Panic surges through him like that same tide had so recently done his entire world.
He plunges back into the blackness, squinting, searching the drowned cell.
He gropes along the darkness, absolute as it is, along the walls and corners, refusing to give up as his body so desperately wished.
His muscles scream, his lungs burn, and yet he prays silently for that same gods-forsaken instrument.
And only then, as he unwittingly wrenches his head towards where he'd first glimpsed it,
does he see that accordion, drifting just beyond the bars as if it unlike him yearned for freedom.
He stretched his arms out, every fiber of his being crying out in agony.
He grasps it with the will he hadn't had eight years ago, clutching it to his chest.
His vision blurs.
His body fades, that spark whittling down to smoke.
And yet he presses the accordion to his numb hands and squeezes.
It is silent, broken, lifeless, and yet in his mind, in the recesses of his skull, it sings louder than memory could ever serve.