{se} karma for the rules I break

Jude

In my head I am hunting for myself
but I come up empty again

There's no logic to Liam finding his dad given he isn't anywhere close to Torchline, but Jude isn't in a state to recognize that, subsiding fitfully under the calm tone and reassurances offered to him despite the lingering twitchiness. There's direction and transparency to Liam's words, but it's lost on Jude - he only clings to his offered name and the idea that soon, this might be over. What is pain, of all things, when measured against an end to this nightmare?

"Jude," he chatters out between trembling, clacking teeth. Definitely shock, he thinks dully, slightly hysterical with far-away humor. His eyes sway toward his leg only to skirt back again, sick with the sight of pale bone where it definitely shouldn't be visible. "Just get me out of here. Please, I don't care if it hurts." The swift way he breathes through his nose makes it clear he's clinging to his higher brain functions by a thread. Words feel like a grind of grit and stone through the dulled blades of his mind, spitting out pebbles and dust through his salt-scorched throat as he reaches his hands toward Liam like a much younger child might.

the night is a cavern
I am underneath it, inside it, anything but free of it