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Rollamundo

Wake up, daddy.

He heard it in one voice, then another. Little, childish, muted voices. Wake up, daddy! Wake up! Wake up! Daddy!

They got quieter as time passed, their voices fading into the sound of the ocean, until that's all he could hear. He groaned, reluctant to wake up, until the sand began to itch at his face. He was lying on his side, curled around something with edges that pushed into his skin just the way he was used to. His arms tightened hard around Mimsy, pushing them deeper, until they hurt.

Wake up.

One last voice. Very quiet. Almost robotic. More familiar than the rest. Alice.

His eyes opened.

It would take a while before his mind could process what had just happened, or accept what was real and what wasn't. This wasn't the first time he'd woken up to a dream with children who weren't real, but that didn't make it hurt any less. And Mimsy, locked in his arms, would fair no better.

He had to be the stronger one, this time. He couldn't lose his mind, couldn't lash out in mourning. This time, Mimsy would need him more than ever.

As would Peter.

He gasped when he realized it. Peter. Peter. He was real, he wasn't just in their dreams. He was real - and he was in danger.

"Mimsy." He whispered, hugging her close as he stirred her. "Mimsy, baby. Wake up. We gotta go home. Mimsy, Peter."

<Wake up, Ace ♥> A sweet voice was calling, just the same way every morning she did it. The tall man opened his eyes to the bright sun, he immediately groaned when his eyes hurt. He covered his eyes while he stood up, found himself covered partially in the sand. 'Wow, what a nap." It was fun that he remembered, that dream was too real.

In the dream he was a jewelcrafter in the Death Clan, in other words, a horseman. He had met one in the Sahara mission and it was no doubt from the Famine Clan. Exposed bone structures with insects flying around them and they dressed like someone lived in desert. Yet, he wasn't familiar with the other three. It was a strange feeling when they inserted fake memories to them now he recalled it.

Time to go back to our home, Catherine crooned. On his way to the dorm building, he realized the island was suffered from damage, just like what the mirror in his dream showed. He wondered the situation of his room and their room. Oh well, he hoped it was alright or that man might kick him out. It was difficult to find a non-basement room nowadays.

Since he got to share a room with a higher rank hunter, his room was used as a storage room. It mainly held Catherine's belongings, most brand-new and sitting there to find a new owner. He fiddled for the key and opened his room. It was mostly untouched, except some small items like perfume bottles that he put on the vanity broken into pieces and some shoes on the lower shelf got soaked. "Not too bad I think?" He asked his partner's opinion, who seemed no longer interested in any of them.

After getting rid and cleaned the debris, he locked his door and went upstairs to check his roommates. He didn't see any of them in his dream but it was a fun experience to share. The horsemen's life seemed relaxing, Cae, his horseman self's life was simple but meaningful. He enjoyed making things for others, it was a combination of sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. It might be a shame that Catherine wasn't there, instead, he got a female wolf as mount. The Haunt reacted greatly at his thought.

He soothed the Haunt with some sweet words and he was already there, it seemed he was not the latest one, she wasn't there. "Cafeteria's gone," stated the man who was his roommate. The conversation then went to it took ages to fix everything, the main buildings almost torn into halves and how some appliance needed to be replaced. The man frowned for how much troubles the horsemen had caused them, he became annoyed when he can't cook.

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2-5 inconvenient damage

He was tired, and while he wasn't sure if his mind was just exhausted or the events before affected his body, he knew he wanted to sleep. He wanted to escape. He wanted to just move away from what was a massive list of repairs and salvaging that surrounded him. The labs he was in was destroyed, and as he moved, he saw techs and others checking on patients and their projects, a few having meltdowns while repeating "Eight months, man. EIGHT MONTHS! GONE!" Hugs were given, others threw already broken equipment against the floor, and Melvin wandered out as he sent out messages.









After some thought, he sent another text.



He looked at the dorms, parts of windows broken and walls broken down, and made it up one of the working stairs to his dorm to see the door on it's hinges. Pushing it only sent it falling in, and he stared at broken furniture, what little he actually brought into his dorm, a few figurines he liked torn to bits, and clothes thrown all over. Paperwork flapped here and there from the torn out window, and he looked to see the broken bathroom he had paid so much to have customized. Everything was destroyed, and he sat on the ground and ran a hand through his hair and silent, his phone in his hand and his eyes closed.

Was it a good thing to be home, back from his adventures abroad, here to survey the damage and here to repair what had been broken? Or would Ever have been better off missing out on this particular experience, and coming back to a room destroyed, only to completely start over?

He was still groggy as he stood in the doorway to 204, rubbing at his eyes, hair and coat rumpled. Maybe this was why the first thought that came into his mind wasn’t goddamnit, my room is wrecked and was, instead eh, well, I’ve lived in worse. One leg of the bed was broken, leaving it leaning at a precarious angle, but at least there was still a bed there. The dresser drawers were open and their contents upended onto the floor, but it was still more stuff than he’d ever had before in his life. The door creaked ominously on its hinges, but still closed if it didn’t lock. It could be worse.

Someone else might have found the overpowering smell of vodka – bottles smashed, soaked into the floor and pretty much every article of clothing that he owned – offensive. For Ever, it evoked memories of nights spent sleeping in the back room of a bar, before he’d managed to find someone willing to rend him a shitty one-room apartment for dirt cheap. It made him slump where he stood, almost yearning for a time when he didn’t owe anyone anything.

He could have used a healthy dose of that vodka, right now, but judging from all the broken glass, there was none left to be salvaged. With a slow breath out, Ever waded in to start with that, the biggest problem: picking up large chunks of glass with his good hand to drop in the garbage can in the corner (slightly dented) and then considering what he could do with the smaller shattered fragments. Not walk barefoot for a few weeks, that was for sure. Not until he’d vacuumed eight or ten times.

His attention slid sideways to the bathroom instead and now, finally, Ever grimaced. The shower door was also broken, hanging horribly on its track, and water had leaked out to cover the floor. All of this, again, could have been worse, but there were cigarettes floating in the bare four inches of water. Lots of cigarettes. Soaked through, ruined, and likely the entirety of what was left of his stash.

“Son of a b***h.” It was low, under his breath. Ever tucked the cast in against his side, leaning in this doorway too, and stared flatly at his mess of a bathroom. One-handed, this was going to be a colossal pain in the a** to clean up.

But at least it would keep him from thinking too much about strange days spent running around in the guise of a horseman, of the constant darkness of the past few weeks. He could appreciate his eyes, being able to take in the room with a quick flicker glance around; could appreciate the relative comfort and familiarity of the island, even destroyed as it was; the familiar coats that surrounded him, like family, even if he didn’t always recognize their faces.

Slowly, he drew in a breath and stepped in, glass crunching under his feet and water sloshing around the heavy soles of his boots, to at least turn the water off all the way. The rest was going to have to wait. He had a feeling his wrist was healed, by now, and clean up with be far easier with the cast off his arm.

He’d start at the infirmary, and then come back.

And pray he ran into someone along the way who could give him a dry cigarette.

[Wrong dice again]

Waking up from that nightmare should have been a relief, but unlike what had happened in the past, consciousness hadn't come with the void of missing memories. What had once been alarming would have been considered a blessing in this instance. He didn't want these memories, would haven given a lot to erase them from his mind. Life as a bug infested Famine abomination, sociopathic, selfish, and possessive of everyone and everything around him.

{That wasn't you, boil.}

He knew that, but it only provided a minor comfort, and did nothing to remove the awful sensation of small bodies crawling around beneath his skin. One more bug related nightmare to add to the host of others that already plagued him.

It would have been too much to ask that they return to an island untouched by crisis, but as always, that was beyond hope. Of course, the squabbling of the Legacies would place Deus at ground zero. The island was trashed. Not just in small, concentrated pockets, but the entirety this time.

It wasn't surprising then when Zeke returned to his dorm to find it in shambles. It looked as if someone had broken in to search for something, but never ended up finding it. The dresser was tipped over, draws spilling out onto the floor. everything had been shoved off the desk, and the drawers ripped out and upended. The door to his closet was barely hanging on by a single hinge, and the window had been busted out. He stood for a long moment in the doorway just staring at the mess, not entirely sure where to start, and was reminded strongly of the how the horseman version of himself had stood there and stared at the mess in his apartment in that tower.

The thought made him scowl, lips drawing back from his teeth, and the wood of the door frame creaked under his hand.

{It wasn't you, boil.}

His hand loosed, and after drawing a deep breath, holding it, and letting it out slowly he entered the room. If he wanted to be able to sleep later(if his mind would even let him) he was going to have to start cleaning. But first...

rummaging through the mess, Zeke pulled out a half empty pack of cigarettes. Tapping one out with his palm, he'd slump down in his desk chair, before digging out a lighter to ignite the tip. The first lungful was deep, and he held it for a while before letting it out in a rush towards the ceiling.