Chapter Text
A while ago, someone in the Sect told you about something interesting; They told you about a time they were threatened with a knife on the side of the road, and they kinda "ceased existence" for a while. They described it as "my mind became one with the Void". They said it was a defense mechanism of some sort, void-ly protection or whatever, but you don't know exactly how because you weren't listening. They said that outsiders experience it too, except they call it "disassociation" or something like that, and for them it isn't a "profound experience" and is instead a "trauma response" or something of the like. Something about punishment? You forget.
You think you might have just become one with the void.
You wake up.
You're fairly certain that you're now in a better state, more suited for physical escape instead of psychological. You're still panicking, though. You recall another Sect assassin, Vanus, it was, telling you that there are 2 types of adrenaline, good and bad. Actually, vo didn't say "good" or "bad", vo said some sort of equivalent in Sect-ish slang, but you got the picture. Good adrenaline actually helps you do things, and bad adrenaline just makes you "sob and cry and piss and shit yourself". At the time, you thought voids choice of language was unacceptable, but you can't deny it got the point across. You now know it was figurative, anyway.
Shit, you got sidetracked again.
Good and bad adrenaline.
You think you have the good one now.
You're still not doing great but at least you can see 2 inches in front of you and remember who you are.
You just remembered that pain receptors exist.
Maybe remembering is a bad thing, after all.
No, pain keeps you anchored to reality. Pain exists for a reason. A couple moments ago you weren't feeling any pain, and you went crazy or something.
Why are you in pain, anyway? You're about to die, yes, but-
You're only going to die
if you sit there crying about it.
You shouldn't have any injuries bar a slight bruise on your head, anyhow.
You try to stand up and get a better look at yourself. Emphasis on "try" because you immediately fall over since you've been crumpled up on the ground for the past maybe half-hour shaking and crying and borderline-hallucinating in some sort of panic-fueled madness. The room is not very large, however, so you manage to catch yourself on the walls before your head hits anything.
Oh, it's your hands.
All the pain is in your hands.
And once you re-adjust yourself to standing, you look down at your hands before anything else. If it weren't for the splinters, fucking shitwrecked state of your skin, and horrible stinging you'd probably think your fingertips are just dirty. For your nails, though, you're not too sure. So you scrape underneath the nail which appears to have the most dirt under it to check if it's actually dirt or if it's dried blood. It's blood, but some of it's not dry.
Your arms appear as if they have been used as a werewolf's chew toy. As you have never encountered a werewolf, and you have quite a significant amount of blood on your nails, you presume these injuries are self inflicted. Since none of the cuts are particularly deep, and you apparently had enough awareness to avoid your arteries, you are in no risk of bleeding out. You're going to need plenty of bandages to avoid infection, and most of it'll probably scar, but those are things to worry about later.
You would usually check your face next as per your usual" unknown injury procedure, HAHNCLFO: Hands, Arms, Head, Neck, Chest, Legs, Feet, Other. (Quite the mouthful but you remember it since it's rather funny to try and pronounce as a word) but you don't have access to any reflective surfaces. Unfortunately, this means you can't properly check your neck either, requiring you to skip a quarter of the whole procedure, but since you're still breathing you're fairly certain your neck is alright.
This carriage has one really small window, so it's unlikely anyone is going to try and snipe your vital organs from here, you feel safe enough in that regard to check for injuries on your chest.
Turns out you don't have any, but those scars are healing up nicely at least. You put your shirt back on.
Your legs are in a very similar condition to your arms, but not nearly as bad. You suppose they're just more difficult to access.
Your feet are in a very similar condition to your hands, you assume for similar reasons. You can't exactly determine which are worse. You had your shoes on when you first got here, but they must have fallen off since they DID take your shoelaces. Couldn't have you killing yourself before they got the pleasure of it. Bastards.
You weren't going to anyway, but, still.
It's the thought that counts.
It hurts to hold
It hurts to touch
It hurts to breathe
It hurts to walk
It
hurts.
This is not important, actually. you can tend to your injuries after escaping, none of them are severe enough to hinder your movement in any significant way.
Pain is fine.
it hurts
Pain is safe.
It Hurts
Pain is good.
IT HURTS
Pain means you're not dead ITHURTSITHURTSITHURTSITHURTSITHURTSITHURTS
And that is your top priority. ITHURTSITHURTSITHURTSITHURTSITHURTSITHURTS
You need to find a way out of here, quickly.
The interior of the cart is in a very similar condition to your skin, so it's evident that you have already tried brute force, and you don't think you have anywhere near enough energy left in you to try it again with a level head. If you had a level head in the first place, you wouldn't have even tried in order to avoid this exact scenario, but hindsight is in full colour, you suppose.
The singular window is barred, high up, and small. An adult would struggle, but you could fit through it with relative ease if it were possible to remove the bars, and you could simply run in the opposite direction to the cart, hopefully towards any sort of area that is equestrian-unfriendly and shadowed.
Tragically, the bars do exist. They are solid steel, and the wood they're attached to is reinforced and not budging either.
It's probably best to not waste your limited time with this specific escape plan.
You have no hope of escaping the carriage while it is still on the road, so it stands to reason that you should try and get it off of the road. If you were of a bulkier build or had any sort of blunt weapon in your possession, and were not exhausted, you would know precisely how to knock the vehicle in such a way that it either falls over or frightens the horses; the former would lead to the latter and the latter would lead to the former. Unfortunately, you have a physical build which could be easily likened to a sapling, are entirely defenseless, and already exerted yourself trying to tear the place apart. You could try to trip up the wheel by throwing something out of the window, but you don't have anything on your current person that would both fit through the bars and be of much detriment to the wheel.
Wait no, you do.
You look at your lace-less shoes which you still have neglected to put on, grab both of them, hold them out of the window, drop one directly in front of the wheel, and drop the other a bit further ahead incase that one doesn't do anything.
And you watch for a moment
...
You no longer have shoes, and the cart is still stable.
They were getting too small for you, anyway, but this will make running far less comfortable.
That totally would have worked if they had laces, bastards.
You are going to get out of this
You are going to live another day
You are going to see another sunrise
And everything will be okay