BUST YOUR KNEECAPS // DOUBLE-JOINING

[LAZARUS]

[align=center][div style="width: 500px; text-align: justify; font-family: helvetica; font-size: 9pt; line-height: 1.4;"]Sometimes a day that wasn't absolute shit was all you could ask for. It was a lesson that Lazarus had learned from birth, even if he had never been consciously aware of it. Days where he went to bed without his stomach growling or his body throbbing with cuts and bruises were the ones that left him feeling satisfied, and beyond that point, he can't say he's experienced much of anything at all. While that life was technically months behind him, the memories remain in the front of his mind. Gabriel was right to call him out on his temper, though he's slowly learning to keep it on the right track. He still left bite mark impressions on too many of the people who crossed their paths, but it was better than before. For him, the worst event he experiences in a day is typically where the older feline (ish) creature falls right through him. It's hard to explain his issues with the disappearances. Unsettling, uncomfortable, upsetting. Some part of him is concerned about the physical split, the lack of contact. The rest of him finds it creepy that something just went through him.

He wouldn't say that Gabe had chosen this, though. Sometimes people were pushed to do what they did, and although nobody had held him at the threat of death (that he knows of), every now and then, the only choice left was a bad one. Now for Laz — the only choices he ever has are between bad and worse. Not that he really minds them. Adrenaline still thrums through his veins like some kind of hot poison, slick black tar through every patch of skin. His heart races, each step coming with a bounce. He'd been earning his life for months, for as long as he can remember. Copper in his mouth and yelping in his ears had become his own lifeblood. People more well-adjusted might call that cruel, savage, inhumane. He'd tell them straight to their faces that they hadn't been raised the same.

Gabriel understood, though. Didn't always approve, but made sure not to mess with him while he was eating, grabbed his attention when he was getting into something. Didn't blame him for his roughness, didn't hate him for it. And the hybrid didn't give himself enough credit: there's more to learn from him than his mistakes. Patience, planning, morality. There was more to life than fighting over scraps. The territory they're coming up on now is some proof of that. Even with the jostling bounce that has his (mentor? dad? something) constantly readjusting and watchful expression, there's a sort of anxious excitement combined with foreboding. Lazarus rocks almost unsteadily before a sharp nip to a short-cropped ear startles him out of it, the canine yelping more with an instinctive reprimand than actual pain. It's not like he hasn't felt worse, and to be honest most of the skin on his ears feels numb now. "Too much energy," he explains even though Gabriel knows it. A low rumble, reluctant to leave his throat and clearly displeased, shows acknowledgement to the next part, corners of his mouth pulling down severely. "I know, entiendo. ¿Dónde estamos, anciano?"

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