Zachary L. Finch (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
eternityunseen) wrote2010-07-31 10:22 pm
eternityunseen) wrote2010-07-31 10:22 pm
Entry tags:
☍ time waits for no man (but maybe Fate can be persuaded). {<user site="livejournal.com" comm="beten
1. Player information
Name (or internet handle): DJ
Current character in Bete Noire: Sefton Lowell (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
polarisation), Chris Halliwell (ghostlighter).
2. Character information
Name: Zachary Finch
Livejournal username:eternityunseen
Fandom: Original.
Image: This is probably the worst icon to link to, but I don't care~
3. Character information II
Age / appearance: Twenty-four years old, 5'10", fairly normal build. Black hair, just a tiny bit curly at the ends, and brown eyes. The most noticeable thing about his otherwise generic appearance would be his blank stare, while the second-most would be the collapsible white cane he carries around with him. His movements tend to err on the side of confident cautiousness.
History:
Personality: To all appearances, Zachary Finch is a very happy-go-lucky guy. While he is able to be serious and think realistically if the situation warrants it, his optimism wins out more often than not. Why is this? Because the ability to feel all life unfolding around him has given him a unique perspective: anger, sadness, anxiety, any negative emotion you can think of, none of it stands up to the simple force of happiness. There's nothing like it. Yet people wrap themselves up in their misery and block out their opportunities to let the dark melt away. Zachary, however, has learned from others' mistakes and rarely allows himself to miss the chance. In this same vein, he feels exasperation at people in general for letting life pass them by. Condescension works its way in from time to time, as well.
With this outlook on life, he is quite the opposite from a depressed disabled. His opinion on the matter is that he might be missing out on things in the visual world, but he has his memories and isn't any less himself for it. If his sight had to be taken to fulfill Fate, then he would just live without - he still had four other senses to work with, after all.
... of course, he's only fooling himself.
Underneath the tough, sunshiny exterior is a kind, but frighteningly bitter young man. His tie to Lachesis is inextricable and impossible to reverse; his eventual blindness had always been a given, yet he tried to run from the truth and never quite prepared himself for it actually happening. After first experiencing his connection to life, and realizing the happiness that he, too, had been missing out on, he tried to bury his frustration, bitterness and pain and allow himself to experience the happiness that the rest of the world insisted on missing out on. It worked, to an extent. While he still feels the anger at his position, his fear of rejecting Lachesis, part of himself, keeps him from ever voicing or properly acknowledging the opinion.
On a different note entirely, Zachary's relationship with his cousins, Abe and Markham, is one nearing emotional dependence. They're so close, in fact, that they call each other brothers and live together. As the current Incarnations of the Moirae, they share a secret knowledge that the rest of the world is oblivious to, which only strengthens their closeness.
Sexual preferences / orientation: Heterosexual, but not terribly interested. Despite his outlook on people missing out on the happiness in their lives, he would much rather have a meaningful conversation with someone over getting tangled in sheets.Poor loser.
Powers: Being the Incarnation of Lachesis, Zachary has the ability to feel Life around him as Lachesis measures them. What this means is that he has a very general ability for empathy, able to gauge the mood of an area but never an individual. It isn't at all overpowering to him mentally, but it is all encompassing.
He is also able to use postcognition, looking back at the thread already spun in a person's life (and has the capacity for precognition), by obtaining something of theirs and twisting it around his fingers or arms. The precognition is only theoretical, since it means exerting his own influence on Lachesis herself to look ahead. Similarly theoretical is the ability to alter someone's Fate by completely hijacking Lachesis (and pending player-permission). Such a thing would leave noticeable trauma and he barely dares to think about trying it; it isn't his place to alter Fate.
Having the soul of a goddess allows him to perceive supernatural entities or phenomena, as far and few between as they are. And while not as notable as his goddess-given powers, Zachary's four remaining senses are heightened in compensation for his lack of sight, and he learned ASL as a child for the sake of Abe and Markham.
In-game: Zachary wished that he could know the layout of the city better during a time when wishes really did come true. This means he has a magical GPS/Mapquest of the city in his head, for all of your are-we-there-yet needs. Handy!
Reason for playing: Not only is Zachary much more extroverted than my li'l ol' blue-haired werewolf kid, but he is blind (something I've always wished to explore in roleplay) and has a seriously different outlook on life - sharing a soul with one of the Fates will do that to you. What he can do in the city is entirely up in the air, but I hope he can make some friends, at the least.
4. Original character supplement
World history: Modern-day Earth, 2010. Things are about what you'd expect, if you overlook the fact that the age of the gods truly existed and leftovers of the era still linger in the world today. Though almost every god has faded from sentience into becoming a force of nature, the Moirae were unable to afford letting their duties slip into the fingers of a mindless entity. Their fade was inevitable, and yet they worked out a solution: humans who would share their souls, connect with them on the most basic, intrinsic level, through whom they could siphon consciousness from. These Incarnations were free to live their lives until the previous Incarnation passed away; their only escape from their contract is to die. (This does not necessarily mean they are born Connected, but that they are born with the Fate to eventually come into their destiny. It's fairly common for there to be two Incarnations for the same Fate at the same time, but only one can ever be Connected.) In exchange for the connection and as a symbol of ownership, a sense would be stripped from them: for Clotho, speech; for Lachesis, sight; and for Atropos, hearing.
Although they have since faded from their proper roles, cults exist to worship the disappeared pantheon. Those with extreme amounts of faith are allowed to channel infinitesimally small fractions of their power - these people are chosen ones, and extremely dangerous, both because of their power and their fanatical fervor in their patriot. Mysteriously, no one who worships the Moirae has ever received any sort of power. Many assume the cause of this to be that the Fates cannot be swayed by mere mortal means.
Mythical creatures still exist, hiding from humans and cowering out of fear, having lost the protection and power of the gods along with the rest of the world. Most are imperceptible to the regular human, allowing them to retain their place in stories and legends.
Character history: A long, long time ago, the Moirae, the personifications of Fate, were born. Records are unclear on who parented them, but the fact remains that they existed. For untold generations, they carried out their duties: Clotho wove the thread and began new lives, Lachesis measured the thread and decided a person's destiny, and Atropos cut the thread and ended their life. Then, slowly at first, the gods began to fade. Their powers were left to the wilds of nature as humankind found different religions and strength in themselves. The Moirae, too, began to fade. However, they knew that with the demise of their rational thought, the fate of the world and its people would be completely unguided. And so they created the Incarnations to escape their own demise. It's not cheating Fate if you are the one to decide it, right?
Zachary was born to a fairly normal family, the Finches, in 1986. His father was a fashion designer, and his mother stayed at home (and shopped - a lot). He grew up in Atlanta, Georgia, with his cousinbrothers, Abe and Markham, with whom they shared their birth year. For the most part, Zachary lived an uneventful life. He went to school, he hung out with friends, he drew and played music.
As he grew, he was aware of the knowledge that he would eventually lose his sight to Fate, but ignored the warnings. Abe was the first to Connect, losing his voice and gaining a strangely whimsical attitude when he was only twelve years old. Markham lost his hearing at sixteen, turning reckless and protective. When they were all eighteen, the three brothers moved away from their parents and rented an apartment together. That was when it happened for Zachary. He lost his sight, and temporarily closed himself off from the world until he forced himself to see the bright side of the situation.
While Abe and Markham went on to gain degrees at college, Zachary was satisfied without and went into writing cheap little musical jingles when he didn't feel like mooching off of his brothers. Six years after they all finally came together as Incarnations, something finally shook them from their quaint little life near the beginning of July, 2010.
Atropos' shears had become dull, and death no longer came to the world. Her power became unstable, with her unable to do the one thing she was meant to. Though it affected all of them to some degree, Markham felt it the worst; he became more reckless, violent, and even suicidal in the face of Atropos' helplessness. Abe and Zachary were left to their attempts at locating the source of... whatever it was.
Then, one day, Zachary found it. (Cue Bete Noire.)
5. Samples
Third-person:
"Gooood morning, Atlanta! Today is July the 31st and the time is nine o'clock! Boy, is it beautiful. Better get your kids outside, Mom, because..."
Zachary groaned, reaching over to smack the alarm off just as the station's jingle began to play. Why, oh, why had he made it so high-pitched? Sure, the execs liked it, heck, even Zachary liked it at first, but after hearing it every morning for the past two months, he was quickly becoming sick of it. Routinely, he would poke and prod at the notes in his mind and try to rearrange or alter them to make something better.
His eyes were open. He could feel the sun on his face, so Abe must have been in already to open the blinds. He didn't really know why either of his brothers bothered to close them, since he was the only one who slept in this particular room, but he appreciated the effort, if not the action itself. Yawning, he stretched his legs out and finished kicking the sheets off the bed. He would fix them later tonight, hopefully after he had finally reenvisioned the radio jingle into something he would be satisfied with. Hey, who knew? Maybe he would pitch the new jingle to the company and try to make some extra money off it, too.
Standing, he felt his way along the wall to the closet, retrieved the clothes he had set out the night before, and set them out to change into. All part of his routine. The quiet sounds of the morning coming from the main room told him that Markham (who made as much noise as you might expect as someone didn't know they were making it) was still asleep, although Abe had already begun the day. He gave a quick tug or two at his blankets to pull them onto the bed, then snatched his cane from where it hung around his doorknob and went to greet the woken one.
"Morning."
Tap-tap went the pen against the counter. Abe's return greeting. Zachary offered a smile, assuming Abe to be looking in his direction for the moment, and sat at the kitchen bar.
"Breakfast ready?"
Without warning, Abe grabbed his hand. He twitched his fingers, then opened his palm for the other. The closed pen was placed against it and Abe dragged it back and forth in a straight line. Zachary frowned. "Why not?" Another line; another negative. "No... food?" he guessed. A circle. Zachary rolled his eyes, even if he felt the effect had been diminished since he couldn't see where he was rolling them to. "Fine, okay. You got any money?" Tap, tap, tap. "What's that supposed to mean? Actually—" he pulled his hand away, giving Abe a superior look now that the other couldn't argue, "—just give me some cash, and I'll be right back."
Sounds from down the hall. He tilted his head toward the room hear them better, and could tell Abe had shifted, noticing Markham's awakening, too. Attention turned toward Abe, he emphasized, "Right back." He heard Abe sigh, then shift around while retrieving his wallet. The paper money crinkled under Abe's touch as he presumably folded it before setting it on the counter. Zachary followed the sound and snatched up the ten dollar bill after a little searching. Hopping off the stool, he gave a salute to empty space and moved to the door with practiced ease.
He was out in the hall, making his way to the elevator, when he heard Markham's slurred, "Morning..." as the door swung shut behind him. Silently, he apologized to Abe for leaving him alone with Markham. Hopefully, today wouldn't be such a bad one for their brother, but such days were getting farther apart, only a few weeks after death had lost its power. He was happy that Markham still recognized them, even during his fits, and hoped he wouldn't sink further into the insanity before they could right what had gone wrong. (And they would find what had gone wrong.)
Ding.
The elevator was moving behind the doors, stopped at the floor above him, and he felt for the down-button while unfolding his cane.
Ding.
The doors trundled open, and he stepped inside, keeping himself to the edge in case someone else was still inside the car with him. He let his hand graze over the buttons, feeling for the first floor, and pushed at it before stepping back. He and his brothers lived on the sixth floor, so it never took too long to reach the first from there. He couldn't hear anyone else breathing, meaning he was alone, yet he still stepped back. Holding his cane against himself to keep it out of the way, he simply listened to elevator music on the way down.
The elevator stopped. The doors opened. He took a step forward before he fully realized that there had been no ding, and promptly caught his foot on—something and crashed into the ground. His cane jarred itself from his hand, rolled away, and the smell of smoke and pollution assaulted his nose. The sounds of the city were right beside him, the feel of concrete under his hands, heart beating wildly in his chest. He knew couldn't be outside, so...
"... What the hell?"
Third-person II:
CRASH
Zachary tilted his head upward, startled out of his music (an attempt to rewrite that stupid jingle - it seriously should not have warranted so much of his attention, but he couldn't help it!). He strained his hearing to try and determined what was happening. It didn't take long. Another sound—a WHUMP this time—joined in, followed by quieter crashing as things were knocked off of a higher surface. Quickly, he placed the guitar in its stand, spared a second to make sure it wouldn't fall out, and hurried toward the sounds; toward Markham's room.
Markham was yelling. His slurred, but recognizable speech ringing out loudly in concert with the noises of a struggle. "No!! I have to do this!"
He bashed into the hallway wall in his hurry, his shoulder taking the brunt of the damage, and he stumbled, fell. He grunted, catching himself on his elbows, and quickly stood. He was a few feet from Markham's room, but already could smell the blood. Adrenaline spiked and he shot to his feet, leaping the last few steps to the room. "Abe!" he called, knowing that must have been who Markham was struggling with. There was no pause in the sounds of the struggle - Abe couldn't take his attention off Markham, he presumed, and Markham was still raving and utterly oblivious to Zachary's entrance.
"—die, then maybe everybody else could die, too! It's got to be something wrong with me, Abe!"
Then, Markham grunted in time with the sound of something hitting the wall, shortly followed by a thump. Zachary thought he heard something drop, then someone was moving (Abe? He could still hear Markham against the wall), and something tapped against his bare foot. He crouched down, tentatively reaching for it, and pulled back when he felt what it was: cold, solid, sticky and wet. Sharp. A knife, covered in blood.
Suddenly, Zachary felt his heart leap into his throat as he realized how helpless he was right now. "Abe," he tried again, reaching for the handle of the knife in order to embed it in the wall outside the room. Seconds later, a hand slick with blood - he could smell it, that was definitely blood, and way too much - grabbed his arm and tugged him in. He felt like he was about to be sick, but Abe continued tugging him, bringing him to the opposite side of the room. Debris from the battle painfully poked against his feet, but he didn't complain. Another tug, and Zachary was kneeling. Abe placed a hand (this one was clean, thankfully) against Zachary's eyelids, gently pushing them down, then guided his hand onto the corner of Markham's chest.
"He's unconscious," Zachary surmised. He allowed himself a moment to simply feel the rise and fall of his younger brother's breathing. Then, he swallowed back as much of the nausea as he could and asked, "What happened?"
Abe once again took his arm, pulling it to face palm-up and used his other hand to trace along the wrist with the back of his nail. Zachary's blood chilled in his veins. Cut himself. Suicide attempt. "Wh-what are you sitting here for?" he demanded, hardening his aimless gaze and knowing Abe would see it. "Call an ambulance!"
Another grab at his hand, though this time there was hesitation before he was properly directed. Markham's arm was placed inside his hand, and he almost let go at sheer disgust from the oozing blood covering it. He shuddered. No time for that. Fabric of some sort (a shirt?) was shoved into his other hand and he quickly moved to press it against the area Abe had demonstrated on him earlier. He heard Abe stand and rush out of the room to retrieve the phone - while he wouldn't be able to actually direct anyone to their residence, he would find the thing much faster than Zachary could.
Markham's quiet breaths and Abe's thumping steps were the only sounds left to him, if he discounted the blood rushing past his ears. The jingle he had been working on before completely left his head. Now, all he could do was feel the pulse against the side of his hand and wait. An attempt at taking a deep breath turned into a slight chuckle. "What are we going to do with you...?" he murmured. They would get through this, of course, there was no other option. It wasn't the end of the world; they would fix this lack of death and things would go back to normal.
The only thing that concerned him was whether they would pull Markham through in one piece.
Name (or internet handle): DJ
Current character in Bete Noire: Sefton Lowell (
polarisation), Chris Halliwell (ghostlighter).2. Character information
Name: Zachary Finch
Livejournal username:
eternityunseenFandom: Original.
Image: This is probably the worst icon to link to, but I don't care~
3. Character information II
Age / appearance: Twenty-four years old, 5'10", fairly normal build. Black hair, just a tiny bit curly at the ends, and brown eyes. The most noticeable thing about his otherwise generic appearance would be his blank stare, while the second-most would be the collapsible white cane he carries around with him. His movements tend to err on the side of confident cautiousness.
Personality: To all appearances, Zachary Finch is a very happy-go-lucky guy. While he is able to be serious and think realistically if the situation warrants it, his optimism wins out more often than not. Why is this? Because the ability to feel all life unfolding around him has given him a unique perspective: anger, sadness, anxiety, any negative emotion you can think of, none of it stands up to the simple force of happiness. There's nothing like it. Yet people wrap themselves up in their misery and block out their opportunities to let the dark melt away. Zachary, however, has learned from others' mistakes and rarely allows himself to miss the chance. In this same vein, he feels exasperation at people in general for letting life pass them by. Condescension works its way in from time to time, as well.
With this outlook on life, he is quite the opposite from a depressed disabled. His opinion on the matter is that he might be missing out on things in the visual world, but he has his memories and isn't any less himself for it. If his sight had to be taken to fulfill Fate, then he would just live without - he still had four other senses to work with, after all.
... of course, he's only fooling himself.
Underneath the tough, sunshiny exterior is a kind, but frighteningly bitter young man. His tie to Lachesis is inextricable and impossible to reverse; his eventual blindness had always been a given, yet he tried to run from the truth and never quite prepared himself for it actually happening. After first experiencing his connection to life, and realizing the happiness that he, too, had been missing out on, he tried to bury his frustration, bitterness and pain and allow himself to experience the happiness that the rest of the world insisted on missing out on. It worked, to an extent. While he still feels the anger at his position, his fear of rejecting Lachesis, part of himself, keeps him from ever voicing or properly acknowledging the opinion.
On a different note entirely, Zachary's relationship with his cousins, Abe and Markham, is one nearing emotional dependence. They're so close, in fact, that they call each other brothers and live together. As the current Incarnations of the Moirae, they share a secret knowledge that the rest of the world is oblivious to, which only strengthens their closeness.
Sexual preferences / orientation: Heterosexual, but not terribly interested. Despite his outlook on people missing out on the happiness in their lives, he would much rather have a meaningful conversation with someone over getting tangled in sheets.
Powers: Being the Incarnation of Lachesis, Zachary has the ability to feel Life around him as Lachesis measures them. What this means is that he has a very general ability for empathy, able to gauge the mood of an area but never an individual. It isn't at all overpowering to him mentally, but it is all encompassing.
He is also able to use postcognition, looking back at the thread already spun in a person's life (and has the capacity for precognition), by obtaining something of theirs and twisting it around his fingers or arms. The precognition is only theoretical, since it means exerting his own influence on Lachesis herself to look ahead. Similarly theoretical is the ability to alter someone's Fate by completely hijacking Lachesis (and pending player-permission). Such a thing would leave noticeable trauma and he barely dares to think about trying it; it isn't his place to alter Fate.
Having the soul of a goddess allows him to perceive supernatural entities or phenomena, as far and few between as they are. And while not as notable as his goddess-given powers, Zachary's four remaining senses are heightened in compensation for his lack of sight, and he learned ASL as a child for the sake of Abe and Markham.
In-game: Zachary wished that he could know the layout of the city better during a time when wishes really did come true. This means he has a magical GPS/Mapquest of the city in his head, for all of your are-we-there-yet needs. Handy!
Reason for playing: Not only is Zachary much more extroverted than my li'l ol' blue-haired werewolf kid, but he is blind (something I've always wished to explore in roleplay) and has a seriously different outlook on life - sharing a soul with one of the Fates will do that to you. What he can do in the city is entirely up in the air, but I hope he can make some friends, at the least.
4. Original character supplement
World history: Modern-day Earth, 2010. Things are about what you'd expect, if you overlook the fact that the age of the gods truly existed and leftovers of the era still linger in the world today. Though almost every god has faded from sentience into becoming a force of nature, the Moirae were unable to afford letting their duties slip into the fingers of a mindless entity. Their fade was inevitable, and yet they worked out a solution: humans who would share their souls, connect with them on the most basic, intrinsic level, through whom they could siphon consciousness from. These Incarnations were free to live their lives until the previous Incarnation passed away; their only escape from their contract is to die. (This does not necessarily mean they are born Connected, but that they are born with the Fate to eventually come into their destiny. It's fairly common for there to be two Incarnations for the same Fate at the same time, but only one can ever be Connected.) In exchange for the connection and as a symbol of ownership, a sense would be stripped from them: for Clotho, speech; for Lachesis, sight; and for Atropos, hearing.
Although they have since faded from their proper roles, cults exist to worship the disappeared pantheon. Those with extreme amounts of faith are allowed to channel infinitesimally small fractions of their power - these people are chosen ones, and extremely dangerous, both because of their power and their fanatical fervor in their patriot. Mysteriously, no one who worships the Moirae has ever received any sort of power. Many assume the cause of this to be that the Fates cannot be swayed by mere mortal means.
Mythical creatures still exist, hiding from humans and cowering out of fear, having lost the protection and power of the gods along with the rest of the world. Most are imperceptible to the regular human, allowing them to retain their place in stories and legends.
Character history: A long, long time ago, the Moirae, the personifications of Fate, were born. Records are unclear on who parented them, but the fact remains that they existed. For untold generations, they carried out their duties: Clotho wove the thread and began new lives, Lachesis measured the thread and decided a person's destiny, and Atropos cut the thread and ended their life. Then, slowly at first, the gods began to fade. Their powers were left to the wilds of nature as humankind found different religions and strength in themselves. The Moirae, too, began to fade. However, they knew that with the demise of their rational thought, the fate of the world and its people would be completely unguided. And so they created the Incarnations to escape their own demise. It's not cheating Fate if you are the one to decide it, right?
Zachary was born to a fairly normal family, the Finches, in 1986. His father was a fashion designer, and his mother stayed at home (and shopped - a lot). He grew up in Atlanta, Georgia, with his cousinbrothers, Abe and Markham, with whom they shared their birth year. For the most part, Zachary lived an uneventful life. He went to school, he hung out with friends, he drew and played music.
As he grew, he was aware of the knowledge that he would eventually lose his sight to Fate, but ignored the warnings. Abe was the first to Connect, losing his voice and gaining a strangely whimsical attitude when he was only twelve years old. Markham lost his hearing at sixteen, turning reckless and protective. When they were all eighteen, the three brothers moved away from their parents and rented an apartment together. That was when it happened for Zachary. He lost his sight, and temporarily closed himself off from the world until he forced himself to see the bright side of the situation.
While Abe and Markham went on to gain degrees at college, Zachary was satisfied without and went into writing cheap little musical jingles when he didn't feel like mooching off of his brothers. Six years after they all finally came together as Incarnations, something finally shook them from their quaint little life near the beginning of July, 2010.
Atropos' shears had become dull, and death no longer came to the world. Her power became unstable, with her unable to do the one thing she was meant to. Though it affected all of them to some degree, Markham felt it the worst; he became more reckless, violent, and even suicidal in the face of Atropos' helplessness. Abe and Zachary were left to their attempts at locating the source of... whatever it was.
Then, one day, Zachary found it. (Cue Bete Noire.)
5. Samples
Third-person:
"Gooood morning, Atlanta! Today is July the 31st and the time is nine o'clock! Boy, is it beautiful. Better get your kids outside, Mom, because..."
Zachary groaned, reaching over to smack the alarm off just as the station's jingle began to play. Why, oh, why had he made it so high-pitched? Sure, the execs liked it, heck, even Zachary liked it at first, but after hearing it every morning for the past two months, he was quickly becoming sick of it. Routinely, he would poke and prod at the notes in his mind and try to rearrange or alter them to make something better.
His eyes were open. He could feel the sun on his face, so Abe must have been in already to open the blinds. He didn't really know why either of his brothers bothered to close them, since he was the only one who slept in this particular room, but he appreciated the effort, if not the action itself. Yawning, he stretched his legs out and finished kicking the sheets off the bed. He would fix them later tonight, hopefully after he had finally reenvisioned the radio jingle into something he would be satisfied with. Hey, who knew? Maybe he would pitch the new jingle to the company and try to make some extra money off it, too.
Standing, he felt his way along the wall to the closet, retrieved the clothes he had set out the night before, and set them out to change into. All part of his routine. The quiet sounds of the morning coming from the main room told him that Markham (who made as much noise as you might expect as someone didn't know they were making it) was still asleep, although Abe had already begun the day. He gave a quick tug or two at his blankets to pull them onto the bed, then snatched his cane from where it hung around his doorknob and went to greet the woken one.
"Morning."
Tap-tap went the pen against the counter. Abe's return greeting. Zachary offered a smile, assuming Abe to be looking in his direction for the moment, and sat at the kitchen bar.
"Breakfast ready?"
Without warning, Abe grabbed his hand. He twitched his fingers, then opened his palm for the other. The closed pen was placed against it and Abe dragged it back and forth in a straight line. Zachary frowned. "Why not?" Another line; another negative. "No... food?" he guessed. A circle. Zachary rolled his eyes, even if he felt the effect had been diminished since he couldn't see where he was rolling them to. "Fine, okay. You got any money?" Tap, tap, tap. "What's that supposed to mean? Actually—" he pulled his hand away, giving Abe a superior look now that the other couldn't argue, "—just give me some cash, and I'll be right back."
Sounds from down the hall. He tilted his head toward the room hear them better, and could tell Abe had shifted, noticing Markham's awakening, too. Attention turned toward Abe, he emphasized, "Right back." He heard Abe sigh, then shift around while retrieving his wallet. The paper money crinkled under Abe's touch as he presumably folded it before setting it on the counter. Zachary followed the sound and snatched up the ten dollar bill after a little searching. Hopping off the stool, he gave a salute to empty space and moved to the door with practiced ease.
He was out in the hall, making his way to the elevator, when he heard Markham's slurred, "Morning..." as the door swung shut behind him. Silently, he apologized to Abe for leaving him alone with Markham. Hopefully, today wouldn't be such a bad one for their brother, but such days were getting farther apart, only a few weeks after death had lost its power. He was happy that Markham still recognized them, even during his fits, and hoped he wouldn't sink further into the insanity before they could right what had gone wrong. (And they would find what had gone wrong.)
Ding.
The elevator was moving behind the doors, stopped at the floor above him, and he felt for the down-button while unfolding his cane.
Ding.
The doors trundled open, and he stepped inside, keeping himself to the edge in case someone else was still inside the car with him. He let his hand graze over the buttons, feeling for the first floor, and pushed at it before stepping back. He and his brothers lived on the sixth floor, so it never took too long to reach the first from there. He couldn't hear anyone else breathing, meaning he was alone, yet he still stepped back. Holding his cane against himself to keep it out of the way, he simply listened to elevator music on the way down.
The elevator stopped. The doors opened. He took a step forward before he fully realized that there had been no ding, and promptly caught his foot on—something and crashed into the ground. His cane jarred itself from his hand, rolled away, and the smell of smoke and pollution assaulted his nose. The sounds of the city were right beside him, the feel of concrete under his hands, heart beating wildly in his chest. He knew couldn't be outside, so...
"... What the hell?"
Third-person II:
CRASH
Zachary tilted his head upward, startled out of his music (an attempt to rewrite that stupid jingle - it seriously should not have warranted so much of his attention, but he couldn't help it!). He strained his hearing to try and determined what was happening. It didn't take long. Another sound—a WHUMP this time—joined in, followed by quieter crashing as things were knocked off of a higher surface. Quickly, he placed the guitar in its stand, spared a second to make sure it wouldn't fall out, and hurried toward the sounds; toward Markham's room.
Markham was yelling. His slurred, but recognizable speech ringing out loudly in concert with the noises of a struggle. "No!! I have to do this!"
He bashed into the hallway wall in his hurry, his shoulder taking the brunt of the damage, and he stumbled, fell. He grunted, catching himself on his elbows, and quickly stood. He was a few feet from Markham's room, but already could smell the blood. Adrenaline spiked and he shot to his feet, leaping the last few steps to the room. "Abe!" he called, knowing that must have been who Markham was struggling with. There was no pause in the sounds of the struggle - Abe couldn't take his attention off Markham, he presumed, and Markham was still raving and utterly oblivious to Zachary's entrance.
"—die, then maybe everybody else could die, too! It's got to be something wrong with me, Abe!"
Then, Markham grunted in time with the sound of something hitting the wall, shortly followed by a thump. Zachary thought he heard something drop, then someone was moving (Abe? He could still hear Markham against the wall), and something tapped against his bare foot. He crouched down, tentatively reaching for it, and pulled back when he felt what it was: cold, solid, sticky and wet. Sharp. A knife, covered in blood.
Suddenly, Zachary felt his heart leap into his throat as he realized how helpless he was right now. "Abe," he tried again, reaching for the handle of the knife in order to embed it in the wall outside the room. Seconds later, a hand slick with blood - he could smell it, that was definitely blood, and way too much - grabbed his arm and tugged him in. He felt like he was about to be sick, but Abe continued tugging him, bringing him to the opposite side of the room. Debris from the battle painfully poked against his feet, but he didn't complain. Another tug, and Zachary was kneeling. Abe placed a hand (this one was clean, thankfully) against Zachary's eyelids, gently pushing them down, then guided his hand onto the corner of Markham's chest.
"He's unconscious," Zachary surmised. He allowed himself a moment to simply feel the rise and fall of his younger brother's breathing. Then, he swallowed back as much of the nausea as he could and asked, "What happened?"
Abe once again took his arm, pulling it to face palm-up and used his other hand to trace along the wrist with the back of his nail. Zachary's blood chilled in his veins. Cut himself. Suicide attempt. "Wh-what are you sitting here for?" he demanded, hardening his aimless gaze and knowing Abe would see it. "Call an ambulance!"
Another grab at his hand, though this time there was hesitation before he was properly directed. Markham's arm was placed inside his hand, and he almost let go at sheer disgust from the oozing blood covering it. He shuddered. No time for that. Fabric of some sort (a shirt?) was shoved into his other hand and he quickly moved to press it against the area Abe had demonstrated on him earlier. He heard Abe stand and rush out of the room to retrieve the phone - while he wouldn't be able to actually direct anyone to their residence, he would find the thing much faster than Zachary could.
Markham's quiet breaths and Abe's thumping steps were the only sounds left to him, if he discounted the blood rushing past his ears. The jingle he had been working on before completely left his head. Now, all he could do was feel the pulse against the side of his hand and wait. An attempt at taking a deep breath turned into a slight chuckle. "What are we going to do with you...?" he murmured. They would get through this, of course, there was no other option. It wasn't the end of the world; they would fix this lack of death and things would go back to normal.
The only thing that concerned him was whether they would pull Markham through in one piece.