Sorry state
#1 of Surviving a lost mind and a lost soul
Memories of precedent conversations plague his mind, they don't want to leave. If those memories left him he would feel better, he wouldn't have to bother snapping himself out of the past. He would be alone, cold and shaking in the dark. There's nothing he can do, nothing's been suggestive of what he's been hearing, nothing rational or logical. False memories have taken root as well. Quaking with knees to his shoulders, his eyes transfix on the white wall of the other side of his room, his head echoing and his ears ringing.
"You lied to me, you said you'd take me to a safe place Darrek. Why are you a liar?" It's just a voice, he tells himself, but his rampant imagination puts a face to it. A wolf cub rubbing his eyes with a balloon of yellow sunshine wrapped around his wrist soaring above the little one's head. His black nose twitches with his sniffles. "You said that you knew where my parents were, you said, you said..." Throngs of furs passing by them, their features become melded and unison. He pulls the distraught cub by the paw backwards to get away from the bustle; his back comes against the shrubbery wall.
"Of course, of course, don't fret. It won't be hard to find your family, let me help you, show me your trust." He looks down at the cub with a safe smile, his eyes blackened by the shadows, his ears tall, and a single shining white fang shows through his closed muzzle. His blood boils hot, the smile on his face on the verge of vanishing altogether.
"I want to go home." The cub chokes on his words, his ears flat, tail between his legs. The youth's cheek fur matted down from tears.
"He'll draw attention to himself; we can't have that, not now while the timing is perfect."
He snaps out of himself, still shivering, still cold and degraded, he rocks himself back and forth, tail curling to one side.
"What were you planning on doing to that lost cub huh? You're sick, despicable, low life scum. You know what you were going to do; you would have kidnapped him and made him another one of your slaves' right? Yeah, you know I'm right."
The wall clock ticks seconds away, he looks into the dials with a hopeful look in his wide grey-blue eyes. That never happened and he knows it, why is he being haunted like this, he deserved this torment? The second hand ticks slower and blurs out.
"Baby brother?! Where are you??" Shouting stops short, fading away, and getting lost in the black hot hanging smoke clustered from ceiling to floor. Tears run down and evaporate from the blistering heat. Fur gets singed, skin scorched, his lungs filling with ebony clouds and grey smoldering ash. "Anthony!!" He scampers frantically from room to room, and then just stops dumbstruck at the entrance to his brother's room. Fire nips at his back, his tail fur burning away. The wolf rushes to the lifeless mass of fur and soot.
Sirens at the sidewalk now, screaming and shouting of orders everywhere, coming through clearly despite the immense sounds of crackling wood. The wolf's heart is in his throat, he carries his cub brother out of this maze of burning black cinders, out to the front lawn, his cub isn't moving, or breathing. The older brother sits there, sobbing uncontrollably into his cub brother's chest fur. The roof of their house collapses, sending a maelstrom of fiery embers into the night sky above them. The firefighters have to pull the blubbering older wolf off of the cub to allow the paramedics to help. All he sees is the motionless soot and ash covered form as he gets carried away.
"T...That..." The wolf speaks to his clock, which now starts ticking again. "Wasn't real..." His paws grab at his head, pulling his fur, tearing at whatever they can grasp, "That didn't happen!!" His words coming through his sobbing from the false scenario, body shaking like he was having a seizure. He lays in the fetal position on the floor. The wolf feels the burns under his fur, the matted down burnt fur on his tail, the smell of fire, and the sounds of everything still ringing clearly. He thinks of his illusory cub brother and all the phony times they spent with each other and the love shared, which makes him happy for a moment, being lost in happy thoughts, he even smiles a little.
"You let him die, you weren't controlled. Where was your head, too busy blithering over the cub to let the paramedics save him, you wanted him to die didn't you? If you can't have a cub to yourself, then you want them to die"
"Please...no...I saved him...I did!" He chokes on his words, his eyes bloodshot. He's sure a week ago he went to the doctor because he was crying out blood instead of tears. The doctor didn't see anything wrong with the wolf, but sure enough, his once white now grey cheek fur is stained a rusted color, bald patches show where the dried scarlet tears were painfully pulled away along with fur.
Here he is again, sinking into his own mind, his white shag carpet becoming stained with his ruby tears, not the first patch of crimson to desecrate the sanctity of his carpeting.
"Where are you PUP?!" An old wolf snarls with teeth bared. "You are RUINING yourself DOG! Digging yourself a hole!" A crash from outside and down the hall, blithering hateful yelling towards a young pup who finds himself cowering under his twin bed, pressed against the plethora of his ecstatically joy filling toys. "Don't worry puppy, nothing will happen. I love you too much to do anything, hush pup, I know where you are, where you hide. I smell your tears, your fear, your anger and confusion." The furious parent hums what can only be perceived as condolences. The fright paralyzed cub seeing those dreaded foot paws stop at the threshold of his room. Audible growling and under the breath obscenities pierce the pup's twitching ears, his paws clasping his muzzle tight, concealing his whimpering, his eyes blurred and burning with tears. "I know your hiding spot pup, right under your bed, come out so I can say goodnight!" The cub's gut churns and starts to sob again after almost calming himself down. The old wolf closes the door quietly and locks it. The tumbler of the lock echo and hangs in the room, then silence. "Get up from your hiding spot, or I'll make you DARREK!" With the fierce roaring out of his name the cub scampers out from under his bed, ears flat, tail between his legs, trembling violently. "What to do with you. Pup knows what he did wrong right?" He grabs the cub by the wrist and nearly yanks him off his foot paws, "RIGHT?!"
More whimpering and sobbing, and choking for air, but no answer from the cub. The bastard wolf of a father's paw comes up, and just before striking down the second hand ticks and snaps the curled up pile of fur out of his mind, his bloodied tears forming a small puddle under his head.
"I need to get out; I need to get out; I need to get out..." The wolf repeats himself over and over until it turns into a hymn, a mantra. The knock on his door makes the wolf jump out of his fur, scrambling to the farthest corner from the door. He curls his knees to his chest, shaking hysterically, his blood stained eyes refocusing. The seconds are back to normal, another series of poundings at the door.
"DARREK! Open the door! Open the door!"
Is this real? It can't be, this is another time lapse, another mortifying memory. It was the police coming to arrest him, a burglar who read his name on the fridge, a stalking serial killer. There won't be a chance to find out as long as the door stays closed.
"He's here for you wolf, you know it. Why else? Don't open it, don't answer, and don't make a noise, keep your muzzle shut"
"I swear I will break down this door! Open it!" The voice comes in unison with the deafening banging on the solid oak door.
"You see how mad he is? He wants to get you. Stay there where it's safe, distract yourself. Think of the cub."
"Darrek! It's Joel! OPEN UP!" An incredible crash and the door splinters open. Darrek has his muzzle pressed between his knees, paws covering his ears.
"No more, no more...Please, stop this!! STOP!"
The concerned husky dog just stands there, glued in place from fear and remorse, not knowing what to do or say. The trembling wolf whining and whimpering, slowly looking up with crimson eyes, stopping at one point, then just staring off, not weeping or anything, just mystified at that spot beyond Joel, Beyond the white wall. "Darrek?" Joel treads lightly to the hypnotized wolf, kneeling down outstretching is paws to the wolf's shoulders. Darrek snaps out of it and starts to bawl again, curling up into an even tighter fur ball, shuddering in the warm room.
"Is this real?" Darrek asks in a whisper as if not wanting anyone else to hear.
"Yes Darrek, this is real. Stay focused for me okay?"
Darrek hugs onto Joel, sobbing into the husky's neck fur, staining the grey-blue fur and white T-shirt red. He starts to get lightheaded from crying away his blood and soon is asleep in the husky's arms. Sleeping peacefully like a cub without a care, Innocent and happy, a smile across his muzzle.