the bell tolls for thee || xov v. axyl, day 8

Axyl sits with Bennie's body for what feels like an eternity after pulling the bat, tooth and nail, from the soft part of the beast's neck. Listening to growls turned whimper turned whisper turned silence, shaking of a paw turned twitching turned stoic, waiting for a cannon that never comes. They collect Ines's body on a schedule from across the way, tossing up a few warning signs of red glare and lightning too close for comfort, trying to get him to move away from the scene of his own haunting so that the illusion isn't broken. 

He calls their bluff not on the back of his own fearlessness, but on the fragmented pieces of his own shattered ego.

Carving into him like knives, flesh and sinew pulled apart and threads of muscles ripped anew, Axyl can't bring himself to move away from a crime scene, lets the blood seep into him and dry with a palm resting on Bennie's back all the while, listening for something anything other than the sound of his own heartbeat hammering in hollow chest, dead eyes focused on the soft lull of the ocean waves- methodically pulling and crashing into the shore in rhythmic procession.

A small part of him believes that, if he sits there long enough, unmoving and silent and broken and bent, that all his ghosts will forget he ever existed in the first place.

The larger part of him, afraid to look over his shoulder on the merit of what might look back at him, knows he's too far gone for anything as hopeful as that.

It's why the numbness sets in like clockwork, why he's grateful when it finally does. Refuge, solace, there's a tingling in his cheeks where the tears once arced and bent down skin, dried quickly in the winds and left to blot at the corners of his eyes. He rises slowly and with heavy heart, digits still wrapped tight around his weapon and blood still clinging to the scraps of nails. None his own, all his making. 

His familiar still sits in a heap of abandoned clothes and blankets, left over bite of an icy arena still wrapped within the folds, and it's all Axyl can do to pause and unfurl the creature from where it rests, avoid the way it stares at him with the same expectation of going along on their next adventure, bury the feeling that he knows he should take it along- wrestle the fact that he knows what will happen if he does. Bennie's howls carve through his mind, tears form at the edges of his eyes. "You're gonna stay here buddy, okay?"

Speaking to a creature of comfort that doesn't know it's own existence, what it means, what it's done. Jett curls a paw around his finger and instinct causes him to pull his hand away, sever the ties and bury the bodies. "Here-" He pulls his food from duffel bag and places it softly next to the creature, catches it curiously following him with a silence he hasn't heard in days, a sadness he's known since before he stepped into the arena.

He leaves a new kind of ghost by the shore, forces himself to ignore the cries of a creature better off alone than with him, swipes away the tears just to convince himself it was worth it.

He's still numb by the time the morning sun arcs above the clouds the next morning, sleep having found him curled up and haggard, ragged breaths and broken heart. Auto-pilot runs in his veins, instinct in his bones as he grabs what's left of his things and moves somewhere, anywhere. His steps are not his own anymore, guided by a higher power and a force too lethal to bear- blood and ichor on the horizon.

"Axyl?" 

Old wounds, new beginnings. He turns from his spot in the brush and is met with the sight of Xov staring back at him. Blood coats both of their uniforms, and Axyl lets his gaze travel down to the glaive within her grasp- recognizes he's outclassed by steel and willpower alone, gulps and swallows and readies himself for the end he's always known was coming. The words dance at the edge of his mind.

You broke my fucking leg. 

"I didn't mean to break your leg." 

Axyl sits in silence at the words, watches her struggle with her own mortality and faces his own. "I would say sorry if it mattered anymore..." 

It doesn't, it can't- never did.

"I... well, I am sorry. But we have to keep hurting each other."

"Bit late on the draw there with the apology." Axyl snaps back, voice solid, unforgiving, empty, numb. 'But, you got that last part right." Even as the blade thrusts towards him he stands for a second, willing his muscles to move, forcing the ghosts to wait if only one more moment for him to join them.