[for Various]
Aug. 1st, 2012 07:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
onlyapassengerIt comes back in flashes, fragments. Colors run together behind closed eyes. Reds and blues and grays. The racing pulse of a heart turns into the burst of sniper fire. Bodies, bodies, so many bodies, bleeding and mangled and dead. Heads facing the wrong direction. Bullet holes between their brows. Machinery and white coats, murmured Russian and the soft hands of a lover. A glimpse of red hair and the heavy perfume of scented oil. Cold. Alone. Death, then life, then death again. Never my own, not since the first time.
Not since the first time.
There will be others.
It's dark when he awakes, tangled in his sheets. The moonlight filtering in through the slatted windows paints his room in the same shades of his memories, muted blues and grays, shadows twisting his modest furniture into carnival versions of reality. He forces air down his lungs in gulps, his face wet from tears he shed in sleep. He presses his hands to his cheeks, fingers framing his bones until he manages some measure of calm. He's lived through this experience before, he knows -- and there's a strange feeling, knowing after weeks of not -- but it's different this time. There's no Cosmic Cube and no purpose behind it, not the loss of his memories or regaining them.
He wants to sob. He wants to scream. He wants to rip this island to pieces until he finds some fucking answers, but he settles for destroying his room instead, senselessly tearing through his bedding until he's on his feet and there's a chair in his hands. The wood makes a satisfying crack as it snaps against the sturdier dresser, clothes spilling out onto the ground as one of the drawers gives, fabric and bamboo splinters pooling around his feet.
He doesn't know how long he stands there, wooden shards poised to inflict more damage on an enemy that isn't -- and may never be -- there, but his breaths have leveled by the time he moves again, numb from remembering. He keeps one in hand as a makeshift weapon as he exits his room, tucking it under one arm as he pulls open the pantry door to fetch one of the bottles of Chechnya Vodka freed from Rapture he keeps hidden behind a loose panel at the back. He doesn't bother with a glass, padding his way outside to the porch and lowering himself onto one of the steps.
Dimly aware that Jason's not home and that Virginia is asleep in her stall, he unstops the bottle and takes the first of what's sure to be many pulls, his eyes peeled on the pinkening horizon.
Not since the first time.
There will be others.
It's dark when he awakes, tangled in his sheets. The moonlight filtering in through the slatted windows paints his room in the same shades of his memories, muted blues and grays, shadows twisting his modest furniture into carnival versions of reality. He forces air down his lungs in gulps, his face wet from tears he shed in sleep. He presses his hands to his cheeks, fingers framing his bones until he manages some measure of calm. He's lived through this experience before, he knows -- and there's a strange feeling, knowing after weeks of not -- but it's different this time. There's no Cosmic Cube and no purpose behind it, not the loss of his memories or regaining them.
He wants to sob. He wants to scream. He wants to rip this island to pieces until he finds some fucking answers, but he settles for destroying his room instead, senselessly tearing through his bedding until he's on his feet and there's a chair in his hands. The wood makes a satisfying crack as it snaps against the sturdier dresser, clothes spilling out onto the ground as one of the drawers gives, fabric and bamboo splinters pooling around his feet.
He doesn't know how long he stands there, wooden shards poised to inflict more damage on an enemy that isn't -- and may never be -- there, but his breaths have leveled by the time he moves again, numb from remembering. He keeps one in hand as a makeshift weapon as he exits his room, tucking it under one arm as he pulls open the pantry door to fetch one of the bottles of Chechnya Vodka freed from Rapture he keeps hidden behind a loose panel at the back. He doesn't bother with a glass, padding his way outside to the porch and lowering himself onto one of the steps.
Dimly aware that Jason's not home and that Virginia is asleep in her stall, he unstops the bottle and takes the first of what's sure to be many pulls, his eyes peeled on the pinkening horizon.