i wrote something else!
and i'm so excited i'm writing again i'm posting with nearly no beta. yep, i'm nutty like that.
Warning: OT3, AU, bookverse because a) giant squid, b) greater depth of text, c) easier reference (when is the dvd coming out?) and d) giant squid. Also, this will only make sense if you've read the first part, Life or its reverse.
i.
Dan walks into their little mid-western house a week after he helped Rorschach kill a paedophile and feels regret. The funeral was days ago and the wife is still wearing black. It wasn’t supposed to go like this.
It was supposed to go:
1. Michael Every, rapist, pulls into his garage after another night at the bar, gets out of his car.
2. Rorschach steps out of the shadows, breaks his neck.
3. Dan steps out of the shadows, helps Rorschach load huge, dead Every into the trunk.
4. Dan drives to the lake, sinks the car, Rorschach walks back home to make sure Laurie hasn’t woken up.
5. Dan walks back home.
6. No-one ever finds out.
It would have looked like Every just kept driving, leaving behind his wife and two sons and a half dozen little girls with terrible nightmares. It wasn’t a fool-proof plan (what if someone saw Dan driving the car, what if Every put up a fight, what if there was someone at the lake) but they had contingency plans for all that. They never expected that the car battery might be flat.
It was a miracle he had made it home at all. Dan considered powering up, but that would make noise and take time. So they tugged him out of the trunk, stole his wallet and climbed silently through backyards all the way to their own. It wasn’t perfect, but murder never was (unless you were Adrian Veidt).
When Laurie found out, it was alright. She understood. They sat together, planned to move town in a few months. When they were invited to the funeral, it was still alright. They knew very well what it was like to keep a secret. He didn’t feel regret, yet. He didn’t regret it until this morning.
He sits at the linoleum table a week after he helped Rorschach kill a paedophile and feels the ground beneath his feet. He feels solid earth, wrapped up in concrete and tiles but no less unyielding for it. He envies it.
Rorschach is reading Of Mice and Men, Dan’s not sure where he got it. He even reads tense, face giving nothing away. Laurie is standing over the stove (half her dishes end up burned but she’s still better then either of them), bare foot and hair curling in the heat. He marvels at the domesticity, the normality which he knows is an illusion.
“We have to leave. Tonight, tomorrow at the latest,” Dan announces. Laurie puts down the spatula and Rorschach closes his book.
“What happened to not drawing suspicion?” Laurie demands.
“I know we said that, I know we agreed, but” Dan taps his foot against the ground, “The chief. He's been talking all over town, how a gang just doesn't make sense, how it's starting to look suspect that his house wasn't trashed. How maybe it wasn't a robbery.”
“Shit,” Laurie slumps into the third chair. Rorschach cocks his head, says “There's no reason for him to think,” but Dan waves him off.
“We can't do anything to draw any attention. We're still off the radar and we need to stay that way.” He hates to lie to them but hates what might happen if he tells the truth. Which has somehow becoming the story of his life.
“Sam Hollis, is it?” Adrian smiled that big, sincere smile across the counter. “I hear you have a lovely wife, and a brother-in-law? How cozy.”
Dan briefly entertained dreams of punching him so hard his teeth scraped his spine. They were alone. He breathed in, and out, and thought about Lauire's mole, Rorschach's red roots.
“What do you want this time?” Adrian regarded him evenly, before gesturing to the store.
“Hardware. You see, my famine benefit show is in town. We are raising rather a lot of money, some very exciting young performers, but the authorities have warned me about passing motorcycle gangs doing some damage. I wanted to purchase a few padlocks. For safety.”
Dan put his hands flat on the countertop, to keep them still.
“What do you want from us?” he said, quieter, sadder.
“What do any of us want? Safety, Sam. Safety for me and my people.” Dan’s knuckles were white. Adrian leaned closer, spoke softly, intimately.
“The trick with the journal was interesting, but obviously no-one will believe such a clearly falsified document. Three people, two of whom appear quite sane, are somewhat more convincing.”
“We won’t make any trouble,” said Dan, and felt part of himself die.
“I know,” Adrian whispers. He stands back. “Now, these padlocks, Sam.”
Dan’s hands are flat on the table, his feet are flat on the floor.
“It’s not a risk we can take.” Rorschach stands up abruptly. Dan is terrified he knows, he will have to chase him down again, talk him down again. He’s not sure he can do it all again, not sure he wants to. But Rorschach takes the pan off the burner, turns off the stove, and sits back down.
“We’ll leave tomorrow,” Laurie threads her fingers through his, “Give them a story.”
“We’re good at that,” says Dan, holding her tight, staring at Rorschach’s hand on the book, pressing himself against the unyielding earth.
ii.
The backseat is hot. The whole car is hot, but at least the front seat car windows open fully. Laurie, feet on the seat and back to the door, is stuck with child-safe half windows. She makes a mental note, Steal a better car next time, or at least one with working aircon. The open windows do make conversation difficult, which is a relief. It's too hot to argue. The felt seat covering is sticky and stifling against bare legs. If she tilts her head, though, she can see clouds, blue and grey, purple and brilliant white, tessellated around the horizon. The noon sun sits in a blue field at the peak of the sky, superheating the tiny car, but they are driving into a storm. And besides, the warmth feels good in her battered bones. She slides her fingers against the bright bruise on her cheek, relishing the pain. Her molar is still loose. She hasn’t mentioned that, yet. They have more pressing problems.
Dan pulls into a service station and stares ahead. Rorschach, who might be Walter he’s so careful, says “Daniel.” But Dan is out and slamming the door, saying “Just stay in the car. Both of you.”
“Well,” Laurie rests an elbow on each headrest, “I think he’s over-reacting a little. But just a little.” Rorschach makes one of those noises she’s learnt to interpret.
“Yes,” she replies, “and you might have waited to see if that cop had back-up.”
“Didn’t know he was a cop.”
Laurie watches Dan, a day’s stubble and trucker cap pushed away from his forehead, talking to the attendant. He’s beautiful when they’re on the run.
“How could you not know?”
“What kind of cop walks around an apartment block asking for bribes?” She’s not sure if he’s furious or petulant. His voice is still hard to read.
“A corrupt, L.A. cop,” she says flatly. “What I don’t get was why you went for him there, then. Why not wait? We could of all gone together?” He grunts again, hiding his face under the absurd cowboy hat that came with the car. The hats and the heat are making her crazy. If they weren’t escaping from a bunch of angry cops (again) she might have taken them both in the backseat (again).
“There were four guys. Cops. If I hadn’t been in the apartment, who knows what would have happened?”
“If you hadn’t been. If you.” No, that’s furious. He twists in the seat, wrapping his fingers around her wrist. “They wanted you. They wanted you to be the bribe.”
Dan climbs back into the car and sighs.
“There are roadblocks on the state lines. Apparently they’re looking for a pair of potential terrorists. The attendant showed me the descriptions and everything.” Laurie slides her hand out of Rorschach’s grip.
“Cops are getting imaginative.” Dan looks at her like she’s mad, which she might be because she just had an idea.
Two hours later, it’s raining in California. They stand behind her on a manicured lawn as she knocks on a door.
“Bad idea,” mutters Walter, and that is definitely petulant.
“Got a better one?” Dan mutters back.
“Mom,” Laurie says.
iii.
He can still see his mother and that man, melted together.
Daniel’s breath smells of tandoori and toothpaste, his hands are still redolent of disinfectant. Laurie’s mouth is cigarettes, and her hair is cheap dye, but her soft neck, glowing pale in the motel’s neon scrawled gloom, is the sweetest thing he can imagine. Sweeter then any sugar.
At the home, they kept the sugar as a prize, doled it onto the morning porridge in tiny measured spoonfuls, but only if you were good.
Her sly fingers trace the fresh wound on his ribs, feeling Dan’s neat stitching.
The first time he needed stitches he watched the nurse do it, did it every time after by himself.
He shifts inside her, feels her teeth scrape down the edge of his ear, feels Dan shifting in her too, slowly. They all ache too much to go any faster.
He can tell the difference between a clean break and a fracture from the sound it produces.
He fists his fingers in Dan’s hair, lets go. Slides his nose along Laurie’s collarbone.
He doesn’t remember the first time his nose was broken, but he remembers the last three times.
He opens his eyes, looks over Laurie’s shoulder, over Daniel’s head. The moon seems to hang from the window frame, huge, gibbous and yellow, a smug face.
He can't look in the mirror. It still disgusts him. It always will.
Behind their breathing, Dan’s groans, the polyester sheets rasping, he can hear a clock ticking.
“I did it thirty-five minutes ago.”
He twists his hips like Laurie taught him to, his stitches stretch, Dan grips his arm. All he can see is white, all he can her is her voice and all he can feel is them.
because they are addictive: moral winter ~ a fugue in two parts
Warning: OT3, AU, bookverse because a) giant squid, b) greater depth of text, c) easier reference (when is the dvd coming out?) and d) giant squid. Also, this will only make sense if you've read the first part, Life or its reverse.
i.
Dan walks into their little mid-western house a week after he helped Rorschach kill a paedophile and feels regret. The funeral was days ago and the wife is still wearing black. It wasn’t supposed to go like this.
It was supposed to go:
1. Michael Every, rapist, pulls into his garage after another night at the bar, gets out of his car.
2. Rorschach steps out of the shadows, breaks his neck.
3. Dan steps out of the shadows, helps Rorschach load huge, dead Every into the trunk.
4. Dan drives to the lake, sinks the car, Rorschach walks back home to make sure Laurie hasn’t woken up.
5. Dan walks back home.
6. No-one ever finds out.
It would have looked like Every just kept driving, leaving behind his wife and two sons and a half dozen little girls with terrible nightmares. It wasn’t a fool-proof plan (what if someone saw Dan driving the car, what if Every put up a fight, what if there was someone at the lake) but they had contingency plans for all that. They never expected that the car battery might be flat.
It was a miracle he had made it home at all. Dan considered powering up, but that would make noise and take time. So they tugged him out of the trunk, stole his wallet and climbed silently through backyards all the way to their own. It wasn’t perfect, but murder never was (unless you were Adrian Veidt).
When Laurie found out, it was alright. She understood. They sat together, planned to move town in a few months. When they were invited to the funeral, it was still alright. They knew very well what it was like to keep a secret. He didn’t feel regret, yet. He didn’t regret it until this morning.
He sits at the linoleum table a week after he helped Rorschach kill a paedophile and feels the ground beneath his feet. He feels solid earth, wrapped up in concrete and tiles but no less unyielding for it. He envies it.
Rorschach is reading Of Mice and Men, Dan’s not sure where he got it. He even reads tense, face giving nothing away. Laurie is standing over the stove (half her dishes end up burned but she’s still better then either of them), bare foot and hair curling in the heat. He marvels at the domesticity, the normality which he knows is an illusion.
“We have to leave. Tonight, tomorrow at the latest,” Dan announces. Laurie puts down the spatula and Rorschach closes his book.
“What happened to not drawing suspicion?” Laurie demands.
“I know we said that, I know we agreed, but” Dan taps his foot against the ground, “The chief. He's been talking all over town, how a gang just doesn't make sense, how it's starting to look suspect that his house wasn't trashed. How maybe it wasn't a robbery.”
“Shit,” Laurie slumps into the third chair. Rorschach cocks his head, says “There's no reason for him to think,” but Dan waves him off.
“We can't do anything to draw any attention. We're still off the radar and we need to stay that way.” He hates to lie to them but hates what might happen if he tells the truth. Which has somehow becoming the story of his life.
“Sam Hollis, is it?” Adrian smiled that big, sincere smile across the counter. “I hear you have a lovely wife, and a brother-in-law? How cozy.”
Dan briefly entertained dreams of punching him so hard his teeth scraped his spine. They were alone. He breathed in, and out, and thought about Lauire's mole, Rorschach's red roots.
“What do you want this time?” Adrian regarded him evenly, before gesturing to the store.
“Hardware. You see, my famine benefit show is in town. We are raising rather a lot of money, some very exciting young performers, but the authorities have warned me about passing motorcycle gangs doing some damage. I wanted to purchase a few padlocks. For safety.”
Dan put his hands flat on the countertop, to keep them still.
“What do you want from us?” he said, quieter, sadder.
“What do any of us want? Safety, Sam. Safety for me and my people.” Dan’s knuckles were white. Adrian leaned closer, spoke softly, intimately.
“The trick with the journal was interesting, but obviously no-one will believe such a clearly falsified document. Three people, two of whom appear quite sane, are somewhat more convincing.”
“We won’t make any trouble,” said Dan, and felt part of himself die.
“I know,” Adrian whispers. He stands back. “Now, these padlocks, Sam.”
Dan’s hands are flat on the table, his feet are flat on the floor.
“It’s not a risk we can take.” Rorschach stands up abruptly. Dan is terrified he knows, he will have to chase him down again, talk him down again. He’s not sure he can do it all again, not sure he wants to. But Rorschach takes the pan off the burner, turns off the stove, and sits back down.
“We’ll leave tomorrow,” Laurie threads her fingers through his, “Give them a story.”
“We’re good at that,” says Dan, holding her tight, staring at Rorschach’s hand on the book, pressing himself against the unyielding earth.
ii.
The backseat is hot. The whole car is hot, but at least the front seat car windows open fully. Laurie, feet on the seat and back to the door, is stuck with child-safe half windows. She makes a mental note, Steal a better car next time, or at least one with working aircon. The open windows do make conversation difficult, which is a relief. It's too hot to argue. The felt seat covering is sticky and stifling against bare legs. If she tilts her head, though, she can see clouds, blue and grey, purple and brilliant white, tessellated around the horizon. The noon sun sits in a blue field at the peak of the sky, superheating the tiny car, but they are driving into a storm. And besides, the warmth feels good in her battered bones. She slides her fingers against the bright bruise on her cheek, relishing the pain. Her molar is still loose. She hasn’t mentioned that, yet. They have more pressing problems.
Dan pulls into a service station and stares ahead. Rorschach, who might be Walter he’s so careful, says “Daniel.” But Dan is out and slamming the door, saying “Just stay in the car. Both of you.”
“Well,” Laurie rests an elbow on each headrest, “I think he’s over-reacting a little. But just a little.” Rorschach makes one of those noises she’s learnt to interpret.
“Yes,” she replies, “and you might have waited to see if that cop had back-up.”
“Didn’t know he was a cop.”
Laurie watches Dan, a day’s stubble and trucker cap pushed away from his forehead, talking to the attendant. He’s beautiful when they’re on the run.
“How could you not know?”
“What kind of cop walks around an apartment block asking for bribes?” She’s not sure if he’s furious or petulant. His voice is still hard to read.
“A corrupt, L.A. cop,” she says flatly. “What I don’t get was why you went for him there, then. Why not wait? We could of all gone together?” He grunts again, hiding his face under the absurd cowboy hat that came with the car. The hats and the heat are making her crazy. If they weren’t escaping from a bunch of angry cops (again) she might have taken them both in the backseat (again).
“There were four guys. Cops. If I hadn’t been in the apartment, who knows what would have happened?”
“If you hadn’t been. If you.” No, that’s furious. He twists in the seat, wrapping his fingers around her wrist. “They wanted you. They wanted you to be the bribe.”
Dan climbs back into the car and sighs.
“There are roadblocks on the state lines. Apparently they’re looking for a pair of potential terrorists. The attendant showed me the descriptions and everything.” Laurie slides her hand out of Rorschach’s grip.
“Cops are getting imaginative.” Dan looks at her like she’s mad, which she might be because she just had an idea.
Two hours later, it’s raining in California. They stand behind her on a manicured lawn as she knocks on a door.
“Bad idea,” mutters Walter, and that is definitely petulant.
“Got a better one?” Dan mutters back.
“Mom,” Laurie says.
iii.
He can still see his mother and that man, melted together.
Daniel’s breath smells of tandoori and toothpaste, his hands are still redolent of disinfectant. Laurie’s mouth is cigarettes, and her hair is cheap dye, but her soft neck, glowing pale in the motel’s neon scrawled gloom, is the sweetest thing he can imagine. Sweeter then any sugar.
At the home, they kept the sugar as a prize, doled it onto the morning porridge in tiny measured spoonfuls, but only if you were good.
Her sly fingers trace the fresh wound on his ribs, feeling Dan’s neat stitching.
The first time he needed stitches he watched the nurse do it, did it every time after by himself.
He shifts inside her, feels her teeth scrape down the edge of his ear, feels Dan shifting in her too, slowly. They all ache too much to go any faster.
He can tell the difference between a clean break and a fracture from the sound it produces.
He fists his fingers in Dan’s hair, lets go. Slides his nose along Laurie’s collarbone.
He doesn’t remember the first time his nose was broken, but he remembers the last three times.
He opens his eyes, looks over Laurie’s shoulder, over Daniel’s head. The moon seems to hang from the window frame, huge, gibbous and yellow, a smug face.
He can't look in the mirror. It still disgusts him. It always will.
Behind their breathing, Dan’s groans, the polyester sheets rasping, he can hear a clock ticking.
“I did it thirty-five minutes ago.”
He twists his hips like Laurie taught him to, his stitches stretch, Dan grips his arm. All he can see is white, all he can her is her voice and all he can feel is them.
because they are addictive: moral winter ~ a fugue in two parts