Disclaimers: Slash implied/remembered. Follows on from O When May It Suffice? The title is from the poem "Easter 1916", by W.B. Yeats. Somehow, it just seemed... appropriate.
Many thanks to betas Sue and Anika. And to Rhi for encouragement and friendship--I'm sure I could find a way to lay this one at your feet if I wanted to *g*. -- tarsh
What Is It But Nightfall?
Soft fingers brush over his cheekbone, shockingly cool against the heat of his skin. He moans softly as they travel lower, ghosting across his throat, pausing atop his Adam's apple, descending agonisingly slowly into the vulnerable valley at the base of his throat, between his collarbones.
It doesn't really surprise him that when he opens his eyes to look, there's no one there.
Still, real or not, the gentle touch is everything he wants, just now. Any touch, actually, would have done: he doesn't much care at the moment. The rough kindness of a stranger, the caress of a lover, Mulder's rough handling--he'd welcome any of it. Hell, he'd get down on his knees and beg for it, if he thought himself capable of movement, or if there'd be anybody there to beg. Instead, he'll lie here with his eyes closed and savour the firm hand rubbing his hair, and thank whatever gods he can find it left in himself to believe in for the gift. Real or not, the faint touch is a thousand times better than the listening to the slow dripping of his heart's blood onto the grass.
Kind of ironic, really. To die, here, where he had himself pulled out his own heart and torn it up, all those years ago--and at the hands of--but best not to go there. No point, really.
No point in anything much anymore, of course. "I'm sorry," he whispers to the darkness, to the figure he hopes is still there to hear; even though he knows there's not really any point to that, either. What he's done--what's between them--it cannot be encompassed by a single comment, a mere 'sorry.' He's not sure it can be encompassed by words at all.
It had seemed like a good idea at the time. To attempt his reconciliation with the love he'd once killed in the very place he'd killed it seemed... fitting. Oh, not that it would have made a difference to the one he'd loved--still loved, despite his best efforts--this was just another field, to him. Odd place for a meeting, maybe, but there was no way for Walter to know what had taken place here, so many years ago. What had been sacrificed here, or how. It had seemed a good place to come and inspect the corpse, see if perhaps there might not be a flicker of life left in it after all, if there might not be a chance of bridging the past. It had seemed like a good idea, then.
Odd. He'd always recognised his death-wishes for what they were, before.
The hand strokes gently along his arm--his new one, the one he'd been gifted by the aliens right before he sent them all to hell, the one he's still incredibly sensitive about having handled--and his automatic flinch starts a chain reaction of agony building through his body. A soft whimper escapes before he can catch it, and then habit has him clamping down on his body, his reactions, holding fast to the only charm that might get him through this storm. And as ever, pain fades, eventually--leaving him to the cold realisation that the phantom hands he'd needed so badly have faded with it.
Anywhere else, he thinks, the words a sob cutting through his brain in the wake of the phantom's abandonment. A mall, a street, a parking lot--anywhere. Anywhere but this too-dark field. The outcome wouldn't have changed. But at least he would have had one last glimpse of his beloved's face to hold on to during this long descent into death....
He'd never thought he'd die alone.
But then, he'd never thought he'd live to see the aliens fled, either. Himself unemployed, nothing left to clean up, the old men vanquished, and the world safe again--well, safe from without, at least. Or Mulder actually happy, never mind finally acknowledging his feelings for Scully. Or the X-Files a major department of the FBI, dragged kicking and screaming into the limelight. Scully juggling motherhood and marriage with the occasional debunking of her husband's pet theories, while the Lone Gunmen played uncle. Skinner taking early retirement. Taking pottery classes, of all things. The idea of whoever finally got to him not staying to gloat had always been up there with the rest of those fantastic impossibilities. It simply wasn't going to happen.
Somehow, they all had.
The feel of careful hands stroking along his feet leaves him weak with relief. Kneading and rubbing, easing aches he hadn't noticed until they were gone. Stroking hands firmly along his soles, cradling them carefully across strong thighs. Or what feel like strong thighs. He doesn't bother opening his eyes this time: he knows this phantom too well.No one's there. Of course not. No one is ever there.
Which only makes the sudden play of a flashlight across his face all the more shocking.
Next story coming soon to a webpage near you....
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O When May It Suffice?
Too Long a Sacrifice
A Terrible Beauty is Born
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