[He had been so absorbed, in the fun - one of the few pleasures he had left - and quieting the screaming that the game had spiraled, becoming instead of a means of preventing the Beast, it became the very thing that may draw them together once more.

(It would make it stop, it would make the screaming stop)

As he stood in the flat, the ice in the other man's eyes, the building tension. The declaration wasn't of the 'I know your tricks' variety.

There's a finality, especially the usage of that name]

Over...?

[His voice was cool, but he had been steadily growing cooler in expression and voice over the months, only growing animate when James confront him. But even as he questioned cool, he felt it - that hot flash of rage wanting to crawl out, indignant that their game was being declared over from the beast who had been fed by their play.

yet his shoulders dropped as if in relief]