[Corone] To heist a memory of the past...

Drake slowly opened the windows to his soul, soaking in the grainy spotted remains of ancient treated fir trees which constituted his room’s ceiling. Golden sunrise seeped into the cracks between the boards as the familiar inky hued mold greeted him with her phantom songs from above. Drawing a deep breath through his nostrils, her inescapable aroma tickled him all over- sour basement must upon fermenting wood rot.

“Good morning to you too,” Drake quietly mused to himself.

Her acquired scent would drive most animals and insects away, but Drake knew that most simply misunderstood her. At this point, he preferred her company over most other Althanians: she was far more reasonable, forgiving, and he pretended that she complimented him from time to time.
The principality slowly rolled his eyes, sweeping across the room to fixate on the cillu pane. Once upon a time, the proudly invincible sheen boasted the eloquent extravagance of The Peaceful Promenade’s prosperity. With the loss of its founders to the allure of Scara Brae’s economic tides, a sickness grew about the building as vagrants commandeered the space. At least the comet cleared out the opportunists, allowing new owners to reboot the pub and start to repair. They still belabored great lengths to restore its former glory, but Drake understood that business in this area crept along at a painstaking pace which rivaled cold cheese sauce.

Even though soot and grime opaqued the window’s outer face, the sun’s red morning radiation continued to adore the medium all the same. Despite the filth, Cillu gratefully transfigured the star’s beautiful waves, altering their constitution by nearly fifteen orders of magnitude. Each curtailed wave sang with its newfound golden color after passing through, adorned with energy unrecognizable when juxtaposed to its mother frequency. The change filled Drakes mouth with the memory of exotic Fallien mangoes, and transmuted the mold’s mellow odor into a lemony aftertaste. Drake sat up, only to startle off the bed as the dingy tapestry opposite of him reflected angry, sinister colors of decay and deterioration. The reflected light slapped him with the sound of a slamming steel door.

“FFffff. _. .” Drake huffed defeatedly from the floor with a lazy labial embouchure, “Danged thing gets me everytime.”

After brushing the mold off of his pajamas, Drake began his sunrise routine. He cleaned the window’s inner face with a shammy he washed the previous night and gave himself a spongebath with freshly pasteurized water leftover from his evening routine. After changing into laundered clothing, kept sanitary in his still-air trunk, he grabbed the week’s rent from the remaining reward he had collected from his last courrier contract. Bidding farewell to the mold, Cillu, and the grouchy tapestry, Drake locked his room and departed in search of breakfast. Drake’s heart halted him with a sudden tightness upon recognizing a prone figure’s silent grieving.

“Oh dear,” Drake lamented, “Not again.”

Squatting down with his heels on the floor, Drake gently patted the man on his shoulder.

“Ed,” Drake said softly, “Ed, wake up.”

The man slowly roused, looking up at the principality with bloodshot eyes saturated with pain.

“Gone,” Ed groaned as the fractal patterned depressions on his face from sleeping on the floor moaned in their pink fashion. “They’re all gone.”

“I know,” Drake sadly resigned. The two exchanged a moment of uncertainty as the torrent of sorrow overcame the two. “This too shall pass. We just have to stick it out.”

“Come on,” Drake said with a sad, non reassuring smile. “Let’s get you to your room.”

Drake pulled the man to his feet and guided the local back to Room 1408, overcome with the stench of waste and excrement upon entry. Rats scattered upon their arrival, knocking over one of the many repurposed ale bottles that Ed had filled with his bodily fluid. Drake gave a heave of frustration as the odors turned his stomach to acid.

“When was the last time that you cleaned?” Drake asked gently. Ed gurgled incoherently in response.

Realizing the futility of exchanging words, Drake proceeded to tuck his neighbor into the recovery position on his bed, and cleaned up the floor. He emptied the bottles into the communal chamber pot, and cleared the remaining refuse into the trash bin before finally setting out again.

Downstairs, Drake informed the Pubmaster of his neighbor’s state.

“Can you please make sure he has a partner to look after him next time that he goes on a bender? I can’t tell him how to live his life, but if he is going to be doing this he has to be safe about it. This place is home to all of us.”

She heaved a great sigh, tousling her cinnamon angel pasta hair about her shoulders, as she saw the truth behind Drake’s words.

“Yeah, don’t worry I will have a serious talk with him when he wakes,” Turk replied. “As loath as I am to admit, I think we’ve all been ignoring him in hopes that he would just vanish or fizzle out.”

“Someday, Turk,” Drake said sadly. “Someday we’ll all be able to move past this.”

The two exchanged a silent, solemn conversation through rivers of the unsaid, until the eye contact began to burn beneath Drake’s shoulder blades.

“Until then,” the principality said, averting his gaze, “Let’s try to look after one another.”

“I’ll say something, if I see something.” Turk replied.

“That’s a great place to start.”

“Did you hear all the commotion at the Museum last night?” Turk inquired.

“I don’t think I did.” Drake responded. “I was probably somewhere in the antifirmament, though I can’t remember any of it.”

“Well I don’t envy you there,” came Turk’s tenor pitched, leathery voice, “But it was annoying as hell. Blaring alarms, clanking armor, people were losing their shit.”

“I’m heading out that way today, I’ll let you know what I find out.” Drake said, sliding the rent payment across the counter.”

“I’d appreciate that,” Said Turk. “But now onto the most important topic, what are you having this morning?”

“Right,” Drake chuckled. “Do you still have any of that tomato pie left?”