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[markedformore]

In the end, he evicts himself from his own home despite the disdain for his surroundings and the terrible costumes he's been made to wear by some greater power seemingly well-invested in having a laugh at his grief. His hands continue to tremble and he tires of watching the shadows his fingers make in the dance of the lamplight. He tosses on an

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[chasinghumanity]

At first, Mitchell had been happy with the change in scenery. He had been a child when Queen Victoria died and it had taken him another decade to make it to London, and even then his time there had been brief before shipping out. But there was something familiar to the streets nonetheless, and the cold, he thought bitterly, matched his mood

[markedformore]

"I feel far more than 'a bit'," he echoes, stringing the words together as he turns enough to see who's speaking to him. Mitchell, then. Erik feels a strange dissonance. Nina has helped him a great deal in his troubles, but Mitchell seems to understand them well enough to not simply quash them away and kill whatever inkling of justice must be served. "It's been a trying number of days and I don't suspect the end is in sight."

[chasinghumanity]

"London got you down?" Mitchell ventured, brow furrowed. But the truth was he knew it was something worse, just by looking at the man.

Uninvited, but he didn't think unwanted, Mitchell climbed onto the bar stool beside Erik. Misery did love company, and Erik had given him an ear once. "The island fucking with you?"

[markedformore]

"The latter," he replies curtly, lifting his drink to his lips. He considers it there a moment before taking it back wholly, pushing the glass towards the bartender for another, given that he's now of a mind to enjoy such a thing all over again. Youth and innocence have been shaken off of him both decades ago and so very recently. He can do what he likes. "Have you heard of people waking up in their pasts, before?"

[chasinghumanity]

He blinked, but otherwise his reaction to Erik's drinking style this evening was non-existent. Heavy drinking is standard when dealing with the island's bullshit. This didn't even count as getting started in some people's books.

"Heard of it," he said, emphasizing the first word. "Never went through it or heard about it directly. Sounds like a bitch though, in theory."

[markedformore]

"Imagine the worst nightmare you've ever endured," Erik says. His tone is dark and his gaze is cynical as he stares at his refilled glass, bringing it back to his palm as he weighs it in his hands. More than anything, he wishes that it were metal and that he could do something useful with it. "And then relive it. Again, again, again, and nothing you do changes it."

[chasinghumanity]

Mitchell had lived through plenty of nightmares. Most of them were the nightmares of other people though. He thought of waking up amongst the dead, of that first kill. He thought of meeting Herrick that first time. He thought of the feeling of Annie being torn from the world, something physically ripping inside of him.

He thought he was going to be sick.

"Fuck," he muttered, taking a sip of his own drink to wash the bitter taste from his mouth. "Ask for the bottle." It wasn't glib. He genuinely meant that.

[markedformore]

Erik gestures for it with a crook of his fingers that would have meant endless leagues more if only he were still the man he used to be -- but Charles doesn't want that, does he? Charles wants him to be more. "Imagine the worst thing you've lived replaying and nothing that you do satisfies whatever force above has placed you there," he says, gripping the neck of the bottle tightly as he pours a full glass.

[chasinghumanity]

Mitchell would have happily cursed the island to Hell and back, but he felt it wasn't his place. It was Erik's torment and Erik's anger. Mitchell was just here as a support, weak though he was.

"You got out," he said, not in a contrary tone, pointing out something against Erik's words, but curious. "Was it something you did or did it just get bored?"

[markedformore]

"I don't know what I did." He does. He does, but there's a part of him that doesn't want to entertain the idea that killing himself had somehow been the key that unlocked Erik's path out. It's too depressing to think and yet, here it stands before him as the likeliest scenario. "I turned the gun on myself -- so to speak."

[chasinghumanity]

"What?" Mitchell sputtered, a look of disgust twisting his features. It wasn't Erik, of course. It wasn't his choice. It was that it seemed the island made him do it.

"Are you saying the only way the island let you out was if you.. yourself?"

[markedformore]

Erik sighs and gestures with his fingers -- still expecting his actions to have reaction and growing more irritated when they don't. "Honestly, I didn't expect it to work," he points out. "We'd tried two different variations up to that point and the whole business was petty vengeance. I'm afraid it worked, though."