FIC : To Drive Away Remembrance From My Eyes : Kraken, Dane/Billyish, gen : for doveheart
Title : To Drive Away Remembrance From My Eyes
Fandom : Kraken by China Mièville
Characters/Pairing : Dane, Billy, mentions of Marge and Paul ; Dane/Billy-ish
Rating : G
Warnings : none
Word Count : 2346
Summary : Who made you? Billy finally knows how to answer that question.
A/Ns : Written for
doveheart for Yuletide 2011. Thanks to Nelle for the beta. Title is from John Keats.
---
In his dream, Billy was underwater.
It was colder than he remembered, but just as dark. He couldn't see much further than his own hand could stretch. He floated, weightless and chilly, lacking purpose. He waited, with a creeping sense of dread that grew with each second that passed. It gnawed at him silently as he remained motionless, not thinking, only feeling, waiting for what was coming.
Just as he became certain the fear couldn't get worse without waking him, there was, suddenly, a spark of light, a brief luminescence. Billy blinked, turning in his briny suspension. Dane was there.
You've been awhile, he said by way of greeting.
I didn't mean to stay away, Billy said. It did not occur to him yet to point out that Dane was dead, that he would have had no way of knowing Dane was waiting for him, or that it was strange to find Dane here, in the ocean of his dreams where none but the kraken had ever been.
You never believed me when I said you were special, Dane said. But you're still here, aren't you?
It's just a dream, Dane. He forced a smile. It's a dream, and you're really dead.
That's really not the point. Dane's focus shifted. He looked over Billy's shoulder, his eyes widening, awe and horror commingled. Billy, he said, hushed, the whisper felt rather than heard. Look.
He turned and looked, and gasped, breathing in sea water as he saw that behind him was no longer only the endless dark of the ocean but the uncoiled splay of ten suctioned limbs, the beak stretched wide as if-- no, not possibly, definitely-- to consume him. It was too close to escape; he choked on his lungful of water, flailing backward, and then the kraken was upon him.
---
Billy woke in the darkness, gasping. For those first terrible moments he knew only the terror of blackness, the taste of salt at the back of his throat. He couldn't breathe. He was gripped by panic, and a great yawning emptiness that both surrounded and consumed him. Then his heartbeat slowed, his breath came back, and his vision cleared enough to see the weak streetlight glow slanting in through the blinds. It was not quite four in the morning, Billy saw when he looked at the clock.
He lay back down and pulled the blankets up to his chin, hands folded over his chest, breathing deeply in, and then out. He looked at the ceiling, trying to make sense of the dream. He was asleep again before he could do more than try.
---
The light was soft and yellow as Billy sat with Marge and Paul in the park, feeding squirrels. He wondered which, if any, was the one that had spied on him for Dane, if it even would remember him. There had been so much about Dane's world that he hadn't had time to ask about-- though it was their world now too, he supposed; his and Marge's, as much as it was Paul and Saira and Wati's.
He watched with a little smile as Paul slid his arm round Marge's shoulders, easy and comfortable. He could never not think of Leon, never not see the space he should have filled when he and Marge were together. But he liked Paul, had a lot of respect for him, and besides, it was good to see Marge happy. Especially after all she'd gone through-- and now Billy knew more about what she'd been doing while he'd been camping out with Dane in imaginary people's flats, he thought he could forgive her anything. She'd done more to avenge Leon than he had; it had brought them closer in the weeks since, and let him get to know her as he should have done long ago. He was amazed, still, to think of the journey she'd undertaken, and even more that she had done it with no friend to guide her down the spiral.
Billy could not imagine-- could only imagine-- what that must have been like, for Marge to find her way alone. Every step of the way he'd had Dane by his side, from the minute he'd rescued him from the Tattoo until the end. It still, weeks later, felt strange to walk down the street without that burly presence at his shoulder, to think of something he wanted to tell him and remember that he had no one, now, to tell it to.
Dane had been, among many other things, his protector. He remembered the feeling of being ready for anything, and missed it, sometimes. Mostly he just missed Dane. Billy tried always to remember him as he'd last seen him; eyes blackening with ink and regret, his jaw clenched in determination, the way he'd squared his shoulders before going down to his death. He tried to remember the way Dane had said goodbye without words.
Paul nudged Marge's forehead with his, and she dropped a kiss on his cheek. Billy looked back at the squirrels, a tight stab of something flickering through his chest.
---
The kraken dreams came much less often than before, which made sense when he thought about it. The dreams were as weird and opaque as ever; deep, dark dreams of muffling blackness broken by the faint gleam of life underwater. Freezing heaven, Dane had called it. To Billy it was still incomprehensible and scary. He didn't belong here. He knew it every second he was down there; he was an interloper, a pretender to this place. He felt fear, where before there had only been wonder.
He wasn't sure what had changed. In dreams, when he could still remember it, he wondered if it was the kraken itself that had granted him passage. If it had known him, had bestowed some favour upon him as Dane and Moore had claimed, and now, being gone, never having existed, could no longer welcome him into its demesne.
He wished in vain that he had someone to ask. Someone who could tell him what he needed to know without wanting to use him for some purpose of their own. Some nights he startled into wakefulness with the phantom touch of a hand on his shoulder, certain that a moment ago a tall, broad figure had stood beside his bed. Some nights he simply opened his eyes to the inky dark of his bedroom, aching with the knowledge that he was alone in the flat.
He thought idly about returning to the Teuthists' church to look for answers, but he never went. He couldn't convince himself it was safe. Billy feared, more than he feared the survivors' reproach, what sort of symbol they might make of him now-- once god-touched, once a prophet, now-- what?
What am I now? he asked himself, staring at the ceiling invisible above him. What am I? He had never really believed, and so could not break faith. He had never been a disciple, and so could not become apostate. Whatever he was, he was a product not only of the kraken's cold touch, but of everything else that had happened to him since he walked into the room in the Darwin Centre to find it missing.
"Who made me?" he murmured aloud, the darkness swallowing the words, swallowing his sad little laugh.
---
It was almost Christmas when the Teuthists came calling.
He was doing his tours at the Darwin Centre again, ignoring the constant nagging unpleasantness when he came into the last, mostly-empty room. He ignored, too, the silence where the sound of glass on marble should be.
The tours had become routine for him now; he could almost say the script without thinking too much about it. It left him free to notice things about the people he was leading through the Centre, which was more diverting than trying to remember if there had ever actually been a giant squid there, or if his memory were playing tricks on him. This morning, though, Billy was startled out of his recitation when a young woman in his tour group shrugged out of her coat, revealing a familiar ten-pointed star gleaming on her lapel. He smoothed over his stutter and continued on as if nothing were different, but he couldn't help looking at the woman, who met his gaze with calm acceptance. He didn't know if he ought to be afraid, and forced himself not to decide one way or another until he knew why she was there.
At the end of the tour she waited beside Darwin's specimens for him. "I didn't think I'd ever see any of you again," he said, his voice low.
"Why did you think that?" she asked, gently surprised and smiling. "The god isn't here anymore. That doesn't make this less a holy place."
Billy shut his eyes. "It's not that it's gone," he said. "It was never here. It never existed."
"You remember it," she pointed out. "That's enough." Her next words sent a twist of ice through his stomach. "And you remember Dane Parnell."
"Of course I remember him," he bit out, surprised by his own sudden anger. "What does that have to do with you?"
"It has everything to do with me. With all of us." She touched the pin. "He was a soldier. A martyr. The holiest of men. He averted the burning apocalypse and saved us all from Grisamentum's ruin."
"If it's all the same to you, I'd rather he were a little less holy and a little more alive," Billy said, his eyes feeling hot, his throat thick. "I never had any use for your god, or your faith. I had faith in Dane, and now he's gone."
"Of course you'd rather that," the woman said with a sweet, understanding smile. "But what's important is your memory of him. It was his fate to die for his god. Those of us who knew him this way remember that. But you knew all of him, and remember him fully." She touched his arm. "He was, and is, lucky to have you."
"That's a shitty fate," he said, stepping away from her. "I have to go." He spun around and started walking away.
"The Darwin Centre has no angel of memory," she said to his retreating back. That stopped him cold. He didn't turn to look back at her, just waited for her to continue. "There are those that think you should fill its place until another is created. That you are the most fitting protector for this museum and all it holds." He did turn, then, to find her looking at Darwin's bottles, her hands clasped behind her back. Her head turned and she looked at him, softly expectant. "You are surprised. Why? Your memories are important. You mourn Dane, and keep him alive in your heart. You remember the god, when most others cannot. You revere this place and what it means. Can you think of anyone better?"
Billy stared at her dumbly, unable to even think of a reply. The woman smiled again and began putting on her coat. Her kraken pin flashed in the light before vanishing under her scarf. "Thank you for the tour," she said. "Thank you for remembering."
Her hand rested briefly on his arm as she passed. By the time he turned to reply, she was already gone.
---
That night, he dreamed of Dane again.
She said it was your fate to die, he said. I don't believe that.
You said you had faith in me, Dane pointed out. I always thought I'd die for the church. Doesn't that make it worth believing in?
No, Billy said. You didn't have to die. That's not-- that shouldn't be anyone's fate, Dane. It should be something unfortunate that happens by accident, or at the end of a long life, or--
Not to keep you safe? Dane asked. His hand found one of Billy's, warm and firm. That's worth it to me.
That's rubbish, Billy said angrily, snatching his hand away. I'm not special, I don't care what you say. I'm not a prophet anymore, if I ever was, and it's bloody stupid to say you should die because I'm some sort of symbol.
That's not why, Dane said. And you know you're not a symbol. Not only that.
But you're dead, he snapped back. You're dead and I don't know who or what I am anymore. What am I supposed to do now? What am I supposed to be?
I told you once before, Dane said, I wasn't asking you to be anything you weren't. You shouldn't do that now, not for anyone. Be yourself, Billy. That was always good enough.
Billy looked down. I miss you, he said.
I know. Dane's hand folded around his again, and this time Billy held on.
---
It was cold out, and Billy walked huddled into his coat, his scarf up over his nose. The streetlights glowed prettily in the fog, a hint of snow in the smell of the air. The Darwin Centre was dark, the loading dock deserted as he walked up and paused with his hand on the door.
He didn't know what he was doing, but he wasn't letting himself think about it. Instinct had gotten him out of bed and into his clothes, had gotten him down here without really asking himself what he thought he could accomplish. What am I? he thought again. Who made me? He thought of Leon and Marge, Goss and Subby, Collingswood and Saira, of Wati, of the kraken, and of Dane. He thought of dozens of nights spent in hideaways and imaginary people's homes, of running through the streets at night, of glass angels and talking tattoos and sentient ink and the knowledge, always, that wherever he was, he was not alone.
Who made you?
"London made me," he said aloud. "And I'm here to guard its memory."
The handle turned under his touch, the door opening silently to him. Billy went inside, unwinding his scarf, and prepared to spend some time remembering.
---
i wrote three different versions of this story; this was the one that stuck. it's the shortest yuletide piece i've ever written, and one of my shorter fics overall. but i am so thrilled to have finally contributed fic for this canon to AO3, and i can't thank
doveheart enough for her request.
This post crossposted from Dreamwidth (
comments)
Fandom : Kraken by China Mièville
Characters/Pairing : Dane, Billy, mentions of Marge and Paul ; Dane/Billy-ish
Rating : G
Warnings : none
Word Count : 2346
Summary : Who made you? Billy finally knows how to answer that question.
A/Ns : Written for
doveheart for Yuletide 2011. Thanks to Nelle for the beta. Title is from John Keats.
---
In his dream, Billy was underwater.
It was colder than he remembered, but just as dark. He couldn't see much further than his own hand could stretch. He floated, weightless and chilly, lacking purpose. He waited, with a creeping sense of dread that grew with each second that passed. It gnawed at him silently as he remained motionless, not thinking, only feeling, waiting for what was coming.
Just as he became certain the fear couldn't get worse without waking him, there was, suddenly, a spark of light, a brief luminescence. Billy blinked, turning in his briny suspension. Dane was there.
You've been awhile, he said by way of greeting.
I didn't mean to stay away, Billy said. It did not occur to him yet to point out that Dane was dead, that he would have had no way of knowing Dane was waiting for him, or that it was strange to find Dane here, in the ocean of his dreams where none but the kraken had ever been.
You never believed me when I said you were special, Dane said. But you're still here, aren't you?
It's just a dream, Dane. He forced a smile. It's a dream, and you're really dead.
That's really not the point. Dane's focus shifted. He looked over Billy's shoulder, his eyes widening, awe and horror commingled. Billy, he said, hushed, the whisper felt rather than heard. Look.
He turned and looked, and gasped, breathing in sea water as he saw that behind him was no longer only the endless dark of the ocean but the uncoiled splay of ten suctioned limbs, the beak stretched wide as if-- no, not possibly, definitely-- to consume him. It was too close to escape; he choked on his lungful of water, flailing backward, and then the kraken was upon him.
---
Billy woke in the darkness, gasping. For those first terrible moments he knew only the terror of blackness, the taste of salt at the back of his throat. He couldn't breathe. He was gripped by panic, and a great yawning emptiness that both surrounded and consumed him. Then his heartbeat slowed, his breath came back, and his vision cleared enough to see the weak streetlight glow slanting in through the blinds. It was not quite four in the morning, Billy saw when he looked at the clock.
He lay back down and pulled the blankets up to his chin, hands folded over his chest, breathing deeply in, and then out. He looked at the ceiling, trying to make sense of the dream. He was asleep again before he could do more than try.
---
The light was soft and yellow as Billy sat with Marge and Paul in the park, feeding squirrels. He wondered which, if any, was the one that had spied on him for Dane, if it even would remember him. There had been so much about Dane's world that he hadn't had time to ask about-- though it was their world now too, he supposed; his and Marge's, as much as it was Paul and Saira and Wati's.
He watched with a little smile as Paul slid his arm round Marge's shoulders, easy and comfortable. He could never not think of Leon, never not see the space he should have filled when he and Marge were together. But he liked Paul, had a lot of respect for him, and besides, it was good to see Marge happy. Especially after all she'd gone through-- and now Billy knew more about what she'd been doing while he'd been camping out with Dane in imaginary people's flats, he thought he could forgive her anything. She'd done more to avenge Leon than he had; it had brought them closer in the weeks since, and let him get to know her as he should have done long ago. He was amazed, still, to think of the journey she'd undertaken, and even more that she had done it with no friend to guide her down the spiral.
Billy could not imagine-- could only imagine-- what that must have been like, for Marge to find her way alone. Every step of the way he'd had Dane by his side, from the minute he'd rescued him from the Tattoo until the end. It still, weeks later, felt strange to walk down the street without that burly presence at his shoulder, to think of something he wanted to tell him and remember that he had no one, now, to tell it to.
Dane had been, among many other things, his protector. He remembered the feeling of being ready for anything, and missed it, sometimes. Mostly he just missed Dane. Billy tried always to remember him as he'd last seen him; eyes blackening with ink and regret, his jaw clenched in determination, the way he'd squared his shoulders before going down to his death. He tried to remember the way Dane had said goodbye without words.
Paul nudged Marge's forehead with his, and she dropped a kiss on his cheek. Billy looked back at the squirrels, a tight stab of something flickering through his chest.
---
The kraken dreams came much less often than before, which made sense when he thought about it. The dreams were as weird and opaque as ever; deep, dark dreams of muffling blackness broken by the faint gleam of life underwater. Freezing heaven, Dane had called it. To Billy it was still incomprehensible and scary. He didn't belong here. He knew it every second he was down there; he was an interloper, a pretender to this place. He felt fear, where before there had only been wonder.
He wasn't sure what had changed. In dreams, when he could still remember it, he wondered if it was the kraken itself that had granted him passage. If it had known him, had bestowed some favour upon him as Dane and Moore had claimed, and now, being gone, never having existed, could no longer welcome him into its demesne.
He wished in vain that he had someone to ask. Someone who could tell him what he needed to know without wanting to use him for some purpose of their own. Some nights he startled into wakefulness with the phantom touch of a hand on his shoulder, certain that a moment ago a tall, broad figure had stood beside his bed. Some nights he simply opened his eyes to the inky dark of his bedroom, aching with the knowledge that he was alone in the flat.
He thought idly about returning to the Teuthists' church to look for answers, but he never went. He couldn't convince himself it was safe. Billy feared, more than he feared the survivors' reproach, what sort of symbol they might make of him now-- once god-touched, once a prophet, now-- what?
What am I now? he asked himself, staring at the ceiling invisible above him. What am I? He had never really believed, and so could not break faith. He had never been a disciple, and so could not become apostate. Whatever he was, he was a product not only of the kraken's cold touch, but of everything else that had happened to him since he walked into the room in the Darwin Centre to find it missing.
"Who made me?" he murmured aloud, the darkness swallowing the words, swallowing his sad little laugh.
---
It was almost Christmas when the Teuthists came calling.
He was doing his tours at the Darwin Centre again, ignoring the constant nagging unpleasantness when he came into the last, mostly-empty room. He ignored, too, the silence where the sound of glass on marble should be.
The tours had become routine for him now; he could almost say the script without thinking too much about it. It left him free to notice things about the people he was leading through the Centre, which was more diverting than trying to remember if there had ever actually been a giant squid there, or if his memory were playing tricks on him. This morning, though, Billy was startled out of his recitation when a young woman in his tour group shrugged out of her coat, revealing a familiar ten-pointed star gleaming on her lapel. He smoothed over his stutter and continued on as if nothing were different, but he couldn't help looking at the woman, who met his gaze with calm acceptance. He didn't know if he ought to be afraid, and forced himself not to decide one way or another until he knew why she was there.
At the end of the tour she waited beside Darwin's specimens for him. "I didn't think I'd ever see any of you again," he said, his voice low.
"Why did you think that?" she asked, gently surprised and smiling. "The god isn't here anymore. That doesn't make this less a holy place."
Billy shut his eyes. "It's not that it's gone," he said. "It was never here. It never existed."
"You remember it," she pointed out. "That's enough." Her next words sent a twist of ice through his stomach. "And you remember Dane Parnell."
"Of course I remember him," he bit out, surprised by his own sudden anger. "What does that have to do with you?"
"It has everything to do with me. With all of us." She touched the pin. "He was a soldier. A martyr. The holiest of men. He averted the burning apocalypse and saved us all from Grisamentum's ruin."
"If it's all the same to you, I'd rather he were a little less holy and a little more alive," Billy said, his eyes feeling hot, his throat thick. "I never had any use for your god, or your faith. I had faith in Dane, and now he's gone."
"Of course you'd rather that," the woman said with a sweet, understanding smile. "But what's important is your memory of him. It was his fate to die for his god. Those of us who knew him this way remember that. But you knew all of him, and remember him fully." She touched his arm. "He was, and is, lucky to have you."
"That's a shitty fate," he said, stepping away from her. "I have to go." He spun around and started walking away.
"The Darwin Centre has no angel of memory," she said to his retreating back. That stopped him cold. He didn't turn to look back at her, just waited for her to continue. "There are those that think you should fill its place until another is created. That you are the most fitting protector for this museum and all it holds." He did turn, then, to find her looking at Darwin's bottles, her hands clasped behind her back. Her head turned and she looked at him, softly expectant. "You are surprised. Why? Your memories are important. You mourn Dane, and keep him alive in your heart. You remember the god, when most others cannot. You revere this place and what it means. Can you think of anyone better?"
Billy stared at her dumbly, unable to even think of a reply. The woman smiled again and began putting on her coat. Her kraken pin flashed in the light before vanishing under her scarf. "Thank you for the tour," she said. "Thank you for remembering."
Her hand rested briefly on his arm as she passed. By the time he turned to reply, she was already gone.
---
That night, he dreamed of Dane again.
She said it was your fate to die, he said. I don't believe that.
You said you had faith in me, Dane pointed out. I always thought I'd die for the church. Doesn't that make it worth believing in?
No, Billy said. You didn't have to die. That's not-- that shouldn't be anyone's fate, Dane. It should be something unfortunate that happens by accident, or at the end of a long life, or--
Not to keep you safe? Dane asked. His hand found one of Billy's, warm and firm. That's worth it to me.
That's rubbish, Billy said angrily, snatching his hand away. I'm not special, I don't care what you say. I'm not a prophet anymore, if I ever was, and it's bloody stupid to say you should die because I'm some sort of symbol.
That's not why, Dane said. And you know you're not a symbol. Not only that.
But you're dead, he snapped back. You're dead and I don't know who or what I am anymore. What am I supposed to do now? What am I supposed to be?
I told you once before, Dane said, I wasn't asking you to be anything you weren't. You shouldn't do that now, not for anyone. Be yourself, Billy. That was always good enough.
Billy looked down. I miss you, he said.
I know. Dane's hand folded around his again, and this time Billy held on.
---
It was cold out, and Billy walked huddled into his coat, his scarf up over his nose. The streetlights glowed prettily in the fog, a hint of snow in the smell of the air. The Darwin Centre was dark, the loading dock deserted as he walked up and paused with his hand on the door.
He didn't know what he was doing, but he wasn't letting himself think about it. Instinct had gotten him out of bed and into his clothes, had gotten him down here without really asking himself what he thought he could accomplish. What am I? he thought again. Who made me? He thought of Leon and Marge, Goss and Subby, Collingswood and Saira, of Wati, of the kraken, and of Dane. He thought of dozens of nights spent in hideaways and imaginary people's homes, of running through the streets at night, of glass angels and talking tattoos and sentient ink and the knowledge, always, that wherever he was, he was not alone.
Who made you?
"London made me," he said aloud. "And I'm here to guard its memory."
The handle turned under his touch, the door opening silently to him. Billy went inside, unwinding his scarf, and prepared to spend some time remembering.
---
i wrote three different versions of this story; this was the one that stuck. it's the shortest yuletide piece i've ever written, and one of my shorter fics overall. but i am so thrilled to have finally contributed fic for this canon to AO3, and i can't thank
doveheart enough for her request.
This post crossposted from Dreamwidth (
comments)