The Melting Mind of One Fictum Ernest

Cycle Two: Wet Rat

It's quiet, I've never heard quiet, no voices; theirs' or mine... I like it, turning off all my senses and it feels familiar, but I can't tell why... oh that's right, I'm dead... should I be upset? Who am I even asking. None of life's ambient aches can reach me here in death; perpetual, inevitable bloody heaven, or hell... purgatory? I can't really tell; not like I can ask anyone else their opinion... Alright back to work.

I rip my eyes open against the binding force of sleep gunk encrusted between my lids (it's called rheum), but it fails to improve visibility as I find myself sealed in a bin bag, the polystyrene pushing in against me from all sides. (what happened?) how can a voice inside my head be breathless (DeATh.) (is this death? I expected more) (we will suffocate to death in a few minutes) (well Ernest! Are you preoccupied? C'mon!) reaching out I attempt to grab the bag, but it just bends around my grasping hands, it feels like I'm wrestling with a river, my back is scratched against a pebbled surface. I push the against the solid surface to finally get a grip, on the bag not reality. As soon as I start to pull the bag a jet of water blast me and rends the bag immediately and I discover how truly difficult it is to cough underwater when the current pulls me down the river (get to it gumshoe). Thrashing against the current leave me able to catch gulps of air amongst the taste of filthy water until I drift onto shore, completely drenched if it wasn't obvious. (you even struggle to swim, beyond pathetic) (it's more common than you'd think, percentage wise-) I lose my temper.

"HOW BOUT ONE OF YOU BASTARDS COME OUT FOR A BLOODY LAP!" my fury devolves into sputtering as I clear brown water from my lungs (back those words with some action and you may one day sprout a spine) (now that would be inspirational) I turn my attention back to the river and spot a bin bag gliding near the surface tied down to cinderblock (no expense spared for detective Ernest) "oh it felt like the royal treatment" once I catch my breath I see my reflection in the muddy water, my hair is long like uncut grass clung to my face from overhydration which transitions into patchy stubble on my lower face. I was skeletal and tired with sunken, bloodshot eyes and a mangled scar ripping across my nose. All of that on top of the dried blood plastering my luminously pale skin even after a dip in the river, I can see why people try to avoid me (woof.) "oh, shut up." I look into the exhausted eyes reflecting back from the muck "why am I doing this?" (you're stupid-) (To dO LiKE This Is wHy You BlEEd) "and what if I just don't then?" my voice is dripping with unobstructed venom, why wouldn't it be (You WOn'T, yOU ChoSE tHIs) I can't restrain a baffled chuckle as I fall back into the mud, pulling strands of hair back out of my face "when did I make this choice exactly?" (fROM BiRtH tO DEatH YoU chOSE SPITE. ANGER. FUry) (very helpful riddle-master, now why am I here) (SaME) (what? I'm a decent guy, is there anyone I can talk to so we can clear this up) I end up ignoring most of the gibberish bouncing around my head, sitting up in the puddle of filth "can I get in plain English, who am I supposed to be working for" (I and Snake and Killer and War and Self) I suppose that is as clear as I can hope for.

I walk in circles going down the list of everything hopeless in y current situation, I would speak to them aloud but there are only so many hours in the day (this is pathetic, Alexi sought your end, and yet you wallow instead of finding and gutting them! I would-)

"DO NOTHING! You- you are practically imaginary! You can and will do... wait let me check. NOTHING! But Jibber incessantly every second of the goddamn day!" (pft ehehe-) "don't start" I sigh. With my patience on its last leg I head upstream towards the blinding sight of an artificially illuminated city, after a fem minutes of walking a footbridge comes into sight with three figure atop the old bricks, two far larger than the third who did almost all of the talking as the ogre lessen intently, as though their lives depended on it. I manage to catch a few snippets of conversation before I am noticed.