like so much water / karl, day 6

"That's what you wanted, isn't it?"

The breeze tousles him, beating against his back like a pair of small fists, but he couldn't get up even if he wanted to.

Karl hasn't gone far from the bodies, he fell the moment Pierce stopped screaming and the only small movement he's made since was to pull the jar out of his bag and press it against his chest. He clutches at it, trying to kickstart the sound again because at some point it stopped and it's taken all his focus away from the mangled mess of leg underneath him.

It's not like he can feel that anyways. And he knows that's bad, distantly, but the height of the peak makes him shaky and the bloodloss makes him lightheaded and the silence makes him near frantic.

But it stays silent. Even when Karl grips the glass so harshly that it gives an ominous creak. He scrabbles at the lid of it, thinking that just maybe if he holds it, it'll recognize him again and it won't leave again, not like Calamity not like Yael not like Johnny, not after he's killed two people - two careers.

The paranoia seeps into him like ice water. There's Brennan over there behind those rocks. There's Dyno up on the slope. There's Calamity with their heart torn out of their chest, standing over him with their arms raised up in chant.

His fingers slip against the jar's lid. He doesn't have the strength to grip it properly and the blood's made it slick, so his hand just slips down the side.

"You brought me there." He accuses, pressing his fingertips to the glass so hard that they turn white under the red, "You wanted that."

You did that.

(It didn't.)

Then, he throws the jar.

He regrets it the moment that it leaves his hands, but he still does it.

It doesn't even get that far, maybe a few feet because he's weak and dying, but Karl's already dragging himself over to where it lands and then rolls, clinking against the gravel. He pulls himself across the rocks and trying not to jostle his leg but it hurts now, the pains been there the whole time, now that the jar's away from him he can feel it, it's like being hit in the chest again, like having his limb ripped off, being smacked in the face, burnt -

The moment his hands close around the jar, it subsides again. It ebbs down to a dull, numbed ache, and he runs his hands across the glass feeling for - there. There's a spiderweb crack along the side, starting at the base and reaching up to the lid, branching off in three places, but it's small. It's manageable.

"I'm sorry," He whispers to it, over and over again, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," He rocks back and forth with it, cradling the heart and cupping the crack in the jar.