He turned over in his garbage bed morosely. “Yeah. Got a problem with corpses?” he snapped, closing his eyes again.

There was a long and put-upon sigh from the stranger. The condescension was obnoxious. If he had more energy, he might have thrown a punch at him, or at least pretended to. The key to living unnoticed was to be terminally unlikable, not to actually hurt random arrogant sods who considered themselves to be “do-gooders.”

He had his own strange set of morals.

Don’t stand out among the crowd, but be unpleasant enough that people crave to forget him. But sometimes it worked well enough to just fall asleep. People got bored with sleeping drunks.

He thought that the stranger had left, but when he came to the land of consciousness once more, his body was slumped over someone’s shoulder.

Faintly, he wondered if he was being kidnapped. When he determined that he really didn’t care, he returned to his sweet, dreamless slumber.

Distantly, he thought that the stranger’s shoulder was warm. How long had it been since he’d felt warm? He breathed it in and smiled to himself.

The stranger’s silver hair smelled like earth and wood.

A nice scent to fall asleep to. Like days spent in the afternoon sun beneath a tree.

It would have been merciful for Ny to fall into a dreamless rest. For his mind to lock away all of his thoughts in those distant moments, instead of reminding him of open days by trees and laughter he would never hear again.

Dreams were merciless and cruel and never relented, no matter how much he might wish for oblivion.

All he could do was crave the waking world where he could numb his memories with yet more wine.

Crimson red eyes squinted open onto an unfamiliar ceiling before they closed with a grimace at the sudden exposure to light.

A headache nagged at his senses, telling him that it had been too long since his last drink. The dull throb was a bother, but the real problem was that he was uncomfortably sober. The tired drunkard wondered just where the hell he was. 

He knew he wasn’t still on the trash pile. The material under him was too plush and cozy. It had been a long time since he’d slept on a bed, and a weary part of him, the one that rebelled at discomfort, was sincerely tempted to go back to sleep so that he could enjoy this luxury for as long as possible.

The more sensible part of him was acutely aware that he wasn’t alone in the unfamiliar room. Other than his faint memories of being kidnapped, he could hear the scratching of a quill against parchment and the occasional frustrated murmurs of a man tirelessly working on something or another.

It was good that nothing felt or sounded familiar. He hadn’t been found. There was no sign of those people. If they found him… The thought alone caused his stomach to drop nauseously.

He needed a drink. He was thinking too much, and that was a problem. Sobriety inevitably led to more serious thoughts, and he wanted to cure his headache with more booze. It was difficult to have a complete hangover when you never actually sobered up.

“There’s water on the table beside the bed.” A clear voice came from the direction of the working man, and he knew that his pretense of sleep was over. Dragging his haggard body upward into a sitting position, he looked around the room.

He winced at what he saw.

He needed a drink.

He hated being observant.

There was an unfortunate lack of alcohol nearby though, so he decided to accept the water. If he was lucky, it was poisoned and he’d die. With that flippantly morbid thought in mind, he quenched his thirst and avoided looking at the stranger who kidnapped him.

It was partially because Ny was smart enough to avoid seeing anything that might upset him and partially because he’d already seen far too much. He really hoped that he’d be murdered or kicked out, and then he wouldn’t have to think anymore.

“…The fuck are you?” he asked, not because he wanted an answer but more because he thought it might be expected of him. It would be suspicious for a drunkard not to be belligerent and demanding.

“There’s a warm bath in the adjoining room,” the stranger said in lieu of an answer. He did not look up from his work. “You stink. Go wash up.”

It was the tone of a man who was used to being obeyed and used to issuing orders without a single thought for those below him. Definitely a nobleman, but he’d already pieced that together from the room he’d observed.

He debated arguing. It would fit the personality of a drunkard, after all, to say, “I’m not stinky, you are!” or something equally tiresome. Besides, there was no way that this was an act of kindness. He didn’t know why he’d been kidnapped, but there was no feasible way that it was just to give him a soft bed and a warm bath.

He weighed his options.

His headache won.

Arguing and playing the part of an obnoxious drunk was a lot easier when his head wasn’t throbbing as though it’d been hit by a plank of wood repeatedly. And warm water was a luxury that he didn’t often get.

The stranger was either a pervert, a murderer, or someone who needed a person that no one would miss. There was also the faint possibility that he had been recognized but the drunkard was pretty confident that wouldn’t happen.

If he was recognized, that person would already be here.

“You’re the stinky one…” he muttered without any real bite, and he slumped off to the promise of a warm bath while knowing full well that his future was probably going to be blessedly short. No matter the reason he’d been kidnapped, there was no need to keep him alive for long.

Perhaps this was a blessing in disguise. One comfortable sleep and a nice bath before some creep choked him out to fulfill some freaky fetish. He didn’t have the energy to give two fucks about how he died, so long as he was either dead or drunk.

Preferably both. He hoped if there was an afterlife that it had a lot of alcohol. Although his ideal afterlife was definitely oblivion.

There was a large mirror on the wall that displayed his reflection. He jerked his gaze the moment he’d accidentally got sight of it. Pitch-black hair and dark crimson eyes on a round face. He really looked like his…

Sobriety was a disgusting place to live. He wanted to move. If he couldn’t move to inebriation, he would very much like to stop living all together. The thought cheered him up a bit.

“…Maybe I should drown myself in the tub?” he mumbled to himself when he reached the adjoining room. 

Ny stripped down and dipped into the clear water.

It was actually pretty funny to watch the grime float up to the surface. There was no way he’d get totally clean with just one bath but he didn’t have any intention of becoming totally clean. He was just trying to treat his headache.

Speaking of which, he dunked his head underwater and allowed the warmth to soothe the knots of pain that built up.

He thought about the room he’d just left.

He tried not to.

It was certainly an upstairs room in a tavern, one of the expensive ones that had a private bathroom and was mostly used by sleazy nobles to do their dirty deeds. It was too expensive for the common man but too dingy to be spotted by one's fellow upper society peers.

There had been a sword leaning against the wall. It wasn’t a fancy sword. It was actually simple in design and looked rather old. He could tell by the handle that it had been used diligently, and he could tell by the jagged blade that it had been used improperly.

He had seen a few maps strung up on the walls. They were mostly maps of the capital, stuff that wouldn’t cause any alarm. He saw marks on the maps, little circles and notations that he tried not to read and tried harder not to remember.

He saw a silver-haired man hunched over a small desk with a look of mad concentration on his face. He saw a pot of tea nearby and a half-eaten loaf of bread forgotten by his elbow.

He saw enough to know that whoever his kidnapper was, he probably wasn’t the common pervert.

He’d almost have preferred dealing with some freaky nobleman who wanted to get his jollies off with a worthless homeless drunkard. Sure, it would have been uncomfortable, but afterward he could go back to forgetting everything behind a bottle of alcohol and relieve his anxiety by never thinking about it again. Besides, his kidnapper wasn’t unattractive.

It wouldn’t have been the worst thing to happen to him.

However, a person who was planning something was either crazy or ambitious, probably both. He didn’t want anything to do with either, especially because the only reason that someone like that would want anything to do with him was either as a disposable pawn or wanted to make use of his identity.

Neither was particularly pleasant.

He ran out of breath and crested the water.

He stared into the muddied water before deciding to use some soap. “…I need a drink,” he grumbled. 

If he was going to get strung up in some insane bastard’s crazy schemes, then he might as well take advantage of the momentary luxuries available to him. Maybe he could persuade that guy that he was a better asset when he was drunk.

Yeah. He could use the crazy guy to find his next drink. Things weren’t looking so bad after all. He just needed to find an angle to the situation that suited him.

Ny was a malleable person. He didn’t need life to agree with him—he just needed to force himself to accept whatever misery was flung his way. And whatever he couldn’t accept, he could just drink away the memories of.

Simple as that.

Having cleaned about as much off of him as he could, he got out of the bath. He was ready to change back into his grimy clothes, making the entire act of bathing somewhat pointless, but he spotted clothes left out for him on a counter. 

He debated ignoring it but then decided that if he got out of here alive, he could sell the spare set of clothes for money to buy more alcohol. It was an easy decision to make after that.

He was surprised when the clothes fit him well. He even took a spare moment to glance at his reflection, tugging the purple hood over his eyes and appreciating the anonymity it provided.

The room he returned to was empty.

That hadn’t been expected. The sword was gone, but other than that, everything had been left as it was. Just minus one kidnapper.

The door locked from the inside, so he could just walk out and never come back. It was a tempting proposition.

He sat at the edge of the bed and thought how annoying it was to have a clear head. Sobriety really was the enemy of all mankind. It was best to be drunk off your ass and completely oblivious to the world around you. Making decisions was easy then. You didn’t have to think about the ramifications.

He lay back and looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully.

It had been a long time since he’d known any comfort like this.

He knew that he didn’t deserve any comfort. Not after what he’d done and what he’d seen. He deserved the worst that society had to offer him, and he was willing to accept it so long as he was drunk enough to cope with the aftermath.

He was aware that there was something wrong with his logic but he didn’t want to consider that at the moment. He was stewing in his own self-loathing and wasting away his opportunity to escape.

What was the point in escaping, though?

The door opened and he looked at it with the dispassionate gaze of a dead man.

The silver-haired stranger frowned at him. “You’re still here?”

Ah, so it was part of his machinations for Ny to escape. He couldn’t think of what the kidnapper could gain from that though.

“I’m hungry,” Ny said petulantly. His tone was mostly to see if he could piss off his kidnapper, but also, he hadn’t eaten anything in a few days. “And sober,” he added, his voice emphasizing that was the much bigger problem here. A problem that could be very easily remedied by a good bottle of peach wine.

The kidnapper’s face wrinkled in disgust before he let out a sigh and turned around, exiting the room as though deeply disappointed or annoyed. Hm. It was probably an invitation for him to escape and follow the plan this time. He didn’t have the energy to play along with those games though.

One could say that he thought too much.

He did.

It was one of the reasons he hated sobriety. He had a knack for noticing things and then considering a million possibilities and reasons behind a simple turn of events. His tendency to overthink things mixed with his cynicism led to him thinking up a million awful explanations for his observations.

In defense of his paranoia, he’d been given plenty of reasons in his time alive to be paranoid.

However, as a condemnation of that same paranoia, it was something that came naturally to him, not something he’d learned through his various traumatic experiences.

The door opened up again, and this time he didn’t bother looking over. He must have disappointed his kidnapper by not playing along with the scenario. Well, too bad. He was exhausted. His head hurt. He was—

The smell hit him and his head turned without his meaning to, his stomach aching at the memory of food. The silver-haired bastard was holding out a tray of soup and bread for him with an annoyed expression that clearly portrayed how little he thought of him.

Arrogant prick.

But he was an arrogant prick offering food, so he stuffed up his pride and sat up to accept the tray. He wasn’t surprised when it was pulled away, just unamused. Did the bastard want him to grovel? He wasn’t prideful enough to refuse, but it was still bothersome.

“You clean up well,” the kidnapper said. He looked Ny up and down carefully.

Ny snorted derisively. “Yeah. I figure that’s why ya kidnapped me. Now hand over the grub.” He made no effort to snatch it though. That would be way too much effort.

His captor’s face crinkled in distaste at the accusation. The man handed over the tray and crossed his arms over his chest. “I helped you. There’s a difference. Would you prefer I left you in that alleyway to die?”