A/N: Angsty!Henry demanded an outing, so here he is in all of his no-holds-barred, over-the-top, tortured pain. However, he does take a long, hard look into the abyss, and things get very dark before they get lighter...if that's not what you want to read, or if such things mess with your head, then this isn't the story for you.
Silent Hill, Ashfield, Henry and the rest are Konami's. I don't own them. Title courtesy of a favorite Peter Gabriel song. I don't own that either. No money made, no infringement intended.
A small group of people stood around an open grave in Ashfield Cemetery. Rain fell steadily, and black umbrellas hovered like mushrooms above black-gloved hands. The priest's voice droned on, the sound swallowed up by the heavy late-afternoon rain.
A young man with brown hair stood back from the rest, bare-headed, hands clasped. He wore no coat, and his black suit hung loosely from his lean frame. He leaned slightly to one side, favoring one leg. He looked at nothing and spoke to nobody. A second man, taller and white-haired, stood next to him, holding an umbrella over them both.
Soon, the service ended. The mourners filed away from the grave, slowly, black figures moving through the gray like crows. The young man and his companion remained motionless as the others moved past them, parting like water to avoid them, as if they would be somehow contaminated by their presence.
The priest waited nearby for a few minutes, his white smock incongruously bright in the rain, then left.
The older man stood with him for a while in silence. Then he departed as well, leaving the younger man alone with his thoughts.
The grave grew quiet, and he did not move. The rain fell in large drops like tears. Water ran from his hair over his face and under his white shirt collar, and he did not move. His suit became soaked and his skin grew cold. Rain dripped from his chin and hands, and splashed off of his shoes. Eventually, even the gravediggers left, their job postponed to the next day.
The day passed into evening, and the sky darkened. The lights came on over his head, their illumination diffused by the rain into a soft halo.
His knees gave way, and he fell into the mud, hands gripping the edge of the grave.
...I never knew...
The mud squelched through his fingers. He brought a hand to his face, and watched as the rain rinsed the mud away.
...I never knew that I could feel this…much.
His lips parted, but all that came out was a rusty rattle.
There's so much I didn't know before.
His head dropped, and his eyes met the curved dark wood in front of him. The small brass plate in its center glinted dully. Raindrops quivered on the glossy wood and ran off toward its sides.
No...no...remember, it's not real…this isn't happening…it's just a dream…
Stop it. I'm not allowed that luxury any more.
He sat back on his heels in the mud, and covered his face with his hands.
...I don't want to look.
But I have to. This is happening. Because of me. If I had...
No. You can't do this to yourself. If this, if that...it's too late.
Yes. Yes, I can. If I had watched out for her more...if I had been faster...stronger...
Memory burned, clarified. The blades whirled loudly. Walter laughed. She walked inexorably into the blood...he filled the bastard's body with lead, over and over again...a bullet passed through his upper arm, but he kept shooting…he smashed the man's face in with his axe. Still, Walter simply would not die.
He'd kept calm reasonably well up to that point. At first, it had been out of shock and fear, and knowledge that panic would get him killed. Later, he did his best to be strong for her, to help her hold it together as the madness slowly overcame her. He'd built a wall for himself to keep it all at bay…a wall with shaky foundations, yes, but still a wall. It had bulged and groaned, but it had held so far.
Then, her head disappeared beneath the red, and Henry saw her no more.
He felt the wall finally break. With an agonized cry, he swung with all his might. The axe connected again with flesh and bone (real flesh and bone, finally), and it was over. The madman fell to the ground, crying for his mother...and it was all over.
Two seconds too late. Might as well have been two years. Or never.
If I had hit him harder. Dodged his shots more quickly. Protected her more. There's so much that I could have done.
But it doesn't matter now.
Henry knew that grief passed. He's known it as an abstraction, when he was younger, then after his grandfather died several years ago, he'd found it out for himself. He understood that, given enough time, most wounds would heal. Within days, he himself would be almost whole again. The ache in his leg would be gone, and the hole in his arm would be well on its way to mending.
It was the other wounds that would be the problem.
Not a problem. Never a problem. They're all that's left, all that matters.
I don't want them
to heal. If they do, I would have nothing left of you. Nothing but a
memory.
It was Sunderland, the old superintendent, who had found him unconscious on the floor of his room. Once again, Sunderland had called help to Room 302, and once again, an ambulance had hurried its sole occupant to the hospital. Henry had no idea how he'd gotten back there …only a vague memory of listening to the news report of her death. Then he knew no more until he awoke in the hospital later that day.
They'd patched him up and given him a huge bottle of painkillers (One every six hours, no more. Take the first when you get home) and some dressings for his arm, and told him to avoid exertion for two weeks minimum. It was all his fuzzy mind could do to remember that.
Yeah, that must be it. The meds. He hated the way pain medication clouded his head.
Sunderland had collected him and driven him home in silence.
"Let me know if you need anything," he said as Henry turned his key in his door. He knew that the old man wasn't uncaring, just unsure of how to handle all of this. He could understand that. Very well. So, he managed a weary smile.
"Just one thing…"
He hobbled to the chest by the TV and reached into it, then came back to the door. In his good hand was a small purple handbag.
"Can you put this back in her room? It's hers…it was."
Sunderland took the bag with an odd look, but said nothing, and closed the door. Henry heard a door open close by, and then footsteps in the next room. After a little bit, the door closed, the steps died away down the hallway, and Henry was left in the silence with his thoughts.
Later that afternoon, he pulled on an old jacket and left the building as quietly as possible. He walked slowly down the block to the corner convenience store. People paid no attention to him as he moved along, foot by foot. He was fine with that.
He ignored the fearful glances of the cashier and the stares of the other customers as he shuffled down the aisles and fumbled in his wallet.
I probably look like hell. They think I'm drunk or high or something.
Whatever. Better than them knowing the truth.
When he got back to the apartment, he felt as though he'd walked a hundred miles.
The orange light of sunset was almost gone from his windows, and the room was bathed in shadow, but he left the light switch off. He dumped the paper bag by the stove and threw its predecessor into his trash can. Then, he slowly got down on his knees in front of the hole in the living room wall.
The purple handbag hung on the wall of her bedroom as it had before. Her stuffed rabbit slumped on her bed once again. He could see the slight indentation in the bed where she had sat watching TV that afternoon.
I meant to ask her why Robbie had blood on his face. I never did. Perhaps it was never really there. I can't tell from here.
Clothes that will never be worn again. Sheets that will never be slept in again...
You know how hard I tried. But it was no use.
He sat back on his heels. His eye caught the edge of the brown paper grocery bag on the counter by his head. He thought of the food it contained. Food was life. He hadn't eaten in days. Hadn't been able to. He wasn't hungry now. So why had he gone to all that trouble to get a bag of food that he didn't need?
No use at all.
The kitchen faucet was dripping slowly. It was the only sound in the room.
…except for the faint sound of a crack forming somewhere…
To any of them. To Richard, to Jasper, to Cynthia, to Andrew. I stood by as they died horribly. I did nothing.
...plink...
I had weapons, information, freedom -- of a sort -- and I did nothing.
...plink...
The sound would not let his tired mind get the rest it needed. It poked at him like a stone in his shoe. The cracking noise grew.
In the end, they became just cards around a hole. Threats to beat down. Just more spirits in the way. Doomed to wander there for eternity. They didn't deserve that. Nobody deserves that.
Except for those who put them there … and, perhaps, for those too weak to do anything about it.
The cracking sound grew louder, and then there was a tiny
pop.
Thoughts burst from his brain and buzzed around him like hornets.
...so much blood, brains, shattered bone and flesh. Some of it was mine. Walls bleeding, pulsing red. Everywhere...
...He was laughing, at all of us, for thinking that we could escape. Perhaps I got the last laugh...perhaps not...
...plink...
...what kind of world would allow something like this to happen? What kind of world is this that nurtures that kind of hate? Where does the normal world end and that world begin? And how can I trust my eyes to know the difference?...
…how many more like him are there in that damned town? How many more times will this happen? Who else will end up dead? I can't do anything about it…how can I when I don't even understand what really happened? What is real?...
…plink…
…What was so broken in him that he thought this place was his mother? How does a little kid end up screwed up that badly? My God, what did they do to him?...
...Will they come after me for killing him?...
...I don't know up from down. Black from white. Dead from alive. Nothing makes sense. The rules don't apply any more. I can't put this back together...nobody can.
It's too broken…
...plink...
He sat there for a very long time. The orange light drifted and the shadows grew longer before the room was swallowed up in darkness. Flickering yellow and red light filtered through the windows from the neon signs across the street.
The buzzing in his head grew louder as thoughts multiplied freely. All of the things that he'd held back flowed out of him, the little terrors and worries and annoyances and discomforts that he'd shoved aside while running to the next hole, fleeing the next monster, solving the next puzzle, trying to make it to the next safe place. Now that they were loose…there was nowhere for them to go.
The room soon filled with them. There was nothing else, nothing but Henry on his knees in the middle of the storm. The room vibrated with their buzzing. After some time, they began to slowly come together, growing ever closer and tighter. Finally, they slammed together into a single point that burst inside his head with a brilliant light.
Henry's eyes focused on the wall before him. In the darkness, colors played off of the shadows in the violated sheet rock, off of everything like multicolored flames. He saw the smallest details of the pebbled paint, the dust on the baseboard, the cleaner patch of carpet where the pistol had lain for years before yesterday.
He lifted himself up and pushed the cabinet back into place with his shoulder, ignoring the pain that shot through his arm like fire.
The storage chest stood open and dark. He got down on his knees in front of it and put his good arm in, feeling around. Many of the things that had been in there were gone…all that was left was a broken wine bottle, a piece of pipe, a Saint Medallion, and…
The revolver was heavy and cold, as he'd remembered. He was sure that he'd taken along all of its ammo before his leap into the murky black hole in the back room, and emptied it all into that bastard's body. But now, it held a single bullet.
He moved toward the door, turned the locking knob above the doorknob, and shot the bolt home. He peered through the peephole, and saw that the hallway outside was empty. A flat expanse of dingy white filled his vision. Nobody had heard him.
The hall in his room seemed miles long. The hole at the end gaped open still, and he grimaced as he bent to enter it.
The room beyond still stank. The refrigerator stood open with its red-stained contents rotting in their neat, tidy plastic bags and jars. The huge cross leaned as it had before, empty, and the implements of Walter's ritual still rested on a table. The inky black hole was gone.
Somewhere outside, there were voices. Male voices, one higher and one lower, arguing about something. Sunderland and the guy in 301. Again. Guy never paid his rent on time.
Henry lowered himself to the dusty wooden floor in front of the cross. He leaned back against the table opposite the refrigerator and closed his eyes, inhaling the smell of death and blood and decay and relaxing into the soothing warmth that spread its tendrils through him like whisky.
He turned the gun in his hands as he stared up at the cross. Its oily black feathers glinted in the faint light of the refrigerator, and the slightly translucent cords hanging from it seemed to glow. The blood on the spikes at the center of the cross was still wet, as if freshly shed. Its dark, glistening beauty made it that much harder to close his eyes.
He lifted the revolver to his temple. Its tip was a hard cold circle against his heated skin. He hadn't realized that he was sweating. Suddenly, a single thought wafted through his mind.
I wish I had that handbag right about now…
CLICK.
The sound was unnaturally loud.
Henry opened his eyes, and lowered the gun slowly. Yes, the bullet was ready to fire.
He stared up at the cross, daring himself to keep his eyes open as he lifted the revolver again.
CLICK.
Nothing happened.
His gaze fell upon some of the red objects in the refrigerator. Bags and jars…jars and bags…bags of blood…jars of hearts…ten hearts…
His mind wandered.
Ten hearts…
The high voice of the guy from 301 reminded him of another…
Ten hearts…sailing down the river…
Music he hadn't heard in years flowed through his mind, words altered seamlessly.
Ten hearts are better than one…
The voices soared in his memory, joyous and free.
I hearing it, I li --
CLICK.
Nothing happened.
What the hell…
The bullet was still ready. Henry tipped it into his hand.
A third silver bullet. Bigger, for this revolver. Odd.
Snap, click click click. Loaded and ready. Hadn't misfired before. Couldn't now. Not now.
…
CLICK.
God damn it!
He slammed his head backward against the table, and he heard something above him fall and roll. Before he could react, something heavy knocked him on the head, and dropped into his lap. The pain and anger cut through the haze around his brain.
He picked up the object.
That black cup.
Its lip was stained with blood. His? Walter's? Someone else's?
His fingers traced the spiraling vein around its stem, the wide black bowl. It was warm and smooth, like skin. It seemed an organic thing, almost alive, not crafted by the hand of man. It fascinated him.
As he turned it around and around in his hands, a voice spoke in his head. Her voice.
This is what he wanted all along. Don't let him win, Henry.
Twenty-one sacraments. He would have been the last…
The last one.
The only one left.
He gritted his teeth.
You…fool.
It all laid itself out in front of him, clear as day.
Some Receiver of Wisdom you'd be, you idiot. Playing right into his hands. Sorry, Henry. You don't get out of hell this easily.
Did you really think you could, anyway?
Henry threw the revolver across the floor. It slid through the dust, knocked aside an empty plastic bottle that had fallen on the floor, and disappeared under a heavy shelf.
Whump…
BOOM!
The bullet shot past him and sliced through his jeans. A red line formed along the pale skin of his hip. As Henry watched, blood welled up from the line and dripped down, and was absorbed by denim and the dusty wooden floorboards.
A voice spoke from far, far away…
Damn. That was my last clean pair of jeans.
Silence. Then, running feet in the hallway. Sunderland's gruff voice.
"Henry! Are you all right in there?"
Henry took a deep breath and called back.
"I'm fine."
He heard Sunderland muttering to himself as he shuffled back down the hallway.
His hands were empty. The cup had disappeared. He looked around, but he couldn't see it anywhere. He didn't think that he'd dropped it…
He struggled to his feet, and found the table empty as well. He moved to the shelf, laid down on the floor, and felt around under it for the revolver. His hand found only dust. It was gone.
Henry pulled himself to his hands and knees and crawled toward the hole. He put one arm through the hole, then the other, and hefted himself through, rolling into the hallway outside. He felt something give under his bandage, and warm wetness on his skin.
The air was fresh and clean. He took a deep, ragged breath, and his head swam. He fell to the floor.
The room was absolutely silent. It occurred to him that the faucet was no longer dripping. And his head didn't feel fuzzy any more.
Pain meds must have worn off…
But he hadn't opened the bottle from the hospital, and it had been hours…so the fuzz couldn't have been from that…
He lay there for an eternity. Then, a thought drifted through his brain.
…Rent was due four days ago. I haven't paid my rent either.
Heh. I'm as bad as he is.
Something gave way. His shoulders heaved, and he shook soundlessly, face pressed into the old nubbly carpet.
The bag of food went untouched on the counter that night, next to the unopened bottle of pills from the hospital and the packet of clean dressings. Henry sat on his bed, staring at the walls.
