Death didn't come in the form of some distant, vague light calling to him. It wasn't a peaceful stroll through the most notable of his recollections over the years. It wasn't graceful, it wasn't kind, but neither was it malicious- it simply was.

If he'd had enough rational thought left to describe it, he probably would have compared its likeness to that of silence- but not really, because silence was perceptible. It was a lack of auditory stimuli, something you could still understand, could still know- this was a complete and utter absence of anything. It was the difference between closing an eye and having it removed- there was no shadowy blackness, there was unconditionally nothing.

Nothing.

And then, out of the nothing-silence, came a roar of existence that tore its hold over him with its might, an explosion that ripped away the infinite nothing until it became something; and the fact that there was anything at all meant that he could perceive it, and once he perceived it he understood that he was no longer dead.

He was, however, very cold.

That was the first thing he noticed, a great chill that kissed every inch of his body that he could still feel, what little of it there was left. The next was the blood- it was everywhere. He tasted nothing but copper, and the dried stench of iron around him pervaded his senses to no end. There was light now, a sliver of luminescence which came from outside, wherever that was- it illuminated the floor and walls, now slicked with that same blood, his blood … and when he held his hands up to see them, he saw only red.

And the wind, the wind- it screamed at him so, roaring with a ferocity that demanded to be heard, trying to tear its way into the cave where he'd awakened, daring him to venture out and see where he'd been taken.

Without knowing what compelled him to do so, he made to move towards the light, towards the crack in the carapace of his salvation- and promptly fell forward onto the rocky floor beneath him. His hands braced him for the fall, shaking weakly as they held his weight. He tried to bring his legs forward, but felt no such movement in their muscles. They refused to obey him, try as he might to order them otherwise.

Gritting his teeth, he continued on with another attempt. And another. And another. Though they remained dead and unfeeling, he kept on long past the point that any other would have come to terms with reality- at this point, giving up was a concept he barely understood at the foundational level, let alone something he could ever picture himself doing.

After all, what would she say?

A spark, the tiniest of embers, lit up in his legs. He blew on that ember, breathing life into it as his body shook from the effort and his jaw clenched so tightly that he feared his teeth might crack. The ember grew into a blaze, and then into an inferno- one that burned ferociously with torturous pain, his nerves having shut down to save him from it.

That was okay, he relished the pain- it had always been his constant companion, his closest friend- it told him he was alive, he hadn't drifted into the pleasure of numb oblivion. The pain grew tenfold as his leg finally listened to his order to move. Slowly, he drew it forward until his hands no longer solely supported his weight. He grabbed the wall tightly and pulled himself up, rising from where he'd knelt a moment ago as his other leg joined its twin in carrying him forward.

A small, flickering blue light caught his attention- one that illuminated the dark recesses of the cave from where it lay on the ground. Leaning against the wall for support, he reached down and grabbed her.

The core was still intact, just inactive thankfully. Without a receptacle, however, she was stuck like this- helpless and blind.

Clipping her to his belt, somehow still in one piece, he dragged himself out of the cave's maw. That oppressive cold was still present, if not more greatly felt outside. But 'outside' was somewhat difficult to define.

The ground beneath his feet was real enough, or it seemed to be- a mountainous plateau of rock. It stretched out for an indeterminate distance, littered with sharp points and large crags that reached upward. Dust and small reflective motes blew wildly across his vision in the gale, obscuring both sight and hearing.

But beyond that, no matter what direction he looked, logic had abandoned reality. Glittering triangles spun aimlessly in the air, like shards of glass expelled from a shattered mirror. Beams and rails of abstract light and color connected with them, forming a massive web of tetrahedral architecture.

Maybe he was dead, after all.

"... sorry ..."

He heard a voice echo through the air, said softly though he felt it reverberate around him as though it had been shouted. He turned his head this way and that, trying to locate the source-

"... sorry … not ready …"

He held his stomach like one would a toy whose stuffing is spilling out, feeling his wounds tear themselves open once more as he moved. Crimson began running down his armor, over and through the cracks in his fingers, and finally dribbled to the rock below where it stained the ground with dark, scarlet drops.

"Who's there?" he croaked, his voice hoarse and hollow. The voice sounded eerily familiar, but flanged and distorted. Who-?

"Trust me."

"Always."

Stunned, he realized that the voices speaking were theirs, it was the last words they'd spoken before- well, before this.

If she could speak, she likely would have said something along the lines of, We've been temporally displaced from our base location in relative space-time, he thought dryly. As it was, he'd have to figure out-

"Did you mean it?"

He turned around to face the voice that had spoken from behind him, its tone cool and unnervingly calm. When his eyes found its owner, a chill ran up his spine and he froze to the spot, not daring to move a muscle.

"Y-You … you …"

"I can tell this is a face you haven't forgotten," the newcomer said, reaching a hand up and scratching the top of his shaved head absentmindedly as he had done so many times before. "You've seen many faces, haven't you? Living faces, dead faces … I've no doubt that you've forgotten most, but this one?" He grinned. "No, never this one."

"It's you," he muttered numbly, stating the obvious despite the impossibility of it. "How … you're dead-"

"Let's not beat around the bush, eh?" the man said with a smirk. "Just call it how it really is."

He narrowed his eyes. "I killed you."

"That, you did," Dimitri agreed with a small guffaw, one that did not mesh at all with their present surroundings. "And quite devilishly, I might add- you didn't fight better, but you certainly fought smarter."

He said nothing in response, still too nonplussed to reply. Dimitri eyed him up and down.

"So, did you mean it then?"

He tilted his head slightly in confusion. "Mean what?"

The other man gestured to the air around them, indicating no point in particular. "That."

"... the right choice is usually the hardest one … I'm not ready to give up on us …"

The whisper of his own echo rose out of the ether, hissing as it surrounded them. It seemed to rebound off of the triangles and lights that hovered around them, creating a chamber of sound that completely enveloped them.

He looked with no small amount of trepidation at the apparition of his former friend. "What are you? A ghost?"

"The ghost of a memory, maybe," Dimitri replied vaguely. "An echo of the man who wore this face."

"Am I dead?"

At that, the other man put a hand on his chin and stared at him thoughtfully. "Might be. Might not. Up to you."

He coughed and narrowed his eyes. "That doesn't make any sense-"

"And it won't start anytime soon," Dimitri cut him off. "There are no answers here- only the path."

"What path?"

"The path forward. The path to what you truly want."

"And what is it that I want?" he challenged, practically snarling at this point.

The man shrugged. "I don't know. You spoke of wanting to rest, to finally give in after everything you've gone through- only to change your mind and claw for survival at the last instant. It seems that even you don't know what you truly desire."

Waving his arm behind him, the triangles and light spread apart at Dimitri's touch- they scattered in different directions until a clear route that stretched off into the distance could be seen, the wind howling all the while.

"I promise you this- the path will reveal that much, at least. Your trials have begun, Inferno."

He grinned at the bleeding Pilot.

"The Deep will pass its judgement soon enough."