#evcravens

If he’s honest, his knowledge of baseball is drastically limited. He knows there’s a bat, a ball, and men running from plate to plate like their lives depend on it -- if not their lives, then their salaries. He’s caught a game at the local bar near the place he’s been living out of for the past several months, but beyond that, it’s all gibberish. This raises a question, an impertinent one: why in God’s name would Boris Kovrov go to see a baseball game if he didn’t thoroughly enjoy a game of baseball?

Well, the answer’s fairly simple: Everett Craven.

Craven’s here today, invited on behalf of one of his several business partners, celebrating the aftermath of what Boris can only assume is a deal gone right. He’s all the way up in one of the Empire suites, and that’s where Boris is going now, riding quietly in the elevator with a plastic, too-small-for-its-price cup of beer that he’s sure will be downright awful to the tongue. He finishes it before he reaches the floor with the Empire Suites, and, as a surprise to no one, it’s disgusting. Craven is in suite four, per his sources, and so he strolls right up to door number four with the terrifying-looking security guard in front, earpiece and all. It doesn’t take much: “I’m here for Everett Craven, I need to see him,” in a frantic tone, all Italian, rushed together.

The guard, to his credit, is not some hired hand with the stadium; he must be someone’s personal lackey, since he recognizes that Boris is speaking Italian, and therefore must know that one of several men of the hour inside also speaks Italian. He looks from right to left, grumbles a little bit, gives Boris a make it quick, and Boris rushes in before he has the chance to change his mind. No one pays him any mind once he enters, gathered either by the bar to watch the game on a screen -- even though it’s right there in front of them, because that makes sense -- or speaking in hushed voices about one thing or the other. Boris scans the room, searching, and finally his eyes settle on Craven, sitting down the stairs by the window overlooking the field. They are separated from the masses, here, and even the kitschy-stadium music (take me out to the ballgame) with thousands of drunken patrons doesn’t break through entirely.

001. .   .   .   kills the spider: marcelo would make heloise do it to prove to herself that she can. she’d pick it up, accidentally drop it, and then run in the opposite direction.

002. .   .   .   proposed: neither. heloise’s mom would faint if she found out heloise proposed, and marcelo doesn’t think they’re good enough for her.

003.  .   .   .   kissed the other first: heloise. 

004.  .   .   .   initiates things: heloise. she knows that if she doesn’t, she’ll be waiting forever. marcelo’s too soft with her.

005.  .   .   .   would leave the other: neither.

006.  .   .   .   is more jealous: both for very different reasons. marcelo’s afraid she’ll find someone better, and heloise is afraid they’ll forget her.

007.  .   .   .   is lazier: i feel like neither????

008.  .   .   .   sends weird texts at 3 AM: heloise. marcelo replies with the same emjoi over and over again so she doesn’t feel bad.

009.   .   .   .  is more experienced: marcelo.

010.   .   .   .  said i love you first: both!!! at the same time!!! when they’re in a heated argument AND IT JUST COMES OUT......

          You’re one of us now. 

     It’s a promise and a curse, he thinks. He knows he will prove to be a loyal, capable dog-- passing his initiation, taking his first life had felt like nothing. It had been nothing, not even close to his first actual life, just the first life in service of a new master. He has skills. He still has skills. Battista Tahan is half-mad with his skills, some days, incapable of turning his face from the violence and the blood he’s sworn himself to, sick to his stomach from gorging himself on blood and pills and alcohol. Battista Tahan knows nothing but his skills, knows nothing but taking orders and pulling a trigger. Center mass. Kill shot only, just like he was trained, just as he’s told. 

          It’s nice, he thinks, to get out of the city. 

     It’s nice to remember there’s an entire vibrant world outside of Verona. Some days he can hardly remember anything other than Verona, or other than the hospital in Milan-- sometimes those cities blend together, they blend with Tripoli, with Kabul, with fucking Berlin. The places he’s been to are like a soup in his brain, bits and pieces of flavor that should be so distinct, melted into the rest. He’s never been to Lisbon before, he thinks that’s why he likes it. It’s hot. The city is goddamn hot, and dry, in the dog days of August; at night with the breeze rolling through the docks from the sea, a chill settles at the nape of his neck. 

          You’re one of us now. 

     There’s a relief in being just another cog in the machine again. His head feels so full of static most days he can hardly make himself eat, so it’s a kindness to be taking orders. There’s a relief deep in his troubled bones at the reinstatement of real, physical violence in his life. A reason to toe the line, to drag the weakness out of his bones and stagnant muscle. He’s dragged himself back into shape in recent months, physically at least, because there’s a reason for him to. You’re one of us now. It’s a curse, because he knows now that every offer of shelter and camaraderie comes with a price. Battista Tahan doesn’t mind the work-- quite likes it, actually, he finds it sates the howling parts of him that he’d tried so hard to kill-- but he knows he’s stepped into a pit of snakes, that no one is going to watch the crazy ass’s back but himself. 

     Anyway-- they’re here in Lisbon for a job. On the sea, it’s almost nothing like Verona. Bright stone buildings, terracotta roofing. The docks. They’re in the warehouse district to raid a warehouse. A simple in and out, grab what you can and torch the rest. Iberia is for the Capulets, but is it really? It can be theirs too. He doesn’t care, but the promise of a shot adrenaline and an easy fight means he’s willing enough to play that game. The city is dark, and it’s fallen quiet. 

     It’s a fine plan. They have a good, simple plan, only-- there are more voices than they’d thought would be there. A soft curse, a familiar name. Everett Craven. He almost can’t place it, it’s been so long, but peeking around the corner slams him back to 2001. Fifteen years ago, the easy trust the older teen had had. How his face had gotten splotchy, and his hand had clenched around his glass of Prosecco. I’ll take Craven, Battista volunteers, his voice rolling out of him smooth, confident, and quiet. It’ll be like taking candy from a baby, he thinks to himself, and even better it’s clear that Craven is in charge of the extra men they hadn’t expected. Distract the leader, distract them all. Plans never survive first contact with the enemy. Adapt, adapt, survive.

THESE HALLOWED HALLS ALWAYS MANAGED TO RUN HIS PATIENCE THIN.

While he had attended Mass a few times since his return, while he had visited her countless times for Capulet business, Cyrus Sloane could never really feel at ease in the Cathedral. After a few minutes, he became restless. His neck began to prickle. He found himself fidgeting in his seat.

It was just the dust, he told himself. The building was old, after all, and every surface perpetually seemed to covered in an ash gray smut, smothering its occupants wherever they sat. However, as he glanced at the only other man in the room and felt the biting ache of the new injuries he had collected, he knew that the dust was not all that unsettled him. 

Of course, on some level, it was no surprise that the man who hardly ever missed a Mass felt comfortable within the Cathedral’s musty walls. But, as he took a break from rereading the same line in the paperwork in front of him and watched Everett Craven, an emissary now too (however undeserving), sitting quietly, blissfully free of whatever afflictions Cyrus was enduring, he felt a vicious and irrational animosity rise in the back of his throat. 

How unfair it was-- not just that Everett sat comfortable while Cyrus suffered or that Everett had escaped mostly uninjured from the gala while Cyrus had had to pull himself from it, but a hundred other things besides. How unfair it was that Everett’s belief in God allowed him to be forgiven. How unfair it was that Everett could think himself blameless in anything, when the truth had been laid bare once, when everyone knew that he had never been strong enough, that he had always been a coward.

“It’s getting late, isn’t it?” Cyrus said suddenly, more frustration evident in his voice than he had perhaps intended. He had wanted to leave without notice, but the stupid duplicity of it all had gotten to him. Thinking of how Verona’s most sanctimonious man expected to be forgiven of their sin, given the antidote to the poison that he had helped to brew within her very walls, had soured his mood, “Is it not past your bedtime?  Do you not have other things to do? Does no one else want you in their company?”

DID I SQUANDER MY DIVINITY? WAS HAPPINESS WITHIN ME THE WHOLE TIME?

Number saved as

King of the Circlejerk

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Last 5 sent texts

[ 28/10/18 23:19 ]  →  i just fucked your date[ 28/10/18 23:19 ]  →  she was super fucking keen, literally begging for it, you missed out[ 28/10/18 23:21 ]  →  maybe she was too old for you[ 28/10/18 23:21 ]  →  i mean, you like them fresh out their teens, right?[ 28/10/18 23:21 ]  →  or do you prefer women who already have a child with another man?

Last 5 unsent texts

[ 28/10/18 23:20 ]  →  i’ve always had your phone number, dick[ 28/10/18 23:20 ]  →  i’ve known you for like my entire life why would i get rid of it[ 28/10/18 23:20 ]  →  how else would i piss you off whilst not in the same room[ 28/10/18 23:22 ]  →  maybe i want to test you[ 28/10/18 23:22 ]  →  maybe i want to see you lose it

Calls made this week

0Calls missed this week

2

Last snapchat sent

[Unknown Number] Is this Craven?

ONCE UPON A DIVERONA… (13/∞)

introducing everett craven as merlin from arthuriana