The stale air of the Brooklyn apartment clung to Ethan like a shroud. Cigarette smoke, long since cooled and turned acrid, mingled with the faint, metallic scent of old blood. Outside, the rumble of the B train vibrated through the floorboards, a constant, mournful groan that echoed the turmoil within him. He sat hunched in a threadbare armchair, a glass of amber liquid sweating in his prosthetic hand. The other appendage, or rather, the stump that remained of it, throbbed with a phantom ache that was as much psychological as physical.