TW: Suicidal thoughts, idealization of suicide, violence, blood.
As if anyone would believe he needed anything except a grave. It was easy to deny that she might be right. Even easier to convince himself she’d brought him here to play with him. A bored cat with a mouse, skinny and hungry and eager for some sort of relevance to her existence. He preferred that over any notion that someone might actually CARE, that he was worth saving in any way.
Still, there was no snarky comeback this time. No sneer on lips that might peel back from straight teeth that wanted to bite into the hide of something meaty and devour it. Such a visceral thought, that. Hunger could do that to a person. Make them ravenous, make them forget societal norms. Michael knew most of them, had travelled far enough in various directions to know how important it was to try and ‘fit in’ when he was in the midst of ‘civilized folks’, but he was tired. His head pounded. His injured arm ached, a sharp, insistent prickle that wasn’t horrible by itself, but that it went on and on and on made it unbearable.
That exhausting kind of pain, chronic and unrelenting.
“Yeah.” All he said at the mention of putting up a fight. Most of that beaten out of him by now. Mentally unbalanced by her earlier statement.
A roll of his eyes toward the Infirmary. Bathroom. Clean clothes.
A meal was solid incentive for the cantankerous Nomad, and he shifted on the bench. Applied weight to his feet, used his good arm to PUSH. Shaky, wavering, he got up. Used the back of the bench to keep himself from collapsing, the world spinning.
“Ow…” A quiet grumble, the grate of a growl.
He didn’t look at her when he moved. Took him more than a minute to reach the doors of the Infirmary and enter. More than ten before he came back out. Fully dressed in new clothes. Just a white shirt and a pair of simple black pants. Same boots, though, that he’d come in with, different socks. There were just some things a nomad trusted more than most, and good, solid shoes were one of them.
He didn’t stink anymore, either, once ruffled hair now semi-brushed, swept back carelessly but… at least he’d washed that, too. Wouldn’t talk about how incredible it had felt to stand under that water, to feel the days and weeks of travel and trauma cyclone down the drain.
“You said something about food?” Resistance in that gravely baritone. Hatred of being taken care of, of accepting help from a stranger. But, the promise of food smothered personal opinions about himself, shifted gears instead to basic survival.
The way he watched her, there was hope in that hallow gaze. Subtle faith in this stranger with eyes like his.
MICHAEL
Kid, get off the ground. Spit your blood and bare your teeth.
S N O R T
As if anyone would believe he needed anything except a grave. It was easy to deny that she might be right. Even easier to convince himself she’d brought him here to play with him. A bored cat with a mouse, skinny and hungry and eager for some sort of relevance to her existence. He preferred that over any notion that someone might actually CARE, that he was worth saving in any way.
Still, there was no snarky comeback this time. No sneer on lips that might peel back from straight teeth that wanted to bite into the hide of something meaty and devour it. Such a visceral thought, that. Hunger could do that to a person. Make them ravenous, make them forget societal norms. Michael knew most of them, had travelled far enough in various directions to know how important it was to try and ‘fit in’ when he was in the midst of ‘civilized folks’, but he was tired. His head pounded. His injured arm ached, a sharp, insistent prickle that wasn’t horrible by itself, but that it went on and on and on made it unbearable.
That exhausting kind of pain, chronic and unrelenting.
“Yeah.” All he said at the mention of putting up a fight. Most of that beaten out of him by now. Mentally unbalanced by her earlier statement.
A roll of his eyes toward the Infirmary. Bathroom. Clean clothes.
FOOD.
A meal was solid incentive for the cantankerous Nomad, and he shifted on the bench. Applied weight to his feet, used his good arm to PUSH. Shaky, wavering, he got up. Used the back of the bench to keep himself from collapsing, the world spinning.
“Ow…” A quiet grumble, the grate of a growl.
He didn’t look at her when he moved. Took him more than a minute to reach the doors of the Infirmary and enter. More than ten before he came back out. Fully dressed in new clothes. Just a white shirt and a pair of simple black pants. Same boots, though, that he’d come in with, different socks. There were just some things a nomad trusted more than most, and good, solid shoes were one of them.
He didn’t stink anymore, either, once ruffled hair now semi-brushed, swept back carelessly but… at least he’d washed that, too. Wouldn’t talk about how incredible it had felt to stand under that water, to feel the days and weeks of travel and trauma cyclone down the drain.
“You said something about food?” Resistance in that gravely baritone. Hatred of being taken care of, of accepting help from a stranger. But, the promise of food smothered personal opinions about himself, shifted gears instead to basic survival.
The way he watched her, there was hope in that hallow gaze. Subtle faith in this stranger with eyes like his.
Go down fighting. Go down savage.
