sun."
After this, neither could Lash.
Tilting his chin up, he closed his eyes for a moment... and vowed to thank his father the next time he saw him.
This was... magnificent.
Phury woke up with a burning, foul taste in his mouth. Actually it was all over, like someone had sprayed the inside of his skin with oven cleaner.
Eyes were glued shut. Stomach was a lead ball. Lungs were inflating and deflating with all the enthusiasm of a pair of stoners the day after a Grateful Dead binge. And leading the charge on going absolutely nowhere was his brain, which evidently had flatlined and not been resuscitated along with the rest of his body.
Actually, his chest was pretty much a closed shop as well. Or...no, his heart must have still been beating, because... well, it had to be, didn't it? Or he wouldn't have thoughts, right?
An image of the gray wasteland came to him, the wizard silhouetted against that vast gray horizon.
Welcome back, sunshine, the wizard said. That was such bloody fun. When can we do it again?
Do what again, Phury wondered.
The wizard laughed. Oh, how easily they forget the fun times.
Phury groaned and heard someone move.
"Cormia," he croaked.
"No."
That voice, that deep, male voice. So like the one that came out of his own mouth. In fact, it was identical.
Zsadist was with him.
As Phury turned his head, his brain sloshed in his skull, his bone dome nothing but a fish tank that had water and plants and a little treasure chest with bubbles, but nothing with fins in it. Nothing that actually lived.
Z looked as bad as Phury had ever seen him, with dark shadows under his eyes and his lips drawn tight and that scar more visible than ever.
"I dreamed of you," Phury said. God, his voice was just a rasp. "You were singing to me."
Z's head slowly went back and forth. "That wasn't me. Not up for singing anymore."
"Where is she?" Phury asked.
"Cormia? The Sanctuary."
"Oh..." That's right. He'd driven her there after having sex with her. And then he'd... Shot. Up. With. Heroin. "Oh, God."
That happy little realization brought his eyes into proper focus and had him looking around.
All he saw, everywhere, was pale lavender, and he thought of Cormia coming through the closet in the office in her white robe with that rose in her hand. The rose was still there, he thought. She'd left it behind.
"You want something to drink?"
Phury turned back to his twin. Across the way, the guy looked like he felt, worn-out and empty.
"I'm tired," Phury murmured.
Z stood and brought over a glass. "Lift your head up."
Phury did what he was told, even though it made the water level in his tank shift and threaten to spill over. As Zsadist held the glass to his lips, he took one pull, then another, and then he was gulping with desperate thirst.
When it was gone, he let his head fall back down on the pillow. "Thank you."
"More?"
"No."
Zsadist put the glass back on the bedside table and then settled once more in the pale lavender chair, his arms crossing, chin resting almost on his chest.
He'd been losing weight, Phury thought. His cheeks were beginning to stand out again.
"I had no memory," Z said softly.
"Of what?"
"You. Them. You know, where I came from before I was stolen, then bought."
Whether it was the water or what Z had just said, one of the two brought Phury into full consciousness. "You wouldn't have remembered our parents... our house. You were just an infant."
"I recall the nursemaid. Well, I have one memory. It was of her putting jam on her thumb and letting me nurse on it. That's about all I have. Next thing... I was up on the block with all these folks looking at me." Z frowned. "I grew up as a kitchen boy. I washed a lot of dishes, cleaned a lot of vegetables, fetched ale for the soldiers. They were good to me. That part of it was... okay." Z rubbed his eyes. "Tell me something. What was it like for you? The growing-up part."
"Lonely." Okay, that sounded selfish. "No, I mean - "
"I was lonely, too. I felt like I was missing something, but didn't know what it was. I was half of a whole, except there was only me."
"That's how I felt. Except I knew what was missing." The you went unsaid.
Z's voice went utterly flat. "I don't want to talk about what happened after I went through the change."
"You don't have to."
Zsadist nodded and seemed to