Deimos appreciated the lull; the bartender smoothly, efficiently, slid the required drink across the dirty, wooden surface and he grabbed it with restrained enthusiasm, bringing it up to his lips in swift, earnest approval as burned down his throat. It barely numbed the hollowed surfaces, the etched, sculpted, mottled edges of his nefarious, demonic presence, covered and coveted the thorns and nettles of his taciturn demeanor, but it would do for the moment. Given the opportunity, he might’ve merely stood there and brooded throughout the rest of the evening, anguish, melancholy, and poignant thoughts stretching along the perimeter of his mind until it was time to move on, destroy, devastate some other ruin, some other fortress. He could win battles, just not against himself.
The notion was interrupted by a noise: soft, almost imperceptible. Had he not been a predacious, ravenous creature, he might not have bothered with curiosity at all, and left the small shuffles to another’s wandering stare – but he watched, succumbing easily to the pressures of inquiry and vice, to the layers and shackles iniquity and interest knotted along his skull. He was reminded briefly of a mouse, a little thing yearning to be hidden, unknown, hardly noticed, blending into the background, into the walls, into the scenery. Then why come at all? he half-wondered, but left the query to himself, like most other things, nursing another sip – waiting for something to happen, pondering if he would have to be the one to glean more than silence (an affront to his senses; he was far more likely to recede into the evening, turn a corner, be gone into the midst of twilight and abominations). The Reaper muffled a sigh, turned his gaze back to other things; shifting shadows, strangers coming and going, naught intriguing save for the woman still remaining nearby. For a moment, as he glanced at her from the corner of his eye again, he thought he should’ve known her; familiarity was a strange nuance in a foreign land, but perhaps she reminded him of someone, distant and uncertain, cloaked and concealed, waiting to dart between shards of light. Her quietude was almost vexing and irritating; though he was loathe to admit his actions would’ve done the same to anyone in his company. “Is there something you require?” He questioned from the side of his mouth, almost a growl, an echo of pasts left buried in sand, ash, dust, and soot.
