[center][h2][color=ed1c24][i][b]Drake “D” Edwards[/b][/i][/color][/h2]
[img] https://image.ibb.co/mbnbKq/drake3post.jpg [/img][/center]
[hr][center][color=ed1c24][b]Interaction/Mentions:[/b][/color] [@c3p-0h]  |  [color=ed1c24][b]Location:[/b][/color] Ashford Institute > Danger Room
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	Drake's eyes followed Ashford as he paced, his stare zeroing in on the headmaster's lips.  He heard his voice and knew that words were being formed.  What Ashford was saying, though, Drake hadn't a clue.  He was on autopilot, just going through the motions.  After Ashford gave his speech, he left the room and suddenly there wasn't anyone to focus on, at least not immediately.  Instead, Drake stared at the door that had closed behind the two figures of authority.  He could feel his eyes start to move inward, becoming slightly crossed.  His vision blurred but there was a strange comfort in it.  It was like putting the world on mute while he stood there leaning against the far wall looking like he had just crawled out of a dumpster.

	Drake's eyes were a nearly luminous crimson, except for a slice of azure, surrounded by dark sockets resembling pits of despair.  Inevitably, the little bit of blue that was left in one of his irises would surrender to the red, but the young man was determined to put that off as long as possible.  For a while now, Drake had been struggling with an internal battle, silently combating a foreign entity within his own mind.  That alien force was at its strongest when Drake was unconscious and therefore the fire welding mutant decided to swear off sleep altogether.  The toll it was taking on him was obvious.  Nevertheless, he stood resilient.  Stupefied, but tenacious.

	Amidst the blur of moving bodies, he recognized the shape of Aya come into view for but a moment as she took her exit, seemingly in pursuit of the professors.  And then, once more, there was just the door.  Drake's jaw became slack and he could feel his eyelids embracing gravity.  The darkness was welcoming and it beckoned him forth, tempting him with comfort and refreshment.  His neck started to buckle under the weight of his head and his line of sight was beginning to travel south as the floor gradually came into view.  Maybe just for a minute, he could safely do it.  Maybe just for a minute he could nap and that might give him enough energy to get him through the rest of the day.  Just one... quick... minute...

	Suddenly, his pupils went wide and his eyebrows sprung up.  A grimace appeared on his face as someone in the room let out a scream.  His vision quickly refocused and his body sprung into a cautious landing position as if he had just planted himself after jumping off a cliff.  Hurriedly, he scanned the faces around him to try and identify the source of the outcry.  He played it over in his memory, analyzing the voice he heard.  It didn't take long before he concluded who was responsible.  The voice was his own.

	"[color=f7976a]Sorry![/color]" he said urgently, as if the apology would erase what had just happened so long as he said it quickly enough.  "[color=f7976a]Sorry.  There was a... spider.[/color]"  Drake immediately regretted that.  Surely, there was something cooler he could have said.  "[color=f7976a]But it's gone now.  I killed it.  With fire.  I do fire.[/color]"  He bit his own lips shut, refusing to say anything more that would paint him as being simpler than he already appeared.  He found himself wishing that someone, [i]anyone[/i] would say something to take the spotlight off of him.