Hymns of Struggle

6- The Siren

"So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another." - Romans 12:5

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Who was he?

He knew who he was today. The shepherd, the prophet. The one who recognized that salvation was within the grasp of any of the lost sheep who wished for it. He knew that when the ink flooded beyond the stairwells and into everyone's veins, they had become of the same blood as their lord. His duty was to thank Bendy for this mercy, for saving him from the sweltering nothingness and for providing hope...hope that he could be who he was before.

But who did he used to be?

Do you have a name?

His demeanor of provocation fragmented into uncertainty. He felt his brow rise and his mouth gape.

...He could not remember his name.

In his soul he tightly held onto grains that said he had one; he had a name sometime before all this. The rest eluded him, an entire beach of memory pulled into an ocean by the tide of ink one spec of sand at a time. What he held in his hands was all he could find, and they were so few. A terror sank through him. He never noticed before how little he had left of the person he needed to keep.

Corporality was not the only piece of himself that dissolved in the black brine of souls.

The ocean. He detested the remnants that still soaked his mind. That was where his own soul laid to rest every time his useless form fell apart, until Bendy allowed him to dwell his lord's path again. There were endless wails and murmurs of a thousand-fold swimming through emptiness. "Like fish in a bowl." He heard them, he listened...he heeded. After all, they were no worse than he, sinner of sinners. He wanted them to understand the salvation Bendy had put before each of them.

It had been a very long time since he was in the puddles last; he recalled with chills when his lord punished him. And yet, even after Bendy rejected the sheep offered to him...his prophet called upon him to provide the strength to reform again so he may do his will. Amid the curses and anguish of the ungrateful, he would sing to their savior and encourage his brethren to do the same.

He will set us free!

A simple melody of compassion, courage, and clarity. It offered everything the sufferers craved to cleanse their wounds of wickedness. He hoped...he trusted that if all who needed Bendy's grace reached for him, they would finally be saved. So simple a task. So miraculous in return.

And yet no one would be of the choir. Everyone was enveloped in their own greedy woe.

A lonely existence that maddened every drop of humanity left in the gutters of his heart.

He had never thought about his solitude. After all, his heart now overflowed like a chalice of a bridegroom before they wed. His lord kept blessing with his love even as the wine cascaded over the rim and gushed over his hands and onto the floor, until he filled the room with himself.

...And yet...and yet...

Grief and confusion whirled over him, a spinning transparency emerging from the lighthouse on his shore that searched for answers where there were none.

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She noticed the struggle- her captor shuddering and their fear proving contagious, radiating between them. Her expression shifted to say something but was withheld, unsure if the creature would be interrupted; it seemed they were asking themselves her question. It felt best not to interfere but there was anxiety in waiting for regret to emerge.

There wasn't a conscious awareness of it, but a name to her meant more than what to call them- it meant there could be something within them to grasp. A desperate hope that seethed against everything she had faith in. She needed them. Fuck, she needed them, and they're the one she wanted to be away from the most.

Their reticence had brought back the memories of them together under the spotlight.

They could set her free; if not of the hell around them but then of the one inside of her. The sight of them still sent adrenaline through her nerves and she couldn't forget what happened to her- but it would bring relief, somehow less dread as their shadow rested over her from above. Maybe a belief there would be no more harm to her- valid or not, still a welcome belief. Even if she couldn't forgive.

All she wanted was to stop being scared, to allow her heart to ease just for a moment, if not for good then at least until she died here.

Maybe there was a reason she saw the monster and the physical pain had ceased. She felt so certain she was dying, even so. Maybe they could explain it to her. She didn't even think of escape yet; she didn't even think of why she came, what she searched for so urgently. So inconsiderately in the face of her demise, she just wanted to know. She hoped. She hoped. Maybe.

Any alternatives would result in her spiritual end.

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These revelations of their lives had only been conceived within a few seconds.

Never had this happened. Never had anyone thought of him. Never had he wanted to know about himself like that before. Never had he tried to know, either. Even refracted by the tinted lenses of odium- revealing his corruption to be so absolute that she doubted he could be worthy of a name...-

She was the first to ask him who he used to be.

But soon, matters of mortality overcame history. His heart raced as he comprehended...he was not among the puddles. His lord rejected his offering and hadn't rightfully incurred his wrath as he had done before. He was still here, left with the sheep.

He loosened the ropes behind her back.

"It...does not matter now. And it won't until the day he sets us free."

Maybe his calls weren't in vain after all.