Pain.
Why did it always have to be the one main reminder he was still alive? Too many times in his life he'd found himself waking into this confused almost hung-over haze, scared to fully wake up and realise what waited for him. It never ended well. Almost always in regret.
A vague sense of revulsion and anger seized him at that voice and he remembered where he had been. Remembered the horrors. Practically relived them. With excruciating vividness.
He opened his eyes in panic with a gasp, the darkness of his own head no longer a sanctuary.
"Yeah I ******** hear you." his voice sounded raspy, weak, hardly his own. He didn't even try to speak into his head, scared in his current dazed and confused state that even attempting to do something like that would cause a more massive headache. He looked down at himself almost reluctantly, frowning at the bandages around his torso, his arms. Even his wrists where he knew for a fact the ropes had cut into his flesh were bandaged. It hurt to breathe, but at least he still could.
A memory resurfaced from the chaos. Reaching out helplessly, pleadingly, looking for that presence that was always there with him facing death. Needing the reassurance like a desperate child.
And finding only silence.
"Y..h.." he slumped back against the pillow, finally resorting to the voice within his own thoughts. <
He closed his eyes, turning his head away, as if he could tune out the voice, as if he could ignore him.
< I didn't want you to die >
No one had his best interests at heart. No one. It was always selfish in some way, self motivated. It was just easier to keep people on the outside out. It was so much harder to keep Tracey out. He could feel the weapon's honesty in his words, could feel it hadn't just been about keeping his host alive, that he cared. He didn't understand how he /could/. How the ******** could you keep worrying about someone who so obviously hated everything about you being there?
<< I needed you >>
< You insist you never need anyone. You say you needed me, but how was I to know if you'd react badly to my reassurances? You are unpredictable, even inside your own head and you won't let anyone help you, even when you know you need it. >
He didn't reply, just stayed sullen and silent, trying to cling to the anger that kept all other emotion at bay.
<< I failed both of us. I ******** up the mission, I ******** up the fight. >> He had to open his eyes again as the horrific sight of Reine sliced wide open by the scythe vividly replayed itself in his mind's eye.
< You couldn't win alone >
It was so horrible to hear it. He spent his whole life telling himself he was invincible, telling himself there was nothing he couldn't defeat with enough effort, but then and there he'd been vulnerable, he'd been helpless. He'd needed other people.
It brought back the discussions he'd had with Jordan.
"Nobody's invincible."
"And if you go around thinking you are, you'll do stupid s**t because you think you can't get hurt by it. Nobody's exempt. Anyone can die."
And he almost had. He'd been stupid and arrogant. They knew there was a lair down there, they had been told merely to observe and like a fool he'd waltzed along without a word like a stupid lamb to slaughter, under-estimating the horsemen, over-estimating himself. He had hardly deserved to survive. He was weak. He wasn't invincible. And if he was ever going to stop being weak, he had to face the facts.
He needed people. He needed to learn from the people who knew s**t better than himself, people who had been missed by death's hand because of what they knew. He had to train, he had to learn, he had to keep moving or he would end up dead.
<< I couldn't win alone, next time here's hoping I won't be. >>
< You won't. >
He wanted to start right now. Wanted to get to the gym, wanted to start practising, wanted to hit up the library, hit up his colleagues, wanted to do anything at all to not have to lie here. He tried to sit up, an almost manic resolve seizing him.
Every single injury he had screamed out at once, reopening several of the large cuts he'd sustained just with the force he'd sat up with. It was enough to make him cry out in pain and fall back panting with breathing that was almost sobs. Okay maybe he wasn't fine. But he couldn't lie here, he couldn't. He couldn't.
He didn't want to close his eyes. He didn't want to remember. He didn't want to sleep.
The angel fell silent. Even he couldn't help the sun trainee with that.
There was no way out of it, he was helpless all over again. He couldn't escape it. He just tried not to think as he curled up as best he could on the bed.
He didn't want to be alone.
