them trusted him in any amount now because he was just some mercher's kid slumming it in the Barrel for— for what? For fun? Did they know? Did they know how much of a disappointment Wylan was to his own father? Fuck, he was probably a disappointment to them all now. What was he actually useful for, anyway? What is he doing here? Sure, bombs came in handy, but there were other demolitions experts in the Barrel. Wylan doubted he was much of an expert, anyway. It was chemistry he was good at, not building weapons. He didn't even like chemistry itself, anyway. Calling him an expert was probably something Kaz did in the moment to make them seem more intimidating, like any one of them actually knew what they were doing. There were people better than him. Raske. Even Pim. (Jesper had said so himself. Jesper didn't even remember him at the time.)
Wylan had run away again. He was scared. He was a coward.
(He always was.)
It was only when Wylan had nearly choked on a lungful of polluted, salty air that he realized he hadn't been breathing. Or maybe he was hyperventilating. Or maybe both? Was that possible? If it was, he was doing it.
He could only think of all the disappointment he had caused. To his tutors. To Kaz, to Nina. To Jesper. To his mother. To Ghezen, to the Saints.
To his father.
All he could think of was that burning disappointment, the disdain. Stood there on the rocky sand in the harsh breeze, all Wylan could think about was his father. Every word the man had said to him, with cold poise and a mercher's pretense of grace. Of sorrow. Of mercy.
The thoughts surrounded him, blocking each and every possible exit. Wylan was uncomfortably stuck in his head, his body staring out to sea.
Wylan thought of the boat. The plot. The disappointment. The anger. The trick. The fact that he was stupid and hopeful enough to believe it. He thought of it all.
Suddenly, he remembered a song his mother had taught him when he was young. When he wasn't yet completely worthless.
One of the lyrics jumped out at him, glaring and flashing to the whine of a siren, bright and bold.
...The Merry One lies...
On its own, the words don't sound as good. That could just be because every time Wylan thought of the song, the melody accompanied it and was currently playing through the whirlwind of thoughts crowding around his head.
The words seemed oddly fitting, though. Wylan had been given a second chance at happiness and he'd fucked it up by lying and hiding and running away like he always did. Shit.
Wylan didn't know when he went from standing to digging his knees into the dirt, holding back haunting, gasping sobs from tearing their way up his throat, but he was there now.
The rocks littered and hidden (like him) between the surface of each forgotten bit of earth stabbed into the layers of his flesh and dragged his sorrow, his panic from him and into the ground. With them, the tiny little rocks sunk their teeth in and drained the remnants of his lost childhood, of the cruel hope that a man like Jan Van Eck (his father) could have any shred of humanity, hell, of mercy.
In the end, Wylan was surrounded by every thought that had ever hurt him, stuck in a ritualistic circle that pinned him to his hands and knees, chest heaving with the guttural sobs that streamed from his parted lips. He yearned desperately to crawl out of the pulsating red ring, flashing horrid words at him, flinging hurt and grief and sadness at him, bringing both the sacred words of priests and Saints and prayers and the unholiest swears to come tumbling from his tongue.
He wanted someone to pull him out of the circle.
Deep down, Wylan knew nobody would. Not now, anyway.
In the end, he was just Wylan Van Eck. He could not escape his past.