[Voices and sounds that shouldn't be there, too many people, the wrong kind of pain— and is that gunfire? Octavian lies under the table in a sticky puddle, more aware than he'd expected to be after having his head caved in. He listens, he waits; his murderer's fine shoes carry him away, everything feels swimmy and disconnected again, and he isn't sure how long he lies there before the young women have apparently also gone.
He was never sure how long he'd laid there before leaving his body behind that first time, either, so at least that much is proceeding how it should. Inevitably he lifts himself up, although with a grunt this time, as the whole of his body entire comes with, and he is bloody from the waist up, a gruesome thing to look at, and also:
his head hits the underside of the table, which feels like an insult to injury. He mutters something and drags himself out further, looking around at what is and is not his murderer's private workshop, the stool he'd sat on flickering into the shape of a chair and back again. All of it seems to flicker from his perspective; all that remains strangely solid is the shape of the man slumped in the chair. That's wrong; he was not killed with any witnesses or, hm, companions. Octavian hauls himself to his feet, hands bracing on the table-bench-whatever. He coughs, wetly.]
Wrong, [he says, and then, to the still shape of Silco over there,] Can you hear me over there? Call on your ambitions to open your eyes.
no subject
He was never sure how long he'd laid there before leaving his body behind that first time, either, so at least that much is proceeding how it should. Inevitably he lifts himself up, although with a grunt this time, as the whole of his body entire comes with, and he is bloody from the waist up, a gruesome thing to look at, and also:
his head hits the underside of the table, which feels like an insult to injury. He mutters something and drags himself out further, looking around at what is and is not his murderer's private workshop, the stool he'd sat on flickering into the shape of a chair and back again. All of it seems to flicker from his perspective; all that remains strangely solid is the shape of the man slumped in the chair. That's wrong; he was not killed with any witnesses or, hm, companions. Octavian hauls himself to his feet, hands bracing on the table-bench-whatever. He coughs, wetly.]
Wrong, [he says, and then, to the still shape of Silco over there,] Can you hear me over there? Call on your ambitions to open your eyes.