No Smoke Without: Part Four - A Certain Kind of Sadness
Oct 2, 2015 18:36:46 GMT -5
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Post by Non Compos Mentis on Oct 2, 2015 18:36:46 GMT -5
Sun cracked through the drapes that morning, the heat had already begun to rise from a refreshing start as the clock ticked toward eleven o'clock. The faint waft of unwashed clothes hung in the air like a pungent chandelier. None of these things were noticed right away. The African-American face with a what seemed to be a few more wrinkles than I remembered was. “And just where the fuck have you been recently?”
“Godfrey?” Rubbing the sleep from my eyes I brought his pitted and pocked face into even clearer focus, an action I scarcely needed as he leaned in to only a couple of feet away from me. I could feel the anger coursing through him, and I could feel the telltale odour of an unbrushed mouth in the warm breath on my skin.
“Oh you DO remember who I am! That's a good start. How about where you are?” I'd never seen him like this, normally Godfrey was a man of calm, a port of tranquillity in an otherwise unruly and tempestuous ocean. Now, though, he was the tempest.
Was it the time, why he was so infuriated? That I had not thought, in my warped late-night mind, to remove and wash my clothes? Or even the ones from two or three days ago? Had I woken him when I arrived at sometime past four in the morning? I couldn't remember, I couldn't remember anything. “What the hell are you talking about...”
“I'll help you out a bit; Schenectady, homeless shelter... where you're supposed to work.” So that was it, what heinous act I had committed. I had neglected my duties to St. Jude's. In my mind, however, I had been doing what was best to protect it.
The Order would be looking for me, Calder and his underlings searching every nook and cranny of my life until I was in their custody. With that in mind I had been spending my nights in the relative safety of the streets, the bars and dwellings of ne'er-do-wells, quietly sipping anything non-alcoholic in spite of myself until the early hours. In no way was I doing this to try and numb the agony in my heart, this was what I told myself. “Godfrey, I've had things to do.”
“You're damn right there are things you've had to do... and haven't.” He finally backed off, frustratedly, furiously, reeling back toward the door. I reacted, my nerves frayed by a shallow sleep full of visions of hell, reminiscent of an Hieronymous Bosch painting or that scene from Event Horizon.
I bolted up from the bed, barely noticing the dull ache in all of my joints from the constant movement and little rest over the last couple of days. As intimidating as I could be, Godfrey didn't back down. “Godfrey, you really don't know what you're fucking talking about!”
“You're gone, Laurence has been sick, Bart's out of town, you know what that means?” Laurence Nemec was an old-timer who frequently volunteered to help the shelter after it had helped him back onto his feet, while Bart Stein was a well-to-do local businessman who enjoyed the warm, squishy feeling that helping the homeless gave him. The positive publicity he received didn't hurt either.
With neither available, the list of help would have been slim to nil. One man, handling a hostel full of addicts and vagrants. “Shit...” The situation I'd left Godfrey in finally dawned on me.
“Damn right again. Know what it's like running this place single-handed?” I hung my head. I didn't know, but I could imagine exactly the kind of night he'd had. No sleep, weary for every moment of the day, every incident grating on his very last ounce of his will. His face shifted, the temper draining from it, only to be replaced by a worse expression. Disappointment. “You have obligations, Sean. Whatever you have going on, you gotta understand that people rely on you here too.”
“Godfrey I...” I stepped forward, wanting to reassure Godfrey that I wouldn't forget my duties here. I stepped forward, and nothing came. I couldn't make that promise, not now. Godfrey was a dear friend but I had things I couldn't tell him. I couldn't tell him about the immense pain I felt at some forgotten monstrosity, the other-worldly domineering Order that would be chasing me, the gentle, youthful face that I saw in every waking moment.
“I don't want excuses, I don't want whatever this is. I want the Sean that's been my partner here for the last year.” He made to leave, to walk out and allow the depression in the room to fester until I could no longer take it. My hopes were lifted as he halted at the door, I thought maybe he would offer me a chance to explain. I was wrong. “There's a mop and bucket in the dining hall, I need someone to clean that up while I clean the rooms.”
Schenectady felt like a darkness that could swallow up reality like a black hole. For a moment that felt like a relief. The Order was gone. The search was off. No title defence to compete in. No Eira. No Showtime. No Kaard. Nothing to worry about but the eventual nothingness of space.
But it wasn't real. It was a fantasy and I had to face up to the fact that if Calder and his followers didn't catch me first then I'd be a sitting duck for Deadly Intentions. I couldn't sleep without seeing the same face burnt on the inside of my eyelids, I couldn't be awake without feeling the grief of the unknown through my whole being. How could I focus on defending my championship? How could I concentrate on winning another, or not losing altogether?
I'd beaten Eira at Trauma 179, but only just. No cheap shots were taken, no shortcuts manipulated, the match was fought with respect. She had been injured though, the lasting effects of her 'match' with Sadistic still haunted her flesh and yet it had not weakened her into submission. Given two extra weeks of recovery, the motivation of fighting the Black Hand still in her conciousness, I doubted if I could match her again.
Then there was Mikey Wryght, Donald Trump for the... less intellectual electorate. Could I call him a threat, with his mind elsewhere on some insane mission to win The Black Hand the presidency of the United States? Of course he was a threat. A grand slam winner before me and the man who had the opportunists eye to capture the World Title when I so disgracefully abandoned it. Nobody could write off such a man, no matter how hair-brained his ideas of premiership were.
And Justin Kaard, what could I say for him? He was the true wildcard going into the match. Just a few weeks he'd been back in PCW, just a few weeks and yet he'd shown himself to be much changed... and much the same. Still over-enthusiastic, fast to act before things had shown their true shape. I'd taken a chair to the head for those reasons, a lump still ached where it had hit. So quick he had been to through himself into the mire that he had struck one of the only people willing to help. He'd been a World Champion himself once, and since then he'd been on a journey of self-discovery and maturity. Whether that had made him a more considered threat inside the ring, a threat that could rival any in PCW, remained to be seen.
Dragging myself up from the bed I forewent any food or even a shower, not even a change of clothes, and went straight to the dining hall. In a mood of misery I filled the rusty bucket with water began to clean up the mess from last nights' ill-mannered chow. With two eyes to supervise the entire rabble of broken humanity, a little mess was the least to be expected.
I placed the mop head in the bucket and then slopped it onto the floor and a particularly disgusting patch of unknown juices. Had it been lamb stew last night? Maybe beef. Whatever it was, it was brown and thin. Quickly it had been washed away and replaced with just the linoleum floor left behind, slightly damp. As I continued my job, my detention, I fell into the rhythm of the job and found a kind of numbness in the peace it provided.
Around and around I went, cleaning up the sloppy detritus left by the failed charges. There is a kind of tranquillity when there is nothing else to worry about than the pain you feel, a kind of sadness you can become addicted to. The thoughts seeped into every fibre of my being, the vision of that face and the pain wrought through it. I couldn't block it out anymore and somehow... I didn't want to.
I needed to remember who he was, I needed to remember what had happened to him. It was the one thought that climbed high above the web of all the others. Eira, Showtime, Kaard... they faded into the background. The International Title, the North American Title... they became a shadow behind the face I couldn't help but see.
I registered a vague notion that I wanted to win a match, a match I'd seen before where two titles were decided, only that time I saw the faces of Ace Anderson and Slither. I'd won my first PCW title that night, the North American, the title that had carried my legacy since. Now I came full circle, now I had to beat not only two World Champions but three to come away with my prize, and now I was the one defending my title and not the one with nothing to lose.
And did it matter to me now? No. Only the face did, only why it was in pain.
The mop made its way to-and-fro across the floor, licking up every hint of waste as I devoted myself entirely to the hurt inside my mind. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and...
Sean
…my hands stopped moving instantly and I looked around for a person. The whisper had been almost inaudible, unable to place it had been so light in the air.
Sean
It spoke again, the voice carried by the wind from some distant place. It certainly hadn't come from anywhere near. ”Coincidence,” I thought to myself, ”just some guy down the street, some other Sean.”
Help
It sounded louder now. The man's voice that seemed so close and yet so far as if fighting through a barrier to reach me. I pushed it away, ”Just a coincidence.” I thought again as I pressed the mop into the bucket and rinsed out the grimy water before dunking it once more and continuing.
The mop swept in a circular motion, one way then the other over the black and white chequered lino. I tried to concentrate on that motion, on that simple movement that I had been charge with completely by my friend. I tried so very hard, as the floor began to ripple.
I tried to fool myself that it was the soiled water from the mop making it look like a pond gently ebbing in the breeze, but I couldn't. I tried to convince myself that I was just tired and seeing things, but I'd seen things like this before.
Years had passed, but I knew it was still there. Drugged, diminished... merely dormant. The visions, the hallucinations, of my hidden passenger were manifesting once more. I knew it was one of these visions, I'd been able to prepare myself for them and avoid them, but this one seemed far more... real.
I was about to to retreat, to find the safe haven of my room where I could collect myself and come to terms with what was happening, when the linoleum tiles split open and out from the blinding light beneath shot a hand.
HELP ME!
Shouting now, screaming, the voice attacked my ears with shocking volume while the hand shot out desperately and grabbed the mop-handle. I felt the pull from the arm, dragging me toward the rift in the ground that let out pulsing rays of glaring orange light. It threatened to pull me through, to launch me into whatever hellscape lay beyond this fissure.
With all my strength I pulled back and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't move, let alone pull back from whatever this was. It looked like an old hallucination courtesy of my starved schizophrenic psyche, but this was too intense and too real. All too quickly it descended on me what this really was; part hallucination, part memory.
The dazzling light surrounding the arm suddenly began to spread out. As if burning away the lino to reveal the abyssal depths beneath. Bit by bit the floor eroded and was replaced only by the view of giant pillars of fire, stretching down as far as I could see. Wind began to swirl around my head and with it the flames shifted like tormented demons, writhing in torture. They licked at my arms, my face, and laughed with crackling bursts as yet another piece of floor burnt away.
Sean, please!
I looked down, and there he was. His face staring up as he grabbed desperately for some kind of salvation. Youthful, yet aged horribly by the smears of ashen debris and the taint of agony that contorted his features. His hair caused him to look older that he might have too, as it hung short and silver from his head. It reminded me of Eira, her shock of silvery-white hair that told everyone what she was; a Guardian. But was this man one of that same breed? Was he mine?
His fingers were giving way under the strain, and did I do anything to help? I didn't move an inch, I couldn't. I was paralysed where I stood, watching with the torture in my soul pounding away at my mind.
The flames reached out from all around him, from the ledge we'd found ourselves on that had given way under the fire and from the raging inferno that surrounded us. I pulled at the handle that his hand still clutched but nothing happened. I tried to summon the strength that I'd found when I last saw Calder, but there was nothing to summon.
I watched helplessly as one by one his fingers gave way, his grip faded and the pain of grief found its way into ever atom of my body. I watched and did nothing as his grip faltered for the final time and his hand, streaked with blood that stained the handle, let go. There was no scream as he fell, perhaps I didn't remember it or perhaps he had been strong enough in his last moments not to give the satisfaction to Death. Whatever it was, he fell into the hell below in perfect silence and the only noise came from me.
”EZRA!” I cried, losing myself as I could finally move... using it only to collapse to my knees. The world of blinding flames and incomprehensible darkness rose up around me and I felt the intolerable heat choke my body. I looked up from the grave of this man I felt such a profound bond with, though his body was invisible in the gloom, and I caught sight of a massive figure looming in the distance.
There, as clouds of smoke billowed around him, stood an otherworldly and imposing figure. The werewolf stood at least seven feet, hunched in a predatory pose that meant he was hiding his true stature. The immense musculature of his body cast an ominous shadow across the floor as the flames danced around him. And through the smoke and flames, did I see it reveal its teeth? Drawing back its lips I saw what I was sure was a smile, a sick and humourless grin, before it turned and stalked away into oblivion.
”Sean?” I barely heard the word, I barely understood where it had come from. It wasn't from the world I inhabited then, and hearing it made me snap out of the mesmerised trance I had fallen into. I realised I was weeping uncontrollably, still resting on my knees with the mop-handle clutched in my hands. ”Sean, what's wrong?”
Lifting my head again I found myself back in the dining hall at St Jude's. The floor was the same black and white chequered linoleum, the faint smell of disinfectant hanging in the air. Above me stood Godfrey, staring down with concern and fright at what was happening to his friend. Whatever had come before, he was here as the man I had know for the last year.
“Why did he die?” I muttered, unable to understand what had just happened. The vision, presented to me by the part of my warped mind that had tried to kill me once but now was helping me remember, was so vivid and yet how much more did I really know? “Why'd he die, Godfrey?”
“Who, who died?” Godfrey knelt by my side, pushing the bucket away to find space to console me, as the weight of grief fell on my soul. I still didn't know fully what I had lost, only that I now had something to call it.
“Ezra.” I choked out and cried more. Was he a Guardian with his silver locks, or a stranger caught in the crossfire of The Order's megalomaniacal war against the unknown? Whoever he was, I had felt my life fade into despair as he disappeared into the abyss, my soul had been torn asunder. Whoever he was, I needed to know more and I couldn't concentrate on Eira, Wryght or Kaard until I found something. Whatever happened would happen, win or lose, and the circle would continue on as it always had.
“Godfrey?” Rubbing the sleep from my eyes I brought his pitted and pocked face into even clearer focus, an action I scarcely needed as he leaned in to only a couple of feet away from me. I could feel the anger coursing through him, and I could feel the telltale odour of an unbrushed mouth in the warm breath on my skin.
“Oh you DO remember who I am! That's a good start. How about where you are?” I'd never seen him like this, normally Godfrey was a man of calm, a port of tranquillity in an otherwise unruly and tempestuous ocean. Now, though, he was the tempest.
Was it the time, why he was so infuriated? That I had not thought, in my warped late-night mind, to remove and wash my clothes? Or even the ones from two or three days ago? Had I woken him when I arrived at sometime past four in the morning? I couldn't remember, I couldn't remember anything. “What the hell are you talking about...”
“I'll help you out a bit; Schenectady, homeless shelter... where you're supposed to work.” So that was it, what heinous act I had committed. I had neglected my duties to St. Jude's. In my mind, however, I had been doing what was best to protect it.
The Order would be looking for me, Calder and his underlings searching every nook and cranny of my life until I was in their custody. With that in mind I had been spending my nights in the relative safety of the streets, the bars and dwellings of ne'er-do-wells, quietly sipping anything non-alcoholic in spite of myself until the early hours. In no way was I doing this to try and numb the agony in my heart, this was what I told myself. “Godfrey, I've had things to do.”
“You're damn right there are things you've had to do... and haven't.” He finally backed off, frustratedly, furiously, reeling back toward the door. I reacted, my nerves frayed by a shallow sleep full of visions of hell, reminiscent of an Hieronymous Bosch painting or that scene from Event Horizon.
I bolted up from the bed, barely noticing the dull ache in all of my joints from the constant movement and little rest over the last couple of days. As intimidating as I could be, Godfrey didn't back down. “Godfrey, you really don't know what you're fucking talking about!”
“You're gone, Laurence has been sick, Bart's out of town, you know what that means?” Laurence Nemec was an old-timer who frequently volunteered to help the shelter after it had helped him back onto his feet, while Bart Stein was a well-to-do local businessman who enjoyed the warm, squishy feeling that helping the homeless gave him. The positive publicity he received didn't hurt either.
With neither available, the list of help would have been slim to nil. One man, handling a hostel full of addicts and vagrants. “Shit...” The situation I'd left Godfrey in finally dawned on me.
“Damn right again. Know what it's like running this place single-handed?” I hung my head. I didn't know, but I could imagine exactly the kind of night he'd had. No sleep, weary for every moment of the day, every incident grating on his very last ounce of his will. His face shifted, the temper draining from it, only to be replaced by a worse expression. Disappointment. “You have obligations, Sean. Whatever you have going on, you gotta understand that people rely on you here too.”
“Godfrey I...” I stepped forward, wanting to reassure Godfrey that I wouldn't forget my duties here. I stepped forward, and nothing came. I couldn't make that promise, not now. Godfrey was a dear friend but I had things I couldn't tell him. I couldn't tell him about the immense pain I felt at some forgotten monstrosity, the other-worldly domineering Order that would be chasing me, the gentle, youthful face that I saw in every waking moment.
“I don't want excuses, I don't want whatever this is. I want the Sean that's been my partner here for the last year.” He made to leave, to walk out and allow the depression in the room to fester until I could no longer take it. My hopes were lifted as he halted at the door, I thought maybe he would offer me a chance to explain. I was wrong. “There's a mop and bucket in the dining hall, I need someone to clean that up while I clean the rooms.”
Schenectady felt like a darkness that could swallow up reality like a black hole. For a moment that felt like a relief. The Order was gone. The search was off. No title defence to compete in. No Eira. No Showtime. No Kaard. Nothing to worry about but the eventual nothingness of space.
But it wasn't real. It was a fantasy and I had to face up to the fact that if Calder and his followers didn't catch me first then I'd be a sitting duck for Deadly Intentions. I couldn't sleep without seeing the same face burnt on the inside of my eyelids, I couldn't be awake without feeling the grief of the unknown through my whole being. How could I focus on defending my championship? How could I concentrate on winning another, or not losing altogether?
I'd beaten Eira at Trauma 179, but only just. No cheap shots were taken, no shortcuts manipulated, the match was fought with respect. She had been injured though, the lasting effects of her 'match' with Sadistic still haunted her flesh and yet it had not weakened her into submission. Given two extra weeks of recovery, the motivation of fighting the Black Hand still in her conciousness, I doubted if I could match her again.
Then there was Mikey Wryght, Donald Trump for the... less intellectual electorate. Could I call him a threat, with his mind elsewhere on some insane mission to win The Black Hand the presidency of the United States? Of course he was a threat. A grand slam winner before me and the man who had the opportunists eye to capture the World Title when I so disgracefully abandoned it. Nobody could write off such a man, no matter how hair-brained his ideas of premiership were.
And Justin Kaard, what could I say for him? He was the true wildcard going into the match. Just a few weeks he'd been back in PCW, just a few weeks and yet he'd shown himself to be much changed... and much the same. Still over-enthusiastic, fast to act before things had shown their true shape. I'd taken a chair to the head for those reasons, a lump still ached where it had hit. So quick he had been to through himself into the mire that he had struck one of the only people willing to help. He'd been a World Champion himself once, and since then he'd been on a journey of self-discovery and maturity. Whether that had made him a more considered threat inside the ring, a threat that could rival any in PCW, remained to be seen.
Dragging myself up from the bed I forewent any food or even a shower, not even a change of clothes, and went straight to the dining hall. In a mood of misery I filled the rusty bucket with water began to clean up the mess from last nights' ill-mannered chow. With two eyes to supervise the entire rabble of broken humanity, a little mess was the least to be expected.
I placed the mop head in the bucket and then slopped it onto the floor and a particularly disgusting patch of unknown juices. Had it been lamb stew last night? Maybe beef. Whatever it was, it was brown and thin. Quickly it had been washed away and replaced with just the linoleum floor left behind, slightly damp. As I continued my job, my detention, I fell into the rhythm of the job and found a kind of numbness in the peace it provided.
Around and around I went, cleaning up the sloppy detritus left by the failed charges. There is a kind of tranquillity when there is nothing else to worry about than the pain you feel, a kind of sadness you can become addicted to. The thoughts seeped into every fibre of my being, the vision of that face and the pain wrought through it. I couldn't block it out anymore and somehow... I didn't want to.
I needed to remember who he was, I needed to remember what had happened to him. It was the one thought that climbed high above the web of all the others. Eira, Showtime, Kaard... they faded into the background. The International Title, the North American Title... they became a shadow behind the face I couldn't help but see.
I registered a vague notion that I wanted to win a match, a match I'd seen before where two titles were decided, only that time I saw the faces of Ace Anderson and Slither. I'd won my first PCW title that night, the North American, the title that had carried my legacy since. Now I came full circle, now I had to beat not only two World Champions but three to come away with my prize, and now I was the one defending my title and not the one with nothing to lose.
And did it matter to me now? No. Only the face did, only why it was in pain.
The mop made its way to-and-fro across the floor, licking up every hint of waste as I devoted myself entirely to the hurt inside my mind. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and...
Sean
…my hands stopped moving instantly and I looked around for a person. The whisper had been almost inaudible, unable to place it had been so light in the air.
Sean
It spoke again, the voice carried by the wind from some distant place. It certainly hadn't come from anywhere near. ”Coincidence,” I thought to myself, ”just some guy down the street, some other Sean.”
Help
It sounded louder now. The man's voice that seemed so close and yet so far as if fighting through a barrier to reach me. I pushed it away, ”Just a coincidence.” I thought again as I pressed the mop into the bucket and rinsed out the grimy water before dunking it once more and continuing.
The mop swept in a circular motion, one way then the other over the black and white chequered lino. I tried to concentrate on that motion, on that simple movement that I had been charge with completely by my friend. I tried so very hard, as the floor began to ripple.
I tried to fool myself that it was the soiled water from the mop making it look like a pond gently ebbing in the breeze, but I couldn't. I tried to convince myself that I was just tired and seeing things, but I'd seen things like this before.
Years had passed, but I knew it was still there. Drugged, diminished... merely dormant. The visions, the hallucinations, of my hidden passenger were manifesting once more. I knew it was one of these visions, I'd been able to prepare myself for them and avoid them, but this one seemed far more... real.
I was about to to retreat, to find the safe haven of my room where I could collect myself and come to terms with what was happening, when the linoleum tiles split open and out from the blinding light beneath shot a hand.
HELP ME!
Shouting now, screaming, the voice attacked my ears with shocking volume while the hand shot out desperately and grabbed the mop-handle. I felt the pull from the arm, dragging me toward the rift in the ground that let out pulsing rays of glaring orange light. It threatened to pull me through, to launch me into whatever hellscape lay beyond this fissure.
With all my strength I pulled back and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't move, let alone pull back from whatever this was. It looked like an old hallucination courtesy of my starved schizophrenic psyche, but this was too intense and too real. All too quickly it descended on me what this really was; part hallucination, part memory.
The dazzling light surrounding the arm suddenly began to spread out. As if burning away the lino to reveal the abyssal depths beneath. Bit by bit the floor eroded and was replaced only by the view of giant pillars of fire, stretching down as far as I could see. Wind began to swirl around my head and with it the flames shifted like tormented demons, writhing in torture. They licked at my arms, my face, and laughed with crackling bursts as yet another piece of floor burnt away.
Sean, please!
I looked down, and there he was. His face staring up as he grabbed desperately for some kind of salvation. Youthful, yet aged horribly by the smears of ashen debris and the taint of agony that contorted his features. His hair caused him to look older that he might have too, as it hung short and silver from his head. It reminded me of Eira, her shock of silvery-white hair that told everyone what she was; a Guardian. But was this man one of that same breed? Was he mine?
His fingers were giving way under the strain, and did I do anything to help? I didn't move an inch, I couldn't. I was paralysed where I stood, watching with the torture in my soul pounding away at my mind.
The flames reached out from all around him, from the ledge we'd found ourselves on that had given way under the fire and from the raging inferno that surrounded us. I pulled at the handle that his hand still clutched but nothing happened. I tried to summon the strength that I'd found when I last saw Calder, but there was nothing to summon.
I watched helplessly as one by one his fingers gave way, his grip faded and the pain of grief found its way into ever atom of my body. I watched and did nothing as his grip faltered for the final time and his hand, streaked with blood that stained the handle, let go. There was no scream as he fell, perhaps I didn't remember it or perhaps he had been strong enough in his last moments not to give the satisfaction to Death. Whatever it was, he fell into the hell below in perfect silence and the only noise came from me.
”EZRA!” I cried, losing myself as I could finally move... using it only to collapse to my knees. The world of blinding flames and incomprehensible darkness rose up around me and I felt the intolerable heat choke my body. I looked up from the grave of this man I felt such a profound bond with, though his body was invisible in the gloom, and I caught sight of a massive figure looming in the distance.
There, as clouds of smoke billowed around him, stood an otherworldly and imposing figure. The werewolf stood at least seven feet, hunched in a predatory pose that meant he was hiding his true stature. The immense musculature of his body cast an ominous shadow across the floor as the flames danced around him. And through the smoke and flames, did I see it reveal its teeth? Drawing back its lips I saw what I was sure was a smile, a sick and humourless grin, before it turned and stalked away into oblivion.
”Sean?” I barely heard the word, I barely understood where it had come from. It wasn't from the world I inhabited then, and hearing it made me snap out of the mesmerised trance I had fallen into. I realised I was weeping uncontrollably, still resting on my knees with the mop-handle clutched in my hands. ”Sean, what's wrong?”
Lifting my head again I found myself back in the dining hall at St Jude's. The floor was the same black and white chequered linoleum, the faint smell of disinfectant hanging in the air. Above me stood Godfrey, staring down with concern and fright at what was happening to his friend. Whatever had come before, he was here as the man I had know for the last year.
“Why did he die?” I muttered, unable to understand what had just happened. The vision, presented to me by the part of my warped mind that had tried to kill me once but now was helping me remember, was so vivid and yet how much more did I really know? “Why'd he die, Godfrey?”
“Who, who died?” Godfrey knelt by my side, pushing the bucket away to find space to console me, as the weight of grief fell on my soul. I still didn't know fully what I had lost, only that I now had something to call it.
“Ezra.” I choked out and cried more. Was he a Guardian with his silver locks, or a stranger caught in the crossfire of The Order's megalomaniacal war against the unknown? Whoever he was, I had felt my life fade into despair as he disappeared into the abyss, my soul had been torn asunder. Whoever he was, I needed to know more and I couldn't concentrate on Eira, Wryght or Kaard until I found something. Whatever happened would happen, win or lose, and the circle would continue on as it always had.
