Dances of Duality (Bendy and the Ink Machine)

2- Sammy's Song

"And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing." – 1 Corinthians 13:2

__________________________________________

"Prophet" is not a title without a past. He stumbled into faith and there he would remain, both a blessing and a curse to a man with nothing left but a trapped soul and a heart that begged for what he once had.

To be a prophet was to be the consolation he needed most in a position no human being was ever designed to endure- to be forced to live through an extended death and feel the suspension of blood in its veins and breath merely drift out of lungs as if the body was held still but the world moved on without him.

That's how it felt for Sammy to die.

He heard Susie scream. As the very same person's recollection swarmed his ears today and forced him to listen, he could finally see it in all its horrific clarity; like frozen pictures and slowing film, he could almost reach out and touch what he remembered. Before him was a young lady with pale skin, dark lips, and wide, wide eyes. He could see the glitter of ink reflect in them as the summoned rush of shadows rose as a tidal wave from behind him, gushing past his waist and flying in droplets onto her skin and clothes in the brief half-second before it ate them alive. Then his dark skin became darker, and everything became nothing.

From the innocent visage of the imaginary come to life burst forth its personification of immortality through animation and ink. From the posters and cutouts and sketches of Bendy gushed the black flood that would choke out everything but the very core of each employee or visitor's being. From the face of what he would accept as his lord came that which would claim him forevermore.

And it rose to the ceiling until he couldn't hear, see, or feel anything but the cold of void and endless eternity seep through his skin like water through paper towel. It covered his shape until it became his shape, a snap at the edges of his body as the ink converged into itself and cocooned him until liquification. And from the form of a man this black began to lax, smooth, and then melt away into the rest that had done the same as he.

From the many bodies of men came the massive puddles of souls- the place, person, and thing he would know far too intimately for far too long.

Felt? Did he feel? He did but he...didn't. To be numb would in itself be a sensation, and that's not what this seemed to be.

Somehow he felt pure nothingness, and it drifted in and out of him like he was a spec of sand in the riptides of an ocean.

He did not comprehend yet that it was not that he was surrounded by ink but that he had merely become it.

And so had everyone else. He could feel them- he could hear them. Voices, voices, voices. Everywhere. How close? Close. How far? Far. Endless like the universe was gone and filled to the brim with only the sounds of what it used to have. It was all within reach- all touching him, smothering him- and yet he couldn't touch it at all.

A gaping breath and a splash. He felt a hard surface underneath a slam of his palm- wood- and suddenly all the weight and weightlessness left him from the torso up. He didn't realize what he was doing, but he did all the same; Sammy dragged himself out of the puddles. He couldn't feel his legs.

For the longest time, he saw nothing. He sensed something different- not the same sensation that wrapped around and through him- but it was almost somehow worse. Splash, splash, splash. It fell in the rhythm that was only intended for his walking feet, but it was that of his arms, hands, and elbows.