Fic: Eschaton (1/1)
Title: Eschaton
Rating: PG
Pairing: Richard/Ben
Word Count: 251
Summary: He only sees the sun. For starfoozle, who requested “Richard/Ben” at my Winter Gift-Fic Extravaganza. Spoilers through 5.16 - The Incident, Parts 1 & 2; Speculative Spoilers for Season 6.
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot.
Author’s Notes: For starfoozle: I'm feeling very... apocalyptic in my Lost!fic writing of late. Hence, this.
Eschaton
To have lost so much, to have given everything he has; to see it fall, fail - to see it all have been for naught; it’s more than the human heart can bear.
His eyes are red-rimmed as he stands where they buried her body, where he’d forsaken her for something fleeting, unsteady - a fairy tale that had proven undeserving of his faith; the vein in his neck pulses with the passing of seconds, their fractions. His chest barely rises and falls, defeated, and on his knees - not praying, not strong enough - his hands stroke the ground like her hair, rotting below, the tears drawing soft and delicate like her voice on his cheeks trail, fall, water the soil, begin again.
Richard’s lived so long, seen so much; he’s never seen a man more broken, more destroyed - not even himself. And his heart’s never ached more for anyone, not ever.
He crosses the distance between the then and the now, sinks beside Ben’s hunched, weighted frame; slips his hand, older, smoother, into the one dangling at the other man’s side - younger, but more careworn, trembling in his grasp.
“It’s okay,” he murmurs, even though it isn’t, his voice like the soil, the salt of the earth, and Ben breathes again, and suddenly - miraculously; a gift, he doesn’t want - he doesn’t see ghosts any longer on the horizon; only sees the sun. He squeezes, clamps down on the fingers laced between his - they clasp back in return.
He only sees the sun.
Rating: PG
Pairing: Richard/Ben
Word Count: 251
Summary: He only sees the sun. For starfoozle, who requested “Richard/Ben” at my Winter Gift-Fic Extravaganza. Spoilers through 5.16 - The Incident, Parts 1 & 2; Speculative Spoilers for Season 6.
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot.
Author’s Notes: For starfoozle: I'm feeling very... apocalyptic in my Lost!fic writing of late. Hence, this.
Eschaton
To have lost so much, to have given everything he has; to see it fall, fail - to see it all have been for naught; it’s more than the human heart can bear.
His eyes are red-rimmed as he stands where they buried her body, where he’d forsaken her for something fleeting, unsteady - a fairy tale that had proven undeserving of his faith; the vein in his neck pulses with the passing of seconds, their fractions. His chest barely rises and falls, defeated, and on his knees - not praying, not strong enough - his hands stroke the ground like her hair, rotting below, the tears drawing soft and delicate like her voice on his cheeks trail, fall, water the soil, begin again.
Richard’s lived so long, seen so much; he’s never seen a man more broken, more destroyed - not even himself. And his heart’s never ached more for anyone, not ever.
He crosses the distance between the then and the now, sinks beside Ben’s hunched, weighted frame; slips his hand, older, smoother, into the one dangling at the other man’s side - younger, but more careworn, trembling in his grasp.
“It’s okay,” he murmurs, even though it isn’t, his voice like the soil, the salt of the earth, and Ben breathes again, and suddenly - miraculously; a gift, he doesn’t want - he doesn’t see ghosts any longer on the horizon; only sees the sun. He squeezes, clamps down on the fingers laced between his - they clasp back in return.
He only sees the sun.