Chapter Text
Simon was sure he was dead.
He couldn't see. He felt like he was floating, submerged on all sides yet he didn't feel like he was drowning. There was no pain, though he felt like he should be in agony.
His mind slowly caught up with him, like shaking the fog away after waking from an intense dream. Was he still… alive?
He had felt the blood and fleshy tendrils meld with his skin. He had felt his arm rip from his socket. He had been conscious enough to feel the blood fill his lungs as he finally let himself let go. The blackbox was in the lifevest, he had done something good for once in his life, something bigger than himself. And it was worth it.
He had accepted that was how his life would end.
But it seemed that the universe had other plans.
You will never be free
Why the fuck was he still alive!? Sure, he had been more than ready to do whatever it took to survive but once he had given up, he sure didn't want whatever unnatural force that lived in the blood ocean to magically reverse his decision.
Suddenly, all Simon felt was anger. Why did this ocean, or rather the freaky monster, enjoy ruining his life so much!? Why couldn't it just kill him and not bother with dragging it out and making his life a nightmare first?
He clenched his fist and distantly felt something squishy in his hand.
Simon.
He couldn’t block out the voices if he tried though one spoke clearer, louder than the others. The blood was suffocating. It was loud. It was all consuming. It grew harder to distinguish his own thoughts from the voices.
It’s all your fault, Simon.
Was he even still alive? Was this what death was like? Were these the voices of those lost to the quiet rapture? Whatever this purgatory that he was in was, he was sure that he had earned it. All of his sins, all of his mistakes, had finally caught up to him.
You aren’t listening, Simon.
The voice was starting to sound more like the voice of the researcher from the SM-8–if that voice had ever been real in the first place. Everyone on the SM-8 had died, just like he had.
Maybe these were the voices of those who had been damned like him. All of the poor unfortunate souls who had died in the ocean of blood; all of them screaming for different things. The screaming was just noise to Simon.
He could feel his mind drifting but no longer could he feel his body. Did he even still have a body? …Did it really matter anymore?
SIMON!
~~
“Simon?”
Everything hurt, his head ached, each breath was pained, and it felt like he’d been put through a meat grinder then put back together.
“Simon!”
Something was grabbing his arm and shaking him. Distantly, he felt himself let out a groan of pain.
“Simon, can you hear me?” The voice repeated urgently, “Simon, just—Nod or open your eyes or… something!”
The last thing Simon wanted to do was open his eyes. He didn’t want to open his eyes if it meant finding out that he was still lost in the ocean of blood somewhere. He wouldn’t let himself be tricked again. He wouldn’t let that monster get the satisfaction of a rise out of him.
A moment of silence passed.
If Simon let himself drift enough, he could almost feel the blood sloshing around him, swaying back and forth as the current carried him along. He could almost let himself relax, let the ocean carry him off. The voices he associated with the ocean of blood were suspiciously quiet. Why hadn’t the monster killed him yet?
“Simon.”
No, he wasn’t in the ocean anymore. That feeling of swaying was gone, it was long gone now. He was somewhere solid, the feeling of warm blood all around him was gone too. In fact, it almost felt like–
“SIMON!”
Before he could register the yelling, a warm hand slapped him hard across the face. His eyes shot open and he sat up.
“Fuck!-” He cried out, his throat protesting the action as it sent him into a coughing fit.
“Hey,” a hand reached out to touch Simon’s shoulders, “It’s okay, you’re going to be okay.”
It took him a few moments to steady his breathing and collect himself. He looked up, his vision slightly blurred from tears he hadn't realized he had shed.
Ava was the one holding him, her hands firm yet seemingly gentle for her standards. She looked beaten up but nowhere near as bad as he felt.
“Where…?”
“You're in the med bay on the COI space station above AT-5,” She explain
ed slowly as she carefully pushed Simon back to lying down.
He looked past the captain and out at the rest of the medical bay. His eyes were less blurry now and he could make out the sight of a few other beds, some tattered curtains, and some basic medical equipment. Just as he moved his head to look down at himself, Ava took his head and tilted it back up towards her.
“Simon, you've been in and out of consciousness for a few weeks now. This is the most lucid you've been in almost a month,” She began to explain as they made eye contact, “...What happened in the SM-13? How are you alive?”
“...How the fuck am I supposed to know that?” He replied as he looked away and tried to look down at himself again. This time, Ava did not stop him.
Most of his body was covered by a thin and stained blanket but he could see his arms mostly were covered on bandages. He reached up to touch his face only to be greeted by the feeling of one hand on his cheek.
His heart skipped a beat as he quickly remembered his last moments in the SM-13. Desperate, fighting to survive as the sub filled with blood and tendrils grew from the metal walls to grab him. The blood sticking, his skin sticking. God—Why was everything so fucking sticky!? Though he had no time to regret anything after ripping off his own arm in order to get free.
He hardly remembered much from after that. He'd wrapped the black box in the life vest and then gotten back up at some point to ram the SM-13 into the monster… that was all he remembered clearly. He had some blurry visions from the ocean but nothing that he could truly grasp onto and confirm were real. Something about… voices?
“Simon,” Ava's voice broke through the memory, “It's okay, I'm sticking to my promise, you're free.”
Simon hadn't even noticed how his mind blocked everything out until he started to hear the heart monitor next to him calm down from its erratic beat.
“...After everything do you really expect me to believe you?” He said with as much of a glare as he could muster in his disoriented state, “What reason have you ever given me to trust you?”
“I'm sorry, Simon, okay?” Ava said genuinely as she gave Simon a sad look, her eyes looked tired as if she'd aged a few years in the time he'd been unconscious, “I really am. I don't think I can tell you how many orders I've disobeyed just to keep you alive in here. My higher-ups all want you either back in prison or experimented on… You should be dead.”
Simon took this opportunity to look—to truly look for the first time—at Ava. She was a younger woman than he'd expect for a captain. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a messy braid, highlighting the large scar on the left side of her face and her blind eye. Although she was young, probably younger than he was himself, she had clearly been aged many years by her experiences. She was just human, like everyone else.
The cold look she always gave was a mask, she was just as scared as everyone else. But if she showed how scared she was, how much it bothered her sending all of those convicts down to their deaths, then nothing would've ever gotten done.
“I…” Simon took a deep breath as he laid back down, “I'm sorry Ava… You don't deserve me being such an ass to you. Thanks for saving me.”
A part of Ava that she didn't realize had been tense finally relaxed.
“I did what had to be done,” Ava said as cooly as ever, “I'll call a doctor in. I know we don't have the best equipment here but we have enough to do some basic check ups. And, I apologize, but some blood samples will probably be necessary. I'll have someone bring in some food for you twice a day while you recover.”
She gave Simon a pat on his shoulder and what she hoped was a reassuring smile before turning towards the door.
“You're going to live, Simon,” Ava stated firmly as if trying to convince herself, “I promise.”