Fic: In darkness I wait, in mourning I dream
There is no cure for the madness that plagues me.
There is no understanding for the desire of the accursed mind
Every night I lie awake and hear. They call me.
Soon they will pull me over the edge.
There is only so much pain I can take.
I hear them come, the real people, the ones on the outside. When they come the demons leave me, if only briefly. It is a comfort to know that not everyone has forgotten. To the outside world, I am redundant. I served my purpose, I’ve done my duty. I was born to save them, and save them I did.
Only to those who knew me as a boy, as a man in my own right still visit. And while the time they spend by my side brings me comfort, I wait for one in particular, one whose time would mean more than all the others. I wait all day to hear her voice, but there is silence where she should be. If I could break thorough the fog to the land of the conscious I would ask for her, I would go to her. But the darkness holds me. It surrounds me totally holding me captive.
I live in the hope that she will come.
No one speaks of her, which is odd, because she was theirs. They all loved her as much as I, if somewhat differently. My first and best friend visits often, telling me all about the goings on in the outside world, but he never mentions her, the one I so desperately wish to hear about. His own daughter and not even a passing comment. Mother’s visits are filled with a lonely silence, sometimes broken by the sobbing of a broken heart. She never stays long, and I know that even her brief visits take more out of her than she would care to admit. Her parting words are always a reminder that they are waiting for me to get better and return to them all, and she refers to a few by name, but she never mentions her. The one I wish to hear from more than any other. The one who holds my heart.
Now, there are those who visit that knew me only briefly before that day but still they take the time to talk to the one who can’t respond, who can’t find it within himself to return to them and to the world he helped save. Some visit in an effort to cheer me up, to brighten the darkness that surrounds me, as is the case with the cop and the invisible man, and I find myself smiling even if only on the inside.
But even their visits are marred by a darkness unnamed.
In the outer edges of thought there is a memory, one that frightens and thrills me all at once, but it is only a fragment, a frayed corner in the tapestry of my mind.
I killed the killer, I am a hero.
I find myself slipping a little more each day, but this fact no longer scares me as it once did. I no longer feel as though I have any need to return to them, the world doth turn without me.
Their call is not as strong as the call of eternal sleep.