#tranquilhearted

      DAMNED  :  they crawl beneath the underworld. scratching.   wailing.   screeching.   falling deaf upon those escaping corrosion.   fingertips curve against glass rim.   attention drawn across the bar where her victim lies  (  blissfully  )  unaware.  five years  :  five years for passion and wealth. how foolish  ..  it wouldn’t even be worth the deal.   whiskey’s drained, she’s finding herself baiting for time.   turning to a stranger, the hound offers faux happiness and warming companionship  :  momentarily.    ❛          ——   can i offer you a drink of your choice     ?         ❜ 

@tranquilhearted

6 weeks. It had been 6 weeks.

              He counted them over and over again--Cole stood in the room like a ghost, skin sallow and bruised--there were 27 white roses lay like dead soldiers lined up on the table. Each rose had been shorn of thorns, a tribute to a life lived in an attempt to make things beautiful (but, as life goes on, the beautiful things tend to fade, leaving only gritty reality in their wake).

                 27. Cole had lived twenty-seven years before the accident--his memory held the last fading bits of life, the light that he’d tried so desperately to hold onto as it spilled like sand through his fingers. The bright lights of the hospital room were harsh on his eyes as pupils refused to release their dilation--he had a near deer in headlights look about him.

                 Tahiti--why had he dreamed so heavily about Tahiti? He’d never been, had he? Before he could contemplate that fully, hazel eyes caught the vision of the two-way-mirror, eliciting a hoarse, curious sound find his body, which was so unused to making noise that his chest and throat stung like wounds packed with salt. 

Somebody save me. Is this Hydra?

                 Stiff fingers rapped on the glass, his face, gaunt, peering through to look at the other side. Levi--was Levi there? She’d put the roses out--only the brunette would have known his favorite: white roses were a rarity, a pure flower that had become somewhat of a symbol between the pair in their history with each other: he’d bring her a white rose every week as a simple psalm of I love you. 

                 There it was--his heart--pounding in his ears. Bewilderment was ride on his features as he tapped harder on the glass, hoping that whoever was observing him would answer: little did they know that T.A.H.I.T.I had not taken hold of him like it was meant to do. No, John Cole already had Kree DNA--his mind was his own. After another moment of the tapping, he shuffled his way to the door, tugging at the knob, finding it locked when he made an attempt to turn it. Something felt wrong--Cole ran his hand along his face, scrubbing features after his futile attempt failed.

              “H-h-help!”

You fool, no one’s going to help you.

                 There was anguish in the cry, which was far less a scream than he’d intended, but the fire he met when he tried to utter that much was far worse than the realization that he’d ripped the IVs out of his arm, leaving them hanging like sentinels to watch over him. Dropping to the floor, his head hit the table that laid like a pyre for the roses, ready to be lit. 

              “Levi.”