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It's a small, private medical facility, but it does handle the harder cases, and there's a hard case that arrived just a couple days ago. A man was struck by lightning, was in a coma for eight days, then woke up babbling in old languages and uttering fantastical things about demons and dark gods. They figured giving him a roommate might help him come around. Exposure to the world around him, and all that. It's not so great for his roommate. Poor John Constantine. His luck just isn't good.
The guy will not shut up. He won't eat, they can barely get him to take water. He's thin. So thin, and tall so he looks thinner still. He has a trembling fever sweat, dark hair clinging to his forehead and temples. His large dark eyes are haunted, darting back and forth like someone reading a page, only it's the empty air he scans.
Daemonium somniabunt. Non captures. Interfectus est. Over and over. Incessant.
Constantines luck was fucking non-existent and still, in spite of his best efforts to the contrary, the wanker somehow thrived. The tall blond Brit rolled over in his cot. What the hell, he wasn't getting any sleep anyways, but the constant prattling was just driving him batty The idea of coming here was to get better. The point was to prove none of this was real. The prattling on about demons? Well it wasn't very helpful. Finally he cracked a bloodshot eye open, "Somnia vera sunt. Non licet verum sit somnia." Latin he could argue in all day. He sighed though and had some modicum of pity among the irritation. "Let it go, mate. Just for a few hours. I need the sleep and you sure bloody well can at that."
"In hanc ergo perveniens. Occisio. Verus somnium. Greenwich Village. Nolite ire." He exhales softly, and his gaze stops scanning thin air. "Hello, John Constantine. Periculum est somnium. His fingers twitch at his sides, his body held so rigid it has to hurt. Auffere vult. Auffere vult. Auffere vult. His eyes close, probably for the first time in days, and his features twist in pain. Cerebrum nocet. Non possum accipere eam! He starts to thrash. Uh oh. this can't be good.
Constantine was tired but he knew what he heard. Slooooowly his eyes opened and where he was tired was chillingly wide awake. Dark brown irises that stained the glassy road maps of eyes stared at his roommate.
Quietly he whispered, "What… did you say there, mate?" Could they have spoken of him? Sure it was possible. Everything was possible, but that it was happening felt too coincidental to him and he knew too much to believe in coincidences.
Lindon tries to touch his head, but he's been restrained. For the thrashing, and also because when his hands were free he clawed at his head and there are still red marks in places. So it's a restrained thrashing, and his voice breaks as he yells in English, "Help me! Help me! Get it out of me!" Then he goes still, panting for breath. Weary, his voice aches with tiredness, helpless desperation. "You're not mad. It's real. It's all real." There's still nothing of clarity in his eyes, but his voice is so much more conversational.
Constantine pushed himself up and swung his feet over the edge landing on the tile floor with a smack. He'd seen quite a bit in his day from smack to possession and this seemed like it landed somewhere in the middle. In two steps he was across the room. Briefly he checked the hall and leaned close peering into Lindon's eyes. At Lindon's raving his expression looked wary with the offhanded comment, "Coming from another inpatient that's wildly reassuring." John sucked in his cheeks and then finally relented pressing the flat of his fingers to Lindon's forehead. "Get what out of you, give us something to go on, yeah?" It was encouraging at least if not clinical looking at the puzzle before him.
Lindon trembles. Restrained, he couldn't stop John if he tried. Just how aware is he of the man's presence? Enough to speak his name. At first he stares past Constantine, but then his focus returns, and it's sharp as a rapier, his gaze boring into John. "Everything," he whispers. "You don't understand, he put everything in there. It's all words, words whipping around, I don't I don't I don't know. I don't know what I am." He jerks violently at his restraints. "I saw and heard, and knew at last the How and Why of all things, past, and present, and forevermore. The Universe, cleft to the core, lay open to my probing sense that, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence but could not,nay! But needs must suck at the great wound, and could not pluck my lips away till I had drawn all venom out.Ah, fearful pawn!" He tries to close the distance between John and himself, but he cannot. "For my omniscience paid I toll in infinite remorse of soul."
Constantine looked around and checked to see if the screaming was alerting the orderlies. On the upshot? Lindon was always screaming so this was not new. He pushed the sleeves up on his unbuttoned dress shirt that was crumpled and slept in more than once. He slapped his hands together and rubbed them togehter. He stood and cleared his mind and fixed his eyes on Lindons as he intoned the words "I am addressing the entity inside… Who are you?" Hey, it was worth a shot if he was possessed.
Now that's a tricky question. It's enough to make Lindon stop thrashing. He lies still, panting for breath. His voice is suddenly quiet. Somewhat retiring, really. "I'm the Archive. I'm…" His brow furrows. "I'm a tree." The orderlies and nurses who haven't called him Mr. Mills have called him Lindon. That's a kind of tree, more or less. "Tilia Americana, ranged from southern Canada as far south and west as Oklahoma. Simple, alternately arranged leaves, ovate to cordate, asymmetrical at the base. In spring, it produces yellowish-white flowers that smell like semen." So a linden. What a thing to be named after.
Okay, not what he was expecting. Hmmm. He held his hands out over over this 'Archive' hesitantly. A tongue ran over his bottom lip and he sighed, "You might be confirming I lost my marbles, Lindon-tree, but why the bloody hell not go out with a bang." His hands snapped over Lindon who was already secured to his cot and intoned "In nomine Sancte Luca, Sancte Marce, Raziel Et angelus, quem ostendit mihi videntur!" This was, perhaps, a spectacularly bad idea.
Lindon's back arches and he cries out, "In nomine Sancte Luca, Sancte Marce, Raziel Et angelus, quem ostendit mihi videntur!" his voice breaks. "It hurts. I can't do this. No, no, no, pick someone else." Something in what Constantine has done causes a shift. Lindon's features start to form an expression. It's anguish. Pain. "It's too much," he says, taking ragged breaths. "I can't shut it up. I can't stop thinking."
Constantine set his haw and tilted his head askew. Something was off. Lindon wasn't possessed by a spirit. This was something else something…older? Veeeeeeery curious, and whatever it was spilling out where knowledge was concerned it was seeping out like a radium clock leaked radiation. With jaw still clenched John gave the article inside Lindon or that was Lindon such a stare down and with that pushed up his sleeves, anchored himself, and focused his will through every tightened muscle in his body. The words bellowed over LIndon's cries //"Raziel, custos sapienti%<230>, lux autem scientiam, librum mentis Tuae aciem perstringere. Consuendi a tergo paginae intra numine Parcae.
Constantine set his haw and tilted his head askew. Something was off. Lindon wasn't possessed by a spirit. This was something else something…older? Veeeeeeery curious, and whatever it was spilling out where knowledge was concerned it was seeping out like a radium clock leaked radiation. With jaw still clenched John gave the article inside Lindon or that was Lindon such a stare down and with that pushed up his sleeves, anchored himself, and focused his will through every tightened muscle in his body. The words bellowed over LIndon's cries "Raziel, custos sapienti%<230>, lux autem scientiam, librum mentis Tuae aciem perstringere. Consuendi a tergo paginae intra numine Parcae." The risk wasn't even just to LIndon but everyone around him as well and if he was innatly familir with anything? It was collatoral damages.
Sometimes, just sometimes, luck doesn't bend over Constantine and spread its cheeks. Sometimes, luck decides to toss him a bone. See, the facts are these: that thing inside Lindon is crushing him. It's going to kill him if it keeps boring into him the way it's doing now. To keep him alive, something vastly bigger than he is needs to be crammed into an itty bitty living space.
Who better to call on than the angel of wisdom and knowledge? There's a rosary on the table beside Lindon's bed. He might well be Catholic. Fitting. He starts shaking, but this time it's the bed, not his body. It rattles in its frame, scraping on the floor. The lights dim and flicker, and the tang of magic in the air is palpable. Lindon screams. No words this time. Just a scream of anguish. Is he even going to survive this? Oops if he doesn't, right?
Then he collapses, silent, panting for breath. Breathing is good. Even if he winces with each breath. The patter of footsteps draw closer. Someone's coming to check on them.
Orderlies were drawn in my John's yelling with Lindon's and the inevitable rattling of furniture. Two of the three orderlies rushed in to see John standing over Lindon yelling at him and did what good professionals do; they tackled him to the floor. There was a grunt and immediate protests, "Don't touch him, he's fine everything- Shite!" Oh being subdues was never fun and often painful and… they were trying to drag him from the room. He yelled back, "His pulse, check his pulse! Lindon? Bloody hell, Lindon! Let go of me you bloody wanker and see he's alright!"
One of the orderlies chastises John. "You'll watch your language here, Mr. Constantine." She's not the big burly man that's twisting John's arms behind his back with a knee in the small of his back. No, she's the one coming over to Lindon, whose bed is being held still by another couple of big guys. It starts to settle down of its own accord. One of the nurses comes over to the bedside takes Lindon's pulse at his wrist.
When she touches Lindon, his eyes fly open and he gasps, trying to sit up, but the restraints pull him back to the bed. "I'm okay," he says. "I'm okay. I'm okay. I…" He looks around, clammy like a guy whose fever just broke but he still looks like hell. "Who am I?" He blinks at John without a lick of recognition. "Who's he?"
Constantine says, "He's" he coughed, "a man in need of a whiskey sour. Don't mine me, mate." He glanced a look up to the orderly subduing him and he couldn't help but answer the chastising with a wry grin, "I think you've done this before. You know I happen to be free later, luv?" And that was a knee to his lower back that was met with a groan. "Whaaat I'm complying! That was a compliment. a compliment!" It hurt is what it was. He winced and took a deep breath and just lay there defeated, and partially slack-jawed. On one hand he was purely amazed by what he was looking at; a great, grand puzzle. On the other hand this meant his entire trip to the asylum was a total waste of time. "I'll tell you it's been a blast, but apparently I am," not a namegive, "leaving in the morning."
Lindon tries to sit up again, but the nurse soothes him back and the orderlies stand by in case this maniac breaks free and needs to be tackled. Which in this case he does not. Lindon lies back, and he says, "He wasn't hurting me. I don't think so? My… my head hurts. I think I might need to throw up." Because the mother of all migraines will do that to a man. But hey, he did stand up for John in all this even as his head feels like it's splitting open.
Constantine was still on the floor. Of all the times he's wound up on strange floor this wasn't even ranks among his least favourite. That he had a list should concern people. That bar in Bristol? Oddly still leading for worst situation where he wound up face down on a floor. Right now calm would buy him out of a very literal bind though. His eyes, dark brown and full of haunted wonder, curiously observed Lindon gaining cohesiveness. He could see the runes of will binding his way into him. He murmured to himself, "Thaaaat's a good book." Finally they pulled him to his feet. "Satisfied? I'll thank everyone if I could jut get some bleedin sleep."
"I'm tired," Lindon observes on the tail end of John saying he'd like to get some sleep.
The nurse takes his vitals, and she jots down notes. "Do you think you can sleep without a sedative Mr. Mills, or do you need some help?"
Lindon shakes his head and says quietly, "I'm already falling asleep." It's been three days without real rest. "Something for the pain, though…" The binding hurts, but he'll live. And it'll be bloody quiet enough for John to get some rest. The orderlies and nurse begin to file out of the room, the latter to get some morphine for her aching patient.
Constantine was at least relieved to hear that. He offered to the nurse, "A drink will likely help." She apologized and informed, "We are not giving him alcohol, Mr. Constantine."
John scoffed, "Not for him for me. You help a bloke out and you can't even get a pint for it anymore? This world is burning." He shook his head and dropped back down into his bed lazily sprawling out on it with one forearm over his eyes, "Cheers, mate." And with that he finally go some goddamned sleep.
By morning though, true to his word, John Constantine was checked out. This time in a literal and geographic sense.