To the desperate husk of a man, throwing that little rock took the energy it would have taken a normal man to throw a boulder, and thus, he collapsed. Parthen's strength was used, and now, for naught. If he could form thoughts, he would have sworn, been angry, but in truth, all he could really do was let himself his body limply fall back onto the hot concrete. Perhaps he would have taken a drink water, but the gaze of the sun weighed more than his sanity. It seemed that in such a position, even light was too heavy. Slowly, as his vision began to become more confused and disarrayed, Parthen found within him the will to cling to something, to anything that was still his in the world. Though his life was worthless, dying of his own inability, survival was an aspect of himself that he could not let go.<br/>---<br/>There was a voice somewhere outside of himself, a soft whisper that just barely broke the surface of the water in which he drowned. There was irony there, to be drowning while life struck him with dehydration. The gallons of water not three feet away were too heavy for him to lift now, and it was an effort to open his eyes. The decrepit body was only barely able place into focus the figure of a man. Parthen's mind tried, fruitlessly, to connect the furred man with something, a past thought, or some idea. In another time he might be afraid, but as the man spoke again, Parthen blinked and closed his eyes again. The words were incomprehensible, even less valuable than his sight.