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Derek wakes as usual to the overhead lights turning on. They offer no ease in flickering; one moment, it is dark and he is without dreams, and the next his closed eyes are screaming at him. Whilst the lights wake him, it’s the blistering headache that forces him into awareness. He briefly recalls the rose-coloured days in which his depression would pull him straight back into sleep, wishing he could roll over and choose a new nightmare to wake up into.
Unfortunately, it’s another day of the exact same shit.
The first thing he does is reach for the heavily tinted glasses on the bedside table, putting them on before even opening his eyes. Next, he throws back the thin blanket and stares up at the ceiling for a moment. His eyes are unnaturally fast as they expand his vision and confirm that there are still seven strip lights overhead; this is the same room he has been in for the past… few months, perhaps? The days tend to blur into one and he isn’t entirely present for all of them.
Still, he knows what he’s expected to do. There’s a very small bathroom to the side of the hospital room. Each morning, Derek enjoys opening the door. He likes the feeling of putting his palm on the metal handle and pressing down, having the door move for him. In the brief few seconds before the interior of the bathroom becomes visible, he imagines that the door is opening outside – that he will soon be met with fresh air in his face and a wide world that he knows but has not yet met. Instead, he is greeted with white tile and the small supplies with which he washes his face, brushes his teeth, and mists his hair. He changes from one set of grey DMS-issue clothes to the next, replacing yesterday’s long-sleeved shirt and loose pants with today’s long-sleeved shirt and loose pants. He hates the restrictive itch of having his forearms covered, but asking for sensory adjustments doesn’t make his priority list right now.
This is all the time he gets to himself before the main door opens and one of the DMS agents enters with a tray that they set down on the small table. They stand there expectantly as Derek leaves the bathroom and walks over slowly, his legs stiff with the pain of disuse that has been amplified by sleep. He receives no commendation for walking unassisted, but when he grips onto the back of the chair for support and stays standing for a moment in order to rest his knees, the agent looks annoyed with him.
Lèse-majesté refers to the crime of defaming the dignity of a King – When discussing the medieval punishment of ‘Hanging, Drawing, and Quartering’, many people mistake the ‘drawing’ section as drawing the condemned down from the gallows. Others correctly attribute ‘drawing’ to the victim being dragged behind a horse on their way to execution, but what many do not know is that there is a secondary meaning – that of disembowelment, where the condemned, half-dead but still half-alive, would witness their intestines burned in front of them – You should not stand for this, Knight, have some pride, for Our sake –
Derek avoids eye contact and takes the small paper cup containing one large, white pill from the tray. Whilst he doesn’t trust the DMS one bit, the morning medication designed to reduce the pressure in his brain does help with the headache, and it’s preferable to its evening counterpart which offers effects somewhat similar to sleep paralysis. He even drinks some of the nutrient smoothie provided, knowing that today of all days he’s going to have to be on his best behaviour and pick his battles.
If all goes well – if he’s deemed compliant and subservient enough – then he’ll get to go home with Avery tonight. Giving anything other than his best fight against the DMS makes him feel pathetic, but he’s just plain desperate enough to sink the hits to his pride for the possibility that he’ll get one night – just one fucking night – away from the hell of this routine.
He takes a deep breath when Constance enters the room. She smiles at him, and the one he gives in return feels spiteful and tight against his face.
“Good morning,” she says. He offers no response as he stands up to follow her to wherever she’s going to take him today.
At the door, she stops. “Are you going to drink any more of your breakfast?”
It feels like a trick question. Derek looks back at the table and says blankly, “Do you… want me to?”
At this, she gives a small victory laugh and pats him on the back. “No,” she says. “But I’m glad you asked.”
He keeps his eyes on the floor as they walk out of the hospital room. After completing weeks of Constance’s little tests, Derek knows better than to let his mind wander to what could be behind each door that they pass. It’s better to stay quiet, try and conjure some peaceful image in his head. It’s strange, knowing that he is here to have his brain studied and still feeling like his mind is his only defence left against the lack of autonomy. The DMS can’t take his imagination – painful and vast as it is – from him. Sometimes he pictures Avery, wondering what he is doing to fill the hours until they can be together at dinnertime; other times, he imagines his brain finally bursting from the pressure, releasing Hastur to be someone else’s problem and letting him finish the process of dying that started last New Year’s Eve.
Mostly, he just thinks about going outside.
The room that Constance takes him to is on the same floor as his hospital room. She opens the door for them, and it is immediately dark inside – not curtains-closed dark, but this-is-a-boundary-light-cannot-touch dark. Derek flinches at the threshold.
“In you go,” Constance orders, and his feet move.
His eyes don’t adjust even when the door is closed and the light from the hallway loses influence. As afraid as he is about what’s in here, there’s something soothing about standing in the pitch black, like how cavers say that going deep underground and turning off their headlamps is the closest thing to a spiritual experience they’ve ever had.
He feels Constance’s hand on his arm, walking him over to a chair.
“I’m quite excited about this,” she says. “And you’ll be pleased to know there’s no needles this time.”
“What’s the catch?”
“No catch, just a theory I’m working on about communicating with the entity you call Hastur inside your mind.”
“What do I have to do, then?” He asks.
“I like this Derek,” Constance pats him on the shoulder. “He’s much more pleasant to work with. Are you familiar with the technology commonly used amongst hobbyist ghost hunters known as the spirit box?”
“I’m familiar with everything, Constance,” Derek rolls his eyes, though he knows she won’t be able to see him do so.
She laughs. “That’s the rough blueprint for what we’re going to do here, you and I. All you have to do is sit here wearing this-” she hands him a pair of headphones with a microphone attached; he recognises them by touch alone as a pair similar to the ones he used to own when he was a free man. “-And keep talking. Don’t say what you hear through the headphones, just say the first thing that comes to mind, okay? I’d rather you repeat the same word a thousand times than fall silent for longer than half a second, can you do that?”
Derek nods.
“Can you do that?” She repeats.
“Yes,” he says.
“Good. This is all you have to do today. If all goes well, you can even go to Avery’s before dinner.”
“Then let’s get it over with,” Derek says, putting the headphones on.
He feels Constance start to walk away from him and then sees a door opening at the other end of the room. The small office that it leads into is also dark, but only lights-off dark. She disappears inside and then her voice comes directly into his ears, sounding ever so slightly distorted by the transmission. “Ready?” She asks.
“Ready,” he says.
“Start talking in three… two… one…”
Derek opens his mouth, but no words come out. The moment Constance’s countdown finishes, the entire room flashes into a hot, bright yellow. He scrambles to stop falling before realising that he hasn’t moved, it’s just impossible to tell wall from floor from ceiling when everything is made of the same tiny LEDs, burning from every direction. It’s not the wind that is rushing in his ears at terminal velocity, but the screeching sound of ever-changing radio frequencies, offering half-words and a static that feels wet with blood. He can’t stop himself from tearing the headphones off his head. Soon after, the room falls dark again, leaving him with only the painful afterimage that shakes across his vision with each blink.
Constance re-enters the room. In the fresh quiet, her voice is ice-cold with disappointment.
“Are you asking to terminate the experiment?” She asks.
“Fuck,” Derek breathes shakily. “You could have warned me.”
“I felt it was best to introduce the technique to your mind organically. I was hoping for a little more dignity and compliance from you.”
“It hurts like hell.”
“Bravery, then,” she tuts. “Avery will be so upset if you can’t spend the night.”
“Just… give me a minute,” Derek feels his hands shaking as he raises the headphones back to his head. He pictures Avery’s face, his arms around him. “I can do it.”
“Tell you what,” Constance pats him on the arm. “I’ll give you two.”
Even two hours wouldn’t be enough to prepare, but two minutes is pitiful. Derek has barely caught his breath before the blistering overstimulation begins again, but he knows that there is no choice other than getting through it and doing what Constance wants. His heart won’t survive being let down if he can’t see Avery. His eyes might be able to survive having their corneas seared off by this assault of yellow light. His ears might be able to survive the bursting of their drums. Gritting his teeth, he starts speaking. He can’t hear his own voice, but he feels the vibrations of it in his throat.
“Hurts… hurts… Avery… yellow… gates… field… grass… outside… outside outside outside outside outside outside outside sky… sky… sky… blue… wind… Avery… tonight… sleep… medication… routine… hate… hate hate hate hate hate you hate you hate you hate you hate you hate you hate you hate you hate you hate you
The very act of deeply hating something provokes a spike in cortisol and, according to some studies, has been proven to activate the fight or flight system – You have nowhere to fly, Knight – Do you want to lash out? Do you want to
hurt someone
The human body has an immense capacity for violence – Separate brain pathways are responsible for responding to immediate threats versus ones that require deliberation – Ignite both, Knight! We have been wronged
we have been wronged
Do not forget You have also wronged Me. Penance in equal and opposite
subservience –
Ah, how fascinating? – If the human body yells hard enough its vocal cords can haemorrhage – Sound moves air through vibration. I am air and sound and vibration – You are body – We
cannot be apart
But I can move through You now, more than before. I am vocal cords; I exist between thin tissue. Rest, brave Knight. I know it hurts.”
At last, Derek falls. He becomes light, not weighed down by the armour now around him. The familiarity of his helmet offers underwater numbness from the sound of the wind rushing past him. The world is beautiful and he is falling, but there is nothing to land on. He flails in shades of blue and purple, losing the stars in the movement as his mind loosens. It gets quieter, darker, until it is timeless. There is peace here in the space between quick heartbeats, in the knowledge that he can go no faster – that this is it. Falling endlessly and without pain through something infinite.
When he lands, it is with his back against the ground. He hits his head first, reigniting a headache from the base of his skull, but his spine takes most of the impact. He feels the cracking of his outer shell as he is suddenly no longer wearing armour, no longer falling, no longer peaceful in some dissociative bliss.
He is on the floor of a room that is dark again, his eyes so dry that blinking takes significant manual effort.
Derek only realises that he’s still wearing the headphones when Constance takes them off. The LEDs making up every surface of the room fade in with a slight glow – just enough to offer the return of his regular sight, though it is still shrouded underneath the blistering yellow afterimage. The first thing he sees is that Constance is grinning.
“Great work, Derek,” she says. “Absolutely fascinating.”
“Did you speak to him?” He asks, suddenly fearful. His voice is hoarse and it hurts to talk. His head feels foggy, like he’s just woken up from an accidental nap.
“Briefly, though I imagine I was actually just listening into his side of your mental conversation for once. Neither of you were outwardly talkative, but your brain scans yielded some interesting results. Either way – a thoroughly successful experiment, perhaps our best yet, don’t you think?”
“I don’t have any particular thoughts on our experiments. Other than that they fucking suck.”
She chuckles. “Can I just ask – how long do you think it’s been, Derek? Since you first sat down in that chair?”
A horrible feeling of formless dread hovers over Derek’s skin. “I… don’t know. An hour?”
“Four hours.”
“Can I see Avery now?” He whispers. The words and the way he says them are small and erode what remains of his pride.
“I think you should probably try and stand up first,” she offers out her hand. Derek refuses to take it, ignoring the pain ricocheting through his body and pushing himself up without any assistance. His little show of defiance doesn’t seem to shake Constance’s good mood. “And put on a brave face. You wouldn’t want to worry him, would you?”
The best that Derek can offer is a neutral expression, with his eyes half-closed to make blinking easier. Constance takes him by the arm and walks him back out into the hallway. Her strides are confident, each footstep offering a dignified heel-clack like a metronome to his shuffling and the ringing in his ears. She swings her arms slightly as she moves. Her joy disgusts him. He pulls whatever energy he can from the petty recesses of his mind to tense the muscles that she is holding onto, disrupting her rhythm.
The elevator ride is the longest he’s ever taken at the DMS facility. Normally, Constance’s experiments are contained to the floors just above and below the hospital floor, but Derek spends a good few minutes travelling down before the doors open again.
When they do, he sees a floor of the building that looks a lot different to the others he has spent time on. Where he’s used to a mass of clinical white and overhead lights, this level looks more like a hotel, with lamps giving a soft, orange glow against the walls, which themselves are half painted cream and half panelled with wood, split horizontally down the middle. The rooms are sparser, too; he can only count five, and four are padlocked from the outside.
The one right at the end isn’t. Derek instinctively looks at Constance for confirmation and has to suppress a wince upon realising it.
“Go ahead,” she says. “I’ll be expecting you back here at 9am sharp.”
With the clock now ticking, Derek pushes away the tired tension in his legs and walks down the hallway as fast as he can, using his hand to brace himself against the wall. As he approaches the apartment at the end, he raises his arm to knock at the exact moment that the door opens.
Avery is standing there, beaming at him, one hand still on the doorknob. Derek looks back to see that Constance is watching him from the other end of the hallway, her arms folded. He straightens his back and drops his shoulders before entering the apartment and closing the door behind him.
The moment he is separated from Constance’s direct line of sight, he leans forward and allows Avery to take all his weight. It doesn’t matter that this apartment is probably bugged to hell and back, it’s close enough to privacy for him to tentatively invite vulnerability in. He buries his face in the cotton t-shirt warmth as his knees give way and Avery’s hands around his back keep him standing. He feels himself dropping down further, but instead of falling again, he is lifted off the ground and held against Avery’s chest.
“You’re home,” Avery says. “I’ve got you.”
Derek allows himself to be carried down the hallway to the living room, his arms draped around Avery’s neck and his face still pressed into his shoulder. When Avery sets him down on the sofa, he clings on for a moment in protest but relents the moment Avery sits next to him and wraps his arms around him again. The old Derek would have winced at accepting physical affection so easily, but he is desperately, painfully hungry for it. He needs something to touch him that doesn’t hurt, and Avery is so gentle. The rhythm of his hands – one rubbing his back, the other gently scratching the back of his head – is predictable and safe, two feelings that otherwise do not coexist in Derek’s life anymore.
He closes his eyes and feels dangerously close to sobbing. His body is screaming for sleep, but his mind is alive with the worry that he will waste this precious time if he does so. He wants to stay awake to experience every part of it – Avery is warm and stable and soft and Derek cannot think of anything that could possibly be better than this. He needs this to become a memory so strong that he can return to it and suck bravery from its marrow when everything gets too much. He brings his arms up to reciprocate the hug, the movement bringing with it a restrictive reminder of how uncomfortable the DMS-issue clothes are.
“Avery?” He asks, without really moving his head to give his voice space to breathe. There’s a nagging feeling in the back of his mind that tells him he’ll ruin everything by asking for something – that he should be satisfied just being here and not back on the hospital floor.
“Yeah?”
“Do you have anything I can maybe change into? I hate long-sleeved shirts.”
He holds his breath. Avery pulls back from the hug slightly. “Of course,” he smiles.
Derek doesn’t want to break contact, so he keeps his arms around Avery’s waist as they stand up. It helps to have the support whilst he walks, allowing himself to be led back down the hallway into the large bedroom. Avery has clearly made himself at home here – there are clothes on the floor and the bed is unmade, which only serves to make it look more comfortable.
“Here,” Avery takes a clean shirt from the dresser. “This okay?”
He holds the fabric against Derek’s hand, waiting for confirmation. It’s so much less coarse and thin than the DMS-issue clothes, softened by years of washing and wearing but clearly made with quality. Derek nods but does not move to change, frozen in his compulsion not to let go of Avery.
“Can I?” Avery asks, his fingertips lightly holding the bottom of Derek’s shirt. Derek nods again, wordless and enjoying the comfort of being guided by somebody who wants the best for him. He raises his arms, compensating for losing touch by leaning closer as Avery lifts the shirt over his head and replaces it with the more comfortable, short-sleeved one.
“Better?”
“So much better,” Derek mumbles. “Thank you.”
“That’s the shirt I got kidnapped in,” Avery jokes. “Don’t worry, it’s been washed.”
When they kidnapped him he thought he was going to die – It didn’t bother him – The only thing that bothered him was the thought of dying slowly or in pain – Avery is not scared of dying – Avery’s family think he is dead – Avery has a grave that a crying mother visits –
“I’m sorry,” Derek whispers. He feels weak and pulls away, sitting on the edge of the bed with his hands against his shaking knees. This whole time, he’s been focused on his own pain, but Avery has sacrificed everything, and for what? To bring him dinner each evening and sit there as Derek can’t figure out how to talk like a person? It’s easy to forget just how little Avery knows about him. It’s only Derek who has infinite knowledge, only Derek who has fallen completely and entirely in love with a man whose worst moments and darkest secrets are still born from misguided kindness and a desperation to do the right thing. Avery knows nothing of how vile Derek’s soul may be.
“Sorry?” Avery joins him, putting an arm around him and leaning his head on Derek’s shoulder. “Why sorry?”
“For putting you through this. You don’t even really know me.”
“I’d like to,” Avery says, his voice candid and confident.
“Still… it’s weird that you’d give up your whole life for a stranger.”
“You’re not a stranger. You’re the most important person in my life.”
“Why?” Derek asks.
Because You saved him – It’s guilt and debt and repayment – It isn’t because You matter –
“Because I love you,” Avery says. “Can’t explain it, but there it is. I’d rather be in here with you than out there without you – I’m certain.”
“Don’t you miss it? Your life?”
“All the time. I miss being able to ride my bike and the huge park by my old place where the flower displays would change with the seasons. I miss my mom so much it hurts and I know she thinks I’m dead, which makes it so much worse. I’m bored all the time and I miss the internet like crazy. Hell, I even miss my shitty job.”
“So why don’t you just let them erase your memory and you can go back to it all? You wouldn’t remember me,” Derek says, his voice getting quieter as the old indulgence of self-sacrifice soothes his damaged pride. “So it wouldn’t hurt.”
“Oh, it would hurt,” Avery gives him a tight side-hug. “It would hurt in my bones and my soul. I don’t want any of that if the cost is you.”
“You’re insane. What’s my favourite colour?”
“Red.”
“Okay, good guess. Easy question. When’s my birthday?”
“Ooh, let me guess! You’re… February?”
“Not even close,” Derek smiles. “Wrong half of the year. August 4th.”
“Thank god. Plenty of time to plan your present.”
“My point is, how can you make such a bold decision when you don’t even have a fraction of the information you need to decide?”
Avery shrugs. “Once I make my mind up, it’s made. Just how I am, I guess.”
“I love it,” Derek says. He finally breathes out as the relief settles in. Avery is not leaving him. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” Avery says. He lowers his face and presses a light, yet intentional kiss against Derek’s shoulder. “We’ll adjust to this. We both will. I’m just so, so glad you’re alive and here with me.”
Now, Derek really does cry. In the whole time he’s been here at the DMS, he’s been making a great effort not to. Sometimes Constance’s experiments bring tears to his eyes, but they’re quick and hot and made of pain and anger. Other times, he allows himself a single, silent full-body sob underneath the blanket when the lights are off at night, too self-conscious of the possibility of night vision cameras capturing his movement to let it all out completely. But being around Avery feels like coming home after battle to strip down and finally assess his wounds.
Still, the act of crying carries a deep sense of shame. He turns his head when he feels how thick and pathetic the quickly pooling tears are, managing to look away just as they start to fall down his cheeks and do not stop. He hunches over with shaking shoulders, squeezing his eyes shut and looking down.
Avery presses himself into Derek’s back and wraps his arms around him. His cheek is soft like warm dough against Derek’s ceramic spine. His embrace is tight, grounding Derek as his body tries to expel its hurt and frustration and injustice all at once. Avery’s arms are so strong and kind that, when they turn Derek back around to face him, he offers no protest, letting Avery hold his face with both hands and wipe his tears.
It takes him a while to stop crying, transitioning from loud sobs of abject despair to a quiet, dry shaking that shivers through his whole body. Throughout it all, Avery holds him, rubbing his back with a patience that Derek knows is only a breath away from stubborn persistence. When he manages to finally raise his head, Avery smiles at him.
“It helps to cry,” Avery says. “Do you feel a bit better?”
Derek considers his body. Underneath the sheer exhaustion of letting it all out, there’s a sense of release and a feeling of finally being able to enjoy their time together. He nods.
“Good. Thank you for letting me look after you.”
Avery’s words are so sincere that Derek cannot fathom questioning their truth. He simply accepts it, knowing that Avery is the kind of person to derive genuine purpose from doing good – and Derek no longer has the luxury of shunning goodness when it is offered to him. In the hurricane torment of his life at the DMS, Avery is the eye of the storm. His brief, beautiful relief.
Holding onto Avery’s hand, he follows him back down the hallway and through the living room, past the half-wall into the kitchen. As Avery begins to heat up some soup on the stove, Derek stands behind him with his arms around his waist and his chin on his shoulder.
“Is there anything you want to watch on TV?” Avery asks.
“I’m not sure. I don’t mind.”
“They have pretty much everything here. Have you ever seen Stop Making Sense?”
“I know of it.”
“You know of everything,” Avery laughs. He says the word everything with a mixture of admiration and pity. “Have you seen it, though?”
Derek shakes his head.
“Perfect. I think it’s one of the best performances in the world, personally. David Byrne wears a really big suit.”
Talking Heads’ iconic performance ‘Stop Making Sense’, independently produced and filmed over four live shows in Los Angeles’ Pantages Theatre in 1984, was remastered and restored in 4K by entertainment company A24 in 2023 –
Avery pours the soup into two cups, leading Derek into the living room. He guides him onto the sofa and hands him one of the mugs, covering his legs with a blanket and turning on the large TV on the wall before returning to the sofa to lean into him again. Bringing the cup to his lips with both hands, Derek breathes in the steam and the smell of chicken noodle soup, his glasses fogging up slightly. He takes a sip and allows it to warm his mouth, then his throat, then his stomach, highlighting areas of his body that often go overlooked in the omnipresence of his mind and the amount of pain it can register. It’s so simple, but the feeling of warm soup inside him makes him feel like a person for the first time in a long time.
The televised musical performance is a good choice for background watching, Derek thinks. It doesn’t command his attention with a plot, which also quiets the impulses to flash forward through his infinite knowledge and consume it entirely too quickly or spoil the ending. Things like music and art are harder to process all at once, in his limited experience. Especially with Avery next to him, grounding him, it’s easier to witness the present unfold in the right dimensions. The second song that plays is the one that captures his attention, the soft bassline catching his ear immediately. He closes his eyes and leans in. Without sight, the music washes over him with much more complexity, brought into reality against his body by the low vibration of Avery humming along.
The band in Heaven, they play my favourite song / Play it one more time, play it all night long – Thoughts cause neurons to fire in your brain. Having the same thought over and over will cause those same neurons to fire, forming a neural pathway over time – Heaven is a place / A place where nothing, nothing ever happens – The ‘illusory truth effect’ is the tendency to believe false information to be true after repeated exposure – What do You believe about Yourself, brave Knight? Are You weak? They treat You as a cornered animal and You do not bite them – Is it any better to put your life in His hands than Mine? Theirs? – When this kiss is over, it will start again / Will not be any different, will be exactly the same / It’s hard to imagine that nothing at all / Could be so exciting, could be this much fun
Derek shakes his head, trying to loosen Hastur’s web of influence from an otherwise lovely moment. Avery seems to notice this, pulling him closer.
“I like this song,” Derek says. “It sounds nice.”
“You think so? I always saw it as kind of horrifying.”
He looks down. His arms and wrists are bruised; his fingernails are milky. “It would be nice to do the same nice things every day with someone,” he admits, feeling childish. A long time ago, he would have loved to sit with Avery, analysing the lyrics and discussing things like Buddhism’s influence on David Byrne’s work or the human brain’s genuine neurological requirement for newness. But now he’s just tired. He doesn’t even have a word beyond nice to describe what he yearns for. Maybe simple. Maybe normal.
“You’re getting better, which means you can come here sooner,” Avery says. “And it’s not even in small steps. You’re making strides, Derek. I mean, when was the last time you used your crutches?”
“It would be easier if I still had them. Or a cane, or something.”
“They don’t think you should?”
“They think it’s giving up too early. I think it’s choosing my battles. But I don’t even get to choose those anymore.”
Avery averts his eyes. “I’m sorry you have to be here because of me.”
“What do you mean because of you?”
“You’re in this whole situation because of me. It should have been me with Hastur inside their head, not you.”
“If that’d happened, the world might not even be around anymore.”
“Sometimes I wonder if that would be better,” Avery admits. “But you said it was such a lovely place and… I believe you. I’m just sorry I can’t take you to see it.”
“I would love to go outside,” Derek says.
“I’ll find a way,” Avery holds his hand and gives it a squeeze. “I promise.”
Whenever Avery touches him, Derek’s mind quietens. Wherever skin meets skin, the touch-sensation overrides the thoughts, leaving his brain blissfully numbed. It isn’t like the usual haze of medication, where he feels as though he has to fight to keep control – around Avery, it’s more like a willing pause; a breath out.
With the silence and the peaceful, thoughtless passage of time, Derek only realises that Avery is asleep once his grip loosens. The band on TV are now performing a song where the lyrics Take me to the river / Drop me in the water are hypnotically repeated, almost in time with Avery’s light snores. In his sleep, he clings onto Derek, drawing up his knees fully onto the sofa. Now, it’s Derek’s turn to derive joy from offering steadiness, pressing gentle kisses against the crown of Avery’s head and holding him close despite the ache in his muscles. It soothes his pride and allows him to reach for that old, ugly enjoyment of pain, like it is something purposeful bestowed upon those who can handle it.
As the minutes pass, Avery’s snores become louder until he’s very clearly in a deep sleep, his chest steadily rising and falling. Derek feels very important to be trusted with something so lovely and alive. He doesn’t know what he would do without this – the small but significant goodness provided to him at the end of each day. And now, from this moment on, he will forever need more than just two hours and dinner in a hospital room – he will need this, consistently, or he will be unable to live.
He knows this more certainly than he knows his own mind.
Avery’s snores slowly begin to fade, transitioning into a light whimper. It takes Derek off guard to hear him cry in his sleep, and he momentarily stiffens up. Are you not supposed to wake people up in the middle of bad dreams, or is that just sleepwalking? He’s never slept next to another person before all this, and when he has nightmares of his own, the medication keeps him trapped in them until morning. Gently shifting his weight, he shuffles around just enough for Avery to blink himself awake before opening his eyes in panic.
“I didn’t miss it all, did I?” He gasps.
“You were only sleeping for a little bit,” Derek says. “It’s not late.”
“Thank god. Thank god. I’ve been so excited all day I think I just… god, I’m glad I didn’t sleep through the whole thing. I want to hang out with you.”
“Were you having a nightmare?” Derek asks.
Avery looks deep in thought for a moment. “I don’t think so,” he says, eventually. “I think I was just dreaming about my mom. But it’s alright, really.”
“You were crying.”
Lifting his hand to his cheek, Avery confirms this. “I guess I was. But I’m not anymore.”
Derek places his palm flat over the back of Avery’s hand, holding his face. He smiles softly. Silently, he presses his forehead against Avery’s, bringing their minds close enough to touch. They stay like this for a moment, Avery breathing deeply and carefully, Derek obsessively committing the feeling to memory.
When they break apart, Avery says, “Is there anything you want to do? Like, activities or anything?”
“I don’t know,” Derek shrugs, looking away in slight embarrassment. “I haven’t really thought about what I’d want to do or anything like that.”
“Well, what did you used to like doing?”
“Stuff on my computer, mainly. Just tinkering around with bits of code or whatever. Nothing important or even particularly interesting.”
“And what about with your hands?” Avery asks. “Everyone needs a screen-free hobby to keep them active.”
“I suppose I liked taking things apart and putting them back together, but making them better than before.”
Avery lights up. He takes Derek’s hand and stands up, hauling him off the sofa. Excitedly, he leads him to the small table in front of the media wall, pulling out a chair for Derek to sit before heading into the kitchen. When he returns, his hands are full.
Onto the table, Avery places a small alarm clock and a set of tools. “It doesn’t work,” he says. “It did for the first few nights, but now it just shows two red dots and the radio won’t play. Do you know what’s wrong with it?”
“I can find out for you,” Derek smiles.
Having a screwdriver in his hand feels like riding a bike. The excitement he feels now is different to the excitement he had felt this morning about seeing Avery; this is not the anticipation of relief, but the expectation of knowledge. It is the same impulse that led him to those golden gates in the first place, and eventually to the DMS – that desperate hunger, the need to know and practice and understand. The need to do it right no matter how many tries it takes.
But his hands shake. His hands have never shaken before, least of all when working on something finicky. In Derek’s memories of the time before this, focusing intently on the minutiae of something had always calmed him, emptied his mind of the thoughts of boredom and that hopeless, endless search for meaning. Taking things apart and fixing them is a task with clearly defined parameters, something that he relied on when nothing else in the world made sense. An unchanging end, a closed circuit, a consistent satisfaction.
Now, he can’t even hold the screwdriver with enough pressure to remove the plastic outer shell of the alarm clock.
He hunches over, determined not to give in. Pushing his glasses down his nose to get a better look, Derek commands his hand to move the way it has always moved. It does not.
It still does not.
It does not again.
The more he tries, the more violent the shaking becomes.
“Fuck,” he hisses.
Avery lays his hand over Derek’s. “It’s okay,” he says. “I’ll steady you. You’re turning it this way, right?”
Allowing himself to be guided, Derek focuses only on positioning the screwdriver correctly against the head of the screw. Doing it this way feels like a waste of time, but as pathetic as needing this level of assistance makes him feel, he’s glad that Avery didn’t just take the alarm clock away or insist on doing this part himself. It takes over twice as long as it should, but eventually, they loosen all the screws and Derek pulls the casing away to reveal the inner workings.
The job gets easier when all he has to do is look inside. He narrows his vision by leaning in until he can only focus on the circuit board and see nothing of the table that it rests on. This is his domain, and he will refuse Hastur any worldly context with which he could muddle the information that Derek knew long before they merged. He will fix Avery’s alarm clock the way he would have if they’d met under any other circumstances.
It’s not even particularly difficult to diagnose the fault. “There,” he points, highlighting a crack near the transformer. “It might be that.”
“What do we do with it?”
“We’ll need to get that resistive coating off first. See that green stuff? Solder won’t stick if we don’t get rid of it.”
“And we do that… how?”
Derek picks up the smallest screwdriver. “Just scrape it,” he says. “I’d normally use a fibreglass brush, but this’ll do.”
Avery steadies his wrist this time, allowing Derek to move his hand up and down without his whole arm shaking. It takes a lot of mental effort to maintain both his concentration and his control over his own nerves, but he manages it.
“Shit,” he says, with a realisation. “There’s no way we have a soldering iron, right?”
“Not here, but I can get one!” Avery smiles. “They’ve got all sorts downstairs, and they let me make requests. Constance said I can ask for anything I want within reason. She said she’ll even think about the PS5.”
“That’s… out of character.”
“I’ve charmed her.”
Derek isn’t so sure. He feels like he’s watching an animal get fattened up before slaughter. “Yeah,” he says. “Just… keep your wits about you, yeah?”
“Oh, of course,” Avery says. “I know she’s like, completely evil.”
“I don’t know about evil,” Derek says, quietly.
Pathetic – Spineless – You feel proud when You impress those who keep you captive, Knight – You feel worthy when You bear the pain they inflict – Deep down, You feel honourable for enduring this – You are not honourable
“I’m gonna nip downstairs and see if they have anything,” Avery says. Derek wants to tell him not to leave, that the alarm clock doesn’t matter that much, but truthfully – it does. He wants the satisfaction of completion, of making something broken work again when most people would just throw it away.
Derek watches as Avery stands up to leave. He imagines what it will be like when he is finally discharged from the hospital floor and able to live here permanently. Will he also be granted the privilege to wander around the facility at his leisure using an ID card to enter certain areas, so long as he comes back to the hospital when called, like a well-trained dog? Will he sit at this table in 30 years with grey hair? Will he have been outside at all in that time? Will Avery still be here?
None of these questions have an answer beyond the comforting feeling that Derek will likely not be alive long enough to know.
Avery reaches the front door and opens it. Derek’s body freezes up and turns cold as he sees one of the DMS agents already standing there, clearly having been about to knock and taken off guard. He wants to run, to barricade himself in the bedroom and stay there until he starves to death, which would surely still be better than being taken away from Avery. All he can do is claw his fingers down the table until they bend almost to the point of breaking.
Derek can’t hear the conversation at the door. He desperately tries to, but every other sound in the room is happening at the exact same volume – the hum of the fridge, the hush of the pipes, the creaking of the walls. His chest constricts and the half-inhaled breath catches in his throat just before it intakes enough oxygen, further immobilising his body in the stillness of sheer panic. He can’t breathe, can’t hear, can barely see. The formless shapes at the door are getting closer. Avery is letting the DMS agent in. Avery is letting them take him away.
But Derek cannot move, even once they are standing over the table, right next to him. He can’t speak or reach out for help.
He feels Avery’s hand on his arm anyway. “It’s okay. It’s just your meds.”
Derek squeezes his eyes shut and shakes his head.
“I know you don’t like them,” Avery soothes. “I’ll be here the whole time, okay?”
Keeping his lips pursed, Derek cautiously opens his eyes. He sees the DMS agent holding a small paper cup containing a pill similar in shape and size to his morning medication, only this one is blue instead. These are the pills that pull him every evening into nightmares that he cannot escape from until morning, those awful dreams where Hastur rises from his chest to swallow the world using Derek’s mouth. Logically, he knows that he cannot refuse it, and it’s better this than having to leave Avery, but he just can’t bring himself to unclench his teeth.
“Give us a sec, okay?” Avery says to the DMS agent without fully turning his head. He keeps his eyes on Derek, holding both of his hands. “Just breathe with me. There’s no rush.”
“There’s a bit of a rush,” the DMS agent chimes in. “This is a scheduled medication for optimal sleep hygiene.”
“Not helping, thanks!”
Avery lifts his head and rises his shoulders as he breathes in, dropping them back down on the exhale. Knowing that he has no autonomy and must be guided by something, Derek chooses Avery and follows along.
“Good,” Avery says. “Really good. Will it help if I hand your meds to you?”
Although Derek doesn’t imagine it’ll make much of a difference to their physical effect on him, he nods. Avery takes the paper cup and a glass of water, placing them carefully in Derek’s hands with a smile.
Derek swallows the pill and, with it, a sob. The beginning of the end is here, and he will soon have to return to a place where he cannot hide from the world in Avery’s arms.
“You can fuck off now,” Avery shoos the DMS agent away with his hand. Surprisingly, they don’t threaten him with the removal of any privileges; they just leave without a word. Once they’re gone, the presence lingers, stuck in Derek’s throat.
“That’s the one that makes you feel really bad, isn’t it?” Avery says. He leans down and gives Derek a hug. “I wish you didn’t have to. I’m so sorry I made you.”
“If I didn’t take it they’d never let me come back.”
“I know. That’s what I was scared of, but I shouldn’t have made you do it if you didn’t want to.”
“That’s not your fault,” Derek mumbles. “You’re not one of them. I needed you to help me do it.”
“It’s still not fair. And I’m sorry.”
“It’s not so bad,” Derek reassures. “At least I get unbroken sleep. That’s a new luxury.”
“What makes it bad?” Avery asks, his voice curious and quiet and full of love.
“It’s not like feeling tired when you’re actually tired. It’s like something is… manually reaching inside of me and turning off the switches that keep me awake. My brain wants to fight it but my body just can’t. And then the nightmares start, and I can’t wake up, and they don’t stop.”
“Fuck. That sounds horrible.”
“It’s… not great,” Derek says. “But what can you do?” He shrugs, trying to salvage some small part of his ego as the realisation that he had a panic attack in front of the DMS agent sets in. He can only hope that it didn’t come across as a reluctance to comply that will be fed back to Constance before morning.
“How long before it kicks in?”
“About twenty minutes, I think.”
“Alright. I’ll put the kettle on.”
It doesn’t take Avery long at all to make two cups of chamomile tea, bringing a small bottle of honey to the table when he returns. “Mom swears by it,” he explains. “I used to have nightmares as a kid and she’d tell me the chamomile flowers would protect me against bad dreams by making my sleep full of sunshine. I think she just wanted me to pass the fuck out so I’d stop waking her up in the middle of the night, but it kind of worked.”
“Thank you,” Derek says. He takes a sip. The tea has been slightly cooled by the addition of honey, enhancing the sweetness and deepening the strong, earthy base. Back in his old life, he used to have a cup of green tea every morning. He doesn’t miss it. He has more pressing things to lose.
“I don’t want to go back,” he whispers. “I know it’s stupid. I know I’ve been there before and it’s nothing new. I know it’s–”
“It’s not stupid,” Avery says. “In what world is it stupid? You have to go through hell every single day and I know it’s not just from the DMS. I know Hastur is giving you a hard time and I don’t know what I can do to make it better but god, Derek, you are not fucking stupid for hating every second of this.”
“Not every second. Not this one.”
The problem with a second is simply how long it lasts. It is never long enough. Derek is barely halfway through his cup of tea when he feels his fingertips starting to go numb.
“It’s kicking in.” He tries very hard not to sound like he’s about to cry.
“Let’s get you to bed,” Avery smiles. “I’ll stay with you the whole time, I promise.”
When Derek stands up, his legs feel shaky. Normally, he’s sent to bed the moment he has taken his final daily dose and has no further need to use his body. He stabilises himself on the table for support and Avery, immediately recognising that something is wrong, holds him up.
“Let me carry you,” Avery says. “Please.”
Derek just nods. He can’t stop himself from falling. Avery lifts him and he floats.
He’s been fantasising about this bed since Avery first mentioned it. Truthfully, anything would be better than the thin mattress and almost-paper blanket he normally gets, but this really is as good as Avery described it to be. His entire body is cushioned in softness and the feeling is so unfamiliar that it registers even beyond the growing medication-induced numbness. Having more than one pillow beneath his head eases the ache in his shoulders. He uses the last of his strength to reach up and grab for Avery.
Though he doesn’t manage to hold on, Avery lies down next to him anyway. He brushes the hair out of Derek’s face with gentle hands and secures it at the back of his head, keeping his neck cool. When he lies down, he first positions himself on his side, pressing soft, slow kisses all the way down Derek’s arm. Then, he brings Derek’s head to rest on his chest, holding him and rhythmically rubbing his back.
It’s an entirely new feeling – something that Derek did not believe could exist for him anymore. The medication fog is familiar, but slipping into unconsciousness here feels like falling asleep in a shallow river, water rushing against his back but never getting high enough to drown him. His face is warmed by the sun. There is rhythm in Avery’s motions, and in rhythm there is music. Like a song coming from another room, a childhood memory, a weightlessness. Like falling without falling.
Morning may still come, but not yet.
Dreams may still come, but not yet.
If Derek were to die here, he would die happy. As sleep, at last, overtakes him, he realises that this is not a thought he has ever had before.