Shell Shocked

I

Life is strange.

Once you're born, it takes years for you to develop a memory, then a personality. As you age, you become more mature, you have your own morals, your own life. As you get older, time seems to move faster. Work isn't what it used to be. Friends are disappearing left right and centre. Until it just stops. Then, when you wake, the only thing you remember is dying.

The crack of his bones as whatever evil that clawed at the soul demands his prescence in the underworld. The icy claws that peirce the skin and torment his every thought.

But he refused to die.

He was certain he was dying. After weeks of endless torture, people- people who used to be friends- laughing in the face of his body being torn apart and scarred. He remembered that day, the day he vowed to never give them what they wanted. He would never allow them to harm his people- his family. Not then, not now, not ever.

It was a strange feeling, being so close to death but never being able to reach it.

He flirted with death like a drunk at a bar, tormenting his own ghost and swirling the whiskey in his glass. He was reless and giddy, with no intention of going home. He knew he wasnt going home any time soon. He wasn't escaping their clutches.

He vaguely remembered the day he returned. The alarms blared loudly, bursting his eardrums and causing him to groan. He didn't move, though. He couldn't.

When the doors burst open and guards rushed down the corridors, paying no mind to the blood that coated the floors and they trampled into the carpets upstairs. His blood.

Hours must have passed, his senses dwindling. His hearing had long gone, he had lost all sense of feeling in his arms. The pain was fading. Darkness was overtaking his vision.

Until he heard something.

The rattling of a cage.

His cage.

At first It was a mumble. But, then it got louder, until it was so close it was deafening.

It was a plea.

A plea not to die.

He was certain he was dead. Blinded by the darkness of the room. He swore he heard his brothers voice, alongside his father's- and his best friends. But, he couldn't tell for sure.

He tried to move, but everything felt like a dead weight. He scoffed  why was he fighting? You're dead, aren't you? Why are you fighting? he questioned himself. Perhaps they were waiting for him there- perhaps they had truly destroyed everything he had. Had they taken the lives which he valued most?

Hours passed and he had long ago given up to remove himself from his purgatory of white noise. Surely he would die soon? Surely, he could cross over the threshold and die before he has to suffer any more.

That's when he felt it. The crack felt like ice. Whatever he had been drugged with had suddenly fragmented and he was left hovering over an endless abyss.

Until he saw them. His eyes had been crusted shut, the room blinding as he peeled them open to assess his surroundings.

Is this what Hell looked like?

His father, his brother, his best friends- and eventually, his cousin, who was cautiously rubbing his chest to try and rouse him from his slumber.

His sternum was broken, so Lorenzo knew he could not press on it without causing some serious pain.

Lorenzo said something, but he couldnt hear. All of their mouths moved, but it was like nothing was being said.

It was like something wasn't connecting. He couldn't understand any of his surroundings. Instead of silence, he could hear muffled hums, white noise that filled his vision as tears threatened to break.

Was this his Hell?

And he let them.

He remembered dying. He remembered gasping as he fought for the very thing he no longer wanted. He remembered the sheer agony of being alive.

That was agony enough, but this? This was more than he could take.