#|| starter.

flick a cigarette a metre and it’ll always hit a runaway.  though his runaway seems intent on staying in one place, these days.  fool for andrew, he’d mistakenly believed neil josten’s home was the foxhole court.  the process of graduation -- of pro-leagues while a certain blue-eyed conundrum stayed put elsewhere -- certainly proved him otherwise.  it had only been five days since they’d last seen one another, since the forced move back into fox tower at the start of a new semester leaving andrew’s apartment stripped empty and outlandish.  five days to hear it on the grapevine that neil had instigated several pissing contests with the new freshmen line-up hopefuls.

eight months of static.  eight months of nothing.  a fool of unparalleled measure, andrew is not, though the pariah of hopelessness?  perhaps.  for no hope is held for the return of a boy labelled idiot, trouble, disdain,  and as the months continue to fly on by, it seems the abilities of kenneth vareck waxed poetic are questionable at best.  this stone-cold silence is sobering -- is anger-inducing and mind-numbingly boring, licking at his heels like some kind of untethered animal itching for release.

SHE’S ENCROACHING ON HIS PERSONAL SPACE, ten miles far too close.  it’s their court – their rules – their home.  and the very presence of her squad uniform only adds insult to injury.

IT’S 9AM, AND HE IS SNAPPED ELASTIC,  oversleeping rarely garnering positive results.  today is no exception, the blank black fog of his mind dispersing as he wakes jump-started like a battery -- dispersing to reveal a nightmare relived in perfect clarity.  his hands flail, hitting empty, cold bed-space and exhaling a shaky, pin-needled breath.

WHAT A FUNNY LOOKING BIRD,  its wings all clipped and feather-bared, scars a litany etched upon bodice hidden.  no longer does this one fly; though perhaps it never did.  after all, boys of towering height can still amount to nothing -- no threat to five feet knife-wielding fanaticism, grin a kiss to blade.  always surrounded by giants in spirit, jean moreau may just be the least intimidating of them all.

HE’S ENIGMATIC --  A MYSTERY TO BE SOLVED;  a puzzle box ripe for contemplation, mind a rubik’s cube of possibilities.  and andrew hates him on sight.  with the stride of a man war-torn, he manifests midnight on a doorstep with the broken bird clutched beneath shoulder, he and kevin a package deal.  the problem is, though kevin’s wings are thoroughly clipped, feathers so damaged they’re scarcely recognisable, neil’s... well, perhaps they never even existed in the first place, because he’s got his movements down to a fine art -- careful and precise -- prisoner plotting prison break for years.