He lay his shuddering, bleeding form against the cold, flat stone, each breath haggard. Too tired for even register the pain. Too tired to notice to sounds of his failing breath. Too tired to witness his vision turning bloody. Too tired to bother about the emptiness that gnawed at him.

His lifeblood, leaving his body more slowly now as the pressure waned, soaked into the dirt and rocks like some demonic mortar. The flat stone behind his back almost seemed to suck at his blood and tissues as if an ancient vacuum was finally being filled.

His brain meandered, thoughts of people long forgotten, places long left, feelings remembered. He was dying and he knew it. Alone, in a hole, forgotten. Would people even know? He chuckled and winced, spitting black blood at his feet. Self reprisals at the end, weakness. Would he have done something different? Would he do something different, even if by some abstract miracle he was rescued? Hatred rose with bile in his throat, wanting to scream but not having the strength. Weakness. Always, weakness. Yet memories rose unbidden almost as if to counter his final desperate thoughts. Memories of light, of his father in his dusty study peering at mishapen rocks, of his stupid brother pulling a face. The flowing black hair of a lover long gone, secret whispers of experiences past.

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Then more pain, or really a different pain, deeper, numbing the agony in his physical body. Now a different memory, one that felt different to the others. One of wind, of heat, of mountains and valleys, one of life itself. A figure standing amongst the towering, impossibly tall, trees. His face shimmering, yet even so, a feeling of warmth.

“Who is he?” he murmured, the tendrils of darkness finally taking hold.

*End of Part 1*