Holy shit I completely forgot this story even exists! Well, if you are still wanting the rest of it…here it is. I found it while I was cleaning my room!
I'm currently working on the next chapter of Fast Forward, so if you haven't read that story you should check it out!
It's too bright to watch the shadows anymore. He almost faints after he stands up and has to lean against the wall to keep himself from doing so. One sleepless night isn't that bad – he's done it several times before. Though, then again, he's had several bodies on that table – not all dead – and yet none of them have brought him this much trouble. He licks his lips, blinks his tired eyes, scratches at the dried blood on the side of his nose, and opens the door.
He keeps an arm out on the wall, expecting anything; still, though, he gasps and falters when he stares once more into glassy brown eyes. The man looks angry, displeased; one of his arms hangs off the table – where it was previously half a foot from the edge – with his fingers almost brushing the ground. A small pool of blood is just below that hand, shining scarlet in the morning light.
Sabretooth stands back up and stares at the body, at the empty eyes watching him, judging him, stripping down his soul and looking it over. He wants to ask the man – what do you want from me? Why are you doing this to me? – but is just met with more cold silence. It's infuriating, knowing that this thing on his table is still alive – well, is that even really the right word? – and yet, it still won't move in his presence, as if it's determined to convince him of raw insanity. If he looks close enough, he can almost see the man's eyes flit back and forth, back and forth…
Sabretooth steps back, almost trips over the chair he left by the table, falls into it. The man doesn't move, but he can't help but feel his head moved – just a bit, while he was falling – and is now pointed more directly towards him. Those eyes, those cloudy pools, stare intently at him, holding him in that chair, keeping him from going anywhere by the cold fear gripping his heart.
You've brought this on yourself, the man seems to say, with his disapproving gave boring into his soul. This is your fault – all your fault and only your fault. How does it feel, being your own deathbringer?
I'm not dead yet, Sabretooth wants to say back, mouthing the words. One of his hands grips the arm of his chair tight. Not dead yet. Not yet. Not yet.
That's right, coos the man – did his arm twitch, or was that just a nerve-induced hallucination? – not dead yet. That will change soon, though. It will all change soon.
Sabretooth jumps and shakes his head – was he asleep? When did he fall asleep? He's not lying in his bed; he's sitting in the chair in the room with the table. Was all that just a dream? Did he just fall asleep admiring his work and imagine all of that? Everything makes sense to fit that; the man is on the table, arms at his sides, eyes closed. Nothing's different. Nothing's different.
…Something's different.
The blood. The blood. By God, the blood is still there. The puddle of it still remains from the man's hand almost brushing the floor. He reaches up, touches his nose – the dried blood is still there. It all happened. It all really did happen. That's not the scary thing, though; Sabretooth feels himself start to shiver as he things about the things the man could have done to him while he was asleep – he could be dead right now, throat slit like that of the body on the table. What time is it? How long has he been asleep?
A glance over at the window quickly answers his questions: it's dark outside. He's been asleep all day. He could be lying on that table instead of the man right now, his intestines strung out on the walls while he still breathes. So why isn't he? What stroke of fate can be credited to bring such amazing mercy – if it can even be called that – to him? What did he do to deserve this – any of this?
No, no, no, not mercy – simply a delay. He woke the man up before killing him, and slit one vein at a time while he still lived, still breathed, still felt pain and still screamed. All of this in revenge – the man had simply put off his punishment until he was awake and conscious, lucid in feeling and sensation.
But – what if all this isn't really happening? He stands up, feels his face, his chest, his pulse. This can't – can't – be real. Such a thing is insane! – is he insane? Am I insane, he asks himself, to think this is real? No – no – no, I'm not insane. Mom always said that I just have an active imagination.
Well, she used to say that. Then she got blood all over the wall and the next night's dinner tasted a bit different.
If you're insane, the man seems to whisper, then we're all insane in our own special way. Sabretooth remembers that voice, from the screams still so fresh in his ears. He looks up from his hands, sees the man's head tilted towards him, once-brilliant eyes just half-open. The curtain of the closed window sways. The man's voice is calm and relaxed, soothing…Sabretooth thinks he sees the revealed muscles of his throat clench and move with the words in his mind, but he can't be sure. He can't be sure of much of anything anymore.
But that doesn't make sense, he wants to say back. He sits back down in his chair, head tilted quizzically at the fox. If we're all insane, doesn't that make insanity expected and normal, a kind of uniform sanity in itself?
The man blinks. Whoever said it makes sense? Life is life and, if anything, life doesn't make sense. There's always something that can't be explained: the disappearance of our mother, when our cousin 'lost his grip' climbing a tree seven years ago and fell into a coma from which he never awakened, when your name disappeared from the list of mutants at The Facility and nobody could explain why.
The body on my table, Sabretooth muses. His wonder at how the man knows these things about him is just a miniscule annoyance in the back of his mind. It's been years since they've had any sort of contact. This body can't be explained: nobody's missing. I've been out every day and haven't heard a word of it.
Yes. That too. The man's arm gives a slight sway, hanging off the edge of the table. Your schizophrenia, a mental illness? – who's to say not having it is a mental illness? What if black were to be called white, and white black?
Perceptions would change. Sabretooth stands, walks over to the man, strokes his hair; the head turns to follow him, the eyes watch. I could finally be normal.
Who's to say that you aren't already normal – that everyone else is different? Who's to say anything?
Everyone's insane in their own special way. Sabretooth continues stroking the stiff, dry hair, and, hearing no response, looks up: the man's face is pointed to the ceiling, eyes closed. A fresh trail of blood drips down the side of his neck. Is it normal to talk to corpses, he asks himself, and hear their voices? Is it normal to have to endure endless whispered conversations as an eternal soundtrack to your life, even when you're in an empty room or trying to sleep? What, exactly, is normal? It's so, so hard to tell sometimes.
Over time, though, he had learned one thing from another, learned to discern the things that happen from the things that don't. Cadavers do not talk – no matter how much he wishes they would, at times – nor do they move, or breathe, or live. Death is the one thing truly certain, something Sabretooth has been trying to disprove – but, so far, in the end his attempts have always failed. The man on the table has never moved, has never tilted his head or opened his eyes, has never uttered a word, has never moved from this position he has remained in for the past who-knows-how-many days.
The man is not lusting for revenge.
One thing that bothers Sabretooth as he prepares to head to his bedroom, though, is the pain in his wrist, bright and hot: he has never imagined pain before. He tries to lift it, tries to move it; he finds it's stuck somehow, and looks down. One of the man's hands grip his wrist, nails digging into his skin. He pulls, can't move, pulls again, still can't move.
The man tilts a sharp-toothed grin at him, the muscles and flesh in his throat clenching, bunching, convulsing as he moves his head. "Now, now, where do you think you're going?" he rasps, voice harsh and empty on severed vocal cords. "We were just getting acquainted."
Sabretooth stumbles, panics, falls over, hurts his arm in the process – the man's grip is powerful. "Th – this isn't happening. This isn't happening. This isn't real – "
"Isn't it?" The man sits up and drags his other hand across his mouth. "It's happening, isn't it? So then – how can't this be real?"
Sabretooth manages to pull free of the grip, then backs away on the floor. His heart thrums in his chest, throat, and ears like an ill-tuned bass drum. "You're dead," he stammers, "dead!"
"Who's to say?" The man cracks his neck and knuckles. "Cadavers don't talk – or breathe – or live – now do they?"
"I watched you die!" Sabretooth jumps when his back hits the wall, his eyes wide.
"I'm not questioning that." The man turns, swings his legs off the table, then stands, checking his balance before focusing back on Sabretooth.
"I – I killed you! You're dead! Get away from me – I killed you!"
"No," the man practically purrs, taking one slow step after another towards Sabretooth in the corner, "I killed you."
There's a body on the table.
It's a man. No breaths enter or leave his lungs; he remains there, lifeless, with a chest as still as the table he lays on. His eyes are closed, arms at his sides.
A slash runs across the front of his throat, along both wrists, behind both knees. The skin of his nude body is slick, soaked with the crimson liquid so thick it looks black under the watchful gaze of night; it stains the wood of the table as it drains, still lukewarm, and begins forming puddles at the foot of each leg.
The house is empty.