Kaz Brekker Imagines

This Week

You've been staring at the ceiling for a while now. It would be smart to get up, certainly. That is what is expected of you, that you'll come up from this overwhelming low and go back down the twisted, rickety stairs of the Slat to face the rest of the Dregs, Ketterdam's finest gang. Maybe you'll even keep rising and go up the stairs to the top, where Kaz Brekker has fashioned an office for himself out of the previously abandoned attic. You could do that, you know. You could go right now.

You don't, of course. You stay where you are, still lying down and staring up at the ceiling. You've probably memorized the cracks in the boards about a thousand times over by now, identifying every place where it creaks as the inhabitants above you walk and run and stomp over your head. There is nothing for you in this room, but then again, there is nothing for you anywhere.

You're not usually like this. That's the promise that you make to yourself, at least. You're not usually like this. You'll come out of whatever slump you've managed to land yourself in after a few hours, maybe a few days if it's especially bad. You deal with this every year, after all, and you always manage to make it through. It's just that journeying through it is rather hard, especially since the loneliness of it all presses around you until you're certain that you'll choke to death. Maybe then you'll see them, your family.

They're why you're feeling like this, after all. Exactly one year ago to the week, your family died in these very streets. Their blood watered the cobblestones, and even if they weren't the first to die here in this Saintsforsaken city, they're the ones that killed you the most when they went. You were supposed to have a home in them, a place to turn when everything else burned down around you. Instead, you were left alone, with no one except yourself and the killers to blame. You don't know why they chose to leave you alive. Perhaps they didn't see you hiding in horror amongst the narrow alleyways, or perhaps they simply decided that you weren't worth their effort.

Regardless, you're alive now when everyone who once knew you by name and heart and touch is gone. You're supposed to keep living, of course, and you aren't so far gone that you would consider crossing to their side of the river so quickly, but it just hurts to remember that they're so far away from you right now.

Footsteps sound at the top of the stairs. You recognize them at once, knowing the rough beat of a cane against creaking floorboards to be Kaz and Kaz alone. This, if nothing else, is enough to convince you to get up and start moving away from your center of the desolate universe to rejoin the rest of the Dregs once more. You know as well as anyone else that a weak link is not tolerated in Dirtyhands' chain, so you cannot show any signs that this week is affecting you any more or less than the last.

You manage to make it down before Kaz, and have just enough time to strike up a conversation with Anika, another Dreg who's standing closest to you. Luckily, she doesn't have enough time to look closely at you and wonder at the bags beneath your eyes and the relentless nothingness in your gaze, because by now Kaz has stepped down to the ground floor and is issuing instructions to the room at large. He's saying something about how the Dime Lions are trying to encroach on Dreg territory and how they should all be wary, nothing major. Gang disputes like this happen every other day around here, so it's nothing to ruffle your feathers too much.

Anika bids you goodbye before heading off with a large crowd to patrol the streets, making sure none of Pekka Rollins' men have it in their fool minds to step foot in Fifth Harbor. You move to follow her, but just as you've started to cross the room a cane flashes in front of you, mildly tapping the ground in front of you and effectively blocking your way. When you look over, Kaz is standing next to you, jerking his head towards a more shadow-stained corner where no one else will be able to hear you speak.

He barely waits for you to follow him into the alcove before he turns to you with a question. "What's happened?" You do your best to feign ignorance. "What do you mean?" Kaz gives you a look, one he reserves for the poor schmucks at the Crow Club trying to talk themselves out of a recently arrived debt after too many rounds of Makker's Wheel. "You aren't yourself today, Y/N. Do I need to be concerned?"