Do You Blame Yourself?

[Chapter 41] - The Devil's Wishes

TW!!

It was a razor.

No, maybe it wasn't.

Whatever it was, I'm not thinking about it again.

It had been some sort of dream- nope, it wasn't a dream. It was a whole nightmare. It was those types of nightmares that had you waking up soaked in your own sweat, hopefully not your own piss if you were a lucky one.

Thankfully, Kwazii was a lucky one. That would've been embarrassing.

But then yet again, it was still one of those nightmares that had you shaking hours after. The kinds of nightmares that have you convulsing, like the ground during an earthquake. If it was one of the worse ones, you would never fall asleep after. What had happened would imprint in your mind, and you could never close your eyes.

Kind of accurate, wasn't it?

This one was the worst.

The worst.

Emphasis on the 'the'.

This was the type of nightmare that has you screaming and sobbing in your bed, hoping that whatever happened really never did.

But what about that?

It wasn't like everything that had just happened would just... leave.

Leave his mind? Wouldn't happen without a therapist, that's for sure.

At this point, he had blocked most of what had happened out. That was the slightly easy part.

But the blood and the death and the gut wrenching pain and terror in that moment would never leave. No matter what.

It wasn't even real, why was he screaming and crying about it? Was he a child or something? Is that how he thinks of himself in this moment?

A damn nightmare. That's what he was losing his shit over.

If anyone was to tell you what it was about, it would be Kwazii. But he wasn't telling anyone about this. He'd have to be dead before he'd do that.

All he remembered was that it had something to do with stalactites and cave ins and that was it.

And blood. A lot of it.

Now usually, it's something normal. You don't see blood everyday, but the occasional paper cut or a simple scrape on a knee or elbow would cause some reaction, but this?

This was bad. This was almost 'out of a horror movie' bad.

...

It wasn't even, like, a scream. It wasn't loud or anything, it was muffled.

This wasn't in any dream, we're moving to real life now. From a distance, anyone would believe that he was okay, but to be honest, he wasn't.

But heavens forbid, someone had to hear him.

And that someone just had to be Peso.

To be fair, it was better than anyone else.

...

It wasn't even 3 AM, which made things even worse.

For a second there, Peso had thought that the sudden and somewhat quieted screaming was the Captain.

Why on earth did he think that?

It was high pitched, how would it be the captain's?

That idea was out the window.

"Was that you?" Peso whispered, peering into the lab.
"Hm?"
"I knew it. Go to bed." He gave a quick flick of his wrist towards Shellington.
"Not yet, let me waste my energy."

...

"You didn't happen to hear an... ear drum shredding scream, did you?" he asked.
"No?"

Was that a dream too?

"You didn't?"
"No, what happened?" He stood up.
"That's the problem, I don't know," Peso replied, "but either way, we both should be getting back to bed, especially you. I know what you do," he added, laughing.

Now all he had to do was figure out who, or what, had made that noise. He had some idea of who it could be since there were a few people out of the picture.

He really didn't want to see who he thought it was in that kind of struggle.

"Kwazii? Was that you?"

Nothing.

"Kwazii?"

Silence.

"Kwazii, if you don't answer me if you're awake, I'm going to come in."

Nothing but a quivering sob on the other end.

The sudden urge to poke through and see what was really going on behind closed doors nagged at him. "Kwaz, I'm coming in."

...

For a second, Peso had thought that he was asleep, maybe having a bad dream, nothing more. But as soon as Kwazii had moved his hands from his sides to cover his head, he knew that something was wrong.

Something happened, but he didn't know what.

And Kwazii wouldn't tell him anything.

"Kwazii?" He shook his side slightly, letting him know that he was there. He glanced down at him, awaiting a response, whether it was physical or verbal.

When he turned around, his stupid sobs had turned into a hysterical mess.

Was this stupid? To be this upset over something that wasn't real? Over something that hadn't happened? It sounded so utterly stupid, so ridiculous. It sounded like something a child would do, but it wasn't like nightmares and night terrors just...

Night terrors?

Was that the word? It sounded a bit too... eh, detailed and accurate, maybe?

It didn't fit, really. This was just some bad nightmare. It had to be.

It wasn't real, again.

Right?

...

"You weren't there! I couldn't do anything to stop it!" Kwazii sobbed, now a frantic, panicked mess.
"Shh, hey, it wasn't real. I'm right here," Peso assured him. "I'm not going anywhere."
"You were there, though. You just weren't... there."

Peso had moved from his leaning position to sitting next to him. "What do you mean by that?"
"You were there, but not... I don't know," he muttered, obviously disturbed trying to rethink this nightmare over again.
"Did someone get hurt?"
"Yes, it was you. That's the thing."

To be honest, Kwazii couldn't look at him the same anymore. Anytime he did, that nightmare would be the only thing he would think of.

"Come here, I'm not hurt or anything," Peso whispered, pulling him into his embrace. "It's done now, you know that? That stupid nightmare isn't real, no one is hurt or in danger."
"It felt so real, though."
"I promise you, it wasn't real. Look," He held his head in his hands. "I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere."

That made him feel a bit better.

Being reminded that despite that, everything was normal now. Everything was fine.

Everything was fine now, right?

Nothing bad now. Nothing.

Right?

Words: 1050 Words
i can't be bothered to reread this but all i know is that this chapter sucked ass I NEED TO STOP PROJECTING ONTO MY FAVORITE CHARACTERSSSS