Under Darkness [AU]

[Carver Amell]

"Yes," he says flatly. "Because it's not about him. A father I can't respect is someone I can learn how to grow up not to be. What hurts is being abandoned." He takes a deep breath. "After we moved to Nyra, Mother fell to pieces. She was never the same again. Weak-willed, broken, full of nothing but regret and poison. But she was there. She was trying. She still loved us, deep down." 

[Tethras Clan]

Andy flinches at the description, but he listens. Warily, almost hopelessly, but he listens. "...how? How do I..." Fix this? Get better? Become stronger? Get my family back? Live?

[Carver Amell]

"Step one is to want to get better." He takes another deep breath. "Alright. You've done that, so I'll just-- right. Step two is to stop drinking. It's a bad habit, it's a waste of money, and it's a coward's way out."

[Tethras Clan]

Andy flinches, eyes darting to a cabinet Carver hadn't bothered with yet. "I... I don't know if... I need it. It's the only way to forget long enough to sleep."

[Carver Amell]

"Then don't sleep. Whatever it takes, you live for them now, not yourself. You don't get comforts, not until you've made yourself into what they need. Understand?"

[Tethras Clan]

"What?" Andy says, caught off guard. "Don't sleep? That's not... you can't just not sleep."

[Carver Amell]

Carver gives him an unimpressed look. "If you can't sleep without booze, don't sleep. Eventually you'll pass out and get some rest."

[Tethras Clan]

"And wake up ten minutes later screaming," Andy confesses weakly, ashamed of how pathetic he is.

[Carver Amell]

He shrugs, glancing away. "That gets better," he says, his shoulders awkwardly hunched. "Eventually."

[Tethras Clan]

"Swear it?" Andy begs.

[Carver Amell]

"I swear. The nightmares don't ever go away entirely, but they back off, give you some breathing room." He takes a deep breath, lets it out. "It's almost my birthday, you know. Bethany's birthday. That's usually a bad time. The nightmares come back, around then. But most of the year, they leave me alone."

He shifts awkwardly, sliding the knife back into his sheath. "They tell me talking about it helps. If you want."

[Tethras Clan]

Andy hunches in on himself a bit. "I... Seli said the same thing," he whispers. "But I couldn't... I could make her carry my pain and her own." He laughs bitterly. "That worked out fucking great."

[Carver Amell]

"Well you don't give a rat's ass about me, so tell me, then." He grabs a chair, moving some random junk off it so he can sit. 

[Tethras Clan]

"...it was my mother," Andy says randomly after a few minutes of silence. "My father was some idiot apprentice, studying with a mage here in Nyra. Skilled and a good student, as I understand it, but... a fool. He never even questioned why there was a nearly nude woman in his master's lab, never asked why she would be willing to lay with him within minutes of meeting, never doubted his good fortune. Until, of course, his master caught them."

The tiefling scoffs. "Probably saved his life, even if he went on to ruin it right after. Fired him of course. Passed word of his idiocy so none would touch him. After.. Evidently the mage keep the succubus around long enough that he noticed... I existed so... I suppose I'm grateful, most days, he maintained the summons long enough to dump me on Bastion's doorstep instead of sending me back to be born in the Abyss."

[Carver Amell]

Carver's face darkens. "I can't say as I approve of all this, you know." He sighs, raking a hand through his hair. "But you're not sitting here trying to rape me, so I assume you've risen above your base nature at least a little."