Chapter Text
It is times like these that Cain misses Abel the most. Not for any of the soft warm reasons he wishes it could be, but because he knows with very fiber of his being that Abel would hate him. All that's left of him these days is less like any actual man, and moreso resembling the process that takes place when a small animal has died in somewhere dry and secluded, and is thus doomed to becoming a sad shriveled little body, hardly even recognizable as the creature it once was.
If Abel could see Cain, he would hate everything his brother has become, and would equally resent everything Cain has lost to himself. If he could see that Cain is up to his neck in this curse, how tattered he lets himself be, or the total lack of effort to fix it.
There is a rot within him. For so long Cain has felt so sick with it to the point of constantly both dreaming for, and dreading, the inevitable point when his horrible useless skin will finally fail him and his guts with fall filthy to the soil and marr it with his evil. But what can he do; there is no remedy for a being so far gone, so set in his ways. Malcontent with his own contentedness with the discontent that will still somehow never be enough to move him.
Abel would undoubtedly hate the way that Cain continuously picks fights that he knows won't win just to feel himself be beat bloody. Knows equally, how much Abel would hate the guilt and regret, and the pathetic, almost childish loneliness that so often pushes him to throw his life around so.
Abel would hate Cain, but he would still likely fuss over him if he were there in any of the innumerable instances that Cain had gotten caught up in things just to feel the pain that came with it. He would probably tear Cain a new one for being so foolish. would shout about Cain's stupidity and then tug him into a furious kiss, after tending Cain's wounds. Would tell Cain he was being idiotic and rash, he would chew Cain out like he would personally make sure there wouldn't even be a tomorrow for Cain, if he couldn't learn how to be better.
Truthfully, Cain isn't sure he can learn. The very nature of his existence is a sick punishment, everywhere he goes he will forever simply be chased away like an ill behaved mutt, but never able to die of his own hand, or any other's, no matter how hard he tries. If it isn't enough to dissuade him from embracing the harm and making things infinitely worse for himself, than nothing will. If the deeply distressing fact that Abel would hate him, isn't enough to stop the storm raging inside him, then truly nothing will.
Though, in Cain's current state, he's almost sure that Abel wouldn't yell, wouldn't even have the heart or the stomach to raise his voice at such a hellacious sight. Cain is practically just a pile of pulp, it would barely even be worth the effort to kick a man so pathetic and worked over.
Abel would attempt to prop him up, would realize quickly that even that was too much movement for the ravaged state Cain was in. He would have to strip Cain from his tattered, bloodied, garb until Cain was naked save for his filth. Abel would wipe him down so very carefully, diligently avoiding the worst of his contusions. He would shed hot, angry tears much to Cain's anguish, but wouldn't say a word until he was done. And when he finally was he would pull Cain into a bone crushing embrace that would hurt so awfully good.
Abel in the flesh, as real as life itself, would hold Cain so tightly to himself that they would both struggle to breathe from the pressure. Abel would murmur furiously into the skin of Cain's neck about how selfish Cain had been to do something so unbelievably reckless, about how not even Abel would be capable of patching him up forever if Cain kept succumbing to such temptations.
But none of that happens. Because Abel is dead. Because Abel is dead, and Cain is the one who killed him. A horrible loss that never gets easier, never feels less raw. He hopes still, that it was worth it, that Abel at least is okay, happy and safe, protected from this mess by god surely. Maybe it's selfish, or for Cain's own benefit that he wishes it, but he hopes beyond all else that Abel cannot remember him at all. That there is no burden of memories to taint his doesn't remember him No more does Cain have the wise-beyond-his-years brother who so diligently looked out for him in his times of need as Cain had always done for him.
Abel who had possessed such foresight as to never end up in the kinds of situations Cain brings down upon himself. Abel who Cain knew moreso as an extension of his own soul, than his own separate entity. Abel a beautiful archaic voice who now resides in Cain's mind alone. Not a single thing left of him in the world apart from some old bones that are probably long since splintered, or entirely sun bleached and brittle from it. Bones that Cain will never see again, only a tiny score in the ground, all that's left behind of a man that used to be the brightest light on all the earth.
So as it stands, Cain is as close to dying as he has ever been, the otherwise desert dry ground around him is muddy with his own mess of blood, and he couldn't move even if he tried, not even if he wanted to desperately, and he doesn't. Nothing matters when he's in a world of hurt like this, life is quiet, peaceful in a strange way when the soil is red with his agony. Everything that exists is just the massive gaping hole of grief, and the hungry gnawing edges of it, shredded by the teeth marks of a thousand rabid animals all sent by god to punish him specifically.
In another life, another world where this isn't all Cain's fault alone, he would resent god so much more strongly for the curse placed upon him. But when this is how Cain lives, an animal among animals, all of them pretending to be something more, it is nearly impossible to act as though it is anything beyond his own flagrant stupidity that led to this outcome.
Cain's ribs feel as though they're splintering with his every breath, little fragments wedging themselves every which way into his entrails. He wonders If it really means anything at all, that him and Abel share the same flesh, or came from the same womb, when all that exists of Cain now is the pain that is left after Abel is gone. He wants to dig this heels into the dirt, and scream for god to fix this. Proclaim what he knows to be true; that god was a wretched liar to encourage him and Abel's love. To do such had been to condone it, and to take that away so cruelly makes god nothing more special or important than the poor pathetic sinners he so ruthlessly condemns. How is Cain to hate the Serpent for going against god's order, when god goes against it himself?
He remembers a day, so many years before, when he and Abel were both still young, they'd sat curled close together between the roots of the Great Sycamore Tree. Abel had lamented to Cain about feeling like the bruise upon Cain's heel, only a thing to plague Cain, dooming them both to be far away from god. He had admonished Abel then, told him that to say such a thing was an insult to both of them, that it was cruel to himself, as it was Cain, in that it put fault on him for loving Abel which he'd told Abel most plainly, that he wouldn't allow, as well as making it seem like something forced upon Cain rather than something he gladly accepted in full.
It was a strange memory to hold close now, in that it wasn't big, or incredibly pertinent to much of anything. But it felt important like every memory containing Abel felt important. Cain had long ago allowed most of what made him himself to slip through his fingers, too busy trying to salvage every last little crumb of Abel. It had been more important to preserve Abel's memory than himself. It only took a few hundred years of wandering the earth like a starving lost dog, to lose all the things that made Cain cain.
Now the only times he could really manage to remember how he himself used to be, was when he tried hard to remember what had infuriated Abel the most, what had made him smile or laugh, to shove Cain playfully as he always had when Cain said something especially absurd, what caused him to moan, all of those were caused by Cain, even if he couldn't now properly remember what specifically about him had been capable of having those effects on Abel. A Cain doesn't exist anymore, but he's one that had at one point been something important to Abel. One who had known all the best ways to draw such beautiful reactions out of Abel.
Presence in his mind comes in waves, especially now, when Cain is so used to being so fully out of his own head. When he is aware again, his body aches like it has been beaten down by a stampede of some giant herd of Hoofed creatures. He can almost, almost move through bone-grinding-on-bone feeling that is the simple act of opening his eyes. It's too bright to even form a single coherent thought through the burning. Blindingly bright, like god himself is set on searing the eyes straight out of Cain's skull. And if he is, it's working quite effectively.
God has a wicked sense of humor, Cain can be sure if that if nothing else.
His existence has become that of a beached whale, entirely hopeless and immovable, there is truly nothing he can do but wait. He wonders if god would not just let him die. If Cain were only to find a way to egg someone on enough to the point of trying to kill him.
Maybe for the sake of irony it could be someone with a donkey's jawbone in their possession. It would be so cathartic for all involved parties that god might actually show Cain mercy in the form of death. But there are no such donkey-jawbone-possessing people around, and Cain is almost sure he couldn't string together enough words to successfully infuriate someone to the point of murder.
He can't make himself move, not now anyways, So Cain, provided with no other choice, waits. Either the crows and ravens will pick him apart before he has healed enough to move and he really will die here, or sooner or later his body will remember the curse, and will begin to slowly mend itself.
𖦹 ᭄᭡ ͏𖦹 ᭄᭡ ͏ ͏𖦹 ᭄᭡ ͏𖦹
Abel knows the rules better than he knows himself. Knows them like he knows Cain. He's conscious that the second he intervenes, god will spring him right back to the Place Of Waiting. It was true when the covenant was made all those years ago, and it's still true now.
He's allowed to touch Cain briefly, allowed to speak, to vent his frustrations to Cain, none of it will make difference anyways, Cain won't know he's there, won't hear or feel him in the slightest. But the second he tries to do so much as help by cleaning Cain's wounds, or attempts to help the poor man to sit up, it's over, and the deal will be broken. He's not allowed to take care of Cain in any sense of the word. Only ever allowed to ease his own anxieties, never Cain's.
It's as fair a deal as any you could expect from god, honestly. Better to be here with Cain, to be able to watch over him, than to never know, and spend the rest of forever waiting and wondering, wishing and needing. Anyways, God would've had to rip every memory of Cain from Abel's mind himself for Abel to ever be even halfway sated enough to begin considering an eternity apart from Cain.
Not that it's all that important, and it was never explicitly stated, but Abel heavily suspects he will cease to exist when Cain does finally succumb to himself. But Abel has already made his decision- if you could even consider it much of one- if closeness with Cain equals eternal separation from god, it's still the decision he would make given a thousand do overs.
Cain won't go to the Place Of Waiting when he dies, Abel is sure of that at least.
Having to wait like this is enough to drive Abel to madness in a way few other things could. He's never been an incredibly patient man, but waiting to see if your brother will find it in himself to get back up, or if he'll just lay down and die, wasn't ever going to be particularly easy. So he sits on the cracked, bloody ground, as close as he can possibly be to Cain without actually touching, and does his very best to be calm and patient despite how at odds is is with his very being.
This instance of near-death would be a mark well into the thousands for Cain. Abel had lost specific count so many years before, specific numbers were mostly irrelevant at this point, just standing as proof that close calls mean next to nothing against a curse from god himself. This is definitely the closest Cain has been to dying in the whole duration of their punishment though, and it does an awful lot to feed Abel's ever growing concern.
There's a part of Abel that wonders distantly how long it would take to mark the cracked soil as many times as he has sat next to Cain as Cain has struggled on the brink of death. Weeks or months maybe. a long time though definitely, maybe longer than it would take for Cain to heal. Or die. More time than it would take for Cain to fall into the same cycle, traipsing into some new village with hardly more than the clothes on his back and a horrible death wish.
It's not Cain's fault, not really, Abel knows that, remembers well the curse God had spoken over Cain. Over both of them, really.
"you have spilled your brother's blood upon the ground, she will hold it as a grudge, no longer will she yield you a harvest. you will wander the earth as a vagabond and a refugee all your days, and your fellow men will scorn, and despise you, but according to the mark I have placed upon you, they may never take your life, or they will face my wrath sevenfold."
Abel forms the words with his tongue silently, it's so ingrained into his mind that he doesn't have to think about it for a second. he can still hear god's awful voice echoing them, the damning promise.
It's a useless question to ask, but he finds himself plagued with it often despite that knowledge. Would they have chosen to do it if they'd known? They'd thought it would be a way out, not an easy one, but a loophole of sorts. Of course they hadn't known Abel would have have to stay right by his side forever after never able to communicate. Forever waiting with Cain for a change that would never come, or forever away from him, itching to know. Would he have taken Abel's life and his own with it if he'd known that not even that could keep either of them safe from God's wrath? Would Cain have even suggested the plan if he'd known god was such a cruel conniving trickster? Probably not, but It doesn't matter either way. they've long since made their decisions, lived, and in Abel's case died by them.
In the evening when the sun is low in the sky, and the air is just beginning to cool, Cain's breathing turns from something awful and rattling, to an almost silent thing, and Abel carefully leans over Cain to check him for a pulse; slow and faint, but definitely present. it's as great a relief as it is torture, and Abel has to force himself not to reach down and squeeze one of Cain's badly bruised hands. He'll wake up when he wakes up, there's simply nothing to be done about it.
As often as this procedure plays out, just so, it never feels less cruel. Would Cain forgive him if he knew that Abel was right there the whole time, but never once tried to make himself known? Likely, if he knew the price that came with 'interference.' But knowing that never really lessens the gnawing guilt for more than a handful of seconds.
They're near a river that's only slightly south of the small village Cain had picked his most recent fight in. The river in question is clearly much wider at other times in the year, as the banks are carved out nearly three times wider than the river itself. Cain had collapsed to the ground mere feet from where the dried section along this side of the river bed meets the steep bank above. The ground all around them is a patchwork of crackly dry, sandy soil, and varying shapes and sizes of river stones that are all for the most part relatively smooth from the water rushing over them.
Abel wanders over to the closest flattest stone to Cain, picking up a smaller more jagged stone on the way, one that fits nicely in his palm, and which doesn't hurt to hold despite it's sharp edge.
He's no artist, not like Amari; the sister seven years his junior who'd possessed such a knack for re-creating likenesses, and even creating whole new things she'd never seen. Abel had always been a tiny bit envious of her skills, but mother and father had seemed to hold to the belief that such things were frivolous if not downright childish, so it was something he and Cain had made an effort to help her in keeping it under wraps.
He or Cain would sometimes invite Amari out to the fields with them while they worked and when she wouldn't be missed by mother, so that she could scratch her pictures into the soil with her finger or a stick without being berated or scorned. Most of the pictures were simple sketches of the lambs playing, or of the shiny insects Amari was so fond of, while others were more gruesome detailed images of violence or death. But sometimes they were just pretty patterns that as far as Abel could tell, weren't the likeness of anything, often combinations of swirls and spirals, or different jagged shapes all coming together to form something mesmerizing.
As time went on Amari's skill had grown, eventually she'd begun to prefer stones as a more permanent canvas for her picturess. Usually a large flat stone as a canvas and a piece of charcoal, or even occasionally a smaller more jagged stone she could hold easily in her hand to scratch into the larger one. Abel doesn't have any charcoal, doesn't have anything on his his person besides the clothes in his back, so he settles for the latter.
Abel isn't quite sure what compels him to do it beyond just the almost disgusting levels of boredom that he knows he's facing for the foreseeable future. It'll be days before Cain will feel well enough to do more than just maybe stumble down the the rushing river for a drink, and if he can hold himself up long enough, to wash himself of the blood and filth he's coated in. Cain almost never speaks to him anymore, and never when he's in such a state, so Abel is stuck with nothing but the faint almost but even sounds of Cain's breathing, distant birdsong, and the rush of the river, until Cain can manage such a task.
Stone against stone, Abel starts by scratching out the rough shape of the image first, then he goes back in for the details. Just the way Amari always had. The noise of it is grating. Bad enough that he can almost remember the way such noises used to hurt his teeth. He's honestly a tiny bit shocked Cain isn't coming to just from how awful it sounds. But really only a tiny bit. Cain is dead to the world.
Once he's finally mostly satisfied with it- Abel really is no artist- he takes the small jagged stone of the two back to where he'd yanked it from the ground, and wedges it back into the same spot to the best of his ability. He walks the few paces back to Cain, settles down as close as he possibly can without risking jostling his brother's unconscious form. He goes back to waiting.
Bird calls turn to cricket chirps and back into birds calls again, and still Cain doesn't move an inch. A full night and day pass. Still Abel doesn't move. He doesn't want to leave Cain alone when he's in such a state, and there isn't much need to besides. Nothing is especially eye-catching about this specific setting, nothing he'd chose over being here with Cain, to watch him breathe, to know for certain that he's still alive- if only for now- than wander aimlessly about.
Abel has to concentrate hard on the effort to restrain himself from reaching down and petting Cain's greying head. He can't help but feel the loss so strongly in moments like these, when he allows himself to remember that he and Cain could've greyed together. That in some world where god didn't hate the pair of them, Abel could've had along fulfilling life and they could've shared it together.
Some other time, or life, or world. There is surely versions of Cain and Abel still tangled together in a home that is theirs, on a bed that is theirs, and these versions of him and Cain weren't bruised or battered, weren't defeated or hated just for existing, weren't dead and invisible. they would both get the chance be old and grey together, would die together, instead of just Abel first at Cain's hand, and then later Cain, alone by himself. Forever separated by hundreds of years and the irreversible barriers of god's curses over them and death.
Though despite everything, their souls are still knotted firmly together, chained to each other like prisoners maybe, but it's a burden Abel will continue to wear as the treasure that it is. At least he's here with Cain. Wether or not Cain knows it doesn't change it being the truth. Abel had hoped for a long time that he might figure something out, some way to communicate, that wouldn't just lead Cain to believe he's insane, or lead him to think that it's god meddling, instead of the truth, that Abel is here just like he always has been.
Time goes on though, it doesn't seem much to give a damn about Abel's hopes or wishes, and now it really is more of a nebulous thought, or a daydream than anything be believes will ever truly take place. But Even if Cain never aware of Abel's presence, which is… a more likely outcome than Abel likes to admit, he'll still gladly follow Cain to the ends of the earth a thousand times over rather than leave his everything to wither away alone, or to finally make a decision stupid enough to kill him for real.
It's nearly another full day before Cain so much as stirs. Evening again, air just starting to cool as the sun slides low enough on the horizon that the riverbed is in full shadow. Abel is sitting as close to Cain as he can. Trying to stay calm. Trying not to glance over at Cain every time his breathing stutters for a second. He mostly fails in both regards. But all a man can do is try.
he's collected a small pile of smooth little pebbles with holes worn through them. They're important- or they were at one point- What he used to call them, even why he kept them, is all gone now. All that's really left is the itch, and the inexplicable association. When Abel is near a river, he looks for stones with holes worn through them by the water.
Abel doesn't think he's forgotten a lot of things about his life- not that he would really know if he has forgotten them- but he's pretty sure that this one has just slipped through the cracks somehow, the loss of yet another reminder that he really did used to be a flesh and blood person just like Cain, and not just this only semi-corporeal collection of now half lost memories and longing, that he has been for so long.
When Cain does finally come to, it's a little startling in the otherwise still air. He lets out a truly guttural groan, his hands scrabbling at the hard cracked ground. He's so filthy it's actually a little difficult to tell what is crusted on, sweat and dirt beginning to flake from what is flaky dried blood, most likely it's probably a fairly even mix of both.
The way Cain's clothes are visibly stiff in many places with the dried blood, probably scratching uncomfortably against his skin as Cain attempts to push himself into a sitting position makes Abel ill with that familiar sense of failure and guilt. He should be helping Cain, not sitting in the dirt right next to him while he's suffering. Playing with his stupid rocks like an easily distractible toddler. But he can't help Cain, not really, not in any way that matters in the least.
So Abel just does the only thing he can. Abel shuffles as close as he can possibly get to Cain without being directly in his way, and as Cain trudges to the water's edge Abel speaks to him of all the thoughts he's had since the last time he'd spoken to Cain. He talks of all the memories he's dredged up since Cain fell unconscious, He tells Cain of his artistic endeavor, of his not-memory of the stones with holes. He wonders aloud if it will rain soon, and if they'll go back to the village again when Cain is slightly less unwell. It's futile. Always has been. Cain can't hear him anymore than he could hear the clouds rolling across the sky, or the sun slipping below the horizon, but just like both of them, Abel is present regardless of Cain's perception, or lack thereof.
Eventually Cain's slow and visibly painful walk down to the sluggish water is complete. Cain then begins the arduous task of undressing. Seeing Cain naked in this context never fails to make Abel feel more than a little twisted. He misses when Cain's nudity was something he could properly appreciate instead of just something exclusively reserved for when Cain was so bloodied up that he is left no other choice. Abel always feels a deep sense of perversion for watching Cain like this when he has has no say in the matter, but there really isn't anything pretty or gratifying about watching his destitute brother struggle to move and breathe, in such rough shape from the pain and exertion of just trying to hold himself up. Anyways, He really does have to watch Cain for the sake of his own sanity. If he could have any faith at all that Cain wouldn't simply fall and crack his skull open the second Abel turns his back, then he might would look away out of respect.
It hurts more than it should.
Abel watches Cain wash himself first, a painstakingly slow process of bathing, he hisses in pain any time the water touches a new wound for the first time, and then hisses again as he sets about scrubbing grime from it. Cain is finally as clean as he's going to get while so badly wounded and restricted because of it. Then he washes his garb.
Abel keeps talking all the time, trying and mostly failing to distract from the pained noises and the way he's absolutely itching out of his skin to help or just to do something.
Finishing finally, Cain drapes the wet clothes over a slightly sad little shrub that for it's location below the riverbank, in an area that's flooded half the year, and completely dry the other half, is honestly thriving shockingly well.
Cain trudges back to the general spot he'd been sprawled out in before, and settles down gingerly the way in which the least amount of his damp skin possible is touching the sandy ground below. He glances around apprehensively in the way that he never used to before, his eyes fleeting past Abel with the same lack of recognition that Abel has seen so often but will never grow used to.
Moments of it, Cain wearing such an expression of unrest that Abel almost itches with it. Abel feels it so strongly, the exact moment that Cain's attention shifts. Cain's eyes locking onto the rock marked with his juvenile drawing, the sensation is how Abel imagines what water must feel when it freezes. One second he's just a concept, so loose and fluid that he could easily slip through fingers, able to be passed through easily, and the next, he's like a fresh sheet of ice, new and tentatively solid, just in the cusp of sturdy wholeness. It's at once so disorienting yet emboldening that Abel is already preparing to launch forward towards Cain when he's still yet to remember where he is. Like finally waking from a horrible dream within a dream.
Cain's eyes aren't exactly on Abel, so much as they're searching frantically for him. Panic written on every line of his features as he looks repeatedly from Abel's rock to the place where Abel himself stands. There's this look of dawning realization on his face and His voice is ragged and scratchy like his throat is full of gravel when he speaks.
It's the first time in days he's spoken. The first time in months he's spoken to Abel. The first time since he killed Abel that he's uttered Abel's name. it feels so much like coming home just to hear the broken searching call of;
"Abel?"
The sound of it so lost, pathetic like a mangy, starving, stray that's been kicked one too too many times asking for scraps.
Abel is charging forward before he even has the chance to wonder if it isn't a very, very, bad, horrible, reckless idea that will likely just result in separation from Cain for an indeterminate span of time as punishment. But damnit, even if that's all it achieves, Cain knows now.
Not even god can take that back, and Abel almost thinks god wouldn't even try to. He has been all but silent for so long, years, lots of them likely, most of the duration of their punishment in fact. Abel has even been risking the sin of wanting for a long time before that even, all without consequence. god used to occasionally pop up to bother one of them, or even just as a silent observer to watch them suffer. Maybe he's finally gotten bored of them, or maybe he's just miraculously been busy with something, or someone else. Though Abel couldn't possibly care any less about the reason as he charges towards Cain.
Abel stops short, just barely in time, only a hair's breadth away from cupping Cain's marred, scruffy face. Cain looks so unsure, I faint hopeful flicker under his stupidly lost expression. it physically pains Abel to a near excruciating amount to not be fully sharing a skin with him right this second. he's such a beautifully horrible hurt and tangled up mess of brother and lover, that all Abel is managing to hold onto without it slipping through his fingers immediately, is that he cannot mess this up. He has to get it right for both of their sakes.
Abel isn't even sure Cain actually knows that he's here, that Cain isn't just delirious, if he has any real grasp on what's going on, this might not change anything at all, maybe Cain won't hear him, maybe he'll just terrify Cain if he does anything at all. But Abel knows like he knew all those years ago when he and Cain kissed for the first time, that this, his brother, their nearness to each other, is the most important thing.
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'cain?'
The voice, is tentative, questioning, more familiar to Cain than his own, and it's so undeniably Abel that it hurts. Worse than all the beatings and horrible decisions, worse even, then the already so staggering guilt.
Cain starts so sharply at the sound of his own name that he forgets temporarily about his cracked ribs, about the giant blackish bruises speckled and spanning across his sides. That is until he's reminded by the all too horrible sensation of moving.
Knowing where Abel is without being able to see him is incredibly disorienting. Cain can somehow manage to pinpoint every part of Abel in the pale moonlit air, almost like knowing where your own limbs are, how you can tell it even in the dark without ever having to look. Cain reaches for his brother then, trembling like a leaf caught in a breeze as he extends his hand with unsure fingers for the place Abel wrist should be. Abel is perfectly still as Cain's fingers close around him. Unnaturally still, like a small prey animal caught between fight, flight, and freeze.
His wrist is Cool, Just on the verge on being cold beneath Cain's hand. that's the only real difference between Abel then and now. Every line of posture, the shape and the size, it's all him. By some miracle or insane chance it is him. But it's difficult from here to know what to do.
Abel so close after so long. After everything Cain has lost, how long it's been, how much he hurts, it should be easy to pull until Abel is flush against him, Abel would go willingly, Cain is confident of that at least. It may be the effects of this strange place they find themselves in, or it might have more to do with every single memory of Abel that he's so painstakingly catalogued away. From the very beginning until their very last moments together. Almost nothing is unaccounted for that wasn't already at the time of Abel's death.
Somewhere deep within him, there's the icy, clawing, burn of panic. Abel isn't supposed to see him like this, isn't supposed to be back in this awful forsaken place of his punishment. Not for Cain, not for anyone. Bone deep, the guilt is like little needles in his marrow.
Cain's face is wet with tears, and he doesn't even remember starting to cry. he doesn't know what to do with any of this. He's all hot and wrong, still a little damp from the river, skin cooling, yet sweating despite it from the anxiety and discomfort, he wants to pull away, to turn so Abel can't see his shame so plainly. He can't though, not now when they're touching, and Abel is here, and now that he knows. There's no coming back from this.
Abel has no pulse anymore, there's no thrumming under the almost reptilian skin on the inside of his wrist. The only movement Cain can feel is the slightest twitch of the muscles just past the joint indicating the opening of his hand. Abel pulls back then, and Cain lets him go, the strangest mix of regret and relief. But Abel's hand is on his in a heartbeat, tightly interlocking their fingers. The angle is a little awkward, facing each other as they are, but it's good, so good, and real, and whole, that Cain can't help making a small involuntary noise in the back of his throat. Abel squeezes Cain's hand, once, twice, and then lets them fall together to the space between their bodies, or- Cain's body- Abel's spirit?
Abel's voice is soft when he finally speaks again, it might've been whole hours or only seconds of them just staring at each other before it rings out.
"I wasn't supposed to do this, it was never a part of the deal I made with god." He says to Cain in a warning tone, "I wasn't allowed to help you, not to interfere in any way he might take issue with. he's been silent for ages though, I've not seen hide nor hair for him. I'm starting to doubt his presence."
Abel reaches his other hand up to wipe at the damp teary mess of Cain's face. The words barely even register at first, it takes a long moment of trying hard to focus more on the part where Abel said he believes god is, what- just gone? Instead of the fact that Abel is holding his face like he's a prized lamb, instead of the old, pathetic, ragged thing they both know he is.
It takes more effort on Cain's part to form words than it should, and what he finally says is so much more like a person he hasn't felt like in so so many years, that it's a bit like waking up from a dream that spans a lifetime, than what it really is. a pathetic attempt at humor.
"the jawbone." Cain gestures wildly in the direction of the stone bearing Abel's drawing. It hurts, but that's not exactly new. "you draw the wretched thing I killed you with as your first attempt to reach me in over three hundred years??" It shouldn't be half as funny as it is, but the longer Cain thinks about it, the stupider it becomes. His laugh is rough and broken, even to his own ears. He's still crying and he's sure he must sound ragged, possibly even bordering on insanity.
There's a certain self awareness, Cain guesses, that must come with a situation this bizarre. He's standing here talking to his invisible ghost of a little brother who's been dead for so much longer than he was ever alive, and talking about the disappearance of a god who has quite a strong vendetta against the pair of them.
Abel's own laugh rings out, bright and true, if not a bit ragged himself. It's a rich beautiful sound that gives Cain life in a way he couldn't begin to adequately describe if he tried. Like pieces of himself sliding back into place, whole sections he hadn't even remembered existing all fitting together snugly leaving him feeling more human than he even knew he could be.
"I didn't think you'd even notice. You were so out it, and you don't pay near as much attention as you used to. I was just trying to pass the time a little faster. you aren't much in the way of company, when you're knocked off your ass, y'know." Abel jokes that perfect wry smile of his completely invisible to Cain but he knows it's there, can picture it perfectly.
The lightness that follows is so right that the gap of wasted time and lost memories fades into obscurity so quickly it might as well have never existed. Abel keeps on holding his face, brushing Cain's tears away with chilly fingers. They get gradually closer as the moments crawl on. At some point Abel tucks Cain properly against his chest, and they slot together like two pieces of a whole. Made specifically for each other.
Abel presses his cool lips softly to Cain's feverish forehead, and Cain realizes then, belatedly, that he's somehow the smaller one now. Abel just the same as he's always been, is broader than Cain like he never used to be. Abel is still slightly shorter than him, but in Cain's current state, he's much more wizened than Abel, practically emaciated, and still all hunched over from his spectacular beating. he even feels like the smaller one. Given enough time, perhaps when Cain can finally breathe again without so much pain, Cain is sure that Abel will poke him for it.
The icy chaste kisses Abel press to Cain's forehead, turn to something featherlight as his lips travel down the bridge of Cain's bruised nose. just the tiniest hints of dull pain stirring under the skin at Abel's attention. The novelty of which is so uniquely wonderful. Pain without any of harm that he's grown so familiar with. There's little nudges of familiarity somewhere far in the past, smudges of Abel being taken care of by him in much a similar way after something bad had happened. Something he should remember, but can't.
The hand of Abel's that isn't lightly cupping Cain's face, is trailing all over his back, somehow always light and barely there in the tender hurt spots, but hard and invasive over knots Cain hadn't even know he has until Abel relives the pressure with deft fingers. Cain slumps against Abel, breathing heavily, a mixture of pain, pleasure and tiny muffled sobs. His eyes are closed, not much use in the night and especially not when Abel is invisible to him.
It's almost easier that way, to picture Abel's exact look and expression. A version of him from the day of his death, forever frozen just before the blows that took him out. It's maybe a stupid thought, induced by the exhaustion and the sheer relief of Abel's presence, but Cain wonders if Abel can see himself, or if he only knows, just the same as Cain does, where he is because they're his hands and body and if anyone were to know, it would be him.
It's Somehow simultaneously exactly the same, and entirely different than in all of Cain's memories from before, Abel's lips finally reaching his in a cool smooth press, like a stone in the shade. Abel tastes clean, almost immaculate, like the water from the spring where they used play as youths. Nothing there to taint him, just Abel in his purest rawest form.
Abel's tongue meets Cain's and it's so strange and almost refreshing how cold his mouth is. Cain is still crying a little, and it should be more embarrassing, but this is Abel, not just some random person. this is his person, the only one who has ever, and who will ever, know Cain as a part of himself.
Abel had said he thought god was absent, and, well, he has been. Maybe he is gone? It's been years after all since the last time Cain had felt God's presence, and longer than even that since Cain had had the displeasure of being spoken to by him. Abel must have been here with him for long enough to make that assessment. Abel doesn't draw baseless conclusions.
Cain would ask about that later though, when Abel's tongue isn't exploring his mouth. He'd feel a little more guilty for the arousal cropping up if it weren't for the very real sensation of Abel's cock hardening against his hipbone.
He wants, but he isn't sure how to ask or if that's even an option now. He hasn't let himself think about sex in the context of Abel since before. Cain had tried, once, when he was so desperate for any kind of release, any solace from the sickening weight, the horrid black waves of guilt lapping freezing cold at his skin. He'd had a vague thought that just maybe that was the way to get even just a few minutes respite, but when he thought about Abel for real, thought about Abel if he could see Cain, if he knew Cain was ever okay enough to pleasure himself after letting Abel die, Abel might think he was over it, that he was somehow okay without Abel there with him. Which would never be the case.
He'd been stupid to try to enjoy anything without Abel. Had been even more stupid to think Abel would go somewhere nice when he died- His fault really for trusting mother and father on the latter- that he would be away from Cain and wouldn't have to witness Cain's strife. He'd been equally stupid for having known the whole time that something was off, and simply chalking it up to his own deteriorating mind trying to make things even more difficult than it needed to be, when in reality some part of him must have known that Abel was with him for part of this.
He is wrong to want again, now so quickly, when he and Abel have only just reached each other again. But even without his permission, still he wants. The thoughts appear in abundance now, rattling around like pebbles in a clay pot, making so much noise that it's getting increasingly difficult to think about much besides it.
he doesn't think he can take much of anything in his current state when any and all movement hurts a great deal, his body already crying out like great swarms of screaming crows at the slightest exertion. All he's done after days and days of rest was walk to the water's edge, bathe, and walk back. That's all it took though to feel thoroughly used up. An empty battered vessel. Cain feels as though he's in a dense fog somewhere pitch black.
It occurs to him then to wonder if maybe Abel isn't really his anymore. he probably hasn't been for a long time, if ever. It's much more like he is Abel's, if anyone belongs to anyone else. Cain may have been the one to keep Abel safe and out of trouble when they were just children, he may have been the one who initiated their tangled up mess of love and need and dependence that was and will always be so amazing and terrifying in magnitude.
But Abel is the one who stayed, stayed and waited and who must've held Cain's stupid hand through the duration of this curse, even when Cain could neither hear nor feel him.
But this is Abel, here, and real, and wanting . On top of that is the pressing nagging thought that Abel might just disappear. Fade back away before they ever get the chance. Cain's head pounds insistently, set on splitting open or imploding before he ever gets the chance to properly appreciate the balm of Abel's presence. Theres the sickening feeling of guilt at the prospect of potentially depriving Abel of something that he himself also wants desperately, all on the potentially false hope of another chance that just might not exist.
Cain doesn't know how this works, and he is pretty sure Abel doesn't have a clue either. They're traveling in completely uncharted territory. Them together. Not at all something new for them, in fact, it's almost like returning to the default in a strange way. Completely uncertain, but in that place together. A brighter conclusion than Cain could've expected to draw mere hours before, but hours before Cain hadn't yet been wrapped in his brother's embrace.
It had worked out before- until God got involved- it might work out again. It would take time obviously- time that we might not have- a deeply annoying part of Cain supplies unhelpfully. It would take effort, but that was never a problem for Cain. He needs Abel like he needs the air in his lungs. More than that even. More than any physical desires or needs. He needs Abel like the missing part of each other's souls that they are to each other. wants like nothing else to get back to that place where they as a single thing aren't strange or new anymore. Where them being them felt right and normal beyond any shadow of a doubt.
There had been times back before, when for whatever reason they weren't together for a night, or even a few nights. Cain had always struggled to sleep then, incapable of keeping his mind from wandering to what Abel might be thinking at that exact moment, what they could be doing if only Abel were there with him. Even once his mind had tumbled over the thoughts of Abel himself until they were worn smooth, Abel's absence would still keep him awake, driving his already exhausted mind and body to near insanity with it. Even the sound of Abel's breathing was a near necessity for Cain to fall asleep. Had been practically since Abel's birth.
He'd spent all but the very first two years of his life with Abel sleeping right by his side. Even long before sleeping together had ever mean anything beyond just laying to rest in a shared room, Abel had been a warm presence in the back of his mind. The deciding factor in wether it he was capable of enjoying a space had been defined by the sounds of Abel's soft breaths, a glimpse of his curly black hair from across a room or space, the familiar tones of his perfect voice. It's been a long time since sleeping was reserved for anything more than the times when Cain was in too much pain or too exhausted to move. His life has revolved around Abel for so long that to pretend that it's ever been any other way would be insane.
Cains breaks away from Abel to catch his breath, and Abel shifts, plants little kisses all along Cain's jaw and neck. Cain's throat is raw and aching from crying, and he's not even quite past the point where it would take only a second of thinking too hard before he'd be hurdling right back to a place where he can't control it again. It's a distant realization through his heavy breathing and attempts to fight down the tears, that Abel is rocking them. It's slight, and overshadowed some by the kisses, and the coolness, the dull painful pressure on Cain's bruises, Abel hard against him, and just Abel, but Cain can't help finding it soothing.
Abel doesn't breathe like a person typically would, there's none of the same movement there, no actual expanding of the lungs or rising of his chest to go with it. Though when he tucks his face against Cain's neck, there's the faintest ghosting of cool air, like maybe some part of him is still trying to breathe without any of the necessity.
Memories from before resurface like little pieces of wood that have fallen into a pool of water from great heights. Abel with his forehead resting on Cain's shoulder while he speaks to Cain too uncomfortable to say to say the words to his face. Cains fingers running through Abel's thick dark curls, practically petting him while he listens raptly. Remembers the way he'd tugged Abel down until they were both laying down, how he'd let coaxed Abel to rut against his leg to completion. Even afterwards, how a loose sleepy Abel had tried to initiate something with him, and how he'd gently turned Abel down despite himself with a promises of a later date when they weren't both struggling to keep their eyes open.
A striking resemblance now that Cain thinks about it. The way the strong want and the exhaustion are battling like rams. Abel stops kissing him then, he pushes his face in the crook of Cain's neck. Cold, against Cain's skin, hands sliding up to knot themselves in Cain's hair. Abel pulls a little, experimentally, and huffs out a soft pleased noise at the way Cain goes boneless in his grip. Allowing it to just happen, to let Abel do whatever small things he pleases, it soothes something deep within cain, a hurt so old and festering that it feels is like the purest form of relief. Like Fueling some previously dormant need, reminding Cains how good it can be.
The worst of Cain's hurts are making themselves more known than ever in horrible pulsing waves that remind Cain a bit of how it must feel to get crushed repeatedly under the stone in a grain mill. At some point Abel stops petting him, easing up gently like he can sense Cain's discomfort. it wouldn't be all that shocking, he can remember a time before, when he and Abel were so in sync with each others needs that even having to ask at all, was more for the courtesy of it, than an actual need for confirmation.
"you hurt." Abel murmurs, tone drenched with concern, face pressing back into the line of Cain's neck. "trying to hide it will only serve to make it worse. You need sleep brother." If Cain had just a bit more sense he would've tried to hide it, but Abel reads him too well, and has already come to his own conclusions.
Abel pulls Cain into a laying position then, and as much as the ground felt rough and hard before, and Cain's bare skin against the sand isn't the most pleasant feeling in the world, just laying down helps more than it should. Not having to exert the energy to say upright helps a little to ease the burn in his everything. It helps that Abel is taking the brunt of his weight, Cains head pillowed on his unmoving chest, Abel with his arms wrapping securely around Cain's back, folding together against his spine. It's so at odds with the setting and the way Cain has felt and existed as for so long that it feels a bit like whiplash.
Abel is still half hard, and Cain should be doing something about it, he's aware enough to know that, but the guilt that Cain feels over it is so simple and easily fixable in comparison to enormity of all that was. It might as well not be guilt at all. It's the same 'soon but not now' that he provided Abel with all those years before it's concise but Abel won't argue. He's is more forgiving of Cain than he should be, it's especially apparent to Cain now than ever.
"Let's get to a point where I can trust you to stand on your own before we try anything, yeah?" Barely a whisper, and Abel breathes it more than says it, really, his chest does rise and fall just a little then. He's gotten warmer as time has gone on, as though matching Cain's temperature, or maybe just a reflection of it.
It's almost as though Abel can see into Cain's mind, read his very thoughts, and it's uncanny but not entirely unpleasant. Or really all that foreign, actually, now that Cain thinks about it. Abel has always been skilled at reading him. It's part of the reason they were always able to put on such a convincing act around mother and father only run off to the low spot in the farthest field where grass stalks all around them were more than tall enough to disguise anything amiss they may have been doing, ranging form the purely innocent to acts filthy enough to leave them in a horrible spot if trouble if they'd ever been caught in the act.
"I stood well enough on my wall to the water did I not? No crutch to my aid and you didn't see me fall on my ass did you?"
"If that is your idea of 'well enough' I'd hate to see what you look like when you really cannot stand at all." Abel pokes Cain in the side. Enough to hurt, but not any worse than he already does.
There's no real bite to the words, but the truth laying under the layers of warmth and affection makes Cain grimace. The notes of Abel-like 'you've been incredibly stupid and selfish, but you're my brother and I still love and need you like you're the left side of my own body.' that very nearly make him want to bash his head against the nearest Stone because yeah
"You'll have to be patient with me." He replies too quickly. It almost immediately feels like the wrong thing to say, rude considering the circumstances, immature at the very least, but Abel who seems set on making peace just now only says:
"I always have been brother, Now sleep."
"Abel, You are far too forgiving of all that I've done to test you."
"I won't be for much longer." Abel huffs it out darkly, as he prods Cain again, another finger between the ribs, this time more careful to pick one of the few places lacking in horrible dark bruises.
Cain knows there's a truth to it, and as much as it shouldn't hurt, he feels almost rubbed raw with the knowledge. It's a finalizing statement though reasonable closure to the split open guilt about the whole ordeal. They would talk about it later when he can actually think.
Sleep comes relatively easy then, Cain is heavy with exhaustion. the little shapes Abel rubs into the skin of his lower back are so steeped in nostalgia and adoration. He speaks softly to Cain of nothing in particular, or, maybe it it something specific that Cain's sleep addled mind just can't piece together.