The Return

His body burned from the inside out. From the depths of bone marrow, right up to the top layer of scorched skin, all he could feel was intense heat and stabbing pain. If he’d had the strength to open his eyes, he would’ve been met with the sight of heavy foliage and bright, springtime flowers. He also would have seen the gun next to his hand.

As it happened, he couldn’t open his eyes. The pain was far too intense, and his body too numb and dysfunctional. For a few moments he was conscious, but a second later fell back into the haze of darkness.

The next time he was aware of his body and mind, he hurt a lot less. There was no longer a burning sensation running through every vein in his body, and only a dull pain knocking against his skull every few seconds. His body was regaining feeling, and his fingers were twitching slightly with the need to move after so long. This time his eyes felt a part of his body once again, and they jerked open to the midnight sky.

Stars. So long since I’ve seen the stars.

He passed out seconds later, before his brain could process the fact that there had been no reply to his thoughts.

The final waking took place after a horrific dream (vision?) of a startlingly familiar face falling lifeless from the shot of a gun. The bang reverberated off his skull and the open mouthed silent gasp stuck in his brain for a few moments. Then his consciousness caught up with the dream, and his body jolted upright with a yell.

“Ben!” Ben!

It echoed off his brain, the name repeating itself over and over in his own voice. Not in the voice of the men from the town who’d heard the yell and been shocked into repeating it, but his own voice echoing around his brain. And there was nothing else to accompany the name. There was no more Noise.

His eyes searched the area around where he sat, though found it unrecognisable. It was a large ditch, filled with browning plants and fallen golden leaves. The air had a bite to it that could only be found in the dead of Autumn, and the sun’s rays filtered through the many trees above to give the ditch a sparkling sensation. It was too beautiful, and far too quiet. The name had stopped bouncing off his skull like the old voices used to do when they had filled the air, but Cillian could still hear it.

Ben. Ben. Ben.

His brain still wasn’t allowing him enough information for him to work out who Ben was, other than a strong pastel blue colour surrounding the image of the dying man from his dream. And emotion. So much emotion flooded his body each time he thought the name, and yet he couldn’t reach out to work out why. The only information his brain was passing through seemed to be his awareness of his body. He could finally feel his weak legs and stiff arms tingling back to life with the uncomfortable sensation of pins and needles.

He decided it was time to get up.

It took immense effort to force himself up on his shaking arms and legs, but it was well worth it as he was struck with a sudden sense of recognisation of the area around. The trees were thick and bushy in some places, while sparse in others. Round red fruits hung off the end of the branches, which could only be the late falling apples of last season. The ground above the shallow ditch he had ended up in was muddy and looked extremely unstable, like it could collapse in with the tread of one foot.

Further through the curtains of trees, he swore he could see the shimmering of water, but it could have been his messed up brain.

Water. Water.

The word started to echo through his head with the realisation that in all the time he’d spent in this ditch, the only water he had consumed would have been rainwater falling into his mouth, and he was only surviving when it came to food because of the nutrition from whatever had crawled into his mouth. That drew a shudder from his whole body.

He needed that water. Whether it was a trick of the mind or not, he needed it before he collapsed again. He did not want to go through the utter confusion and pain of waking up from another deep sleep like the one that he had been roused from only three times.

One foot was placed in front of the other, then another, then another, then-

“What the-“ He croaked as his foot hit something so sturdy and hard that it was not a bramble bush. He brushed long hair out of his eyes to clear his vision, then used extra effort to drop his head to see what was blocking his way.

Davy-bloody-Prentiss.

It was a name. A name and a curse. That was all he could associate with the gun lying at his feet in the instant. Was the gun a belonging of Davy-bloody-Prentiss? Or was it meant to be used on Davy-bloody-Prentiss?

Cillian would have shrugged if he could manoeuvre his shoulders to do such a thing at that moment. It was a gun. Whoever it was meant for or whoever it belonged to was obviously not using it, and in a place that only vaguely touched the edges of his brain as being familiar he would need any kind of weapon. What if there were evil new inhabitants with no Noise who would attack him from nowhere, and that was why he hadn’t received any reply to the calling out in his mind. Maybe-

A word fell from his brain. And it was terrifyingly familiar. So familiar that his brain even supplied an image to go with the word.

Spackle.

Oh, he knew what a Spackle was. And with that word came the reminder of so much he had forgotten. A war with the Spackle. Living in Prentisstown under the Mayor with too many cruel ideas to know what to do with. Working on a farm. Sheep. And-

There it was. Ben. Clear as day he remembered Bennison Moore and how could I forget him? Ben helping out with the sheep. Ben smiling across the table at him over dinner. Ben holding his hand and watching over a young-

A child. A young child that he and Ben had looked after for so many years until he had gone. He had to go because of something that was so close to his mind and all he could think of was a book. A leather bound book, heavy in his hands but so precious. So, so precious.

“So, this is it?” He asked quietly. His fingers brushed over the cover, flipping it open to reveal the inked handwriting running across the lines of the page.

‘Dearest Todd, I begin this journal on the day of yer birth, the day I first held you in my arms rather than my belly.’ He read to himself, the words flashing out in his Noise. He read the next few lines with forced back tears of anger, then slammed the cover over as it became too much.

“I can’t believe this is it. She’s gone.”

Ben sighed at the conflicted look on Cillian’s face. “But we can’t do anything, remember? It ain’t our place to start an uprising over her death. Let’s just, let’s just get on with it and live our lives and raise Todd the way his ma and pa can’t. Let’s look after some sheep and do some farming and fer god’s sake Cillian, please don’t be violent.”

With a heavy sigh, Cillian dropped to floor and replaced the journal back into its hiding place where its precious contents could not be found by any sort of searches carried out by the-

“Cillian.”

He held back the curse (just barely) and left the thought unfinished (there was no kind description of these men that didn’t involve a curse).

“So... The sheep?” He asked quietly. The baby was sleeping, the town was working, and Cillian and Ben had to survive.

He blinked at the vivid memory. Todd, an orphaned baby boy who he had raised from only a few months after birth with only Ben’s help. In a town of terror hidden behind the mask of peace and work, Cillian now had no doubts about where he was. The problem would be finding home.

He lifted the gun hesitantly to rest over his shoulder. He knew this area of land well, now that his memory was starting to fill in the blanks and give him an almost complete knowledge of his identity and life, and he knew the direction North.

But water came first. Water had to come first if he wanted to survive.

On shaking legs he forced himself forwards, tripping once or twice but using his entire focus to regain balance each time. The boggy water couldn’t have been more than a few metres away, but to Cillian with his short, slow steps, it took what he would estimate as being at least ten minutes (with several pained stops as he fought the ache in his limbs). Nevertheless, it was worth it when he reached the glittering liquid and realised it was nowhere near as muddy and disgusting as he had predicted. In fact, even in normal circumstances he wouldn’t have had too much of an issue with drinking this water (especially since he knew it was a safe and mostly uninhabited area of land).

When he was sufficiently hydrated again, Cillian stumbled back to the shallow ditch where he had woken. The gun remained hoisted over his shoulder, and with new found strength that came from the water he turned and headed in the direction which, despite one or two memories being hazy, he still remembered was the right way to head back to town.

The path heading north turned out to be a lot longer than he anticipated.

Sure, there was barely any pain in moving now that he could stop and drink, and eat from the bushes cluttering the forest area (he wanted to steer clear of the swamp, since the image of a crocodile with a wide open jaw and rows of deadly teeth kept flashing in his mind). But that didn’t stop the fact that he had slept for-

How long? He vaguely remembered waking during a freezing cold night, but that hadn’t given away any clues. He guessed at a few months, since the prospect of it being years was too much for him to handle.

A few tears escaped his eyes when he reached the break in the trees that revealed a large collection of fields that were so familiar it hurt. Across the fields he expected to see the large wooden structure of the farmhouse he lived in with Ben and Todd, with the two waiting outside, yelling his name with an overwhelming Noise.

What he saw instead was a burnt out first floor, and no sign of the second, confirming his suspicions of a fire. And no Ben and Todd waiting outside.

But what if they’re-

He stopped himself quickly. Ben had hope, far more than he himself could ever muster in the world they lived in, and Todd was a fighter. Cillian should be the dead one, not his family.

But the thought had struck desperation inside of him, and he found his legs working into a run and his voice and mind screaming their names as he trampled down grass that had grown out too much (shoulda bin there to stop that) and weeds poking up that he had strong urges to just pull out of the ground.

When the blackened house was stood right before him with bits of ash being swept up into the breeze, everything became a bit too real for Cillian. He was no longer sleeping, and this was what he had missed. With a weary sigh, he slunk through the hole of collapsed wood and fell down in the centre of the old kitchen. Nothing had remained intact; not even the large metal stove which had melted into a strange gooey mess on the floor.

It was all too much. Every old toy of Todd’s, every farming tool and item of clothing, all gone to the fire.

His emotions were boiling up inside, in that way that in the past would cause him to shout and get angry without realising the affect it could have. This time it was raw terrifying sadness that had consumed him though, and his Noise was indescribable. It was no longer words and images, just a violent blur of grey battling with other colours and shades and completely undisturbed in the silence and lack of other Noise and he was losing control again and it hurt so much and-

He heard the sound, even with the whirlwind messing up the insides of his head. It was calm and clear, with no undertones of desperation or anger or images swirling around. Just words floating through the air, clear as day and crisp as night.

The words themselves were difficult for Cillian to make out, but he knew there was a distinct feeling of calmness sweeping over the owner of the Noise, and also a feeling of... Belonging? It was definitely a safe and homey feel and it was relaxing Cillian right to the core. But along with that blurred out feeling of safe was a patch of silence. Not the silence he had felt when he woke to no incessant pounding of words against his skull, but the silence felt as if there was a hole right through the air where something was missing.

...Or where something was.

The harder he listened out, the more he started to hear a faint blurred voice repeating a name every once in a while. It wasn’t the calming voice repeating the name (Violet? Vi-?) but it kept breaking through those patches of silence that he found himself analysing closely and feeling as they moved closer and closer to his curled up position.

That thought shocked him. Prentisstown felt hollow and empty, and the possibility of seeing another human (even one of the old men from the town who he’d detested in the past) made his heart jump.

He staggered up to his feet and pushed through the wooden barricades to reach the broken down walls of the farmhouse. When he was through the gap, he made a beeline for the road where he could just feel those – whatever they were’s – coming closer and closer and-

He stood there in the middle of the road watching the blobs of the figures merge into actual people, and was shocked when he realised that the silence came from two quite small (at least compared to the other person) figures. They were definitely human, and not Spackle, but other than that he had no idea what he was looking at.

Unless-

As they got closer he started to pick out shocked words from the Noises of the taller two people, both noticing him stood in the road and he caught glimpses of Why is someone here? How are they alive? How did they get away? But it made no sense so he blocked it out as much as possible to try and focus on that slowly ebbing feeling of home that the tallest was emanating.

As they got even closer, his brain started making a few connections. Hey, they look a lot like-

And the words were mirrored in the Noise of the two males when they were finally at a distance where they could see one another’s faces. Cillian was shocked, though not completely terrified, when he realised that the other smallest figure was a girl, and therefore had no Noise. It made sense, and it wasn’t like he didn’t know of the women living in towns and villages all across New World.

But then as they got ever closer, things froze. No one moved when complete recognition set in, and their faces stayed in a deadly still mask of shock. Because they knew. Cillian knew. It was... It was them and they were right there in front of him and despite the obviously large space of time they had been apart, there was still no doubts that the unshaved raggedy man was his Ben, and the much taller, more serious looking teen had to be his Todd.

The girl Cillian wanted to think about, to work out what she was doing there, but he couldn’t look away from his family. So different. He knew after so long (how long?) he mustn’t look any better (the stubble across his chin was thick and he thanked every god he wasn’t sure if he believed in that it hadn’t grown into a full on beard) with eyes that felt sticky and swollen from such a long sleep, and lips that had crusted up the moment he stood and walked away from the water in the pool.

Ben? Todd?

He asked with his Noise, rather than his voice, since he knew it would come out scratchy and painful, leaving his throat even more sore than it already was. It was unnerving to feel his own Noise bouncing back and forth with shock while three silent (or at least controlled) humans stood before him.

It took barely a second before Ben was moving. He said nothing, and let nothing out of his calming Noise other than Cillian, Cillian, Cillian. Then his arms engulfed him and they were inseparable. Cillian could feel Ben’s wet tears against his own cheeks, and realisation started to hit him. They thought I was dead.

“Damn right we thought you was dead, Cillian. The house burned down with you in it. How the hell were you s’pposed to survive?” The words were choked and angry and so full of emotion that Ben didn’t even need a Noise in that moment.

“I was... Asleep? I think. I ran, before it burned down. The forest. I passed out. I... I just woke up.” His own voice was still small and cracking and hard to force out, but the words made sense and the relief that washed over him straight from Ben’s body was comforting and warming.

“So no injuries?” Ben asked quietly into his ear.

“None,” Cillian replied. Ben grinned against his ear and gave him a quick squeeze before pulling away. They turned to face the two younger, and were met by Todd’s expression of disbelief that had not moved since they had first noticed one another. The girl was shocked, he could tell, but she had a glint in her eye, one that made him think she was enjoying the surrounding feeling of home that they had created from the hug.

“But- But you’re-“ Todd was stuttering, his voice much deeper than Cillian ever remembered and he had a sudden urge to cry too, to just join in with Ben and let the emotion was over him.

“YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD!” Was the roar the followed from Todd’s mouth. He was tearing up, and when the girl tried to slip her hand into his he shoved her away. Cillian flinched at the yell. Of course, they had expected he would never return, and then as soon as they come back for a trip down memory lane, they get faced with Cillian. Long dead Cillian.

“I’m sorry, Todd. I Just-“

“No. No no no. Please don’t apologise; you’re supposed to be mad at me. No, what am I saying? I’m mad at you and if you were mad at me I’d hate you forever cuz you just don’t go like that Cillian-“

Cillian stepped forward until he was right in Todd’s face. “I’m not mad. I can’t be mad. I’m seeing you again, ain’t I?” And then they were hugging and Todd was crying and Cillian just let himself go, let the tears flow and let himself nod along to the mutterings of ‘God I hated you so much but then you were gone and I missed you Cillian, I effing missed you. You’re like my pa and you just went and you just can’t do that Cillian you can’t.’ He distinctly remembered a moment, right before he ran away, when he had hugged Todd and been rewarded by a still body and a shove. It had all started with a terrible hug, and he was glad that it was ending with a good one.

Eventually they pulled away, and the first thing Cillian noticed that wasn’t Todd’s tear stained face was the girl. She was looking teary now too, and had a huge grin plastered on. When she realised Cillian was giving her an expectant look, she grinned even wider.

“I’m Viola,” She smiled. He was aware that her accent was nothing like anything he’d heard from New World before, but the way she was all raggedy but grinning made him think of only one word: hope. And then he watched as her hand crept into Todd’s, and Todd let her and they were holding hands. Cillian couldn’t stop it, he was grinning too because Todd was happy and Todd was smiling like he hadn’t done since he was five years old, and Todd had found his One In Particular.

He could just tell by the shy look on his face.

Ben cleared his throat from behind and the small noise in itself made Cillian’s insides jump with happiness because Ben.

“We kind of have a lot to talk about. So, Cillian. Walk with us?” His eyes were smiling just as much as the rest of his face, and all those months of sleeping were catching up with Cillian and he felt like he really had missed half of his life.

“I just found you again. Why would I say no?”