Chapter Text
He remembers drowning.
The water pushed him down further and further, no matter how hard he swam against it. He couldn't tell up from down, darkness overlapping everything around him like the water did. Oppressive, thick like sludge despite only being water.
He tried to surface, he really did. His lungs burned for air, his eyes watered and tears melded into the current around him, adding onto the abundance.
How ironic that he couldn't surface despite being a beaver. Beavers are supposed to be excellent swimmers, right? Yet no matter how much, how hard he tried, his head could never breach the water.
He vaguely wondered if that's how Olivia felt like when Brandon killed her. She drowned too, didn't she? That's what the layers had shown him and his ‘friend’..
He doesn't know how long he had been down there, in that dark abyss. Minutes, hours… he couldn't tell. Eventually though, dots faded into his vision, lungs screaming for air, and he couldn't keep conscious after that.
…Where was he now? It was still dark when he woke up again. Well… not exactly dark. Whatever was around him now was something thick, transparent but not clear, and had some kind of green hue to it. He couldn't feel the water from before around him now, and soft wheezing breaths left him every time he inhaled and exhaled. His limbs felt heavy, them sluggish in the.. something that he was in. His eyes… he could barely open them, couldn't hardly keep them open either. There was also something on his face, it clear and surrounding his snout as if it was made for it. He could see the inside of it fog up from his breathing, but for some reason that was blurry…
Not only was that blurry though, there was moving shapes further out in front of him. Warped a bit, like he was looking through glass, and.. also very freaking blurry as well. More blurry than the mask thing on his face. It was so bad he couldn't even tell what the shapes were.
He didn't register sound until seconds later. His ears twitched when he noticed the soft murmurs around him, most of which were muffled by something… glass..? Sounded like something muffled by glass anyways. It was kinda hard to hear what the murmurs were, but it didn't take him long to realize that the murmurs were speech. Talking.
So the moving shapes were probably people then, right? People… that he couldn't really see or hear very well. Great…. Well, he could hear them better than he could see them… that was better than nothing, yeah?
… One of them sounded like they were beginning to raise their voice. And almost sounded like they were angry. No, wait, they were angry. That has to be the angriest he's ever heard someone, which is shocking considering he knows Giovanni of all people.
He could almost hear them now. It was faint, but he was beginning to make out words in the murmurs.
“-isn't even supposed to exist! What if something goes wrong? He could-”, Someone's voice was practically on the verge of shouting. It was hard to tell if it was higher or lower though…
A different voice interrupted the first, clearer now than they had been. Their voice was low in the way that sounded stern, and he could only imagine narrowed eyes on whoever was speaking,” You could say you weren't supposed to exist as well..”
The raised voice instantly silenced, like the words were a punch to the gut… The much calmer voice continued undeterred though, and one of the shapes, one with grey at the top and white the rest of the way down, moved closer. For some reason he still couldn't see who was making the shape, it was as blurry as before. “I feel that you've forgotten who aided you in getting your mind back in order. And who saved you from that hell pit that was forced to be your home for years…. We are well aware of the risks. You should know by now that we prepare well for these things…”
There was a lull in the conversation, and fainter murmurs in the background were the only sound for a long time. It was almost uncomfortable, heavy and dense with tension so thick you wouldn't be able to cut it with a knife if you tried.
He could feel his body trying to squirm due to it.. but he couldn't move much other than a twitch. It seemed like whoever was out there didn't notice it either.
Then, one of them spoke again. The one that raised their voice. They almost sounded familiar…… it sounded like a guy's voice, but… Why did it almost sound like his own? He's… he's pretty sure he's heard that voice from somewhere before… and not because of its similarity to his own voice. “... Why? Why did you…”
The other, a older woman he's pretty sure, responded with a slightly lighter tone than she had before,” Well… as I said, you shouldn't exist. Yet you do. And he exists as well to an extent. Despite now having your mind back, you once had his… Which led to us wanting to test something.”
“... So you wanted to what, try to bring something from fiction into reality? Someone already tried that with us, and look at where it-”, The first voice spoke again, his voice hardening as anger bled into his words.
“Brandon.”, The woman's voice cut him off again, this time with a voice of steel. He tensed when she spoke, his eyes widening as a cold dread shot down his spine at the name. That name…
N-no, it couldn't be. Brandon was in the layers. He- he wasn't, couldn't be here. T-this had to be a different Brandon-
Yeah! It's a different one-
“You had a purpose once when you had been created. And so does he.”, A hand pressed against something in front of him, and it was clear enough that he could see the shape of it. He didn't know whose hand it was , but… the woman's voice came from that direction. It was probably her's. “... You know him better than anyone else would. You can tell what way his thoughts would go, how he thinks. We need that more than ever. If this is to go awry, you'd be the first who'd see the signs.”
“... So you want me to babysit him?”, the angry voice was quieter now, but there was an anger still there that felt similar to the disdain Giovanni held for Bucky.
A scoff, muffled but clear as day came from the woman. “Babysit? No no, not babysit. it's more like.. observing him. Keeping an eye on him. You'd also be helping him adjust to everything… think of him in the way you would a younger brother who needs to be guided.”
“.... You're kidding right? I'm not treating that thing like-”, Bucky flinched at the venom that coated those words, at the word ‘thing’....
Too familiar to how Rex would talk about him when no one was looking. Much much too familiar-
A voice broke through the very tense exchange now, interrupting the two talking and cutting through the tension. Their voice was deadpan at best, but there was an urgency to their words,” Dr. Rachel, the subject's vitals are spiking.”
Another moment of silence now, but a lot more short lived than the previous one. The woman spoke soon enough, and her hand slipped out of focus again until he couldn't see it against the colors again,”... His vitals? What part?”
“Heart rate mainly. But there's something else…”
The woman hummed, before seemingly waving off the man that had spoken, “We'll continue this conversation later. I'd suggest going to see the others… I'd like an update on how they are doing.”
The sounds were getting muffled again. Worse now.. and his vision… darkness edged it, fading into view and making his sight spotty.
The last thing he heard before the dark covered his vision and mind completely was a very muffled word that almost sounded like a reluctantly said ‘fine’...