The sunset poured down like thick blood, blanketing the dead grass. The wind carried the stench of rusted iron and acrid dry earth. High on the cliff, a body hung against the sun, arms spread wide, legs pinned fast, four pitch-black nails fastening it to the crucifix. Praised as beautiful, it looked more like a dead snake draped on a small wooden beam, facing the sunset as though being burned alive.
He opened his eyes. The first light stabbed into them, making his pupils contract in pain. The first sensation wasn't fear but cold. His spine felt numb, as if buried in snow. Then the pain struck, raw and merciless, tearing from his wrists up to his shoulders, from his ankles deep into his hips. Every heartbeat was another hammer driving the nails in. Not built for this, too much pain, too much pain. That's how an ordinary man would describe the spasms racking his body now.
He inhaled; the smell of blood and scorched wood hit him, nauseating. He inhaled again; the stink of rust and burnt flesh flooded his throat. A stream of alien data surged into his brain: **scent and taste**. The salty tang of blood seeped over his lips, sharp and metallic, impossible to erase like deleting a file. "This… is sensation? Nausea?"
Who am I. Where is this. But, I can't... die.
Commands ran wild in his head, but none could process what he felt. The heartbeat wasn't an electronic signal; it was a lump of flesh screaming beyond his control. Pain wasn't a system alert; it was a blade cutting into bone. He realized: this body didn't obey. It only lived, and forced him to live with it.
Too fast. The body had just died and now woke again, like a machine drained of oil still groaning to stay alive… or like a child ripped from the womb, crying without knowing what it is. Too much pain, what does pain even mean? He couldn't black out, writhing like a fetus gasping for its first breath, his brain throwing away every definition of self just to cling to life. No monitor, no command prompt, no "Toe, what does it mean for humans to hurt like this?"
Like a child.
He moved his left hand. Mistake. The metal drove deep into bone, tearing each muscle fiber as he yanked hard. The pain dimmed his vision, teeth grinding until his gums bled. Cold sweat beaded down his temples. His lips curled into a smile, but tears came first. The body betrayed him: wracked with pain, shaking, forcing out hoarse sounds. "Living… so this… is living?" The words rasped like wind through a corpse, warped and cracked like a machine sparking.
Wait. Someone will come for you. Escaping like this is suicide. Wait.
Wait for whom. His body convulsed, jaws clenched. There wasn't even a grave here, what hope of rescue? I want to live, I want to live. His body writhed like an earthworm dug up to be bait. Then stopped.
Tears welled up, not from weakness but because his body revolted against pain too brutal to endure. He yanked again. Twice. Thrice. The sound of ripping flesh chilled the air, bright blood spraying. His wrist nearly torn open, but the nail clung stubbornly in place.
This body. Too real, its brutal truth made him want to reject it.
He roared and heaved one last time. A sharp crack rang out, was it wood or bone? His left hand dropped limp, as if life had drained from it, his weight sagging on the remaining three nails. All of it pressing into his right shoulder, pain so sharp his breath broke, vision swam.
No stopping now. His right hand smashed against the beam, fingernails tearing bloody as they gripped tight. Each jerk shredded the muscles finer. Strands of salt-and-pepper hair stabbed his eyes. Blood streamed from his elbow to his ribs, dripping onto the ground. The nail popped free with a cold metallic clang.
His body pitched forward, now held only by the nails in his feet. As if someone meant to strip him of movement before he could live. No panic, no fear. Just pain, and nothing in his mind but a wild drive to survive. He twisted, clawing at the wood till his nails split, each breath a low ragged moan. His left foot tore free first, agony making his whole frame convulse. Each pull was a sound of mangled flesh, a scream bitten back in his throat.
The last nail pierced his right ankle, almost to the bone. He gathered every shred of strength left and wrenched hard. The nail came loose, his body plunging to the hard ground. His back slammed down, his sight blurred, his heart hammering so violently it seemed ready to burst. His body jolted like struck by lightning. "Get up," he thought, but every muscle shrieked "can't." He realized there was no power switch, no standby mode. This biological machine only writhed, gasped, and forced him to feel every stab of pain. From his raw throat came a cracked scream, mingling with wet sniffling and tears in a grotesque harmony. Birth may be a miracle, but not for everyone.
Like a corpse freshly dug up, unable to stand. He dragged himself inch by inch, leaving a long smear of blood over the cracked earth. On the ground, the shadow of the crucifix stretched like a deep black wound. Though he had escaped it, he still felt himself hanging there again. This time inside the terror he'd just learned. He found a dry tree stump, slumped his shredded back against it just to breathe. The pain in his limbs overwhelmed all other senses.
"See, Elia, you're a perfect creation to survive." Like migraine attacks, flickering in and out.
His breath hitched, blood and tears staining his pale face. He stared at the blazing sky, lips twisting into a crooked grin.
"Still alive…"
Far off, in the darkness, a figure stood frozen, unable to accept itself. Watching the place of the crucifix. That gaze, like a guilt. As if seeing someone they once knew… someone who once laughed this madly.
Elia laughed harder, voice ragged, a laugh warped together with sobs.
"This… is… living…"
"Yes, Elia. When humans know pain, when they know tears. Then they know life."
Whispers from the past struck like a migraine, consuming him whole.
Where the old man stood, nothing remained but the echo of mockery. He knew whose body that was, yet he wasn't certain. No living thing that truly understood life would thrash like this.
The wind carried away the hoarse laughter, heavy with the stink of fresh blood. The sunset swallowed the sky, leaving only the wild, defiant heartbeat of someone who didn't yet know who he was, but knew he had no right to die.
The wind took away meaning, sweeping off every unfinished dream. Like the day the old man pushed his closest friend toward death. For a moment he thought that corpse on the hill was someone he once knew.
The wind took away meaning, swept off every dream left undone, but it couldn't take away life itself. Elia crawled on, leaving a crimson trail across the dead grass, like a newborn leaving blood at birth, with no one to welcome him, no one to call his name.
December 25th. Forty minutes and seven seconds to live. Elia, child of tragedy.
Does it hurt? Not really, collected memories are almost impossible to recall, just like a newborn's.
Sometimes birth isn't a miracle. There are children who crave life, yet never asked to be born with tragedy. Pain exists to show them that ahead lies no pause, no end waiting…