Procul Nox Noctis Frater Sollicitus

by Shiori Tsumi

Deviantart Mirror

He’s standing in front of a mansion, tall and dark and imposing. The house is a relic from the days when the elegant Victorian style was as necessary to a cultured man as air to one’s lungs. Yet in its’ age, the paint has faded and peeled, revealing the shameful insides of the slowly rotting wood, and the red has faded from the thing chimney stretching up towards the grey sky like so desperate a child’s arm has ever been seen. The wrought iron gate surrounding the house shudders at his very touch and it scrapes across the cobblestone path noisily, painfully, in a cacophony of agonizing shrieks that would put a banshee to shame. The path to the mansion crosses between two halves of a gruesome garden, which though it once was green and full of life at one point in time-many years ago perhaps- the years have reduced it to a dark and untamed jungle, sickly in color and wild in appearance. Tall stalks with pointed leaves and wide-mouthed blossoms growling with some strange sound that is somewhere between pained hunger and furious rage. The blackened blades of grass act as though some hybrid of snakes and bear traps, snapping at his heels with terrible crashing clapping sounds.

The sound of a hammer against wood greets him as he nears the mansion, hammering sounds and the vivid visage of an orange haired woman in green corduroy overalls. A strap hangs low on one shoulder and her feet are spaced widely apart as one braced for battle, yet her body as a whole is loose and sleepily relaxed. She does not budge from her work or make the slightest effort to look at him as he approaches.  “Good day, sir.” Her voice is soft and gentle, almost bored and tired sounding, as though speaking to him is a trying and disdainful affair. “What do you want?”

He leans over her. “What are you doing?”

“Repairing the wall.”

He inspects the side of the mansion. Though rotted and aged, the wall is one piece. Some amount of repair would not be unwelcome, yet the girl has no nails anywhere in sight. “Wouldn’t that break the wall more?”

“Not this wall, fool.” She makes an irritated ‘huh’ sound. “There are walls other than the ones you see.”

“And which walls are those?”

The girl turns abruptly, fixing her eyes the most brilliant and brightest blazing green upon him. “You speak too much. Just like Mother. Speaking of,” he has to quickly step back as the girl whips around the arm bearing the hammer to point at the front door to the building, “go now. Mother waist for you inside. She will most likely be much more capable of bearing your noise.”

“Uh…right.” He doesn’t know why he doesn’t argue further, he can think of a dozen responses a thousand and one times better than what he said, yet he says nothing further. With those blazing green eyes turned on him, locked on him in the manner she had them, so watchful, so piercing a gaze he had never experienced before, somehow it has become clear to him down to the most central core of his nerves that continuing the conversation with the fire-haired woman would be most unwise.

“Well?” The gaze has turned to a glare. “Git.” The silence is suffocating, and the glare a painful assistant to the heavy pressure weighing down upon him, forcing him towards the door and gratefully away from the woman.

The door is tall and thin, painted a darkest shade of black. A delicate glass window is set into the door, the only decoration to the door, but though it can be seen only an empty decorated Victorian era-esque lobby, much like one would imagine seeing in any hotel. To one side of the lobby is seen a front desk, behind which is located a large peg board with more keys hanging off of it than he cares to count. And at the end of the lobby, furthest away from him is a grand staircase, branching off under a large painting of a graveyards filled with strange shadows of darkness under the brightest light of a full moon to two hallways lined with a richly red velvet carpet, extending past rows of doorways he can only barely see glimpses of. However, no one is standing anywhere near the desk. The lobby is empty, and utterly silent. The door swings open noiselessly with a light prod, and he steps into the lobby unimpeded.

It’s cold. That’s the first thing that he notices. The second is the way the floorboards bend and creak under his weight, the only sound to be heard. How is everything else so silent? The third comes after a solid ten minutes of silent wandering about the lobby, a strange sound that comes from nowhere and everywhere. It’s a soft sound at first, no louder than the coo of a dove, a sound vaguely between a sob and a laugh, but more importantly….it is a sound that is vaguely between the sob and the laugh of a child. “…ther.” And then.. “-other…” Then… “Bi…..other…” Then the sounds become like words. “Big…” And then they become words. “Big brother.” Real words. “Hey, big brother!” And they call to him. And he knows those words, he knows that voice. He’s heard neither in so many years, but he knows them.

He whips around, searching for the child that lends his voice to call for him. Where is he? Where? “Wh-“ And he tries to return the call, but- “Mohck!” But he can’t. His throat closes up and his voice fails him and he falls to his knees, coughing, trying to relieve his airway of the pressure upon it. And then-then…then-

“You shouldn’t talk to them down here.” Then the pressure disappears. “It isn’t healthy.” He turns. A woman is standing behind the desk; she waves.

The woman is tall and very thin, so much so that she appears far taller than she is, yet in comparison to her frame appears to be of average size somehow. Her skin is pale, so very pale, paler than snow and the very purest of white. It is as though someone took her skin and bleached it and bleached it and bleached it until color no longer remained at all. This skin, paler than porcelain and the very snow that sits upon roofs and decorates lawns on a winter morning is garbed in a black-blacker than black and darker than the very abyss of the absence of the sun within a black hole- Victorian era dress, of the like not even the most accurate and most obsessive of historical outfitters could see fit to posses, but would likely kill to do so. Her hair, black as the midnight sky and just as shimmering with a strange mysterious sheen of beauty that entrances so many, descends as a waterfall of darkness over her bare shoulders, just barely caressing her tauntingly visible ample bosom. Her eyes are shut, squeezed shut in a content smiling squint, dark eyelashes brilliantly vivid upon her pale cheeks, reminding him somewhat of a porcelain doll, but no doll exists that would look so content as this woman does, standing there as she does. Her red lips-rose red, ruby red, blood red- turn up in an amused yet not unkind smile and she beckons to him.

“What was that?” Words no longer fail him, yet at the same time, they do, for the dizzying puzzlement washes over him all at once. “It-it..” What does he say? How does he say it? What is it he should say first? “It…it sounded like-“

“Sorry about that.”  Her voice is sultry yet sweet-in the manner that comes only when a person truly honestly enjoys what they do from the bottom of their heart and are content in all things they oversee within it. “They aren’t supposed to speak to guests when they’re in the lobby. But…” She tilts her head slightly. “I think perhaps he was so excited to see you, he simply couldn’t wait.”

“…He?” He approaches the desk. “Who is-“ He lays down his hands on the desk, but scarcely but one split second before his hands touch the cold marble, touch her own hands, she takes a step back from the desk and clasps her hands over her chest, taking on the look of one admiring a small child.

“Of course, young Garrott, I’m excited to see you as well. You were so young the last time I saw you, and now you’re all grown up!”

He stares at her, mystified and confused, and utterly lost. “I don’t recall having ever seen you before. Unless you are much much older than you look.”

She laughs, and it’s like the music of a tragically cynical opera. “I’m not surprised, though. You must have been maybe fourteen. Maybe thirteen? You were so little.”

“What-“

“And then there is the policy to consider. It’s a shame I can’t be so familiar with guests as I would like, but it really is for your own good.”

“You keep saying ‘guests’. Is this a hotel of some sort? Things are awful quiet here…I’ve never been in such a quiet hotel! Granted, that’s usually Janus’s fault..”

The woman purses her lips. “It’s something like that.” She crosses her arms over her chest, and tilts her head down slightly, as though inspecting him through her closed eyelids. “I’m Lenora Strang, I own the place. No doubt you met my daughter Cassidy out there?”

“The redhead? Yeah, I met her. I barely got to say anything and she-“ He stops. “Wait.” Something’s occurred to him. “Cassidy said you were waiting for me in here.”

“Mm hm.”

“But when I came in, the lobby was empty; No one was here. You weren’t here.”

“I was here.”

“I didn’t see you.”

Lenora smirks and curls up a hand resting just beneath her chin. “And that is the key word which makes all the difference.” She leans ever so slightly to one side, accentuating wide feminine hips which at one point many years ago, when the world was a different place, would have had mothers and grandmothers rushing for suitors, begging for children, filling the air with comments upon her ‘motherly figure’. “You did not see me. But that does not mean I was not here.”

“How could you have been here without me seeing you?” His hands ball into fists, shaking, trembling with barely suppressed confused rage.

Lenora’s head tilts up, towards the stairs behind them, leading to the second floor. “You were entrapped in his illusion from the moment you peered through that window. I was most…torn when I saw you wandering about as you were.”

“You were…torn.” He says the words slowly, but it’s not entirely clear whether it is because he doesn’t understand them, or he believes she doesn’t understand them.

“Dear me, yes! I wasn’t sure what to do. Wait it out or call to you-they can become…unpleasant and retaliate violently when interrupted from their fun, so I wasn’t sure it was a wise decision. Yes,” she lets out a small breath he hadn’t been aware she was holding, “I am quite glad I took those chances. It could have ended far worse for you if I didn’t.”

“And how’s that?”

Lenora shakes her head and turns to face the pegboard. “Ah, but in the excitement, we’ve forgotten why you’re here. I’ll just fetch your key, then..”

“Forgotten? I don’t even know why I’m here!” Lenora laughs.

“There’s only one reason people appear at my front gate the way you have today.” She glances back at him. “You’re afraid of something. You are so afraid, you barely recognize it as fear any longer, but an old companion who daily walks beside you.”

“Fear? I’m Arthur Garrott, what do I have to be truly afraid of?”

Lenora does not look at him. “You recognize that voice, did you not?” Her fingers trail over the keys and they make a jangling sound. He briefly wonders how she knows which key is which, for there are no labels nor engravings on the keys to differentiate one from the other.

“Of course I recognized it. Why wouldn’t I? That voice was-“

“That is what you fear. His voice would not sound such a way if that were not that which you fear.”

“I’m not afraid of my-“

“Fear of and fear for may seem to be utterly different, but when one truly sets one’s mind to it and ponders it, they really are the same. There is not distinction between the two.” She plucks a key from amongst the countless keys there, and she palms it, slowly turning back to him. “It is the greatest weakness a man can have, fear is. Yet it also serves, in many cases, that which makes a man human. In this mansion, you may seek to face those fears and overcome them, so that you may protect those you love. Or…you may not.” She shrugs,” It is up to you,” and she holds up a hand, the key dangling from between two long pointed pale fingers. “Your fears reside beyond the door this unlocks. Will you face them?”

He scarcely takes the time to consider this and snatches the key from her. “Of course I will, don’t be foolish!”

“So impulsive,” she chuckles. “Very well, young kingling. Room 217, sweeties.” She gestures to the stairs. “Don’t hurt yourself, kingling; he can be tricky.”

“Don’t worry yourself over me. It’ll be nothing.”

With a confident grin he strides up the stairs and Lenora watches silently with a smile mirroring his until the young man disappears into the hallway. Then she calls out, “…Cassidy, sweetie?” The door opens, and vivid orange and green peers inside. “Fetch the buckets, won’t you?”

“Have you so little faith, Mother?”

“It’s not that.” Lenora leans forward on the desk. “But…” She shrugs. “I think it’s better this way.”
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Locating the room dictated by Lenora is one of those things that’s easier said than done, as Arthur finds, wandering about the halls. At a first glance from the top of the stairs, there were but seven doors and a hallway at the rear, near the seventh door, a hall which he had assumed at the time connected to the other hallway. Yet upon turning the corner, what awaited was a hall much like the one recently left behind but nine doors to line the walls. At the end of the hall was yet another corner which turned into yet another hall lined with eleven doors. He followed turn after turn after turn until he grew dizzy, and now slumps against a wall wearily. Thirty one plane brown wooden doors stare back at him. The floor throbs, as though with a pulse, and walking the halls is much like walking across the floor of a funhouse room that shifts and trembles beneath your feet, and his feet drag, as though moving though a bog or-and he shudders to think  how the idea came to his mind- many hundreds of hands clinging to his ankles. All in all, his energy is quite nearly tapped out. It astounds him to think he’s come so far.

“What the…hell…is wrong with this place? Didn’t look…nearly..so big before.” He leans his head back against the wall. Did the design on the ceiling change in the last fifteen minutes? Fifteen minutes ago, there was a seraphim on that ceiling, yet now it boast the image of a tall thin figure in black following closely behind a large pale white horse. A chill runs up his spine and he looks away-a glance upwards out of the corner of his eye reveals the return of the delicate features of the seraphim from before, but he gets the feeling he doesn’t want to test his luck. “Room 217, she says,” he scoffs, “none of the doors are even labeled!”

“Don’t hurt yourself, kingling; he can be tricky!”

“Hm…” Arthur considers this and stares at the door opposite him. “He can be tricky, hm..?” He stands and the floorboards groan. No they don’t sound like people they can’t sound like people they aren’t people stop thinking they’re people. He turns the key in hand once, twice, and leans forwards, sticking the key into the lock. And it turns. “Ah ha.” The door knob turns, and as the door cracks open slowly, cold air-freezing cold, cold as the grave, dead cold- rushes to greet him and a child’s voice giggles.

“You made it, big brother, you made it!” Two bright lights glimmer in the encompassing darkness within the room and a small shadowy black hand-very tiny, so tiny, a tiny doll’s hand- reaches out to him. “Come on, big brother! It’ll be okay!”

It’s that voice, his voice, and how can he resist that voice? Lenora said he can be tricky, but…but that voice! And…he doesn’t know Lenora-regardless of what the woman may say or may know- but he knows this voice, and he knows he’s never been very good at saying no to it. “Alright, alright, don’t get impatient.” He closes his fingers over the small hand and the darkness seems to close in around them.

There’s no light anywhere, anywhere at all but the specks of glimmering light in front of him. It’s so dark, so very dark, how can he possibly know where he is? What is the floor made of, or is it another hallways he’s in? “Oh, you can’t see. I forgot.” The child laughs and he can feel a cold tiny hand on his cheeks. Then, like a faulty black light, a strange purple-blow glow makes itself known, illuminating the features around him. Or lack thereof. “Now you can see?”

The child is now visible, a miniature child version of Mordred, were he to be dipped in black ink again and again until no color but the deepest darkest black remained. Even the whites of the child’s eyes are black as night, only a devilishly brightly glimmering ruby red iris glinting in each eye. Arthur takes a very long time to answer, but words finally come to him. “……Y-yeah, I can see. You look….different.”

“I look better.”

“Do you think so, Mordred?” He pats the child on the head. “You’re adorable.”

“Of course, big brother!” The child laughs, like he did so long ago, so very very long ago, Arthur almost doesn’t really remember it. “But….” The child frowns. “…It hurt. A lot.”

His brow furrows and he kneels next to the child. “What hurt, Mordred?” This isn’t Mordred, it can’t be…but with that voice and that form, he can’t help himself. “What hurt? What hurt you? Who do I have to kill?”

The boy is silent for a long moment, then, “I look good, you told me I look good. So I look good…but it did rather…hurt an awful lot, getting this way.”

“….When did I say that?”

“Don’t you remember big brother? It was before I came here…right before. It was when…” But he can’t hear the rest of the words. He told Mordred that…when? Before he came where? When…when what happened? When?! “When…-Gustav….-and…”

His eyes snap open mere seconds before his face makes an intimate greeting with the floor. “What the-GAH!” He spends several long moments laying on the floor, gathering himself. He is laying on the floor of his bedroom, though not in his pajamas.  The clock beside his bed says it’s three in the afternoon, so he’s not sure what he was doing sleeping at this hour. There’s a dull ache in his chest and his face feels hot, but…that’s because he fell out of bed, right? Right?

“Ah hah! I heard you in there, Arthur!”

“Oh, dammit,” he scrambles to his feet, “it’s Janus…” He watches the door warily, but thankfully, it remains shut. What’s Janus doing in his wing of the estate?

“Still moping, are you?” Moping?

“Shut up and go away, Janus! I’m not in the mood for your stupidity!”

“You’re wasting your energy moping like this, Arthr. You’ll move on, find something else to smother….mm, maybe Sedrick? You already spend enough time together…think Sedrick deserves some smothering?”

“He’s your brother, too!” Wait…what? Why is he so angry? What…what’s….what’s happened?

“I’m real torn; I am.” A brief pause. “Don’t tell me you’re still set on blaming me for this?”

“Gustav was aiming for you!” What is she talking about? What is he talking about?

“So does that make it my fault?” He can hear Janus scoff. “You’re Gustav’s master. Doesn’t that make it your fault by that logic?” She laughs, high-pitched and haughty and vain. “Hey, Arthur,” she lowers her voice to a cruel whisper, “if he dies…”

“Don’t say that.”

“There’s talk, Arthur. If he dies-“

“Don’t say that!”

“Gustav’s going to be put down, yes?”

“I…” He can’t speak. It’s as though his voice has been taken from him.

“Get away from there. Move it, charlatan!” That voice….can it really be? Is it?

“Jeeze, I’m going, I’m going…” Silence. Then, a hesitant tentative knock on the door.

“…Arthur, it’s me.”

He runs to the door and flings it open gratefully. “Sedrick! Oh, thank god, Sedrick…”

“Arthur, you look like shit.” Sedrick frowns and pushes his way into the room, “Have you slept at all? The bed’s still made.”

“Eh, sort of.” Arthur allows himself to be pushed down on the bed. “How is he?”

The answer is hesitant and deadpan. “Alive.” A comb is being carefully run through his hair. “For now.”

“For how much longer?” And he fears for the answer, though he hardly understands the situation. It is as though words are simply coming out of his mouth.

Sedrick stares at him. “Not much.”

“Then-“

“But he woke up. Thought you’d want to talk to him. Before-well.” Then Sedrick narrows his eyes. “But you’re not to hug him, or move him, or touch him in any way or you’ll file yourself exiled from the room like Driver and that Swedish brat.”

He manages a weak smile. “They always find a way to keep me from him.”

Sedrick claps a hand on Arthur’s back. “That’s the spirit!”



A thick fog of misery hangs over the hole of the estate and the pieces are slowly falling into place, taking form an image he would give anything not to see. Wiglaf is seated next to a door, slumped forward with his knees drawn to his chest and his face buried in his hands. The ordinarily omnipresent chainmail is missing, and the golden hair has become frizzy and tangled from neglect and his skin has become tan for reasons other than genetics or sunlight. “Wiglaf.” The Swede looks up. “You look like hell.”

“Look who’s talking.”

“Yeah, well…”Arthur sighs. He doesn’t much feel like arguing. “How is he?”

“He was in pain when he woke up, and he found about a dozen different reasons to blame me for it. Made me wish I’d brought a dictionary into the room with me.” They share a laugh, but it ends painfully. Wiglaf chews on his bottom lip. “Arthur…do you think maybe-“

“It’s not your fault.”

“But-but I’m the hero! I’m supposed to save people, not-! Not-…not watch them die of-of-of nth degree burns! Or-or whatever degree burns dragons give….”

“But-! I’m his brother! His big brother! I’m supposed to protect him!”

“I’m his best friend!”

“I-“ Arthur’s retort turns to yet another sigh. “I….kind of don’t want to do this right now.” Wiglaf’s eyes drop down, as though the hero is attempting eye contact with the floor.

“….Yeah…me neither…” The blonde sinks back into his slump, to sleep this time it seems. “Wake me and tell me how he is.”

“…Of course.”

The room smells sterile and clean and smoky and charred all at the same time. Presents, cards, balloons, and stuffed animals decorate the otherwise drab dull room. In the middle of the chamber, laying prone on the bed is a softly groaning pitch black figure spotted with red and long strips of white, draped in silk pearl bedclothes. A startlingly bright red eye opens warily when he enters-there is no longer any white left to the eyes, only red and a sickly dark grey speckled red- and the eyes narrow and the figure groans. “Dear god, they sent you? Lackey and his brattish sister was one thing, but you? That’s just-un…Just…just…nngh.”

“Mordred!” He’s at the bedside before thought even dares to come to his mind, and he only just barely catches himself before he attempts to sweep the injured man up into an embrace. “I-Mordred…how are you feeling?”

“Oh, let me think…I’m bed-ridden with burns on approximately eighty to ninety percent of my body, I can’t move, I’m being constantly questioned by people I hate, and now I have to talk to you. So I suppose I’m just peachy keen, aren’t I?”

“Mordred…” He lightly brushes a charred black hand with his fingertips and the hand spasms painfully. “Ah! I-Mordred-I-“

“Driver and that stupid brat were kicked out…”

“I heard.”

“Stupid brat kept trying to pick me up…ah, but…Driver. Can’t fault her, I suppose…she tried to help change the bandages. She ended up arguing with Brat…”

“And got kicked out, of course.”

“You’re not…nng…you’re not following me, are you?”

“Following what?”

“Don’t touch me!” Mordred’s eyes squeeze shut shortly thereafter his outburst. “Nng…dammit…”

“Mordred…I-I’m sorry, I…this is all my fault.”

“Feh.” Mordred makes a slight twitch of his neck, as though attempting to turn on his side away from Arthur. “Since when were you so pathetic? As if the whole of the blame could be placed upon your shoulders for such an unfortunate occurrence? If you wish to…to continue claiming so…be my guest.”

“You’re not nearly so wordy as usual.”

“I’m in pain.”

“I’ll speak to the doctor about upping the morphine.” Arthur turns to leave, but a trembling hand clutches at his sleeve. “…M-Mordred?”

“Don’t bother…it’s no use.”

“What are you talking about, you’ll feel better with-“

“Guh, you sound like Lackey. Fussing like that all optimistically while you’re bawling your eyes out.”

“Bawling…..?” He hadn’t even realized his cheeks were wet.

“It may not look it…but my eyes still work.” The blackened lips turn up in a weak smirk. “Feh. Aside from your hair, you look like shit.”

“Well…I try.”

“Bullshit. That’s the fine touch of Sedrick. Still babysitting you, is he?”

“He’s my loyal number two, not my babysitter!”
“Don’t fool yourself. Without him, you’d be a wreck.” Mordred pauses almost thoughtfully. “But…I guess I’m not one to talk right now.”

“No,no,no! You look good!”

“Mn?” Mordred stares at him. “…Wha?”

“I mean it. You look great.” Arthur gently brushes the injured man’s hair away from his eyes.

“…My scarf got burnt up.”

“It’s only a scarf. I’ll get you a new one when you recover, I promise.”

“Feh. If you wish.” The ruby eyes close and that last exhale is too long, just too long and too final-sounding.

“…M-Mordred?” No response. “Mordred, wake up.” He shakes his shoulder gently at first, then roughly. “Mordred! Wake up, dammit!” But there’s no response to be found; all he gets for his effort is the horrid stench of burnt flesh and charcoal-like flakes on his coat. Who…how could…this would never happen, right? Never! So-so-the kid…Lenora warned him he was tricky. Would that kid, would he… “It’s…it’s that kid’s fault…” And it somehow pains him to realize that the child would.

“What do you mean by that?” The child’s voice returns, echoing and familiar sounding as before. “That Hnaef boy has very little do with-“

“Not Hnaef! You!”

“Me?” The voice seems vaguely surprised. “I have done nothing, nothing at all. What you saw were your own memories, replayed to remind you.”

“That’s bullshit and you know it! Mordred isn’t dead, he can’t be dead. This is all one of your illusions, just like in the lobby! God….I should have just listened to Lenora…”

“But then…if this is an illusion, a dream…then your fall from bed earlier shouldn’t have hurt you, yes?”

“I…” That’s true, isn’t it, he muses in a panic. The fall…it hurt-it hurt and he cried out. Then…but then…but then-!

“But then, it was all a dream and you’re awake and talking to a voice in your head.”

“No…..”

“Then Mordred is dead and it’s all…”

“No.”

“-your…”

“Shut up!”

“-fault…”

“N-no, it can’t be my fault! I love my baby brother! It’s your fault, isn’t it? It is, I know it is! And I know you’re not fake, I-I met you, I touched you!”

“In a dream, yes….” The child’s voice cackles cruelly and the door is open and he can hear voices and shouting and they’re calling his name and he’s shoved and the child’s voice is laughing and Sedrick is the one that grabs him roughly by the shoulders, tugging him down to his own eye level.

“Arthur, listen to me!”

“I-I can’t, it’s that stupid, but that child, that kid, he-Sedrick, that kid-“

“Oh, for god’s sake!” The slap makes a sharp cracking sound and the light abruptly fades to twilight and he’s half sitting up in bed, Sedrick holding him up by his shoulders, a furiously irritated expression on the brunette’s face, “Just wake up, dammit!”

“…S-Sedrick?” Arthur’s eyes finally focus, and he can see his room, his bedroom, his own bedroom, and he can no longer smell the stench of charcoal and charred skin nor the sterile smell of a hospital room.

“So you finally decided to wake up, huh?”

“Sedrick!” He grips Sedrick’s nightshirt almost desperately. “Sedrick, how’s Mordred? Is he okay? He’s not dead, is he? Oh dear god, don’t say he’s dead!”

“Arthur, get a grip!” Sedrick wrenches the dragon master’s hands from his shirt. “Mordred is fine. He’s not even here, but Driver gave her report just hours ago! What the hell is wrong with you?!”

“I-“ And he wants to say something, but all of a sudden, with the strange echoing of a woman’s laugh in his head and a dull bored voice saying ‘Guess he lost…’ somewhere inside his ears, the terrible dream fades into nonexistence within his mind. “I…I-….I don’t even know anymore. A-I guess it was just a bad dream….”

“They happen.” Sedrick stands, brushing himself off, glaring at Arthur. “I’m not helping you the next time, just know that,” he growls, and turns to leave.

“R-right….thanks for helping me this time, though….” The other makes a strange noise that could almost be considered a ‘whatever’. Arthur lays back down as the door closes, but his heart is beating quickly in his chest, and somewhere at the back of his mind lingers the image of a woman with long black hair in a long black dress, billowing over her feet. Who is that woman…? His mother….? Who knows…?