An old friend, or something of the sort had taken up residence in Corinth Bay. They hadn’t spoken in centuries, but she’d stumbled across some of his photography and found herself... Intrigued. He’d been so young when they met, they both were. She’d changed, Emma wanted to see if Jamie had too. The knock that she makes on the door is light, loud enough to be heard but soft enough to remain polite. Almost stupidly Emma found herself smoothing down the front of her shirt as if something like that would even matter after all this time. The man that greets her isn’t Jamie, but based off of the clothes and rather shabby demeanor he almost looked like her ex-boyfriend in miniature. “Hi, um-” Emma suddenly felt incredibly awkward. “is Jamie here?” 

A couple weeks ago they were all talking about living together, Micah had been kidding himself into thinking that everything he’d been doing wouldn’t come to a head. He was out of the hospital now, but the feelings of uselessness and hopelessness were as crushing as ever. The only place Micah really wanted to go to now was Void, but he’d made promises not to do that anymore. The police program had kicked him out, apparently not being in good physical health was enough of a reason for them. They said to come back when he was well again, and maybe he would, but part of him thought he should just skip town. “I get if you don’t want anything to do with me anymore,” Micah shrugged, “I know I screwed up, but that’s what I do. I fuck things up, everything I touch just... breaks. So, this is me giving you an out. I can go if you want me to.”

Hi there! Aziz Al-Hamed, at your service. What can I help you with?

@askoctoberhare

“I love you.” Micah’s tired voice whispered as his heart hammered loudly in his chest, the shifter’s lips pulled away from Emory’s as Toby’s fangs dislodged themselves from Micah’s neck. “Both of you.” He added sheepishly before he collapsed between the two of them, Toby could heal him in a minute, for now he just wanted to bask in the afterglow with his boyfriends. Tiredness and fatigue ran familiarly through his body, Ptolema had been gone for a month at this point, there was still not line on how to kill Medusa for real, Apep was doing fuck knows what, and even now Micah found himself thinking of death. Found himself feeling like a failure, his features were still, and his heart beat harder and harder in his chest. His breaths came in short bursts when suddenly he gasped and clutched at his arm as pain shot through him, he tried to say something, to speak, but he couldn’t manage anything. A few grunts came from his lips and then, just as quickly as it had started, it was over. Except, now there was no heartbeat, and there was no breathing, he was gone. 

There was a slew of comics spread out between them as Micah and Toby sat on the bed, the shifter was still in his boxers, hair freshly tousled as he flipped through the glossy pages of one of his favourites. In truth he’d done just about everything that he could to not talk about how painful the two weeks that Toby was gone had been. He didn’t want to get emotional, he didn’t want to break down again, and whenever he tried to reach for those memories he just felt cold. Numb. Toby was back, everyone was back, there was no point in dwelling on the past now. “So uh, I’ve got some good news.” Micah said sheepishly, “Crazy, right?”

The anaconda shuttered from the trees above, Micah absolutely despised Winter, the cold in general but Winter especially because every minute of every fucking day seemed to be frigid and all it did was make him bitter. The air temperature changed and the reptilian shifter caught the scent of a vampire, not in the mood to do anything but fight, Micah prepared to launch before they examined the smell closer and realized that they knew it as distinctly Tobias. Their vision was not great in this form, but their others senses were keenly attuned to hunting and they realized very quickly that Toby wasn’t alone. They didn’t know what had led a werewolf to chase down Toby, but Micah launched himself at the four-legged creature just the same. He coiled around the werewolf and a moment later their neck was snapped and Micah was shifting back into his human form, chest heaving as he looked at Toby. “You okay?”

When Micah got home the next morning Ptolema had cleared everything out. All her clothes, all her things, everything was just gone. He felt... Betrayed, abandoned by the one person he never thought would. She had raised him, trained him, Micah thought that meant she even loved him. He looked at her like she was his mother, but at never once been able to say as much to her face. The shifter felt himself sinking, he’d gone to Void, lost himself there, then stumbled home exhausted and slept for a few days. By the time he looked at his phone and saw the plethora of missed calls and text messages, he had recovered, but still, Micah only felt numb. 

Come over? I told Ptolema about us, she’s gone. 

Micah texted Toby, he’d call Em later but the vampire hadn’t even seen his flat, and while the shifter was now wondering what he was going to do for work, and how he was even going to afford this place. There was something that he wanted even more. He greeted Toby at the door, a tired but languid smile on his lips as he did. “That was fast.”

Micah picked a table in the corner, there was a good view of the stage, less people crowding, and it wasn’t too far from the bar. Toby had promised free drinks though, so the shifter decided he would leave that to the vampire. He figured The Embassy was safe, there was the whole deal with it being spelled against violence, and there was no small part of him that was eager to spend time with the vampire outside of the bedroom, or whatever backroom the two found themselves in before this. “You look good.” Micah commented, he could vaguely remember the last time he was at a Drag Show, Emory was there, that’s how long it had been. “When does it start?”