Burr had taken laudanum himself, before he left. Just a few drops on his tongue after bathing, because he never before had been in the habit of denying himself. It is that, in combination with the total overabundance of emotional stress, that triggers that disconnect, shutters the bridge between feeling and understanding.

So he doesn't really register until he is sitting in the room alone, watching the book clasped between his hands, and then between his knees, tremble. One empty room, windowless, stuffy with dust, and shaking hands clasped on a worthless. Book. He feels like he is eight or nine, sweating through a sweating summer reciting prayers he doesn't even understand.

It hurts, to sit. A horrible deep ache. He is bleeding, maybe. From when there had been no preparation, and--he is too relive himself in either way. Rings and a rod and--

Then there is the assortment of odd aches. The dull throb where he caught a foot in the rib. The heat that doesn't flee from a swollen cheek. The ache of his jaw, and the awful twisting of his stomach, threatening again at nausea. A pounding headache. Exhausted.

But none of this is--it doesn't compare to that awful numbness. Hollowed. Playing over Hamilton's face, again and again and again. Burr is--any other mate would have done something. Known what to do. Burr's never been a good mate.

"I thank you, I am well," Burr says, when Ned enters. "I beg your pardon. I will return to him once he is settled. I thought it best not to agitate him more, given his state." Which means--I am fine, please leave.