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The scent of freshly cut grass wafted through the air. It felt oppressive in the way that it pressed down on Finn, made him feel like he couldn't breathe.
He was walking somewhere, he realized. He hoped it was home - oh, how he ached to just lie down and forget, forget, push it all down - but he couldn’t be bothered enough to check. The movement of his legs was automatic, guided by naught but instinct. Not even his sight helped him; so focused on nothing that his sight swam not even with stars, Finn wasn’t processing any of the light hitting his eyes.
He felt like he was going to throw up.
The absence at his side was so sorely felt, the thud of only one pair of shoes on the soft, forgiving ground making his ears ring.
Something had shattered just minutes ago, he was just present enough to remember, but trying to push through and think about what it could've been (a foolish thing to even attempt, really) only left him shattered even smaller.
Tears didn't sting at his eyes. Grass clung to every part of him, embracing him, smothering him until the urge to just hold his breath and let himself succumb became too strong.
He felt like he was going to throw up.
In the middle of the empty aching grasslands, Finn found himself swimming. His thoughts wove thickly between tacky pitch, trickling in just often enough to keep him on his toes, and the most aggressive of ocean waves, lapping ruthlessly at the shoreline until even the strongest rock was corroded into nothing but the sand beneath a beach. It was nauseating, the way his mind was racing at a snail's pace, the way his mind was crawling by so fast that it ought to shame even the most desperate of gazelles.
With each step he took, the trickle slowed and sped, to and fro. With each step he took, the shards pieced themselves back together to allow more surface area to shatter.
It was getting dark out. Retreated into the farthest corners of his mind while he waited for the Vault to swoop in and do its job, a part of Finn almost forgot why he'd been out in the first place.
Something horrible stirred in his mind, like a beast awoken by the snap of a twig, and -
Just like that, it shattered again, and only one pair of footsteps echoed off the grass.
He felt like he was going to throw up.
Whatever had stirred in his mind, whichever beast it was that he'd awoken didn't seem to want to go back to sleep despite the beautiful stained glass mosaic of a bed Finn had so delicately crafted for it. It pranced through his head (though Finn couldn't identify where it came from, the shape of its footprints, nor the reason why it had such an acrid scent of grass), only helping him to shatter the rest of what lay intact.
Thoughts swam behind his head slowly in circles like drowning fish; images, memories. He stared at them through his mind's eye, studying every angle and crack and seam until the images nearly fell apart. The thoughts were thick and sturdy, and Finn got the feeling that they should be a lot more visible under better circumstances. Thankfully, however, whatever the images depicted was lost to Finn; after all, what use can you really get out of a magnifying glass with a shattered lens?
Something weighed heavily down on Finn, making him antsy and paralyzing him just the same.
Even so, his feet kept marching onwards, dragging him along to an unknown destination.
A pause in the trickle, the light refracting off the shards in just the right way, and Finn had just a moment's glimpse of where and what and why he was.
He remembered, of course - it's all he'd thought about since; it's the reason he'd hardly had a single thought since - the fight that went down earlier. The feeling of being pinned, of a sharp at his throat and a cutter to his stomach. He remembered, of course, the way he'd pleaded and tried to deescalate, the way his words just seemed to anger him even more. He remembered, of course, the desperation and the grief in the eyes of the other, and he remembered, of course, the way the fight had ended with his arm -
And just like that, something shatters again, and the shards make a much better shield than Finn could've ever hoped. Memories swam back down, hidden in the crevices of the Vault where they belonged yet banging on the doors still demanding to be let out.
The beast chose to stay where it sat rather than following its roots to the back of his mind, clawing at the inside of his head and giving him a headache.
No matter how hard his mind's eye tried to picture it, he still couldn't quite see what the creature looked like nor identify the prints it left behind.
The feeling of grass clinging to his skin made Finn feel more nauseous than he'd ever felt before.
He was certain he was going to throw up.
Something malicious sat just behind his eyes. This time, Finn was smart enough to leave it be, to turn his gaze away from its harsh glare.
He could've sworn he heard the sound of crunching as glass continued to break beneath his feet, leaving a trail for no one else to see as he walked.
All he wanted was to make it home intact, to take a shower and wash from himself the sins of today, to compress himself beneath his blankets until the sound of tinkling glass and whirring motors stopped screaming loud enough to make his ears ring. He wanted to wield the shattered glass like a weapon, protecting him from it and himself until the creature behind his eyes shriveled and died.
No matter how hard he tried, however, the sound of one pair of footsteps deafened him and that creature kept returning to sit just behind his vision.
Again, something managed to trail its way out of his Vault, reminding him of what had happened. It only made sense, Finn figured - If you play with broken glass, you ought to get cut eventually.
This time, the glass stood too tall and proud to shatter, instead crushing Finn beneath its own weight. The memory of the temple, of the hissing of machinery, the feeling of grass above and beneath him and such a light ache on his stomach wrapped around him, choking him, demanding it be responsible for his last breath.
He could still see the way Fern's eyes had changed,
(he was going to throw up, he was sure. It was a miracle his legs were still managing to walk)
the way his own arm cut so effortlessly through his adversary's head,
(even the deafening scream of cracking glass wasn't enough to drown out the whirring)
through his entire being,
(Finn may have survived the fight, but with the way that beast clawed at his soul, he knew he'd lost the life he had. Only one pair of shoes flattened the grass beneath him, the absence of green haunting the corner of his eyes in a way that made him blink away tears that never threatened to appear)
until he was reduced to nothing more than the scent of freshly cut grass and the clippings that clung to -
Finn wasn't shaking. He wasn't crying, and he wasn't fidgeting, either. All he was doing was simply walking, going wherever his instinct brought him, letting that nothing in the place of him take the wheel.
He wasn't present enough to notice his own hand reaching up to turn the doorknob, nor was he paying enough attention to hear the way the door clicked shut behind him.
Up a ladder his body took him (only effortlessly avoiding all the broken glass), and with the images of a friend turned foe fading far too fast from his mind, Finn found himself being greeted by Jake calling out.
In all honesty, he missed what Jake said at first, but he didn't miss the concern in his tone nor the worry in his eyes when he turned to look at him.
"...Wait, what happened?" he was just present enough to catch, the sound shocking him back to reality, easing him out of the snail's race. Mentally, he tried to shake off the ache of glass, the way his stomach still bled. He didn't even realize that he'd never pulled his shirt back down, never wiped the grass of his victory off of himself.
He opened his mouth without thinking, moving to answer on instinct, only to close it again when he realized there was nothing for him to say. What could he say?
Any words hid behind that wall of glass, taunting him from the other side, far too cracked to see clearly. Maybe he'd never see them clearly again.
Maybe that would be better than this.
"I know that look!" BMO chimed in cheerfully, pausing in her assault on Jake's newest vuvuzela.
"You just killed someone." He pointed towards Finn, blowing the horn.
All Finn could do in response, so tortuously stuck somewhere between reality and naught, cracks and clarity, was bring a hand up to his eye. Before long, it was accompanied by his other hand resting as well against his face. It took everything within him to ignore the scent of grass.
Finally, after being absent for so much of the day -
tears did not prick at Finn's eyes.
Only present enough he remained to hear the sound of two pairs of shoes approaching, to feel the presence at his side of his friends and family alike comforting him atop this fractured mosaic throne.
Just one last time, guided by the hand of Jake and BMO's comfort, Finn let it all shatter out of sight where it couldn't bother him anymore.
He knew by now, however, how poorly a prison made of glass held in a beast like what now populated his head, waiting at the tip of his sword each fight for every swing.
When Finn slept that night, he was not surprised by the creature sleeping alongside him at the foot of his bed; and when he awoke the next morning, he was not surprised by the way the crackling of glass still echoed in his ears loud enough to blind him whenever he dared to avert his gaze.
