[Woooo Meridy Nightmare sequence! This is mostly just self-indulgent with a bunch of references I don't expect anyone to get but I like it so I'm posting it :)]
[Heads up for mentions of weapons, blood, and death, as well as just general disorientation and some of the very, very shitty things Meridy has had to hear throughout their life]
Meridy opens their eyes to a sky full of stars. Their eyes trace over constellations whose names linger on the tip of their tongue but they can’t quite bring the words to sound, to speak the information into reality. They roll over to their side.
Well, they try to.
It’s rather hard to move when there’s no floor underneath you, no ground to push against. Their head turns, and the stars are below them just as they are above.
Meridy falls.
The breath is knocked from Meridy when they land. It’s a grassy field, full of flowers. Here, they can stand, and they stumble to their feet, turning their head up to face the sun. They take in a breath, but they don’t have lungs to breathe. There’s no worry in their mind at that fact.
Their feet are moving before they can think, hands beginning the work of gathering sticks and stones upon the ground, eyes scanning for where in this new land might someday be called home.
Time skips like a record, throwing them off balance. Forests, fields, deserts, taigas. Caves, ruins, villages, strongholds. They know it and they don’t, walking these strange places like they’ve been doing this all their life.
The fire is warm. Shadows of people they know but can’t remember dance around the grand castle-like hall and laughter rings out in a way that makes Meridy want to scream. They don’t know this place. They don’t belong in this place.
Yet the people keep talking to them like they do, keep treating them like more than they deserve to be. It’s off-putting and disorienting and the fire burns hotter now, flames starting to reach for hands that have long since gone numb to the pain. They try to pull away, try to leave this place for the loneliness they know so well, but the shadows work with the flames and they are stuck.
Stuck until they draw the knife from their belt and plunge it into the shadow nearest to them, a small figure, a young boy.
Their heart breaks as the scene fades and they don’t know why.
The blade is covered in blood. It’s a knife, their own blood, hopeless and unworthy. It’s an axe and the blood is young, too young with a flash of green and a desperate plea to uncaring tyrants. It’s a sword and now the blood is caring, a heart that leads with a steady and unrelenting kindness and now responsibility chokes Meridy’s throat just as much as grief.
The blade skids across the mirror-like floor, landing at the feet of a cloaked figure and now it’s a trident, sharp and deadly and the man picks it up. Meridy struggles to raise their head to focus on the figure, his eyes a burning, shifting color that cannot be named. He does not speak. He never speaks. The trident is held at their throat and their life is in the stranger’s hands. They squeeze their eyes shut and wait for death.
The blade is gone, but their eyes are still shut. The world turns and shifts and twists around them and they don’t want to see the places they’ve been, the places they’ve lost.
None of them had ever fit.
They had never fit.
Something always went wrong, something always felt wrong. A decade of wandering and no closer to anything that could be called a home.
Calling it wandering was generous.
It was running.
Running away.
The path is familiar under their feet, the dirt and the rocks crunching as they push themselves further with every step. Meridy’s eyes are open again even though the wind wants to drive them closed. Their lungs burn and they taste blood in their mouth but they don’t stop.
Voices cry out from all around them.
“Worthless child!”
“Cursed!”
“Nothing but trouble!”
“You’re not welcome here!”
“Leave!”
“We don’t want you here!”
The voices fade into one, familiar and foreign all at one.
It’s Meridy’s own voice.
“Nowhere is your home.”
“Nowhere is your home.”
“Nowhere is your home .”
“Nowhere is your home.”
“NOWHERE IS YOUR HOME.”
“YOU HAVE NO HOME.”
“YOU DON’T BELONG HERE!”
Meridy wakes up with a gasp, shivering from the cold of the ocean air as they pull themselves up with one arm to sit against the rocks.
It takes a minute for them to orient themselves, to notice the familiar water that has crept up to their feet, the curve of the alcove that sheltered them for the night, the pain that radiates through their shoulder.
Their throat is raw, and their face is streaked with tears.
The sun is rising.
