A/N: Here we go!!
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Warning: This chapter deals with themes of suicidal ideations, depression, severe anxiety, self loathing thoughts and feelings as well as angst.
As always please proceed with caution. Reader discretion advised.
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-𝐏𝐥𝐚𝐲 𝐒𝐨𝐧𝐠 𝐍𝐨𝐰-
(𝙿.𝚘.𝚟 ~ 𝙳𝚢𝚕𝚊𝚗)
Do you know what it's like to wake up from a coma?
I'm sorry.
The real question I should be asking is, do you know what it's like to be in a coma?
For starters, it's nothing like a dream.
That's a common misconception that people tell to someone whose love one is comatose. It's by no means sweet or like a long running dream you can't seem to wake from. It's often misconstrued as such.
It's more like being awake. Except you think you're living, breathing, and conscious but you lack awareness that your true body is out there, hovering between life and death.
Trust me, I knew.
I've had the unfortunate displeasure of being comatose twice within my life.
As ironic enough, this experience was twice as bad as the last one. Considering I remembered more from this one.
I jolted awake with a harsh gasp as if all the wind had been knocked from me. I was coughing against the strain of gravity that seemed to pull at me mercilessly as I rose up.
"Hello?" I huffed as I open my heavy eyes to darkness. I stood then stumbled around aimlessly in a never ending span of void. Only left pacing and slamming into what appeared to be a dampened wall as I walked to and fro.
I pulled my hands away from the wall and grimaced at the texture. It was like papier mâché over a slab of concrete. Thick in some areas and thinned out in others like a bad paint job.
I turned away nervously and continued through the space, eventually slowing when I heard the sound of water running.
"I-Is anyone there? Can you tell me where I am?" I questioned aloud again, hearing my voice echo against the darkness. Water dripping eerily in response, and not a person in sight. Not that I could see much anyways.
The tempo of the leaking increased and suddenly it sounded like a pipe burst turned flood. The water was rushing and rapid then suddenly I noticed how the sound grew closer.
In an instant I realized all the water was pushing full force towards me.
I screamed aloud as I ran away. Screaming for help, desperately awaiting to hear an answer. Though I snapped out of my plea for aid by the feeling of water filling my shoes. It was creeping up my ankles dampening my pants.
I tried calling out again as I fought against the water. Over and over, feeling petrified at the pace of the water filling the room. It showed no signs of stopping.
Eventually, I found myself calling out for Jayden. I suddenly realized with the weight of a thousand heartbreaks that I had not seen him or heard him once.
For a second I feared he'd be in this mess too and I called out more frantically, his name on my lips like a prayer as I trudged through the space. That's when I suddenly I heard the water slowed and beeps began blaring in my ears.
It sounded familiar the beeping was periodically paced, slow and dull. Methodical and maddeningly familiar.
I couldn't place my finger on it. It was like the words I needed were escaping me as my panic was setting in.
Then I heard the voices. Loud and familiar voices coming from the walls and echoing in the space.
I continued my march through the water that now pulled against me at the waist, walking over to the point in the walls the noise was loudest.
"W-What exactly are you telling us Maddox? There's no way this is the truth." I put my hands the the wall where I heard the voice coming through clearest and started to claw at the wall desperately.
The wallpaper started peeling away to reveal fogged glass to a sight that bent my mind.
I looked through the glass at what appeared to be a memory of my past. Though it was a past I had no recollection of. The people in the memory, me in a hospital bed, the beeping of machinery. It was all splayed out in front of me like a paradoxical nightmare.
That was my dad, my mother, and aunt with the pack doctor, although I had no idea why they were standing in front of me. My view was from a hospital bed but it was as though I was the patient, sitting on a gurney.
Yet I had no recollection of this.
"Pops help, I'm on the other side! I-I'm trapped somewhere dark and I can't get out!" I yelled as I beat against the glass with closed fists.
I was forced to watch helplessly as these moments played out in front of me. Knocking on the glass frantically but remaining a helpless witness.
"It's remarkable, his DNA is unlike anything I've ever witnessed before. His blood lust triggered vampiric ancestry to emerge when it was otherwise dormant he—" The pack doctor said onto my parents as they looked back at him in disbelief and horror.
There are moments of the chatter that cut out like foggy audio in a choppy video but then it starts up again. The film itself never stops, only the words scramble. Like bad cell service or crappy cable.
"While you're gushing about your little scientific discovery you forgot to mention to me why my son isn't awake yet! He isn't talking, he won't wake, my precious boy is—" My mom's voice cuts in enraged, sounding as fiery as her red locks in that moment.
The doctor went in to explain the situation further but his voice cut in and out before he shared a look of condolences and he exited the room. Leaving my family to hover over the little body within my point of view.
From what I remember my parents mentioning, this is what happened after the incident.
This was some point after I had played in my mom's spell books. I casted a spell that nearly killed me, hence why I swore off magic for all those years. That's why my social anxiety manifested, and why I thought I was a monster.
I scoffed at the whole scene in frustration and backed away from the glass, nearly losing my footing in the water.
"Why am I sitting here watching this shit? I know what happened, I should be looking for a way—" I hissed out before three words were cutting through the darkness of the space.
"He's a Tribrid." Raven mumbled in dismay after a brief moment causing me to turn in shock.
"What did you just say? Raven what did you—" I mumbled out in alarm while I trekked up to the glass again. My eyes flicking back and forth in horror.
"Elaine, his father, our ancestry! Your son is a—" Raven started again before my mother got in her face and shot her a look of rage I couldn't fathom.
"Not another word Raven. He can never know what happened tonight." My mother barked out as she paced the space looking back and forth between my father and aunt who looked at her in disbelief.
"W-What? His familiar, how can we ever—" My father started before his words cut out and the scene continued to unfold.
"My familiar?" I shout frantically from the other side of the glass, I began pounding on the memory as if that would keep the audio from cutting out.
Unfortunately it did, and my mother and my aunt shared a few inaudible words before they spoke up again.
"Tonight our little boy's life changed forever, if you have a shred of decency you'll help us hide it from the world and himself. If anybody finds out, the peaceful life as he knows it is over." My mother demanded in a hush tone leaving no room for debating.
They all reluctantly agreed and the glass encased memory went dark. Leaving me in complete darkness once more.
I drop to my knees within the water and struggled to grasp everything I just heard. I try to pull at bits and pieces of everything I just witnessed and suddenly the thread started to unravel. Pieces of lies and dishonesty fell away from my memories and I was left with the truth.
"I'm a tribrid, and I have a familiar." I whispered into the soundless air before me.
Suddenly the earth was rumbling beneath me. The lights in the room flickered on and the newspaper applied to each of the cracked black walls came into view. I saw the walls and glasses full of memories. I ran past them all, each moment in my childhood more or less.
I saw the moments to everything, yet I couldn't unlock the final moments leading up to the incident. I still didn't know what truly happened. I just got happy snippets of me enjoying time with my familiar.
A fennec fox named Phoenix ironically enough.
All the moments I saw were her Dimitri and I playing games and casting spells. I was fearless when it came to magic, I had so much life in me, and each of the memories brought tears to my eyes.
Not only because I lost that light but because I recognize in those moments that Phoenix was a part of my soul. So where was she now?
"What happened to you girl?" I asked as I leaned against a happy memory. Watching silently as it played on repeat in front of me till it was snuffed out.
The memories on all the walls suddenly grew dark and for a moment everything was black again. It was dark and the sound of water flooding the space started up again. This time faster and it didn't stop, I watched in terror as it crawled up the walls and coated the upper part of my body. Creeping up my arms and chest till my neck was nearly submerged.
Then through each one of the glasses, I saw it. That same dream I have each time I go to sleep. That horrific nightmare I had was playing in my room of memories which meant one thing.
My nightmares were real.
"No..." I whispered out in a broken tone as I was met by the view of me leaving the dinner table to go play.
Watching as I playfully disobeyed rules and went down to the basement. The younger version of me chatted, giggled, and played. Completely unsuspecting as to how I had played a part in her disappearance.
I was completely unsuspecting to the fact that I was a monster.
I could barely hold down the bile that creeped up my throat as the image of blood filled my sight. My eyes grew blurry with tears and I collapsed into the water around me with a scream.
It was the type of scream that came from the bass in your voice, deep, gut wrenching, unsettling. There was so much pain and guilt and shame, I felt like death.
I welcomed it gladly as I continued screaming beneath the water, allowing it to permeate my lungs and fill my airways. Allowing it to drown me like how I drowned in my sorrows. I'd gladly drown in the water if it cleansed my spirit of its sins. I'd gladly drink in and get drunk off of the water meant to drown me if it washes out all the blood.
There was so much blood on my hands.
"Monster, I told you from the beginning that was who you were."
"A murderer, who needs to be put down."
That voice filled my head again. The voice of my demons that has made its life mission to haunt me for the rest of my own. The one from my dreams in its full glory.
Kicking me while I was already down, while I was already drowning in guilt.
I don't know how long I spent screaming beneath the water. My lungs ached and my throat burned and the voices screamed on and on in my head as I was surrounded by my terrible memories.
In those moments I wish death would grant me the peace of non-existence. I wish my breath would give out and my heart would stop. I wish it would and I prayed out loud that it did.
Though suddenly at the sound of my prayers a voice called onto me.
"Dylan?" It came soft like an ethereal whisper. It echoed into me even from beneath the water, it sounded so pained and it soothed me from my own.
It came in grainy at first, so my first thought was I actually died and it was the Moon Goddess taking me to paradise. So I stood before the voice, rising up out of the water. Having half the nerve to ask her why the hell did she make my life a living one?
But then the voice spoke again without the muffling of the water and it came in far more clearly. Like a light in a storm, beaming brilliantly as it guided me from my perils.
"Dylan, I know you probably can't hear this, but it's me, it's Sasha—"
"—And Ryan. Don't forget to mention me." Ryan's interjection also sounding throughout the space.
"Right, how could I forget to mention you? Do you realize how fucked up that sounds, you dumbass?! Our best friend is literally in a coma—"
"Well, I'm trying to give him my support from the other side, you know the land of the living and you wanna go and not mention me. I would never do that to—"
"Oh my fucking Goddess! Dylan, I know you probably can't hear this, but it's me, Sasha and Ryan!" Sasha yelled in exasperation causing me to chuckle at my friends stupidity. Not realizing how the water emptied out of the space or how the memories silenced and stilled through the glass.
"...I definitely like that better, but you could've said it a bit nicer." Ryan added sounding hurt before he sniffled a bit and blew his nose.
"Ryan, I'm gonna put you in a coma, then maybe you won't have to go through me to say hello." Sasha threatened lowly earning another laugh from myself and a loud gasp escapes Ryan.
"Wow that's just dark. Also kind of fucked up of you to make a coma joke in front of the kid in a coma!" Ryan starts full on fake sobbing, or possibly real sobbing.
It was hard to tell when I couldn't see anything, I could just hear them up to their usual antics.
I was sure they were gonna continue bickering but before they could, I heard a voice in the background cut through the chaos.
"I'm sorry, visiting hours are over. Please come again tomorrow morning if you wish to see the patient."
Then everything went silent again.
I was left alone in a prison I now realized to be my mind before I looked around the walls of memories.
I stood silent as my thoughts grinded like gears within my head. Metaphorically speaking I suppose, since I was literally standing in my head.
"If this is my mind wouldn't that mean that Dimitri's here too?" I mumbled before turning to face a dark path I never thought of venturing through, I tried to connect to him but I couldn't reach him. I just knew that somehow I'd find him if I continued forward in through the dark.
And I hoped for my sake I was right to venture deeper into a place of no return.
It took hours of walking down the narrow hallway for me to finally reach a partially lit area. It revealed the entrance to a door, marking the end of the hallway.
It was wooden and had fine detail engraving of swirls and specks of gold scripture. Something foreign and ancient that I could hardly read. There was no door handle or lock for a key to open, yet the door didn't budge when I pushed against it.
So in defeat I collapsed to the ground after hours of walking and just sat there with my back to the darkness, staring at this door.
I must've been out there for awhile because the next day came promptly, and I could hear the chatter of friends from the other side once again.
Voices I recognized as my immediate friends, like Sasha and Ryan. Many others came of a duration that I no longer kept track of. Lizzie and Heaven, Rivera if you could believe it. Marcus, Leo, the girls, and the rest of the guys. Ethan and Kiara always tried cracking jokes while Jonathan and Renaeh stood beside them telling them to knock it off.
I even heard some of my teachers come to visit me. Hillan's voice usually was coupled with Liagizan's youthful chime. Each wishing me a fast recovery as they left old witchy charms at my bedside to promote health, and healing.
I found it strange how I never heard Raven's voice, or my parents.
Which was ironic in its own way. Mainly cause this was partially their faults. Secrets and lies led me to this situation.
Though besides all that, the voice I came to realize I haven't heard in all the days that passed aside from them, was Jayden's.
I never once heard Jayden's voice. I haven't even felt his presence, or smelt his scent. From this side I caught glimpses of reality. I could smell the flowers they left in my room and feel the presence of each distinct person and all their distinct scents. Yet never the one I craved most.
I never once heard from Jayden...
Not a whisper of his name from the others, hushed or otherwise.
It was like he was gone.
That made me sick with worry. It filled me and all my nerves to the brim with anxiety. It was boiling my skin and tearing at my soul. It hurt me.
I loved him so much it hurt, and I loved him so much I hated him for not being here.
So here I was, stuck in another coma sitting within my mind under a dim light, before a door that wouldn't fucking open and AWOL mate that has no idea I'm missing him. He has no idea that I'm here, yearning for him.
Was he yearning for me?
"Stupid fucking Alpha's." I gritted out as I kicked against the door in fury.
Just then the mystical door decided to swing open and I was falling face first into the black marble floor of the space before me.
"Ow, my nose." I groan out in a nasally pitch as I look to the person who open the door. To my surprise I was met by a set of paws and not legs. Though not just any paws, the familiar paws of a white wolf.
"Dimitri?" I questioned with the tilt of my head as I looked the petite wolf in its eyes.
"Dylan?" His voice echoed into my head as the wolf tilted its own head in a manner mirroring my own.
This was such a trippy, out of body experience.
I'm literally looking at Dimitri for the first time. The wolf form version of my spirit residing in our shared minds. I know it seems weird how I'm weirded out by this, but you have to understand this was all quite strange to me. I've never talked to him face to face like this, he's always been in my head.
"Dude, this is so weird!" He screeched out in a voice of pure excitement as his tail began to wag and he nudged me up off of the ground with his snout.
I was suddenly on my feet besides him and he motioned for me to follow along his side for the tour of his half of our joint conscious.
With wide and curious eyes, I took in the beautiful space that he inhabited.
The ground we walked on was marble and a littered with drops of gold, it was embedded in the tile and glistened off the light that cut through the stain glass windows that lined the walls. A beautiful mix of building and nature made up the chasm.
Sequoia trees taller than anything I've ever seen stood on the edge to close the gaps in walls, and chandeliers made of moonlight hung from the ceiling like stars. There were stairs along the walls that looked like they led into other worlds.
Memories of my life and Dimitri, happy memories stood encapsulated in the same fogged walls I had seen before. The only difference is they were framed in golden mahogany wood that looked like something out of a futuristic museum.
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"H-How come the place I just came from is all run down, dark, and wet, while this spot is so gorgeous?" I asked while straying along, still in awe at the view.
"There are certain areas of our mind that I don't go to. The area we are in now is the main center for our memories, and thinking. It's where I live. The longer spent in an area, the more it expands and takes shape." Dimitri explained as he led me down a pathway besides a long stretch of water towards a nook covered in furs and pillows.
He walked over, and once we arrived he circled the spot. Meticulously pressing his paws into the ground before he stretched into a downwards dog. Eventually lying down and motioning for me to lay with him.
"This is cozy." I yawned while lying next to him, my head against his chest, feeling how our hearts beat in tandem. If they were separate to begin with. He nodded at my words and laid silently. He was strangely quiet and comfortable for a wolf who I'd never met face to face.
"It was really scary where I was before, I'm glad I'm with you now." I stated causing him to shift a bit and release a tired chuckle in his mind.
"This reminds me of when we were younger and you fell into your first coma. I couldn't remember it before, but seeing you here now reminds me of that day." He told me with a soft voice as he played the memory out in front of me like a movie.
It was a holograph of sorts. Particles of light and shadow casted into shapes to illuminate a memory I had no recollection of.
My seven-year-old self stumbled into the door the same way I had just now and walked through the room, calling out for Phoenix and my parents.
The room was smaller though, only a quarter of the size it was now, a sign of my current maturity and prior lack there of. My younger self instantly embraced Dimitri when he found me, looking at the wolf who has hardly changed as and old friend, knowing not to be afraid.
The younger version of me was never afraid, it seemed to me that the incident was the thing that had changed me. My parents lies to cover it did contribute as well but I guess it's too late to do anything about it.
"Now we know the truth, or more so we remember it all." He mumbled as the memory faded out into nothingness.
It was really sci-fi futuristic and I would've been painfully impressed at the whole holograph thing if I hadn't been in such a shit mood about the truth that stared me in the face.
"Dimitri....I-I'm a monster." I whispered in a broken tone as tears filled my eyes. He was instantly up in defense at my words and he stood from behind me, letting my head drop to the floor with a thud.
"Ow."
"No we aren't! You're not, I'm not. You're a vampire who went through blood lust at an early age, and no one could have predicted it!" He explains defensively while trying to be supportive.
"Y-Yeah but—"
"Dylan, there's no 'but's', only the truth. It's unfortunate and it's painful and a lot of fucked up shit happened because of it, but the only thing you need to think of is how to go forward from here." His voice rang in my head soothingly with an otherworldly wisdom.
"You're a Tribrid, the incident is a lie, but our familiar is out there somewhere! Hidden away from us somewhere dark and lonely. We need to go find her." He declared causing me to shake my head in shame from where I sat.
"I could never face her again after what I did. I hurt her, I'm horrible and I hurt her—"
"You're not horrible, you were a child. Find a way to forgive yourself and Phoenix will too." Dimitri assured while leaning into me causing tears to fall freely onto his fur. I sobbed into him and he leaned into me. Supporting me like he always has.
Loving me in ways that a piece of your soul would. He was amongst a few of my other halves. Him, Phoenix, and—
"You know I finally figured out what the flowers are." A sweet honey voice rang throughout the space. It filled my bones, it warmed my skin, and it drew breath into my lungs.
"I know I said hyacinths...Y-You do smell like a bed of freshly bloomed hyacinths, but also Caribbean mangoes. They were my favorite growing up." Jayden's voice whispered out.
His voice was so painfully wounded it was haunting. It was jarring to hear his voice after who knew how long but I welcomed it. I welcome him in anyway he chose to come to me.
"H-Hey Dylan....I think I was mad for a while and I think it was partially towards you. That seems so fucked up but it's true." He told making my heart ache within my chest, I let out a broken sob at his words because I could feel his anger through the bond. His proximity let me feel his worry, and rage, his heartbreak and neglect.
It burned me, and for the first time since I've been trapped in my mind I think I've heard my heart truly beat.
I felt alive.
"I'm in therapy now and I figured that out there if you could imagine. My therapist was actually the one who got me to visit you. I'm sorry for that." He chuckled out in a bittersweet way.
His words had me reaching up into the air as if to offer a hug to him. As if he'd feel my forgiveness and my own apology from the recess of my mind.
"I'm sorry I didn't visit or that I stayed away from you. I just didn't want to hurt, but in some way I ended up hurting you instead." He whispered once more. It was so sincere it felt like every other word ever spoken to me was disingenuous. Like his words were the only thing I've ever known.
"I love you so fucking much. Just come back to me Tiny. P-Please, wake up." His words rang through my body. It pierced my spirit and I found myself gasping for air. I heard Dimitri whisper something from besides me before I was light years away.
I felt my eyes flutter open and the blinding artificial light cut into my vision. My mouth felt like it was filled of sand and my skin felt as though it was ripped with a thousand paper cuts. My nerves were humming back to life and my body ached.
I could feel my limbs, the full weight of them. I wasn't sure what was real or fake. Was this a dream or was I awake? Was I alive or dead? Was I still in the in between?
Was I real?
I drew a breath in and fought against the tubing and wires connecting to my body. I weakly made a move to pull them off but the attempt was futile. My body ached and I had no control of my motor function. It was all numb.
I instead casted a spell beneath my breath and watched as the wires faded away. Once free a made a motion to move or at least willed myself to.
I was able to turn my head with a great amount of effort and my eyes burned with tears at the strain against the movement. I was stiff but the circulation was slowly returning to my body, and each turn of the neck was slightly less agonizing as the last.
"Who am I honestly trying to look good for, I feel like a damn fool—" Jayden's deep voice grumbled aloud. Sounding just as sweet and refreshing as the first time I ever heard it. The sound sent chills up my spine and it encouraged me to speak my first words since my coma.
Though I didn't have anything poetic to say, or whimsically delightful. I didn't even know what to say, nothing was important in that moment besides him.
It was only him.
"J-Jayden..."
"Dylan?"
•To Be Continued•