…

“Stay away from him,” Laurence hissed, tugging at Damian’s left arm with a meagre amount of strength. The aloof, lackadaisical student cranes his head, having to look up at the lanky specimen of tender, tremulous flesh, of whom had begun to shake, with perhaps anger or fear. In Damian’s decried apathy, he had not been able to distinguish which.

Perhaps it started from when he was young. Anguish, yes, was an emotion Damian often had felt. With the abandonment of his father and with the death of his mother he was trapped in a scalping loop of it. The endless waves of misery, crashing against his senseless form like a tsunami. It was something he became acquainted with, something he danced with on nights as gentle as this. Few else looked. Dashes of incredulous fury, perhaps, a soft, corrosive wrath and then that misery again. And again and again. Something else formed one day. Encased around his heart like a placid layer of ice. Some sort of dreary apathy. A sort of nothing that left him breathless. No regard for the world, he had, sometimes. In those times he had been the worse, he thinks. Stolen like it was for the chase. Shouted like it was for the adrenaline. And cut like it was… Damian shakes his head. That sort of disregard was dangerous, wasn’t it? He would not know. And he never would. In the future, he would find comfort in the looming abyss set upon his heart. That expulsion of feeling would be all that kept him from killing those around him, from going beastly and gnawing at the flesh of those before him. Micolash is so beautiful. Would he look as pretty strung from his guts..?

Laurence’s idle, wasteful threats did not deter Damian from watching Micolash. He just resolutely does so from farther. While quieter. (While hungrier.) Micolash flourishes without him, teaching a new band of students beneath the apprehensive eyes of the sane ones around him. Provost Willem, in particular, is wearily disapproving of this newfound mentorship Micolash has been thrust into. His ideas are dangerous, Willem had grumbled. His mind not yet matured, Willem had grumbled. With a heavy heart, he is still sick, Willem had grumbled. Damian watches Micolash laugh boyishly at something one of the students say, eyes twinkling with a darkened hue of asinine passion. Damian could not disagree with Willem. Micolash is terribly ill. Damian can feel his heart flutter in his chest. A smile blooms on his slender face. Micolash grips his head as he cheers, enthused by something mystical and unreal, eyes welling up with special tears (surely meant for Damian’s eyes alone, at this moment.) The students around Micolash roar, emboldened by the hearty rally of the insane man, inspired by the unabashed horror before them, not at all comprehending but all too willing to be subservient for such a fool. In the future, none but Damian would be comprehensible enough to regret becoming so infatuated by Micolash’s idea. Looking at the creature before him bellow, Damian could understand it, truly, he could. When you watch someone so irreparably sing falsehoods, it was hard to deny the charisma of it. In the future, Laurence, Willem, and Micolash would all be sordid, tremendous examples of such a concept. You could preach blasphemy with enough beauty— enough of this. Damian breathes in the sight of Micolash. Micolash is so, so beautiful.

It had taken a few weeks after Micolash had recovered for Damian to muster up enough courage (empathy) to face Micolash. Many words began to entangle themselves deep within the crevasses of his throat, many of a disturbed variety. He wanted to admit he had been watching Micolash. He wanted to cry into Micolash’s arms. He wanted to laugh at him. With everyone … Damian tries to tear the mildewed thoughts from his ephemeral head, instead allowing a soft quiet to encompass his harrowing form. He knocks once. Twice. Or was it thrice? Micolash’s door creaks open and there stood the passing enigma. Damian feels the beautiful poems of haunted love die within his soured mouth at the loutish, sedative sight of his muse, his (dear) friend. He could count every eyelash. Every blemish on the surface of his friend’s brooding skin. He could count on his hands the amount of times he’s made Micolash cry. When confronted with such a heavenly face (starved to shackled bones, looking rotted, at times), Damian often felt aptly silenced, oppressed by the skewed, comforting image in his head. “Micolash,” he begins, head bowing in respect (or was he acting?), eyes fitted to the floor. “I know I’ve done you wrong. I have. Please, won’t you..? Forgive me, I’ve not meant any of this, I..” a sudden clarity tramples all the thoughts in Damian’s lamenting head. If Micolash were to cast him aside, he would have nothing. No education. No prestige. No.. he.. he wouldn’t have Micolash, most importantly. (Why did that not cross his mind? When he dared to laugh? How dare he? Why, when he gazed upon Micolash’s rancid vulnerability had he laughed? Conspiring with all the other twisted beasts of Byrgenwerth? What had become of him? Once, he had been kind. Once, he had been young. Once, he was starving.) Damian feels his heart grow heavy. “I’m sorry.. I’m sorry, I..”

“..What are you on about?”

It had grown serious. He could not remember the date, at times, and often he would find himself staring into a vacuous space for hours on end, unable to truly comprehend what was before his eyes, veiled so gently by tear-stricken spires of black eyelashes. Sometimes, Micolash would think himself back there again. He pictures it so deeply, the sensation culling over his humanistic skin, coddling him in a deepened comfort. Come back to us, they would whisper. Come back, they say. To your true home, his eyes grow irreparably soft, to us, Micolash, to me, she says (something wondrously odd that perhaps he forgot long ago, when he was born, when they all were. How shall he forget this time? He solemnly pries the temptation from his mind. To fling himself to the ocean. To join her. To join them. To go home). Days bleed heavy and Micolash cannot find himself entertained by the current stream of humanity he surrounds himself with. The disillusioned, enchanted hoards of students that infatuate themselves with his wasteful ideals of harrowing madness. At first it had sent his heart asunder, fluttering, with a gored tenderness; but now, as his eyes stare blankly at his lecture, he cannot find himself whimsied by the dreary state of human skin and bedazzled eyes. For what, could compare to her? She smiles, with her single row of jagged, suckling teeth, her cacophony of eyes shredding into his memories. Micolash, enthralled by her disfigured beauty watches her, not noticing that a student has taken note of his lack of vision and has guided him to the epicentre of the room, the equator of their hungered, escaping gazes, gently pushed into a wooden, ratty chair. Micolash watches her. The students watch Micolash, desperately hoping to see her reflected off his eyes. The students watch in wonderment, leaning in and whisking themselves away into the faint whispering of Micolash, host of the daydream. “..the Great Lake of Mud.. the, ah, the..?” The students hold each other’s hands and wring their heads lower, in prayer, hoping to inspire her to impart her name. “What was that..? A little louder, once more?” One student begins to cry, wishing so desperately for the prophet to succeed (so she may leave, so they all could. To escape the horrible dichotomy of being alive, of being conscious. For what could be a fate worse than birth?). “…I hear you! I hear you! I- I- Open my eyes! I heard you, back then, in the water! When I drowned! It was you! My child, the bearer of my miseries! Rom!” Silence. The one student who had been crying hiccups. The world tears into sobs. Rom, Rom, Rom, they chant. Bring us to the Great Lake of Mud, won’t you?

“You cannot dismiss me, Master Willem! What is the meaning of this?” Micolash looks at his Provost in scandalized shock, an acute anguish beginning to retract off his darkened orbs of blinding, mindless sight. The Provost flinched at the look of the scalding, quiet betrayal.

“It was not my decision, Micolash. I am simply honouring the request of your parents. They wish as we do,” Laurence, hiding, feels some tears cling to his waterline. “For your recovery. You are.. sick.” Willem sounds flawed at that moment, vulnerable in the shame he expresses. “They will send you to a safe place for you to recover. Until you are well, I’ve no choice but to suspend you…”

Micolash stares, wizened eyes turning a curled shade of quivering rage. “Suspend? Me?” Something odd thrums in his chest, beating like a war drum. Micolash is seething, he realizes. “How.. how dare you! Sick? You liken me to those who are sick? To those bloodthirsty vermin in the wards? To those maddened bastards sent to the gallows? To those irreparable defilements locked in cages because their families are too scared to tend to them?” There is a lucid sneer writ upon Micolash’s grim features, gaunt and impossible. His lips tingle with the need to smile. “I.. I am in disbelief over your naivety.. me? Sick? No, no, I’ve never been in such a state! I can hear her! Don’t you get it? She sings to me! Finally… after all I prayed for! To be brilliant, to be special, to be.. loved. Finally, she whispered to me! Yet you and that harlot and that drunkard wish to send me away? From my students? From my.. from.. ooh, what was it again? No, no, you can’t! I will not stand for it.. I will not! If you will not harken in my new world, then you are not welcome in it.. I will not let you! I will not have her taken from me! You would sooner have to rip her out from my eyes! You greedy monster! You, you! Ooh, she whispered! So loud, I could hear it..! Hahah! What was it again? My dream.. it’s so close..” his eyes fog and Damian watches with a snide smile, waiting with a baited breath for the maladaptive daydreamer to escape from this reality with him. To run away with him. “Provost Willem, why am I..? Ooh, I can’t recall.. ah! Suspend! Me! There shall be no nightmare large enough to contain a mind so sullen! You think to send me away? Just try to catch me!” With feet as light as raindrops and feathers, Micolash runs, followed quietly by Damian, his students, and a dream (and something in his mind that, faintly, began to scream). Laurence, whom had been listening in, clutches something in his hand and cries, softly. Willem does not give chase. The moon hangs silent, accompanied by the piano-steps of the madman of Byrgenwerth.

Laurence had been apprehensive but would soon approach Micolash; one day, accompanied by no one and nothing but the idle fall of snow outside, the frigidity clinging to the windows, the white dusting the ground near blinding. Micolash does not seem lucid enough to respond when Laurence calls out, gingerly; such a thing prompts Laurence to hesitate, perhaps, but he does not. For there was something secret happening to him. As Micolash’s mind rotted, as did Laurence’s heart. No sympathy remained, at times. Not for the strange folk of the ocean town, not for the admiring peer among the sea of students, and none for the future and the experiments that would one day end the world. Hesitate, he does not, his justly concern outweighing the little decorum or tact he usually beheld. He shed a fanciful skin of preening feathers and shows a lustrous coat of rustic skin. “Micolash,” he begins, salacious voice dragging into the cold room, dusting the book shelves that surrounded them. “I.. meant to speak with you much earlier, I admit. I wanted to speak about,” he looks at Micolash, for all that the martyr was and will be; perhaps the only one capable of such. “You, Micolash.” The individual in question looks up, eyes covered in a moulded fuzz of passive recollection, remembrance fickle amidst his darkened, harkening gaze. Laurence feels ill. “I.. I am sorry we drifted apart. I am, truly. You are struggling right now,” Micolash’s eyes get a bit colder, absorbing the frost from beyond the veiled windows behind him. “You have been for so long. I’m.. I’m sorry I did not recognize such. You needed someone to guide you. To not exploit or push forth a position that was unbecoming of you. Now look at you. Nothing but a figurehead for those.. vermin.” When Laurence speaks, he does not do so with malice, no matter how disillusioned he may be by the subject matter. He remains tender and deeply sullen, in light of Micolash’s plight. “Micolash.. if I’m honest, I came to beg you. Do not refuse your parent’s wishes. You are sick. Deathly so. Do not let me watch you die. You.. I.. we’ve been together for so long. I’ve been so deeply enchanted by you for what must’ve been centuries. Micolash, you had been my light as I outgrew my frugal life in everlasting grace. Only you. There is not a day that goes by that I do not recall the fondness I beheld for that look in your eyes. The one you had whenever you had an epiphany of sorts. Brighter than the sun, it was. Micolash..” Laurence drops to his knees. Micolash’s eyes widen a tad, still murky and cold but beginning to gleam with something tangible and comprehensible. “I’ve not seen that look in you for so long! We are losing you! I am losing you! To that sickly daydream you’ve tapered yourself to; the one that’s been devoured again and again by your demented hoard of students. By that manipulative bastard: Damien! Don’t you see? Look at me, Micolash! Look at me and hear me well! This is not your destiny. Little do men exist that can match your conniving, beautiful mind. How can you be contented to throw it all away? How can you be so spirited by such a fantastical lie? There is no Rom. There will be nothing awaiting you in that everlasting sea… look at me. Don’t I matter to you? Your- your mother, think of her! You likened her to a harlot; who put such ugly words into your head? That was not your voice, was it..? Please, tell me, was it? I was your dearest friend for so long wasn’t I? In deepest nights, we cried together. When your father’s petty torment grew too much for you to bare, I was there to console you! Not some heretical nightmare; I am real, Micolash! I am real! If you do not wish to be sent away, it’s okay! I will be willing to convince Provost Willem to allow you to stay if you promise me.. give up your dream. This horrible dream that has got you so dearly carried away.. abandon it, and find companionship with Ludwig and I.. continue your studies and become the brilliant scholar we all knew you were destined to be.. Micolash, please..”

His heart felt dreary and heavy, especially as he gazed upon the barely conscious look upon his dear friend’s face. That look of confusion and misrepresentation. As if still locked away in that daydream. It made Laurence sick. He reaches out, perhaps for his own comfort, gripping Micolash’s too thin hands… “Stay with me.. don’t abandon me, please..” Laurence has long since began to cry. “I need you here.. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.. I could not comprehend why you jumped and I shied away! I could not understand the anguish that plighted you and the insanity that has marred you! I will recast all my sins and help you, even if it is too late for me..” the small town, by the ocean.. “Micolash.. why won’t you look at me..?” He pulls Micolash’s hands to his forehead and quivers, gently weeping, darkened eyes culling with a rumbling misery. His lip shakes and he just wishes, so deeply, so secretly, for his friend back. For some semblance of the man, or perhaps boy, he knew to come back. To comfort him as he had so often did when they were young. When Laurence had felt crushed instead of spirited by the expectations placed on him by his studious parents.. only Micolash had been there to shepherd him through the maelstrom of sadness that had frozen around his heart. He can remember it so very clearly. Laurence, the ever sensitive, would run away to Micolash’s home, in the dead of night or in spite of the day, it would not matter. Once he would arrive, the servants would whisk him away to wherever Micolash would be meandering about at the time; and seeing Laurence in such a stricken state, the young scholar would order his servants (with such a steadfast voice that Laurence had once, secretly, swooned over, taken by the empathetic, willful, protective tone of his friend, truly dazzled by being so cared for,) to bring sweets and tea and to not disturb them for at least an hour, lest they be punished (Laurence had witnessed it once before. A new servant had disturbed their quiet time. Had caught Micolash personally brushing the tears away with his slender hands. Had bore witness to the intimacy in the young scholar’s touches. Laurence had felt shamed and thus, Micolash felt acutely annoyed, prompted by the still miserable look upon his friend’s face. He had stood up and straightened his back, still not too tall but tall enough to not strain his neck looking the servant in the eyes. Micolash thoroughly berated the worker, voice emblazoned and cruel, carrying little sympathy for the individual before him. The servant would promptly be fired, never again to find a place in the manor.. much to Laurence’s silent delight.), for certain. In the hour presented, Micolash would listen, would console, and would caress Laurence. His embrace had been so warm.. so tender and so lively, just for him. Micolash had been so tangible then. But now, he roams like a ghost, in Laurence’s mind, it felt like. It hurt him, deeply. To know he had squandered their friendship, it seemed, and perhaps this was his fault.. Micolash should’ve never left him. Left him on that boat and left him for that idle dream.. “Micolash.. look at me.. please..? Won’t you just look at me? Truly, at me! I miss you.. I miss you so much. Not this fiction that has stumbled into your body! It’s not you! Whatever mottled illusion that has begun puppeteering your form, it’s not you! It can’t be, please! Come back to me! Just look at me; why won’t you see me, properly? Micolash.. Micolash..” his shoulders shook as he sobbed, blubbering out all sorts of words, hoping one of them may stick. Micolash stares, oblivious to it all. Laurence, selfishly, wishes Micolash had succeeded. All those days ago. When he had jumped. “Micolash..”

“Laurence? Laurence, is.. is that you?” The would-be vicar’s eyes widen. He looks up and finds Micolash is looking back at him. Not quite aware but still, doing his best to gaze upon Laurence’s disheartened form. Micolash gets down to his knees as well now too, pulling his hands away from the grip that Laurence had thorned into him to instead wrap around Laurence’s quivering form. “There, there, don’t.. don’t cry.. what’s the matter..? Was it your father again?” Laurence, ever the helpless, can do nothing but cry. “Laurence? Won’t you..? Ooh, it’s alright if you cannot speak. I am here for you.. I swear it. I’ll always be here for you! So you needn’t fray your head with such worries, alright? There, let it out.. it’s alright. Laurence..” the man in question does nothing but sob, taking deep solace in a memory of the past. One that would soon fade, he is sure; but for now, he will take quiet, horrible solace in a future that will never be, wishing so desperately that this embrace was true or was not Micolash at all…

Damian decides to make his presence known much later into the night, slipping into the room quietly, making sure to close the door behind himself. Upon his gaze befalls the visage of Micolash clutching a slumbering Laurence, a wistful smile writ upon his (Micolash’s) paled face, the two locked in an embrace reminiscent of something mythological with its decadent beauty. Damian feels a slithering jealousy warm his head and he stares down at Micolash quietly, the other still not noticing, merely smiling into a space only he could see. The frigid man kneels down, careful not to wake Laurence (ever the nuisance. Laurence had already taken enough of Micolash’s life. It was time for Micolash to move on, Damian thought.), steps light as feathers and movement smooth as water. “Micolash. What are you doing?”

The daydreamer recants a look of clarity on his hungered face and looks up, at Damian. Damian shudders a bit. “Damian.. Laurence wasn’t feeling well,” he rakes a goodly hand through the medical professional’s coarse, raven hair. “I was comforting him.. Are you alright? Did you need help sleeping? Was it too dark..?” Damian tilts his head, rotted mind now comprehending the situation at hand. Micolash was playing pretend, locked in a memory, again. It was alright. Damian, ever the generous and loving friend, would wake Micolash from this delusion (to pull him back into the one he was so very fond of). Damian reached out a scouring hand and brushes his fingers against Micolash’s cheek, noting the dazed, confused look place upon his idle muse’s face. “Damian..?”

“Micolash. I should ask you again; what are you doing?”

“I’m—“

“Pretending?” Micolash’s expression morphs, dropping into something fretful. Damian smiles, sweetly. “You’ve no need for this fiction. For this slumbering memory. You are living the future, Micolash; far beyond what we may hope to perceive. Don’t you remember?” Damian’s voice is seductive in its steadfast, lascivious belief, as if gazing upon a muse of religion. Micolash looks a bit pained. “Shall I speak her name?”

“Whose name? What are you on about?”

“Do not be so coy. May I speak your name? Oh.. her baneful name: Rom, the ever-vacuous, the one whom you’ve grown so bewitched and enchanted with. Do not cast her away. What did he tell you, I wonder?” The hand that had previously been caressing Micolash’s face moves down, now tangling itself in Laurence’s hair. “Did he beg? Cry? Were you so naive as to believe him? What sort of fool would believe a liar like this?” His words are laced with a stringent poison. (The little town, beside the water..) “Micolash, look at me,” (I miss you). “You have grown past him. You are so far beyond; beyond me, easily. You’ve outgrown our students. This school, certainly. You were meant for a greatness that we will never understand. We can only hope, and pray, that you take us with you.. Micolash.. cradled by the stars..” (was that the crying of a child in his mind?) “You are the host. Of our benevolent dream. Do not allow yourself for even a moment to entertain such a wicked lie. It will only hurt you. Haven’t I always protected you..?” (He had laughed, blatantly, at the sight of Micolash falling to the ground. But none shall recant such a fact. Invisible as Damian is. No one would remember it. Certainly not Micolash. Ever the sweetest fool.) “If you continue to slip into these memories, your voice will never reach her’s as she does to you. Would you abandon her?” Micolash’s eyes widen and his grip on Laurence loosens. Damian feels his heart flutter. Such a sacrificial heaven he has chosen to dedicate himself to. “Would you? After she has spent so many nights tirelessly whispering to you?” The words feel numb on Damian’s lips. As if they were not his own. Something like stardust glimmers in his eyes. “Micolash?” The individual in question moves, abruptly, putting Laurence down with a meagre amount of grace, the other stirring at the movement, blearily beginning to flutter his eyes open. Micolash stands, a look of lonely ambition written on his features. “Micolash?” The star-swaddled host looks at Laurence and then at Damian before smiling, laughing about something Damian never knew. He leaves the room, followed by Damian, acutely aware of Laurence calling him back in surprise, voice crackling (whether it was from newfound tears or because he had just awoken, they would never know).

Micolash was born into a distinguished family, bred to be a true scholar. His family was friends with Laurence’s and they had idle sparks of passing fancies during their youth. They would soon fall out as Micolash’s acute delirium began, the over abundance of foggy imagery beginning to drive Micolash insane and, as such, drive his loved ones away from him as well. Except for one. While Laurence, ever the brittle, beloved coward turned his feathered head from the sight of Micolash’s peril, one admirer by the name of Damian would persist in his care of the decaying mind of Micolash.

Damian was a child when he met Micolash. Impoverished and hungered, contented to die on the muddied streets of Yharnam, seeking a peaceful end to his anguish. His mother died young. His father abandoned him. For what could he find purpose in his life? On a rainy day, apt for the dying state of Damian, Micolash would stumble upon the living-corpse and would goad the other, attempting to invoke humour or perhaps spite into the situation. Damian, scorned, would ignore the privileged young boy. Micolash would persist. He runs off to get bread as Damian lays in death, ready to be herded to a dream… Micolash would return and insistently force the other to eat. To live. To stay. Damian would refuse, blatantly, keeping his cracked lips clasped closed. The spoiled boy would not accept defeat. Eventually, Damian would eat, inspired by the tender way Micolash pulls Damian into an embrace, much taller than the other, having not been starved of such nutrients. Micolash asks Damian for his name. Damian has never been asked such a thing. He begins to cry, calling out his own name, sputtering from how dry his throat was. He wanted to live. Just a little longer … just to feel this embrace a bit more…

Laurence does not respond well to Damian and vice versa. They both tolerate each other’s presence with a salacious, brewing, embittered fury just so they may look upon the smile of Micolash, their dear friend. Micolash has a lovely smile. As radiant as the sun, they used to say… Damian was placed in Micolash’s residence, accepted into the fold of attendants and servants of the imposing manor. The manor rests in the countryside and it’s an unfamiliarity to Damian who was used to the trampling of horses and the shrewd barks of anger that the dogged denizens of Yharnam often yapped. When it’s dark, it’s quiet. It discomforts Damian. He seeks Micolash out. Micolash will form a leering sort-of fond look on his face. He’ll let Damian sneak under his covers and will idly delight in the quiet trust Damian displays when he snuggles into the lanky, scholarly boy’s form.

They go to school together, of course. By his insistence, Micolash’s parents whisk himself and his new companion to the school that Laurence’s father attends to. Laurence, Ludwig, Maria, Gherman, and many more attend this prestigious school and they all set their sights on Byrgenwerth, run by a kind man named Willem. To be called Master Willem, of course. As Laurence and Micolash drift apart, Laurence finds comfort in the tall, imposing figure of Ludwig. Strong and steadfast, tan face painted in a galaxy of harrowing freckles, Ludwig is picturesque of strength and illustrious love, kindled eyes never straying from kindness. They meet in coat closets and gardens and their love blossoms (with all the purposes to rot, in the future) and flourishes and nothing is more beautiful than the raven-haired, brittle visage of Laurence, long locks of liquorice hiding the kiss he delivers unto Ludwig’s lips. Micolash is happy for them. Damian looks at Micolash and stews, silently jealous of such a courtship. Was Micolash avoidant of his feelings on purpose? Or was he simply too passive in his advances? Either way, Damian would feel some of his love rot in his heart, as he watched Micolash, from farther than his mind could handle, something possessive beginning to take hold …

When Micolash comes back from the ocean, he’s not the same. Damian noticed it the first day; of course, everyone did as well. Micolash’s once perfumed gaze was blurred, eyes filled with a fluttery sorts of course, dead, looming looks. As if they had fogged up completely, blind … his hands would not stop shaking and he could not look someone in the eyes proper, merely keeping his gaze to the floor while muttering something that Damian could never quite hear… Micolash was not the only one to return in such an impoverished, odd state. Plenty of others that had been aboard the ship had matched Micolash’s colour of strange, some more so than others. Micolash would be the only one not sent (locked) away, at the insistence of Willem. His potential, was what Willem had said. Micolash is a budding rose. Roses come with thorns but that does not detract from their beauty.. right?

Micolash and the others had been at sea for 7 months. As such, quite a few changes had been instilled. Notably, plenty had dropped out and plenty of others had joined their ranks. Micolash and Gherman, both of whom had been on that voyage, slowly became rumours in those 7 months. Their faces faded from human memory. When they returned, the campus was irked by the sudden state of Micolash. They were disappointed. It starts like that, at least. Some of the younger students approach Micolash and Micolash’s kind nature had not died at sea. He attempted to answer inquiries of all sorts. The students found it funny how he stumbled over his words. But not funny as endearing but rather…

It starts off with someone tripping Micolash as he heads to the front of the classroom to start a presentation. Quiet laughter blooms in the room as Micolash, brittle, sweetened Micolash, crashes to the floor, looking miffed as to what happened. Damian stares at the (ugly) cute look on Micolash’s face. Confused. Humiliated. And slightly hurt. Damian finds it a bit funny. He put a hand over his mouth and snickered into his fingers, a bit ashamed and a bit amused. Micolash does not notice. Damian dares to laugh louder. Micolash gets up, brushes himself off and continues to walk. Someone kicks at the back of his heels, causing him to fall backwards this time. The class erupts in unbridled, animalistic, youthful laughter. Damian can’t help the way his smile reaches from cheek to cheek. He couldn’t help the bumbling laughter that spews from his cold lips. Really, he couldn’t… if you had saw Micolash, wouldn’t you laugh too? Look at his face! He’s crying! He’s crying! The class keeps laughing, the sound of the professor furiously demanding they quiet falling upon deaf ears. Micolash sits on the floor for a bit, dazed, acutely aware he is, at that moment, alone. Not entirely, something whispers in his head. He wants to rip it from beneath his skin. He gets up again. He walks forward. He falls.

How could he? How dare he? After all Micolash had done for him… he… Damian stares down at the bandaged figure of Micolash, the bruised thing hardly breathing. The students said it was an accident. Some students say he jumped. Damian stares at Micolash, face blank. Would he..? Some say he was pushed. Some say Micolash had slipped in a drunken stupor. Others say he was sleep-walking. Laurence is crying at Micolash’s bedside. Damian, pressed against the wall, can’t even muster a tear. Some say they saw someone push him. From the highest point of Byrgenwerth, Micolash did fall, in all the ways he could. Laurence bares an unsightly voice, sobbing girlishly, beautifully, as if acting out a somber role. He is not pretending. Ludwig sits beside Laurence, rubbing the shoulder of the wailing figure with a haunted look on his face. Laurence is pulled up beside Micolash on a wooden stool, head buried in his arms which are fitted onto Micolash’s brittle (starved) chest, hair interlocking between the sheets. Damian’s mouth is dry. Would he..? Damian looks at the peacefully dead look on Micolash’s face. Micolash does not look fretfully deluded. He does not look confused or kind. He looks eternally at peace. Like a corpse. Damian fancies it, a bit. Maybe it was a welcome change from the insanity that had begun to tarry Micolash’s features. The insanity that began to age his (dear) friend. Maybe this was alright. Micolash’s chest rises and drops, slow. Laurence cries harder. Damian feels the strangest tingle of a smile begin to build on his narrow face (this will be the first time Damian finds himself infatuated with something dying. It will not be the last.)

When Micolash recovers, the world is neither sympathetic or slow. He stares as the world goes by. Laurence visits often, he thinks. He can’t recall much from the time he had been healing. He remembers crying. Someone is apologizing to him… he can’t remember much of anything. He looks outside, watching the leaves fall. Snow begins to dust and line the decaying grass. By the time he heals, it is summer. It feels like days had gone by, his mind vacuous and quiet, occupied only by little, gentle whispers. Something that pulls him back home. To the ocean, it (or perhaps they) says. They miss him terribly. On the third day after he had been granted permission to return to his dreary dorm someone comes to visit him. It’s a younger student. A young lad with curly brown hair and warm eyes, not dissimilar to the colour of finely crafted beer. The student looks to Micolash, staring wordlessly (or perhaps helplessly) as the older student simply stares at the other, eyes a simple blank, knotted into a twisted empty. The student introduces himself. Micolash cannot remember his name. He will never remember the student, in the distant future, only a flurry of hushed whispers. “You’re Micolash, aren’t you? I.. I read some of your work. The stuff you’ve gotten written while on ya’ voyage.. no one read it proper, you know? It’s incredible, truly. I showed it to my friends! They were amazed.. you’ve got somethin’ special in that head of yours. Won’t you..” he does not look Micolash in the eyes. “Oh, won’t you teach us? Tell us more? About the ‘cean,” Micolash’s eyes widen. “About the little.. whisperin’ things you described! About the shapes..” like his suicide attempt, Micolash jumps into this newfound opportunity; with a smile on his face.

Damian is surprised to see Micolash in the library. Unofficially, Micolash had been deterred from his studies, Willem constantly putting off giving Micolash any work. Micolash was still fragile, Willem had intoned. Micolash’s parents wouldn’t like their boy going into so much work while ill, Willem had intoned. Micolash isn’t right, Willem had intoned. None dared question the headmaster, most who were privy to the halfhearted explanation having been entirely accepting of this situation, for Micolash’s sake or not. Laurence wished for Micolash to be safe. Ludwig felt uncomfortable looking at Micolash. Maria and Gherman both were disapproving, silently, stoically of the restrictions. Damian supposed he didn’t mind either way. Damian had drifted far from his friend, he supposed. Checking up, quietly, had become habitual. He was not stalking the other, he supposed. Speaking of the other.. Damian looks, a bit aghast at the sight. Micolash is standing on a table, surrounded by a flurry of students. Damian counts 36, the bushes of varieties of hair making it inconvenient to gauge how many were truly present. The students look enthralled, eyes sparkling, quietly, with a pursuing intrigue, gazes decorated with a befuddled, lustre of wonderment. Damian finds himself staring, blatantly, eyes wide. Micolash is enthusiastically weaving together all sorts of words and shapes and ideas and thoughts with his gingerly mouth, eyes radiant as the sun. So radiant it was blinding. Damian feels his eyes become murky with tears at the familiarity. Micolash dances along the table, describing something about a creature he was not quite familiar with. A slug of sorts. The students lean in closer. Damian is on his toes, peering close, venerable eyes stitching their gaze into the form of his muse. Micolash is beautiful, Damian thought. His heart twists with something horrible. Micolash is beautiful.