Part I.


The apartment was quiet. Very, very quiet.

It was immaculately kept, as usual; each and every little thing set into his proper place, not an inch of dust anywhere. The girl who cleaned his loft did well, normally, but even after she left this evening Dorian had gone back and fixed up whatever he did not find satisfactory - namely everything. He supposed he should stop paying her to come. After all, he would just do it all over again, which meant that giving someone money to do a job he would do himself was rather useless. But she had seemed so desperate for money that he had not quite seemed able to refuse her.

There was not much it; Dorian was not the type of person to collect useless trinkets, although there was a small painting or two hanging in the front room. It was a small place; one wide room housed both the kitchen and the living area, while the room in the back was where he slept. The refrigerator was stocked with various fruits and vegetables, mostly, as well as neatly stacked packages of meat that Dorian would use to cook for his evening meals. Nova Nona was known for their fine cuisine, and Dorian's kitchen was no exception to that. However, his cooking was merely for pleasure, not for profit; he saw no need to share what he made with the rest of the world when he was the only one who need appreciate it.

The curtains were open, but Dorian did not get up to close them, though it was nearing midnight. Outside he could hear voices; soft ones, loud ones, and a few slurred ones; though the night was still young and there would be more later, perhaps. He was used to the subtle noises; he tolerated them better than listening to music, at the very least. Music tended to irritate his senses when he was trying to concentrate; Dorian preferred silence.

He didn't tend to drink, but the glass of scotch held loosely in one gloved hand was only half full. Dorian raised it to his lips, inhaling the sharp, spicy scent before taking another swallow; it burned down the back of his throat.

He tasted ginger. Over in the corner of the room, a tall grandfather clock - the only thing that looked almost out of place in the otherwise starkly empty room - clicked one spindly finger closer to twelve. Dorian stood, stretching out limbs that had been still, pressing a hand to the small of his back briefly, making his way around the sofa towards the kitchen. He set the glass on the counter, brushing off a spot of dust, and then, glancing back at it, picked it back up and took another sip before dumping out the rest. Dorian rinsed the glass, sliding it carefully into the dish drainer beside the sink and then moved back to the living area, standing in front of the floor to ceiling windows.

He pressed gloved fingers to the cool glass. staring out across the city. Nova Nona is quiet tonight...

The clock struck midnight.