Author Games: The Absent Empress

Task Three Entries: 1-10

King

White Russian:

(2 parts) Coffee Liqueur

(5 parts) Vodka

(3 parts) Fresh Cream

All systems go in three, two, one, herded down the narrow hallways of his thoughts to the steady rhythm of the walls around him. Is it day or is it night? Does it matter through the tinted dark windows and the pulse of the lights? Artificial sunlight, artificial moonlight, channeled through wires and cords that hang suspended from the ceiling. Frozen in place. Always in motion. They plunge the world into alternating cycles of dark and light. Dark, the music that swells through the air, the feeling of his heart in his throat. King sucks in the energy, the vibrations of the bodies around him. It fills him with new purpose. New life. New grins plastered across old faces. He doesn't know a single person in the crowd but that has never mattered before. Friends are friends. People are people. All you have to do is give 'em a smile and a laugh and they're putty dripping through your fingers as you rake your nails down the skin of their lives.

Light, the illumination, the thought, the realization that you are alive once more and your pulse synchronizes with the person beside you until the mass of moving bodies becomes a giant, singular, beating heart. It is to be whole. To be one. To pull yourself to the hips of another and shake the world with the electricity in your veins.

Dark and light, on and off, a flicker and a twitch and with every cycle King is reborn.

Should he be working? Fuck, shouldn't we all? He tries to ignore the thought. The bar is illuminated in blue and purple and neon and he tries to ignore the thought. Parties give him the kick that he needs, solidifying his constantly fluid shape into a jumble of mismatched parts that might be considered human. At least that's how he feels. At least that's how it makes him feel. Lost without the tide roaring over his head. Sewn together by muddied promises that breathe in the scent of liquor and sugar. And it feels good. And it feels good to be back in a place that he knows. A place that knows him. A place where although the eyes ask "where's Kitty?" the mouths stay shut because some things should just stay dead. Some people should just stay dead.

But he is wrong. A surprise, an anomaly, a glitch in the Matrix, but he is wrong. There is a face he recognizes. One that looks just as good with a spatter of blood on his cheeks as he would with a spatter of glitter. He too, is fluid, moving through the crowd as if they part the seas for him. King grins. "Hey, Boy Wonder!" The sound of his own voice is strange, but it catches the necessary attention. The Disney Prince turns his head, wanders over until King doesn't have to fight the white-water rapids of sound that fill the room. "If you're looking for the paparazzi they went—" A pause, mouth opening in an exaggerated thought, pointing his finger somewhere in the crowd. "That-uh way."

His words elicit a laugh. Wonderbread steps a little closer, teeth shining bright under the neon glow. "Actually, I was looking for a drink, your Highness."

The words straighten King up, lighting up his eyes with excitement. "Well, shit!" Fingers itch, desperate to be the one to make the drink. But he can't. That's against the rules now. The King's Rules. He can do one almost as good, though. Almost. Not quite. "In that case—"

He puts his fingers between his teeth. A whistle, swift and sharp, cuts like glass. The bartender looks up from the glass in his hands. Unspoken communication floods the thrumming air. It's a head jerked in the other hero's direction, a tight nod from quiet lips, and King turns his body back to the ginger-haired boy. "It's on the house," he informs. A shiver of disbelief clouds fresh eyes. Lips that quirk in a look that says what's the catch? But King isn't a fisherman. There's no prize for the longest cod caught even though, spoiler: it's him. "It pays to have friends, Spandex." The words tease a little more than he intends, but he doesn't take it back. He takes nothing back.