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CW: the link a few paragraphs down goes to a still photo of Trent Reznor in the music video for NIN’s “Closer,” shirtless, blindfolded, and tied up. It is a very NSFW image, please open with caution!
Somehow, a month had passed since the battle with the Calamitous Hollow. Since spying some Chaos-rotted Negaverse senshi from across the battlefield and recognizing the fuku as Tyndareus’s—or at least a version of that one. Since a heavy bolt of lightning had sent Thalassa into some kind of void and brought him staring into the heart of an immense, deep, and impossibly hungry Darkness.
The Dark Star, whatever it thought it was.
Whatever business it thought it had, haunting Heibing’s nightmares.
On one hand, it didn’t feel as though enough time had passed for it to be an entire month. How could it have been so many days, so many weeks? Everything had flown by so fast that Heibing couldn’t name everything he’d done. On the other hand, what he’d done had largely consisted of staying in his room at Huanxi and Liánlí’s home, buried under several blankets despite the steady encroachment of heat and humidity (neither felt properly warm to Heibing anyway), very rarely touching the food Liánlí left on a little table outside Heibing’s door, and long baths set to music.
A lot of staring at walls or ceilings, wondering what the point of anything even was.
Wondering who he even was: he hadn’t powered up at all since leaving that horrific abyss where he had died but not really, but Heibing Morningstar was little more than a vessel for Thalassa, for the moon he called home, and the entirety of his people or the memories of them anyway, and the entire history of every Sailor Thalassa that had come before him. Not powering up felt wrong. But the thought of doing it felt pointless, so where did that leave him.
Maybe stealing away tonight didn’t have a point either, but after eating some of his dinner (some kind of shrimp dumpling), Heibing itched to go do something. No more thinking. Or staring into nothingness. He powered up into Thalassa enough to make the process of jumping out his bedroom window less annoying, and make it easier to get over the front gate—then powered back down and twisted the asinine necklace charm that made him pass for human.
Skulking through the streets as Heibing did nothing positive for his mood, but it didn’t have to. Going as Thalassa would’ve attracted more attention, the last thing he currently wanted. Human idiots already acted strangely about someone wearing long jeans, a thick black sweater, one of the heavy, unzipped hooded sweatshirts when he was cold, and a long black coat. Extra attention on top of that might have impeded Heibing from his purpose. (Maybe the strange looks had something to do with the way Liánlí had described the sweater’s pattern as being an “ugly Christmas sweater”? Yet, the central design featured some shirtless, blindfolded man with his hands bound above his head, which didn’t strike Heibing as particularly wintery, so it shouldn’t have attracted much notice.)
All he wanted was………well. He’d know when he found it, he supposed.
Something to get drunk on, hence his finding his way to the late-night emporium with the brightly lit sign and the green-orange-red-white color scheme. Although he hadn’t made much progress on learning to read contemporary human English, Heibing recognized their numeral ‘7,’ bisected by the word ‘Eleven.’ Allegedly, he had good word that this place would carry what he desired. Good enough to motivate him through the doors.
When he pushed through the double doors, the bell attached to them sounded his arrival. Looking back, he glared up at it for its cheek, but didn’t allow it to distract him from his purpose. Shelves of bottles stood before him, and somewhere amongst them was the right substance for Heibing’s purposes. He simply needed to stalk amongst them until he found the right liquid solace.
lizbot
