The Future, the Past and the Ugly (Untrusted Love: Electric Boogaloo)

Ch 3. A Constant Fate

Mono slept for a long time. His body needed time to heal and he couldn't quite remember the last time he got a good rest. So he remained in a deep slumber, a near-dead like state. He didn't need to eat, his body lacked any movement and the air was musty in his lungs; the kind of air that'd choke you out if you breathed it in for too long. Without as much as a single stir, Mono slept.

His brain was healing, too. It slowly began to process things. How he was truly alone, that he was alive, how he'd come to be on this chair. No dreams took him away, nothing to distract him. Just darkness.

/ / /

Mono woke slowly. It was more of a gradual regaining of his consciousness then a wake up. Mono opened his eyes. It was the first time he got a look at the room he was in as he had collapsed rather quickly. The fleshy mass had disappeared and was now replaced with solid concrete. Interestingly, a door sat in front of the chair. The usual engraving of an eye watched him from atop the frame.

Mono's head was heavy, how long had he been asleep for? He didn't try to move, his body had stiffened significantly and it frankly hurt to even look around. Mono felt as if he'd seen this place before. It hit him soon after, this was the Thin Man's room. This was his chair. For the millionth time, Mono froze. That couldn't be true! Was he destined to be the next Thin Man? Was this always his fate? Was.. was the previous Thin Man.. him? But that didn't make any sense! If that was true, why did he go after Six? His whole body felt like it was spinning but he hadn't moved.

"I-I don't understand!" He cried to no one. Maybe someone would answer him? His body finally moved as he trembled and shivered. Mono shook his head in denial. This wasn't real! It couldn't be real! Mono sobbed in confusion, pain and sadness.

"I just want Six!" He whimpered. His body was racked with sobs and he stayed crying for hours.

/ / /

For the first few days, all Mono did was cry. He cried for a long time. He cried until all the water in his tiny body should have run out. His cheeks were covered in tracks of salty tears stains, old and new. His nose was rubbed raw from wiping his sleeve across it. His ugly black eyes felt puffy and heavy. Mono's lungs burned with agony from the crying that turned into sobbing that turned into coughs that turned into wheezing.

His breathing was shaking, having finally stopped crying. A rare moment but he knew more crying was to come, it always did. Mono's body remained quivering slightly, occasionally shaking roughly if his breath caught in his throat.

The boy sat alone in the chair. Lamenting. His friend was gone, he'd just found out he may be the thing that took her away and he was tired. So exhausted. But he couldn't sleep. Whilst his eyelids hurt to leave open, closing them only brought terrors of that awful fall. Mono knew he was hungry. He should be hungry but he didn't feel like eating. His body rumbled and groaned, demanding that he needed food. But his brain, it didn't. His brain was preoccupied and found no time to alert him. His body desperately tried to activate his survival instincts, to go and find something to eat, but Mono refused.

He didn't want to keep trying or to get up again or to move forward or to find another goal to relentlessly chase down.

Or to live.

He didn't want any of that. He just wanted to give up. To sit there and wait until he died. Even the idea of going and finding Six was nothing more than a fuzzy and distant dream.

He couldn't do this anymore.

"I... give up"

/ / /

The next few days Mono sat in complete silence. He began hearing and seeing things. That constant buzz of nonexistent static mixed with flashes of a yellow raincoat was driving him mad. His desperation to make it stop drove him into hearing the flesh again, as if he was still being pulled into the mass.

Soon the fleshy noises turned to voices. At first they were indistinguishable, just a hoard of whispers. That soon became a few words he could make out. Mostly terrible adjectives like 'alone', 'forgotten' and 'unwanted'.

Mono missed when that was all he heard. Now, he found himself responding.

"You should be angry, furious" the voices said in a rough whisper.

"Why would I be angry?" Mono asked back quietly. He had lost all hope of these voices ever leaving him alone.

"She dropped you"

"Left you to rot"

"She never cared for you". Mono grimaced at the last one.

"She didn't drop me, I fell" he argued. She'd never do that to him! As if his mind was no longer safe, the voice's responded.

"Then why hasn't she come back for you?". At his silence, the voices went on. "You're alone down here. And you'll never leave. All you can do is be angry. Be furious! She left you like trash! Hate the monster that left you to DIE!" It screamed.

"No! Six is not a monster!" He yelled. He thought he yelled, anyway. It was his normal volume but he'd sat in pure silence for so long that even the sound of his own whispers felt like booming screams.

"Hate Six! Hate Six! Hate Six! Hate Six! Hate Six!" the voices chanted causing the boy to cover his ears.

"N-no!" He weakly protested but it was of no use. The voices never shut up after that.