Work Text:
You wake up.
You didn't know you could do that. You thought...
You...
You......
The back of your head hits mildewed carpet. Your feet bash against a desk, your right hand a wall, your left hand a– something metal, you can't tell what. Your eyes, only two, fly open and you are blinded with burning, flaring darkness. No glow, no blue light, no nothing—just darkness.
Darkness.
...
You exhale; it feels like melting into the carpet beneath you, becoming one with the grime, and the Earth, and reality. God, how long has it been since you were real?
...
How long has it been since you were real. How long has it been since ANYTHING? Since you began to exist? What's your name? Where are you? How did you get here? Who are you?
Oh, god, you thought that was the end. You were supposed to be gone, but you're here now, you're not gone, you're still here–!
Your eyes have begun to adjust to the lack of light by the time you sit up. Only barely, only enough to see the metal to your left glint—you think it's the base of an office chair, maybe. And there's that desk, and this carpet– Are you in an office? There was no office, right? No, why would an office be in a circus? (Why would you be in a circus?) No, no, there was no office, so you must be– You must be, either hallucinating vividly, or you're out.
You're not still there. You can feel everything and it feels real.
You scramble to stand on shaky legs and stumble out of the little room, into a hallway. The wall provides you support until you reach an unlatched door and fall through.
In this room, there is light. There is a window, grimy and disgusting, bathing the room in cool daylight. It's cloudy and gray outside. Both your palms hit the glass. A car goes by on the street below. It's followed soon by another. Someone meanders down the sidewalk, someone real, someone who looks up at the window you're at and does a double take. Like they're shocked that you're there.
You, too, are shocked that you are here. You pull your hands away from the window and they shake.
You can't let this person see you any more. They will be frightened and you can't have that, you're supposed to be comforting! You're supposed to be strong! You're supposed to be–!
know that something is wrong, but you're always FINE, you have to be! You can't be anything but–!
laugh for all the wrong reasons, and ask stupid questions, and pester you and pester you and ignore what's in front of them or the lack thereof and you HATE THAT THEY KEEP–!
They
You
You fall back from the window. You stumble right into a desk and catch your balance by just sitting there. You need to breathe, you need to breathe. You need to breathe. You breathe.
It feels like it's been so long since you've needed to breathe. It's a good thing your body does it automatically.
You look at your hands. Real hands. All five fingers on each. No gloves or weird padding. Normal human skin color.
You bring them to your face. Real face. Two eyes, one nose, one mouth, all proportioned naturally. Realistic human shape. Hair in places hair should be.
It's almost too canny. It's the reverse of uncanny valley—so exactly what it should be that you're afraid it's not real, somehow. That's not something you've feared in a long time.
Screw almost, actually. It is. It is too canny, and therefore wrong; you're just misremembering how reality feels, obviously, because you don't remember anything you don't remember anything you don't remember anything you don't remember anything you
Are stumbling down the stairs. It's a wonder you haven't fallen, really, with how unsteady you are. Everything is so unfamiliar. The concept of familiarity might as well not even exist. You hardly know how you make your legs work. You hardly know... anything. You don't know yourself.
All you know is a circus, vaguely, that you are in an abandoned office building, and that you are inhabiting a body. That's nothing. Is it even your body? You know nothing. This might as well be a stranger's body that you've stolen. Your past self, if there ever was one, is as much a stranger as anyone else! You know nothing!
You reach the bottom of the stairwell and exit into a larger room you don't bother describing—because there's an exit sign, pointing left, so you follow it away from the boardrd up front of the building and to a back exit. It's red and familiar familiar familiar, the first familiar thing you've ever seen in your entire short memory.
You dash through it.
Immediately, you are blinded by unfiltered pale sunlight and swept away by the feeling of fresh air. You feel faint You make your way around the building anyway.
You collapse to your hands and knees on the sidewalk. You think you're crying. It feels like your face is melting. This is all unlike anything you've ever felt, anything you remember ever feeling.
You might die. Lifespan of a house fly, you've got! Hah! You made it out of that damned place, away from that mouth, and you die of shock immediately.
You press your forehead against the concrete below, and scream.