Sunlight burned so harshly that it seemed to char Tobias's very bones. Yet he was cold, as wave after wave of nausea filled his throat, the screams of the damned and the undead swarming through his ears. He felt a chill down his spine before a skeletal hand with flesh falling off of it scraped against his bare feet. He took a step away to try and avoid it, but it hurt his body to move.
The only thing he could properly use was his hands, which were on his guitar. He was playing riffs he never remembered in any of the songs he'd ever played before, and in the distance, he could hear other instruments joining him.
Tobias squinted up into the sun, watching it flare brilliantly, as he played. It looked like it was getting closer, or maybe it was just swelling up and getting bigger, or even maybe it was a trick of the light. He didn't have time to think about it before the world fell into sudden black. He could no longer hear the undead's cries or see their twisted features, but he could still feel them, trying to climb up his body. Aside from touch, it felt like all of his senses had dulled or were being suppressed, or like he was being submerged in water.
Then there was light again... but a different kind of light. The moon stared at Tobias, bright and blood-red. He could see seven shadows looming far in the distance, and the sounds of a song so painfully out of tune, a song he had never heard of before that made Tobias drop to his knees with anguish, even though he was part of the cause for the song, since he never stopped playing. It just sounded so haunting and evil by nature.
The moon seemed to drop lower and lower to the Earth below until it felt like Tobias was so close to touching it, then seemed to dissolve into black matter; reappearing as a brand new silhouette in front of a growing light, that raised goosebumps for him. The last thing he remembered was hearing a man's laugh echo in his ears while the undead began to swarm once more...
Tobias's eyes slowly focused on the world around him, his 'dream' already long forgotten though it had happened merely seconds ago.
Everyone was talking and being loud. It made Tobias's budding migraine worse as he sat up slowly, trying to focus on his surroundings. He heard himself ask what had happened, his mind coming up blank. He couldn't even remember what he was doing before he had passed out, or why he was outside of his room, since he wasn't that much of a social person. The sunlight coming from the window in front of him caught his eye while blinding him temporarily, but his mind became distracted again when everyone began to bombard him with questions or complained about one thing or another.
He found himself shuffling back to his room, trying hard to insist to the others that he was fine and that there was no need to follow him or worry about him. He wasn't very comfortable with people fretting over him, because frankly he was pretty good at taking care of himself and in fact was so responsible, Abigail usually had him in charge despite Nathalia being the leader, because he had such an instinct of making sure everyone else was good, too. To be fretted over made him somewhat feel small, though he did in general appreciate the thought.
Eventually Tobias found himself on his bed and after a moment of staring into nothingness, his eyes finally focused and the fog in his head lifted. He looked up to see Nathalia, Ivy, and Raven staring back at him with a raised eyebrow; the medic and Klokateer must have left.
"You good?" Ivy asked again.
Tobias thought for a moment, feeling his headache disappear. "Yeah," he said. "I'm good."
Nathalia nodded. "Good." Of course, it was like her to take over on a conversation that she hadn't even started. "Ivy, Raven, can I talk to him privately for a sec?"
The two looked at each other, and Tobias noticed Ivy roll her eyes. They weren't often considered in group meetings by Nathalia, because Tobias knew that Nathalia had a thing for being attached and clingy to very few people and everyone else would always be at arm's length, never any closer. Though Tobias tried his best to include them himself, or Salem would try as well, however it seemed Ivy and Raven were usually past the point of caring and would normally decline these days. The two friends watched Ivy and Raven walk out quietly before Nathalia turned to Tobias with wild excitement in her eyes.
"I gotta tell you something."
"Oka-"
"Pickles is trans."
Tobias blinked, unsure on how to deal with this new information. "Good for her?"
"No, not- jesus fucking christ." Nathalia facepalmed. "No no, he's a trans male, or whatever the fuck. At least I think. Fuck."
"Oh, wow. Uh, how do you know?" Tobias questioned as he stood up from his bed to stretch his limbs, still eyeing Nathalia. He had a feeling...
Nathalia grinned. "I kinda overheard some shit." Yep, there it was. "Anyway I already told Salem, and I wanted to tell you too so you could help me."
"Help you with?"
"You gotta convince Salem and Pickles to date so they can talk more about their trans shit, and then I can get more info that way."
"Jesus Christ, why not just ask him?" Tobias spoke as he shook his head.
"Uhhh, because I just fucking said I overheard it, meaning that I'm not supposed to even know. It sounds pretty hush-hush, and seems like it has to do with Murderface or some shit- oh and by the way Pickles and him fucked- and I wanna find out all the details, which might only happen if Pickles and Salem get close enough to talk about being trans. Like, close close. Like, 'I'll suck your cock' close." Nathalia finally stopped talking long enough to actually take a deep breath while grinning at Tobias.
Tobias gave her one of his signature unamused blinks, his face blank as he tried to process all that was said. He could go on and on to her about how selfish it was to force two people to date just for some juicy gossip, but he'd rather not waste his breath on things when he'd never actually be listened to. So instead, he said, "Okay, so... I get, sort of, trying to convince Pickles to date Salem, but why do I need to convince Salem? They're so obsessed with Pickles that if the dude asked them, they'd probably marry him right now."
Nathalia gave a small pout. "Yeah I thought so too but they're kinda hesitant on talking to Pickles about it. And they also don't wanna 'intrude' or whatever on Pickles's personal life. Like uhh, Pickles literally fucked Murderface. He can handle a little talky talk with the midget."
It wasn't a secret that their band was not a fan of Murderface. They loved the rest of Dethklok for the most part, but Murderface was just an outright asshole that said a lot of stupid shit that their band did not stand for. Sure the rest of Dethklok had been known to say dumb things too, but they weren't as severe and they definitely learned to control their mouths finally. At least a little.
Tobias sighed lightly. "I might have to side with Salem on this one." Nathalia gave a dramatic gasp, looking offended that Tobias hadn't picked her side. "Look, it's probably a secret for a reason, and I don't want Pickles to be uncomfortable around us."
Nathalia groaned. "I know I know, Salem already lectured me on that. I'm not like, planning them to spill out everything at once to each other. I just want them close enough to trust each other. I want to know NOW but if I have to wait a month or two, I guess I will. Just help me!"
"I'm not sure how I could, even if I wanted to," Tobias shrugged. He usually had no time or patience for drama, or meddling in other people's affairs, unless it involved offering advice that was specifically asked from him, which happened in his friend group often.
"I dunno, like, talk to one of them and I talk to the other. Maybe convince them to fuck or, I guess, go on a date. Whichever comes first." Nathalia's eyes gleamed with mischief. "Pickles already seems a little interested. Salem told me he tucked them in when they were crashing from the alcohol, and it'd only been like an hour or some shit. We just need to be the little devils on their shoulders whispering 'fuck each other, fuck each other!'"
"You'd be the devil on the shoulder, I'm the guy in the corner literally trying to avoid the situation to begin with."
"Come onnnnnnn, Tobias!"
Tobias rolled his eyes at the other. "Who do I even talk to and what do I say?"
"Whichever one you wanna talk to, and maybe just ask them about the other. Like go up to Pickles like, 'hey bro so that Salem bitch, huh?'"
"Sounds like you already know what to say to Pickles, so if I have to I'll just talk to Salem." Tobias had a much higher level of anxiety with his idols anyway, especially after having an episode in front of probably all of them.
"Fine," Nathalia scoffed but since she also had anxiety, her confidence had wavered slightly.
"Hey, you're the one who wants to be nosy. I get to choose the easier path of this." Tobias commented. That was one of Nathalia's biggest... qualities. And not a particularly good one, at least not with the way she used it. Always wanting to be nosy, always wanting to spy, to just know everything about everything and everyone. She called it wanting to be knowledgeable. Tobias called it wanting to start drama, because that was what it all boiled down to. She had a way with getting dirt on various people that she would later spew out in a fit of rage if she didn't get her way or she was embarrassed.
Honestly, Tobias was in no way eager to humor her or enable her, because as old of a friend she was, he knew she would also throw him under the bus for instigating her behavior, if she could in that time. She lived on autopilot; survival mode. Even after all these years she still didn't know how to trust people enough to not try to damage the friendships she did have when she felt her only option was based on a fight or flight response.
Salem acted like they worshiped her sometimes with how attached at the hip they were to her, since she was the one who saved them from themself when they needed it the most. He supposed he felt the same too, at some point. After all, she seemed very strong, independent, with seemingly good intentions and just had a bad habit to be a little too blunt about them. Now... maybe he supposed that it was because he had been around her longer that he could see how much bullshit all of that was, because inside she still seemed to be like a child trapped in the cage that her childhood and adolescence had created for her long ago. He could even swear that she had the option to walk through the open door at many points to escape her own mindset and would rather just re-shut it and meld the iron bars together, now it seemed impossible to sway her on really anything unless threats were to be made, and even then, she would find a way around it.
Tobias winced to himself. He had a problem with letting his mind wander too much on the details of their friendship. But he would be lying if he said that he was there purely out of love and adoration for the singer. He used to have a reoccurring problem of looking down on others for their lack of knowledge, of acting like fools, or of seeming 'unintelligent', and she was the first person he came to respect despite being the opposite of everything he taught himself to value (not that she was stupid, just that she liked to play stupid and would rather have fun than worry about how she presented herself until it was time to undermine other people's level of maturity). He at one point saw a different type of value in her, something he didn't have himself, which was a strong will, since he had no backbone for a lot of things or a lot of follow-through. However, sometimes foolishness really needed to be a make or break situation in terms of friendship, though Tobias was in much too deep with this situation to back out of it now.
He just knew he'd seen too much, been a part of too much, then watched as Nathalia seemed to discard him over shiny new toys and people, just because he was the oldest friend, the calmest one, the boring one, the one she regarded as average, with no actual personality traits except "smart and quiet and behavior like a dog". So he was less than enthused about her bugging him with anything, especially to further her investigation so she could probably use it for her own interests.
Did anybody know how Tobias felt about this? About her? No; nobody particularly asked his opinion except for their own benefit. Except for Salem, and recently Toki who had taken a major liking to him as well as Nathalia, but they never asked about his friendship with her, of all things. Then again, he never showed it on his face, much less said anything suspicious, so he figured they probably never would ask, and he didn't expect them to.
None of this meant though that Tobias hated her, and didn't want to try and make things work so it would be more bearable. She was just very hard to get along with when she felt like spiraling out of control (which was almost all of the time), had a major habit of taking advantage of situations, and was really, really irritating in general. And he would prefer for her to leave him alone on really ridiculous things and let her get tangled up in her own mess.
"That's dumb, I asked you so you could help me, that means you should be making my life easier!" Nathalia complained. Tobias knew she wasn't joking, even though anybody else would see it as slight crude humor with the way she said it.
Tobias rolled his eyes and turned his head away from her to look out one of his windows, for some reason, while he tried to figure out what to say to her. Immediately his attention was switched over to what was happening outside.
Clouds were rolling in at a rapid pace, dark gray with an odd purple tint to them. There was an obvious harsh wind that was actually bending the trees nearby and causing various Klokateers outside to go flying off somewhere like kites at the beach. The sun was a bright orange, poking through the cracks of the darkening sky, catching Tobias in the eyes and causing him to flinch, for some reason reminding him of something that he couldn't put his finger on.
"Uhh, were we supposed to get a storm tonight?" Tobias asked, feeling nervous for some reason.
"Hmm?" Nathalia tilted her head toward Tobias but didn't look very interested, as per usual whenever he said something that she didn't initiate first. "A storm?"
"Yeah, like- oh Jesus fuck," he hissed as a sharp crack of lightning struck right in front of the side of Mordhaus, causing a fire to erupt.
At the same time, he heard hysterical sobbing coming from someone that was running through the halls, which actually caught Nathalia's short attention span. "What the fuck?" She walked over to the doorway and peered out, then shouted, "Toki, what's wrong? Oh fuck you're bleeding!"
"Wait, come look at this shit!" Tobias called after her, but she was already gone, following Toki he assumed. He did hope that Toki was okay, but he was more concerned with the strange weather pattern right now. He sighed and resorted to staring out the window, watching as Klokateers attempted to put out the fire before getting swept away by such harsh winds. He figured at least one person should be keeping an eye on whatever the fuck was happening outside.
The fire was spreading fast much to his shock, and even worse it was actually traveling up Mordhaus in a fiery path, burning through everything it touched. This was one of the most fast-paced and dangerous fires Tobias had ever laid his eyes on, and he'd seen plenty of fires to last a lifetime. He began to back away from the window, smelling the burnt rubble already from outside, before the window cracked and then smashed into bits within a split moment.
Tobias quickly covered his face with his arm, inhaling smoke that began to creep into his room, and feeling the sting of sharp glass splattering across his skin. Of course Nathalia had run off to do who-knows-what, so he would just have to save himself, as he usually did.
Tobias grabbed his unpacked things by the doorway that he had left there purely out of laziness (thank goodness he was lazy sometimes), and fled the room with the fire high on his tail. Some Klokateers made their way past whatever Nathalia's dramatic self was doing with Toki and Skwisgaar, so they could help stop the fire, but it was already... receding? By the time Tobias had managed to escape the room. He found this odd behavior, in fact it not even being possible from what he could see right before he had left, yet it was true. It began to grow smaller and smaller, and eventually it died out as quickly as it came with the help of the Klokateers that had brought several fire extinguishers.
Breathing a sigh of relief before letting out a couple of coughs from the smoke that burnt his lungs, Tobias led himself away from the damage, away from Nathalia's hysteria, away from all the people and Klokateers surrounding him. He was tired and just wanted to rest, but at the same time he needed to find another window to look out.
Tobias peered out the nearest one that he could find at the end of the long hallway and toward the same direction as Tobias's window once faced, and he stared with bewilderment at the fading storm, not even a raindrop on the windowsill, and the wind as still as his breath. He thought for a second that maybe he had imagined things, not even convinced that he had seen Klokateers putting out the fire themselves.
Then his eyes landed on the ground, rather than the darkening yet calm sky, and noticed the blackened grass that stretched as far as Tobias could see; not even burnt. Everything just looked... dead.