Title: expendability.
Fandom: Marble Hornets
Pairing: Alex Kralie/Jay Merrick (sorta.)
Rating: PG-13
Length: 2190 words
Content notes: warning for implied (planned) homicide and suicide.
Author notes: i'm team "alex tried his best." also i hate second person voice but i did it for those sweet, sweet achievement badges, and it was kinda nice to branch out.
Summary: You can save him; you can save everyone.



There are times when everything meanders onwards smoothly, or as smoothly as the situation can pan out in such massively disastrous circumstances as these. Times where it all just slides into place with only the gentlest of pushes and then you have some breathing room; you can pause and reassess.

It is not satisfying; to think of it as such would be a gross overstatement, so you'd never consider such a brashly optimistic label. It is not satisfying, but the twinge of relief at the base of your spine is enough on its own.

Maybe I'll be able to sleep tonight, you sometimes think to yourself then, because everybody has those days where baseless positivity helps keep them going.

You won't sleep, though; you never do.

There are also times when everything goes to hell and you've lost control of everything and everyone so completely that you know this is all for naught, and you will eventually fail. All you're succeeding in is the delaying of the inevitable.

It is not an option; you cannot fail. It has to be defeated, dragged back down to whatever nightmarish underworld It was borne from.

You don’t dare allow yourself to latch onto any semblance of hope, but with every atom in your body, you long for it all to be over soon.

At these times, everything seems long past hopeless.

You don't notice the blood dripping from your face; you cannot even feel it.

There's shattered glass on the floor where you stand stationary, a detail which you hadn't even taken note of. It's not important. But the way the light bends through the clear shards mesmerizes you for a long minute; you count sky blue, pink, lemon yellow… The refracted rainbow is blindingly bright, and you're not sure why you can't seem to tear your eyes from it. You reach out to pick it up, lifting it closer to your eyes to see more clearly, and suddenly there's an overpowering blackness eclipsing each and every individual color, and you know It is here.

A sudden involuntary tremor in your hand causes you to lose hold of the glass, and before it ultimately clatters to the ground to separate into more even tinier pieces like some sort of rainbow prism mitosis, the sharp edge cuts through the skin of your hand. You don't feel this either, not in the slightest.

Run. Running. Getting away. As far away from It as you possibly can.

But you know It will find you. It always finds you, and that is the sad reality you exist in right now; you have learned to accept it. Kind of.

That's what the plan is for, because once you take care of everything, It will leave you alone forever, leave everybody alone forever…

...And you will finally get the long, peaceful uninterrupted sleep that you ache for.

It is for the best; they will understand soon enough. They are all so tired too, and you are giving them the gift of rest, of unending safety.

You run and you run until you're positive you aren't being followed, and then you run some more for good measure -- you can never be too careful.

And then you hide.

---

It worms Its way under your skin and distends like a web through your veins; you are certain of this because you are tactilely aware of it.

If you cut yourself open, you don't think you would bleed at all; only Its vitality would leak from your wounds in ethereal wisps.

You are so, so tired.

But your work will reach completion soon enough; have patience, and you will finally be granted the eternity of repose that you seek, and you will have shielded humanity from It.

This is by no means an easy task; in fact, it has drained dry your physical and emotional well-being, shattered your psyche like a delicate fragment of glass, but there is no choice in the matter to be had.

The woods are tranquil today, and the bitter irony of that is hard to swallow. The breeze is so gentle and unassuming that you wouldn't even take notice of it if it weren't for the soft rustle of dead leaves, brought back to a short-lived life through the force of the wind.

Sunlight seeps through countless tree branches, a natural light show projected on the chaotic mess of dirt, pine needles, and gnarled tree roots that make up the forest floor.

A beautiful day that you cannot enjoy. You take in your surroundings on only the most primitive of levels; you're careful not to trip on any stray tree roots, and you make an effort to dodge the harsh rays of the sun so as to preserve your vision, but whether or not you actually see any of it is up for debate.

It is like you're viewing everything around you through aquarium glass; it's a glance into another world, one that is as real as an image on a screen, visible, beautiful but not tangible.

Neither of you say anything, opting to walk in silence instead, but you hear him tapping on the aforementioned aquarium glass all the same, shattering your delusion of a fabricated reality, and you meld into the outside world forcibly, instantaneously.

There are many lost souls that you must save, but he is special. Completely separate and yet not unlike the way she was special, but she is already at peace so dwelling on such things will only hold you back from reaching the long-awaited end of this journey.

You can read the suspicion engraved into the lines of his face, a suspicion which you know is justified, but you still like to tell yourself that he agreed to follow you deep into the woods because he trusts you; it's a welcome delusion, like a mirage of an oasis in the desert.

A sharp twist of excitement cuts through the thick air of apprehension between you both, and you do not know if it's from somewhere outside of yourself or within; if you are being honest, you cannot really tell the difference anymore, as you think you have about as much control over your own thoughts and actions as you do those of the outside world.

Is this sick anticipation Its influence, or your own? You are not sure which hypothetical is worse; all you know is that neither option is in the least appealing, and therefore you probably do not wish to know the truth. Living in ignorance is preferable, and this strange moment, charged with energy, will undoubtedly pass.

It doesn’t pass by promptly enough for your liking, so you make a haste decision to break through the tension by speaking.

Haunting words, suspicious words, but they are all that had been floating in the recesses of your mind, so they will have to do. He looks at you, eyes exhausted and wide with confusion, narrowing with misgiving as the seconds crawl by.

He says something in delayed reply, but you are too wrapped up in the nonverbal responses to really pick up on it. The realization hits you suddenly, and all of existence itself seems to come to a screeching halt as it dawns on you. When he looks at you, he does not see you anymore, or what you used to be; he sees only It, and you aren’t even sure you can blame him for this.

You only realize that neither of you are pressing onwards anymore when the silence becomes almost unbearably oppressive, amplified by the absence of steady footfalls.

It is time. You are delaying the inevitable, but it is time.

He will thank you for this, or would if he could, because you are doing the right thing. This is the right choice, the only choice really, and you cannot hesitate.

You must save him, and you must do so right now.

It will only hurt for a moment, and then there will be no more pain, I promise, is what you want to say, but “Jay, come here,” is all you can manage to vocalize.

You can see the mistrust cloud his eyes, darkening the uncertainty that’s already there. Both of you are walking again, but slowly, almost cautiously, noiselessly. He stops almost as soon as he's started, mumbling something about his camera that you do not care enough to pay attention to. ...Ah, changing the tape, that's what he is doing, because he has to be filming at all times. You can sympathize with this.

It does not matter how many tapes he fills with recorded obsession, because the ultimate fate of these tapes? Incineration. The reels of footage will melt down to nothing, and you will be free - all of you.

Inanimate objects can be set aside for right now, though, because the matter at hand deals with human beings, which makes it far more pressing.

You are almost there, almost to the Place, and if you can only complete the trip without any major setbacks, things will turn out just fine. Just like they turned out just fine for the others (or so you think).

It won't hurt, and I'm doing it for you. More silent reassurances that you will never even attempt to verbalize. You're facing away from him, finding it difficult to stare directly into his wary gaze, and instead face the direction you’d been hiking toward this whole time. You are close, but close will never be good enough.

“Come here, Jay.” It's the same phrase repeated from before, but it sounds different, somehow, as though there are different meanings wrapped up and intertwined in the sound waves. You don't know what these meanings are, and you are pretty sure you'd be content to never unravel the mystery.

He doesn't. In fact, he does not take a single step towards you at all, instead shrinking backward just a little, enough for you to draw the conclusion that he is, indeed, afraid. You do not listen to the collection of excuses that spills from his lips (something about how it's getting dark and he doesn't want to be in these woods come nightfall), you are too preoccupied analyzing his frightened expression.

He doesn't just look afraid; he looks breakable somehow, fragile. Poor health, both mental and physical, has left him pale, his skin almost appearing translucent in the harshness of the evening sun’s glare. Fragile, see-through, he is like a glass figure just waiting to be crushed, shattered.

Now he is leaving; paranoia and second-guessing your motives are both likely reasons why, much moreso than the inevitably setting sun. Perhaps he also fears an appearance by It, for which you cannot blame him. You can feel It lurking in the trees, playing voyeur as you orchestrate Its demise. It won't matter when your plan finally succeeds.

You let him leave, after forcing an agreement to postpone this… Nature walk, or whatever it is on the surface. As much as this needs to happen, you cannot bring yourself to use force, so you will wait. The time will come, and it will be as painless as it can be, and everything will be fine.

He sets off on the return hike immediately, but you do not follow. You cannot bring yourself to leave this Place, not just yet, so you keep wandering toward your original destination, alone.

It is dark, and it is quiet. You are still fluctuating between varying states of distress, but this might just be the closest thing you'll get to equanimity until all is over and you can sleep.

Soon. It cannot be much longer now.

You will save him; you won't allow yourself any sort of serenity until you are certain he is saved.

The woods are even more silent after the sun goes down, the low call of an owl the only sound you can hear other than small twigs snapping beneath your feet.

Through the slightly dirtied concave lenses of your glasses, you think you see It, but it is only a trick of the eye, a shadow in the moonlight.

It could get you if It wanted to, It could get all of them if it wanted to. You have been doomed from the start, and so too have they. Marked, cursed, trapped.

But you found the loophole. And you are getting out of this, dragging them all out of this before It can devour them.

Perhaps you should feel valiant about this, but mostly you just feel exhausted.

You're only distantly aware that a chorus of insects is chirping an unknown melody, and you think it would be nice to break through this thick, plexiglass aquarium hell and really experience the sound, but you can't.

Nothing pleasant is actually enjoyable anymore; you have not experienced joy in a very long time, but right now you let the distant knowledge that the sound is just a bit soothing be enough.

Maybe you'll be right here, in this exact spot, at the End, and they will be here to sing you to sleep.

Yes, you think that sounds wonderful.