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“I’ll be back,” Killer said. Dust sighed.
“Mkay…”
“Just find a way to entertain yourself for a few minutes, play Candy Crush on your phone or something,” Killer said, already heading towards the nearest bathroom.
“I’m not a white soccer mom.”
Killer made his way down the empty hallway, footsteps echoing loudly like each one was a gunshot drilling into his skull. His soul ached with numbness and apathy. He’d been working nonstop all week, Nightmare had been spending him on mission after mission, hardly giving him a break to sleep or eat. And just a few hours ago…
“You and Dust will go to AU 1344, you need to locate and acquire a folder that will likely be in some kind of locked container.” Nightmare said. He held up a red spiral-bound folder. “It would look like this except it would be labeled ‘December-March’.”
“Got it.” Dust said, sounding the opposite of enthusiastic.
“Yes, sir.” Killer sighed. He hadn’t eaten in two days. He wasn’t exactly thrilled to get sent on a mission when Horror was literally making dinner right now and it smelled absolutely delicious.
Nightmare looked up at him, his gaze sharp. Quickly, Killer straightened his posture and fixed his miserable expression. “Do you have something to say, Killer?”
“No, sir.” He said softly.
A tentacle lurched towards his face. Killer reeled back unthinkingly, but it didn’t matter. The tentacle grabbed him by the chin and dragged him close, making him slam his knees into the desk painfully and fall against the furniture.
“Don’t you ever forget that the only reason you’re alive right now is to serve me. If it wasn’t for me, your pathetic ass would’ve withered away and died in your shitty AU like the miserable worm you are.” Nightmare said, his voice deadly calm. Killer didn’t dare look away even though he was shaking. “You should be thanking me for finally giving you a purpose. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.” He said, voice strained.
“Good.” Then, he shoved Killer away. “Now get to it, dog.”
He and Dust left the office, not looking at each other. They were teleported to the AU as soon as the door closed, but for a moment neither moved. Killer stood there, staring hard at the ground while emotions burned inside of him. And after that moment passed, Dust sighed and leaned against the wall, pulling a box from his pocket. Dust quietly offered him a cigarette, a subtle but sweet display of sympathy. At least for Dust. Killer was happy to take the cigarette from him.
“You wanna get something to eat before we go on the mission?” Dust asked.
“Uh-… Yeah. Sure.” Killer said.
It was a nice moment between him and Dust. But Killer was still shaken. Killer was still upset and angry and exhausted. And yet at the same time, he was so fucking numb, so fucking starved of dopamine.
He closed the bathroom door and immediately rolled up his sleeve. Killer undid the bandages, letting them hang loose. His wrist was still tender from the last time he cut it. Messy and bloody scabs, some that were still bright red and hurt, but others that were healed for the most part but still textured what should be smooth bone unpleasantly.
Killer readied his knife, putting the tip against the bone. He liked cutting in patterns, lines going up and down then other lines crossing those horizontally, but now he was running out of space to do that. Maybe these should go diagonal across that grid pattern.
Pushing the blade down hard, he dragged it back quickly. He cringed a little in pain, but it didn’t hurt as much as he wanted it to and, even though it was red, it didn’t bleed immediately. Killer adjusted his grip on the knife, stealing his resolve, then he cut even harder and even deeper.
Useless. Worthless. A pathetic worm. The only person he had value to was Nightmare. The only person who’d ever found him useful was Nightmare. Maybe he was just being ungrateful. I mean, he was being given a home and good food, and clean water. That’s so much better than someone like him deserved.
But at the same time, he fucking hated being treated like that. He hated getting grabbed and dragged around like a doll, he hated it when Nightmare touched him at all. It was like he had a physical reaction every time Nightmare touched him, a complete repulsion to the contact. And Nightmare had to know that, he HAD to, and Nightmare did it just to make him suffer. All of this was to make him suffer.
Killer winced and sucked in a breath. The cut he just made was so deep that it snapped him out of his thoughts, it hurt so badly that his vision went dark around the edges. Each beat of his soul sent more blood spilling down his wrist. The ones that were bleeding the most were the first one and the last one.
“Fuck…” He mumbled.
He made his way to the sink, rinsing off the blood. Using the paper towels, he tried to stop the bleeding by pushing the paper against the cuts as hard as he could. And as he was trying to stop the bleeding, he looked up at himself in the mirror.
God, he really was a pathetic mess. He looked tired. His face was smudged by black tears and his expression was just so… numb.
He moved the paper towel to stare at his wrist, hoping the bleeding had stopped. And for a moment, it did, but then it started beading blood again. Killer groaned in annoyance and pushed the paper towel against it again.
“Killer.” Dust called, knocking on the door. Killer jumped, he looked towards the door in absolute dread. “Come on, we need to get going before the boss gets all pissy.”
“Right, uh, coming.” Killer called back. Fuck. Dust was rushing him out of the bathroom, yet his stupid fucking wrist wouldn’t stop bleeding.
“I know you’re not pissing, so what the hell are you doing?” Dust asked, voice light. But Dust’s standards.
Killer bit his tongue as he thought. Skeletons don’t use the bathroom. What excuse could he give that Dust would believe?
“Wouldn’t you like to know, scumbag.” Killer teased, throwing in a quiet laugh. His head was a little light. He shakily grabbed the bandages that were hanging from his wrist and wrapped them around his cuts tightly. He looked around the bathroom, realizing there was blood all over the floor and the sink, but not having time to clean it.
He stepped out of the bathroom, closing the door behind him. Dust looked tired as well, clearly just wanting to get this over with. And so, they went about their business.
But as they went through the process of locating the place and hunting through the building without being spotted, Killer started to feel worse and worse. Whenever he’d turn his head too fast, he’d get super dizzy. Any time he had to squeeze his hand closed to grab or hold something, it hurt like a motherfucker.
“Oh god, how many filing cabinets does one fucking place need?” Dust groaned as they entered yet another room full of filing cabinets. This was just one of many they’d searched through.
“Man, I gotta sit down for a minute.” Killer mumbled. Dust looked over at him, eyes flicking up and down his body. Then, he nodded. God, he must look as bad as he felt if Dust wasn’t protesting being left to do all the work.
Killer made his way to a desk and sat down in the chair. He slumped against the desk and closed his eyes, glad to relax but scared he’d fall asleep. It had been so damn long since he slept.
But as he lay there, he began to realize just how sticky and slick his arm was. Killer looked up at his arm, but the bandages were hidden by his sleeve. He glanced over at Dust to make sure he wasn’t looking, then pulled his arm to his chest and pulled the sleeve up.
The bandages were completely soaked through.
“Oh shit…” He mumbled. One of the cuts must’ve nicked a leyline or something.
He set his hand over where he remembered the cuts being and squeezed his arm as hard as he could. Hopefully, the pressure would get it to stop bleeding. Dropping his forehead to the desk, he stared at his arm in his lap as his thoughts from before came back.
It was this weird conflict in his mind; truly and deeply believing that he was so worthless that Nightmare treating him like a tool was a good thing, and also another part of him that was spiteful and hated the way Nightmare degraded him and abused him. One moment, one side would take over and he’d feel one way, then the other side would take over and he’d feel different.
Murderers like him didn’t deserve happiness. He didn’t deserve to just get away with everything he’s done. This was his karmic punishment from the universe. He should be thanking Nightmare for saving him, for taking him away from that terrible place and making him useful to someone, even if it was just as a tool. He truly was an ungrateful, worthless, pathetic, ugly, disgusting creature. And when that half took over, Killer felt so trapped. He felt helpless and sad and numb.
And at the same time, fuck Nightmare! Fuck being trapped, fuck his stupid fucking emotions and feelings, fuck everything about his shitty life. How the hell did his life get so complicated? How did this happen? It was all so fucking ridiculous. He wanted to kill himself, if only to watch Nightmare’s stupid face shift when he realized he couldn’t control Killer forever. And when this side took over, he felt anger burn away the numbness. Manic energy and spite join the anger like overexcited dogs.
And strangely enough, when he thought about killing himself, he felt so much better. He felt relieved, although the relief was tinged by a note of sadness. Killer fantasized about killing himself so often that the thoughts felt normal, safe. Sometimes, he comforted himself to sleep by fantasizing about how he’d do it and how freeing it would feel to dig his blade into his soul.
“I think this is it.” Dust said. He looked up at the other. Dust was holding the red folder with the date on it.
“Good. Now let’s get the hell out of here.” Killer said.
They brought the folder back to Nightmare. Killer gave a breakdown of what happened on the mission, and then they were allowed to go. And this time, Killer wasn’t sent on another mission. Which is great because he was feeling incredibly woozy.
“I’m sure Horror saved some leftovers if you’re still hungry.” Dust said.
“Uh… Yeah I-I m-m-…” His voice petered out.
Dust gave him a quizzical look. “Are you ok?”
The weight in his head shifted. It felt like the front half of his head suddenly lost weight while the back part gained it, making it increasingly difficult to keep his head up. His vision began to swim and darken at the edges.
Suddenly, his back and head struck the ground. Killer was asleep but not. He was out cold, but acutely aware he was out cold. And for a while, he just floated in the tingly not-hot-not-cold void.
And, just as suddenly as he slammed into the ground, he started coming back to himself. His wrist started aching again, but now his head and back hurt as well. They were all throbbing simultaneously in agony, jarring him awake unpleasantly.
He struggled to open his eyes. Not only was he worn out in every possible way, his very life was dangling by a thread, but the goop in his eyes had solidified them shut like glue. But eventually, he managed to open his eyes.
Killer wasn’t in the hallway. He was in his undershirt and pants, jacket nowhere to be seen. And around his wrists were gauze being held in place by clean bandages that smelled like antiseptic. But there was another smell that permeated the air.
Weakly, he turned his head to see a plate of food near him. He was so comfortable where he was that he didn’t want to reach for it, but he knew he’d feel better if he did eat something. He could already feel the healing intent that had been poured into it. Killer must’ve scared the shit out of his comrades to get such tender treatment. He’d have to apologize about that later. And in front of the plate was a note propped up so he could read from where he lay. He stared through the dark at it, trying to read what it said, and when the meaning of the symbols cut through his brain fog, he couldn’t help but laugh.
‘Go back to sleep, loser.’