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 Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2016 7:46 pm
It took him a long time to get home.
His throat was bruised, but he'd wrapped a scarf around it, carefully, to try and keep it from being seen. Bruises were up and down his sides, predominantly on his ribs and scattering downwards; and he was relatively certain that there was one on his bad leg, pressed between the burn marks.
But his mind was not on those. His mind was on Celsus.
No. Not Celsus.
Fritz.
It did not seem possible. It didn't seem real. How could it even possibly be true, there was no way - no way that it should have been true, Celsus was not Fritz, Fritz was not Celsus, he wasn't -
"Olly."
"Oh, Olly."
Tolliver stood on the landing just outside the apartment, trying to keep himself steady, readjusting his scarf, his heartbeat frantic against his chest, and his hands shaking so violently that he almost wasn't sure he could get his key out.
Swallowing hard, he pushed the door to the apartment quietly open, and eased himself inside, hoping that Hitch was asleep.
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Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2016 7:54 pm
Hitch wasn't asleep.
They'd been in this position once before. One of them waiting for the other in the dead of night, in the dark. He was sitting on the couch, his phone and a bottle of bourbon he'd been trying to use to settle his nerves sitting on the table in front of him. His hands were wound together tightly enough to see the whites of his knuckles.
He, too, had had his mind of Celsus. And on Tolliver.
Every inch of him was wound so tightly, it was unsure whether he'd break or snap with the pressure.
It can't be true.
But then --
"Where were you?" His voice was rough. It still quivered.
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Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2016 9:09 pm
The voice came from the middle of the room, familiar and rough. Yet the tone of it - the tone of it was not familiar, trembling a little at the edges, sending a sharp, terrible tremor through Tolliver, who froze where he stood, green eyes wide.
A hand was still on the door. Hitch was there, sitting on the couch, they couch they had both sat on so many times before. The couch where, once, Hitch had drawn him into his lap, wrapped arms around him, asked Tolliver to tell him a little more about himself because he was interested; the first person that had ever been interested in Tolliver St. James.
Tolliver's mouth opened and closed. He felt sick with fear, with anxiety, with the pulse of his own heart, erratic inside of his chest.
"I..." he started, and it came out hoarse. Desperation was setting in; a desperate, panicked attempt at keeping his voice level. Tolliver let his fingers slide from the door handle and rise to twist absently with his other, the keys jangling a little.
"I was...taking a walk," he said hesitantly, and it sounded weak to his own ears, pathetic.
He never took walks. Not now, at past three in the morning, not ever.
"To - to clear my head. Another - another n-nightmare," Tolliver stammered.
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Posted: Fri Feb 05, 2016 11:31 pm
Hitch's shoulders tensed as though he'd been hit, his jaw tightening, teeth grinding together. He drew a long, slow breath between those clenched teeth. Even if he didn't know the loophole - he could see the lie from a mile away. Tolliver would have never. He would have called out and Hitch would have held him and soothed him until the nightmare was gone. It was just how they did things. That, 3am walks, was not.
"So you didn't notice I was gone?"
Maybe Tolliver could feel his lover's gaze on him, sharp and piercing from across the room as he rose from the couch. He strode across the floor, the floor he'd been sitting on, curled into himself, when Tolliver had come home and found him on the anniversary of his mother's death. It was the same place they'd gotten engaged, out of need as much as love.
"When I left, you were asleep."
He stopped in front of Tolliver, a few feet of distance in between them. He'd met his lover here, too, the first time he'd come for drum lessons. When it'd turned into so much more.
"Please don't lie to me."
There was a chord of pleading, although it was as much pleading for Fritz's words to be a lie as it was for Tolliver to give him the truth. "Please don't hide from me, Tolli. Please."
Please don't tell me Fritz is right. - no, he can't be, he can't -
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 3:52 am
So you didn't notice I was gone.
The words hit, like a physical slap across the face. Tolliver felt the ground drop out from beneath his feet, felt the world spin to a terrible, awful, screeching halt around him. A sinking sensation made a wash of dizzy panic sweep over him, green eyes widening.
"I - " he stammered. "I - "
But the words were pathetic, ludicrous even to his own ears. He could scarcely breath. He heard the shifting of clothing as Hitch stood, the quiet thud of footfalls as he drew nearer, saw the shadowy outline become sharper, defining itself into his lover's familiar features as he came to stand in front of him, all too clear, right in front of him.
Instinctively a hand rose, fingers curling in the scarf around his neck, Tolliver's expression stricken, and his breaths were coming out faster now, rapid pants, because he could feel his tiny, precious world collapsing in its entirety around him.
Please don't lie to me.
Fritz had told him, he knew it without having to ask it. Fritz had called him. Fritz, who was not supposed to be one of them, who was supposed to be safe and sound away from it all, who was supposed to be the one being protected and really he'd been the one on the wrong side of it all the entire time.
"L-Logan," Tolliver said again, and there was desperation in his voice, a pleading that had not been there before. "Logan, I - p-please, I j-just wanted - I - "
He swallowed hard, the movement painful. His eyes closed as though he could not bear to look at Hitch as he said the words, forced them out, because each one hurt so much that it was like trying to speak around a mouthful of acid.
"I was," he whispered, and it ached. "out. On...on p-patrol."
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 5:57 am
On patrol. He'd been hoping for a denial. For anything but those words to come out of his mouth. Although in the darkness Tolliver wouldn't be able to see it, Hitch's face fell - and his hopes began rapidly crumbling to dust, with him struggling to collect pieces that scattered between his fingers.
His hand lifted, almost as though he wanted to reach out and touch his fiance, his ring reflecting dully as it caught what light came in through the windows from streetlights and whatever else. Then, the same hand fell limply at his side, useless.
"Show me." His tone was unreadable bar that it was entirely too softly. It didn't suit him. "Now." He didn't want to see it. But he needed to. He needed to or he'd go on pretending it wasn't there, like Schrodinger's cat. Tolliver could go on being just Tolliver unless he saw the rest, the person he'd truly become under Hitch's nose.
Or had he always been this? - had Tolliver been this from the beginning, and neither of them had realized? - no, no, he couldn't have been, they'd taken him with the rest, and -
God he'd wanted him to say it wasn't true. He said he didn't want lies. But he didn't want the truth, either, not this truth.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 6:10 am
He felt as though all the air in his lungs was constricting; as though every part of him was being somehow suppressed, so that everything was thick and crowding in the space that had once felt so open and so caring. Tolliver’s legs were trembling - all of him was - but he couldn’t move, could hardly even draw breath.
Show me.
No, thought Tolliver desperately, his eyes too wide, fearful in a way that he had never been before.
For the first time in his entire life, he was afraid of Hitch. Afraid of the reaction, of what was going to come, afraid of what was crumbling to pieces around him. Tolliver’s pulse felt too rapid for himself, too fast to normal or healthy, too much. He was staring, his heart in his throat, at the man that was supposed to trust him.
No.
It was not a question. Not a request. A demand.
His throat felt dry. Tolliver swayed where he stood, his lips pressing together in a desperate attempt at keeping his emotions at bay - but he had never been good at that, had never been able to control the shifting, twisting, roiling feelings that were burned so deeply into him that it felt ingrained.
“Logan,” he whispered painfully, but refusing was impossible.
Slowly, shifting slightly, the glamour spread up and then it had overtaken him, and before Hitch, before the one person he’d been trying to keep it from this entire time - the only reason for which he had done this at all - the guise of Lieutenant Cerussite came upon him, the black uniform melting into the shadows.
“Logan,” he said again, desperately now, and he took a step towards Hitch, a hand outstretched. “Logan, please - “
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 6:22 am
Except it wasn't. It wasn't the first time he'd been afraid of Hitch, although only he would know it - and suddenly as he saw Cerussite standing there where his fiance was supposed to be, along with the painful constricting of his heart, he felt a sense of morbid understanding settle over him, twisting his insides, too much like the way it'd felt to have a general's hand in his chest.
He made a sound like choking, like he'd been hit. Hitch's hair whipped around his face as he turned his head abruptly to a side, then shook it, taking a step backwards. But there was no denying what he'd seen.
Hitch wanted to scream. He wanted to yell. He wanted to sob. It was all he wanted, and it was on the tip of his tongue, but none of it would come. Internally, he was chaos. Externally, it was all he could do to reach for his henshin pen, grimacing as though it pained him.
It had. But he'd kept doing it. He'd kept going out there. And for what, now?
"Eurydike Star Power. Make up."
He said it with no enthusiasm, in spite of the array of lights that followed, briefly illuminating their dim little apartment. Eurydike stood there in the wake of it, his cape settling in the aftermath of the transformation. His eyes were dull.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 6:34 am
The tension in the room was on the edge of a knife, a sharp and lethal as a blade. He felt as though one wrong move would make everything that much worse; as though a single step could cause him to be impaled upon his own metaphorical sword.
”Logan,” said Tolliver - Cerussite - again, his hand still outstretched towards his fiance - but the shake of Hitch’s head was like a slap to the face, more painful and more agonizing than he could have ever imagined it would be. He’d stepped back. He’d rejected him, and Cerussite felt it with every single cell of his body like it was on fire.
But - Hitch was reaching for something, now, and Cerussite saw it in his hand and knew what it was, knew without the words what it would do, and terror ran through him, sharp and fast and suffocating, because no - no, not Hitch, not his Logan, this wasn’t happening, no, no, no -
No.
His mouth opened and closed. Fritz - Fritz had been one thing. Fritz had been an unfamiliar face, a nameless knight. Someone he’d only seen once.
Hitch was -
No.
Cerussite let out a choking, strangling sound, staggering where he stood. His back hit the door, and he shook his head violently, feeling suddenly, overwhelmingly sick to his stomach. He wanted to scream, but nothing came out. He wanted to run, but his feet were rooted to the spot.
He wanted to disappear and yet time kept moving even as his heart had stopped the moment he’d walked into the apartment.
“No,” said Cerussite, and it was a painful, awful sound of a word, gasping for breath now. “No, no, no, you c-can’t be, n-no, you’re - you’re Logan H-Hitchcock, you’re m-my f-fiance, you’re not - you’re not one of t-them, you c-can’t be h-him - “
Not the one who was kind to me once, but then took me.
Not the one who was in my cell, spitting in my face with words of acid.
Not my Logan.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 7:04 am
The sound he heard made his eyes clench shut tight, as if that'd somehow be able to block it out. It didn't. It changed nothing, just like him being a senshi had changed nothing - his fighting, his scars, they'd been for nothing - the blood, the exertion, the inadequacy, the -
Nothing. Nothing he'd done had been enough. Not if Tolliver could have become this. What you did to him - you did that to Tolliver - He'd hit him. He'd scared him. He'd -
"I didn't know."
For a fleeting moment at the thought, guilt won out over everything else. As if that somehow explained away the captivity, the violence, any of it; his words were strangled and heavy, too thick with emotion. But guilt was cloying, suffocating, and he couldn't - he felt himself drowning under the weight, felt something more familiar, more true, fall into place behind it -
"You should have." His head snapped up, suddenly, his hair whipping into his suddenly too sharp eyes. "You should have ********' known!" His voice had risen from subdued and soft to rough and loud in a few seconds flat, and now it was Eurydike that was advancing on Cerussite, trying to stand taller than he was. "I protected you - twice! An' you still - this?!" He gestured to the man in front of him in a wide, sweeping motion - it ended with him swinging and hitting a wall close by.
Eurydike was stronger than Hitch, though - his fist went through.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 7:28 am
His throat felt dry. At some point in time, he’d raised a hand, his fingers clutching at the front of his uniform, as though trying to hold his rapidly shattering heart through the fabric. His chest heaved for breath, on the verge of hyperventilating, and Cerussite felt so very, very small.
You should have.
It hit him with the force of a gun, with the force of a javelin cutting painfully through him. His eyes widened, a stricken expression on his pale, freckled face, and Cerussite found that all the air had been taken from him, the wind utterly knocked out of him. His mouth opened and closed, a desperate attempt at finding words that would not come.
And then -
- the anger.
It was there, and it was sharp and bruising like the marks on his ribs, like the ache in his sternum; the finger marks ringing his neck, hidden beneath the high necked collar of his familiar black uniform. Cerussite backed up, but there was no where to go, his back pressing hard against the door, the handle jutting into his side, but he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t even think past the feel of Hitch - of Eurydike advancing towards him with a look of pure anger in his eyes.
“Lo - “ he started, yet again, but the slam of a fist stopped him, the crack of plaster making him jump violently, a stunned sound escaping that was half a sob. Cerussite’s eyes were fixed on the man in front of him, and he felt the ground beneath him starting to collapse, the world shifting, twisting, blackening, dissolving.
“Lo - Eurydike - “ The name sounded foreign on his tongue, harsh and wrong. “P-please, you don’t - you don’t understand, I had to - “
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 7:43 am
"You didn't!"
Don't call me that.
I don't want to be Eurydike to you.
But I am.
You're Cerussite.
You're Cerussite...
"That's bullshit! That's utter ********' bullshit!" To grab the collar of Cerussite's uniform was too familiar, now - this is where they'd been twice before - and the irony of it was lost maybe least of all on Logan Hitchcock in that moment. "Fritz an' I would've protected you! - we tried to protect you!"
Fritz. He hadn't believed him. He'd called him a liar.
Even now, with another layer of guilt eating away at him like acid, he was angry at him, too. Angry for telling him. Angry for bringing down the only thing that was good about this world to him. I called him a liar...
"You're the one that doesn't understand jack s**t! Or you'd know! You'd know I was never your ********' enemy! But no, you went with the people that ********' kidnapped you?! You -- "
He realized then how badly he wanted to hit him. Maybe needed to hit him.
It was a startling rush of desire that left him reeling, left his hands dropping too sharply at his sides.
"Get out." His voice quivered.
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Posted: Sat Feb 06, 2016 8:10 am
He was drowning, drowning, drowning.
It felt like agony, a worse pain than he had ever felt before, had never even known was possible until this moment, until this second. The blistering burns of his accident had been physical, but this - this was something deeper than just his skin, his muscles; something that cut into his chest and hollowed it out so that everything felt raw and exposed and open.
He was yanked forward, abruptly, his neck screaming with pain, but Cerussite hardly seemed to register it.
“No,” he said, desperate for Hitch to understand. “No - I was trying - please, I was trying to protect you, I was doing this for you, Logan - “ And he couldn’t say Eurydike, he couldn’t call out that name. “Logan, please, I was - I wanted to protect you, I wanted to - to be stronger f-for both of you, for Fritz too, because I love you - “
His arguments sounded weak to his own ears, and Eurydike was standing here, spitting anger at him, and each word was like a dagger pressing deeper and deeper into him, his chest heaving -
Get out.
He might as well have been stabbed. He might as well have been burned. Cerussite froze in place, as though time, for him, had stopped suddenly, sickeningly abruptly, a steady red flush as though a hand had slapped him beginning to appear scarlet on his face. His mouth fell open, and for a moment, he could do nothing at all.
“Logan,” he whispered, and it was an aching, terrible sound, the most painful word he’d ever spoken.
Don’t do this.
Don’t kick me out, don’t let me go, don’t push me away, don’t do this -
His eyes, still fixed on his fiance (could he even still use that word?) were glassy, and the first few tears slid down his reddened cheeks, disappearing under his jaw. They were followed by more, until it was a constant stream, until Cerussite’s vision had blurred, obscuring Hitch’s - Eurydike’s - figure in front of him.
He had never been strong at all. It had been an illusion, had been a mocking twist of all that he had striven for, because he couldn’t do anything.
The end of everything he had ever held so dear was crashing, burning down around him, dissolving into ashes at his feet.
He forced his mouth to move as he stood shakily, easing away from the door, his throat throbbing.
“I’m - “ Say it. “I’m s-sorry. Logan, I’m sorry.”
Please.
Don’t do this.
But even as he thought it, he knew there was no hope left. There never had been.
His fingers fumbled at the door, pulling it open, and then Cerussite was outside once more, running as fast as his bad leg would carry him, stumbling, sliding, staggering down the snow covered steps away from himself, away from the world.
Away from Logan, who was far, far gone, slipping through his fingers, until there was nothing left at all.
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