Title: Blisters

Author: Xelly-chan

Rating: T since nothing is really explicitly said. Besides the summery should've proven warning enough

Pairings: Nate/Wade, War/Wade, Stryfe/Wade, John Doe/Wade, Wade's Father/Wade

A/N: Written a few weeks ago, but my Beta Reader has been busy with life and homework. Only reason I'm posting is to get back in the grove of things. And I'm as sick as a dog and not getting any sleep. So yeah, someday I'll post the rewritten, edited version of this but until then you'll have to deal. Not really written to Coal Chamber's Blisters but it sorta fits. Or something.

It's sad and wrong and by all accounts, he shouldn't even be alive right now. Today, tomorrow, yesterday. He should have been dead years ago. Even before the cancer, there was that ever-present wrongness in his skull. Not just depravity and social stigma gained through fuck ups and life, but that bone deep itch only razors and broken glass could scratch.

The crick in his neck he tried to fix with rope and the living room banister.

He remembers the headaches he used to get, and how he used to pop two painkillers, maybe three, four, ten more, just for luck.

By all accounts, he should already be dead. By all accounts, he shouldn't be here. By all accounts, the voices are not real either. However, he is alive (mostly), and he is here (physically at least. Sometimes), and the voices are there too, disembodied and as convincing as they have ever been. Loud, too, the bastards.

So he slaps on a crooked grin and forces out a one-liner or two. A lot as changed since weapon x, and a lot has stayed the same.

He still can't kill himself or die peacefully without being revived for one reason or another. He still gets the short end of the stick. The voices are still soothing and kind sounding when they tell him just how stupid he is and why won't he do the world a favor and die. People still leave him, sighting higher priorities or just because he isn't worth the effort.

He's used to it. Really, he is. Normality is comforting. Like a three hundred count box of medical alcohol. The tingle-buzz of his liver regenerating. The pressure over his heart and the tightness of his throat. Cracked smiles, jagged laughs that sound too much like sobs and anguished screams, his eyes wide, like the lids have been peeled back, as he hugs himself. Holds himself together on his dirty carpet, hands digging into his aching sides, chest heaving. All normal. Like the constant thrum of white noise of pain under, inside his skin, the cancer eating at his insides.

He wonders who is the most damaged: Deadpool or Wade Wilson.

He wonders who cares, and for how long.

He wonders if Cable might, or if the other man has given that up for a lost cause.

Then he picks himself off the ground and watches the veins in his arms stitch together, from elbow to palm. It's dark now, the sky bruised behind dishwater colored clouds, the sent of copper heavy in the air. When he closes his eyes, he can feel skeletal, rotting hands burst from the soil, digging into ruined flesh and torn spandex. Can feel dead skin fall from bone onto his face, taste graveyard dirt, and smell coffins and decay. The voices coo, caressing his tired mind, assuring him it's what he deserves, just relax, an eternity of pain, only half of what he's gone through and put others through, then he's home free. Shh, shh, it will all be okay. Just die, it will all go away.

He opens his eyes again, instead of hollow sockets; he sees white padded walls and thinks this is normal too. So are the needles, scalpels, and unsympathetic doctors in masks and flashing glasses. The lights are too bright, they hurt, almost as much as the leather straps cutting into his arms, legs, holding his head still, cutting of his circulation.

It hurts, but it's old hurt. It's only a motor reflex to jerk and scream as a y-incision carefully splits open his chest. He doesn't fight when they tie the sleeves of the white jacket to his waist, just lays limp as they wheel him down an impossibly long hall. When the put him back in his corner, it's almost a relief, the wall is cool and cushy. It's easy to fall back into a dreamless, open-eyed sleep.

Someone grabs him, shoving him against the rough side of a brick wall, scraping his back red and raw, and he moans something like "fuck", wrapping his unbound arms around broad, unfamiliar shoulders. When his eyes roll out of the back of his head, he sees a blank, fleshy mask with only a mouth twisted and snarling with pleasure. His skin is even, unblemished, but it's also pale and sickly colored. He's moaning too, now, the fleshy mask is pounding into him and it's alright but it's something Wade thinks he should do, that it'd end better if he does. But underneath the soft pants of "more", and the ragged groans, he can hear rattling in his chest with each breath. Then the flesh mask finishes deep inside him, and he takes it, takes it right inside himself. More sickness, more pain, more regret.

Suddenly the Flesh mask morphs into a square jaw and a glowing eye, the other one blue and worried. His fingers scrap at broad, mismatched shoulders, smooth globed muscle and cool sleek metal. Nate is pinning him softly to the bed, sweet and gentle, caging him inside thick arms. He can feel the heat radiating off the large mutant, and this isn't normal, but it's nice. It'd be nicer if his skin wasn't bumpy, deformed, but that's okay too. It's more real this way. Large hands cradle his face, like he's a precious china doll, the voices whisper, yet all he pays attention to is Nate. Nate, who is telling him to "Stay with me", "I'm here", and finally "This is real." He wants to say, "I'm trying", "I know" and "That's what they all say". He does not, though; he wants to stay in the fantasy just a little longer.

The dream skips and it's War standing in front of him now. Towering over him, stronger than Cable ever has been, solid in the gleaming armor, and blurred around the edges. The touches are harsher, but still familiar, because it's still Nate. He hates what Nate might become, what Nate might do, but he will never hate Nate. And War is Nate. This feels real too, normal, or what might be normal. It's not "nice", nor will it ever be anymore, still Nate needs it, and so does he. The pain is good, so is the pleasure. He'll take anything.

He's not in War's dungeons anymore, and that is not Nate. A good copy, but he can tell. Stryfe is leaning back in the huge throne, covered in metal spikes, clean, pristine, and out of place in the wasteland he rules. Stryfe's hands are hard against his skull; a far cry from his twin's caressing hold. He's almost thankful. He's almost sad. The voices are whispering, sighing or making jeers. He ignores them, mostly, just hallows out his newly smooth cheeks, concentrating on the stifled groans above. Stryfe has been kind today, and he has been good. This is his reward; a new face with old beauty. It is the future, he has not seen Nate for several centuries, Stryfe was here and would still be here even when, if, Nate comes back again. Stryfe isn't Nate, but it's the closest he's got, even then, he'd still be here, at Stryfe's lap. The kisses are rough, and there is no love in them, not the healthy kind anyway. It's the best he's ever gotten before. It will be the best he will ever get.

He rolls backwards, maybe through time, maybe down a hill.

Soft hands cup his face, and it's Terry looking at him with apologetic eyes and a gentle eyes.

Then it's Nessa, grief-stricken sobs reaching his ears as she begs him to stay.

And he's sorry. For both of them. He wishes they had never met him. He's thankful he had them in his life, at least for a little while.

His mother is there now, with open arms, waiting for him and Dad to come home. She's healthy and full of life. He presses his face in her stomach, inhales the forever scent of jasmine and sandalwood. Behind him, his father glows with pride. They are all so happy. All around them strawberry flowers bloom, their ripe fruit hangs low under the vast sky.

The thick smell of antiseptic irritates his stuffy nose, burning his already wet eyes. He buries his face in his mother's unresponsive side. Behind him, his father stares incomprehensively at the clean white and red-checkered tile. It's been days since any of them has spoken. The beeping of his mother's life support system is cut short, the cooling machinery whirring to a stop, soft hisses as things decompress and die. Outside the doctors shake their heads and the voices tickle the back of his mind.

Back colliding with the sharp corner of the table, he tries not to yelp. Daddy doesn't like that. Daddy doesn't like a lot of things anymore. Daddy doesn't like his attitude, or his piercing. His face makes Daddy angry, so does his voice. Daddy doesn't like him anymore either, but Daddy tells him he still loves him. Daddy tells him that he loves his little boy so, so much. That they are all they have left of each other, all Daddy has left of his mother. So that's why- that's why this is okay. Family helps each other, and that's what he's doing; he's helping Daddy.

Something warm, and slick, and red explodes over his hands, face, and chest. He staggers underneath his father's dead weight, the side of the pool table digs into his hipbone. In front of him is another boy his age, with a dumb, slack-jawed expression. The bar is frozen, unable to believe that just happened. No one moves and his father's body is draped over his, blood seeping through his black tank. The other kid drops the still smoking gun and runs out the door before it clatters to the floor.

The light shines bright overhead, someone is screaming while another person makes small talk. Both voices are nearly drowned out by the high-pitched "vrr!" of a bone saw. Dr. Killbrew wipes his brow, taking down the surgical mask to reveal a companionable smile, "We're almost through here. Just a bit more." They do not stop for another six hours. Only because several ribs punctured his left lung, rupturing a major artery. He's bleeding out to fast to continue.

The voices fade in and out, like yellow static.

He blacks out.