A heavy dinner to follow left Skwisgaar hardly able to keep his eyes open, let alone hold an intelligible conversation. He drifted off while watching their show, only waking up long enough to be guided under the blankets and told to sleep no matter how much sunlight still pervaded Mordhaus. The next time Skwisgaar opened his eyes, the sun poured in from a different direction. Summer air brushed his face from the window Toki opened, and some birds had perched nearby on the ledge. An arm laid over his hips belonged to the snoring lump beside him. Mirroring that deep sound of rest, Baldur's limbs twitched nearby, on his bed brought over from Toki's room.
Not wanting to disturb the Norwegian's rest, Skwisgaar carefully untangled himself and headed in to clean up. Wetting his hair in bath water left it greasy, as well as tangled again despite the thorough brush he subjected it to the night before. All evidence of their activities disappeared when he reemerged dressed, fresh-faced, and calm despite the day ahead. Coffee sealed his good mood; sipping from his skull mug, he situated on the corner chair where the draft raised tiny goosebumps over his forearm.
Speaking with Tyr resurrected something Skwisgaar fleetingly considered ever since he and Toki allowed themselves to sleep in the same bed. Of course, one part of him certainly loved Toki, in the same manner he cared about the other guys. They were friends with an abundance of shared experiences as well as a level of untouchableness by common people. At what point, if he and Toki carried on this way, did that cross over into something even more exclusive? Skwisgaar possessed a distorted experience of love; his mother loved him like a mother did, but she rarely showed it. His fans loved him only so long as he kept them entertained. He'd loved women long enough to procure sexual favour unless Katrine, the one he took out a few times in Sweden, counted. While Skwisgaar didn't realize it then, their ungainliness as a couple didn't stem from his personal awkwardness. She mistook his experience with the opposite sex as translatable into a bona fide relationship; true, his departure spelled their end, but her naivety concreted Skwisgaar's romantic type. He didn't want someone like him, that'd seen and done it all. He wanted someone he could surprise, who'd in turn reinject mysticism into a world gone grey through nihilistic eyes. Skwisgaar impressed that philosophy on Toki, but the Norwegian always defaulted back to wonder. Even when their sex remained casual and Skwisgaar increasingly sullied Toki, the younger man maintained that component of his personality. Some things simply weren't meant to be destroyed. If that was, Magnus would've done it long before the Swede had the chance.
The brown hair splayed across his pillow shifted along with the body it belonged to. A deep sigh indicated Toki's wakening, then he felt about where Skwisgaar once laid. His head rose and he smiled when focused on the blond. "Whats you doing?"
"Havings coffee." Skwisgaar took a sip.
"What times is it?"
"We gots another hour until we gots to be in de studio."
"Cool. Woulds you order me a cup of that too? I sleeps almost as longs as you, but I still nots used to gettings up this early."
Deciding to one-up that request, Skwisgaar set his mug on the dresser and headed for the kitchen. Klokateers would get it to Toki much faster and with precise supplements, but the Norwegian would appreciate the effort. Sure enough, when the Swede made it back to his room, an arm around his waist and brief taste of minty toothpaste preceded Toki testing it. Skwisgaar led him back into the bedroom proper, resuming his seat so that he could watch the other man dress and comb out his wet hair.
"Dids you get any rest, at all?"
"Ja, but I t'inks I goes a bit de ot'er way, now. I amn'ts tired, but I's dozy. I sleeps too much." The coffee would help clear that up, hopefully. "Not shore about how works will go. I guess we finds out when we gets dere, ja?"
Whatever attitude adjustment Skwisgaar underwent, it altered nothing for the second scheduled attempt at progress. Abigail wrote the day off as a small improvement, although by Thursday her annoyance and impatience manifested as crossed arms and a heavy sigh. "What's going on, you guys? You're not into it. You've had six months to get something done, and there's jack shit. No material, no ideas, nothing."
"Hey, schweetheart," Murderface butt in. "You can't rusch usch, that'sch what'sch wrong. We don't juscht pull gold out of our asschesch becausche you tell usch to!"
"I don't want gold, I want centuple platinum material. I can't work with nothing."
"You sure say 'I' a lot," Nathan pointed out.
"Okay, how about this? You want a good album, because you don't want to release a shitty record and be the laughing stock of the entire world. You don't want to lose your home, you don't want to get second jobs, and you don't want to clean your own toilets when all your servants get laid off. Does that work for you?"
"I can't get a second job! I don't even have my GPD!" Nathan pushed his fingers through his hair. "Fuck, guys! What're we gonna do? There's nothing left to say!"
"Aw, don' say thet, Naaate," Pickles slurred. "We got plenty t' say. You knooow, like thet. . .death herts. . .partyin's fuuuuun. . .eeeeehhhhhhh. . ."
"You guys have been working exclusively in here. Maybe you need a change of scenery?" Abigail suggested.
"Yeah, and go where? Back to the bottom of the oschean?" Murderface stabbed the couch cushion. "Becausche that schure worked lascht time. Yeah, we've written our bescht schtuff down there, and the scholitude, heat, and lack of natural light isch practically torture, scho it'd probably be a good idea. Wait! What am I trying to schay here?"
"That we need to torture ourselves," Nathan summarized. "No, you're right. We're too comfortable. How the fuck can we make decent metal like this? We need to go to the most brutal, uncomfortable place in the whole fucking world."
"Dood, with videos of people killin' each other everywhere!"
"Schnuff filmsch!"
"But it can't be like b'fore," Pickles said. "I'm all good fer physical and psychological torture, but sexual torture's takin' it too far. We gotta be allowed to have somethin' to put our junk in."
"The whole sub can't be like that, if we did this." Nathan sat up straighter. "There's gotta be a work place and then a safe place, with air conditioning and that's quiet and comfortable."
"Doesch't that defeat the purposche of having a torture chamber?"
"Yeah, well, if one of us is driven to murder I wanna know I don't gotta wait until we surface to put something between me and you."
"Our headsch would explode first! Fuckin' metal!"
"Not metal if you can't finish the album. . ."
Just like any of their hare-brained ideas that got away from them, mutual silence allowed for contemplation over its validity. Personally, Skwisgaar could see from either side. The guys were right; they needed something to jar them from the hedonistic lifestyle they led. Their best music always came from suffering, and while usually an external source provided that, what lately disrupted their contentment? The reason they couldn't bypass their old material was a lack of experience. If no one threatened, attacked, or maimed them, then what could they expect other than writer's block? All the leftover rage and adrenaline from Toki's rescue went into rerecording and finishing off their last album with Blazing Star. If they wished to stay relevant—not to mention get this album done by its deadline—they needed to up the ante.
And yet. . .Skwisgaar couldn't ignore how nervous Toki grew at the mention of torture. Abigail too unconsciously shifted toward him. "Are you guys serious about this?"
"Dunno." Nathan bowed his head. "We're getting nowhere, Abigail. We've got to do something."
"The Dethsub has been upgraded since its last use, in hopes to alleviate the various issues last time we all descended," Abigail reminded them. "Not that this is exactly what I'd call a good idea, for obvious reasons."
". . .Right." Nathan glanced at Toki.
"I don'ts want to slows the band down, though. I does it if I haves to," the Norwegian said in a small voice.
"Dat amn'ts fair, though," Skwisgaar argued. "Dere gots to be a diffsrent way. Beside, is like Abigail say. We can'ts be tortured in de Dethsub because it amn'ts a t'ing what can does dat so much, anymore."
"So then—" Nathan pounded a fist down on the recording panel. "We'll do this separate. In a different sub. Just you, me, and Pickles, since we're the ones writing the music—"
"Oh fuck you, I wanna come too!" Murderface cut him off. "I'm cruschial to the writing proschessch!"
Pickles chuckled and leaned closer to Skwisgaar. "I guess bein' in a sub wid Merderfeece is torture on it's own."
"That would be ideal, as far as subjecting yourself to torture goes. If you four find some inspiration, then maybe—if we're lucky—we could jumpstart this entire process." Abigail glanced at her watch. "Anyway, I think we can call it a day. I'll go discuss this with Charles, and you guys all think about it. Once you're underwater, there won't be much room for regret or second-thoughts."
Nerves manifested as a flutter in Skwisgaar's stomach. Much as a feasible course of action and possible cure for this writer's block relieved him, could he handle torture? Perhaps the various ways Toki marked his body counted as such, but that belonged to an entirely different league.
The hot tub, thanks to the band spending such copious amounts of time together already, had barely gotten any use since they left for Seoul. Nathan suggesting they all congregate there to further discuss this trumped Skwisgaar's initial inclination to gauge Toki's opinion behind closed doors. He assumed the Norwegian would carry on anyway, to collect his pet and wind down for the evening, but he too tagged along to the recreation room.
Nathan drank deeply from his beer before addressing the others. "Well?"
"I think we know whet we gotta do," Pickles spoke first. "Whet we're doin' now ain't werkin'. I'd do it fer the band."
"Skwisgaar? You in?"
What option did he have? He didn't like being uncomfortable, nor the idea of being separated from Toki, but he didn't want to hold the band back either. They needed a quick fix, however drastic. "Ja."
"Scho what kind of torture are we gonna do, huh?" Murderface rubbed his hands together. "Or schould we let them schurprische us?"
He, Nathan, and Pickles threw ideas around, while Skwisgaar tuned in and out between mechanically playing his guitar and checking on Toki. Why did he come here? Listening to this obviously made him nervous. "We can goes, if you want."
"Is okay." Toki wouldn't meet his gaze. His bottom lip disappeared back into his mouth, jaw moving about as he chewed on it. "I can'ts go down there with you, but I still parts of the band. I shoulds know about everything you guys doing."
"Would, uh. . .hey, Toki." Nathan got his attention. "Would it be totally not cool and over the line to ask if you have any suggestions?"
"Um. . ." Toki scraped at his beer's label with his thumbnail.
"It's okay to say no. That's why I'm asking first."
Toki sighed. "I says this to you all. If you does this right, you's are going to find some dark thing insides you. You goings to hate yourselfs and each other. Possiblies the whole world. But whatever sounds you get from that, it wills be a good one. I cans hear it in us other albums what we write underwater, since it always kinds of hard on the nerves downs there, but it won'ts has ever been concentrateds like this before. If you wants brutal, this is the rights way to do it."
Put that way, Toki so far was the only one brutal enough to work on this record. Nathan, Murderface, and Pickles too seemed to entertain that notion. If they caught up—experienced something akin to what Toki did—then they'd truly outdo themselves artistically.
"If you wants to be tortured, gives the power to decide what happen to someone else. It isn'ts all that bad when you knows what to expect, because you brace yourself." Not exactly used to everyone hanging off his words, Toki's leg pressed against the Swede's. While the band stood behind him upon returning home, they'd never asked him for details. Nathan mentioned once to Pickles and Skwisgaar that Toki's ordeal would probably stand as great subject material in their music, but sensitivity dismissed that. "I was luckies to have Abigail there, and you guys will haves each other. Beings alone is terrifying when you gots no choice to be. I don'ts want to go into specifics abouts it, but I wants to help you. You gots to make sure you don'ts go too far, just fars enough. I don'ts want anys of you to reallies get hurt."
Silence followed, as the other four men stared into their beers. For Skwisgaar at least, it sunk in a little further what they poised to do. This could very well make or break them.
A quiet word of gratitude toward Toki on Nathan's part ended the conversation. The television came on out of habit, but no one paid it much mind. There had to be an easier way to go about this. The image of their shrunken, malnourished bandmate clung to the back of Skwisgaar's eyelids, enhancing hesitation sparked by survival instinct. Skwisgaar still held doubts, when he and Toki excused themselves to join Baldur in the recently built enclosure. The Norwegian took up his tennis racket, sending the wolf repeatedly down to the other end, while Skwisgaar laid on the cool grass.
"Toki," he ended the silence between them, "what's you really t'ink about all dis?"
The man grunted with the amount of effort behind his last hit for Baldur. They both watched the animal dash off, then Toki dropped down beside the Swede. "I meants what I tells all of you. I don'ts want you guys to gets hurt, and I thinks we all agree that we gots to do whats is best for the band. I woulds go withs you all so we coulds do it together, but I can'ts. I reallies, reallies can'ts do that again."
Skwisgaar rested a hand on Toki's knee, nose wrinkling slightly as wolf breath touched his cheek. "I wouldn'ts do it either, if we hads any ot'er way to gets dis stupids album done."
"I's not worried about the label, to tells you the truth. I just wants Dethklok to puts out a good album, because thats is what we does. We's the best in the world." Toki smiled tightly. "We gots to sound like it."
"Is true. We done some pretties crazy shits for de music's sake." Who else jumped out of an airplane, or hastened the discovery of Earth's deepest places for the sole purpose of recording there? "Ams dere anyt'ing you worried about for us, or ams it just a reminder?"
"Oh, I's worried," Toki confirmed. "I don'ts want you guys to get hurt or spooky. Well, you gonna get spooky if your head starts playing trick on you, but I hopes none of you is too prouds to get that craps figured out once you comes back up. I don'ts want you guys to change, or to get stucks inside yourself. It's a bads place to be."
"I'll does whatever you t'inks I got to."
Toki would know best, after all. He still lived in the aftermath, and always would. The Norwegian's hand closed over Skwisgaar's. "I'll takes care of you likes you took care of me. That's a promise. Things might get rough down there, but just keeps it in mind that you'll be comings back. That's is all what kepts me going somedays. You goes down there, you gets this record in your head with the rests of them, and then you return to Toki. I's going to miss you."
