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Lost in the haze of exhaustion and stress that tended to mark the end of most days in the office, Charles could almost pretend that nothing had ever happened. The Haus hadn't burned to the ground, he hadn't been beaten senseless by an assassin, he hadn't faked his own death and been gone for nine months, he hadn't left his boys alone and defenseless for nine months, and, most importantly, he could almost forget the things he'd learned while he'd been gone.
Almost, but not quite.
But keeping up appearances was his job, and so he kept up the facade of normalcy for the boys, hoping to spare them what was coming for just a little while longer. Give me strength, he thought as he looked into the mirror in his bathroom, to keep them sheltered from all of that for just a little longer. The face that looked back at him was tired and drawn, the face of a man with too much to do and not enough time in a lifetime, let alone a day, to do it all in.
He had spent the day dealing with the collateral damage from Murderface's encounter - for want of a better word - with an angry mob after the Thunderhorse fiasco. Charles had been amazed to find that only a handful of people had been killed in the extraction, but trying to deal with the damage while at the same time keeping it quiet that Thunderhorse had been Dethklok themselves had proven difficult. But it had been done, and done before lunch, leaving the rest of the day to read and review the staff reports from the various departments within the Haus. Not that those had been any less stressful to deal with.
The boys are getting on in years, he thought, noticing the hints of crows-feet at the corners of his own eyes as he removed the makeup from over the scar, and perhaps the doctor is right that they should see him more frequently. Pickles especially. But, that could wait, he decided, until after this ordeal in Egypt was done with. At least they are doing something for some good other than their own, this time.
* * *
Charles stopped himself short. He had been about to think that this day couldn't get any worse, then remembered when he had thought that last - what, twelve hours ago now - and had seen that in fact, it could get worse. So much very worse. Kicking his shoes off and loosening his tie, he lay nearly fully dressed on his bed, too exhausted to even undress, the events of the day running in his mind like a hamster gotten into Pickle's drug supply. Pickles, his mind stumbled over the name, and he tried to slam away the thoughts, but he couldn't stop them.
He had been on the phone, explaining to yet another person - this time some bureaucrat with UNESCO - that he had explained all of the risks, had all of the wavers signed, and was under absolutely no obligation at all by any law, international or otherwise, to help fund the repairs at the Giza Necropolis. However, as part of a very generous package he was offering both UNESCO and the Egyptian government, he would help to defray some of the costs of stabilizing and evaluating the damage to the site. It had been the tenth call of its kind since the concert the week before, and Charles was beginning to tire of explaining the same thing to every petty bureaucrat with a law degree, so he was grateful when the head doctor at the in house medical wing had come into his office to give him an excuse to hang up on the man. No matter how bad the news is, this day cannot get any worse, thought Charles.
He had said the results were ready, to get the boys together, and that he would give his report all at one go. Charles had nodded, begun the process of herding cats, and had even joked, as best he could with the stress he was under, with the boys. He had thus been standing right there when the news had been broken. He regretted it.
Even now, laying in his own bed, he couldn't shake the look he had seen on Pickle's face. Getting through the rest of the day had been hellish - having to keep his tone neutral while talking about one of his boys dying had tested the limits of his capacity. Now, he was too exhausted even for the grief that kept trying to overwhelm him. It was too soon.
That thought hit his tired brain like lightning in a distant storm - the implication rolling over him like thunder several seconds after the flash blinded his eyes. It was too soon. Summoning energy he didn't realize he had left, he all but dived for his personal extension, and began dialing the doctor's number.
"Hello? Yes. I need you to run some tests on those samples. Something isn't right."
* * *
Toki's cat. Charles could have kissed the dead thing. Even for all the work Charles knew he would have to do to track down the sources of the leaks to the media, even after all the people he would have to fire or have killed for incompetence, even after all the slew of other medical issues the supplemental tests had turned up with the boys, Charles was grateful merely to know that everything was alright. Thus, he had signed off on every expense Toki had wanted to spend to bury the animal, not even caring how much it cost them - within reason - to airlift the monument to Egypt, all out of gratitude that it was the cat which had died, and not one of the band. Even Toki, heartbroken as he was over the cat's death, seemed happy that it had been the cat, not his bandmate.
There would be issues to deal with resulting from this, Charles knew, but for now, everything felt nearly normal. I can do this, he thought, I can keep them safe a little longer. How much longer, he didn't know, but he would be grateful for every day extra he could get before - no, best not to think about it. Even Nathan seemed almost back to normal, though Charles had yet to make sense of the two prior encounters with the front man.
You don't get to pretend it didn't happen, he had said to Charles. The words still rang in his head every day, accusing and angry. No, Nathan, I don't, he thought, looking out of his office window, I don't get to pretend it didn't happen. But you boys can, for me. That's all I want.