Totoka River keep cool but care

yunxu was unreadable, his face full of smoke and noise-- was he seeing auras now?-- and he almost envied his anonymity, his featurelessness, an exercise in military-grade minimalism, the perfect silhouette of a mackerel bone... no seams, no flyaways...

and of course whenever anyone sees something so unbroken, the immeadiate urge is to want to break it.

he laughed, and even he didn't know if it was genuine or if it was all just a farce. smart, he murmured, tapped his head, nodding aimlessly but knowingly. shut up. shut the hell up. another smile, another earthquake fault line scrawled across his face by some caffeinated cartographer. owlglass taps out a frenetic rhythm on the ground. somehow, some way, the drugged wall street banker brand of instability has found him.

no, he said. you? he grinned.

the river swelled and roared. a brief spasm crossed half his face-- a tic, a twitch, an exaggerated flick of the ear that was carried into his cheek. he ignored it. just a reflex gone haywire.