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vaznettiThe language of the strong to the weak
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vaznetti
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crossovers100 prompt 87: choice
SPN/Alias
Bela, Sark, possibly disturbing content, spoilers for SPN 3x15 and 3x16.
This is, as usual, forzarahemla
A companion piece to the nameless dead and Isis and Nepthys. c. 1000 words.
The dead spin and wail around her, faces she recognizes, men she's consigned to death, never looked back, block her way now. Bela flinches away from them, crowded along the river bank where the mud steams and boils and the water reflects flames she can't see; the reeds cut her skin and she clutches at the ghosts to catch her balance. They slip through her fingers; she sees too late that they can no more touch her than she them. She falls, and the water burns around her.
Now she is running through a house she knows too well, the furniture a little too large, too bulky, heavy feet behind her driving her along, up the stairs to a long hall lined with doors. She skids a little on the polished wood. The footsteps are coming closer as Bela tries one door, then the next. Each one opens onto the same bedroom, the same wooden bed and wardrobe, the same white sheets and coverlet, and all the time the footsteps are just behind her.
At the end of the hall there's one last door, nowhere left to go. Her fingers are shaking and the doorknob is slippery; when it opens she stumbles inside, where the bed is waiting. This is where he catches her.
* * *
She wanders in and out of her own nightmares, in and out of other people's hells. A man runs by, fire clinging to him, three children chasing him, their teeth bright and sharp. Then she is in a forest, heavy snow clinging to branches, piling on the ground, hiding the blood flowing from a woman's arms until it soaks through again, black-red in the fading light. On the river-bank, a woman carves a boy into pieces with leaves as bright and sharp as glass. Bodies burn and are torn to pieces all around her: sometimes her own is one of them. And Bela never knows which step will take her back to the house, back to the hall, back to him.
The dead linger under the cypress trees, clustering around the cool spring. They push against each other, hurrying to drink and fade away into the shades that hover everywhere, eyes and faces blank. Bela finds herself among them, coming closer and closer to forgetfulness, to escape her memories, herself, her bargain. The water will be cool, she knows. One drink and she will know nothing, feel nothing. Be nothing.
She thinks she sees Dean Winchester once, on the other side of the pool, and turns away. This is her hell, and she will bear it alone.
* * *
Her feet slip on the floor again, the door burns her hands. The shades in the hall watch through blank eyes as she struggles. Behind her, the stairs creak. She slams the door behind her, a barrier between her and the uncaring dead, but nothing that will protect her. She has locked it, blocked it with furniture, hurled herself out the window, but the end is always the same.
There is a ghost in the room with her, a young man, gold hair and bright blue eyes. This has happened before, not this shade but others. But this one is watching her as if he sees her, as if he sees a person where she is. He steps forward, pulls the knife from his chest and places it in her hand. "My name is Julian," he says, and Bela simply gapes at him until she feels the door push open against her back. Then she turns, the knife warm and reassuring in her hand; she knows what to do.
* * *
When she's done, when his body is lying at her feet, she turns back to the ghost behind her. "You can say your name," she says.
The room fades around them. They stand under bright sun, red sand stretching out all around them. "Ozymandias, king of kings," Julian says. He tilts his head upward and squints against the harsh light. "I miss sunglasses. You haven't drunk forgetfulness either."
"I made my bed," she says.
His lips twist. "Keep the knife under your pillow."
* * *
She walks with Julian as desert changes to marsh, to jungle, to a concrete yard surrounded by rotting public buildings; around them the dead cry out, fall, bleed and weep. He steps away from her by a river, under a sky as blue as his eyes, where rushes grow green around them. Two women come forward to greet him and kiss him and cut out his heart , and all the time he smiles.
Bela helps them rearrange his limbs and smooth the torn places together, and watches them wander away, further along the river's edge. They whisper to each other; they are looking for someone, that's what they told her, but when Bela asked who, they could not say.
He opens his eyes, first dim then clear with memory. "You," he says. "What shall I call you?" Mud falls away from him as he sits up.
"You gave me your knife," she says. It isn't the answer he wanted, but it is an answer.
"I would never have used it." He hesitates. "I killed my father, as well."
"Did it cost you your soul?" The sky clouds over, and ash drifts down on them.
"That was long gone." His lips curve into something that isn't a smile; she feels hers do the same. She takes his hands and they rise together, into the falling ash, as the tides of hell shift around them again.
End
Title from Adrienne Rich, "Harpers Ferry"
Yes, I am posting fic late at night on Friday, when no one will see it. I never claimed to know what I'm doing, did I?
by
vaznetticrossovers100 prompt 87: choiceSPN/Alias
Bela, Sark, possibly disturbing content, spoilers for SPN 3x15 and 3x16.
This is, as usual, for
zarahemlaA companion piece to the nameless dead and Isis and Nepthys. c. 1000 words.
The dead spin and wail around her, faces she recognizes, men she's consigned to death, never looked back, block her way now. Bela flinches away from them, crowded along the river bank where the mud steams and boils and the water reflects flames she can't see; the reeds cut her skin and she clutches at the ghosts to catch her balance. They slip through her fingers; she sees too late that they can no more touch her than she them. She falls, and the water burns around her.
Now she is running through a house she knows too well, the furniture a little too large, too bulky, heavy feet behind her driving her along, up the stairs to a long hall lined with doors. She skids a little on the polished wood. The footsteps are coming closer as Bela tries one door, then the next. Each one opens onto the same bedroom, the same wooden bed and wardrobe, the same white sheets and coverlet, and all the time the footsteps are just behind her.
At the end of the hall there's one last door, nowhere left to go. Her fingers are shaking and the doorknob is slippery; when it opens she stumbles inside, where the bed is waiting. This is where he catches her.
* * *
She wanders in and out of her own nightmares, in and out of other people's hells. A man runs by, fire clinging to him, three children chasing him, their teeth bright and sharp. Then she is in a forest, heavy snow clinging to branches, piling on the ground, hiding the blood flowing from a woman's arms until it soaks through again, black-red in the fading light. On the river-bank, a woman carves a boy into pieces with leaves as bright and sharp as glass. Bodies burn and are torn to pieces all around her: sometimes her own is one of them. And Bela never knows which step will take her back to the house, back to the hall, back to him.
The dead linger under the cypress trees, clustering around the cool spring. They push against each other, hurrying to drink and fade away into the shades that hover everywhere, eyes and faces blank. Bela finds herself among them, coming closer and closer to forgetfulness, to escape her memories, herself, her bargain. The water will be cool, she knows. One drink and she will know nothing, feel nothing. Be nothing.
She thinks she sees Dean Winchester once, on the other side of the pool, and turns away. This is her hell, and she will bear it alone.
* * *
Her feet slip on the floor again, the door burns her hands. The shades in the hall watch through blank eyes as she struggles. Behind her, the stairs creak. She slams the door behind her, a barrier between her and the uncaring dead, but nothing that will protect her. She has locked it, blocked it with furniture, hurled herself out the window, but the end is always the same.
There is a ghost in the room with her, a young man, gold hair and bright blue eyes. This has happened before, not this shade but others. But this one is watching her as if he sees her, as if he sees a person where she is. He steps forward, pulls the knife from his chest and places it in her hand. "My name is Julian," he says, and Bela simply gapes at him until she feels the door push open against her back. Then she turns, the knife warm and reassuring in her hand; she knows what to do.
* * *
When she's done, when his body is lying at her feet, she turns back to the ghost behind her. "You can say your name," she says.
The room fades around them. They stand under bright sun, red sand stretching out all around them. "Ozymandias, king of kings," Julian says. He tilts his head upward and squints against the harsh light. "I miss sunglasses. You haven't drunk forgetfulness either."
"I made my bed," she says.
His lips twist. "Keep the knife under your pillow."
* * *
She walks with Julian as desert changes to marsh, to jungle, to a concrete yard surrounded by rotting public buildings; around them the dead cry out, fall, bleed and weep. He steps away from her by a river, under a sky as blue as his eyes, where rushes grow green around them. Two women come forward to greet him and kiss him and cut out his heart , and all the time he smiles.
Bela helps them rearrange his limbs and smooth the torn places together, and watches them wander away, further along the river's edge. They whisper to each other; they are looking for someone, that's what they told her, but when Bela asked who, they could not say.
He opens his eyes, first dim then clear with memory. "You," he says. "What shall I call you?" Mud falls away from him as he sits up.
"You gave me your knife," she says. It isn't the answer he wanted, but it is an answer.
"I would never have used it." He hesitates. "I killed my father, as well."
"Did it cost you your soul?" The sky clouds over, and ash drifts down on them.
"That was long gone." His lips curve into something that isn't a smile; she feels hers do the same. She takes his hands and they rise together, into the falling ash, as the tides of hell shift around them again.
End
Title from Adrienne Rich, "Harpers Ferry"
Yes, I am posting fic late at night on Friday, when no one will see it. I never claimed to know what I'm doing, did I?
