Hiya! It's been a long time since I logged in and did more than add a favorite or follow... alas, life is life. Hopefully this manages to be posted while it's still 2018 somewhere, heh.
Dark fingers traced a fresh, pale line down a smooth and somewhat damp chest. The line his fingers traced wasn't the only mar to the skin there; other, shorter pale lines bisected the longest of them, just as fresh, standing out amongst the other, smaller scars gained from more benign (and arguably embarrassing) circumstances. The underlying musculature was tender, still. Not by much, mind. But still tender.
He laid his palm flat against his own chest, letting it rest as his eyes wandered elsewhere. On the bathroom sink before him were a pair of glasses, the same trusty old pair that he'd worn for the past year and change, scuffed and bent and a little worse for wear but still in good enough shape to keep wearing them. He'd have to order a new pair soon, though. His prescription hadn't changed much in recent years, so he'd opted to keep wearing the same pair of glasses instead of getting a new pair, but it seemed his current pair were nearing the end of their life cycle. No surprise there; he'd been rather unlucky in the months since he made that decision, what with GUILT and the bomb and Delphi's base and so forth. That pair had seen things no pair of glasses ought ever need see.
In front of him was a mirror, foggy and opaque due to compensation. The hand on his chest lifted and reached forward, swiping away just enough to see his own reflection. His cheekbones were a bit sharper than usual, complexion unusually sallow, but he knew it would sort itself out with another day of food and rest. The dark bags under his eyes would, in theory, do the same, but he suspected it would take more than a single night of sleep. Unfortunately, sleep wasn't exactly the biggest of his priorities. Disease, after all, stopped for no one. Not even a descendant of Asclepius, if the legends were to be believed. Derek didn't put that much stock into it.
Life was a fragile thing, the doctor mused as his eyes drifted down to the scar marring what was once a smooth expanse of brown. The scar, too, would fade, with regular application of gel; the green ointment truly was a miracle of medicine. So powerful that even most post-surgery scars would heal, powerful enough to make it seem as if many an ordeal were nothing more than a bad dream.
Would that if it were one.
A drop of water chose that moment to make its way down a dark lock of hair, trailing down a jagged line from his cheek to his chin when the hair proved too short to mark a smoother path. His hair was still wet from the shower he took; he'd yet to get dressed.
Derek sighed, grabbing a towel just as the condensation blurred the mirror once more. With the new year would, hopefully, come the end of the nightmare.
He couldn't wait for it all to end.