#sleep deprevation is certainly something

[ashenmind]

?!?

[attorneys-against-court-violence]

Athena Cykes probably had a lot of self-identity issues as a kid.

She grew up in a strange, wonderous place filled with robots her mother and Aura built together. Rarely could she function outside in everyday life. She's told it's because she notices things people can't, does things people don't usually do. She's told she's... stranger than most, in various ways.

Why was she so different? Why is she the only one who can hear how offput people are around her? How come she's the only one who sees robots as people?

Is everyone else deaf or is she too aware to be 'normal' by their standards?

Perhaps she's a robot too, like the rest of her mother's creations? That makes sense! They can hear everything she can and they understand each other. Love each other, it feels like. Juniper probably giggled when she told her, assuring her that they'd be friends whatever Athena thought she was. Simon merely lets her get on with things because it helped her make more sense to herself. And it does help; imagining that all she needs to fix her ears and her brain was to tighten a single loose screw or type a line of code or... or... something her mother could easily do but always denies her. Does she need to be fixed too? Is she broken, like Athena was?

Everyone else though, she could tell they thought she had gotten weirder. But it makes sense to her. Why are they so obtuse and unwilling to listen?!

Nobody listened to her when she stood up for Simon's innocence. Face full of tears and voice strained from yelling and choking back phlegm and fear alike and no one listened to her. She might as well have been speaking in hexidecimal to these people the way they looked at her like some intrusive stranger in the middle of their wretched witch-burning.

When she moves to Europe, it's a total system-shock; no longer is she surrounded by laboratories and metallic friends, permitted to wile the days away playing in the flowering fields of her mother's research. Now she was in a regular brick-and-mortar home surrounded by... ordinary people, so few of which ever bothered to understand her in the past and certainly not now.

No one was going to help me solve this, she figured.

Neither could she at the time.

We don't know what friends or family she has in Europe who'd be willing to listen to her woes and at least try to understand. She probably didn't have time; someone was hurting far away from her and she NEEDED to save him. She NEEDED to untangle all the crossed wires and messy cables in her brain to stand a chance at ever helping him. And maybe, just maybe, finally understand why people never bothered to understand her.

Psychology is the study of the human mind. With the wisdom of psychologists past filling her brain and the gentle support of her mother's ghost - distant but encouraging even in death - she might just have a weapon to fight off all this doubt. One she can turn on others' internal confusion as well. To be the person she needed in her darkest hours, crying her eyes out in a hopeless feedback-loop wondering just why she was so alone.

To be someone willing to listen and understand. For herself, and for others.

(She might also be robokin but she has a full-time job and heavy sleep deprevation so she doesn't really care about that rn)

[romanxeisdeadbutimnot]

Zosan ramble// Angst? Mayhaps

WIP WENSDAY LETS GO

Sleep deprevation was a familiar yet unwelcome feeling for Sanji. There was an odd tingling just behind his nose, face going numb from both anxiety and exhaustion. There were moments where Sanji was so full of an unnatural energy that undoubtedly always disrupted his normal schedule.

It made him feel pathetic. It made him feel as if he was meant to suffer like this for his whole life no matter how hard he tried to look for a cure.

But there was no cure for being cursed.

It was in the early morning on the Sunny, and everyone but Sanji was seemingly asleep. At least, to Sanji's knowledge.

The taste of a burnt cigarette bud lingered on Sanji's tongue as it mixed with the black coffee that had gotten cold. It tasted purely bitter, but it wasn't flavour he needed.

It was still too early to start cooking. As much as he wanted to start, it would be a disappointment to have the food get cold before anyone was awake.

Sitting at the table, Sanji did nothing but stare. The ingraves in the table seemed to slowly swirl and move, and if it were living still. Heart palpitating, body aching for rest and mind sick as ever. It was hell living in his body, but Sanji thought it was well deserved.

Night shifts were usually quiet, but Sanji wasn't on night shift, so his restlessness didn't even have a use. Every little circumstance, and Sanji always thought of how he could have always done something else, something useful.

He didn't know who had night shift - either that, or he forgot due to his sleeplessness. That tended to happen if he didn't get his rest.

The door to the kitchen opened, and Sanji didn't look up. He knew someone was there, but it was most certainly not Nami, Robin or Luffy. Even if it was the latter, Sanji didn't know if he had the strength to keep him at bay.

"Oi, cook. The hell you up for?"

Great, the thorn in his side was the one who found him in this state. Sanji looked up with a scowl on his face (well, an attempted scowl) and took another sip of his cold coffee.

"None of your business, you mossball. What the hell are you doing in my kitchen before breakfast?"

It must have been noticeable that Sanji didn't feel good, because Zoro didn't give a nasty retort in response. No quick wit of the tongue, no yelling or name calling.

Instead, Zoro paused for a moment before sitting at the table with Sanji. He wanted to object, he wanted to tell him to fuck off and let him enjoy his solitude in peace, but Sanji didn’t.

He couldn't. Not when he so desperately needed this.

The silence in the air was so thick, Sanji could almost swallow it. The numbness of his body and mind only added onto the eeriness.

"Did you stay up all night?"

Was it that obvious? Surely there were bags under Sanji's eyes, and sometimes exhaustion wasn't easy to hide. Still, Sanji didn't appreciate the potential teasing that was surely to come his way.

"...yes."

Sanji didn’t even have to look up to feel the worried look Zoro gave him.

"That was stupid of you."

Reassurance that Sanji was slowly destroying himself was somehow both nice and devastating, especially coming from Zoro of all people. Yet in some way, it was fitting.

"Maybe, but unlike you I'm used to it."

An admittance that this happens often enough that Sanji knows how it feels. Maybe not the wisest idea, but it wasn't like everyone was here to worry about him. It was just the mosshead, and he was most likely going to piss off.

"...please take a nap after breakfast."

Was that...begging?

[blissfulalchemist]

the confession, villain fluff, and dark wives club xx

Okay Villain Fluff is a challenge piece to see if I can make villainy things feel more like domestic bliss. I have it started but it’s a challenge.

Dark Wives Club is a kiss prompt that I have to finish 😭 it’s Wren and Cat and like I need to write it out but Dark Siren Wren is intimidating! Because I love her so. 😔 and this is all I can give you I’m sorry

“I don’t want or need any help, John,” Wren said crossing her arms, “I’m doing just fine on my own.”

John placed his hands on her shoulders, “And I don’t doubt that. You really are doing an amazing job, however with the increase of those coming to us we can expedite the process a bit.” Wren pouted her burgundy lips, kicking the ground, it’s what John had told me when he asked, no decided, I help his wife. I shouldn’t be peering in like this but I’m curious so see her, get to know her. Wren Blake, The Judge, her name alone sent fear into anyone within earshot, it certainly did for me. She’s who you didn’t want to meet when joining Eden’s Gate or if you got caught while being on the other side. I can already see that she’s found herself in this role of hers, the presence already smothering my lungs and any confidence I had before my eyes landed on her. “Trust me. At least meet her first,” John’s voice was reassuring, smooth, always whispering in one’s ear.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Confession is part of Catlina’s main canon and what is below is part of the first run through of that part so it’s very rough but I am rewriting it because well it deserves better and I might just start posting stuff out of order who knows.

There was another sharp pain against her back, “At least you read the book on torture, classic sleep deprevation to get my mind weak. Ah!” Another one.

“Look the sooner you tell us the sooner things can go back to normal.”

“John, she needs more encouragement,” Joseph spoke prompting her to look him in the eyes. She glared at him as he looked at John, “You can’t treat her special. Treat her like the others.” John looked hesitant, before grabbing something from a tool box.

“You can go to hell Joseph! Ah!” Whoever was behind her must have had specific orders and she started to feel some blood run down her back with that one. “Fuck you!”

John came closer with what looked like, well the only thing coming to mind, a skewer. She could see his eyes assessing her up and down noticing the six cuts on her arm. “Guess we won’t use knives for you,” his face looked darker and more sinister, even his eyes weren’t giving anything away. He placed the gag on her, “Seems like you would enjoy that too much.” He placed the tip of his tool of choice against her shoulder pressing it giving it a slight twist causing blood to seep through the shirt. She screamed at the pain, her tears soaking the gag. “Now confess!”

When he pulled the gag down, “You want to hear sins? I’ll give you some. I tried to take my own life twice. I stole from the workplace. I-” he dug it in deeper.

“Don’t make a mockery out of this,” his eyes seemed to plead with her to just be truthful. “Tell me what did you do to get here!”

“I was meeting with one of my friends.”

“Keep going John, that wasn’t all.”

“Fuck you!”

[ifbrd]

Are there any other pairings between characters in Word Up you're willing to share? And you mentioned some new villains show up--are you okay with sharing a lil' bit about them, or are they entirely a surprise?

Firstly, thank you for the question! It did help me last night! Sadly I still didn’t  get a lot of sleep, but because I calmed myself down by typing the response to this, I at least wasn’t suffering through panic attack the whole night! So thank you so much (and if you have any other questions, feel free to share them tonight because I have a feeling I’ll need it tonight too)

I’m now rewriting the response because it was a little disorganized.

I’m not sure what you mean by “pairings,” would you mind elaborating? (We’re going to blame my inability to understand on the sleep deprevation)

Regarding the villains, originally I was going to keep them a secret until each of their reveals. But since I really needed the distraction last night and typed them all up, and because it seems rude to not answer your question when it helped me, that’s going out the window! I’m excited to share these anyway, I’ll just be extremely vague for the villains I want to keep secret for now.

Little bit of background, my original plan was to have a new villain to parallel every old villain. That idea was thrown out for a variety of different reasons, but some of them did survive to the final product! And I noticed a lot of these guys, while not being directly based off any character, often still unintentionally have similarities to some older villains. The villains who have a direct parallel to some of the orignals are the ones I’m wanting to stay secret. Honestly just a complete coincidence that they all ended up being the ones I wanted to keep secret

These are in no particular order.

I have one currently unnamed villain, who’s character design I’m struggling with, who is known as being basically the most useless villain in the city. She can’t commit a crime. (kinda like amazing rope guy, complete coincidence btw) Why can’t she? No one knows for sure, she certainly has the abilities to, her powers are like WordGirl’s, super strength, super speed, and flying. The real reason she’s so terrible at being a villain is because she doesn’t want to be, and she’s subconsciously sabotaging herself by making her too nervous to know what to do while committing crimes. The only reason she’s a villain is because someone is making her do their dirty work for her. Until I eventually reveal who this person is, I will refer to them as her “boss.” I don’t know if you’ve seen the post I did on all the episodes and summaries, I think you saw the original with the first five, but I don’t know if you saw the reblogged updated version with the next five as well. If you haven’t, the sixth story is titled “Theo’s Birthday” and features the kids (mostly Theo) wanting to have a public battle, and being proven that they weren’t ready for itwhen they get their butts kicked. This is the villain for that story and it will be her debut. You’ve got to be a pretty bad super hero to have this girl actually beat you!

Carrie- Is a social media personality, and a shapeshifter! But she can only shapeshift her hair and clothes. This makes her social media presence pretty easy, as she can have all the coolest new clothes without having to by them, and have all the coolest new hairstyles without destroying her hair, and it also makes getting disguises for crimes a lot easier! Carrie doesn’t want to be a villain, but she loves that she has a job as a social media star, and is scared of losing that, so she will do anything her followers want her to. Sadly, her followers think her doing illegal stuff is pretty funny

Immoral- Funny enough, Immoral was originally just the stand in name for this villain until I had their actual names (for example, Carrie’s stand in name was “Shapeshifter” while I was developing her, until I eventually decided on a name for her) but the name ended up sticking. I think this is probably a name Theo gave this villain, instead of them giving to themselves. This villain was inspired by me having a moral existential crisis. I was frustrated about a choice I had to make, in which every option seemed to have some kind of immoral repercussions, and I frustratedly said to myself “what’s even the point of having morals if they’re impossible to keep! I may as well be a villain!” And that’s how the idea for Immoral was born! Immoral has given up on the concept of morality, and just does whatever they want, whenever they want. He’s the villain in “Everything Changes” and that story at this time doesn’t have him present any kind of abilities that would make him a good villain, and I probably won’t change that for that particular story because 1. That story gave me a lot of trouble and I’m not about to change a whole bunch of it 2. I like that it helps show that Julie and Theo have no idea what they’re doing. That being said, he’ll probably gain some more exciting tactics in future appearances. At the moment my plan is to have him be very prepared for whatever he’s wanting to do that day. They make another appearance in what I think is the eighth story, which I believed I titled “The Only Way Out is Through” where they try to cheat in a biking contest, so perhaps they came prepared by bringing things like tacks to pop the tires of their opponents and things like that. I also noticed I freely switched between “he/him” and “they/them” for Immoral, so I guess he/they use both sets of those pronouns

Crazy Cat Lady- I love this one, and she’s not even a creation of mine, she’s the creation of my psychopath of a friend (can’t wait to read this to her hahaha). I told her I was in need of some unique super power ideas (WordGirl the show took all the good ones!) and she told me to give her a letter. I said “C” and she said “C…C…Cats! Okay…how about a lady who uses cats to do her bidding. She’ll need something done and she’ll call forth an army of cats to get things done for her.” And that was too good of an idea to pass up. Crazy Cat Lady has a lot of cats, she loves her cats, she’ll go through a lot for her cats and will get her revenge if you piss off her or her cats. (My friend also came up with a man who can shoot bees out of every orifice of his body. I have no idea what’s wrong with her but that’s a villain I definitely wasn’t going to do because…well because that’s really disturbing!)

Time for our top-secret villains!

One villain I knew, from the second I came up with him, that I wanted him to be the first official villain introduced. (Note I said official, I posted the first page of “Return to Fair City” where a character named “The Rural Burglar” is mentioned, this is not this villain. The Rural Burglar is a one off who’s just a plot devise for that particular story). I’m not even 100% sure why I wanted this villain to be first, it was just really important to me that he was.

Another villain who was supposed to be directed based off of one of the original WordGirl villains, is now in the process of getting a complete personality overhaul. When I’m done he might not be recognizable as being someone meant to parallel the villain for whom he’s based. I’m hoping I will find the perfect balance between the original personality I had for him and the new personality he’s getting. I’d rather wait until after his debut to explain why he got a last minute character overhaul, but I will say while this decision is making his debut a little hard to figure out, I’ve thought of some fun ideas for his future appearances that I hope will make it all worth it.

My final villain (for now. I’m not opposed to adding more as I go along) will be someone who will not be introduced until “episode” #20. I think he will stray a lot from the villain of who he’s based, but his debut will have him using the same methods as his WordGirl original. I do plan to foreshadow who this villain will be up until his introduction as a villain, so keep your eyes peeled for clues.

Thank you again so much!

[one-excessive-waffle-story]

The tale of the time I ate waffles out of a solo cup with a chopstick

The time was 12:30 am. The date was July 14, 2019. Though let’s be honest, it was barely after midnight. It was basically still the 13th.

I lay awake in bed, slowly being driven mad by my ever-worsening sleep deprevation and, perhaps more sinister still, the craving for chocolate milk. Finally, I could restrain my desires no longer, and into the kitchen I crept.

Confidently, some may even say brashly, I removed a red solo cup from the stack of identical drinkware. I was all too certain we were in possession of the necessary ingredients. I was the only member of my family who drank milk, so if it were gone I would certainly know, and I knew we yet had some chocolate syrup from when my mother purchased ice cream along with sundae toppings, as the chocolate magic shell she had simultaneously purchased left the syrup completely unused for its original intent.

I removed the syrup bottle from the fridge, pouring a perfect layer of its rich contents into the solo cup. As I returned the chocolate syrup, I was faced with the consequence of my hubris, for I had completely forgotten that, when previously I had partaken of fudge graham cookies from the Dollar Tree, I did indeed drink the last of my milk.

Devastated, my gaze slowly turned to look at the cup I’d left on the counter, doomed to contain chocolate syrup without its bovine byproduct counterpart. I knew I couldn’t simply waste the syrup, but what else could I do with it? I thought of anything I might be able to achieve with the thin layer of chocolate at the base of the cup. I couldn’t drink it, with its low volume and high viscosity I certainly wouldn’t be able to drink all or even most of the syrup, and what’s more, chocolate syrup would be too rich for enjoyable consumption without something to augment the flavor.

A thought: we had frozen waffles. I checked the freezer and sure enough, two waffles remained in the yellow packaging. “I should only need the one,” I thought foolishly, removing one waffle and placing it into the toaster. After a brief wait, I removed the waffle, and placed it atop the cup in an effort not to burn my hands on the freshly heated food.

I looked to the silverware drawer and was relieved to see a plethora of spoons through the clear plastic front; my mother must have done the dishes earlier, which means the lack of forks I’d suffered from earlier in the day would be averted. But alas, for myself from the past was determined to bring ruination on my present predicament, for earlier that very day I’d used the last of the forks that awaited in the dishwasher to be put away.

“I could just use my hands,” I thought, in vain, for even as the thought entered my head I knew it would be fruitless. Just as I could not efficiently drink the syrup for its volume and viscosity, so I could not easily pour it, and the height of the cup meant I could not dip food into it but for a long instrument with which to hold it. The waffle would slip too easily from a spoon held vertically, and a knife would simply be too dangerous to use as an eating utensil.

When all hope seemed to be lost, once more the brilliant lightbulb of ingenuity saw fit to alight within my mind. While we didn’t have forks, I could just as easily skewer pieces of the waffle onto a chopstick! And so I went about my business of tearing apart the waffle, impaling each bite-sized piece upon a wooden chopstick, dipping the piece into the chocolate syrup, and eating the resultant chocolatey delicacy. I had seen myself through this disastrous situation at last!

However, one hurdle remained: even after the whole waffle had been consumed, despite my best attempts, there was still excessive syrup at the base of the cup. Realizing that I had one hope remaining, and that leaving only one waffle in a box of frozen waffles was a massive dick move anyway, I toasted the final remaining waffle, eating it as I had its predecessor, until finally the syrup was sufficiently depleted.

Triumphant, but ultimately even thirstier than I’d been upon resolving to leave my bed and quench my craving, I downed a cup of milk, and returned to bed.

[thederailedtrain]

The Mark of Oblivion: Loose Ends [Three]

Like every other incubus and succubus, Cedric liked his sleep. He needed it to function - even more than humans did. Sex wasn’t the source of his abilities, just the energy he drew from. Sleep, dreams; these were the things were the center of his power. Perhaps even the center of his being. Scientific research into that theory was decidedly slim.

Once, when they’d first started working together, Kira had jokingly likened him to a cat. “Because you would sleep twenty hours a day too if you could,” she explained with a wry smile.

Kira wasn’t smiling now. Cedric wasn’t even sure if she was aware of the expression on her face right now, much less anything else. Loss of attention; one of the major warning signs of sleep deprivation. It shouldn’t have been this severe after only twenty-four hours, but most tables on the subject didn’t factor in magical exhaustion.

However, being an incubus meant Cedric knew what an accelerated time table looked like. Moreover, he knew how to deal with it. A spell was out of the question. Kira was using every ounce of neutral magic she had left to keep the Mark sealed. Enough magic that Cedric wasn’t sure he’d know where she was if he couldn’t lay eyes on her. But there was more than one way to lend someone magic.

“Stay right here,” Cedric said. He placed a hand on her shoulder, both to steady her and reassure himself of her presence. “I’m going to brew a potion that should help keep you awake.”

As Cedric turned to leave, Kira nodded in reply. It wasn’t until halfway up the stairs that he heard her voice once more. “Well, it’s not like I’m going anywhere.”

A beat later, Cedric realized she was replying to his last remark. Cognitive delays. That shouldn’t be apparent for another day at least. Cedric took the rest of the stairs two at a time.

When he finally made it back to his apartment, the first thing he noticed was Toni crouched in the doorway of his spare bedroom. “What are you…?” He began, before the answer became apparent. He spotted the chalk in her hands, recognized the runes she was drawing on his floor. A quick peek into the room told Cedric she’d already finished the ones inside. Looked like Toni decided to create the anti-magic and sealing wards the hard way.

“The quicker I get the done, the quicker I get to go home,” Toni explained, focus mainly directed at the floor. “And the quicker I can get the hell to sleep.”

“Theme of the hour,” Cedric muttered under his breath. Toni gave him a rather flat what? and he let out a sigh. “Nothing...I’m going to fix Kira a potion that will keep her awake until we can get this all sorted out. Are you all good here?”

Toni gave him a thumbs-up with her free hand while Gus replied, “Should be!” After sharing a quick nod, Gus turned back to the man he was guarding. Cedric beat a hasty exit before his eyes landed on the other occupant of the room.

“Have fun!” Toni called after his retreating form.

This wasn’t fair, Cedric couldn’t help but think. That after everything she’d been through in the last twenty-four hours, Kira had to deal with this now too. And she would have to continue dealing with it until Cedric worked out a more permenant solution. He already had a few ideas, but right now he needed to focus on making sure he didn’t mess up this potion.

Strictly speaking, he’d never made a potion to keep someone awake and ease the symptoms of exhaustion before. Cedric just threw in any ingredient he hoped would work. Everything from aubergris to coffee grounds found their way into the cauldron. In the end, it was just a sludgy grey-brown mass that was enough for three portions when passed through a sieve. Okay, that gave them about seventy-two hours.

He finished bottling the finished solution just as Toni was completing the sealing wards. Before Cedric could check in, Gus practically jumped into the hallway, letting out a small gasp of surprise. “That anti-magic spell is really weird,” he said, shaking off a chill. His eyes suddenly lit up gold and Cedric watched as he ran a tongue over his fangs, like he was checking if he was still a werewolf.

The moment he was free, Toni closed the circle around the sigil she’d drawn. Magic rippled in front of the door briefly before fading. Cedric couls still feel it there, charging the air with the barest electric hum.

“There,” Toni said, brushing off her hands as she stood. “No living being should be able to pass through this room from either side of the barrier.” She looked up at Cedric. “Please, boss, will you send me home? I’ve racked up so much overtime and my bed gets awfully lonely when I leave it for so long.”

Clever, but it’s wasn’t enough of a distraction. She placed the chalk in her pocket, where Cedric could still see the outline of the talisman. He held out a hand. Toni rolled her eyes, but handed it over without any more complaints. “Did you pick this up from Dustin?” Cedric asked, examining the object while it was dormant for this first time.

“Oh, he and I go way back,” Toni grinned. “I met him through Jasper even before he joined the Harbingers. Never liked that asshole, though.” She waited just long enough for Cedric to open his mouth in reply before adding, “So I have a night shift and I’d like to at least take a nap before-”

“Not so fast.” Cedric held up a hand. “Even after I get these potions to her, someone still needs to watch over Kira. And,” he added quickly, that hand rising again in anticipation of Toni’s protest. “You’re the only one who can use transference quickly enough if something goes wrong.”

The look on Toni’s face might’ve gotten a laugh out of him were the situation not so dire. “You expecting me to hang around here until Kira can stop herself from blowing shit up? I have a life outside this. Calling out of work tonight’s gonna be enough drama. How long is this gonna take?”

Cedric was barely able to hold himself back from saying something he’d regret. Sleep deprevation was not a good look on him. And he had to remember this was something they were all going through together - even if his demonic nature was making this a little harder on him. Only a little. “Look, you’ll still be able to get to your job tonight,” he said once he’d calmed down. “I only need you for the next few hours while I run an errand. Then you can take that nap you were hoping for.”

Okay, he might have still been a little testy. In any case, it still seemed to cool Toni’s protests. She shut her lips tightly, shaking her head.

“Alright, fine. Where’re you headed?” Toni sighed, but didn’t say anything more.

“I know an enchantress. She has a shop not too far from here and it should be open today. I was planning on making a surprise visit,” Cedric explained.

“Oh, you’re talking about Ravid, right?” Toni asked.

Cedric had to blink away his surprise. He nodded, unsure of what else to say. Then again, Toni had presumably been operating in the Otherworld for years before their paths had recently crossed. Maybe it wasn’t such a shock that she knew one of the most prestigious talisman-crafters in his Ward.

“And do you need me for anything?” Gus spoke up. Cedric found himself having to refocus his eyes to get a better look at him. Gus had been so quiet, he nearly forgot he was there. “I can, you know, guard Mill or whatever.”

“You don’t think my seals are airtight?” Toni spun around to face him. It could’ve been an accusation, but all Cedric felt from her tone and body language was teasing. Interesting.

Gus wound up floundering anyway. “No, I- I just…” He trailed off, suddenly slouching. Until that moment, Cedric hadn’t realized just how tired he looked. “Kira’s my bloody best friend. I can’t just stand here while everyone else helps out. I have to do something.”

Ah, so that’s what this was about. “Well, you’re welcome to join me when I go out,” Cedric suggested. He could sense Gus perk up. The werewolf nodded enthusiastically. “Alright, let’s run these downstairs, shall we?”

While Gus ran ahead and Toni followed behind, Cedric found himself hanging back. This whole time, he’d managed to avoid looking into the room right next to him. Now, without anyone else to focus on, it was all he could think about.

He could feel Mill in the other room. Maybe he was just paranoid and hypersensitive - the anti-magic barrier had cut off all his sensing abilities - or maybe Mill was staring at him. Cedric couldn’t bring himself to turn around and check. Just the thought twisted his gut. Yeah, it was probably for the best that he didn’t.

Breathing in deeply, Cedric forced himself to unclench his fists and begin the trek downstairs.

Along the way, his eyes caught his reflection in the mirror hanging by the door. Well, he’d certainly looked better. His hair was beginning to fall out of the coif he’d styled it into the day before and his beard...This was normally the day he shaved. Tomorrow, then.

The thing that Cedric focused the most time on were his eyes. There were the beginnings of dark circles under each, but that wasn’t what concerned him. He got as close as he could to the mirror, desperately searching his irises for any trace of red. No, still blue.

Thank the gods, Cedric thought, sighing audibly as he leaned his head against the mirror. Only another couple hours, he reminded himself, and then he could sleep again. The cravings hadn’t started yet. He had time.

Pulling himself upright again took more effort than Cedric was willing to admit. He gave himself another once over in the mirror, nodding reassurance to his reflection. However, as he did, another image came to mind. The vampire coven they’d seen on Kira’s accidental first Otherworld mission; no whites left in their eyes, every tooth pointed and dagger-like. Cedric tried not to think about his own eyes looking the same.

For Kira, Cedric reminded himself as he made his way to the shop’s basement. If nothing else, you have to do this for Kira.

By the time he got to the door, he could hear voices coming from the other side. “No way! Is that from when you blew everything up earlier?” It sounded like Gus.

“That’s my best guess,” came Kira’s response.

When Cedric made it in, he found everyone gathered around something in Kira’s hands. Once he was close enough, he realized it was her phone. By the time he was standing amongst them, he realized what had grabbed their attention. The device looked thoroughly fried.

He looked up from the phone and found its owner already staring back at him, expectant. Kira looked better than when he’d seen her last, but she still didn’t seem like her usual self. Full of life, confident, glowing-

Cedric erased the thought from his mind and focused instead on the reason he’d come down in the first place. “I made these for you,” he said, handing the vials to her.

“They’ll keep me awake?” Kira asked, inspecting the potion contents.

“That’s the intention,” Cedric replied. “And, hopefully, mitigate any ill effects of sleep deprevation. Just take one every twenty-four hours.” He paused to wince. “It...probably won’t taste great.”

“I was a freshman once upon a time. I’ve probably had worse,” Kira shrugged, opening one. She plugged her nose and downed the contents like a shot of cheap tequilla. The next second, she was coughing, which managed to draw laughs from the room’s other two occupants. “Nevermind. Forget I said anything.” When she stopped, she looked up at Cedric once more. “Thank you.”

Already he could see some of the light returning to her eyes. Cedric thanked the gods once again. “It was no trouble,” he assured her. “Now, I have to run out and see if I can find a more permenant solution. Toni will stay with you to make sure you’re okay.” Said ex-Harbinger gave an unenthusiastic wave. “But if there’s anything you need in the meantime - from your apartment or wherever - don’t hesitate to let me know.”

“Thank you, Cedric. Really,” Kira repeated, offering him a smile.

Tired and beaten down as she was, Cedric could still get lost in the curl of her lips. Could stay there for hours if he let himself. All he wanted was a moment alone with Kira, without Gus and Toni for a peanut gallery, but he knew that wasn’t a smart decision and they needed to get a move on besides.

Instead, Cedric told himself to be content with a nod in reply. Then he turned to Gus, gesturing towards the door. Gus didn’t need to be told twice. He took off running up the stairs with goodbye and a wave thrown over his shoulder.

But Cedric couldn’t bring himself to leave so casually. He had to say something. He made it to the bottom step before turning around. “We won’t be gone long,” Cedric promised, hesitating while he tried to figure out something more substantial to leave them with. “Just...stay safe.” He turned around, hurrying up the stairs before he really did get lost down there.

Gus was already at the door once he made it into the shop itself. All of the battle participants who had been nursing their wounds in the lobby had since gone home. He bounced between his feet, like a jogger stopped at a streetlight. Sometimes, that eager attitude of his was contagious.

“A moment, please,” Cedric chuckled, grabbing his coat from the end of the counter where he’d placed it earlier. He shrugged it on as he made his way over.

“Lead the way, boss,” Gus said, following behind as the pair made their way out onto the street. The bells above jingled twice before the door closed behind them.

It was still early, but the sun had already risen enough to fully brighten the street and cut though the early spring chill. This is just about when the shop is supposed to open, Cedric couldn’t help but think. He turned back around, but the lights of the shop were still off. It was unlikely they would be on before the following morning. Guilt wedged a knife into the space below his ribs. He was failing in his duties as a Warden.

Only by the time they made it to the end of the street was Cedric finally able to tear his eyes away. He had to do this, he reminded himself. Not just for Kira, but for the Otherworld as a whole. He had a duty to them and he would honor it. But this really was all about Kira, wasn’t it?