[Triage had proved difficult on a battlefield half on fire with body parts scattered to and fro, too, as he remembers, though he hadn't recalled much between when they had pulled him from the bodies and when they had rowed the survivors back across the lake. He'd drifted in and out on a wave of fuzzy shock as he does now, so that what words of hers filter through do so at a great distance.
Yes.
This isn't real. It happened a while ago, it's over and done with, and it hardly matters anymore when the rest of his carcass is rotting on his bones somewhere. Pain is an illusion when you're already dead.
Oh, but it feels real--
Unintentionally, perhaps, given she can't see the devastation the detonation at the main gate had wrought on those about to breach it, her hand brushes the spot shrapnel had sliced cleanly through his armor. He makes an animal noise of pain, writhing with his eyes still closed like a newborn who can't bear to take his first look.]
Stop! Just--stop.
[He chokes. Even his throat feels raw with scorched air.]
are you sobbing because of that or me never tagging on time...
Yes.
This isn't real. It happened a while ago, it's over and done with, and it hardly matters anymore when the rest of his carcass is rotting on his bones somewhere. Pain is an illusion when you're already dead.
Oh, but it feels real--
Unintentionally, perhaps, given she can't see the devastation the detonation at the main gate had wrought on those about to breach it, her hand brushes the spot shrapnel had sliced cleanly through his armor. He makes an animal noise of pain, writhing with his eyes still closed like a newborn who can't bear to take his first look.]
Stop! Just--stop.
[He chokes. Even his throat feels raw with scorched air.]