As Vince remained curled, staving off the horrendous migraine that was blinding him behind the eyes, flashes of his life and the most painful of memories seemed to tug forth. They were both his and not, some the pirate’s, some new— he couldn’t decipher in the end what was his own anymore and what was lost to the ether. Perhaps he never should have given up his correspondence with the lonely Ophelia. It was the only balm that ever soothed.

A feminine voice lit his world for a moment, a firework in the periphery of his vision (too bright, too warm, too striking). Vince stared at the face before him, not really seeing and certainly not registering where he knew her from. Fate did not admire him enough for her to have been his Ophelia come to life in this desperate moment of need. (Could it? Just this once?) Vince reached out to grab a hold of the woman’s arm and steadied himself, fingers curling into the fabric of her sleeve harder, perhaps, than he intended. A sharp, deranged sounding laugh escaped from his vocals as green, bloodshot eyes darted away.

“Pain pays the income of each precious thing,” he muttered. Was it a trap, was it a last ditch attempt at hope? He didn’t know. The Bard’s words felt fitting, moreso than any he himself might conjure in that moment, and so in borrowing the famous line, he set the lure. It was a hand reaching for the lost threads of time, searching the void for any flicker of gold. And was there, really, any precious thing to be found in the end? Vince couldn’t be sure. He’d lived a perfectly sane, decent life before all of this. He’d gained nothing from having his mind cleaved in two, and three parts— but as with everything, he would continue to fight through it. Every day, every moment, until every scrap of himself was completely abolished. As for her question, of course he was in pain. The rippled flinch that stole across what was (once) a handsome visage settled every question of as much.

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