Author's Notes: Hi. Today I come bearing morbidity. Hope you, er, enjoy it?
Warnings: Scary imagery
32. Guilt
This isn't right.
As Dan walks the streets, cape whipping in the hollow wind and backlit by the silvery moonlight, he can't shake the feeling that something is (was, will be) very wrong. Everything looks milky and ethereal in the moonlight and the shadows make all the houses look like skulls no matter how Daniel adjusts his goggles. His footsteps echo more than they should, and that's not right either. He was never this loud. He thinks he hears hollow steps padding against the pavement, but when he whirls around to face his stalker (cape swirling behind him in almost stop-motion and has it always been that long?), there's no one there.
There's nobody anywhere, and Daniel knows that's not how things are supposed to be.
His breath stumbles out of his chest in gasps, but he can't hear himself breathe. He can, however, hear his footsteps. And they're so loud. His goggles are starting to squeeze his head and he adjusts them, unwilling to take them off even for a moment. He knows without knowing that if he takes off his goggles then he will see everything. And he's not sure he can handle that. It seems very terrible.
He figures he ought to start looking for people. Maybe the Comedian. For some reason, Daniel thinks this would be a good idea and he starts walking down an alley. It'll take a while to get to the Comedian's house, but it's pretty important, and worth the walk.
He squints up at the sky and it's red but that makes sense. It does.
Something dark trickles in front of his lenses and he touches it. It slides beneath his fingers and even though it looks black he knows it is blood. His blood. The goggles are cutting into his forehead and making him bleed. But he is afraid to take them off, so he ignores it.
He forgets where he needs to go and feels slightly panicked because he doesn't know where he is. Something's watching him. He can feel it with the gooseflesh on his neck and the tightening of his muscles. He's the Night Owl after all, he ought to know if someone's—
He frowns. No, that's not right. It's not Night Owl, is it?
The goggles are making blood run down his face and making everything seem a thousand times closer, more distorted and the houses look like they're leering at him, nothing but malcontent and ill intentions in their features. They look like something that's died in the water. And they're coming for him. The city's coming for him and it's gonna—
He jerks off the goggles and throws them onto the pavement. When they hit the ground, they shatter in a thousand pieces like glass. The shards glint in the moonlight and stab at him. The noise of their destruction sounds like a scream and when Daniel puts his hands up to shield himself, it's too late. And they pierce his eyes.
Shuddering, he begins to run and run and run and the alleys are charred with fire and they twist and it doesn't really make any sense because alleys don't turn this way and as he runs there are too many corners to turn through and there are bumps in the road that throw Daniel in the air and he is still twisting and spiraling through the streets, spinning and wheeling through labyrinthine visions of brick and mortar and faster, faster, faster, they're going to catch up and then—
He walks up to his front stoop and brushes the snow off of his cardigan. The whole city's covered in snow and the cold should begin to bite soon if he doesn't get inside. Squinting through his glasses (because his eyesight's starting to get so bad nowadays…), he unlocks his door and steps into the house and oh my god
They are all hanging from his ceiling.
His mouth mirrors theirs in a silent, desperate scream as he looks upon them, pale and bloated with wide, wide eyes rolled in anguish and terror. He steps forwards instead of back and he doesn't know why, but he wishes he hadn't because he knocks into one of them (and really, it's impossible not to, there is no space between them). It sways limp and doll-like from the contact and its head lolls horribly from its neck, horribly and unnaturally angled by the thick, black cord.
He might have screamed, but there isn't any sound and he pushes it away from him, unwilling to look and it falls to the floor. They are all falling to the floor and somehow Daniel is in the middle of them and they are all falling limply on him, weighing them down with their bloated bodies and their cold, empty eyes that all have pieces of glass stuck in them. He can feel their blood in his mouth and their last words on his breath and it smells like rotting leaves and leather. As he falls, he hears something mutter about justice and redemption and trust I trusted you and he can no longer breathe and he feels so cold and maybe if you'd cared from the start, none of this would have happened—
…
GOD NO IT'S TOO COLD.
Daniel jerked up in his bed mid-scream and looked wildly around his darkened room, his breath coming out in short, panicked bursts. He ran a hand through his sweat-dampened hair and cursed.
"Jesus," He sighed, putting the shaking hand over his eyes until his heartbeat slowed to something more reasonable.
You'd think after three and a half years, you wouldn't have nightmares anymore.
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A/N: Well wasn't that fun. Yay for nightmares, right? Lol. Anyways, this one was kind of hard because I wasn't sure what Dan's nightmare should be. Rorschach's on the other hand, I'm actually looking forward to. I've some sick shit for this little twisted guy to dream about. Because don't tell me Rorschach doesn't have nightmares. Haha.