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The air around them was cold, and it ached his mangled lungs as he breathed. Pain… for so long, pain was all he had ever known.
Someone was… talking… a child, maybe… a girl… her voice was gruff. She shouted his captor’s name.
The world shifted. He was… on the ground… he thought he was on the ground. Somewhere…
Where… were they…?
No one else came. He stayed in his position on the ground, curled in his prison. Tenna hadn’t moved. Why not? He had stopped keeping track of time, but he knew Tenna had not moved for a while. He knew…
He heard… shouting…
“Guys! He’s over here!”
Voices… quiet… louder, now…
“Oh— is that blood? He—“
Something…
Tenna was… cold… and the machinery, the ever constant churn of machinery that held him like a cage was no longer whirring. Cold… freezing… he hadn’t moved from his position on the ground…
“Someone— someone do something! He’s going to bleed out! He’s—“
Someone touched Tenna, just barely, and the machinery around him jolted, like a final, wheezing breath. Spamton screamed.
Someone else did, too.
“What— what was— was that—“
It was kind of like being shocked. Like his captor, his partner, his friend had shocked him back to life, as a final goodbye, a final apology. It was hurt, hurt hurt hurt hurt hurt hurt hurt hurt and searing blinding pain and terrible awful as gnarled bones and festering wounds mended themselves, and it was just how it felt when he had removed him from his chest so many times and pried his mouth open to shove a ReviveMint down his throat and keep him alive, keep him trapped.
“…That wasn’t Tenna.”
Whoever spoke had done it quietly, like they were afraid if they spoke too loudly the dying machine encasing him would come back to life.
“Then who—?”
Someone… was loosening the chains…
He was worried, for a moment, that it was his captor. But Tenna had never been this slow, and the unmoving machine surrounding him led him to believe he was alone in his prison.
“The hell are you doing?” It was the voice from before. The girl. “What do you mean that wasn’t Tenna, Ramb, it came right from him, who else could it have possibly—“
Light peaked through his constraints. Sunlight. Beautiful and blinding. All encompassing. The hands untying him pulled away. The hustle and bustle surrounding them went deathly quiet, as though the world had come to a stop, and…
He could move.
“Oh, Angel, there’s something inside of him!” He recognised that voice. Elnino.
He reached towards the sunlight…
Another scream. Blood curdling. A woman. Lanina?
Shouting… crying…
Who was crying… why…? He…
First his hand… then his head… his torso… both arms grasped the sides of his cage, prying himself free, and the constant coating, marinating of blood that was always there came with him, sloshing out and onto — snow, that was snow. For so long, all he had ever seen was red, but this was white, just like the sun. White.
He gasped, breathing in cold air, fresh air, not the stifling, warm and eternal air of Tenna, or the clammy air of the studio, he… his lungs burned. It was the best pain he had ever felt. He reveled in it as his hands clawed at the edges of his captor. He wasn’t strong enough to pull himself free. He tried. He tried. Tenna was still keeping him trapped.
His legs… he hadn’t used them in years, they were practically useless by now, and he couldn’t use them to push himself any further.
“Angel, fuck, what is that, what—“
“Don’t just stand there! Someone help him!”
Someone… grabbed him. Gentle hands. Gentle. Like they were touching something like porcelain. Some fine China. Like he would crumble and blow away in the wind.
Someone grabbed him, and lifted him into the sunlight. Into Heaven.
“Lay him down, luv. Let me get a look at him.”
They set him in the snow. It was freezing, but he didn’t mind — all he had ever felt for so, so long was his captor’s unending warmth. It stung his open wounds. He didn’t care.
“M…Mr. Ramb, s-sir,” another voice spoke. Another child? A boy, this time. “Who… who is that?” His voice cracked, wavered. It sounded wet. Was he the one crying?
Ramb took a breath. He sucked air through his teeth as he assessed his wounds. Again, treating him with such gentle care. Such gentle hands.
“His name is Spamton.” He began, and it seemed like he thought over his next words carefully. “I’ll explain all in due time. We need to get him somewhere safe as soon as possible.”
“W— We can take him t-to Castle Tow-n,” the boy was choking up again, clearly having a difficult time pulling himself together. “He’ll b-be saf-e t-t-there. We- can treat his w-wound-s there.”
He heard murmuring. He heard someone say, “that’s Spamton? Our Spamton? T… Tenna’s Spamton? What happened to him?”
What happened…?
He had been through hell and back. He had suffered, and suffered, and suffered. He had been alone for so long, hurting and hurting and hurting anytime Tenna moved, anytime he breathed. Constricting around him like a snake. Anacondas will sometimes cannibalise their mates. He was merely prey. Merely a means to an end.
But he was alive. He was alive.
He was alive… and Tenna wasn’t. It was the only reasonable answer. Tenna wouldn’t have let this happen. Wouldn’t have allowed him freedom. No amount of begging, pleading, clawing, screaming, convinced Tenna to let him free. Nothing.
But…
He felt the cold air in his lungs. Felt the snow touch him, wrapped all around him. Felt the sun reach down and graze him, cradling his face like a lover.
It was real. It was real. It had to be. He had stopped dreaming years ago.
It was real.
He
Was
F
r
e
e.