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We would be unlikely to find something that does with Wonderland's powers of resurrection in play.

_{[Don't worry, he's not about to try. And he hopes for Elena's sake she doesn't have cause to, either.]}

I will keep this all in mind should it become necessary. Do be careful in the meantime.

[ He hasn't changed much since he was a Lost One. Then again, he's actually 11, so that's probably why. Still talking with a lisp and missing his front teeth, though. ]

Hey, do you remember me from Neverland?

_{[Oh... lord. Victor needs a minute to collect himself before he responds. This boy is incredibly young. Still incredibly young, even after the Neverland event has run its course and returned them all to their original ages.

They'd only been two years apart when they'd met, but now it's more like fifteen. Time, age, and a decade of poor habits have replaced his baby fat with sharper, starker angles. But his eyes remain the same, still a little tired and sorrowful somehow. (In real life, he's never really stopped be a Lost Boy, he'd just masked it with narcotics and work. No one said growing up solves all problems.)

Is it time to awkwardly clear his throat? Yes, yes, let's do that.]}

Yes, I... I remember. It's Dustin, isn't it?

_{[God, he's so young. How do you go about speaking to the eleven-year-old you knew as a boy when you're not actually a boy?]}

How can I help you?

[ He looks a little crazy, and super tired, but it's definitely his friend from the woods--Dustin nods, more to himself than anything, and proceeds to wrinkle his nose.

Wow. He's still a quiet nerd, and a bit like Will Byers in that aspect, but he's certainly a lot older than he was expecting. ]

Yeah, Dustin. [ And he decides to be just as blunt as he's always been, because there's no use beating around the bush: ]

Is all the stuff you told me about your mom true?

_{[Nerdy, a little crazy, and super tired--congrats, Dustin, you already have Victor's three most prominent attributes down pat.

Frankness is a child's prerogative, but even so, Victor isn't prepared to have one of Neverland's Lost Ones blast him with that question out of the blue. He blinks at the screen, pausing to answer. There's really only one answer to give.]}

... Yes. She-- That's how it happened.

_{[His younger self had been painfully honest in that regard. More honest than with anyone else in recent memory. It makes for an odd, disorienting start to a conversation.]}

Huh. [ It's said more like Huh than huh?. There's a distinct difference in his vocabulary, because he's chewing the information over like a piece of beef jerky.

It makes sense that this place screwed with him, if all that was true. He's a little disappointed that he's older, but maybe he's like Hopper. They're both kind of sad when no one isn't looking. At least he has a feeling Viktor is, and he knows the police chief is.

Dustin is very, very observant. ]

That really sucks. [ It's only said after a pause, and he immediately screws his eyes shut, regretting how dumb that sounds, and is close to just smacking himself for how tactless it was. ]

I mean I'm sorry. You wanna go get ice cream? Guaranteed to help you stop feeling like shit.

[ victor has a visitor. ]

[ an incredible black beauty has invited herself into his room. a familiar set of paws and sharp ears lies comfortably in the middle of his bed licking the fur between the pads of her paws. vasilka's eyes are the same striking gold as they had been at hogwarts, and her mannerisms are just as clever and arrogant as ever. it's almost as though she's the same cat from the event, although this one has a better knack for entering rooms she hasn't been properly invited into. ]

[ she's dragged a bit of paper to keep her company, and has been nibbling on the corner. when victor decides to grace his room, she ignores him. her tail sweeps along the cover of the bed, and it's the only hint anyone will ever get that she's noticed he's arrived to keep her company. ]

_{[Victor has the acute feeling he's being interviewed for a job with the way the boy looks him over like a human Rubik's Cube he's trying to puzzle out. Had Dustin wanted to confirm some elements of the event were true? Victor can't fault him for that; the way Wonderland plays with their memories would make anyone question what's real and what's not.

But it's not the boy's responsibility to do or say anything about ancient history, and Victor shakes his head, absolving him of any need to apologize. Caroline Frankenstein had just been the first of many, many deaths.]}

Thank you, but you really don't have to... _{[Wait. Ice cream? He blinks and absently trails off, more than a little thrown by the offer.]} I beg your pardon?

_{[Did he just get invited out by an eleven-year-old?]}

[ 'I beg your pardon?' Who the hell says that other than Mike's mom when Mike accidentally gives her attitude? ]

Do. You. Want. To. Go. Get. Ice. Cream?

[ There, slower and louder. ]

_{[The thing about living alone in a quiet room on a quiet floor is that you live alone and it's quiet. There definitely shouldn't be faint sounds of shuffling coming from your bedroom when you walk in the door.

Victor listens for it again--yes, there it is again.

Nothing that can sneak into a locked apartment can be good, in Victor's experience, and he carefully sets down his keys on a side table (one would think that having a lock and key would help prevent this sort of thing, but apparently not).]}

Hello?

_{[I'm armed, he thinks to add, and then decides against it. Better not to announce it should he need his pistol.

There's no answer. The sound continues.

When Victor hazards a cautious look to see what it is, he discovers the source to be not be shuffling movement as he thought, but crinkling. The crinkling of paper being brushed back and forth across his bed. The culprit, a cat, sits there like it belongs there. Which it certainly doesn't for more than one reason, the primary one being it's a dreamt-up hallucination from an event.]}

You shouldn't be here.

_{[Because if he's not mistaken, this is a cat from that wizarding school. Katherine's cat.]}

_{[Victor does. Victor talks like that. Granted, in their time together in Neverland he might have left out the part where he was born in the 1860s where such figures of speech are common.

Literally everything else about this? Not as common. The vaguely pained look on his face as Dustin enunciates every last word like he's talking to a slow person speaks to just how out of his depth he is.]}

That is--why? Why would you want that?

_{[Dustin may be proud to know his soft-spoken friend has gotten more comfortable posing blunt questions over the years. Even so, the words lack an edge. He's almost gentle in the way he phrases them, not wishing to make Dustin regret contacting him. But he's curious, too. Shouldn't children be scared of Frankenstein?

Perhaps he'd been like Wirt in the beginning, and simply hadn't known enough to be scared.]}

Viktor looks pained and Dustin's first thought is that his stomach isn't well or he ate something bad--but it goes away after a moment and Dustin finds himself grinning his toothless grin again, because the other is just confused.

'Cause when I feel like shit, I eat ice cream and nilla wafers, sometimes at the same time. And you look like you could use some serious sugar.

[ He shrugs, and it's casual, like it's totally not a strange situation they're in. ]

It sucks eating alone and you're still my friend, right? So get your shit together and let's go!

[ he's literally gone from asking to insisting. He has a feeling he's going to do that a lot with this one. ]

Good evening, Frankenstein.

I understand it's late, and you dislike conversation, but you seem to have more experience with Wonderland than I.

Did you, perchance, see three playing card men on your device the other day?

I must admit, it's gotten me worried.

Edited 2016-11-10 03:15 (UTC)

[ vasilka will be wherever she wants to be. doesn't victor remember this? ]

[ she looks up at the greeting and stares unblinkingly at him. it's almost as though vasilka's asking how dare you come into my home. but she'd found a home — her hogwarts version — in victor's things, from his quills and licking them to biting his laces to even wearing his jackets as a blanket. vasilka had lived and breathed victor in hogwarts, and this version of her seems to have been looking for home once more. ]

[ as if taking his comment as an invitation, vasilka picks herself up and scurries across the room to leap onto the very top of a drawer. if something is knocked right over by her paw, it was clearly accidental. ]

Wait, hold on a moment--

_{[Good catch, Dustin. This truly is a confused man, and it only gets worse as Dustin perseveres in dropping curse words at the same time he calmly and confidently announces they're friends (what?)

9-1-1 Operator, he'd like to report an abduction in progress--and apparently it's his own and they're going for... ice... cream?]}

You want to go now?

_{[This is old people logic at work--one can tell from the furrow in his brow, the physical manifestation of the adult mind instinctively looking for any excuse to keep from being fun and spontaneous. Someone help this poor soul.]}

_{[... Good evening to you, too, knock-off Mr. Gray? What is this even.]}

Let the record reflect I am not adverse to either the hour or "conversation." Nonetheless, I confess I was surprised to see your message.

_{[Then again, he did say it was all right for Dorian to contact him, so he has only himself to blame for this. Wouldn't be the first time he's invited the devil into his house, unfortunately.]}

I did see them. Something to look forward to this weekend, I wager.

_{[Oh god, why is this thing still alive? Shouldn't it have faded away with the event? It's a small apartment that offers few places for a person, or even a small animal, to hide; nevertheless, Victor looks around like he's half-expecting to find one of Hogwarts' ghosts next. Or a doppelganger with Elena's face.

The time it takes him to glance away is all the cat needs to abandon the bed and jump to a new piece of furniture scattered with books and articles of clothing he hadn't gotten around to putting away.]}

Hey.

_{[Victor approaches, arms out like a net in case it should try to jump past him, giving him a chance to grab it. How did this bloody animal even get in here?]}

Get down from there.

[ vasilka gives his command some thought and kindly rejects it. ]

[ she simply stares at him. hadn't he missed her? katherine won't give her the time of day, so she's decided to come bother her third favourite person. (the second doesn't exist in this universe, sadly.) ]

[ for the reason why vasilka's here, it isn't for any ulterior motive of her owner. katherine's forgotten victor's existence as she has anyone she deems to be irrelevant to the grand scope of things. a mistake, in vasilka's opinion. for the way he doesn't grab at her, she likes him and misinterprets his actions for a welcome. ]

[ vasilka remains where she is, golden eyes staring at him. her tail stills for a long moment before it begins to sweep again. her paw twitches before she lifts it. instead of jumping into victor's arms for the hug she deserves, she leaps into the mess of clothes he's left in a pile. she surfs a little on one book in the process. ]

I shall keep that in mind.

[Get used to it, bootleg Frankenstein. Mr. Gray likes talking to you.]

Something to look forward to. You make it sound like a good thing.

Do the cards normally have the ability to turn into dogs?

Where did you even come from?

_{[Baffled exasperation marks his response to the animal jumping all over his belongings (shedding cat hair every step of the way, he's sure of it). The momentum of the first book bumps a small paperback sitting on the edge of the chest of drawers, sending it toppling to the floor in a flutter of pages.

This is either a reason why not to leave your things stacked in piles everywhere, or a reason not to keep pets. He prefers to think it's the latter.

In the manner of a lion tamer attempting to corral a lion, Victor slowly moves closer, hoping against hope she'll stay in the nest she's making of his clothes. His plan stops at what he'll do once he actually catches her. Put her out in the hall? He's not sure what else he's supposed to do with a witch's familiar that's broken into his private room to lounge about.]}

If you wanted to hear some sarcasm, you should have called instead of written.

_{[That is a service he's happy to provide at all hours of the day, every day.]}

I have seen them only sparingly over the years so I could not say. Do they have you afraid?

Would you rather have me call you, then? Your voice is rather soothing to hear.

[Is Dorian flirting or being sarcastic himself? We may never know.]

So they're a rare presence. That's good to know...

I suppose Alice is a more common sight than the cards.

Has she always been blind? Her blank features still haunt me.

[ He throws his hands up in the air, successfully knocking his hat off, and there's a scuffle as he bends down to pick it up, only his voice heard on the communicator. ]

It's not a mission to save the world, it's just to eat, you know.

[ vasilka has two choices: she disappears and scatters fur all over victor's clothes, or she leaps into his arms. ]

[ as the cat who seemed to have a bit of a crush on victor, it's obvious which option she chooses. ]

[ that crush doesn't live in the past. ]

[ she remains still, almost suspiciously so. sitting on her throne of clothes, vasilka looks up at victor expectantly, as though she's waiting for his hands to produce a golden throne for her to perch upon. she eyes him and doesn't so much as twitch. where another cat may shrug him off and continue to pilfer his things, leaving fur everywhere, she waits. ]

[ if he so much as picks her up, his touch better be gentle. vasilka is very much like her owner — she demands and takes only the best from those who are blue-eyed and her prey. ]

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