So it goes with saying that only things I own with any connection to MARVEL I bought on Ebay or Etsy. MARVEL COMICS & MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE are their own creatures and I have nothing to do with either of them aside from the fact I enjoy reading or watching them, and am grateful for the ability to play in their world. I claim nothing, and I receive nothing for this, expect the pleasure of putting something out into the world.
You can also find this story on ARCHIVE OF OUR OWN under the same title and pen name along with a place to post suggestions.
Don't forget to check out the Photobucket album listed on my profile page too. (My apologies. I didn't realize FF removed the links. I have corrected the problem in what way I can, so for those who like the visual additions, feel free to check them out.)
DAY FIVE
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND FIVE
SATURDAY, MAY 5TH 2012
1001 HOURS
BELVEDERE CASTLE, CENTRAL PARK
79TH ST
AR(NORA)
The first word I said was no, if you overlook the choking gasps and screaming.
It wasn't a rubber band anymore, and it wasn't in my head. It felt like a chain, tied to a car, and I was fixed to the spot. It felt like my sternum was going to tear right off, and honestly I think that would have been nice, because at least the pain would have stopped.
Part of me knew it was in my head, because I had my arms wrapped around me so tightly my hands were numb from their grip on each other, and because I could see my chest, perfectly stationary and intact as I kicked and writhed in futility.
I needed to do something to stop the pain, I just didn't know what to do. I didn't even what was causing it. Was this happening to Loki? How could he even survive this, if they were tearing off his chest? How could I even survive this?
I lost the ability to scream at a point, mostly due to the fact I barely retained the ability to breath. Even then the pain kept growing as the tension increased.
Then it slowed, then it settled. The pain still agonizing but bearable in its consistency. It became less like the hook at the end of a taut chain, and more like a red ball of barbed wire.
That's when I realized there was a hand tied to my hand. It was held there by two zip ties, one around the wrist, and the other around the block of the hand, palm pressed to palm, and our fingers interlaced. It was a man's hand despite the purple shade of it, with a bandage that had old blood staining the center of it, where a hole was placed by a bullet.
I was wrong, the pain just got worse again, and I can't breath again. Duncan?!
He's just sitting there, leaning against the wall with his head hung like he was sleeping. But the sleeping don't smell of ammonia, feces and rotten meat. The sleeping don't turn purple at their lowest points from the blood pooling under gravity's pull. They don't have pale lips and waxy skin that's mottled with blue and green blotches. Their eyes aren't sunken into their skulls. The sleeping are not dead.
The sleeping don't leave messages, only the dying.
There's a wet circle on the top of his thighs, one that doesn't connect with the pubble of thin brown liquid beneath him, and its the size of a human head. My head. I was laying there, sleeping in the edges of that puddle, with my head on his lap.
I remember dreaming of James, James with dark hair, James who was a man. Duncan has dark hair, and is also a man, and while James was a hallucination, Duncan was always very real. He must have been the hands I felt, he must have tried to fix me, and I...
Gypsies, Jews, Romanians, Russians, Americans, POW's from every country including a few of their own for being spies and traitors. They made me kill them all. When I was too weak for them to cut another piece out of me, they made me kill them so they could torture me more. They knocked me out to make sure I would. because when I'm unconscious I can't stop my body from trying to preserve its life, from ripping it out of others.
"NO. NO!, NO!, NO!" I didn't want him to die. I tried to save him. Why would he hold me like that? He could feel it, I know he could. They all could feel it. I remember some of them screaming and crying, whether it was because I woke up in the process, or because he recorded it for 'science'. Why would he tie himself to me! Why would he let me kill him, make me kill him?
Why would he write me a message, did he really think it would make it okay?
Its okay : ) don't compl \
The letters got sloppier as they went, until the last one was just an uneven line, as his arm lost its strength, and dragged back to where it rested near his thigh. He wrote all of that on the floor, in his blood. Even that damn smiley face!
"You idiot! WHY?!" My hands are on him again now, and I rip his free from mine. The zip ties are solid even if they break with surprising ease under my fingers, proof that Idunn's apples have been restoring my strength. His hand isn't, its about as soulless as candle wax, and so is the rest of him, but I refuse to acknowledge that. I've never been good at accepting finality. I didn't with Kenna, or Skari, or James, and I can't seem to make myself now.
"I wanted you to live!" The magick moves where I want it, even if its weak. Its so much weaker than I thought it would be. It's like the connections aren't actually touching. Like I'm holding the plug half way out of the socket and expecting it to make the lamp work. Its flickering at best, and all its doing is forming tumors.
Even dead flesh has life in it. There is still energy lingering in the cells, but their object has changed. The body releases a chemical, and once that happens all the cells know how to do is break down. I'm trying to bring him back to life but all I'm really doing is making that process happen faster, one piece of decomposition at a time.
"I didn't want you to die, I didn't want to be your killer! WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS TO ME?" Frustration, guilt, rage, and confusion get the better of me, followed almost immediately by the urge to vomit. My emotions took control of my limbs for a moment too long, and my fist struck his torso, getting stuck inside his chest cavity as one of the ribs shifted out of the way.
I had to wrestle back out, which wasn't as easy as I wanted it to be. On the first yank it took his body with it, making him almost fall into my lap. My other hand stopped that, but had to feel his shoulder squish like a thick paste beneath his clothes. I finally got free when the bone snapped free of the soft cartilage, and then I barely stumbled out the door in time to throw up on a stone wall.
It's not enough, my next breath makes the urge return even stronger. The smell is still there. Its essence soaked into my hair. I can feel it stinging my eyes and smearing across my skin in thick strands!
I know this city, I know this park. I know the building I just stumbled out of once I steal enough seconds between the dry heaves to glance around. I know there's a lake down at the bottom of the hill.
I also discover another problem very quickly. There are poles tied to my leg. That wouldn't be an issue if it weren't for the fact that they're sticking a fraction beyond the flatness of my foot, making each step awkward and jarring. I don't know how it didn't happen as I all but ran to the wall, but the cobblestone pavers catch those edges now.
There's three curved stairs at the edge of the cobblestone, and I miss them all. I don't miss the raw stone slope though, or the bushes and trees on the side of it. I hate those bushes and trees.
My leg and my chest are basically screaming from that pain, and the damn branches crumble to splinters when I try to use them to pull myself up. I could level this park, and it wouldn't be enough to stop the pain.
My leg feels stronger beneath the splint even as I wrestle with it. Despite the strength Idunn's fruit seemed to return to me, it isn't enough to loosen the knots Duncan put there, that handsome stupid bastard is still getting in my way.
There isn't any difference in the burning ache sitting on my chest, and burrowing in my heart. I'm so tired of killing poeple, of killing things. I'm even mourning those trees a little as I hobble back to the stone path. I do have one more life though that I wouldn't mind taking, and Loki's last words will not involve comforting affirmations or smiles.
SATURDAY, MAY 5TH 2012
1004 HOURS
BELVEDERE CASTLE, CENTRAL PARK
79TH ST
NYPD OFFICER
I thought it was a woman at first. It definitely looked like one, even in the weird clothes. We got a call about a break in at the Castle, and our sergeant told us to check it out. We didn't need a bunch of those aliens taking a fortified position. They all seemed dead, but who knew if they might get back up. Plus there was a chance it might be humans who broke in, looking for a place. Somebody should check and make sure they aren't hurt and tell them the invasion is over. I really hope it's over.
Then I saw her, she stumbled and fell down the path. I almost called out until I saw the tree fall next. It wasn't just a tree falling like its trunk was cracked. It looked like paper soaking up too much water, it just sort of curves and bent under the weight of its branches like a wet noodle. That was enough to convince me and Brian to keep our mouths shut.
I'm really glad we did too. She's stumbled off out of sight down the hill, and we're looking at the place she landed. There's dead plants, and animals all around. A few of the squirrels and birds are even in their last last throws.
We both become even more blessed by are caution when we look in the castle itself. "Call for backup." There's a dead man slouching against the wall that I guarantee hasn't been there as long as he looks. "Call for a lot of it."