Chapter Text
Pain— white hot and searing, is what woke Cale Henituse up 1 year further back in the past than what he had intended.
Gasping for breath, Cale could not even scream, clawing at the sheets as he shook in agony in that specific kind of anguish only a shredding of a soul could be.
For a moment, that was all Cale was.
Thrashing pain with no beginning or end, hot tears pouring out in streams and locked in a soundless scream, thoughts grinded to a halt because nothing else existed but hurt.
Still, eventually, Cale became himself again.
The pain did not stop, no. Cale simply got used to the pain. Enough to realise something was wrong.
He was not supposed to be here.
"No..."
The moment the realization hit, panic set in. Just enough to override the pain and had Cale scrambling up luxurious sheets he was never supposed to feel again.
Cale stumbled rather that walked his way towards the bath room he once treaded a lifetime ago, still weak with pain but fueled by the dread of possibly fucking up the one thing that could make everything right, not caring for the bottles that falls or the faucet he accidentally knocked loose, mind only thinking of looking at the mirror he knew would be there.
And look he did.
In the mirror staring back at him was a reflection of himself, young and alive and impossibly scared.
There is only one thought in Cale's mind right then.
Again.
My family are all going to die.
Again.
Then, because he was him, Cale did not dwell on what could happen and focused instead on what he could do.
I need to fix this.
Cale Henituse, who knew the deal he made with death could not go through so long as his soul remains inside this body, decided he needed to sever his soul out of this body immediately.
And, well.
Once Cale decided on something he goes through with it no matter what.
Pushing through the pain with the single-minded determination of a man ready to give it all just for a sliver of chance to save his family, Cale grabs hold of a straight razor and makes his way into the bathtub that was slowly filling up with water.
There is no hesitation.
Slash!
Cale is not one to hesitate.
One slash becomes two. The water turns a crimson color and Cale topples backward, arms splayed out and wrists gaping, eyes open but dimming, body finally relaxing as relief did not quite ease the pain but it did release his fear.
Cale could see Death at the edges of his vision.
It worked, then.
The world flickers, and time tears apart Cale's soul completely, leaving behind only an empty shell another soul could now occupy.
The deal would go through.
His family will not die a second time.
But,
Cale could never know.
Never know that in this point in time the him of the past had an argument with his father about an inconsequential thing that felt like a bigger issue at that moment than it was on the grand scheme things...
Never know that the one who would wake him up that day was his own father who wanted to make things right...
Never know of the red stained water and the taste of iron in the air and of the great wailing and anguished cries that would flood that side of the Henituse manor that day...
Cale could never know that 3 days after this death, he would start haunting this manor as fragments of his own soul, displaced in time Nd unable to find peace.
It was not Cale's fault.
He did not know this.