AN: Alright. Chapter two! How was it? It was a bit harder to write than chapter one. Especially because I tried to make it a bit longer. Don't worry. Things will be getting interesting soon!
The silence and comfort of the darkness enveloped me. I knew that I shouldn’t have let it in. I couldn’t help it. To push against it, the unrelenting and ever pulling force, exhausted me to no end.
I knew to save my energy, to save it for when they all talked. I needed to know what they knew. I had questions that needed answering, questions I wished I could ask them myself. But I had yet to find my body in the abyss.
The familiar scent of apples wafted to what I suspected was my nose. The nose I could not place on my ever missing body. I expected her to speak, but she did not. That told me she was alone. I had never heard her alone with me before. I took in the silence happily.
I let the darkness take me again. I could have been gone for a few seconds, or a few years. I didn’t know. Time meant nothing anymore. Only two things meant anything to me; the darkness, and their voices.
A voice I had yet to hear broke apart the black around me and I held tight to it. It was a woman’s voice. “How is he doing?” She sounded kind, but it was a strained sort of kindness. As if asking the question was a simple formality, for the sake of my healer and not me.
I knew she didn’t want to know the answer. I did though; and I did not care for her forced hospitality. That was why I liked my apple woman. She never forced anything. To my knowledge.
What is wrong with me? Pray tell, lovely healer.
I tried to force the questions out of my non-existent mouth. Nothing. I simply waited, gripping tighter to the other woman until the time came when I could hold onto my apple woman, my healer. Her voice came like a wave of sweet songs and I sighed happily at the darkness as it slowly released its grip on me.
“He is holding steady, I think.” She sighed. I heard her shuffle away from me, wherever I was, and I assumed towards the other woman. “And as far as I can tell, it’s a bloody miracle.” She made a noise that was a hybrid of a snort and small sob. Obviously she was unimpressed with her report. I couldn’t say I blamed her. I needed to know more. She spoke again.
“Whatever is wrong, I cannot fix it. I haven’t found anything of use in those damned books of mine. Nobody I’ve talked to-” She was interrupted, I didn’t care for it. I wanted her to keep speaking.
The other woman screamed. “You’ve talked to people about this? About him?!” I flinched at the venom in her voice when she referred to me. Was I so bad that I couldn’t be talked about?
What is so bad about me? The me that inhabited my still undiscovered body? Am I that terrible a person?
I wanted to cry out. To ask her these questions that plagued my mind but my efforts were halted immediately when my healer spoke up again. “No, of course I didn’t mention him.” I was thankful to hear no venom in her voice. Much to my dismay, though, she continued on a path I did not care for. “I didn’t mention his name, at least. They probably would have laughed me off anyways. I was just trying to get answers from someone, anyone for that matter.”
I was fuming by the time she stopped. Or rather, by the time I thought she had stopped. I didn’t want to think of one of the two people who seemed to treat me decently hated me. Whoever I was.
I’ll be giving you all a piece of my mind. Just you wait and see.
She pulled me from my thoughts yet again. “At this point, though, I really don’t care who he is. I hate to see anyone like this.”
The venom lady snorted. Obviously she didn’t like the healer’s words. “You’ve got to be tugging on my leg. Bloody hell. Are you cracked?” She did not raise her voice this time. I was thankful as my non-corporeal head was still pounding. The darkness seemed to enhance it. I was still mad, but the faith in my healer had been restored. If only slightly.
My healer spoke again. “As I was saying, nobody I’ve talked to had anything to tell me.” I heard her slump into a chair or something near my body. Wherever that was.
How long have I been here? Like this?
I burned to ask the questions. All of the questions I need answers to. My mind ached at the strain I had put it through. I attempted to hold onto my healer’s breathing. It was too faint. But if I had tried harder I might have been able to do it. The darkness sensed my weak hold and pulled a fraction harder. It had decided I had heard enough. My time was up.
I let it take me. I needed strength. I needed to recuperate.
Before I knew it, a male’s voice broke through the veil of darkness. I recognized it to be my saviour’s. I let a sigh of relief wash over my thoughts. I listened happily. As happily as possible, anyways.
“You would think that after a week of this there would be some kind of progress.” He sounded tired. His voice gave it away. I found myself silently wondering if his friends knew how tired he actually was. All was evident in the way he voiced himself. I guessed not. When you have the power of sight, of touch and taste, you no longer pay attention to the little things.
Does he look as bad as he sounds?
I felt the darkness around me frown. Obviously mimicking what I wanted to do. It only took a few more moments for me to digest what he had said.
A whole week. Still nothing. Good thing time means nothing to me here.
My favourite voice answered. “It isn’t always that simple. You should know that.” I assumed my saviour made a gesture of some kind, because his voice did not return. Apples flooded one of my two and only senses. She was close, apparently hovering over me. I tried smiling, still no mouth. The darkness made up for it.
“It’s a miracle he is still alive, to be honest.” Her voice made me shake non-corporeal smile from my lost mouth. She was distraught. “After what you told me, I guessed he would have been dead by now. Something, or someone, is keeping him steady. I wish I knew what, maybe it could help.” Her voice no longer hovered over me, but she was still close.
It had taken me some span of time to put the pieces together. I had figured out what was helping me stay alive.
It’s you. All of you. My healer. My saviour. The snorting man. Venom lady.
It wasn’t very hard for me to figure it out. After all, the only way I could ever come from the darkness was when I smelled her apples, or heard the tired in his voice. It was them.
Keep talking to me. Please.
“It is almost getting to be too much. I need him to wake up. I don’t know how long I can keep this up. Especially with our other friend in there.” My saviour grunted in return, but his voiced opinion did not reach me. I focused my efforts on noises. I tried to make them, but gained no reaction. I assumed they didn’t make it out of the darkness.
Try harder!
I screamed at myself. I needed them to know I was listening. That I could hear them. They needed to know.
A voice finally made it through. I didn’t know how long after, but it did. “Do you think we should take him somewhere else? Anywhere far from here?” The voice of the snorting man made the darkness around me vibrate with anger. I never cared for his voice.
Say no. Say you won’t send me away. Please.
I waited. The silence that befell the room frightened me. I kept wishing them to say no, to turn against the snorting man and tell him to leave and never return. To say anything at all. I soon realized I had slipped into the abyss, too far away to hear what was said. Too weak to pull myself back. It had drained me.
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