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You were never good at swimming.

You can’t remember what landed you in the river by the time you were getting there. Against yourself you were still swinging for life, your lungs begging you stop. All the ideas of you never giving up were so easy to say before now, when you can barely think at all except to survive.

Your robes drag you down further than you can remember and your mask has filled with water too deep to see. You’re kicking despite yourself, unfamiliar with actual techniques, but your robes cling to you and make it nearly impossible to move. It’d be so easy to let go, to let your eyes see your final resting place, to keep your arms motionless. It feels nothing like sleep. No peace at all, nothing but panic, and your lungs beating at you to escape, to get away, while they fill with something that makes your chest feel close to breaking.

The water surrounds you and you can feel it. You can feel the countdown. Your life doesn’t flash before your eyes and there’s nowhere your mind is except beating against the wall of your chest where your lungs are ready to collapse.

You lose consciousness before your body does.

-MoD-

You know something is wrong when you’re able to think again. In the distance, you hear a voice call and you want to reach out to grab it, but you can’t feel yourself at all. You want to grab it, hold it close. You try and connect this to what you’ve told others, about the afterlife, assuaging their fears, justifying everything, but this isn’t what you expected. Sure, you had nothing to suspect, but your vision is blurred making your surroundings colors and not shapes, and this voice is not the voice who saw you, who lived through you, who is calling you.

Then the colors have shapes and the voice sounds less holy and you return to Earth to notice that your mask is gone.

You gasp, but you choke even further. The water still takes you whole and you still can barely breathe. Your chest tears into your muscle and you cough so much you still can’t imagine breath, and gods above it’d have been so much easier had you died.

Your arms are flailing, but you still reach for your mask until your arm is pinned down. You can only look up, eyes burning, at the owner of the arm. You steal a desperate glance at him, this young light-skinned man with spotted rainbow paint around his eyes, and too formal a soldier’s outfit to call his own- clearly given to him. He’s looking at you in panic and his hand’s still on yours. You feel his other hand on your stomach as it bridges to your chest, just below your breast, on sopping wet red robes.

Without warning, he pulls you up and places you above the river. Your stinging eyes take in a new sight and you gasp again, spitting more water out. His hands are on your chest, pushing sharply and holding you above. You kick at him as you spit more, wanting out before the other shoe drops, even if it means returning to the depths, because against yourself you want to see the gods again, even if you know you shouldn’t.

All of the water spills out of your lungs and your chest feels so weak it’s a wonder his hands don’t crush you like you’d expect. You’ve heard of these hands more than you’ve seen them, but you fear them. You wait for him to push you into the river again, where you’d hope you’d drown. You cough as you try and process drive, only for him to pull you again, lying on your back, face to face with you again.

You close your eyes, desperate to see anything else, but your hands still reach for your mask desperately. You feel an object land on your chest, nearly crushing it. Desperate to remove it, your hands clasp and pull it before they recognize it to be perfectly spherical.

“You okay?” he asks.

You’re too afraid to respond, for your lungs and your life.

“Are you okay?” he asks again.

Too worried about giving him even a hair-trigger reason to push you back into the water, you nod, nearly blasting your head against the ground on which it rests.

You hear him stand on his feet, wobbling and unsteady unlike the perfectly organized way you expected from him. Eventually, his feet stomp on solid ground, and you hear the crunch of boots on top of freshly fallen autumn leaves. Finally, you open your eyes, only seeing part of his outfit, blue and white as expected, cling to him with as much water, with a perfectly dry backpack as brown as you’re comfortable with, familiar with.

He doesn’t look back, but you still hear him say “Be careful.” In a few steps, he’s left your sight.

The sights are too clear and open for you- even as he leaves you can see the canopies of every pine tree and hear the edge of the river’s merciless rapids. Too quickly, you place your mask back on, the remnants of water dropping onto your brow ridges, drops gradually leaking on your eyes. Closer than ever of the robes you fell in with, clutching your legs, merely a far-too-close extra layer of skin bright red, saying too much, too desperate to let go of the woman who nearly died.

You lie there for a full ten minutes after the soldier leaves, thinking only of the bottom of the river, trying not to reason that if there were any justice in the world, you’d have ended up there.

-MoD-

You don’t count the sun when it rises nor when it sets. These aren’t luxuries you know you can afford yourself, because you never have been that foolish. You’re not surprised that you feel the sun more than you see it, as your eyes still sting and even as the leaves rarely are indented by your bare feet, you barely keep your eyes open. Only when the air has chilled and tries to bust inside your still-soaked robes are you certain it’s night. The sense of touch is your closest friend. The eyes are too deceptive, the ears can be misled, and the mouth is capable of lies. Only when feeling something are you capable of the true honesty.

So you do. You feel the breath hit your own mask and cycle again. You feel the heat of the day dry your robes but never pull them away from you. You feel your own chest heave with a breath too much for them at times. You feel your feet hit the ground slower and slower by the second, by just a fraction of an inch. These feelings all tell you one thing, safe or not, the only thing you know.

Keep going.

You only stop through the halt when you hear a multitude of footsteps, perfectly in rhythm. The leaves beg for mercy beneath them and you hide behind a tree, invisible. No one looks for you, which is alright by you- one soldier is merciful enough but whatever good they can do washes away in a sea of hundreds. You hear their passing, but only move when you don’t feel the crowd near you.

Even if you can’t trust your hearing, best to be careful.

You can’t tell anyone how many days and nights have passed when you hear more footsteps. You duck behind the nearest tree and stand on exhausted feet. Before you can stand tall, you’ve bent over, feeling intense exhaustion wrack your body. You only then realize how cracked your chest feels, how you can barely breathe, how much you hate standing still.

Against your better judgment, you peek behind the tree.

You see a new set of group marching, people you can’t quite recognize. You only know your own group and the group fighting you, and anyone else is an odd human being. At first you wonder if this tribe is your own- their skin is not pale like the soldiers you run from, but it isn’t your skin of tree bark- imposing and, you’d always assumed, closer to the Earth. Instead, their skin gleams enviously, like polished copper. You try to look away, used to rejecting superficial beauty, but you can’t bring yourself to.

The people are entirely women, maneuvering through wagons and horses that move too calmly. They’re also similar to yourself, and you wonder if they would be merciful, or- like you- too cutthroat. They don’t seem similar to you at all- they wear pants close to their navel but aside from that, only a bra. You can discern their skin far too easily, but you’re too tired to resent them.

Only when your thoughts are interrupted by a new sight do your judgments dissipate. A male figure, with clothes too intense to match the freed bondage of the women he’s with, walks near them. He’s donned with armor too dented to say that it serves no purpose, and boots even thicker than the soldiers you hid from, donned in skintight robes that are too similar to your own skin to leave you looking for long. Your mask gets more heated as you hide behind the tree, but their marching is louder.

You think for a few seconds before your thoughts disappear into nothingness, and all you feel is exhaustion. You know you can join them far too easily. You aren’t sure they’ll accept you.

You try and think again, your thoughts too heated and angry to ignore, but not strong enough to fight. You remove your mask, and the whole world gets wider than the eyes would have it. You look into it, plain white with black eyeholes covered in netting, and one small hole near the mouth to speak in, also netted.

It has no expression and you can’t see your own reflection in it. It’s comforting to you but you can’t discern the person who’s worn it.

You place it in your robes, and it acts as a breastplate, too close to your aching chest to heal. You slowly walk from behind the tree, waving at them. The back end of the caravan stops, and he distantly can be seen holding up a gloved hand, calling in a foreign tongue at those ahead. The whole crew stops- people, wagons, horses, and all.

Before you can say anything, you fall over and feel everything disappear.

You don’t remember anything when you wake up, so you swing at her the moment she meets your eyes. She’s busy looking down at you, presumably hoping you don’t die, so when you swipe at her she moves out of the way- too easily and unaffected for you. With a bored sigh, she motions for you to settle down, but you’ve already sat square up, feeling the clutch of your mask against your chest.

She notices you’re up for good and sighs, again far too bored. Casually she mentions something in her language which you cannot decipher, and turns her head around, nearly whipping you with her ponytail. You only see the back of her as she gestures, red hair far too close and far too large, back only covered with her blue covering barely touching her chest, tight enough to choke her. Gods, you can’t imagine wearing something so tight against where you can barely breathe.

You’re so caught up making sense of her that you barely notice where you are until the wagon doors burst open enough to expose you to sunlight. Even as shaded by the forest as it is, it’s more than enough to make you hide in the blankets you’re too comfortable with. The view is blocked by someone far too tall storming in, exchanging words with the woman watching you earlier, taking her seat on a box, head ducked to fit the wagon.

You perch on your elbows, taking him in with anxiety. You don’t find the same man from earlier a new experience on the eyes, but alarming nonetheless. He looks patient, hand on his face (nearly on his knee) and watches you with dedication. He mutters something you can’t understand so quietly you almost don’t hear it before you don’t understand it.

You tilt your head, confused.

He blinks, surprised, but doesn’t look at you directly. He tries to speak again, but this time in a tongue he was less experienced with- so you could tell by his stilted syllables and blocky pronunciation. Still more experienced than you.

You deign to shrug this time. He laughs, hand over his face, but still lighting the wagon with his own grin. When he lets himself go, he looks more serious, but still smirks. He reaches around him for something only to stop on a nearby barrel. He cups his own hands on an object that he promptly tosses at you. You catch it in self-defense, glaring at him. He shrugs, clearly out of words, and slowly walks out of the wagon, letting the light in before the curtains shut again.

You look at your own hand to find a ponytail holder clasped by your right hand, similar to one she was wearing. You stare at it blankly, wondering how you apply it, when you stop cold. You look to see if anyone’s there before reaching into your robe, pulling out your mask and staring into its front and back.

You still can’t see your own reflection. You haven’t a clue what you look like.

Your hands reach for your hair, still damp to the touch, from something else. It’s so long you can pull it in front of your eyes. It’s pitch black except for the many, many impurities and tears you see, and as you pull it it hits your shoulder. Your own hand looks exhausted, with nails either chipped or oblong. You push everything back, unable to look at it, but still curious.

You find yourself wondering what he saw.

-MoD-

Sleep comes far more comfortably this time. You wake up staring at the blankets that held you, realizing that they’re all that held you from the floor. You’re tangled up in them like a second robe, more at rest than you’ve ever been. You remember everyone there immensely and try to imagine communicating with them, chest burning where you placed your mask. You hide your face in the blankets once more, noticing they’re nearly soaked. You take too long to pull away, leaving them a mess.

You stumble to your feet, head ducking down, hair plastered to your skin. Your robes are looser than before, but only barely. You feel them beat against your legs as you take small steps to the edge of your wagon. You slowly push them open, but no sun greets you. Instead, sparse stars do, and the only light is that of fire you vaguely see at its source in torches along the side of wagons, carried by horses, or held by people in the same outfits they wore when you first saw them.

Your hand is against your hair, this lost concept, when you nearly bump into him. You step back in surprise before nearly backing off of the wagon. His hand is resting against his head, covering not even his amused grin. He motions you back towards him, also unsteady. You don’t want to get too close to him, but anything is better than falling off.

You step towards him and he responds by sitting on the side of the wagon, legs stretched out, far less likely to move. You realize that the wagon holding him up at all is quite astonishing, but when he pats the seat next to you, not a second of hesitation passes your mind.

You notice the wood as you perch on its side, legs wrapped under it, hands on the metal keeping you static. You can barely make out the trees by firelight as you pass them by, each one looking like the last. Only by their shapes can you tell them- they’re midnight blue pieces of the sky with jagged tops that blend together with uniform nothingness that you stare into for too long. It still feels too warm, warmer than the night would indicate, helped nothing by the presence of him next to you, also staring at the blue nothingness.

Eventually you feel your hair grab you closer than your skin and your hands leave the metal seat. You slowly pull your hair away, too careful to test for pain or rip your own hair apart. He taps you on the shoulder, stopping you cold. You glance over at him and he holds his hand up, showing another ponytail holder.

You laugh, hearing your voice graze your throat too sharply. It sounds too bitter, too unrehearsed, and it feels like fire, but a part of you wonders how many ponytail holders he has on standby. He smirks again, but his eyebrows are too loose to imply he stands above you, that he’s found whatever you did amusing.

You take it again, but as you slowly pull your hair away, you realize you still are unaware of how to put your hair up. You look at the holder, staring it down to find its weaknesses, what will hold your hair up. As you do, he taps you on the shoulder again, and you’ve still not found a way. Reluctantly, you release the holder into his hand, sighing, staring at nothingness.

You feel your hair rip away too fastly to pay the trees too much mind. It’s so swift that it nearly removes from your scalp and leaves your skin stinging. You move to pull away, but he places his hand on your leg. You’re tempted to leap away for good back into the forests, but all you do is look away, trying to avoid that familiar burn. You close your eyes, avoiding a look at him, and let it happen.

Too quickly for you to predict, and with a wince every time, he pulls your hair into a uniform knot. You feel it tangle and twist around through his hands before feeling far too secure for being alone. You nearly leap as you feel something slap you in the back of your neck, but his hands are already back at his sides, nothing held. He looks at you with a raised eyebrow and nods, successful.

You notice now that none of your hair sticks to your skin as you brush against it. Eventually, your hands find their way to the root of your hair, and you pull sharply against it. Your hands brush briefly against a foreign material until they hit the edge of your hair, thick and unified.

You smile, but still tilt your head around to make sure it’s tied, and that it looks fine. None of it feels quite right, but at least you’re not glued together.

You whisper something in your native tongue at him, and despite him looking at you for too long, he nods. The wagon passes by, only the trees ahead of you. Even if you don’t look at him for a long while, your hands find their way to your hair, and you slowly pick out anything that doesn’t feel right. Truth be told, nothing really does, and the constant slap of spiced air from the wind that passes brushes your cheek with incorrectness. You want to reach for your mask, but you find some secrets are worth keeping to yourself. Still, you’d be so much more at home with it on.

Your hands are wrapped around your chest as the wagon moves on, brushing the mask.

-MoD-

You can’t count how long went by, but you feel him falling asleep in his own lap, hands clasped at his knees, bent over and head tucked away as though his armor were a shell. You watch him, barely awake, clearly uncaring, as your wagon takes small, plodding wheel movements through the dirt road.

You hear an unfamiliar tongue bark out, and as you react, the wagon finally slows to a halt so gradually you’re unsure if it’s still moving. A few more people sharply yell at each other in lightspeed, and you feel him start to come to near you. Still, you slap his chest a few times in an attempt to be gentle. He blinks, nearly jolting as you touch him, but still turns around towards the voices of his own tongue that will trump yours.

Eventually, he replies back to them, and the voices of the women are relieved. He finds one in particular he centers on, though you haven’t quite differentiated between them yet, unused to living faces. His words become softer, more quizzical, and when she sharply yells at him instead, he jumps down off the wagon and walks in front of him, through the nothing trees that no light has clarified. You reach for him, concerned, but he’s gone in a flash.

That is, until he comes back, hand in his short brown hair, looking at this woman. You look towards her for an answer, finding by the torchlight something different- an emerald kept in lock by a golden case above her forehead. She’s still barking at him, hands moving rapidly. You try and discern the language there but all you read is frustration.

Hesitantly, you leap off the wagon, landing on your knees. He looks down at you, expression mute as can be but betraying shock. He bends down towards you but you wave him away, robes still against your bent, aching legs. You gingerly reach your feet, preparing to fall again, but standing fine. You feel your legs ache and nearly give away, but take soft steps like they’re your first. He watches you pass by, eyes felt on your skin through your own robes as you step through the trees.

For the first few seconds, they’re dark to the point where you see not even yourself, but you feel the ground prepare to end abruptly at a cliffside. You stop sharply, nearly falling again, and stare at a river you’re unfamiliar with. You glare at it for a half-minute, still grabbing the nearest tree to avoid falling in. You stare at the surface of the water, but your eyes go deeper, maybe as far as you went, not far enough.

You try and imagine this river as a new one, but you know where each river leads. It leads to another river, then another one, and another one, eventually to the ocean. You realize that everyone has followed the river for quite a long ways. You’d be damned before you let them go any further.

Though, maybe you already are.

Your eyes trace it and watch it go to its left, impeding your progress, cutting everyone off at the heel. Wherever you are, the river has caught you.

You return to the dark forest you walked through to get here, only faintly lit by torch fire. You burst back through and see him standing there, watching the steps you took to leave for a few moments. Even as your eyes catch that no trees shield you from the water on the other side of the wagon, even before the empty nothingness with no end in sight, you catch him waiting. As you stand there alone, an outsider unlike the others, his eyes keep on you.

Whoever they are, you’ve traveled with them. You must assume they will travel with you- away from where you’d hope they’d never go.

The woman with the emerald is still shouting at him, but he won’t turn to him, so fixated is he on you. He gestures towards the river that passes him, but you point forward, facing away from the river. He turns around him, and motions at someone atop another wagon. They talk for a few seconds as you can only watch, before he looks at you.

Eyes on your face as your robes catch you, he gestures in front of you. You nod vigorously. He looks at the woman atop the wagon and gestures towards where your hands point, adding a few casual lines in his tongue. You swear you almost catch him smile.

The caravan begins to proceed again, but you feel it shift towards your left, away from the river. You walk with them, and he stays next to you. Even as you shift away from the river, your eyes stay towards it until there’s nothing but hinterlands ahead of you. You notice the front of the caravan, so far away, shift towards where you commanded, and feel his hand on your shoulder. You still can’t tear your eyes away from the river as it enters and disappears sight, never- you hope- to be seen again.

You notice his hand on your shoulder and face him. You manage, just barely, to smile. The mask beats against your chest, and inside you feel a new sort of fire- one you figure is the feeling of escape until it disappears with his hand.