#mc: raven nakamura

[endlesschange]

Deep Into the Darkness Peering (Platonic!Noah Marshall x MC)

Warning: Mentions of suicide, character death, blood, and gore. Mostly angst, whoops.

Summary: “Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing . . .” A moment of sacrifice brings upon a whirlwind of emotions for Raven Nakamura (my mc) as she peers into the darkness that surrounds her both physically and emotionally.

Note: Set during chapter 15, with Noah being the one to have taken Jane’s place. Basically just some heartbreaking angst for a girl who just lost another one of her closest friends. This is written as if everyone else had survived, because honestly there’s nothing better than all the pals screaming “I’m not scared”. Inspiration taken from Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven. I own nothing.

Word Count: 1403

Raven Nakamura falls.

She’s falling to the ground, the bones of her knees thundering down on the hard ground of the cavern within the ruins. It’s deathly silent in that moment, so the sound of her collapse echoes loudly, the sound nearly louder than the sound of blood pumping in her ears. The teenage girl lets out a silent scream as a body drops to the ground beside her, eyes lifeless and cold. A beanie is still snug tight around the corpse’s head and perhaps it’s the beanie that makes Raven realize what’s happening.

She stands there for a long moment, peering into the darkness until she is able to make sense of who the corpse is. Her brain feels like it’s going to explode, because while the realization is all too easy to make, it makes her sick to her stomach. Because it’s Noah. 

Noah Marshall is beside her, the life that had once encompassed him now sucked out. He’s dead, he’s fucking dead. Her blood runs cold as that thought plays like a broken record, on loop throughout her mind. Noah is dead. The boy that she had been childhood best friends with. The boy who loved his late sister more than anything in the world. The boy that needed help, who needed support that no one gave him when he needed it most. The boy who would willingly sacrifice the people who called him friends if it meant having the chance to bring little Jane back to life, the teen having become deluded with the lies of the ghostly spirit that was honestly the furthest thing from his sister.

But he hadn’t done that. He hadn’t sacrificed his friends. Their friends had more nerve than Raven had seen in one person, all having let out a thunderous cry of “I’m not scared” when tested by little Jane Marshall. They had made it out of the ruins, their lives safe and sound outside. And in the end, when given the chance to kill Raven or sacrifice himself, Noah had made his choice.

His last words hang in the air of the cavern, like a haunted melody. Let me take over for a little while, Janie.

He let Jane free. Noah has made the ultimate sacrifice and for that, Raven is still here. Her heart beats within her chest and she stares into the darkness of the cavern as the last of the light fades out. There’s a wild wind coursing through the air and if she squints hard enough, Raven is certain that she can make out the form of a lithe darkness, one that has arms and legs. 

She stands there for a long moment, peering into the darkness, until she is able to make out a figure. The figure is one that Raven knows all too well. When she was a young child, she had regarded the figure as Mr. Red. After Jane’s death, it had been Jane. And now? Now the figure that once haunted Raven’s darkest nightmares was now Noah.

He looms over Raven and his former body and Raven can subtly make out the frown that haunts his face. There’s no fire in his eyes, no terrifying form that will cause Raven to jump out of her skin. There’s only … sadness. Sorrow. Pain.

“Friend … Raven … I … sorry.”

The whisper crawls through the air, the sound reaching Raven instantly in the silent room. It causes a shiver to run down her spine, the hairs on her arms to stick up. The voice isn’t Noah’s, not even close to sounding like his cynical tone. But she knows it’s Noah talking, it has to be. Her dark eyes raise slowly, glancing up to make eye contact with the figure. Her eyebrows knit together in confusion and a frown settles on her dark stained lips.

“No sorry,” she tells Noah. “Y-You saved me. You gave up your life for mine, Noah. You have no reason to be sorry. If anything I should be sorry. Sorry that I didn’t reconnect with you sooner. Sorry that we weren’t there for you more than we should have been. But mostly, I’m sorry that all of this happened because of me.”

Noah’s spirit frowns even more, if that’s possible. “Raven … no … Noah wrong.”

“No . . . I mean, for this, sure. Bringing us here tonight, bringing this shit back into our lives on the off chance that you could save Jane, yeah that’s fucked up,” Raven relents, eyes stinging. “But Noah . . . you saved my life. The way that I should have saved Jane’s in the first place. I should have done more, I should have made sure none of us ever stepped into this fucking freak show circus in the first place. Maybe Jane would still be alive . . . maybe there wouldn’t have been a reason for you to do . . . this.”

Noah’s dark figure stares at her for a moment. He looks like he’s trembling. “Raven . . . still sorry.”

Her heart clenches. “Me too, bud. Me too.”

A moment passes. It feels like death, the silence that falls between them. Raven feels like her heart is being ripped from it’s bearings, yanked out through her ribs. Her stomach is queasy and while she’s never had a weak stomach, Noah’s lifeless body on the ground is enough to make her want to retch. His eyes stare out blankly, no expression behind them. She glances back upwards, swallowing around the lump in her throat as she takes in the sight of Noah’s new eyes.

Noah forces the faintest of smiles towards her. “Friend … Raven … leave … ”

She gives him one last withering smile. She clambers to her feet, smooths out the front of her homecoming dress, the one still stained with Cora Pritchard’s blood. She’s shaking horribly as Noah’s shape recedes into the darkness and she’s terrified to think that this will be the last time that she ever sees him. She stands there for a long moment, peering into the darkness that consumes the cavern, a darkness not unlike the one that has consumed her life for the past few weeks … past few years recently.

She glances down to the floor, where Noah’s human body still resides. The beanie is still snug on his head. The life is still missing from his eyes. She lets out a sob. It’s a hideous sound, loud and tinged with a whine. It’s hideous but it’s real. Real, because Noah Marshall, despite the horrid choices he’s made, was still a dear friend in Raven’s eyes. He sacrificed himself at the end of all of this, a night that began with his plan to take out anyone who stood in his way of getting Jane back.

She feels sick to her stomach, knowing that Noah sacrificed himself, walked himself into death’s grasp to save her. Her. Raven Nakamura, who wasn’t always the best friend to Noah. Raven, who hadn’t always been the best friend to Jane and was partially responsible for what happened to the little redheaded girl all those years ago.

“Noah?” she whispers. And then, louder this time, “Noah?”

There’s not a shred of an answer, not even a whisper of wind. The spirit is gone. Raven is alone.

So she sobs. She cries and she screams, the sounds echoing through Redfield’s ruins, until her tear ducts have nothing less to give her, her lungs raw and her heart broke. She stares into that darkness a moment longer, peering as the sound of her blood thunders in her ears. She turns on her heel, body facing the exit, the way that will take her away from Noah forever. But it’s also the direction that will bring her to her friends. To Ava and Lily and Dan and Lucas and Stacy and Andy. She’s tired and she’s broken, but the thought of her friends sparks the smallest of flames, one that burns with a hopeful spirit.

She stands for a moment longer and she takes a breath. She dries her eyes. She doesn’t peer into the darkness again. She smooths her dress once more. Another breath.

And then, she runs.