Chapter Text
Contrary to popular belief, Simon was not a religious man.
Of course, growing up on Eden meant he knew the doctrine practically word for word, especially with the… preferential treatment he got from his role as the Butcher, but reciting empty words does not a devout man make. It was simply the way of life for them all, a way to go through the motions in a world where the usual motions had vanished along with the stars. He’s sure some of his brothers truly believed, and they definitely all fought and killed and served like they did, but religion to the remaining people of Eden had always felt more like a frayed and decrepit rope tethering them to community than a true guiding presence.
So, as Simon chokes on blood and viscera during the final moments of his life, it surprises even him that he prays.
He prays with his whole heart, with every fiber of his soul, blackened as it may be, forsaken as he may be, that his final efforts do not go to waste. That the black box has escaped the clutches of this fucking death machine, and is floating to the surface to save all of humanity, all that’s left of it.
He prays for the souls of the ones trapped down here with him. If the thing dies, will they be set free? He doesn’t know, and he prays for them either way.
He prays for the lives of the people up top. That his anger had not cursed them to a slow, agonizing death, that their ship could escape the thing that would turn its focus to them now that he was dead, and that they could recover and move on from this awful place. He wonders if it’s selfish to pray that they remember his sacrifice, but he does so anyway.
And once all those prayers are sent out into the aether, his heart aching with regret and fear and agony and despair and less metaphorical vines of foreign blood worming their way through his veins, only then does Simon allow himself to pray for his own life.
He screams to the heavens, to whatever’s listening, to save him from this torment. He fights until the last to live, escape, be FREE, arms- well, arm- struggling against growths and tumors clustering up against him like a clingy animal, dissolving into his ruined skin and bringing fresh pain with it. He prays to every god he remembers to make this STOP, to SAVE HIM, to send a rescuer or an angel or even the fucking Coalition and save his fucking life that he’d worked so hard for.
He doesn’t hear anything respond. Only the rushing of blood and his own gurgling wails and the howling of a dying amalgam outside.
With his last coherent thought, he recites the only prayer he ever had any hope in.
Hail Mary, full of Grace.
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Simon wakes up, which is a surprise in itself.
A pleasant surprise, if not for the reason he’d been awakened.
Pain. New pain, not the same agony he’d passed out from. That had been external, the pain from his left arm- god, he doesn’t even want to THINK about his arm-, his face, and the twisting flesh-vines and blisters that had patterned his skin and burned horribly as he cooked in the stew of blood, had all been partitioned by a barrier of fat and muscle at the very least.
This pain feels disturbingly internal. And it’s squirming.
He tries to shriek but his mouth feels sealed shut. This causes his imagination to supply him with a visceral image of his own face, the ocean’s gore defiling every inch of skin with tumors and boils. He throws up in his sealed mouth.
Choking once again on old blood and stomach acid, Simon thrashes violently. He feels things rip and tear at his flesh from far too many angles, as if a million fingers are being torn off of his hands every time he moves, but the sharp pain of outside can’t distract his exhausted, confused senses from the wrongness inside.
There is something inside of him. Something moving and shifting like it’s trying to find something tucked in some forgotten corner of his internal organs. He can feel it, still mostly liquid, flowing purposefully into all the nooks and crannies of his insides. He knows what it is.
He retches again.
When the blood the Light the ocean reaches his heart, Simon’s desperate screams are so violent it frees his mouth from its skin-knit prison.
It’s as if his ears have been freed as well, as suddenly with a squelching POP he hears a truly awful noise echoing through the space, much clearer than before. It rattles him to his core, half-dead brain reaching for any explanation other than primal fear but finding none.
The sound is grating. Harsh. Deafening, leaving a ringing in his newly exposed ears that sends white spots dancing in his (non-existent) vision. It’s like the sound of rusted metal snapping under pressure was overlayed with the dying screeches of some kind of apex predator, and from there got mixed with the cries of the damned, with an atonal note at the upturn of it that sends shivers of terror running up Simon’s spine.
Partially in response to the pain, partially because of the all-encompassing fear, partially because FUCK YOU, LET ME LIVE, Simon screams back with all his energy.
The roar only gets louder. It completely swallows any noise Simon makes, if he managed anything at all. He doesn’t know.
As he feels his head start to swim again, the pull of unconsciousness making itself clear and pain overtaking him once again, the noise peters out into a pathetic but still jarring whine. Whatever’s making it is clearly in pain as well. Simon wishes it would leave him alone and go die somewhere else.
The veins now solidly lodged in his heart throb dully. He passes out.
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The next time Simon wakes up, it’s less of a surprise, but still unwelcome with the pain it brings.
He can feel the ocean’s blood, not just stagnated around his submerged body in a slurry of red, but gently winding its way through his systems with a slow, pounding rhythm. It follows his veins through their paths, having invaded every one and replaced his heartbeat with its alien pulsing. He feels queasy again, and struggles to hold back the rising bile.
He feels a bit more present in his body now. That’s good at least. Even if every inch of him aches, throbbing with dull force as if his body is a giant heart beating with every quick breath, and everything below his waist feels wrong in a way he can’t quite put a finger on. It’s constant, and it fucking hurts, but it’s subsided enough from before that he can think, at least.
Trying to open his eyes, Simon feels something warm and wet gently peel itself from his face and float away in the soft current inside the sub. Not that it helped much, since there appears to be nothing around him besides dark, deep red. Or, more likely, there’s just no light down here to perceive. That is… not comforting, and he feels his heart begin to race (the viscous liquid quickening its pace through his circulation feeling like a noose tightening around his neck) but probably should’ve been expected. He is at the bottom of an opaque ocean, after all, and even regular oceans made of less disgusting material didn’t get light this deep.
He closes his eyes again. It’s more difficult than he expected, eyelids sticking to something malformed (wormed under his eyeball, what the fuck) with the texture of half-dried mucus. Gross.
Simon turns his attention to the rest of his face, slowly working his jaw open. It feels broken, out of place somehow, and opens far wider than he’s used to, but strangely it doesn’t hurt any worse than the rest of his broken body. Small mercies, at least. It seems to open and close with little difficulty, no trace left of the tension from earlier.
His nose hurts, as does the rest of him, obviously, and at the same time feels almost numb, but it’s not broken. He can take in air clearly enough, lungs expanding and contracting like normal even if he doesn’t quite feel it going through his nose. Oxygen is a gift that he breathes in deeply, and-
Wait.
BREATHES?