Aaaaah you guys are so sweet sorry for taking so long I was at a loss for inspiration
aaaanyway that aside this chapter is far from cute
sorry (':
i'll make it up to you guys in the next chapter i swear i just had a craving for a little drama forgive me ;u;

LSD dream theatre - XXYYXX

"Is it even safe to stop and start those again?" Lars said, worried as Mathias knocked back a handful of tablets and chased it all down with a shot.

"Probably not but whatever it's better to keep me off the illegal stuff for now." He smiled and spun the cap of his bottles back on before pushing past the Dutchman. "You never know what might set me off, anyway I ave to go look over some things I'll be back in a couple of hours."

"Mathias."

"Hm?"

"What happens to us now?" His voice cracked on the last word, unsure and uneasy and wishing he could just gulp back down the words that spewed freely from his lips.

Mathias' smile was bitter and his eyes were empty as he left out the front door and left Lars choking on his words, was he going to complain? Protest? Question him further? He couldn't remember and numbly after watching the cool façade slip back into place on the Dane he slumped forward till his head hit the edge of the door and curled his fingers at his sides into loose fists, still trying to sort through the happenings of the weekend before. He had work the next day, students to teach things he'd long since memorised and tutors to animatedly converse with to pass the time during lunch. As of late however he'd found himself in the usually empty art room with a blank sheet of paper and paint to symbolise whatever bullshit was raging in his head.

And yet here he was, somebody who spoke for a living, left speechless and feeling as if emotion wasn't a thing to truly exist in that moment. Things had gone back to normal, to how they were before Amsterdam, before Mathias started being close to affectionate. There was distance forming again between him and Mathias and a cold voice was in his ear whispering 'fuck you'. As soon as he was left entirely alone the pride he'd swallowed to enable him to smile with ease, to express himself through emotions rather than scrawled words on paper and angered sketches was crawling it's way out of his mouth and completely abandoning him.

Banging his head a few times against the door frame he gritted his teeth and cursed himself for being so foolish. Of course it would be all business as soon as they got back, of course it was nothing more than Mathias going through the notions. The last three days would be nothing more than fond memories. Memories that would die as quickly as they were birthed and were nothing more than something of the past and he was ALONE.

alonealonealonealonealonesofuckingalone

Lars could feel a panic attack prickling under his skin and chewing the inside of his lip until it broke he took deep breaths and tried to root himself back to earth and get a grip on the overwhelming anxiety that was hammering him weak. He was thinking too much into it, maybe it would be better once Mathias was adjusted to his pills again, maybe he'd be all smiles and open affection once he was back in the apartment, maybe he was just tired.

No he had to stop thinking.

Shuffling back to his room he plugged himself into his music and set up his own self medication, smoke burning his lungs and swimming in his head until he was calm and the chanting and numerous voices died down to nothing. He could focus on one thing or nothing at all if he chose and after finishing off his bowl he opened the window and leaned up against the wall to watch the cars driving by at snails pace below him, everything looking miniature and people resembling scampering ants. He saw the rain clouds before they rolled in and ruined the summer warmth as sudden as the gust of wind that rustled tree branches. The smell of rain against cement trickled in through the crack of his window and breathing as steadily as he could he brought himself back to earth and away from the demons that raged in his head and smiled to himself.

He was in a state of frustration at how long it was taking him to get know Mathias, he was cryptic when he appeared so open about himself. But what he showed contradicted how he spoke and how he would turn out in moments of weakness. After so long of subsequent conversation, the result of weeks of trying to push through Mathias' psychological walls he was still stuck in square one as stories that could be found on websites or newspapers was revised back to him like it was something that had been memorised and repeated many times before. He was confusing he was strange and he was fucking with Lars head more than the Dutchman would like to admit. His own head fuck that danced back and forth until he was so far away Lars wasn't able to reach him or so close that they were sharing the same air. Lars was selfish at times when it came to how his idealistic views of getting to know people, with Mathias he would have preferred to have started prying into the deepest secrets he held and then worked out to the materialistic shell but rather...

He was left awkwardly in love and starved of knowledge for too long.

But he carried the fear that learning what he didn't know would ruin everything, and rapidly change the image of a lucky passing of a stranger, or rather a head on collision, into one less mystery to keep him on edge. It was strange the way they met, comfortable and familiar like a itch he couldn't scratch. It would have been more fitting in a perfect world if they'd been acquainted through a flirtatious glance, or a shared amusement at some odd coincidence or hell even a sympathetic nod that in that perfect world would be fleeting and out of the blue but would still hold a powerful emotional current that would draw them to each other rather than the forces of some cruel god forcing them to walk head on into each other's paths. Perhaps he didn't want to know despite how much he truly did. And the fact that he was so desperate to not let the presence of the Dane become a conceptual husk, he would not learn a thing. He was as confused about everything as he was when he was only a child and he was told mummy and daddy were gone and wouldn't be coming back. With time he was fine with understanding that, however with this. This was something he either needed to understand Mathias all in one go or not understand him at all.

Cupid was irresponsible and he was fucking exhausted of being used like target practise but he would entertain the little shit for as long as it so wished. Closing his eyes he tried to pull in the oxygen from outside rather than the drug strangled and stale air of his bedroom and when he felt calm enough, still with his eyes firmly closed he moved to collapse on his bed, mentally and entirely emotionally drained of energy. For those short few seconds it was easy to ignore his infatuation.

He barely noticed the fact he fell head first into somebody's legs and when he gasped down a mouthful of cologne ready for a shriek he immediately fell silent at the sweetness and wrapped his arms around his best friend's waist, uncaring of how he got in but was more than thankful that the English bastard had.

"Your flatmate told me it was still unlocked on his way down, that's how." Arthur cut through the quiet.

He didn't remember voicing his thoughts but shrugged it off anyway and forced himself to let go and roll onto his stomach on the other end of the mattress.

"This is a one time thing alright Lars."

"I don't give a fuck to be honest."

Arthur lay beside him and hugged him close and when he thought he was thankful for him being there he was more than thankful that the bodily contact and willing hug was proof enough as it is that he wasn't just imagining another person in his attempt to eradicate his athazagoraphobia.

"It's alright, you're not alone."

And he fell asleep to the exact words he'd muttered to Mathias a little more than a day before. Amniotic tranquillity sweetly lulled him to rest as ran pattered against the windows and the continued sentences from the English man had become muffled and unintelligible to his sleepy ears.

xxx

When he was up again at the crack of dawn and his first words to the grumbling Englishmen were concerning Mathias did he find himself kicked out of his own bed and snapped at to get changed and that they were getting a fresh gust of clean air. Well as clean as city air could be.

He walked sluggishly down the stairs and onto the deathly quiet streets with Arthur at his side explaining how he got him an extra day off work to right himself. He showed his gratitude in a sincere laugh before they continued on and he constantly tried to rub the sleep out of his eyes and the scowl off his lips. In the morning he was still wrapped up in the pressing weight of the awareness that even the man he'd known for years had a private life and his own mysterious hallways of his own personality that he wasn't even able to trek into and undoubtedly somebody else would have. It was maddening to remain to ignorant to such things, everybody around him was wrapped up in their own little worlds and he only knew the snippets of them.

"So what had you looking so bummed out earlier?" Arthur said around a stick of nicotine gum. Lars smiled at his determination to quit the smoking habit, knowing his short moody little friend it wouldn't last more than a week. In this day and age everybody had an addiction.

"Anxiety attack."

"Did you remember your exercises?"

"Lasted all of three secon-"

"You went straight to the bong didn't you."

"Pretty much." He smiled behind his scarf and tucked his hands into his coat as they turned a corner. "It worked though. I feel better."

"It's a stupid habit." It came out under Arthur's breath yet it was still loud enough for the Dutchman to hear.

"So's being attached to your work."

"And look where it got me."

"Blah blah blah."

"Don't fucking test me you brat."

"Want me to get you your rag Miss Kirkland?" He smother his laugh with his teeth on his tongue when he saw Arthur's glare from the corner of his eye. "You seem to be having a heavy flow month, you know how you get when you don't look after yourself during this time it's rather dangerous to all mankind."

He was shoved irritably into a wall before they continued on further, silence stretching between them and blurring into the quiet click of shoe on pavement and the odd morning bird starting it's song. The eerie, forlorn atmosphere of the streets that were usually bustling with people remained abandoned and quiet appeared like an emotional after-image that was not just empty in first place but hyper-empty. The population negative plus two that appeared like black spots to anybody who would look out a window against the lightening pavement. He was quiet in his own thoughts as he grew entranced and unsettled by the vastness of the ever ending streets, and even if he wanted to go further the universe that contained the little world that contained the streets that contained him and his thoughts. The recognition of the sky not just a page of blues and blacks and pinks and oranges bleeding together to create an image to appreciate but an entirely unexplored and unbelievably alien stretch of everythingness that carried things outside of it that would remain foreign. It was a jolt and an ache when he found himself in the same mindset of Mathias who respite his ramblings in moments of vulnerability was still just as alien as the sky he stared up at. Who shared the same predicament on a daily basis as the one he was in now.

Maybe he should have become an astronomer instead of a lecturer of psychology. He was far more adapted and comfortable with ideas of the universe and the worlds and stars that would have been snuffed out if not for the flickering light that illuminated the dark at night time. And just as Mathias had said on one cold night or perhaps on many, those lights were nothing more than late invitations to a gathering that was dead and gone years upon years upon years ago and Earth's atmosphere was only lucky enough to get to see those when a void covered what the sun brought to really shouldn't have been thinking about Mathias at that time. Blinking slowly and shaking himself out of his thoughts he forced himself to re-appreciate the company he shared with the Englishman and the air that they so desperately coveted despite it's pollution it indisputably carried to a degree.

"Lars are you with me?" Arthur said, nudging his arm with his elbow, mouth a scowl and thick eyebrows pulled down with it.

"Hmm oh yeah just daydreaming."

"Potheads these days." They chuckled in unison and Lars sighed out happily at the distraction. That was however until Arthur raised a finger and pointed at a figure wandering around ahead of them."Isn't that Mathias?"

He squinted and upon a few more steps it was confirmed that indeed it was the wild haired and wild eyed blonde leisurely walking towards them who looked glazed over and hazy as he walked along the pavement.

"Yeah it is...MATHIAS!" He yelled towards him and he watched as the male stopped in his tracks and came out of whatever trance he was in to look right ahead at him.

The smile that broke across his face was worth the disruption. He walked quicker until they were face to face, a smile of his own hidden behind the thickness of his scarf yet still he hoped the relief was clear in his voice. The laughter that bubbled from the other perhaps said it was too obvious.

"You've gone bright red like a school girl." Mathias' voice was fond and after taking a few moments to catch his own breath he turned his attention to the shorter male at Lars' side and raised an eyebrow."Mr Kirkland. What a pleasure."

"I don't think we've talked for more than a second. And please, Arthur." The pleasantry between them sounded unbelievably strange on Arthur, and the handshake he offered even queerer. It seemed to be more fitting for an actual English gentleman and not the usually foul mouthed Brit beside him. "The pleasure's all mine."

He seemed too false to be genuine and looking between the two Lars narrowed it down to some form of history and shrugged. Some people had things he'd never know and most of those things were probably better to be kept in the dark.

"Well it looks like your job is done now Arthur. I feel better now and I hope he does too." Mathias' smile was stretched too thin and too far for Lars' liking and still he kept his lips firmly together and forced a laugh at the back of his throat.

"Indeed. I'll see you another time." What Arthur said sounded more like a promise more than a suggestion. A definite.

"Of course. We'll save proper introductions for a better date."

As soon as his friend had left and said his goodbyes Mathias slumped again and ran a hand through his hair, appearing thoroughly tired from the unbelievably quick and business like interaction. Gesturing forward they wandered for a while longer until they were both too lost to try and go further and attempted to retrace their steps.

And still there was no contact or words between them the entire way.

xxx

The door was left open a crack, and before Lars could even push through Mathias shoved him aside and held a finger to lips. The door inched open with barely a hiss and the Dane's hand went into the inner pocket of his coat.

He produced a gun that he held with such confidence Lars was left speechless and a little more than terrified to see.

Mathias then continued through before he could ask about it, silent steps carrying him through to the living room where a single leg was kicked over the end of the couch and was connected to a very bored looking male who was oddly familiar to the Dutchman. Lukas. The Norwegian flicked through papers lazily, barely raising his eyes from the sheets before he spoke in a tongue that went right over Lars' head but had his counterpart locking in place. He had to edge around just a little to see the anger plastered to the Dane's face as he replied back stiffly, when Lukas' eyes locked in on the pistol held between Mathias' hands he said something sharply that had Mathias sighing and slipping it away, inclining his head in a gesture to have Lars nodding jerkily and slipped around and to the kitchen while they talked.

The talking rapidly turned to near yelling and when he curiously looked around the corner Mathias had his hands in fists and a vein protruding in his neck as he snapped and snarled in the smaller male's direction. The twist of a scowl on the Norwegian's lips turned to a smirk when he stared dead on at Lars' and ran his tongue over his teeth. Built-up tension crackled between the two Scandinavians, pent up and begging to be released into something that had the possibility of inspiring senseless violence. And being somewhat aware of the strength Mathias possessed he was quick to revise how it could end up, mending the fences of his uncertainty and simultaneously growing weeds that would strangle every logically thought and cut of the circulation between reality and expectations. He knew that the scrawny male with the growingly self pleased twist to his features would end up twitching. If he didn't step in at some point he would continue to be powerless to do anything but stand there and watch. Just when he was about to open his mouth to trim the unavoidable and impending damage to be caused Lukas took the moment for himself.

"So your parents. I wonder why you never looked into it?" Lukas said in English, the smug expression growing more obvious at Lars' distress and confusion. "I wonder do you know anything about it Mr Peeters."

Mathias span around, eyes dead and expression set in a glare once he noticed the Dutchman and staying glued to the spot he turned his gaze from the ambiguous intensity of Mathias' stare that held something simultaneously invasive and vulnerable he shifted his attention to the man behind Mathias who continued to smile a smile Lars could have sworn to have seen in the Dane's during his lows, his voice bitter that he imagined he might have heard it in the laugh that had abandoned his ears for days. The faint almost undetectable scent of cologne he recognised from the side of Mathias' neck and he had known that the smell didn't belong there. Whatever and whoever the Norwegian was that was plunking at the strings that made Mathias speak, talk and think Lars despised him and hoped that if he took the time to press deeper into finding out about the relationship between then two men he would not find his fingerprints soiling the innermost depths of his counterpart's heart.

He realised what had him so wound up since he got back.

Mathias already knew that this would be happening.

He stared back levelly at the Norwegian until the smile disappeared and his star increased to a glare. After the heavy atmosphere became too much for all of them Lukas rose from his seat, brushed himself down and announced himself as dismissed when Mathias walked with purposely patterned steps to his room. Face blank and breathing stopped when he brushed past Lars, his dropped mood invasive to the point Lars almost wanted to puke at the sensation of it. At the click of the bedroom door at the end of the hall Lars sprinted forward, pocketing files from the table on his way out the front door before it could slam shut behind the much smaller male. His thoughts from later in the day before became something of the past and his thirst for understanding became too great.

"Oi!" He hissed, grabbing the other by the shoulder to spin him around and gain his attention.

Lars was on his ass and pinned to the ground before his fingers could reach him and he was left dazed and confused and gasping for air under the press of a sharp knee.

"I could hear you perfectly fine. What do you want?"

"...to...talk and...get the...fuck off...me."

Lukas heaved a sigh and follow through, slipping his hands in his suit pockets he inclined his head in invitation for the Dutchman to follow as he sauntered off, not a hair out of place after his quick manoeuvre. Scrambling to his feet and wincing at the sharp pain in his leg he limped forward to catch up. They didn't talk until they were halfway down the street and sitting at a bus stop, immediately he took up to his own cigarettes, completely ignoring the way the Norwegian turned his nose up in distaste of the thin white tube.

"You know those will kill you?"

Jokingly he shoved three more in beside the original and took to lighting it. After making his point he pulled them out again and continued on with the first one, his feet swinging gently as he did.

"Do what do you want to talk about Mr Peeters." His face immediately went to the automatic default expression Lars had learnt people reverted when they were amused, melancholic in Mathias' case or perhaps in Lukas' case pissed off. It was as if the Norwegian knew right away what the questions would be and for some reason Lars was aware in his lack of subtlety that he did. However he still managed to pull a strong emotion from the psychological mess of everyday life and the stiff hold to Lukas' lips and eyes was more than enough conformation.

"Lars."

"I don't care. Anyway shall we get started I don't have long." He continued to eye up the smoke as he spoke, lips pressed into an even thinner line. "What do you know so far about Mathias?"

"The basics?"

"The things that's in the papers."

"Pretty much."

"You know absolutely nothing but his name, age and his parents. Do you know his disorders?"

"I'm guessing psychotic depression and some form of bipolar." He mumbled around his cigarette, blowing out smoke from his nose before he continued. "He told me the pills I know enough from my job to know what they're for."

He tutted under his breath and shook his head. "More like dissociative disorder. Severe. They fucked up the diagnosis. Any others?"

"Not that I know of."

"He has told you fuck all." Lukas sighed again and slumped forward, his fringe falling in front of his face and his eyes pinched tight. "He's kept the schizophrenia pretty quiet then, lucky you. Paranoia too but whoever hired him is already well aware of that and is using him like a puppet when he's not taking anything."

"I don't care about what's wrong about him. I want to know what happened."

"Nobody knows. Not even him, well he does but he says he's forgotten it. I'm afraid you'll have to fight it out of him, what I did learn however I'd rather not tell a single soul. Do you understand?"

Lars looked out to the street where people rushed to and fro. Just where he'd been hours earlier. "If you can't answer that then why are you still convinced you're on talking terms. From how he speaks about you it's not exactly fondly."

His laugh was cold, sharp and short. "Oh I would imagine so." He tipped his head back in a way that was similar to the way Mathias would, with his eyes closed and his hair falling away from his eyes as he took in deep breaths. It left Lars wondering just how long they had been around each other. "We had a thing for a while, after our sort of friendship I ah...did and said some things I regret but...he was forgiving the first few times until it got too much...and I tried to dig too much into everything. After he went to the army it went downhill from there, well he did. He got admitted to too many places that he didn't have time for anything but whatever he was doing. But it was kept too...quiet and under the radar that I couldn't find anything on it or him. He may as well have been dead when he wasn't around. I'd imagine he's the same now yes?"

Lars jerked his head in agreement just as a car parked up in the place of where a bus should be and Lukas rose from his seat. His reflection grim and stretched in the tinted windows. He turned his head just slightly and the Dutchman nodded once more in his direction before getting up and making his way back to the apartment on sluggish feet and an equally sluggish train of thought. During his trek he flicked through what he had pocketed before having his ass handed to him, scrawled notes in a language he again was infuriated to not be able to understand was written beside paragraphs and photos. One of them holding his interest, and naturally he'd seen photos of what Mathias' parents looked like but there were different and more personal and had Lars curious as to how Lukas got his hands on them. The family of three stood together, a child Mathias smiling with dead eyes at the camera while his parents replicated the upturn of his lips but at least it met their eyes int he way it did not his. There was something off about the way he held himself, as if he were aware of whatever power he would have when he was younger. He couldn't have been older than 13 by height and the childlike shape to his face but shit he'd be lying if his shoulder's weren't held strong and his fucking smile was intimidating to say the least.

Swallowing he put it all away for later inspection and took the stairs up to the flat. He decided he liked adult Mathias more than child Mathias. It was down right creepy the way he stared into the camera.

Back in the apartment the shower ran and biting back the worry that accumulated on the back of his tongue he knocked twice at the door and called out his flatmate's name. When he received no reply he took it upon himself to enter. He could have thanked every higher power for having Mathias unharmed and rather with his forehead pressed against the edge of the sink and when his head rose and they made eye contact in the mirror, his chest grew heavy at the emotionless expression he bore. There was assumption in the silence, an truthful assumption that Lars could not deny if Mathias chose to turn it into words and instead of saying anything he wrapped his arms around the Dane's waist and pulled him against his chest to tuck his chin against his shoulder blade.

Mathias tipped his head to the side invitingly, his attention still trained on what he could see in the mirror, and Lars watched blue flicker rapidly over the surface until it was haunting. Lars pressed his lips to the curve of the Dane's neck, savouring the sweet taste of skin and treating it kindly with his tongue he left deep marks in his wake. He should have stopped when he realised the other was frozen, stiller as a statue and not breathing at all. He should have stopped when he saw fear and disgust in Mathias' that filled his eyes when the Dutchman looked at the reflection of the both of them in the body length mirror.

A skull penetrating scream rang in his ears and Mathias threw a fist into the glass, shards falling everywhere and scattering along the marble floors, paperbacks that sat propped up against the toilet seat and nestled beside the sink went flying and pushing away from the Dutchman the blonde dropped to his knees with his arms wrapped around himself and shrunk in on himself.

His hands combed through the limp hair resting on his lap as one would a cat, crying to comfort the Dane who didn't suit the silence that swept over him and stole his voice. Books and papers and broken glass surrounded the two of them and long since dried tears stained dark patches onto Lars' jeans and carved a stream of dried salt water into Mathias' cheeks. He didn't understand why the silence seemed so heavy, why the room was ripped to shreds and why when he'd come in to check on the blonde who was curled in on himself on top of a bed of paperwork he was told in a broken voice to get out while he could.

Mathias rose his head and looked up at the Dutchman, his eyes dead and his lips a thin line as he untangled his hands from his shirt. Sheer madness stuttered his words and pushed them together in a rambled mess "I thought I told you to go. I told you to leave so many time times why did you never leave? Don't get attached go while you can."

Lars simply held him closer.

It was too late to consider it.

Something about the way Mathias reacted to that had him thinking that it looked like the Dane would be the one to change that.

Rather as soon as he forced himself to stop, just stop trying to remain humanely almost immediately shrink mode kicked in and he crouched down to his level, his disgust in the blood and scattered glass and dirt pushed away as he tipped the Dane's chin up forcefully to see his face. "You can't distinguish your reality anymore can you?"

Mathias tapped the sides of his head with a weak smile. "Who said I ever have?"

xxx

The hours, the days, the weeks, and the two months after that incident Mathias had gone straight back to being cold, calm, collected and occasionally teasing the way he had been in the first wee while that they'd been acquainted. The Dane had slipped out without much of a word before he'd gone to work, wherever that was and came back a month later with a grim expression and a commanding bark to his voice when he spoke. Without a doubt it confused Lars to no end and when he tried to confront Mathias about it he found his head smacked up against a wall and Mathias' arm at his throat. Tears brimmed at the corners of his eyes and whimpering Mathias rested his head against the Dutchman's chest and mumbled in his mother tongue just as pathetically.

He'd left quietly again after that with a cloud of that same bitter cologne that had clung to Lukas and a pathetic excuse for an apology.