Warning: extreme angst, suicidal thoughts

Sometimes, Ban felt empty.

...That was a lie. He always felt empty. His whole life had been defined by the cavernous void inside of him. It stretched across his memories, a near-constant ached for something, for anything, for everything.

As a child, he'd thought it was hunger. His belly was empty more often than not, and it was easy to confuse his physical hunger with his internal one. Zhivago had filled his belly and the emptiness had vanished as well. But then Zhivago was gone and the void inside him remained even when his stomach was full.

When food didn't help him, Ban stole to fill the void. He roamed Liones, snatching anything that caught his fancy. He poured the stolen goods into the hole inside him like a bribe to a marauding dragon, like a sacrifice to a malicious god. But this god was fickle, and the treasures he stole only dulled the emptiness for a moment. Even the endless water of the Fountain of Youth couldn't fill the bottomless pit, and Ban left the forest's ruins feeling emptier than ever.

Then Meliodas had come for him, and Ban tried to fill himself with fighting. In the heat of battle, it was easier to ignore the gaping void. So Ban fought his enemies until they died, and sparred with his comrades until he was exhausted. And when the euphoria of the battle waned, he drank himself into a stupor-alcohol may not fill the void, but it at least made it possible to not feel it for a time. The years passed in a blur of blood and booze, and Ban chased down every challenge that came his way. Because he knew the void was still there, hidden but not sated, and it would surface as soon as it got the chance. When the Sins scattered, Ban lost his distractions and the emptiness returned with a vengeance.

So Ban tried to fill it with pain. After all, the Weird Fangs were so generous with it; it would have been rude to refuse. Ban sat in Baste and basked in their torture, clinging to the pain as he clung to any feeling that wasn't emptiness. But even their sadism had limits; eventually Ban's body grew used to it and even their most novel tortures couldn't overshadow the emptiness anymore. And then Ban could do nothing but scream into the void. And scream he did-he screamed with all his might into the gaping hole, demanding what more it wanted, what it would take to quench it. And the void stayed silent, because Ban already knew what it wanted. What he wanted.

People. People were the only thing that ever quelled the emptiness. Ban didn't want possessions, he wanted to be wanted, and the only way he would ever relieve the void that plagued him was by filling it with people who cared.

But people didn't stay. They left, like Zhivago. They died, like Elaine. They were stolen, as Meliodas had been, by plots and politics. And when they were gone, they left an even-greater emptiness in their wake. How could Ban fill a hole that grew deeper with every addition? And how could he endure the rest of his infinite life with this...this insatiable greed that refused to satisfied any other way? He was like a starving man, eating and eating and yet still remaining hungry. Humans weren't meant to stay unsatisfied; how long would it be until the frustration and the hollowness robbed him of his sanity?

Those were Ban's thoughts in his darkest moments. Fortunately, he was as stubborn as the void was. Yes, the emptiness might destroy him one day, but he refused to just succumb to it. He'd appease the void with everything he could, with brawls and burglary and enough ale to make his liver cry for mercy. But who knew how long it would last?