We’re Looking For a Meaning in Life, Wanting to Shine (Drabble ------> Closed Log)
He's floating.
Or is he falling?
He can't tell. He can't make heads or tails of this sea of white. There is emptiness in all directions, nothing as far as the eye can see; up, down, left, right. Wherever he is, there is nothing. No sound, no feeling, no warmth. It is barren and endless. Eternity.
Was this what it was like to die…?
He laughs. Well, he felt like laughing, a short, bemused huff is what really came. He leans his head back as his weightless soul drifted into the ether. Is he rising, falling, or just flying parallel to a void? He can't tell. His senses, or at least what he believed to be his senses (can dead people really sense anything?), are all jumbled up, like there is some kind of interference.
So, this was it, huh? ‘Least I got all the time I want now to think.
Think? Think about what? There is only so much he could ponder about. He could go over the events of his life, the short nineteen years that he’d lived, but even so, we are talking about eternity here. Infinite time to do what? Drift? Even if he reviewed every second of every minute of every day of his life, it would only take nineteen years, and that is far less than eternity.
But hey, maybe this is the real punishment, the real cold void of death. You lose all sense of time, your consciousness dissolves into the ether, and you literally cease to be as your mind and soul warp, growing ever more insane…
It’s fine…I deserve this after all.
“Are you done?”
His eyes flash open. What the fuck is that? He rights himself, standing upright (near as he could tell) in an endless white void. There is no one here, there can't be anyone else here except--
“I’m not God, idiot. You don’t even believe in him. But why would you, it’s your brother, Pollux that should believe in gods."
The voice is snide, assertive, and entirely too knowing. He clenches his fists, as the dawning of realization sets in.
“Yeah. Why would I believe in a god, Castor?”
Of course he’d be here. They both died that night, didn’t they? At least this way, he’d have some company before the passage of time slowly broke down his collective consciousness. He turns his body, expecting to see the monolithic, pale-faced horseman towering over him. But what he sees gives him pause, the look on his face betraying his surprise.
He's looking eye to eye with himself.
Except this other self has glowing yellow eyes, malevolent but radiating a level of power he’d always known but was too scared to confront. This other Shinjiro smirks, a knowing, mocking grin as he steps forward, hard-soled shoes clacking on an invisible floor. He walks just like Shinjiro; hands in his pockets, head bowed and shoulders hunched, always fixated on his destination. Always fixated on Hell.
“You aren’t dead. Not yet.” Castor speaks. His voice has an increasing sense of presence, a voice that Shinjiro has to fight the urge to shrink away from.
“So, what? I know what you're going to say." Shinjiro spits back defiantly. “I don’t need--”
Suddenly, a level of indescribable pain tears through his body. How is that even possible? He growls and curls in on himself, clawing at his chest, his torso. It feels like something was ripping apart inside of him, tearing and clawing and growing ever more impatient.
“What the hell are you--”
“I’m not doing anything to you.” Castor grins. “You’re doing it to yourself.”
A definitive pause as he looks almost…contemplative.
“But since I’m you…I suppose I am the one tearing you apart.”
The pain grows more intense, white hot fire igniting his insides as it spreads through his own very limbs. He screams and writhes in a weightless convulsion.
We’re losing him! Vitals are failing!
What the hell are those voices? Why is he hearing shit? Is he going insane? Is this what death really was?! Castor’s words resonate in his whirling mind, mocking and laughing and so goddamn (un)true.
“You’re not me!”
His voice sends a ripple through the ‘world’ that he currently resided in. And that purgatory sends a ripple back. The entire world seems to heave, a hollow wind tearing through with the force of a hurricane. And when the splitting pain in his body, in his head subsides, when he's able to lift his head to regard Castor once more, a sinking, crushing, hopeless fear fills him.
Castor had abandoned his shell(Shinjiro) and now looms overhead. Sunken, empty eyes boil over with pitch black disdain. His hand reaches toward his own chest and grabs the sword embedded there. And with a sick, crunching, awful sound, begins to draw it forth.
Shinji’s eyes grow wide at the sight. He has no weapon, no method of fighting. Hell, he was still reeling from that blast of pain shooting through his body. He tries to turn, tries to runcrawlswim away but is frozen, held in place by black tendrils that hadn’t been there a moment before. They seize his arms, his legs, wrap tightly around his waist, and lift him, offering him up to Castor like a sacrifice. He twists his head, seeking the origin of the tiny, clawing hands, only to find that the white, empty void is gradually changing; an inky black mass encroaches on the light, making the world dark and foreboding. Those tendrils originate from that very mass.
The grating of steel against bone ends as the sword is fully withdrawn from its bone and metal sheath. Castor inches closer, his wire-like, jaundiced hair whipping wildly as a silent storm brews around them. Castor’s horse whinnies, its eyes alighting with yellow flame. He raises his sword.
“You always admitted to your guilt, always took full acceptance for what you, for what we had done, and yet now, in your twilight moments, you deny me? Deny our connection? Deny who I am?”
With the pounding force of an angry God(‘s mortal brother) he impales Shinjiro through the heart. Shinjiro screams out, the pain tearing him apart from the inside, reaching to the very ends of his extremities. It feels like his entire body is aflame.
Doctor! Vitals are plummeting! He’s going into shock!
Those goddamn voices again…he could still hear them on the very edge of his peripherals. It makes sense now. He understands what is happening, where he is.
Heh…so I really did win. He got my note and…I’m being…
He feels his fingertips and toes grow cold. He feels his ‘body’ slowly dying, the sensation spreading up his arms and legs. His vision begins to haze, the slight glimmers of light left in this world blurring, reflecting off of Castor’s pale face. His head lolls, strength slipping away. His memories flash before him, everyone he’d ever known, ever cared for, ever fought with. He watches in the third person, his interactions of the last year. He sees all the things he’d done, good and bad. He watches himself through the eyes of another…
And there is still so much he has left to take care of.
He feels the bitterness, the creeping sadness well up inside of him. He had so much, why did he squander it? He had power. He could have changed things. He could have done so many things for the people around him, but now…he's leaving them.
Heh...! Dammit...
I really don't wanna die...!
He feels the grip on his arms and legs loosen a bit, his consciousness slowly returning to him. Curiously, he cocks his head to regard Castor.
Empty eyes look back, watching his cage closely.
“Do you understand now? Say it.”
Shinjiro coughs. His entire body, his very soul, hurt. He shakes his head and fights to move his arms, the tendrils tearing and snapping away like sinewy strings. With one arm freed, he reaches out, clutching the blade of the sword sunk deep into his own chest--
--And begins to push it in deeper.
“I…we killed someone. I’ve…accepted that.” He began, freeing his other arm. They both clutch the blade and he begins to scale its length.
“I’ve…accepted the sin. And I’ve accepted that…to die now would be cowardly. The hell would it even prove?! I can...change things. I have a power. I have you. And even though I don't want 'em, I have 'em both!"
He growls as he forces the blade through, getting closer and closer to the hilt.
“I can still fight…I can still…do things. And I owe it to Amada, to his mom…to meet him here when he finally shows up…”
Finally, he grasps the hilt, lifting his head to look Castor straight in the eyes.
“I accept that I don’t want to die! I want t’keep living! I want to live for the people that see so goddamn much in me! I accept that I deserve that life, that we deserve it! And I accept that I can’t do it alone!”
The world around them begins to twist and heave, black and white conflicting, contrasting, swirling into a mass of gray, matching the tumultuous emotions rushing through him.
“I can’t…I gotta go back. I have people waiting for me. We have people waiting for us! We’ve got a responsibility to them! You hear me, Castor?! We have to live!”
A sudden wave of pain hits and Shinjiro curls into himself once more. He is feeling things again, the numbness that had overtaken parts of his body is giving way to warmth. And when he looks up, the sword had been replaced by his own hand. Castor had returned to his shell, Shinji’s form, yellow eyes flickering with something more than malice. A smile creases his lips.
“So, you finally understand. You accept your burden. You accept me.”
One ragged exhale later, Shinjiro is standing face to face with himself once more. The pain in his chest is subsiding little by little, and he kept feeling warmer for some reason.
“I accept a path…not a burden. I already accepted a burden that night years ago. I accept that…we can’t just keel over now. Not when other people need me.”
“There’s more to accept than just that…things you know, but cannot see yet. But they’ll come to you in time.”
And just like that, he dissolves away on a silent wind.
“Just keep your mind open this time around.”
Shinjiro closes his eyes and nods in acceptance.
-------------------------------------
“Doctor, his vitals are…they’ve stopped deteriorating but…”
The medical proffesionals all jump as Shinji’s body, while laying open and bleeding on the operating table, suddenly convulses and arches up as he gasps for air. His heart begins pumping rapidly, lungs (though still damaged) once again begin taking in air hungrily. Color spreads through his dealthy pale flesh as blood pumps through his veins (and through his dozens of wounds) at an increased rate.
They look on as he opens his eyes briefly, still heavily sedated, looks around, and accepts where he is…before drifting off into slumber again. Even so, his body’s vitals start to increase, grow stronger and stronger all on their own.
“Doctor…?”
“What are you all standing around for? We have instructions, don’t we? Let’s get back to work.”
(OOC: The cut leads to a drabble I wrote, depicting the unseen events in the hospital. Sorry in advance, I know it's not supposed to be posted here, but this ties into one last log, tying up one last loose end. Enjoy! 8)) )
Or is he falling?
He can't tell. He can't make heads or tails of this sea of white. There is emptiness in all directions, nothing as far as the eye can see; up, down, left, right. Wherever he is, there is nothing. No sound, no feeling, no warmth. It is barren and endless. Eternity.
Was this what it was like to die…?
He laughs. Well, he felt like laughing, a short, bemused huff is what really came. He leans his head back as his weightless soul drifted into the ether. Is he rising, falling, or just flying parallel to a void? He can't tell. His senses, or at least what he believed to be his senses (can dead people really sense anything?), are all jumbled up, like there is some kind of interference.
So, this was it, huh? ‘Least I got all the time I want now to think.
Think? Think about what? There is only so much he could ponder about. He could go over the events of his life, the short nineteen years that he’d lived, but even so, we are talking about eternity here. Infinite time to do what? Drift? Even if he reviewed every second of every minute of every day of his life, it would only take nineteen years, and that is far less than eternity.
But hey, maybe this is the real punishment, the real cold void of death. You lose all sense of time, your consciousness dissolves into the ether, and you literally cease to be as your mind and soul warp, growing ever more insane…
It’s fine…I deserve this after all.
“Are you done?”
His eyes flash open. What the fuck is that? He rights himself, standing upright (near as he could tell) in an endless white void. There is no one here, there can't be anyone else here except--
“I’m not God, idiot. You don’t even believe in him. But why would you, it’s your brother, Pollux that should believe in gods."
The voice is snide, assertive, and entirely too knowing. He clenches his fists, as the dawning of realization sets in.
“Yeah. Why would I believe in a god, Castor?”
Of course he’d be here. They both died that night, didn’t they? At least this way, he’d have some company before the passage of time slowly broke down his collective consciousness. He turns his body, expecting to see the monolithic, pale-faced horseman towering over him. But what he sees gives him pause, the look on his face betraying his surprise.
He's looking eye to eye with himself.
Except this other self has glowing yellow eyes, malevolent but radiating a level of power he’d always known but was too scared to confront. This other Shinjiro smirks, a knowing, mocking grin as he steps forward, hard-soled shoes clacking on an invisible floor. He walks just like Shinjiro; hands in his pockets, head bowed and shoulders hunched, always fixated on his destination. Always fixated on Hell.
“You aren’t dead. Not yet.” Castor speaks. His voice has an increasing sense of presence, a voice that Shinjiro has to fight the urge to shrink away from.
“So, what? I know what you're going to say." Shinjiro spits back defiantly. “I don’t need--”
Suddenly, a level of indescribable pain tears through his body. How is that even possible? He growls and curls in on himself, clawing at his chest, his torso. It feels like something was ripping apart inside of him, tearing and clawing and growing ever more impatient.
“What the hell are you--”
“I’m not doing anything to you.” Castor grins. “You’re doing it to yourself.”
A definitive pause as he looks almost…contemplative.
“But since I’m you…I suppose I am the one tearing you apart.”
The pain grows more intense, white hot fire igniting his insides as it spreads through his own very limbs. He screams and writhes in a weightless convulsion.
We’re losing him! Vitals are failing!
What the hell are those voices? Why is he hearing shit? Is he going insane? Is this what death really was?! Castor’s words resonate in his whirling mind, mocking and laughing and so goddamn (un)true.
“You’re not me!”
His voice sends a ripple through the ‘world’ that he currently resided in. And that purgatory sends a ripple back. The entire world seems to heave, a hollow wind tearing through with the force of a hurricane. And when the splitting pain in his body, in his head subsides, when he's able to lift his head to regard Castor once more, a sinking, crushing, hopeless fear fills him.
Castor had abandoned his shell(Shinjiro) and now looms overhead. Sunken, empty eyes boil over with pitch black disdain. His hand reaches toward his own chest and grabs the sword embedded there. And with a sick, crunching, awful sound, begins to draw it forth.
Shinji’s eyes grow wide at the sight. He has no weapon, no method of fighting. Hell, he was still reeling from that blast of pain shooting through his body. He tries to turn, tries to runcrawlswim away but is frozen, held in place by black tendrils that hadn’t been there a moment before. They seize his arms, his legs, wrap tightly around his waist, and lift him, offering him up to Castor like a sacrifice. He twists his head, seeking the origin of the tiny, clawing hands, only to find that the white, empty void is gradually changing; an inky black mass encroaches on the light, making the world dark and foreboding. Those tendrils originate from that very mass.
The grating of steel against bone ends as the sword is fully withdrawn from its bone and metal sheath. Castor inches closer, his wire-like, jaundiced hair whipping wildly as a silent storm brews around them. Castor’s horse whinnies, its eyes alighting with yellow flame. He raises his sword.
“You always admitted to your guilt, always took full acceptance for what you, for what we had done, and yet now, in your twilight moments, you deny me? Deny our connection? Deny who I am?”
With the pounding force of an angry God(‘s mortal brother) he impales Shinjiro through the heart. Shinjiro screams out, the pain tearing him apart from the inside, reaching to the very ends of his extremities. It feels like his entire body is aflame.
Doctor! Vitals are plummeting! He’s going into shock!
Those goddamn voices again…he could still hear them on the very edge of his peripherals. It makes sense now. He understands what is happening, where he is.
Heh…so I really did win. He got my note and…I’m being…
He feels his fingertips and toes grow cold. He feels his ‘body’ slowly dying, the sensation spreading up his arms and legs. His vision begins to haze, the slight glimmers of light left in this world blurring, reflecting off of Castor’s pale face. His head lolls, strength slipping away. His memories flash before him, everyone he’d ever known, ever cared for, ever fought with. He watches in the third person, his interactions of the last year. He sees all the things he’d done, good and bad. He watches himself through the eyes of another…
And there is still so much he has left to take care of.
He feels the bitterness, the creeping sadness well up inside of him. He had so much, why did he squander it? He had power. He could have changed things. He could have done so many things for the people around him, but now…he's leaving them.
Heh...! Dammit...
I really don't wanna die...!
He feels the grip on his arms and legs loosen a bit, his consciousness slowly returning to him. Curiously, he cocks his head to regard Castor.
Empty eyes look back, watching his cage closely.
“Do you understand now? Say it.”
Shinjiro coughs. His entire body, his very soul, hurt. He shakes his head and fights to move his arms, the tendrils tearing and snapping away like sinewy strings. With one arm freed, he reaches out, clutching the blade of the sword sunk deep into his own chest--
--And begins to push it in deeper.
“I…we killed someone. I’ve…accepted that.” He began, freeing his other arm. They both clutch the blade and he begins to scale its length.
“I’ve…accepted the sin. And I’ve accepted that…to die now would be cowardly. The hell would it even prove?! I can...change things. I have a power. I have you. And even though I don't want 'em, I have 'em both!"
He growls as he forces the blade through, getting closer and closer to the hilt.
“I can still fight…I can still…do things. And I owe it to Amada, to his mom…to meet him here when he finally shows up…”
Finally, he grasps the hilt, lifting his head to look Castor straight in the eyes.
“I accept that I don’t want to die! I want t’keep living! I want to live for the people that see so goddamn much in me! I accept that I deserve that life, that we deserve it! And I accept that I can’t do it alone!”
The world around them begins to twist and heave, black and white conflicting, contrasting, swirling into a mass of gray, matching the tumultuous emotions rushing through him.
“I can’t…I gotta go back. I have people waiting for me. We have people waiting for us! We’ve got a responsibility to them! You hear me, Castor?! We have to live!”
A sudden wave of pain hits and Shinjiro curls into himself once more. He is feeling things again, the numbness that had overtaken parts of his body is giving way to warmth. And when he looks up, the sword had been replaced by his own hand. Castor had returned to his shell, Shinji’s form, yellow eyes flickering with something more than malice. A smile creases his lips.
“So, you finally understand. You accept your burden. You accept me.”
One ragged exhale later, Shinjiro is standing face to face with himself once more. The pain in his chest is subsiding little by little, and he kept feeling warmer for some reason.
“I accept a path…not a burden. I already accepted a burden that night years ago. I accept that…we can’t just keel over now. Not when other people need me.”
“There’s more to accept than just that…things you know, but cannot see yet. But they’ll come to you in time.”
And just like that, he dissolves away on a silent wind.
“Just keep your mind open this time around.”
Shinjiro closes his eyes and nods in acceptance.
-------------------------------------
“Doctor, his vitals are…they’ve stopped deteriorating but…”
The medical proffesionals all jump as Shinji’s body, while laying open and bleeding on the operating table, suddenly convulses and arches up as he gasps for air. His heart begins pumping rapidly, lungs (though still damaged) once again begin taking in air hungrily. Color spreads through his dealthy pale flesh as blood pumps through his veins (and through his dozens of wounds) at an increased rate.
They look on as he opens his eyes briefly, still heavily sedated, looks around, and accepts where he is…before drifting off into slumber again. Even so, his body’s vitals start to increase, grow stronger and stronger all on their own.
“Doctor…?”
“What are you all standing around for? We have instructions, don’t we? Let’s get back to work.”
(OOC: The cut leads to a drabble I wrote, depicting the unseen events in the hospital. Sorry in advance, I know it's not supposed to be posted here, but this ties into one last log, tying up one last loose end. Enjoy! 8)) )