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The pillow and blanket helped, but there was still very little that would change the material nature of the situation, and that was that Elliot was asleep in the bathtub. He was a very… mobile sleeper. There was a reason–a good one–that he had his own pillow and blanket in the shared bed in the first place.

His being a fitful sleeper was why, some hours later, he found himself staring into the darkness of the bathroom with the blanket twisted around himself in a futile attempt to make the bathtub softer. The pillow helped, but he still felt the aches across his shoulders and hips as he groaned quietly and sat up. He was too old for bathtub sleeping.

Those same hips–plus his knees, which he realised had also gone painfully stiff at some point curled in a bathtub–creaked and groaned with him as he pulled himself to his feet and half-crawled out onto the bathroom floor. Elliot dragged himself to a standing position after a second of contemplating his life and life choices.

He could drain his bladder, at least.

After, he found himself leaning his elbows on the edge of the sink, hot water–hot, not warm–running over his hands and wrists as he stared at himself in the mirror. The bent position made his back hurt less, but it didn’t do much for his shoulders. He was vaguely aware of the water being just a bit too hot, but that sensation was far away.

There were dark circles under his eyes large enough to land whole aircraft on. He turned the water temperature down, just a bit, and splashed some of it over his face. His spare toothbrush was exactly where he remembered it being, and the sensation of mint helped further clear his mind as water dripped off of his bangs.

That didn’t stop the quiet, though no less heartfelt, “<********>,” from slipping out as he took another long moment to regard himself in the mirror.

Enough of that.

He turned away from the mirror, not wanting to look at himself any more for the time being, and ruffled the hand towel against his face and over his hair with perhaps more force than strictly necessary.

Now what?

Standing in the middle of the bathroom staring at the mirror quickly lost any appeal it had. Green eyes went up to the ceiling, found nothing interesting there, either, and went to each of the walls and, when that failed to provide anything engaging, to the floor.

And then to the door.

Well, what the hell.

Elliot didn’t think they’d’ve unblocked it, but he could at least see what was going on out there, right? Considering Tobias–the only one who actually still liked him–was the one who had put the things in front of the door in the first place, he doubted very much that either of the other two had moved them. He was fairly certain that the only reason Zebulon or Diryas would move the objects would be to come in and take care of things, if the looks on their faces had been anything to go by.

He buried the sigh as he closed the distance to the door, turned the knob, and pushed. Only to be met with a hard stop as the chair under the knob slid up in short order to wedge itself where he wouldn’t be able to push the door open any further.

…Yeah, that tracked.

Hearing Zeb’s voice from the darkness outside the bathroom door jumped Elliot back a foot or two, heart in his throat, pulse pounding in his ears and an invective on his lips. Something unkind, but not pointedly, hissed in Zebulon’s direction as Elliot shook the surprise out of his arms and legs.

“What the ******** are you doing?” He guessed he could see why Zebulon might be in general wary about him, but to spy on him outside of the bathroom that served as his momentary residence?

He re-approached the crack that the door still sat open even with the chair there. He couldn’t quite see Zebulon as he put his eye up to the gap, but he was pretty sure he knew which cluster of shadows was him. “I’m too old to find the ‘watching me in my sleep’ thing sexy, you know.”

“‘What does it look like’?” Sarcasm was thick in Elliot’s voice. Sarcasm and bitterness. “I don’t know, Zeb. I can’t see s**t.” The bitterness wasn’t targeted at Zebulon any more than the invective had been, but it was there nonetheless.

It couldn’t be targeted at Zeb, because this was all Elliot’s fault, and he knew it. Why hadn’t he left when Nectaris did? Before Nectaris did, even? When Nectaris was thinking about leaving?

He was beginning to think that all the talks about god in her office had been a sign.

And now here he was, locked into a bathroom by people he had thought he could trust, but he could trust them, couldn’t he? But they couldn’t trust him. He had already attacked Zebulon once, and he was getting very tired at having to try to justify it. Had it kept him out of Prehnite’s notice through some very lucky fumbling on Ransomite’s part? Sure.

Maybe that would have to be good enough.

Maybe they would forgive him eventually. For all of it.

“Not trying to be sexy right now, sorry.”

“I want out of the bathroom so I can sleep in a normal bed, but I don’t think that’s happening.” His voice was uncharacteristically matter-of-fact and flat considering who he was talking to. There was silence before he spoke again, and Elliot broke it as it started to become uncomfortable, “what do you want from me?”

He snorted. “Good news, then.” Elliot grumbled and groaned as his joints creaked again when sitting back down on the floor, this time on the other side of the bathroom door. “I didn’t come to confess to you with the intention of staying in the Negaverse.”

Elliot however, had not come with the idea, either, of just telling them and sticking around. “I had come to say goodbye, remember?”

“In my defense,” his voice was quiet, “I only drained you to keep you from kicking my a** and blowing my cover while I was trying not to drain or, worse, deal with my superior officer telling me to starseed you.”

Or just… doing it himself.

“You were the first person I drained to unconsciousness who didn’t deserve it.” Did he think of himself as a vigilante hero, going after people who were trying to hurt other people? No. But it had made it all a bit easier to stomach. He kept someone innocent from getting hurt, and he kept the higher-ups off his back.

Win-win.

“I circled back a bit later, once my boss left, but you were already gone.”