He was in darkness, floating in silence as he enjoyed the dreamless rest. They come by few and far between, but he learned to appreciate their lack of anything. Dreaming can be fun, of course, with all the colours, and people, and places: images meshing into memories he would forget a few seconds after waking up.
But they give him something to think about, and silence (in his opinion) is a way better friend. Sadly, his friend left as a light emerged in the corner, gnawing at his attention.
Images started appearing, and he was curious at first, interested even as nothing ever made it to this part of his mind. The second he gazed was a moment he would regret for the rest of his life.
He couldn't fathom hurting somebody, torturing them, let alone killing them; his mind showed him otherwise.
He liked his friends, enjoyed their company, and helped them as they helped him; the images pictured a different story.
He was close to his family, treating them as such, and they showered him with love; he didn't believe and would never accept this, yet the fake memories wouldn't let go.
He couldn't kill, had good friends, and his family NEVER loved him.
So why does he see images of his loving mother doting him like he is worth the world? Why is he friends with people he has never met, talked to, or heard of?
Friends of friends, foes of friends, family of friends looking at him like he is his friends... WHY? Why was the voice telling him to accept this? They weren't him, and he didn't deserve to be them, let alone steal who they were. The voice disagreed once more.
He tried to ignore a set of particularly gruesome images where he stole, broke, strangled, stabbed, maimed, dissected, drenching floors with guts, painting walls with blood on his hands, drinking the sensation and ENJOYING IT.
He smiled, and the voice approved. He slapped himself.
Zane would never steep so low.
But the images don't care about his feelings, and they keep flowing like tidal waves, flooding his mind with foreign emotions he knew weren't his.
He tried to move; he tried really hard, and it worked... for a time.
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Every time he turned, an image appeared, and he did again, but it followed.
He ran, but it was faster.
He hid, but it would always seek AND FIND HIM.
It was painstakingly heavy. The aches, the celebrations, the accomplishments, the murders, the walks, the talks, the grades and the cries felt so real and foreign.
The pleads, the tears, the blood, the sweat, nightmares and dreams, from monsters of men, and men, and monsters, looking at him like he knew something, and now he did.
Maybe he is that demon they feared.
Maybe he was the one who killed them all.
Maybe the voice is right, and he is wrong.
He is not Zane (nor sane), and the weight broke him.
How much time has passed since? He didn't count and doesn't know, both of which he won't care about. He's been hearing voices for a while, too, distant and muffled, unlike his friend's clear and crisp, and he won't bother listening. He did it once, and it was a mistake.
At one point, they stopped, leaving him with his best friendm, silence, and he enjoyed its company. Even the usual hubbub of whoever was in his head, or heart, or whatever, stopped.
But it wasn't the same as before. The silence wouldn't last, and he WILL see their faces again, and those who loved them, who loved him.
He heard something. New voices, and he was sure of it. No amount of barriers he puts up and precautions he takes are enough to block the demon from the outside, and he loathes this lack of power. But he digresses.
This time, it's different. There are too many voices, each with various tones and volumes; they talk about the demon in its presence—a lot. They share the same opinion as his, and for once, he felt... understood.
The people he had heard before always talked about him being innocent, unaware, a kid who had nothing to do with the massacre.
He knew better than to believe in their lies. The demon may be a kid, but he is not innocent, and the voice agreed: he was a monster, no, worse—a demon amongst monsters that should never resurface, and he would keep this oath until his best friend became eternal.
Then he felt a punch, and it was the first thing he felt in a while (besides the little punctures on his arms, the stares, the tubes they connected to him, et cetera). It hurt until it didn't, sending him reeling every time.
The cold floor became his second-best friend, a new sensation that reminded him of the punches, and he smiled (internally): the demon was getting what it deserved.
Even better was the gleeful realization that this body was reaching its limits. With only a few more, it would disappear forever, and his mission would be over.
Nothing ever goes his way. For once, he felt something akin to hope and was happy. Its end was nearing, and soon, he would be delivered from this mess of a life (or a few), but fate had something different in mind.
As soon as the beating ended (for this time, nobody took the demon back up), he felt something wet on his skin, and not the kind they fed him through tubes.
He remembers the substance from the victims: tears, and it wasn't the demon's. Furthermore, a pair of small, tender, fragile hands landed on this broken body, and he felt warmth for the first time since he felt the touch of his mother—mothers, but it was soon replaced with cold, then pain, and agony.
The power continued ravaging the demon's body until every fibre, every cell, every atom of his relived the beat down back to its previous, un-tortured self.
What a beautiful power.
And a perfect sentence.