Kismet - [Eddsworld]

--5--

His hands clutched the balcony ledge as his feet dangled until he dug them into the exterior wall of the house. With a heave, he pulled himself up by the balcony railing. Tord's body begged for the air it needed as he struggled to retain his grip; the railing and ledge were soaked from the rain earlier that day, and his sweaty hands didn't make it any better.

As he was pulling himself up more and more to be able to climb over the railing, his hands shook more and more with the pressure. Tord looked up at the closed window in hope for a sign that Matt was there, but the curtains were never moved those few seconds he remained there. 

Then a droplet of rain decided to wedge itself under his hand, and his eyes immediately widened.

His hand slipped, and instinctively he kept a tight hold with his other hand. But in the flail, he hit his head on the ledge and yelped as he let go to feel it. Evidently he fell near the bushes below with a sickening thud. 

He couldn't move. He didn't want to move. The guilt was already swelling with the pain in his head and back. He had failed. One job, was all it was: Climb up there and convince Matt to come back. That was never going to happen now, was it? The sober guards would figure out they'd been duped any minute now, and he and Tom would be arrested for trying to break in. They just wanted to talk, though. Could a simple explanation like that bail them out of prison? Or out of a trial?

The ringing in Tord's head wasn't getting any better as the moments passed, and he eagerly waited to be hauled off to prison, where he believed he belonged. He'd burned down a convenient store before- not the one he works at but a rivaling one. It was glorious to witness the building become engulfed in flames; bright red and orange. If he remembered it well enough he could have sworn his boss was nothing but proud of him. 

When he was in high school, he'd figured out for the first time how to discreetly demolish a building. Testing it out, of course, on one of the elective portables. No one ever found out it was him, and that was praise enough for Tord.

Having that power to destroy with the flick of a match was thrilling, and it has greatly consumed Tord for many years. That's one of the reasons he believed Tom hated him. Because he was so destructive. 

Actually, with that thought, Tord realized how biased Tom was being the entire time. 

There had been a day when Tord had decided to stop by Tom's place for a quick visit- they needed each other's company or they would actually go insane- and the Brit was absolutely wasted. He would have laughed if he didn't have to stay for three hours after that because Tom also got a heavy fever from the alcohol. Not to mention he had to clean every glass object that Tom had broke, and every ripped fabric he'd torn had to be tossed out or attempted to be stitched back together. Tom was a headache all on his own. 

Tord's thoughts cut short as he heard footsteps sloshing in the damp grass, and he huffed quietly. He turned onto his side and winced as his arms helped him up so he wasn't laying down anymore. But before he could get to his feet, the sharp pain hit his head again and flared down his back, causing him to fall backwards again. 

He waited with open arms for the guards to find him and send him off. Eyes shutting tight and waiting for the inevitable. The stench of that alcohol filled his nostrils and made him wrinkle his nose in disgust. Probably that one drunk guard, he assumed. 

"I don't recall you saying there would be naps on this mission." A familiar and yet irritable voice made Tord freeze and open his eyes again. When his body tensed the pain in his back became remarkably worse. 

"Tom," Tord began once he saw the speaker, the Brit's face was flushed but he looked completely sober, surprisingly. "I'm stuck."

Tom's dark eyes blinked slowly, and Tord could've just barely seen them over the darkening sky from the setting sun behind them. "You're not stuck."