(Untitled)

[iknowyourfear]

WHO: Katurian Katurian, Terry Ward, & the infamous Dr. Angelica Einstürzen.
WHERE: Norman Osborn Hospital of Psychiatric Evaluation, Katurian's room.
WHEN: After hours.
WARNINGS: All the given warnings associated with the above characters.
SUMMARY: Two strange boys discuss a mutual problem; the good doctor meets her match.
FORMAT: Threads within:

Comments

later: angie, katurian & terry;

[dogabuse]

[ it was the witching hour, and she was a phantom of the hospital. it might have been a more convincing haunting, if someone hadn't insisted on making a fuss. of course, she doubted anyone would be able to prove anything-- she was careful, meticulous, obsessive. mistakes were not an option. but there was the chance. katurian had to be dealt with. and in anycase, she so enjoyed their conversations.

angelica drifted through the hallways to katurian's room, pausing only a moment outside the door before turning the door knob. ]

[iknowyourfear]

[ terry's head turned up sharply at the sound of the door knob turning. there was no reason for anyone else to be there. it was late at night, he'd checked the guard rotations --

there's a moment of tension. he glances katurian's way, as if to say, what now? ]

[afeatherpillow]

[Katurian didn't know. He stood, frozen, and though the fear felt like a distant thing, a buzz in a body that wasn't his own, he still couldn't move.

Somehow, he managed to look at her. Hard-eyed. Determined. He could convince himself that the locking in his knees was his will, his stubbornness. He was a brick wall. He didn't turn away.]

[dogabuse]

[ it's eternity compressed into that moment of tension, time slowing down so that fraction of a second feels like minutes. an unexpected guest. she'd seen terrance ward's name, knew he'd found himself an internship at the hospital-- been suspicious of it, even, but this was just precious. little boys and their little schemes.

she knew there was no point in threatening terrance. the boy was immortal. she'd seen it with her own eyes, and even if he claimed evil ran in his blood, he had an annoyingly heroic streak.

the door shut behind her with an ominous little click. she loomed in the doorway, tall and slender, pale as the dead. from her coat, she drew a sinisterly sharp scalpel. angelica's voice was, by contrast, soft and gentle. coaxing. ]

Now, now. Let's play nice, boys. Shall we?

[iknowyourfear]

Like hell.

[ angelica was right. terry had an annoying little heroic streak, probably because he was trying to compensate -- whatever, it didn't matter why, but he moved to stand between her and katurian, defiance in his face, his hard expression. ]

You can't win, Doctor.

[afeatherpillow]

[He'd be fine getting stabbed to death, he tried to tell himself, even though he could feel his hands trembling. Death was fine. Pleasant, even. And it was different from his usual means, a different flavor than getting shot in the head, so that would be interesting, that would be an experience, but--

But Terry shouldn't be doing this. That was the palpable fear, the idea of someone stepping in and bleeding next to him. He put a hand on the other's shoulder, a hold back please, and hoped Terry couldn't tell how much his palms were sweating.]

Doctor, you should-- really look at yourself, take a good hard look at yourself right now, and think about what you're doing here. You don't need to do this.

[dogabuse]

[ it was endearing really. how protective terrance was. their united stand against a perceived evil. she couldn't imagine they had known each other very long. she thought they must have either truly loathed or feared her to come together this way. over jonathan and sweet nigel.

she came closer. two, three, four steps. eating up distance between them, that scalpel gleaming in her hand. she knew where to cut, too. all the softest, most vulnerable places on the body. the places that hurt the most-- or maybe worse, the places that didn't hurt at all.

she didn't raised her voice. ]

Stand aside, Terrance. [ quiet, tender even. lying, perhaps. she smiles. it's vicious, too wide and too many teeth. ] I only want to talk to dear Katurian. That's the least he owes me, don't you think? After all the trouble he's caused.

[ her smile turned blatantly unfriendly. ] I ran into a faceless man the other night. A friend of yours, Katurian?

[iknowyourfear]

[ death wasn't something terry was afraid of. he'd felt it, stared it in the face, and it didn't have a grasp on him. he'd seen it in the minds of a million people, each with a different image, and those images no longer made him flinch. what his conscience feared was guilt, someone else's life lost, and maybe in that way, this was irony.

he felt katurian's hand on his shoulder, eyes narrowing as he glanced between the doctor and his companion. but after a beat, he stepped back, standing at katurian's side instead of blocking him. his stare was stormy, focused on the doctor's face now, but he didn't hit her thoughts -- not yet.

he wasn't sure he wanted to know what was in there. unless he had to. she just wanted to talk? fine, then talk. ]

[afeatherpillow]

That does sound rather like my bent, doesn't it? [The joke in his words was frail, but steady, steadier than he would have been if he found himself in this situation a year ago. He released his hold from Terry and stepped forward, the star of his own show, unafraid (mostly) of pre-written endings, unfinished scripts.] But I can't say I'd recognize someone without any face. Did he have a large nose?

[He gestured at his own nose, cupping his hands around it, then letting go. He didn't drop his eyes.]

No... that wouldn't be-- Did he have blue eyes? No. Bushy eyebrows? N-No...

[Half a joke, half a nervous ramble, but he couldn't even smile. He could only hear Edward's words, promises that he could be stronger than he thought. That if he needed to, he could come out on top.]

[dogabuse]

[ her smile was strangely detached from the rest of her face, an expression that didn't quite belong there, unconnected from the unblinking coldness of her eyes. angelica gently tilted her head to the side, considering katurian with her flat stare. she could see why nigel had found katurian so fascinating. she imagined, with their common interests, she and her dear boy had both imagined cutting him open, at least once.

angelica gave herself a moment to savor his uneven ramble before quickly closing distance between them, faster than a woman her height should have been able to move, and there, against the soft underside of his chin, her whisper-sharp scalpel just barely kissed the skin.

gently, tenderly, she responded: ]

Dear boy. Do you think that I won't hurt you?

[iknowyourfear]

[ her sudden movement visibly startles terry, who reaches instinctively to grasp katurian by the arm in a tight grip, as if to pull him away from her. ]

Katurian --

[afeatherpillow]

[Even with the scalpel at his neck, Katurian reached for Terry's hand and took it, hard, like he was the reassuring one, and maybe he could be. Maybe he could follow Edward's advice after all. (Edward, grimacing over the communicator after telling Katurian to look at his past, 'I already gave you something.' His own, uncannily confident reply, the energy in his fingertips: 'You didn't give me anything.')

It happened in a blink. His journey to Angelica's past, all those years condensed in a split second, all the traumatic landmarks and curves in his possession. Under his control. Returning to the present felt like a dunk into ice cold water, and he shuddered, all his limbs trembling and going still again. It could have been mistaken for fear if he didn't keep his eyes focused on her. the. whole. time.

He told himself that if he died again, he'd exit just as spectacularly as the last time. So.]

Oh, Angie sweetheart. [Katurian's voice was his voice, but the cadence was different, deliberately so, as though he were echoing someone else

[dogabuse]

[ angelica's smile didn't drop away from her mouth, but seemed abnormally fixed there. but there was a faint, almost unnoticeable tremor to the gloved hand that held that blade to katurian's throat-- strange, for sadist and a surgeon. her pupils dilated. the pulse that betrayed her humanity quickened. her smile grew by a fraction on both sides.

in her mind's eye, there was a small girl in a white dress with twelve fingers and long hair whose parents only ever touched her with gloves and needles and other sharp things. her mother called her angie sweetheart, and one night, angie sweetheart had crawled into bed with mommy and daddy and a scalpel. they never touched her again.

angelica pressed the blade harder against katurian's skin, enough that blood began to just barely trickle out onto skin and steel. ]

Get out of my head, you little brat.

[iknowyourfear]

[ he can almost taste it, the second the good doctor's body responds to that memory. he can smell the fear of that little girl with the twelve fingers and the long hair, like the smell of old dust on a mantel. the demon inside him claws, hungry. it's been a while, a long while, since the last time he used his powers, and now, here's his chance to use them on someone he knows deserves it. this time, he can feed without guilt.

maybe he'd known from the start that he'd do this. didn't he say he was going to make sure she never hurt anyone again?

terry felt on the slightest prickle of conscience before he let his powers flood his system. his skin turned deathly pale, eyes becoming a violent red. his hand must have felt corpse-cold in katurian's. he was otherworldly now, supernatural, inhuman. oh, and how easy it was, as if katurian had opened the door for him, and all he had to do now was step through. the doctor's memories were already vivid, brimming at the surface of her mind. ]

I told you. [ his voice echoed like a million

[afeatherpillow]

[Katurian felt the blood dripping down his neck like spittle or water or mud, but mostly he felt the change in Terry's skin and the change in Angelica's present, the quality of her life shifting and thrumming as though the two of them were molding it themelves, like a sculpture or a story. Everything in the air was palpable, and when Terry spoke with his new voice, it was like a hand compressing his lungs for him. A fist pumping his heart.

Oh, he would be so terrified if he weren't so energized.]

It'll be like going to sleep for a little while. [His ears were roaring, but the trembling in his words fell away bit by bit. He lowered his voice to a hushed, a gravelly whisper.] It'll be all right.

[dogabuse]

[ her breathing quickened. those insolent boys. stupid little bastards. it was always the boys, wasn't it? you couldn't trust them, no matter how much you loved them, they never listened. they always wanted to hurt you instead of doing what they were told, the sweet little maggots. she would have been gentle, maybe, he wouldn't have felt a thing--

but that was the nature of the relationship between a woman and such boys, a mother and her children, wasn't it? love. betrayal. violence.

angelica laughed low, baring her teeth. she pressed one shaking hand to her forehead, as if she could feel the two of them inside her skull, infecting the folds of her brain, manipulating each neuron. little boys, darling little boys. with a jerky, quick movement, she grabbed katurian by the upper arm, pulling him closer to her, pressing their cheeks together, whispering unevenly: ]

Shut up. Don't say another word. I'll cut your tongue right out of your wicked little mouth, boy, I'll bury you in pieces. [ her gaze darted to terrance, watching him with