do you have enough love in your heart

[somebadnews]

WHO: Five and OPEN
WHEN: After this mess and bounties are issued for Messalina's little helpers
WHERE: Various points around Ephes
WHAT: A boy plays fetch with a dog, gets targeted for murder, and has too much to drink, not in that order
WARNINGS: language, violence, dead hellhounds, and other typical Five-things

Prompts below, all taking place in the same day. (I'm sorry this idea started out so wholesome...) Open to action or prose, whatever your preference!

Comments

[nothinglikefather]

"Wine is fine but liquor is quicker," Jacob says, the old adage familiar. That's why so many people turn to gin- it's as cheap as beer, but you don't need as much to get the same effect. He's not the one trying to drown himself in the bottom of a bottle at the moment though, and that gives him a moment of pause, looking at the young man to try and work out what afflicts him.

That's not so easy to know without asking, but Jacob's thoughts drift back to the conversation before, what he remembers that wasn't lost in the headache that came after. Five has a sister here. Did he say a brother too? And back home the world keeps ending, or trying to end. He's not sure how that works, but perhaps that's enough to drive you to drink.

He notes that Five doesn't offer the bottle back, but that's okay. He thinks, with all that's going on, one of them should keep their head.

"I don't understand what they'd get out of it if the world does end," He muses, "Because surely, we all disappear? Not just die but go completely? But maybe that's what they want. Maybe they think that everyone is so wicked the world should end." He shrugs, not really buying it.

He's quiet a moment more, and then, more gently, "What are you trying to forget? If you don't mind me asking?"

[somebadnews]

That's an interesting question, asked with an honest concern that he wouldn't have expected from Jacob. He gives it some thought before answering.

"Not everyone drinks to forget. I've been through enough of that." He takes another swig from the bottle and actually considers the other reason. Before, drinking helped to ease the curse he was shouldering. Now that he's cured, it's different. It's getting through the day. "Sometimes I think about the things I had to do to get here, to get out of the apocalypse, for it to still be... like this."

He doesn't know if that's because he's actively been making it worse, or if his family is cursed. How many decades can he keep believing he can save them?

"This would have been the fifth I've lived through. Sixth if you count the one I haven't seen yet." The one he's told he was resigned to, that he's been grappling with ever since his sister returned. He hasn't had the heart to tell Ben about it. "...I can't tell you what they're like if you're dead. If there were ghosts hanging around back then, I can't imagine anything more depressing."

[nothinglikefather]

Jacob watches, head turned slightly towards Five, watching him think as he swallows, watching how he looks at something Jacob can't see- a past, a family, horrors untold that Five has battled through. Are things really no better? Are they worse? The end of the world isn't something Jacob has ever sparred much thought about, and what little he has considered isn't so much the destruction of human civilisation, but the end of the planet. After all, that's the world, isn't it? Maybe he's got that wrong.

"Is it really as bad as what you've experienced before?" He asks, because truly, he didn't think it was all that bad here. He's not been here long he'll admit, but he quite likes Ephes. Apart from the undead at the gates and the horrible mangled corpses.

He pauses, thinking back to what little he does know about the young man next to him, about the fact Five's father has brought them up to save humanity or... something like that. About the fact they keep failing to do that. But perhaps they actually keep succeeding, and it's the rest of humanity letting them down.

"You might be counting your chickens before they're hatched. We're not there yet. Things might turn out different. And if they don't, you've got the experience. You've got through five apocolapses. Thats five more than anyone else I've ever met. You'll get through another."

[somebadnews]

Jacob isn't the only person he's met who seems to genuinely prefer this world, but it's still a relatively new phenomenon. Mostly from those who haven't been round long enough to know better, as much as he wonders how bad things were at home if Ephes seems like a vacation. Then there's the fact that logically, Five should be the same. He's got a point. Anything is better than what he experienced before. No undead, just... dead. Everyone dead, until he reversed it after working on how for decades.

Here he has family. Two out of six isn't great, but it's better than none. And even if they've only gone from crisis to crisis, he got another shot to spend time with them. If he can ignore the fact that at least four others have been here, if he counts Lila, and disappeared without a trace. He tells himself they aren't dead, but they always die. No matter what he does.

"That's inaccurate," he mumbles, feeling the sudden need to clarify. "We've averted five potential apocalypses. I've only experienced the other side of one. That was... that was..."

Words fail him so he gestures vaguely at nothing. Five doesn't fool himself in pretend the apocalypse didn't warped his mind in ways no one seems to see. Returning to his childhood body certainly didn't help. But nobody wants to listen to an old man gripe about his trauma. Least of all someone who has killed as much as him. Although Jacob might be more accepting of that than most, as long as he doesn't get too many details.

"There are worse things. I suppose I just had... different expectations. I haven't gotten in right yet."