dappered | (no subject)

It had been nine weeks, five days, and twenty-one hours since Ben woke up from the nightmare. The Nightmare, really, the one where he'd watched himself speak and act in that illogical way children had, clinging to scraps of faith and putting up a brave front in the face of what he knew was coming. It hadn't been hard to anticipate, back when he'd still been capable of anticipating anything. You get shot in the head and survive with a bullet lodged somewhere inside your brain, there were bound to be physical and then psychological repercussions. The headaches, the blackouts, and then the dream-state where he settled somewhere in the back of his own mind, watching his hands commit sins the real him would never permit, watching his faith regress to its larval form. For a while, he forgot about the angels. He forgot the real name of the Blue Lady. He forgot everything he'd learned in his ten years Outside, except the unhappiness, because that never went away.

And then he made his sister (his beautiful sister, alive and well above the ice, and in the Nightmare he could not even be pleased to see her) play the hunting game, made her follow him into the woods, and suddenly he was nine years old again and afraid of the monsters lurking in the shadows. The real ones, finally come to drag him down where he belonged.

Waking up from his death in an entirely new world really wasn't so strange, after the last year of his life. He was awake now, at least. All the time. No more jerking back to consciousness in unfamiliar places, surrounded by unfamiliar people, wondering what his hands had done while he dreamed.

The bullet was still there. He could still feel the scar underneath his hair, and the headaches still plagued him, but the blackouts had stopped. Perhaps his prayers and his sacrifices had finally been rewarded. Perhaps his sister snapping his neck had finally been enough to move an indifferent God.

Or perhaps it was just a new trial, set in a world that had never known the Pulse.

Some things apparently never changed, even in new worlds. His supply of cash was running low, IDs and ammunition and vehicles were expensive, but he kept on the road with his stolen Ducati and pilfered supplies when he needed to and went right back to the mission the Nightmare had forced him to abandon. Hunting down evil. Proving to petty sinning humans with their guns and knives and delusions of power that there was always a better predator, a higher tier of creature waiting to bring them low.

The men of this world were weaker than those that had survived the Pulse. As a trade-off, they carried more money, and he had enough to waste on a hot meal instead of something killed and roasted over a fire. Ben still didn't like crowds, but he had long ago forced himself to learn how to blend in, and it was easy enough to claim a dark corner in the bar, nurse his beer and wait patiently for his food, gaze automatically scanning the other patrons.