Night-terrors + conversations about mental illnesses + Jill sandwiches = this. Oh, and those big, bold lines of dialogue? That's the sort of yelling that hurts the throat.
All characters belong to Capcom~ (but you knew that already)!
"I don't."
Jill Valentine walked through the dark apartment, eyes wide, yet unseeing, as she paced around the living room. "Don't want to," she muttered as she continued along a strange and nonsensical path to nowhere in particular. She hesitated for a moment, seemingly unsure of where she should go next.
On the other side of the dwelling, Chris Redfield sat upright in his bed and instinctively grasped the sidearm he kept under his pillow. He listened for a moment, sighing as he heard the familiar sounds of his roommate floating through the walls. He returned the weapon to its rightful spot before glancing at the clock on the nightstand: two-thirty four A.M. He deftly climbed out of bed and ran a hand through his disheveled hair. This routine had become all too common in the weeks since his old partner moved in with him.
Jill had a history of interesting nocturnal behaviours: Walking, talking, and using the bathroom were actions she regularly carried out in her sleep for years – particularly after experiencing extremely traumatic events that seemed to go hand-in-hand with combating bioterrorism. The problem now was that what happened to her in the aftermath of the failed Spencer Estate assignment trumped all the things she had previously endured: Valentine was experimented on and used as a puppet-soldier by the very man whom she sacrificed herself to kill – and it had done irreparable damage to her psyche.
Damage that bubbled to the surface on nights like these.
Chris cautiously stepped out of his bedroom, spotting Jill immediately as she stood, swaying slightly, near a window. Her hair, recently dyed back to its natural brown colour, hung gracelessly over her shoulders, fringe partly obscuring expressionless steel eyes. Although Chris had grown rather used to these episodes, he couldn't deny that the image in front of him was extremely nerve-wracking. Quietly he moved toward the languid woman, making doubly sure that she was unarmed. Just last week she was jarred awake by a slamming door and, in the ensuing confusion, viciously attacked him with a fork taken from the kitchen sink.
"Jill," Chris whispered softly as he approached his companion. He didn't know why he said her name. Habit, he supposed, as he sure as shit wasn't trying to wake her up.
"Nooo," Jill said in a sort of sing-song tone as she closed her eyes and tilted her head.
In the past her sleep-talking had been sporadic at best, mostly consisting of statements comprised of sleepy gibberish that revolved around food. Since returning from Africa, however, the incongruous ramblings were almost completely replaced by semi-coherent sentences: At times she spoke so clearly that it was difficult to tell if she was awake or asleep.
"Don't... make me. NO."
"Nobody's making you do anything," Chris murmured as he gently took Jill's elbow and escorted her toward her room. As they passed through the entryway he stubbed his toe on the corner of the door; he swore loudly, and abruptly jerked his colleague's arm as he struggled to regain his balance.
"FUCK YOU!"
Jill screamed and thrashed violently; she dashed across the room and lowered herself into a far corner, looking around like a crazed animal. She flinched when the small bedchamber was illuminated by an overhead light fixture.
"Damn it," Chris groaned. He rubbed at his eyes in a futile effort to help them adjust to the sudden brightness, the pain in his toe a distant afterthought. "Jill, I'm sorry!" He started to approach his startled mate but stopped as she shrank against the wall.
"MAGGOTS!" The panicked woman shouted as she clutched at her head and buried her face in etiolated hands.
"Jill," Chris, ignoring the shrill exclamation, closed the distance between them, crouching down to her level and gently pulling her hands away from her face. "Listen to me, Jill! It's fine now; you're safe! It was just a dream – you're safe!"
"Ah! Chris!" Jill blinked a few times, realization dawning on her unnaturally pale face. In that instance she seemed so innocent – so normal. She offered a small, apologetic smile.
"I'm sorry. I was just… I guess I was dreaming about… I couldn't – couldn't fight it, and…"
"It's okay."
Chris helped Jill to her feet and instinctively wrapped a burly arm over her shoulders. He felt her tense up and immediately moved away, as he still wasn't used to her being so uncomfortable with most physical contact. Then again, he wasn't used to her at all, really; her long absence from his life, on top of abrupt periods of mental instability, made sure of that. He took a deep breath and gestured toward the bed.
"Here, why don't you – holy shit, what did you do?" The graying man was taken aback by what lay before him: Valentine's pillows were strewn about and meticulously torn to pieces, fabric and stuffing everywhere.
"I... had a reason," Jill furrowed her brow, a look of confusion on her face. "I had to – it… Uroboros... It - they were in there and they were going to hurt me!"
"…My pillows?"
"Those - those... THINGS!"
"Jill!" Chris turned and grabbed the trembling woman by the shoulders. At this point he didn't give a shit about her aversion to being touched: he needed to calm her down, to get through to her before her meltdown could become worse. "The pillows aren't going to hurt you! They're pillows, Valentine! There's nothing in them – they're harmless!"
Jill slowly sunk back to the floor, laughing, and Chris followed. Seeing her like this was absolutely frightening, but he had to keep his composure – for his sake and hers. He watched his companion carefully as her mad giggles turned to sobs.
"I HATE this," she wailed. "I hate being like this! Being crazy! It's not fair for you – for ANYONE!"
"Jill – "
"It would be so easy," Jill smiled as she continued to cry, "Just end it all! PLEASE! A single bullet – straight through the heart!" She paused briefly before yelling, "SQUISH!"
"Please, don't say that," the exhausted man choked, barely able to contain his anguish at seeing his once infallible associate reduced to a psychotic mess in the corner of his guest room. "We'll get through this, Jill. Please. You're a survivor – you always have been! You can beat this!"
Jill, suddenly lucid, looked directly into his eyes.
"Can you?"
Chris looked away. It was a simple question he honestly couldn't answer.
A few notes, because that's just how I roll:
* The title's not the most original in the world, but I'll explain because I can: Walkin' After Midnight is an old Patsy Cline song from back in the 50's; the band Girl In a Coma covered it last year. The track is a staple of my playlist, and iTunes was constantly like, "HERE!" any time I would sit down to work on this. (And, I mean, the story does take place well after midnight...)
* Post-Kijuju Jill: I don't care what anybody says – she will never be right again. Ever.
* Waking a sleepwalker is never, ever, ever a good idea, intentional or not.
* Two-thirty four: Used this in "Somnambulist". The more things change, you guys... (or, I'm just really unoriginal).
* "SQUISH!" references a line from the movie Serenity, in which River tells her brother to shoot her (because she's insane): "Take a bullet to me! Bullet in the brain pan! Squish!"
* The torn up pillows are also inspired by River's brand of insanity, as seen in Firefly's River Tam Sessions.
* The line about a bullet to the heart is a subtle nod to an awesome story called The Wanderer, by the lovely Alias Blackclaw. Go read it (if you haven't already)!
* On the use of the word "psychotic": (from Wikipedia) - People experiencing psychosis may report hallucinations or delusional beliefs, and may exhibit personality changes and thought disorder. Depending on its severity, this may be accompanied by unusual or bizarre behavior, as well as difficulty with social interaction and impairment in carrying out daily life activities.
As always, thanks for reading and/or reviewing! Cheers~