Author's Notes: This is a fic not for anime as are the others in my Library, but for the amazing webcomic Eversummer Eve, by Denise Jones. Alasdair, his brother Griffin, the man from the visions, and the entire wonderful world and cast of ESE belong to her.

It was a different hotel room. The printed pattern of the starchy quilt was subtly different, and the curtains pulled closed in two places instead of three. The light above the bed wasn't quite as bright as it should have been; the dim flickering of the bulb cast shadows about the darkened room, outlining the tastelessly large back of the desk chair. There was no television set.

A year ago, they were differences that Alasdair McBride might have dismissed as trivial. But then, he reflected with a bitter smile, he hadn't needed to worry about where he might wake up to find himself.

Abruptly, rising from the bed was too much effort, even to look for a mirror in the small room. At times like this, the boy needed to know that his own eyes were looking back at him, needed to see that for now, at least, he was who he ought to be. But his whole body hurt, starting with the deep ache in the soles of his feet and ending in the tension that clenched at his shoulders. It was as if he'd spent the whole day on his feet, and had only just found the time to rest. It was no comfort to realize that he might have done exactly that.

Letting out his breath in a slow, shaky sigh, Alasdair closed his eyes as he tried to let go of the images still racing through his mind.

Eyes cold as the snow, the bite of their gaze sharper than the dagger that had changed his life so completely. Everything icy, harsh, and the knowledge that eventually, he would be overpowered by a gripping desire to destroy. The colorless man and the awful, calculated hunt that was slowly forcing him to give up everything he'd dreamed of having.

Strange; he'd always thought his little brother would be the one to do that.

Suddenly, Alasdair had to see for certain; the man's eyes wouldn't leave his mind, and the cold from the vision lingered in him still. He had to see his own face, needed the bright glare of electric lighting, the smooth, modern feeling of ceramic tile. Anything to let him know that he was here. Anything to convince himself that now was real, that he was who he thought he should be.

Even the bone-deep weariness wasn't enough to keep him from his feet. He searched the darkened room for the door with narrowed eyes and reached the bathroom in five steps. A groping hand found the light switch for him, and the glow fell on white tiling and a torn shower curtain.

A hotel room in Chicago. Nothing more, nothing less. The relief that he felt was almost painful.

With a grin that was a little desperate, Alasdair staggered fully into the bathroom, the blue of his eyes anxiously seeking their own reflection. The flash of white that stood starkly in the mirror's surface took his breath away; for a moment, all he could do was lean weakly against the doorframe, numb with horror.

There, amidst the mane of thick, black hair was the albino's mark, intruding painfully into the little life that he had left to call his own.

In a sudden flash of certainty, the boy knew that the small comforts of a mirror and the weary gaze of his own eyes would no longer be things to enjoy. Always, they would be shadowed the by the streak of white laced through his bangs, always eclipsed by memories of cruelty and ice.

With stiff, shaky movements, Alasdair made his way back to the hotel room's bed. It was an effort to lie down, but he found himself grateful once he'd settled; suddenly, he wasn't sure that his legs would have supported him much longer. Blue eyes remained fixed dazedly on the pocked surface of the ceiling for a long while, the starchy softness of the quilt firm under his back. It was, he considered vaguely, all he really had. This room. Here, and now.

And soon, not even that.

Squeezing his eyes closed against the flickering light of the hotel room, Alasdair waited to lose more of himself.

~owari~