How many times have I already set foot in Henry's room, and how many times did I become the punching bag until Tharja intervened to put another curse on Henry and restart the cycle all over again? I guess I underestimated the power of habit making every single day feel exactly the same.
The cracks and mountains of bodies were once a very scary novelty, but now they're just another part of the day like eating, drinking, and sleeping. His smile isn't as disturbing as before, don't get me wrong, it still belongs to a psychopath that I would rather avoid. But there are so many times until all the creepiness corrodes to meaninglessness by the power of routine. The once alien sitting became part of the usual shift of pain and training.
"Henry, just start it." How long will it be before I can get out of this sparring unscathed?
"As you wish, my dear apprentice! Let's see if your guts have learned something new!" Another sensation of Deja vú appears. I see the same scene unfold the same way. How long will it be until I get my ass kicked? Ten seconds? Twenty seconds? A minute? It doesn't matter, it always amounts to the same.
Henry opens the tried old spell of Ruin, the same old giant X, the same intensity and the same curse. I do what I always do: as the X travels through the air, I dodge as I avoid the boring sentences of a book, a little bit always scraps off out of necessity.
Um, dois, três. Um, dois, três. I open my flux. The exact bygone waltz of flux, how long have I been so stale to the point of relying on the same old attack to try to get a hit on Henry? It's like that one quote "madness is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results" or something along that line.
The same mist surrounds me to create another pointless attack, this time I can't be bothered by the extensive tension made for the body utilizing this single attack. My muscles resist boringly to the magical energy, once very straining for me, but the use became so common that I just ignored it. And the once prevalent stress of imagining attack turned into second nature once I realize I can use the same form again and again.
It grows like a wildfire. The flow of energy sticking to my body, the purple aura interacting with the air to form a ball that I release unto Henry. It moves like a slug on the ground, the white-haired man dodges it like it's nothing and once again casts his Ruin and aims at my head.
I dodge the weakened X, but only by a few millimeters. I start to feel the strain on my body, the difficulty to maintain a decent posture, the heaviness of the tome feeling like more rock than a proper book. My breath swelling and the muscle getting number, the ever-growing wish to collapse to the ground.
I do one last attack, it will not be long before I get hit by one of his attacks just like always after all, but I decide to do something a little bit different. With all my energy left to run towards like a mad man, I'm going to lose it anyway, so why not try something a little bit different.
As I run towards him, I prepare another Flux, it will be in vain. Henry doesn't react, he just casts another of his Ruin. I release the Flux and let the two's collision create an electrifying mist. Henry and I take the opportunity to duke out against each other. My body crumbles to the ground as I try to punch the bastard. My fist misses the target like his. The pricking ground tells me one thing: another defeat.
"I'm pleasantly surprised! I never thought you would be a man to use such a devious method. Still, it isn't enough for maintaining your guts intact. We are going to change your training for a bit with you."
Oh, something to spice things for a bit? Nah, just another way of becoming a punching bag I presume. Tharja stares at him wondering if she should hex him or not. Why is she so protective of me? Oh yeah, how could I forget, there is still a psycho in here.
"So what is your plan?"
"I'm so glad you asked. You are weaker than a lifeless corpse." He starts to touch and palp my muscle, poking, and testing the connections and the tissues behind the skin as if it is a toy. Tharja, could you kindly curse him, please?
"So we have to do something obvious: train your body. Otherwise, you are going to be all bones and no flesh." Oh great, that's all I needed for another session of physical training with Henry. Just like other days before it, why does the day keep repeating?
Henry gets out of his room and makes a signal, pointing his finger to the exit of the decrepit house. Tharja ignores him and lifts me. She is way stronger than she looks. "Could you really curse Henry today?" I whisper to her.
"I already did that, nobody touches my assistant like that."
Just the same day all over again.
We get out of the body-infested room where somehow the white-haired man can live in. Out of his immediate room greets one courtyard. Just as decrepit as its owner, cracks appear in both the floor and the pillars, some deep enough to affect the structure, and others already fallen, the effects of times shown by the inability of holding their own weight. Rust crusts all of the structure, once white turning to a deep shadow of brown while some plants infest inside it.
The courtyard is as deteriorated as the rest, the unkempt place infested with the blood spatters of previous battles and broken rocks. Two rings are imprinted into the floor, one inner and one outer, the only difference between the two their radius and their colors.
The afternoon has already settled in, the sun staring back at us, blaring his rays quietly, just another spectator, and maybe in the future, the only one left alive after this whole ordeal ends. Henry stands in the center of the courtyard, while I and Tharja stay in the outer ring.
"Gabriel, your body just sucks. Dark mages aren't well known for their physical prowess, but if you are in a pinch and the enemy is stronger, then you are screwed." It isn't like you say that for me every single time. Oh wait, you do this all the time.
I glare at him "Just tell me what to do."
"Very simple Gabriel: you just need to punch me in the face once and that will be it for today!" A continuation of fighting training. I guess Henry's didactic work doesn't like to change at all, the same old tactic of returning without regard to a period of rest. After all, who needs rest after intensive training if they are, of course, like my white-headed 'teacher" whose energy seems like that of someone who drinks coffee 24/7 with tons of sugar.
"Que maravilha, era tudo o que eu precisava," I trail off a little bit. Both of them stare at me. Oh great. Why did I just talk out loud and not keep my mouth shut, goddamnit? Sometimes I'm really asking to bring misfortune to myself, unfortunately.
"What did he just blurt out?" Henry asks Tharja, somewhat confused, with a head like that of a dog when they don't understand something.
"Sadly, I have no idea. Although he often talks in his language when he's stressed." Goddamnit, Tharja! Well, Henry, just don't use this information against me, please.
"I see" He smiles again. I am so screwed right now. Thanks, Tharja. I really needed to survive another round of psycho Henry.
Instead of me starting the first move, Henry dashes towards me like a madman, bloodlust in his eyes, readying himself for another kill like a falcon. I dodge from his dash, although he almost grabs my robes in the process. Seeing the opportunity, I flee for a moment trying to see any strategy to not die in the process.
Thankfully he had fully met the wall instead of my fleshy veins. And as such, I expect him to start to limp himself or be like a very angry drunk, staggering at every step to the point its way easier to collapse on the spot. He gets out from the stones, blood on his eyes, and a wish to make me pay for making him hit the wall, despite not having a single dent to his physique.
He pounces on me like a wolf does to its prey to taste and relish on the carcass of the animal dying beside him. But they were uncontrollable, his arm and legs twitching while he became more animal than man, gruffing and whispering not even a single word, there is no longer man, the only creature turned into a beast
I dodge from his pounce, I crumble in the middle of the evading movement, almost like my soul wishes to just falter and slither away. My muscles give up and refuse to listen to my commands as they become harder and harder. My arms fail me, as with every single movement, they creak like rotten wood and fall down at a single touch.
With the energy I have left, I rise up for one last time before the inevitable happens. I can feel my legs collapsing into nothing, even a gentle breeze could make them crumble away like a badly structured house of cards. Henry does one last movement before he starts running like a horse towards me and grabs me by the throat, making me fall down. My last energies leave me with nothing. I couldn't punch for I'm not that strong. It's always the same end, why should I care?
He stops once he realizes he's won. He gets out and returns to his usual smile as if nothing really happened, ignoring the fact he was acting more like a wolf ready to pounce on his prey.
"Well, Gabriel, you did well. I didn't expect your sudden suicidal attack though, but still, in battle, your guts would be on the floor not inside you." If I'm being honest, whatever, I don't really care. I'm just somewhat thankful Henry didn't deal a finishing blow, or worse break my neck.
On the other hand, let's just say Tharja isn't happy at all. She is fuming, preparing to kill Henry with her tome Just the usual cycle. When I'm going to break out of these messes called Plegia and Henry is anyone's guess, but it will be for a long time before the war can even start and all this situation comes crashing down on everyone. The question is, will I be able to survive until it finally comes? I don't know, I may even be dead before this day finishes.
I stand aside with my thoughts for now. With this tired body, I am more like a very easily manipulable mannequin, easily vulnerable to even a stab in the back, and the best I could hope for is the help of someone to carry me until I can stand on my own two feet again.
"Tharja, calm down! I'm not going to kill him, I don't like to make a cadaver out of interesting people."
"One more mistake on your part and consider our deal null."
She then ignores whatever response comes from the gut-obsessive man and lifts my body. How many times has she already said that? This cycle keeps continuing and continuing and continuing. And after all, is said and done, when will it end?
We stay silent after the showdown. I stand at her side, my muscle too strained to even fathom the idea of walking. As she drags me, my head falls down and sweat starts dripping. I wait for my body to surrender to the wish of shutting itself off and falling into its own death at any moment. Just another of my own super melodramatic thoughts, nothing next to people with true suffering. After all my pain, is nothing and never was.
People are still as annoying as ever, though. As we walk, people keep stealing glances at me, for simply being carried by her or being a foreigner with the Dark mage, or both. Either way, If I could simply disappear I would do it. I just don't want attention, it isn't worth the cost and the stress. Also, could they forget about the situation? People keep plotting against me, or they want to kill me for a case that was like 8 months ago. Or maybe 10 months ago. To be honest, I can't be bothered to remember the date, all that fight with Henry left me dizzier than spinning as an untrained ballerina would feel like.
We arrive at the dining hall, as loud as ever and the same boring discussion of who killed who and who betrayed who and whatever stupid conflict between the sects. We find a place far away, so both of us can rest and be ignored by most people.
Just a small table and some chairs on it. She puts my tired frame on one of the chairs while putting my arms on the wooden frame. My mind dozes off from all the stress, the desire to just fall down and sleep dominating me. The difference between left and right is just as confusing as the nature of the Grima-Robin/Reflet personality complex. Also, I want to be in bed right now and just sleep for an entire day.
"Thank you" I keep trailing off, but it doesn't mean I can't thank her. Tharja doesn't respond and brings a flask of vulnerary to me. I hate the bitter liquid, but what else can make me recover faster than this rancid liquor? I barely lift the drink, and the taste of rotten bitterness invades my mouth. As much as I'd want to spill it out and never have to taste it again, I gulp down the medicine.
"Puta que pariu. Que gosto Horroroso! Por que todo hora que bebo esta droga parece que este líquido veio direto do Inferno!? Caramba!"
"What did you say?" Oh great, I slipped off yet again. This is just being another great day already. Hold up a minute, is it afternoon or night already? I don't know anymore.
"I only said some really colorful words to express my utter hatred for this liquid, Tharja."
"Hmmm, if it weren't for this liquid, you would be looking worse than a dead drunk."
"Thanks for the compliment. But anyway, why are we in the dining halls?"
"After that stupid battle, you are probably hungry or something close to it. As for me, after watching the amount of stupidity, Henry made me lose my hunger. Also, there are some other matters concerning him that I have to deal with."
"Another round of curses and hexes, I suppose?" Tharja doesn't respond, just another smile towards the demise of the crow man.
This again, the days are getting more and more predictable. Another round of curses, another failure with the training with Henry, another day of closing the door and not locking the outside, another moment before the tragedy befalls on this land and I'm dragged as a whole to a situation out of my control?
Who am I kidding, I never did have any control over this situation, being dragged by the Fatimids, having that problem with that noble, my weird relationship with the cosmic horror entity called Reflet Fell. Yes, these days are still the same, essentially a big great confusion.
"Well, Tharja as much as you aren't hungry, I am also not in the mood for eating anything. I just want to go to my room, because my day is done"
"Nonsense, you had a battle with that madman, and as good as a vulnerary is for healing injuries, it doesn't eliminate hunger. You know that. And the results tend to get screwed when you are hungry "
"Ok, fine fine."
I pick something random and eat, ignoring the world around me. Another moment of my memory that will join the massive amount of forgotten memories turned into a blur long before the plate is empty, and we walk towards our respective rooms.
"Goodbye Tharja, see you tomorrow."
"Goodbye, Gabriel. Don't forget the experiment is tomorrow."
"I see" She and I go our merry ways.
I open the door and lock it like always, as usual locking it as hard as it can possibly be. Then I feel something staring at me. A gaze, a gaze unlike any other, so directed towards me it feels like a knife. I turn around and see a figure beneath the shadows standing beside my bed. I stare back at the dark image, while it returns the stare… Oh no no no no.
The thing runs on me, faster than a gazelle, and it pounces on me. My body hits the rocky floor, a sharp blunt object towards my back as it starts strangulating me. With the sensation of air being choked out of my lungs, the suffocation begins. His hood falls revealing a man, way bigger than me, covering my entire body, his weight smashing my lithe frame, the air getting stuffy, while my legs shaking every time, the futile attempt to get him out of me.
He is way stronger than me, at every single moment my neck is ready to snap, an almost cracking sound is heard. The teeth grind into dust, my body gets lighter and lighter like a balloon, a wish to escape from this world. I can barely see the eyes of the thing, but underneath the shadow of my room, I could see one thing: hate
With one of my arms free from the man, I ready my thumb, his intention only focused on my soon to be broken neck, ignoring whatever is happening in his surroundings. With a single swift strike, I put the finger into his eye, and start pressuring it, increasing the pressure at that exact moment, the slime touching my finger as blood starts to mix with it, while it goes further and further into his eye socket.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" The inhuman scream covers the room, more akin to an abomination on his dying breath captured by a bear trap, struggling in his futile attempt to escape. His hands drop from my throat as the burning and prickling sensation takes hold of him.
While he is distracted, I kick him with one of my feet, forcing him to the ground. I look around for a weapon. Sim, a adaga no armário! I kick him a couple of times on the head, the screaming subsiding into moans, ignoring him while I open the wardrobe to reveal the dagger.
When I pick up the weapon, a sharp pain invades my back, fresh blood pouring out from the slash as the skin burns like gasoline on fire. Then another blunt force strikes me, forcing me to fall to the hard floor again. A cracking and expanding a bruise, the dagger stands beside my eyes and mouth.
"Motherfucker! You little foreigner! You dishonorable man! If it weren't for you, my brother would still be fucking alive! And you took his dagger! My dagger! How dare you destroy my eye, you manlet! You will pay! You will pay for what you've done!"
He started kicking my guts, a wish to vomit my meal out. Quiet moans come from me, while the veins and arteries in my nose rupture by the blunt damage . Eu odeio isso tudo, eu não perguntei pra nada disso, porra!
"Cry like the pathetic dog you are! Die for what you have done! How the Fatimids would allow such a stupid little thing to be here is beyond me, but at least you are going to die as you deserve!" I stop moaning and hold my tears and moans from coming out of me.
"Huh, already dead? Truly pathetic. Fine, at least Abdallah can rest now."
With one of his hands, he starts to pick up the blade from the ground, slow like a slug. Wait a little bit, Gabriel. Then he touches the blade on the ground. Now! I pounce onto his hand with my mouth.
"What!?"
And put one of his fingers into my mouth and start pulling. I hear the cracking until the whole thing is ripped apart, the iron taste invading my taste buds and his blood coming out of his ripped stump. I look at him, while the horror spreads through his face as he realizes he's lost a finger.
"How dare you, how dare you?!"
And I spit the blood into his good eye, blinding him for a moment, as he tries to eliminate the mixture of blood and saliva from it. I pick up the dagger and start to stab his guts, twisting and slashing along the way. He starts coughing out blood and stops trying to form a coherent sentence, as his grunts of pain spread through the room.
In this moment of weakness, I push him to the ground. A loud thud comes out of it, and he puts his hands onto his stomach area, struggling and groaning in pain. I rip apart his position and the agonizing moans play their notes to the sky. I aim at his neck and head, readying the dagger like an Aztec sacrifice. "Filho da puta! Filho da puta! " One hit, two hits. The moans become gurgles as the blood spreads through the ground like water, tainting my clothes.
Flashes of my mother come to me. Ela, Ela, Ela. Porque!? I start pushing the body, the blade falling through the sweat and blood infest hand, at every single moment, harder and harder, the sound of slapping flesh burning on my visage. I look at the figure of the man, nothing more but a corpse, any semblance of crunchiness nowhere to be seen.
I breathe and breath and breath. What have I done!? What have I done!? The muscles strain on my neck, contorting my form. Não, não, Não, não. I start crying. I didn't want this to happen, why!? You son of a bitch, do you have the right to take lives!? You pathetic dog, don't you see the damage you have done!? You always fuck things up! If you weren't here this corpse's brother wouldn't have died, nobody would have suffered. You just occupy space, robbing others of their wills! You are a monster, that's what you are! The worst kind, a greedy one who thinks it best for everyone. Don't you see that you are the problem!?
Mother was right along, the worst being in existence to the point of making people sick and sucking out their will like a leech!? I grab my head, and press further and further, and start to push myself again. The knuckle gets stronger at every moment, the pain increasing tenfold at every single Strike; Plak, Plak, Plak, Plak. The rhythmical sound of a bashed skull spreading through the room, the guilty one and the man who deserves everything wrong with him by his selfish wish, Gabriel Raimundo Bilac, the narcissistic young man who never ever should have existed. A mistake deserved more to be abandoned and die alone, my only true destiny and the most realistic one.
I fall at the side of the man, as I stop crying and the world's turn into a standstill. A momentary image before it completely falls apart, the idiot and the body. Nothing and the man. The son and the mother.
How long has it been? Two hours? Three hours? I don't know, it doesn't really matter anymore. After all this time, it's only blanking memories, a motionless haze to escape from reality and all the mistakes I can't correct. My head hurts as if someone cracked open my skull with an axe, making me dizzier than anything else.
The freezing ground touching my face, colder than a tombstone, the tears long evaporated, only the salty trails and itching skin as it's the only remainder of this world. I don't feel like moving at all, all the energy spent on the non-collapse of this body. The corpse stares down at me, one of his eyes still looking at me, as empty as it is, his facial expression contorted into a gasp like that of a fish.
A lone question lingers in my mind, the only one that matters into this blood-soaked infused mix between unconsciousness and reality: will I ever go home? I don't know anymore.
I stay a few more minutes on the gritty and grinding rocky surface ground, so long that I barely register the pointless and utter ugliness of the situation. All the physical pain stopped long ago. Despite how broken my frame may be right now, it's nothing compared to the struggle and hurt in my mind.
Whatever it may be, I can't stand on the ground forever, reality doesn't work that way. I will do an attempt at getting up. The damage received in the battle is still lasting until now, feeling like it belonged to me since I was born. The pain of taking a single breath, soreness in every single fiber of my being, and the extension and contraction of the muscle making me wish to scream into the world for how afflicting it is.
Once I am on my own two feet, I almost fall down again when I make the first step, my legs limp trying to get a single narrow step right, the constant war between the will of the mind and the legs' surrender to tiredness, the sensation of vertigo where a fall can feel like knocking on to death's door. Struggling and dragging myself towards the mirror
I come through the mirror, still intact without a single sign of a fight happening there. Not even a single drop of blood or even the smallest of cracks, despite the conflict between that murderous guy's rampage and the foreigner who has a funny accent and the bare knowledge of the language to live there, and yet lacks the ability and makes more trouble than anything else. Que bagunça!
I look at my face. "Somehow" (obviously), I look way worse than before. Death had visited me in these few hours of drunkenness. I'm paler than Tharja, the unhealthy white claiming my skin as its own, the saliva mixed with blood coming out of my mouth like a river, no doubt because of the few remains of the blood of his finger sticking through my mouth.
The two dark spots under my eyes are bigger than ever before. My hair is wet with the blood of the guy, along with my clothes. What a pain. What the hell am I going to do with this body? If people see this thing, I'm deader than the guy who attacked me.
I go to the corpse and pick up the dagger, some brain matter sticking to the tainted blood on the blade. How I will even get away with this murder? I go to my desk and fall on the chair as a form to think through this mess. There should be a way, but what place and what person in the right mind will accept a corpse?
"Porque eu tô aqui?" Tears come out of my eyes, while I crumble into a fetal position. I'm just so tired, I want to disappear out of this world and never return. What a stupid and selfish desire, just like mother said. You killed a man, and yet you want to escape like a coward. What a despicable human being I am.
The memories from back home come to me like rays out from the sky, the distorted sound of waves and dreamless night, the chaos of Stravinsky. Was there ever true order in melodies or just hidden chaos? Has there ever been peace? Or was it all a false reality to protect me? And what point does any of this matter pretty much? I killed a man, and there is nothing I can do.
I stare back again at the remains of the killed man. His clothes are destitute brown and with a face somewhat familiar to me. Oh, that noble. That one noble from back then, the one who almost brought me to death, yes that one. I pick my journal and I go back to that day, that fateful day where all this mess began.
4/ 3 ou 4?/ 20 ou não?- O QUE EU DEVO FAZER ? NÃO SEI, APENAS QUE TUDO FOI DE MAL A PIOR.
I don't know how to process the events that transpired before me. But who in their right mind would get a problem when they barely just got here? And this person is the guy who writes this entry onto this very stupid journal. How did I get it so wrong? I'm supposed to get everything right and mix in the shadow and become just another face in the crowd and wait for events to happen. Nobody would know me, after all.
I was so naive and dumb. Why wouldn't people question why some random would have become related to this clan? I didn't do my research and look at me: almost becoming food for the maggots.
I was so naive to think I would be capable of speaking in their tongue and be ignored. From the inception all communication was null, my costumes too foreign, a single step made, all eyes on me like a fantastical creature, a single mistake for the laughter of millions. I remember once where I got from the desk and they eyed me like a monster. What else could I do besides recoil in shame?
One of them was special. Every day he spied on me, laughing right down to my face for any single mistake I made. Tharja really doesn't care about my complaints. She didn't interact with me, preferring to do everything alone and ignoring me like a nuisance. What did I do wrong?
The dark mages are awful! They keep their tomes ready to kill me, and their eyes can kill even the most strong-willed of men. Then today happened. I think I didn't quite process whatever happened, but just words came like a broken record: despair. Today would be the same or so I thought.
The tallest man brought me to someplace where I don't have a single clue for what it is. He brought a dagger with him, so cold so sharp and at that moment it dawned on me: I would die.
With all my strength I tried to hold against the dagger, the blood coming out of my hands. Sadly, he wasn't that good with the dagger and while trying to stab me, his blade fell. When he tried to pick it up again, I had already taken it and stabbed him, making him fall.
What have I done? Was this the right decision?
My hands were bloodied, his moans audible for everyone. I couldn't tell how many minutes passed.
The man was still there and I was immobile like a statue. The first person to appear was Tharja. She didn't look at me, not even in the slightest. More and more people came. I was holding the dagger with blood.
"That is the dagger! Holy Grima, he is a killer!"
"Shut up, all of you! My retainer is innocent!"
"On what grounds?" someone said.
She stared back at them, and all their accusations dropped.
"He must pay for the damage to my clan," Tharja said
"But, but…"
"No buts. I'm not a fool. This man tried to kill my retainer."
After all of that, all of the people left. She didn't look back at me.
Then they brought me to the trial, all eyes on me. "Hereby… shall die as punishment."
I heard his last agony. "No, please. I didn't do anything wrong! Don't believe them!" Then the blade passed through his throat, ending his life.
All of them looked at me with punitive eyes, booing and cries of hatred hurled at me, Tharja still didn't look at me.
I only got to my room. This wouldn't have happened if I hadn't been here. I was the problem. I was the one to blame. If I didn't exist, this wouldn't have happened! Yes, if I'm forgotten, people will forget me. They will never hurt if I don't appear at all. Me and my thoughts. Yes, None can kill me if I'm alone with myself. Que saudades de casa.
Gabriel Raimundo Bilac
Did I ever change? Whatever, I will call Tharja, she will know what to do, right?
I get up from the chair, my mind still clouded by the events that happened beforehand. It's like an alcohol-driven headache, my sense of direction being thrown left and right out of the window.
I slip into the pool of blood. My head hits the torso of the cadaver, smearing even more of the liquid into my clothes and hair. I really deserve this. I debate even if I should go to her or not. Is there even a wish to go there? The guilt is ever consuming, but I digress with myself, and with my energy left, I raise and open the door towards the world.
The world is just as dark as my room, the torches barely making their lights, with shadows bigger than a human being, no guards in sight, only the silence corroding the sound of the torch.
I stumble towards Tharja's room. A nauseating descent controls me, vertigo threatening me to just disappear forever, straining muscle burn while I fall on Tharja's door, more like a cadaver than a person. I lift myself and start knocking as loud as I can. One knock, two knocks, three knocks.
"Ugh, what is it….?" At the sight of my pathetic body, Tharja falters. My stoicism may be damned, horror is the reality now, and I can't hold on anymore. So what I do is fall at her, my energy way too spent on every single action. And what can I do besides that? The dizziness and the cold embrace of death cling to me like a mother, the hug of the dark mage to its retainer.
"Eu não sei mais, Tharja. Só desisto mesmo." I whisper back at her. She closes the door, and like a medic brings me to her bed, the soft mattress holding me into the turmoil of everything unfolding so far, the only escape of this migraine.
Bandages cling to me, the blood painting them with purplish-red stains. The same cold bitter liquid spreads through me, dulling my senses, the lack of touch and air, the airheadedness of surgery, and the recovery of my tissues and muscles. She is at my side, still putting on the bandages, while looking at me, worry carved into her visage. After "some moments", I stare back at her, the exertion still pushing me back to the feverish reality.
"Gabriel, can you tell me who did this to you?"
I barely contain my cry, I'm still a crybaby after all. "He's dead. I killed him. His body is in my room."
The words aren't registered on her mind, baffling to both sides.
"How?"
"I don't really know." I can barely contain my tears, his blood clings through my hands like his brother. "I don't know. I am so sorry, Tharja. I didn't want to bring this to you or anyone. Why am I such a mess? I'm so sorry, so sorry..." I break down again. What a pathetic human being you are.
She puts one of her hands on my shoulder and allows me to cry. I allow her to do so, in an attempt to soothe the pain, to only try to put away her from out of nowhere.
I don't deserve anyone. I deserve everything that happened to me. Despite the often agonizing pain making me wish to simply not exist. I get up from the bed resembling more a fresh cadaver and ignore Tharja's reaction.
"I have a body to dispose of, would you help me?"
A small sigh follows "I will help,". The time leading into my room is marred with the dark corridor and the silence dominated by the embedded uneasiness of actions, sweat covers me head to toe along with bodily fluid as the frozen void in my belly pronounces the worst to happen, men incapable to even try to see Tharja at my back, the guilt still consuming me.
The body still lays on the floor, the blood still liquid, despite a few drops being dried out, the odor still didn't settle, leaving a small window of opportunity to pick up the guy.
I look at Tharja "Here is the man. Do you have any idea where we could put it?"
"I have a place in mind."
We carry the corpse, me holding a part of his arm and Tharja his legs. She is way stronger than me.
At any moment the guards could catch, my guts telling this is over and we should give up and die already. Along the journey towards the unknown place, the silence remains the king. I can't nor do I want to see anybody, the pain of guilt dominating me, and my fear of the consequences people would put on me. I try to subsidize my anxiety, but all in vain, it's a ghost still following me like a curse.
The pain subsides a bit once, we arrive under the starless night and hidden moon. The frozen winds and the ruins of a courtyard and the hole towards Henry's room. I swallow my dry saliva at whatever goes inside the room, the smell of death following us since we pick up the remains.
"Are you sure, Tharja?"
"Yes. He will be happy to get a new toy."
Henry sleeps like a baby, with the crows surrounding him, while we put the dead men onto a pile, forgetting its existence and wishing Henry not to get suspicious of a new body appearing there.
The room lacks air, the rotten smell dominating the nostrils, and at every single step, the worst could happen and Henry could appear, damning the whole operation, destroying my sensation of air, the tension ready to destroy me.
When we get out of the suffocating place, my head has fallen, and the mark of shame follows me like an old friend. What am I supposed to do?
"Gabriel?"
"Yes, Tharja?" Why prolong the inevitable?
"I think you should have a break from our experiments."
Just eliminate me already if you want. I sigh.
"I see."
"And also, you don't need to hate yourself."
Huh? What you are saying?
"I know how hard your situation is."
Please stop, just stop, I don't deserve any help. I'm just ranting like a teenager, don't you see?
"Well, Tharja. I think I should be alone. You know, I'm just tired of all of this."
And I leave her alone. What an asshole move I did. I'm the worst. Ignore the pool of blood and lock the door. I'm tainted as it is. And I go directly to my bed and let the dreamless night claim me. I cry and laugh into oblivion, the cacophony, my only relief until the sleep claims me from these faltering actions.
Well, that was chapter X. I thank everyone for following me and reading my stuff. Also, I want to thank Cavik for beta reading this chapter as always. Also if you want to talk with me, here is the discord server where I participate: discord .gg/9XG3U7a
I noticed that the last chapter was confusing because of a myriad of reasons. I apologize for the last chapter, as a writer, I should make people understand what they are reading and from what I could gather it was confusing. I will try to do better in the next one.