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Wilson had long past lost count.
He remembered that first time, confusion forcing itself like a knife into the front of his mind as he opened his dark eyes slowly, head still a little fuzzy from what he presumed to be a fall. A scent that stung his chest from the inside out, his lungs burning as he inhaled the smoke from an unseen source, drifted past following a noise that sounded like something between a pop and a larger explosion. He was too dizzy, too disoriented by the sudden change of scenery around him, to even bother with trying to sit up and find out what had made the noise.
“Say, pal, you don’t look so good,” a voice, quiet yet somehow still booming voice stated calmly. “You should find something to eat before night comes.”
He remembered the startling terror that coursed through his veins that, seemingly, had no reason to be there. He knew the voice--it was the one that had instructed him beforehand and he thought that, just maybe, the man on the radio was trustworthy. The same sound repeated itself, the disgusting odor of smoke still lingering behind. With that, his vision cleared, his head still seemingly crying out for him to stay down, and he saw that the sun glared into his eyes, almost blinding with the pain he felt.
That night, he died.
Not because of starvation--he wasn’t stupid, despite what he had been told as a child--but because he had no idea of how the darkness would affect him. Something lurked within it; something huge and black as pitch and hungry. So, so hungry, for the flesh of the man whom had come from a place so far away.
The stranger who appeared that first day, his name was easy to find. Maxwell. A name that later was used to describe a song about a man killing two people and then himself with a “silver hammer”--a pistol. This man, this Maxwell, wasn’t as gracious when it came to death. A simple gunshot to the head would never satisfy his horrid, disgusting longing to watch this game piece suffer until he was finally put out of his misery.
Alas, it was never for long that the pain ended.
No matter how many times Wilson died, fire or hound attacks or spiders, it didn’t matter. He was revived and tossed carelessly back into the horrible world that he never knew. It changed with every death and spending so much time wandering, searching, figuring out the layout of the land, it was a fruitless effort. It was stupid of him to do this whilst knowing that, the next time he fell, he would lose what little progress he made.
Maxwell was never satisfied with any singular death. He wanted to see suffering, pain, emotional damage and permanent scarring. He was sadistic in that way; unafraid of killing him over and over without regret.
If he could, he would end his own life. It was useless, he knew, because Maxwell would just drag him back, kicking and screaming, into the world he wanted so desperately to escape from. He had to find a way out that wasn’t his own death; but was that even a possibility at this point?
He had cut himself with a razor and let himself bleed out. Had lit himself on fire. Let himself be killed by pigmen, spiders, hounds, beefalo, anything he could get to attack him. He had walked out of the radius of his small campfire. Hell, he even tried making a noose with what little rope he had been capable of making with the grasses he had found. Wilson just didn’t know what to do next.
He was out of choices, but he had to get out of this hell.