It’s been a while since he’s last seen an Elysian here.

He watches as you walk around the crumbling, weathered ruins of a past civilization. The Akrani? The Skirozi? He can’t quite remember the name, not that it matters. The once tall, towering structures now nothing more than piles of weathered stone in pathetic heaps.

He doesn’t think you should be here.

You should be surrounded by silks and furs and precious jewels. You should be decorated with the most valuable of materials and placed in the most luxurious of palaces. You should never have to commit yourself to such a…. What’s the word— miserable?— life of a dimension hopper.

He snarls in annoyance as the thought forms in his mind, his gaze tracing your movements like a leopard on the prowl. He watches as you bend down to graze a piece of engraved stone, or how you scribble something in your notebook, or how look over your shoulder every 5 minutes, as if you can tell he’s just a few feet behind you, standing on what remains of a balcony.

Smart darling, is all he can think at the moment.

He wonders if you know he’s the one who took your brother. He wonders if you know the torture he’s been making your sibling endure for years, objecting him to the insanity of being lost in the depths of time and space.

He deserved it. All Elysians do. For what they did to him so, so long ago.

Except you, of course. He’s sure you could never hurt a fly— on purpose, that is.

He watches as you slowly venture closer to him, your eyes sliding over him but not quite pin pointing his location. He wants to step out of the shadows to reveal himself just to make your life a little easier, but then how would he have fun that way?

You stop by what looks to be remnants of a bookshelf and start to observe the books, plucking one off the shelf to weigh in your hands.

This is when he decides to make his move.

He stalks to you silently until he’s directly behind you. He leans as close as he can without actually touching you. Just as you whip your head around, he stuffs something into your mouth.

And then you fall limp in his strong arms, and all he can do is grin.