https://archiveofourown.org/works/64414510/chapters/165382732
Locked Inside My Head (Say You Won’t Let Me Drown) Chapter 11
We made it! It’s been a long 3 months and I did spend FAR too long chewing on this one, but it’s finally finished. God help me for writing the next one.
It occurs to him that he’s really dying, slowly, so very gently. It doesn’t hurt as much as he thought it would - the realisation, not the actual dying part, that’s absolute shit. It’s peaceful, out here in the middle of nothing, surrounded by nature and the distant sound of water, a source that probably leads into the same stream that killed his sister. He thinks about dragging himself up onto his feet to go find it, to sit beside the cool spray before the mercury gets to Tara’s heart or it runs out of blood to pump, finally, to think of her as his body rattles with shivers and finally gives up on this stolen life.
He gets one hand under him, tries to get up. His arm trembles before he’s even an inch off the ground, vision splintering with greenish-white splotches.
He doesn’t get up. He thinks maybe he should call Liam, at least, tell him not to worry, tell him it doesn’t matter anymore because they’re both dead: Pope's insides turned to blackened soot and ichor, Theo’s turning to ash in his chest, metal on the back of his tongue. He has to remind himself to keep breathing, then gets distracted remembering he can’t call Liam, that Pope took his phone, his keys, everything, that they’re back inside those concrete walls. That stirs some sort of anger in his chest, makes him hope Liam does come looking if only so the truck doesn’t get abandoned again, thrown in some impound somewhere, crushed. It’s the first thing Theo ever bought, it’ll be the last thing of his left once he’s gone.
He allows himself to hope Liam will keep it, as a memento, maybe.
He rolls back over, so he can look up through the leaves into the splotchy patches of sky above, dotted with polka dot stars, quiet and cold and distant. It’s not so bad, he thinks, breathes raggedly through his mouth, doesn’t have the energy to clear the thick liquid choking him, to find out if it’s red or black or silver. It doesn’t matter.
There's a strange, warm sensation behind him, like someone's pulled back a curtain and let the sunlight in, just for a moment, but his eyes have slipped closed at some point and he doesn't have the energy to open them. A presence settles beside him, a hand on his hair, smoothing the too long strands back out of his face, carding fingers over his scalp, a low, humming sound he remembers from somewhere.
"…Tara?" He croaks, fingers spasming when he tries to lift a hand, no longer cooperative, and he feels more than hears the quiet shushing sound, the gentle hum of a long forgotten lullaby.
He drifts. It all fades away until it's just him, a tired, dying mind detached from a body that should have died a long time ago, and the quiet song that stirs up some sort of memory, somewhere deep below everything that tried to destroy it over ten years and thousands of erasures.
