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It was rather dark on...whatever dimension he’d ended up.
A great tide of crisp air hit through him, shuffling through the landscape in a wave. Ford felt too tired, detached, exhausted from himself. Any sense of himself. A familiar worn and dirtied scarf wrapped around his face he’d gotten while on the run; his sweater vest in shambles and his figure draped with a rag of a brown, old cloak, mind running on a dull, dull ring that seemed to come from everywhere; sleepless with adrenaline and sharp still with intense fear. But by now, it was the worn kind of terror, one that dug under his skin, nesting there with ease, one that had created offspring in his head. The kind that he’d been with for so long, weeks now, and come to call a constant companion.
He could hardly think. Everything just felt like a constant, dull hum, spinning in no direction and every direction all at once. The young man’s head dipped, that damned tug at unconsciousness dragging to him as if from a string, nipping mentally at his heels, trying to lull him in some place dark and warm.
‘No.’ A sharp snap of the head, and he stared out in front of him, blinking away the dust, the bruising beneath his eyes a clear sign of his constant fighting to sleep. He could only run on empty for so long, but damn it, he had to try. He had to keep going. He had to stay awake.
Awake, awake, awake, awake.
It ran like a mantra in his head.
It was the only thing he could do. His mind did not want to turn to the reason in question. But it did. Inevitably. Inextricably. Always.
Bill.
Bill.
A pang settled tight in his chest, clawing vicious, chewing remorselessly into him. Something mournful, while still so alive and vibrant in grief, took hold of his whole sense then. Something that surely was hot and warm and deeply painful...and so damned open. Like a fatal wound left unattended, never healing, only worsening and ignored to bleed freely, torn open from the sides and naked to the world. It spilled still so fresh with warm, pooling blood. All of it still simply so, so intense and hot and new, warring, battling furiously with the fear, the doubt, the unhinged mania that had driven him so much longer before.
And with it, his feelings for that triangle spirit reeled through him, a pit of mixed emotions, a dangerous roar of defiance and horror and something so much deeper and raw too. His tired, heavy gaze turned to his feet, met with a deep, detached desire. The conversations shifting over him, washing like cold water, soothing and at the same time somehow so nightmarish. Those damned sweet words. The laughter, joking, easy teachings, rampant curiosity. He had...gotten so well along with Bill. More than that, no, he hadn’t just gotten along. He got along with lab partners. With students and teachers and the people at gas stations and grocery stores.
No, he’d been so much more. He’d felt so in tune with Bill. That timeless spirit. His muse. His closest mentor...and...he shut his eyes, in that moment almost feeling the creature’s warm yellow light as he’d pulled up a hand to touch against the strange, impossible being below the eye, six fingers curious, awed, excited...gentle.
And in just a moment he could see them. As they had been. Back then. Just the two of them, him explaining human mechanics, society, and Bill making fun of him, joking, calling him “Sixer” and “IQ,” that familiar fond banter that tossed there between them. A bright energy that made him laugh freely and hang on his companion’s every word. An excitement that he couldn’t describe and a sudden break from isolation, loneliness. He hadn’t realized even how alone he’d been until then. He hadn’t ever seen it. Nothing, just him, a freak, an outsider...and then there he was, suddenly a bright, fiery light, as overreaching as the sun, taking into his life with a game of chess and some tea.
At the time he’d thought...he’d allowed himself to believe he had been worthwhile enough for Bill. To visit. To mentor. That he’d been worthwhile enough to mean something...anything. Maybe his...the intensity of his own desire to be with him couldn’t be matched, but...even something small was enough. Even just a tiny bit of warmth.
He’d reached out, he remembered, brushing his fingers at the creature’s surface, fascinated...entranced. Looking hesitant and timid and uncertain, awed into that one eye. Into his Muse’s gaze.
Partners. Partners.
A jolt of reality and he felt himself shake awake.
Something clutched like a trap, snapping tighter against his heart, the open wound infesting with so much more hot pain and loss. Somehow the rage of it all wasn’t enough to drown it all out, wasn’t enough to kill the intensity of softness that spread, coating the edges of the wound like an unwanted, open and bleeding thing. Softening the anger and rage into grief and a sort of horrible need.
The 28 year old man clung to the tatters of his heavy cloak, bringing it up to the hem of his neck, staring out in front of him, timid and yet filled deep with a longing pain and awareness. A howl of wind rushed on by, ripping at his clothes, his gaze set against the multi colored dirt that spread out before him. He had to keep moving. He couldn’t stop here. He couldn’t afford to stop here.
And he couldn’t afford to sleep.
He clutched tighter at the tattered cloak.
Would Bill be there...? If he did, showing himself in his dreams…? Or would he take over his body? Would he drag him across the dimensions, until returning him to the second one, where Bill himself resided, where he could...he could…
What?
What is it Bill would do?
Kill him...? Punish him? Torture him?
He honestly didn’t know. What would he do? His muse, his mentor, someone he had...somehow, beyond himself, felt so damn strongly for? Devoted himself for, bought symbols, sought and tracked down markings and paintings and stained glass; shrouding his entire home with every inch of the creature’s form. Worship. Was that the word? Had he...worshiped Bill? Something deep, like a knife, twisted into the wound, through that pumping vast of hot pain. Through that deep, livid, bright red fierce of emotion and horrible sick inducing shame. The guilt. The gut wrenching guilt and disgust. In that moment, he’d never known someone could feel so much. That he himself was even capable of it. It tore at him, shredding his whole being. Worship. He had worshiped Bill.
He hadn’t had time to stop during these long weeks, these months even. Stop and think. Stop and mourn. Stop and feel anything. He still didn’t have time, not after the few short weeks it had been since landing in dimension to dimension from between the rifts and not before then when he’d frantically tried to hide his work, bury it, protect it from Bill and anyone else who might pry into it. Dangerous. It had all become so damned dangerous.
But somehow here he was, at the end of his rope, too tired to fight...finding it hitting him. More strongly than ever before, for reasons he couldn’t put into words. He was worn. He was so tired. His body barely keeping up, his weight falling off with lack of food.
Maybe he was at his limit. Maybe he couldn’t go on. Maybe he’d die here. He shut his eyes, tilting on his feet. ….Maybe he should just let Bill take him. Let Bill have him. Do whatever he wanted with him. Let him fall asleep. And let Bill...do what he wanted. He’d worshiped him once, hadn’t he? He’d wanted this once, hadn’t he? Let him keep control of him, do whatever he wanted, leave him for dead, drive him mad….or keep him. With him.
He jolted to himself. No. No, no, no, no, no, NO, NO.
He let out a roar of anger, desperate to force himself up and awake.
NO. He ripped himself away from that space. From the weak exhaustion. From a so vivid deceitful blanket of comfort. For that seeking warmth. The safety in being controlled. In letting go. That sick, tempting, driving lull that spilled somehow instead into him as a sense of security. Of giving in. Letting himself be free of any control, of any fight or decision, of anything...letting someone else have it instead.
God. God. Christ.
Had he...always been like that? Had he…liked Bill having control of him?...Wanted it!?
He was so very tired. So very worn. Worn to the bone. Dirt encrusted in hair and skin and muscle, he could practically feel the dust to the bone.
And despite it, he felt too very cold then, body stilling, breath leaving.
No.
That wasn’t him.
That wasn’t him.
THAT WASN’T HIM.
He shook himself, stepping forward in a stagger, breath haggard.
It...had to be Bill. Bill had messed with him somehow. Given him those thoughts. That need. Right…? But...had he wanted it even before he’d made the deal? Had he...wanted to be with Bill even before that?
No, get it together, Stanford.
Bill didn’t care. All of it had been a trick. Even if...if he was…if he did...
Whatever it mattered, he’d been a fool. He was a fool. A damned fool.
Ford couldn’t even say or explain why Bill was still tormenting him. Why he was still haunting him, chasing him, laughing his way at his heels as he slept and sometimes when he didn’t. He couldn’t explain why he was still alive. After all, If he’d wanted him dead...why not throw him over a cliff? Take one of the many knives he’d stored away in his boots and coat and belt and end it? Why not do it when Ford was unconscious and he had full liberty over his body? Ford wasn’t useful to Bill anymore. He couldn’t feasibly build a portal on this end, right...?
‘Maybe he’s just bored. Maybe he just wants to play with you before killing you.’
Something tight collected in his throat, threatening to break through, a harsh fire reflecting, warring with the conflict in his eyes.
In the shudder of wind, in the pit of nothing surrounding him, he huddled against his cloak, pulling it in tighter. Suddenly, he felt so very alone, very tired...very, very tired. He wanted to collapse. Too cold to feel comfort in the idea anymore of letting Bill win.
‘Bill had never cared. You really meant nothing, less than an ant, less then anything.’
Yes. He was just a means to an end, wasn’t he? Everything they’d done together, every word, every intent. A lie. And him, him being so desperate to just see his Muse in the real world, to bring Bill here, to share with him everything that his reality had to offer...to be with him, really be with him...he’d ignored every sign, been blatantly blind to everything that told him, screamed to him the truth. Don’t trust Bill.
But how couldn’t he…? How couldn’t he. He’d given him everything, opened himself, parts of himself that he hadn’t shown anyone. Hadn’t even known he’d had to give or share. He’d become someone new with the demon, someone filled with life.
He bit at his lip, gritting his teeth in a working of grief and defiance at the idea, something hot coming to the surface of his chest, spilling over. Something desperate and real and lost. Something much younger than he would have ever liked to admit. Because around his muse, around that spirit, he’d really just felt so much like just a simple boy. And he hadn’t been anything else. For Bill, he would’ve given anything. And everything. Everything. Until the end of time. That had never been a lie. He coiled his cloak tighter, taking a few stumbling, shifting steps forward.
“Bill…” He whispered the name, and to his credit, and perhaps also like a child, tried to make it feel like poison on his tongue. To spit it out harshly. To rid himself of it and the heartache that was suffocating and strangling him. To fly into that anger, the very same that had cast Stanley out of his life, and let it control his mind and wretch from his being. But all he came back with was grief. Sadness. And something, that betrayal of that soft, childish something...that came close to love.
He let out a sharp hiss of defiance and anger, hot tears biting his eyes, but drowned it out in a determined shift forward, marching on at the wind’s defiant rush.
Stupid. So stupid. So foolish. What sort of genius was he? What sort of person was he? Love. Love!?!
He always knew he was a freak. And he’d known this for some time. Known it for quite a while. He was a freak, a monster, on many levels. Not just because of the fingers, or the intellect, no. On so many, many other ways. Ways he knew now.
What was wrong with him? If anyone could manage it, manage something of that sort of deep attraction, that kind of emotion for something unworldly, so incompatible to the concept of their reality...if anyone could. He supposed it must be him.
He wished, so deeply, in that moment, he could choose to go into himself and remove that self paired so tightly to that wonder filled, childish boy from him completely, destroy these emotions, and let them burn.
There was a shift in the planet, a great ring like saturn’s around it, hung huge and impossible against the sky before him. A slight tilting at the horizon, rapidly allowing for even less light than before to spill against the landscape. Gentle hues of reds and greens spread across the ground, fleeing pools of liquid light disappearing through the ground before him as he walked. And that multicolored dirt began to glow, very softly, reaching out into the dark and touching at his heavy, stifled footsteps. His heart took apart with every step. Ripping at his chest. Winding through his being. Like those black arms. Like those small fingers, thousands of dark shadowed ropes winding through him.
He just couldn’t stop the bleeding of that deep wound. And even the anger, rage and grief couldn’t drown it or snuff it finally away. He shut his eyes as he walked, hunching his shoulders to the wind, trying to calm himself, utilize his intellect, turn to his mind. Clutching weakly, nakedly to one of his six fingered hands. Ones his Muse had admired. Ones he had felt those black, alien ones slipped up to hold once upon a time. And had meant something to him he wasn’t prepared to look at anymore. He was too tired to analyze it or to feel it.
And Ford hated himself, hated himself so strongly, so bitterly, with such a passion and such blatant disgust. Perhaps more than he could express. More than he could ever put into any words. Swallowing back his emotions, turning to the wind, the dirt and the abyss with a desperate, furious gaze. The rage turning to a real target: himself. He felt as if he could be swallowed by it. Good. Let him be.
He would abandon his old self today, he thought desperately. He would abandon that boy, so filled with devotion and wonder and curiosity; now so, so ashamed deeply by the open, bright responses to the flattery, to the gentle nudges of his research in another direction, to the lessons and chess and so many quiet moments together. He’d abandon those bright smiles, the excited glow that shot through him in his eagerness, from a creature that existed for eons giving him the time of day. He would abandon that devotional child in the dust and build in himself something new. He would drown his old self, bury it into the sea. Be reborn.
And he would find this new person in these worlds and dimensions, throughout the cosmos...until one day, in his journey, he would defeat Bill. He would in fact become the man who changed the world. And by that, it would be by the demon’s demise. He hunched his shoulders, moving out toward a collection of rocks, face set grimly, and mind more settled, grasping to the thought like a lifeline, like a ground he could possibly step against. He would change. And in it, he would die.
Ironically, it was probably what Bill would want...
Right…?
His death. Pretty unfortunate that it would be so different than the demon perhaps imagined.