Promises
When Pike dreams, it is not of the time before. It is never of anything good.
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Dolmers looked down at the gun in his hand. He was trembling.
“I can’t.”
He looked up. His eyes were red. The veins of his face were dark, his gums black.
“Pike, I c-can’t.”
She just looked at him. She couldn't speak.
“It won’t let m-me. It knows. It—it—it wants me to—” He swung his arm up swiftly and pressed the muzzle to his temple, but his hand was perfectly still. Impossibly still, as the rest of his body twitches. “I can’t.”
He slowly held out the revolver to Pike.
“I need you.”
Pike looked at the gun. Looked at him. Why couldn't she will herself to move? He was crying. Pathetic. Red cut threads down the pallor of his face.
“Pike,” he pleaded in a wet rasp, “it’s gotta be you. Don’t… don’t leave me like—”
She took the gun from him. He withdrew his hand quickly.
He looked over the mountainside. “You… you know the w-way from here?”
“... Yeah.”
Dolmers noddd. A sudden, jerking motion. “O-okay.” He turned around, shuffled a few steps, and sat down on a rock.
For a while, it was just like that. Dolmers sitting, Pike standing. A quiet gun in numb fingers. It’s quiet. There was a cool breeze, growing colder. They were both thinking of earlier times.
There was only such much to think on. Time’s up. “Ready?”
A pause. A long, unsteady breath. “Thanks, Pike.” And then: “Do it.”
Pike did. The sun set over them and the world became starless and grey.