InsaneJournal

WHO: Briseis & Patroclus
WHEN: Late Monday night
WHERE: Bri and Pat's apartment, Upper West Side, Manhattan
WHAT: After seeing this, Briseis is quiet busy having a panic attack.



Briseis had been getting ready for bed, having to go out to take photos in the morning for a magazine. In some ways that was good because the work gave her something else to focus on other than the fact that Achilles was in some way possessed and she couldn't fix it. (Oh, she'd tried, and she wouldn't stop trying, but for the moment she was just tired.)

She brushed her hair and checked things on her laptop, finding Thetis' post about Achilles and wondering what to reply with. But she was stopped from any sort of reply at all when she saw Set's offer to beat up Achilles. Bri dragged a violent breath as every muscle in her body tensed up.

Set above David. Set with the knife through her hands. Set taunting, and laughing, and killing, and now he wanted to do the same to Achilles and Briseis couldn't breathe at all and she wouldn't be able to stop that either just like she couldn't stop it before because he'd always be a god and he'd always be stronger than her and she'd always just be her watching helplessly.

Her chest had tightened up and she pressed her back against the wall of her bedroom, trying to stop the panic attack that was very quickly rising up. She couldn't breathe. Couldn't remember to breathe when she thought about Set.

She screamed out Patroclus' name with her hands digging, white-knuckled, into whatever furniture was close enough.

Patroclus had been reading, because someone had mentioned that he might try it as a means for relaxing. And it was working until Briseis' scream cut through the night, causing him to throw the relaxing book across the room.

His Bri. His Bri was in trouble and he was going to fucking murder whoever it was making her scream like that, and deal with the consequences later.

Pat jumped up from his bed and he grabbed the sword and shield that he kept just under the side for situations like this. He then charged out of his bedroom and into Bri's topless and wearing pajama bottoms, wielding a sword and a shield and shouting, "Where is he, I'll cut his fucking head off!"

There was no one for Patroclus to kill though, and Briseis was still leaning against the wall, hyperventilating with tears in her eyes. "Pat," she managed. "Pat, Pat." She couldn't figure out what else to say and so she just pointed to the open screen of Thetis' journal as she doubled over.

Pat glanced towards the screen, his sword poised in case there was something to slay.

But there was nothing. Set's words and a promise to hurt another man Briseis loved, and Patroclus understood. He didn't slay the naughty laptop. He dropped his weapons to the floor (carefully) and then he strode over and pulled Briseis into his arms so he could hold her.

"Oh, Bri," he said, kissing her blonde hair as he held her tightly. "Just breathe, Briseis."

"Pat," she shuddered, holding tightly onto him as she tried to calm down. "Pat, he- he'll do it again and I'll have to- I can't- I can't watch him do it again! Please, Pat!" She was begging her friend for some sort of divine intervention he couldn't give, that no one could give, and yet she did it anyway.

"He's not going to do it again, Bri," Pat tried to soothe her. He pet her hair and he whispered in her ear, and all the while, he panicked too.

Set hadn't been Set when it had happened, but the Egyptian God had still hurt his Briseis. And now he was threatening to hurt Achilles.

"I...I could stop him, if he tried-" Patroclus said, though he knew he was no match for a God.

"No!" Briseis almost screamed, the very idea of Patroclus going up against Set almost killing her. Patroclus was nowhere near as strong as Set. Achilles barely stood any sort of chance, so how could Patroclus? "Just... please don't," Briseis whispered. "Please, please, I just need you to be okay. I can't-" she swallowed the hard lump in her throat and looked at him seriously. "The last time- when Neoptolemus almost killed you I thought I would die."

"Okay, okay," Patroclus said quickly, because he hadn't actually thought that one out very well. Of course she would panic about his safety instead of sending him off to battle the God who had killed her lover. "I'm sorry, I didn't think. Don't worry, I'm right here with you. I won't go anywhere."

His fight with Neoptolemus had made him think he would die too.

Briseis nodded and then buried her face in his shoulder. "Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you. I don't want anything to happen to either of you."

"I don't either," Patroclus said honestly. "We'll be alright. Come on, let's get you some water or something, hmm?"