| Aug 15, 2016 16:57:14 GMT -5 |
Post by Feliciano Vargas on Aug 15, 2016 16:57:14 GMT -5
Something was wrong. Feliciano could feel it in his bones. Generally, Feliciano would know the source of any uncomfortable feelings and sensations. Today, it was just a sick feeling crawling beneath his skin, making his limbs jittery and weak; stomach nauseous and generally anxious and paranoid.
He tried to ignore it, at least at first. He had shopping to do--Alfred wanted...pizza with french fries on it? Feliciano frowned down at the bag of food in his hands, trying to figure out what he'd even bought. There were hot dogs and tomatoes and cheese and frozen french fries and all kinds of other pizza ingredients...but what kind of mixture was this? Gilbert didn't even like hot dogs, and Ludwig deserved better than frozen french fries. ...Was that corn?
Obviously, something was very wrong here. Feliciano needed to get home, figure out what was wrong with him. When Feliciano looked up from his shopping bag, he was standing in front of Alfred's apartment building. The mutant couldn't remember the building ever looking that large and foreboding. The sandy stonework appeared ashen and worn, and the shadows were deep black against the murky lighting. There was a painful buzz in the air, making his ears ache.
It took a moment for Feliciano to realize someone was screaming.
Heart leaping in his throat, the mutant dropped his shopping bag and bolted into the building. He barreled up the stairs, shoving through throngs of faceless passerby who seemed oblivious, or perhaps uncaring of the shrieks tearing the very air apart. Feliciano recognized Nico's voice anywhere. Blank faces followed Feliciano's path as he ran, and he shuddered under of the weight of their eyeless gazes. What was going on?
The path to Alfred's apartment felt leagues longer than it ever had before, with shadows clawing at his arms and feet, trying to trip him up. The lights flickered and shattered behind him under the force of Nico's screaming. Feliciano didn't know how his eardrums didn't follow suit; he had never heard anyone quite so loud, and yet even the mutant's keen hearing couldn't discern a single word. Just high-pitched noise. When he finally reached Alfred's front door, Feliciano unthinkingly barreled into the unyielding wood.
The door unexpectedly flew open, and Feliciano unintentially launched himself into the room. Hands flew from the darkness behind him, curling into his clothes and around his limbs and even in his hair. They jerked him upright before he could even hit the floor. Feliciano struggled against their hold, but he could hardly move against those hands, as immovable as stone. Out of the corner of his eye, he barely made out the shine of a helmet and full visor before the stranger turned to him. A distorted reflection stared back at him, eyes bulging with a nonexistent nose; mouth a jagged gash of white and red that practically split the reflective visor in two. Then Feliciano stared on in horror as his reflection moved before his eyes, eyes growing somehow larger and mouth twisting into a ghastly smirk and his teeth--
Feliciano's attempts to recoil from the "faceless" holding him in place were soon interrupted, though. First Nico, then Ludwig were dragged down from the loft. Nico was kicking and screaming and his little hands and hair were stained with blood--
Ludwig was completely limp, carted along with two more armored people on each side. There were two little paths of blood trailing down the pale skin of Ludwig's face. The left was just a trickle, emanating from a little wound somewhere above his ear, but the right... His shoulder was red with blood, and the stain only grew larger. When they reached the main level, the guards dropped Ludwig to the floor like a bag of sand. Ludwig did not get up.
It was only by the hands holding him captive that Feliciano remained standing. His mind spun a mile a minute. Why isn't Ludwig getting up? What did they do to him? Why wasn't Feliciano struggling? Were they going to hurt Nico, too? Was that his blood, or was it Ludwig's? Where were Gilbert and Alfred? Why wasn't he screaming, fighting, crying, trying to get to Ludwig and Nico? A heavy weight was slowly settling on his shoulders, and the air was growing colder by the moment.
The group of guards further in the apartment eventually parted ways to allow one of their own pass by. The hand in his hair yanked Feliciano's head around, forcing him to look at the approaching man's bloodstained visor. Over the stranger's shoulder, Feliciano finally saw Gilbert, equally lifeless on the floor. Alfred was crouched next to him, clutching at his shirt and shaking him. He was obviously saying something, but Feliciano couldn't hear a word. There was more blood pooled beneath Gilbert's torso. Feliciano could see see the puddle was slowly growing. There was no movement from the albino, at all. Feliciano raised his gaze. Amber eyes made short contact with blue as Alfred turned his way. Another of the guards pressed a gun against Alfred's head, but the blonde paid no mind as he tried to say something.
Feliciano could only stare vacantly as blood and bone splattered across the walls and floor. Alfred's body crumpled to the floor in a heap alongside Gilbert's, little wafts of smoke curling up from the burn around the bullet hole in his temple. He was inanimate, frozen as cool steel pressed against his forehead. He could only stare at the blood staining the floor, staining the bodies of his friends. The very air vibrated against his skin. Feliciano trembled as he finally stared up at the man getting ready to kill him, just as he had murdered almost everyone Feliciano cared about.
"We've been looking everywhere for you, mutant."
Hands wrapped tightly around his throat now, squeezing mercilessly. He couldn't breathe, and even as he finally began to struggle, the grip only tightened. Let go of me, let go of me--
"Let go of me!!"
Feliciano shot upright with a half-choked scream, fingers clawing at his throat until the constrictive presence finally fell away and he could breathe. And with the fresh oxygen flowing through his lungs, Feliciano's breaths derailed into violent sobs, scrambling out of the blankets he'd become entangled in during the night. His struggles led him to rolling off the bed entirely, and the blow his knees took when they hit the floor hurt a lot. However, he didn't try to pull himself upright, simply sagging against the side of the bed and muffling his sobs against the fitted sheet.
This was the eight night that month, the third consecutive night in a row, Feliciano had had his sleep interrupted by nightmares, but the first night where he could remember his dream after waking up. Thankfully, he had the spare bedroom to himself--Feliciano couldn't remember if Alfred was staying over as well, but Ludwig had volunteered to sleep on the couch, just like he had the night before. Feliciano had told him the restlessness was caused by his mutation acting up, and he did have the onset of stress-hives to validate his lie, so the blonde had kindly camped out in the living room to see if isolation would help settle Feliciano's nerves.
Obviously, the hope was misplaced. Feliciano was glad for the privacy to break down. One hand reached out and scrambled around until he managed to grab hold of one wayward pillow. He tugged it over and hugged it tightly to his chest, burying his face against the soft surface. He needed a muffler, or his crying would undoubtedly wake up someone else in the house.
Eventually, Feliciano managed to calm down into rough hiccups, breathing ragged with eyes swollen and aching. He sniffled, wiping his nose on the back of his hand as he stared at the carpet between his feet. With the images of his dream haunting the blackness behind his eyelids, the mutant finally understood what was keeping him up at night.
The police--rather than slowly give up hope and turn their attention to more recent, pressing matters as time went on--only grew more zealous in their hunt for the last few unaccounted for mutants from the Underground Break-Out over six months previous. Feliciano in particular was seeing more and more wanted posters with his own face on them. There were news segments specifically denouncing him as a threat not only to Archadia, but Russian society as a whole (and others denouncing the Underground for failing to keep such an 'average' mutant like himself under better control). He'd seen more of his own history picked apart by the news than he'd ever seen pieced together in one place before. There were even talks of them sending military help to scour the surrounding forests. People were even blaming Feliciano and Ludwig for crimes they didn't commit.
Feliciano always knew that his presence was a threat to Gilbert and Alfred's safety, but now... Now, the benefits he potentially had couldn't outweigh the consequences if he was caught under Alfred and Gilbert's protection. With Ludwig here as well, it was only a matter of time, the threat was doubled not only against the humans who'd shown more kindness than Feliciano deserved, but to his best friend.
His eyes burned, but the exhausted brunette didn't have any more tears to shed.
Nausea spun sickeningly in the pit of his stomach, and the meager scraps of food he'd managed to eat the evening before burned at the back of his throat. Feliciano forced himself to his feet and dragged himself to the door. As quietly as he could manage, the brunette left for the bathroom down the hall, not risking turning on the lights. He wasn't sure what time it was, but it was definitely too early to risk waking anyone up. He blindly groped around until he found the faucet, turning on a trickle of water so he could splash his face in an attempt to calm his shaken nerves. The action never really managed to help Feliciano the way movies and TV shows always depicted it to, but at least he could wash the tears from his face.
His eyes had adjusted to the darkness somewhat, enough to at least see bits of his reflection the mirror. He couldn't really see anything definitive, but what he could recognize looked at least half as bad as he felt. Feliciano was scared. Scared of what would happen if he was discovered here. Not scared of what would happen to himself, but to the people he cared about. Feliciano couldn't even blink without seeing the corpses of his loved ones. He didn't know if they would be executed in such cold blood, but if they fought back, tried to keep the police from taking him away...
Bile once again burned the back of his throat and Feliciano retched. He curled heavily over the counter, attempting to stay over the sink. Despite the nausea, he couldn't manage to actually vomit, and eventually he spat the bile into the sink and allowing the water to wash it away.
Feliciano couldn't allow anything to happen to anyone in the house. He cared about Alfred, Gilbert, Ludwig, and Nico far too much to let them suffer the repercussions of his own actions. However... He didn't want to leave. But what other decision could he make? They would be upset, Ludwig in particular, if Feliciano just...got up and vanished. But they would be safer with him gone. If Ludwig had an inkling of his worries, Ludwig would leave instead, that he knew. Feliciano couldn't be the reason Gilbert and Ludwig were separated again. That would haunt him for the rest of his life.
Now wasn't the time to do so--there's always the chance that someone else heard him get up. He wasn't prepared to leave and...not come back. He could risk a few more days, give himself time to truly enjoy what he had here before he left. Get what supplies together he could without rousing suspicion. But...but then he would leave. This was the best decision for everyone. They would understand. And...if Feliciano got caught after he left, they wouldn't get caught in the crossfire. Everyone here would be safe. Maybe then they could all be convinced to leave for somewhere safer than Archadia. Somewhere where Ludwig could live a life free of stigma for his mutation, and be happy. Where Nico would grow up not thinking that mutations were akin to monster-hood. ...If he got caught and they left for safety, Feliciano could finally relax. Besides, they'd come back for him. Feliciano can be patient. He would rather they be happy without him than suffering with him.
Once again, his eyes began to burn, but he refused to let himself cry because of this. This was the best decision for everyone. This is the best way to resolve everything. If his pillow was a little damp when he curled up in bed a few minutes later, it was only because he hadn't managed to dry his face off properly.
He tried to ignore it, at least at first. He had shopping to do--Alfred wanted...pizza with french fries on it? Feliciano frowned down at the bag of food in his hands, trying to figure out what he'd even bought. There were hot dogs and tomatoes and cheese and frozen french fries and all kinds of other pizza ingredients...but what kind of mixture was this? Gilbert didn't even like hot dogs, and Ludwig deserved better than frozen french fries. ...Was that corn?
Obviously, something was very wrong here. Feliciano needed to get home, figure out what was wrong with him. When Feliciano looked up from his shopping bag, he was standing in front of Alfred's apartment building. The mutant couldn't remember the building ever looking that large and foreboding. The sandy stonework appeared ashen and worn, and the shadows were deep black against the murky lighting. There was a painful buzz in the air, making his ears ache.
It took a moment for Feliciano to realize someone was screaming.
Heart leaping in his throat, the mutant dropped his shopping bag and bolted into the building. He barreled up the stairs, shoving through throngs of faceless passerby who seemed oblivious, or perhaps uncaring of the shrieks tearing the very air apart. Feliciano recognized Nico's voice anywhere. Blank faces followed Feliciano's path as he ran, and he shuddered under of the weight of their eyeless gazes. What was going on?
The path to Alfred's apartment felt leagues longer than it ever had before, with shadows clawing at his arms and feet, trying to trip him up. The lights flickered and shattered behind him under the force of Nico's screaming. Feliciano didn't know how his eardrums didn't follow suit; he had never heard anyone quite so loud, and yet even the mutant's keen hearing couldn't discern a single word. Just high-pitched noise. When he finally reached Alfred's front door, Feliciano unthinkingly barreled into the unyielding wood.
The door unexpectedly flew open, and Feliciano unintentially launched himself into the room. Hands flew from the darkness behind him, curling into his clothes and around his limbs and even in his hair. They jerked him upright before he could even hit the floor. Feliciano struggled against their hold, but he could hardly move against those hands, as immovable as stone. Out of the corner of his eye, he barely made out the shine of a helmet and full visor before the stranger turned to him. A distorted reflection stared back at him, eyes bulging with a nonexistent nose; mouth a jagged gash of white and red that practically split the reflective visor in two. Then Feliciano stared on in horror as his reflection moved before his eyes, eyes growing somehow larger and mouth twisting into a ghastly smirk and his teeth--
Feliciano's attempts to recoil from the "faceless" holding him in place were soon interrupted, though. First Nico, then Ludwig were dragged down from the loft. Nico was kicking and screaming and his little hands and hair were stained with blood--
Ludwig was completely limp, carted along with two more armored people on each side. There were two little paths of blood trailing down the pale skin of Ludwig's face. The left was just a trickle, emanating from a little wound somewhere above his ear, but the right... His shoulder was red with blood, and the stain only grew larger. When they reached the main level, the guards dropped Ludwig to the floor like a bag of sand. Ludwig did not get up.
It was only by the hands holding him captive that Feliciano remained standing. His mind spun a mile a minute. Why isn't Ludwig getting up? What did they do to him? Why wasn't Feliciano struggling? Were they going to hurt Nico, too? Was that his blood, or was it Ludwig's? Where were Gilbert and Alfred? Why wasn't he screaming, fighting, crying, trying to get to Ludwig and Nico? A heavy weight was slowly settling on his shoulders, and the air was growing colder by the moment.
The group of guards further in the apartment eventually parted ways to allow one of their own pass by. The hand in his hair yanked Feliciano's head around, forcing him to look at the approaching man's bloodstained visor. Over the stranger's shoulder, Feliciano finally saw Gilbert, equally lifeless on the floor. Alfred was crouched next to him, clutching at his shirt and shaking him. He was obviously saying something, but Feliciano couldn't hear a word. There was more blood pooled beneath Gilbert's torso. Feliciano could see see the puddle was slowly growing. There was no movement from the albino, at all. Feliciano raised his gaze. Amber eyes made short contact with blue as Alfred turned his way. Another of the guards pressed a gun against Alfred's head, but the blonde paid no mind as he tried to say something.
Feliciano could only stare vacantly as blood and bone splattered across the walls and floor. Alfred's body crumpled to the floor in a heap alongside Gilbert's, little wafts of smoke curling up from the burn around the bullet hole in his temple. He was inanimate, frozen as cool steel pressed against his forehead. He could only stare at the blood staining the floor, staining the bodies of his friends. The very air vibrated against his skin. Feliciano trembled as he finally stared up at the man getting ready to kill him, just as he had murdered almost everyone Feliciano cared about.
"We've been looking everywhere for you, mutant."
Hands wrapped tightly around his throat now, squeezing mercilessly. He couldn't breathe, and even as he finally began to struggle, the grip only tightened. Let go of me, let go of me--
"Let go of me!!"
Feliciano shot upright with a half-choked scream, fingers clawing at his throat until the constrictive presence finally fell away and he could breathe. And with the fresh oxygen flowing through his lungs, Feliciano's breaths derailed into violent sobs, scrambling out of the blankets he'd become entangled in during the night. His struggles led him to rolling off the bed entirely, and the blow his knees took when they hit the floor hurt a lot. However, he didn't try to pull himself upright, simply sagging against the side of the bed and muffling his sobs against the fitted sheet.
This was the eight night that month, the third consecutive night in a row, Feliciano had had his sleep interrupted by nightmares, but the first night where he could remember his dream after waking up. Thankfully, he had the spare bedroom to himself--Feliciano couldn't remember if Alfred was staying over as well, but Ludwig had volunteered to sleep on the couch, just like he had the night before. Feliciano had told him the restlessness was caused by his mutation acting up, and he did have the onset of stress-hives to validate his lie, so the blonde had kindly camped out in the living room to see if isolation would help settle Feliciano's nerves.
Obviously, the hope was misplaced. Feliciano was glad for the privacy to break down. One hand reached out and scrambled around until he managed to grab hold of one wayward pillow. He tugged it over and hugged it tightly to his chest, burying his face against the soft surface. He needed a muffler, or his crying would undoubtedly wake up someone else in the house.
Eventually, Feliciano managed to calm down into rough hiccups, breathing ragged with eyes swollen and aching. He sniffled, wiping his nose on the back of his hand as he stared at the carpet between his feet. With the images of his dream haunting the blackness behind his eyelids, the mutant finally understood what was keeping him up at night.
The police--rather than slowly give up hope and turn their attention to more recent, pressing matters as time went on--only grew more zealous in their hunt for the last few unaccounted for mutants from the Underground Break-Out over six months previous. Feliciano in particular was seeing more and more wanted posters with his own face on them. There were news segments specifically denouncing him as a threat not only to Archadia, but Russian society as a whole (and others denouncing the Underground for failing to keep such an 'average' mutant like himself under better control). He'd seen more of his own history picked apart by the news than he'd ever seen pieced together in one place before. There were even talks of them sending military help to scour the surrounding forests. People were even blaming Feliciano and Ludwig for crimes they didn't commit.
Feliciano always knew that his presence was a threat to Gilbert and Alfred's safety, but now... Now, the benefits he potentially had couldn't outweigh the consequences if he was caught under Alfred and Gilbert's protection. With Ludwig here as well, it was only a matter of time, the threat was doubled not only against the humans who'd shown more kindness than Feliciano deserved, but to his best friend.
His eyes burned, but the exhausted brunette didn't have any more tears to shed.
Nausea spun sickeningly in the pit of his stomach, and the meager scraps of food he'd managed to eat the evening before burned at the back of his throat. Feliciano forced himself to his feet and dragged himself to the door. As quietly as he could manage, the brunette left for the bathroom down the hall, not risking turning on the lights. He wasn't sure what time it was, but it was definitely too early to risk waking anyone up. He blindly groped around until he found the faucet, turning on a trickle of water so he could splash his face in an attempt to calm his shaken nerves. The action never really managed to help Feliciano the way movies and TV shows always depicted it to, but at least he could wash the tears from his face.
His eyes had adjusted to the darkness somewhat, enough to at least see bits of his reflection the mirror. He couldn't really see anything definitive, but what he could recognize looked at least half as bad as he felt. Feliciano was scared. Scared of what would happen if he was discovered here. Not scared of what would happen to himself, but to the people he cared about. Feliciano couldn't even blink without seeing the corpses of his loved ones. He didn't know if they would be executed in such cold blood, but if they fought back, tried to keep the police from taking him away...
Bile once again burned the back of his throat and Feliciano retched. He curled heavily over the counter, attempting to stay over the sink. Despite the nausea, he couldn't manage to actually vomit, and eventually he spat the bile into the sink and allowing the water to wash it away.
Feliciano couldn't allow anything to happen to anyone in the house. He cared about Alfred, Gilbert, Ludwig, and Nico far too much to let them suffer the repercussions of his own actions. However... He didn't want to leave. But what other decision could he make? They would be upset, Ludwig in particular, if Feliciano just...got up and vanished. But they would be safer with him gone. If Ludwig had an inkling of his worries, Ludwig would leave instead, that he knew. Feliciano couldn't be the reason Gilbert and Ludwig were separated again. That would haunt him for the rest of his life.
Now wasn't the time to do so--there's always the chance that someone else heard him get up. He wasn't prepared to leave and...not come back. He could risk a few more days, give himself time to truly enjoy what he had here before he left. Get what supplies together he could without rousing suspicion. But...but then he would leave. This was the best decision for everyone. They would understand. And...if Feliciano got caught after he left, they wouldn't get caught in the crossfire. Everyone here would be safe. Maybe then they could all be convinced to leave for somewhere safer than Archadia. Somewhere where Ludwig could live a life free of stigma for his mutation, and be happy. Where Nico would grow up not thinking that mutations were akin to monster-hood. ...If he got caught and they left for safety, Feliciano could finally relax. Besides, they'd come back for him. Feliciano can be patient. He would rather they be happy without him than suffering with him.
Once again, his eyes began to burn, but he refused to let himself cry because of this. This was the best decision for everyone. This is the best way to resolve everything. If his pillow was a little damp when he curled up in bed a few minutes later, it was only because he hadn't managed to dry his face off properly.
