I run.

I run and I run and I run. Up and down rolling hills stained amber in the moonlight. At some point I tripped. I must have. How else did I end up splayed face down on the ground, bells tolling in my head and tears carving paths down dusty cheeks? One moment, endless fields of grass part around me, and the next, they tower over my head. Reaching up and out into–

–Electricity courses down my shoulder and back, leaving a smoldering fire in its wake. My left shoulder must have taken the brunt of the impact when I fell.

Working through the jolts of pain, I flop around to my back. The sky blurs into a hazy mosaic that I can’t help but enjoy. The abstract colors and shapes could be anything. Anywhere. Just another psychedelic burst from a dreaming mind. If only my unbidden tears didn’t run their course. But they did and the dead sky answers back with a manic grin.

Strident breaths escape through clenched teeth as I feel the embers in my shoulder and back pulse with savage glee. A passing thought insists on jarring my hurt shoulder. Maybe squeezing out a few more tears and moments of hazy relief from this twisted reality. A tired sigh escapes into the night.

I lift myself off the ground and unclench my jaw, an odd mixture of heat and cold settling over my shoulder and back. I stand in a somewhat pleasant daze, enjoying the cool breeze run over my tired body. Falling into an almost meditative state until my body instinctively flinches which sets off a howl from the reignited sparks of pain.

In the dirt and grass near my feet rests a bloody dagger. My tired attention slowly churns to my shoulder and then to the spot where I had fallen. The pieces snap together.

I didn’t fall. Well, I did. But I didn’t trip. Okay, maybe I did. But it wasn’t my fault! That vicious bitch stabbed me. Speared me. Threw a god damn dagger at me!

I gingerly bend down and pick up the offending weapon by the ring at the end of its handle. I hold it with one finger slipped through the hole and inspect the bloody piece of metal. The dark burnished ring leads into a handle tightly wrapped in rough red cord. About a third of the dagger’s total length, the handle ever so slightly widens as it reaches the base of the blade itself. Double edged and the same color as the ring, it runs a bit less than half a foot, slowly tapering in a soft curve over the last few inches to a sharp point. A point covered in my blood.

A shiver runs from the base of my skull down to my tired feet and I go light headed for a few seconds as I stare at the dark, rust red spots on the metal. I can’t help but swallow as I contemplate what it is I’m actually seeing. My vision seems to focus into the bloody point and countless thoughts burst into existence as they fight for my attention. Pain and fear float to the top, but confusion is the main motif.

Why? Why all of this? Why everything? Why… just why?

My head is filled with cotton and I can’t get over that one word. That one question.

Why?

I look back and can just make out the vague shape of the tree I first found myself under. It’s long branches grasping out into the night. Oddly enough, the sight helps. I can feel something unclench in the back of my head, if only just so. Where before I was spinning and sputtering in a numb circle without meaning, I feel able to take half a step back and breathe. At least before the weight and stress looming over me drags me back. I look down and clasp the dagger.

I need to move.

My first steps are more of a controlled stumble, momentum dragging me forward where strength cannot. Stiff and sore muscles warm up and my awkward shuffle eases into a slow jog.

It’s not long before my lungs are desperate, greedy and grasping with gulping breaths, but the air feels thin and useless. A wet smacking follows each step, alongside a steady tingling of warmth down my back. My sweat and blood soaked shirt sticking on and off as I float onward.

But I have to keep going. She could still be behind me, gifting death with flashing knives. Silent footsteps and whispering wind, come to reap behind a whistling tune.

A thick tongue flops in my mouth and sweat burns my eyes. Hazy shapes and bleeding colors settle onto a messy landscape. Flashes of white sear the corners of my vision. Dreams of pale masks sing out to me and urge me on. It doesn’t matter where I’m going, I don’t know and don’t care. My body is content to go forward in a wheezing stumble.

One dead step after another. Shambling through a sepia tinted world. Shallow rolling hills spread out before me, tall grass bending in a tangled waltz with the wind. Gentle rises and falls, a blanket of grass over a sleeping body.

Sweat, dirt and cold metal flood my head with every breath. Filling my nostrils and burrowing through the stuffing in my head. My throat spasms with a reflexive need to swallow. A consistent, hollow reminder. The thought keeps pace with my every step, my every breath. A cadence that fills my mind, pushing out white masks, grinning faces and burning limbs. Water. Water. Water.

In the distance, a lonely boulder cuts through the tall grass. A stranger, lost and alone. I shift to the side and move towards the rock, releasing the tight grip on my body and letting the inertia burn off until I settle into a stumbling walk.

Halfway to the boulder, a drop of cold blooms over the top of my head. Another spills down my neck, drawing a cooling line through sweat and dirt. Another falls into my upturned hand before I realize it’s rain.

Water.

The word tightens and loosens a knot in my chest and I cover the last few feet to the half-buried rock. The first hint of a weary smile teases my lips at the relief of rest and water.

The pitted surface feels cool and steady under my hand. I tilt my head towards the sky, greeting the rain with an open mouth. I wet my parched tongue and throat, not nearly enough, but it’s a start. With what little effort my exhausted body has to spare, I rip myself away from wetting my throat to sit down.

It’s as if a swift cut severs the strings holding me up. Gravity grabs me by the throat and my legs fold with shaking ease. My back slams against the boulder and the world shrinks to a keyhole of light. Screaming echoes far off in the distance before it burst full volume into my ears. Ringing thrums through my head and all thought is scoured away. I claw into the dirt, fingers sinking with violent relish into the ground. I tear out grass and clench my teeth, breath hissing out through the gaps.

My sweat and blood mingle with the steadily increasing rain as I writhe on the ground. Time passes beyond my attention until I lay in the wet dirt, chest rising and falling in a numb two-step. Face down, I hesitantly shift and reach around to my left shoulder. Shaky fingers slide along my soaking wet shirt, but stop when they come up sticky. Blood. Lots of it.

My breath quickens and I hold my hand up in front of my face, watching the blood disappear under the rain. I rise to my knees and stare into the night.

A tired hand reaches over and moves as far down my back as it can. Testing the damage with a hesitant touch. My fingers meet hot flared flesh and the touch sends stinging sparks flaring through my shoulder. A half laugh, half sob gurgles out from my throat.

Great.

* * *

The stars pivot on their wheel before the sparks dulls to a slow steady throb. My good arm reaches up and I trace the space between the bright lights. Constellations, images that connect the night sky. No – a night sky. No longer the night sky. Not anymore. Not for me.

I always thought they were silly, if I thought of them at all. Quaint artifacts of the past. Something to point out to children. But looking up at the winking beads of light above me, I realize what they are – were. Stories. Stories that people created, shared and lived under. My stories. Is it ridiculous to appropriate an entire world’s culture for your own? No… not when that world is your home, and you’re so, so far away.

It’s odd that this is what breaks the dam. The thought of no longer living under my world’s stories. No longer being part of those stories. Where is the mighty warrior with his belt and sword? Where has the great lumbering she-bear gone? The mighty scorpion? The vain and arrogant Queen? Does the loyal hound ever shine in this sky?

My gaze turns away from the turning stars. Some distant animal inside me scratches and claws at my soul, begging for escape. Away from the heavy night. Away from the looming sky. Gone from the starry cage blanketing the world. Those distant lights are unreachable bars, locking me into a strange and alien story. Someone else’s, not mine.

I try to swallow it down, but emotion isn’t a river you can damn without consequence. And the pressure is too much for me to handle as I am. My tired eyes fight to stay open, my stomach twists and snarls in hunger, and my shoulder presses a red hot iron to my will. My face contorts and the tide rises from my chest to my eyes. I wrap my good arm around my body in a hug as I pull myself tighter and tighter. Shudders wrack my body, before, during and after the wailing sobs. Not the surprised cry of a sudden hurt. Not the frantic cry of a trapped animal. But the defeated, howling cry of someone who has lost and is lost in turn. The cry of an adult being cracked open to reveal the small scared child inside.

The night wind carries the raw pain, loneliness and hurt, over hills and under moon, until a deep silence reigns again. Numb. Empty. Fragile. My fingers wrap around corded leather and tighten. Desperately holding onto something. A fragment of power. A hint that I’m not so weak and broken as I know I am.

My head bobs in the rain. Hot blood, cool rain and hard earth. It’ll have to do. I walk to the boulder and make my way around it. The far side rises from the ground on something of a slope. Enough, maybe.

Three attempts and a bruised knee later, I lay down on my uninjured side. From the top of the boulder rain patters around me, lighter than before, but still insistent. Steady. Calming. It helps. Exhaustion and blood loss do the rest. My eyelids tap out and flutter closed. Before I slip away to sleep, a voice tolls in my head. No words, at least at first. Just a crazed, desperate laugh. Then a spiteful musing. Will I die tonight, bleeding out in my sleep? The question incites another short lived chuckle. Dying my first night here… With some effort I crack open an eye and peek up at the sky. What an awful fucking story that would be.