a rhapsody for discordant thoughts (and other remedies)

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T/W: substance abuse

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He calls it his symphony.

Because it soothes his soul. It softens his heart. It silences the screams in his head that he can't bear to hear.

Because peace it hard to come by when your ears forever echo with voices — when those thoughts run rampant inside your head; when the claws of the creature so stuck to your back start to sink towards your heart.

It's a part of his soul. A part of his mind. It fears the light. It fears the company of others. It tells him left when he goes right. It chatters — whispers — 'chatter-chatter-chatter' all through the night and Ikuto tries to sleep, but wonders; what could possibly silence the song of such insistent a thing until the night fades away and the dull, grey dawn falls utterly short of his own small hell; his personal nightmare; this hive of hopelessness and squalor he has shut himself within.

His skin crawls.

His eyes are dark and jaded.

There's not the fight, nor will there once was, for on this night this is enough — to sit in the still silence for but a moment uninterrupted by the static between his ears; undisturbed by the whispers; the cackles; a brief respite from the ever-constant cacophony, but never much else.

No, never much else.

Because you come to a point where there's no turning back.

Helpless. Defeated. Beneath the water, unable to breathe — unable to fight.

But every now and then, there is a lull. Every now and then the sound of the screaming is subdued by something sublime. By the return of chords and keys and highs and lows because music to him has always been the most blessed of saviours; the most expressive of outlets...

Or so once it was.

But there it lies — his violin — shadowed; dusty; damaged on the floor. Dust clings to its polish. Webs weave about it's surface and trail about the floorboards.

He has not the will to lift it. Not the will to tempt those wiry threads into the rhapsody of his imagination, for his imagined masterpiece is beyond comprehension.

They are relentless. They've drowned it out. Smothered it. Choked it. Those voices dance about it with torches ablaze and metal forks aloft.

Now it is but a dream.

The symphony doesn't flow through those strings anymore.

And willingly — deliriously — Ikuto reaches for another vial and welcomes the cold kiss of steel against his skin.

And drowns out the discordant drumming inside his head.

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A/N: insert obligatory 'I'm still here!' author's note lmao.

I'm back with some more unedited, self-indulgent Ikuto one-shots thrown-together carelessly and left to age in my folders before being thrown out into the void of the internet. I shouldn't have written The Rebel because now I want to keep on making Ikuto suffer for writing's sake.

Unbelievably, I'm not dead — just immensely busy. To anybody who's still reading my stuff; thank you! I've been trying to work on all my fics bit by bit more often.

unsure whether to rate this T or M? Thoughts?