#brilliantanddeviant

Alternative enters the room cautiously, surreptitiously glancing out the window to see Backup, squaring off with a tree...

Relieved to be alone, A nearly startles when the mass of pink catches his attention. For a brief instant he doesn't recognize what it is perched on his pillow, roughly the size of his open palm.

His exhausted blue eyes settle on its dusty pink petals that furrow out indolently against his tightly made bed with a mix of consternation and an unsteady warmth.

Somehow, this is meant to intimidate

Alternative never receives flowers-- things here are never as they appear, they're never delivered without a subliminal menace.

He remembers giving Backup white lilies from the meadow when they were children and the threat me felt after seeing the boy's face light up with recognition of advantage he had just been handed.

He takes it between his fingers and knows that peace offerings don't exist in places like this and he can only fathom this coming from one place, Caustic... Not wanting to give the pernicious little sociopath the pleasure of seeing him keep it, he acts on his first instinct to throw it away.

But, something about it laying so innocently lovely in the discarded trash, a casualty of a feud between inimical teenagers bothers him...

The sight of it reminds him of something uncomfortable within himself that he's not ready to recognize and he takes it back out before putting it in a vase Backup had yet to plant a specimen in.

Alternative gaze shifted with a flick of his lashes and did not hesitate, "The snake that eats its own tail."

A small, derisive smile forms.

...

Probably the time between the loss of consciousness and waking, everything is so thoroughly, mercifully b l e a c h e d ...

My accountability is entirely expunged, ... none of what takes place between those two definitive points is my fault~

[A sets a smoldering gaze on Backup]

Nothing can reach deep enough to find me there.

━Not even pain can find me,

not needles or broken bones,

not regrets,

[The startled gasp tore out of his throat before he could retain it behind his teeth. His lips thinning in annoyance, he shot a baleful glare at Backup over the sleep starved shadows rimming his eyes.]

[It drew the attention of his peers and the question hung between them— Will you take it laying down?]

Today was the first time they had shared lunch in years, a shaky attempt to resolve the incivility he felt towards the other for the threat he posed. Psychologists might call it ‘Reaction Formation’ but he called it tactical necessity, if only to pacify the tempting predilection for quid pro quo. Evidently, Backup had no such intentions of restraining himself for the sake of a threadbare peace. He was well pleased to sleep next to a seething Alternative who would bide his time and strike only when it was most opportune— or he was left without options.

[Alternative let his tray drop to the table, the way he would a heavy book to the desk surface where B attempted to take a furtive nap.]

"That's it- I've had it with you!"

Alternative sets a withered look on him and says nothing, his lips remain still as he just stares at him like he is gazing into an unsatisfying future.

You're wrong. I'm not sick because I went outside, I'm sick because you make me so unwell that I want to crawl out of my skin.

"..."

I didn't know what to do when I want to strangle you and scream sometimes. What would I even do when I get my hands around your throat? Squeeze down? Kill you-? What then?

"You better not disappoint me, I expect only your best efforts." Alternative rasps, feeling like absolute hell but the weakness does not diminish the writhing anger. His gaze drifts off to an unadorned wall, he appears to be in a feverish fuge.