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Leftovers were warming in the oven, not a fresh meal, and Jeremiah was sitting in the living room. He had not stripped out of his layers in the slightest, mostly to combat the chill (the ache; the ache).

He sat at the piano, playing something that was disjointed and chaotic, a tumblr of liquor and an ashtray next to him. There were already three cigarette butts in it and one he was in the process of smoking hanging from his lips.

It was telling.

It was the kind of mindframe that if Algie, for a moment thought that it was about him, Jeremiah would kindly remind him that - of late - it was most definitely his fault. The music faltered a moment when he heard the door open but started back up again after he stubbed out the cigarette and lit up another one.

When Alg came in, he scooted so the other could join him. Jeremiah paused in his playing enough to pour the man a tumblr full of whisky and lean against him before he started playing once more. It did not stop him from pressing into Algie's warm side as he played, a grateful look given even if his expression was dark.

Jeremiah continued to play, Algie's hand on his knee - his simple presence - uncurling and easing the tension. It wouldn't go away but it certainly reached a more manageable level. The detective did not feel as if he was drowning under the weight of his thoughts even if they were still-

He continued to play, sometimes with just one hand so he could smoke. When that cigarette was getting down to the filter, he stopped once more and grabbed another to light up. The old one was stubbed out, the taller man letting out a ring of smoke and sighing.

"I went looking again over there to see if I could find anything clues for the missing moonwalkers," that term was something he had only learned by speaking with some of them, "and ..." His hand jerked towards the bottle of whisky. Underneath it was the scorched around the edges piece of paper. The words YOUR FAULT were written over and over and over again, filling up every bit of space.

"I saw myself," he said quietly, eyes flicking to the paper and then to Algie's face. "On the other side of the barrier that stops us from going to where the college is."

There was a wry twist of lips.

"After picking up that piece of paper."

"His clothing was a bit dated," Jeremiah said as he rubbed a hand across his face and took another drag of his cigarette, "and it looked as if he had a bad run but it was me." The other Jeremiah had looked as if he had not eaten or simply was wasting away.

"Voicing the thoughts I was thinking."

"The deal with Sunny is broken." To bring them home. Michael Mitchell was dead and there was no bringing him home now. "Which I've suspected but-" His fingers squeezed Algie's, warmth returning to them within the other's grasp. "It's neither here nor there."

Jeremiah took another long drag, blowing the smoke out in a ring and then looking at the other. His eyes were darker than usual, shadowed more than just the residual worries that he was at fault for things that were not meant for his shoulders in the first place.

"Possibly," Jeremiah agreed, another breath of smoke blown away from the other man before he was leaning to rest his head against his a moment. The detective stubbed out the cigarette finally but waited this time before he would have another.

He just wanted this moment of leaning against Algie.

"He said-" His nose brushed against Algie's jaw once before he straightened up to look at him. Now he was lighting up another cigarette. "He said that we'll fail again. I shattered the sword and now the crown will follow. The cycle demands it."

"Keeping the cage could be the reason why we're repeating this so much." Jeremiah thought the same too at this point. That keeping The Enemy caged, while it was clearly working, it was not a solution. It was a stop gap.

If they were all caught in a cycle of death and rebirth, who was to say this was the real solution? Even if- If they lived their lives again, would it be nice to live a life where this was not a worry? For anyone?

Jeremiah plucked out a few discordant notes on the piano before his hand reached to curl it around the hand on his knee. "I don't want them to die either but I don't know that I agree anymore with it being caged," he said quietly, "but the other part of it is that ... it's in pieces. We don't know what the pieces are, so how can we get rid of it?"

The detective was silent a moment, his fingers tightening around Algie's. "Which does lead to the last bit of what was said."