When asked when it all started, the only thing he could think about was the first night in May when the soul of the sky befell that of the Louvre - a dreary sea of suicide and stolen art. He remembered that night quite clearly – well, that's not quite true, what he truly remembered of that night was quite little, really. But what he could recall from such a night was something deeply memorable.
Though really, how could one ever forget the night the heaven's fell?
Or how they fell with it.
He felt like a moon-stung Icarus in that sense, lying there in a bowl of his own creation after being shot out of the sky. Instead of a wax melting sun, his ruin was brought by an elegant magenta blast. However, unlike that of the sun which could only burn and simmer the wings, the energy beam was like death in pink gloss tearing apart the seams of his flesh. It was as if his whole being was swallowed and left to stew in the hell-jaws of an atomic bomb. His muscles coiled like a struck snake and spasmed until he was sure his lungs tore and his breath was snatched from him. For a time – a long time – he thought he ceased breathing altogether.
Logically he knew the accident was only half a minute long.
Yet, logic was as useful as a boat with holes when you were being scorched to ash.
He didn't remember at which point he transformed back into his human self: whether it was during the incident, or while he fell, or after he hollowed the earth as Jet-ray.
And while the fall itself was a painless one – he liked to think the gravel greeted him with gentle hands and a mothering hold. It was thick-headed to believe, naive as well, but it was much better than the reality of the event. – he was smart enough to know that if there was any sort of pain, his body was either in too much shock, or his nerves were too charred to feel it. The same could be said about the agony which should have bashed his bones when he collided with the ground.
Funny enough the blast, the pain, the descend, the impact – it was all a fuzzy cocktail of memories and his own damn brain trying to conjure puzzle-pieces and fabrications to fit the story he was told.
What truly reminisced in his mind that night, was as he fell, so did the stars. And while their plunge was one of triumphant grace and holy lore, his was like that of a broken doll.
Be he a doll, be he apart of the heavens, no matter what he be, he still felt akin to them.
Even more so when lolling in a crater and watching as the stars began to fall as a collection of combusted souls; all white with woe and dripping like wax off a candlestick.
You'd never pick any night to be shot out of the sky, but if given a choice he would tell you to pick that night of all nights. You would honestly consider yourself lucky to have been struck out at the same time as a cluster of shooting stars. Lucky that you were not lonely at what could have possibly been your last moments.
He sure did.
He thought he was ready for a deep rest at that point, he recalled the heavy slumber on his lashes as the last of the stars ran wild through the twilight.
Looking back, he knew how truly close he came to death that night.
It wasn't the first, and wouldn't be the last, but that didn't make it any less chilling.
Though, no matter how tied to the shooting stars he felt, they weren't his more evoked memory of that night.
"Ben!"
The irony was thick during his last bits of consciousness, and Ben didn't know whether it was Gwen's mana blast that stole the memory of his own name or his impact with the sidewalk but for some odd reason he couldn't recall it during all that was happening. Not until that moment. Either way, Ben didn't believe that in all his years to come, would he ever forget the memory of his name being bellowed out like that.
He never imagined Kevin saying his name in such a way. With so much emotion. So much worry. So much heartache.
It scared Ben.
It scared him more than death.