I'm humming that tune again.
Everything in every direction is a damp grey shade, seamless and glassy. Like the surface of a puddle when the sun hides and the wind doesn't blow. I look down at my feet, there's a gash in my leg. I guess I could be standing but I could also be lying down, it's hard to tell when there are no shadows.
The hum gets louder, though I stay quiet. It grows to fill the grey, echoing off walls that aren't there, surging louder and louder until the beat of it thrums in my chest in place of a heartbeat. It folds over me a hundred times, a warm blanket.
"Do you remember the words?" In the impossibly tiny fraction of space between one moment and the next, Elle appears at my side. It feels like she's been there for a hundred years, squished into the span of a second. This is a timeless place. She reaches for my hand, I take hers and pull her into a hug. She's warm, her skin is soft, and the points of her bones are all smoothed over where they used to jut. She's healthy.
"Look at you," I breathe, a faint smile ghosting my lips. I brush her curly hair away from her rosy round cheeks, she wrinkles her nose in pretend annoyance. That look flickers when her eyes dart over me.
"Miraté," she whispers, her brow furrowing. "¿Qué es esto?"
"It doesn't matter," I shake my head. "Look, it doesn't hurt." I press the ragged edge of the wound on my arm to prove my point. Hot blood makes my skin slippery, and sloughs over my fingertips. Bad choice of examples. I grimace and move my hand up to press over the gash, my palm scrapes over the jagged edge of a bone. The realization that I'm mid-fight strikes like a truck.
Elle can't be in the dome.
I jolt to my feet. I fall head over heels. Search for my opponent in the grey. They could by anywhere, behind, above.
A small fist knots the remnants of the hem of my shirt and blood gushes in sheets from my stomach.
"You're dying."
"I don't feel it." I take her hand, pulling her close to me, where it will be easier to shield her. The lullaby is frantic in my ears. I search again for my opponent but there is only grey grey grey.
Elle pulls both legs into the air and sits.
"Sit with me," she asks.
"Not now," I say, turning in a circles. "We need to—run, we should run." I cough and blood splashes the back of my teeth. Elle tugs my arm.
"Está bien," she says, "nobody else is here. Sit with me."
Nothing but grey. Red on the grey.
That's right, the fight is over.
I sink down next to her. The lullaby hums on in the background, it's so familiar I feel it singing through my veins. If this is death, it's more peaceful than I could've asked for. It's better than what the Whitecoats will give me if they ever manage to scrape me off the dome floor.
I cough, more blood painting the walls of my throat. Blood gushes in sheets to the floor, drenching anything in its path. Elle leans against me, warm, her curls springing in every direction. I smooth them down and wrap my arm around her. Infinity passes, Elle taking up the hum of the lullaby somewhere between then and now.
"I'll tell you the words next time," she says, stepping back.
"Next time?" The directionless grey begins to tilt on an imaginary axis as if I'm falling in slow motion. Blood loss makes everything fuzzy, and it's starting to get difficult to breathe for an entirely different reason than the lake of blood sitting outside my body instead of inside it. Still, I try to blink away the dizziness. My little sister is right beside me, I can't collapse.
"You can't die yet. You have to fight." Fierceness permeates her words, she sounds determined enough for both of us. But my heart sinks at the mention of fighting. I'm too tired for that. I don't want to spend another day fighting, I don't want to break any more bones, I don't want to hurt anyone else.
"No," I say. The falling sensation doubles, stretching us apart. The space between us bubbles out, swelling with grey. I reach for her. She takes my hand, but blood makes my skin slick. "Elle, when I fight I hurt people. I don't want to do that anymore."
It echoes. I hurt people, I hurt people, I hurt.
"You never hurt me." The lullaby stops, and in the heaviness that follows, she throws her arms around me, pulling me into a hug so tight it's almost violent. Blood soaks us both, but she ignores it, clinging to me. I hug her back until grey static blinds me. Numbness blocks out all but the pressure of Elle's hug and the warmth seeping from her to me. A part of me wishes the lullaby was still playing. A different part of me wonders if it is and I just can't hear it anymore.
"I'll see you later. Te amo, Hendrix."