Sapphire Blue
Chapter 2
by
Lady-T
Disclaimer: Not mine, especially the Aerosmith lyrics scattered around. I'm not Steven Tyler and I can't fit a whole grapefruit in my mouth like he can, so don't sue me. Virtually everything belongs to someone else.
Dedicated to all those people I've accidentally plagiarized in some way, shape or form. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. No, really it is. . .
And he seeth all his goings. . .
"So what kind of stuff do you do, kid?" Logan poured the contents of the syrup jug over his pancakes and glanced across the table at her. He'd given her a shirt and some jeans to replace her torn clothes, but they were too big on her. She looked a swamped in the warm fabrics, but strangely it almost seemed to suit her.
They were seated opposite each other in a quiet booth in some tiny little diner in the middle of nowhere. Bright sunlight radiated through the large window beside them and warmed the remnants of the syrup sitting on the table.
"I dunno' really. I just kinda' feel stuff. . . " She toyed lightly with the eggs on her plate, shifting them around with the end of her fork.
She was hungry but somehow her appetite had left her.
"You mean like a telepath?"
He drew back slightly. The idea of someone who had the power to go poking round in his head had always bothered him. A man's thoughts were private and should stay that way.
"No." She shook her head. "I don't know how to describe it really. It's more like I just know when something's going to happen."
"You mean like you can see the future?" He looked at her incredulously. "That's impossible."
She shook her head. "That's putting it kind of strongly. It's like I suddenly just get this feeling in my gut or a picture in my head. Just a snippet of something that's going to happen close by. Like the if waiter was about to drop a load of dishes or something. I can hear the clatter in my mind just before it happens."
She looked across at his still incredulous face. "You don't have to believe me, you know."
"No, no, kid, I believe you." He grinned slyly and reached into his jacket pocket. "So what am I gonna' do next?"
"Well you'd better be about to pay the bill 'cos I've got no money, but it doesn't work like that."
Logan grinned and fished out his wallet to pay, while the girl continued talking.
"I can't control it or make myself see things. It just pops into my head." She faltered a little. "Like I. . . I knew that something was going to happen last night, but I didn't know what. I knew I should have run before they came into the bar, but for some stupid reason I didn't. . . I. . . "
Tears filled her eyes again.
"Shhh, it's OK. . . " He murmured.
"No, no it's not OK. . . " She looked up at him, worry creasing her smooth brow. "They're going to come after me. What if they find me again? I could see it in their eyes, they were going to kill me. . . "
"They're not gonna' come after ya', kid"
"What makes you so sure?" Her voice was desperate. "They'd been following me for days, they're not going to give up so fast."
"I'm sure, 'cos. . . " *snikt* His claws shot out making her jump. "They gave up last night."
Her face turned an ashen shade of white. "You mean you. . . ?"
He looked away from her shocked face and drew his claws back in.
"Are they. . . ?" She trailed off, half afraid to say the word.
"One, for sure. . . the others maybe not, but they wouldn't have lasted long out there."
"Oh my god, how COULD you?" There was shock and abject accusation in her voice. Here eyes were wide with something unreadable and her fork slipped from her fingers, clattering noisily to the floor.
"How could I what?" He looked sideways at the anguish spreading across her face, trying to hide his surprise and the strange sense of pain it caused him to know he had upset her somehow. It was stupid. He didn't know her from Adam, fuck, he didn't even know her name, but it chewed at him.
"How could you?" She repeated again, quieter this time, saying it more to herself than to him as if she didn't quite believe what was happening.
"Why should it matter to ya' kid? After what they did the other night. . . "
"No, you don't understand. . . You KILLED them. . . "
The other patrons of the diner fell silent at that last exclamation and turned to watch the source of the noise, necks craning over booths and round pillars.
Fighting back the emotion in her voice she leaped from the table and ran towards the diner's door.
Logan raised his eyes to the ceiling in confusion. "Kid, I. . . "
"And don't call me kid!" She screamed tearfully, slamming the door behind her.
Logan rose from the table, throwing a few crumpled notes and a bitter glare at the gawping waitress before stalking after her.
He found her sitting on the snow-covered rail surrounding the porch, the bitter wind whipping through her loose clothes. She was shivering, her arms wrapped tightly around herself. Her head was bent down as if she was trying to curl up into herself.
Logan stepped up close behind her and took off his jacket to drape it over her shoulders. She jumped a little at his touch, but accepted it, grateful of the warmth it provided. She pulled the collar up tight around her neck and snuggled into the heat contained in the fabric. Her eyes still gazed sadly out into the snowy wilderness.
"You're not gonna' get very far sat there freezing to death, honey."
"Lillah." She said flatly. "My name's Lillah."
"OK." He nodded thoughtfully.
"Logan." He grabbed her hand and shook it as if introducing himself formally. "You got something you wanna' tell me, Lillah?" He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the rail.
"I'm sorry." She murmured. "I should be thanking you for all you've done, not storming off like that. It's just. . . " She looked out into the snow, trying to collect her thoughts.
"I just don't get how you can kill someone. How you can let them die. . . It's horrible. . . "
He shrugged and ran his fingers through his hair. "The less you think about it, the less horrible it is."
He looked across at her downcast face. "I'm sorry if I did something you don't like, but bastards like that deserve what they got."
"No one deserves to die" She whispered.
"Not even for what they did to you?" His rich brown eyes searched her face, puzzled.
She silently shook her head. "Not even them."
"I don't get ya' kid. I'd be mad as hell. I'd be shouting on the rooftops to know they were gone."
She smiled a little but stated silent.
She WAS glad they were gone, but not to die. He just didn't understand. . .
* * * * *
Darkness crept like waves ebbing towards the shore. The day had been driven away through the bleak wilderness, and now the road was silent and still beneath them.
Logan dozed peacefully, lightly snoring as he lay curled on the floor. He had mumbled something about a misplaced sense of chivalry before giving up his bed to Lillah that night, and she had accepted it graciously. She was just happy to have something softer than the earth to sleep on for a change. She'd been on the road for months, chased from her home when people realised she had a mutation and then chased from town to town when people had discovered her. She had spent many of those nights camped under the stars. It had been bitterly cold but somehow she had survived, checking into cheap motels and even cheaper hostels on the nights where the weather had driven her from the outdoors.
Tonight, at least, she was warm and sheltered. The bed had smelled slightly musky and distinctly masculine as she had drifted into sleep that night, and it felt strangely safe and comforting surrounded by this scent. She had spent so may nights alone, so long running from something she didn't even fully remember any more that company was a rare and very special treat.
Now, she slept deeply, dreaming of nothing and disturbed only by the light snuffling noises emanating from her companion every now and then.
Then in the darkness, her eyes flickered beneath their lids and her body twitched slightly.
~It's cold. . . Damn it's cold. And dark. It's a darkness not of night, but of absence. A lack of light, a lack of colour. There isn't even blackness in this dark. There is just nothing. Impenetrable and consuming it sucks at your soul and reaches towards you with expectant fingers. . .
I can feel it now. . . so close. . .
Ice pricks at my skin but fire burns my body. It clutches my heart with fingers so fine they are like gossamer threads, but they squeeze. . .
The prickling sensation starts, right on cue. At first only present in my hands but then spreading like wild fire through my whole body, building into a crescendo of excruciating pain as if a thousand tiny, invisible needles prick at my skin. Small, quick stabs all along me, so cold and numbing. . . the blizzard is relentless.
I feel the chill continue to travel through me, spreading through my rib cage, the cruel fingers tightening around my lungs, God I can't breathe. . .
The shards of ice dig into my chest, deeper and deeper, hooks burrowing through sinew and bone, a blanket of frost spreading over my very heart, turning it to ice. The fingers pull harder, drawing me closer as my heart beats. Its last echo fills my mind as I die again. . .
And I see. . . ~
Her eyes fly open, still asleep, unseeing but seeing all. The crystal of her eyes glows in the darkness, a beam of the faintest blue like a mist in the gloom. Her body seems to rise from its prone position of its own volition. Trapped in a dreaming state in a waking world.
And she sees. . .
~The end. . .
It is sharp and blunt and piercing and beating. The rain turns to blood as my body turns in upon itself, for he is gone.
He has gone and I am alone once more and now it is time. It is the end. It is cold and dark and forever, for this is all. It is all and it is nothing, it is agony and ecstasy but I am still alone.
For now how gentle is death? Death and his brother sleep, and so painfully I have searched.
Heat, terrible heat that falls through my fingers, life on my hands but it slips and there is nothing I can do.
Losing. Losing it all. For he is already lost and without him I have nothing and I slip, falling into the abyss, like a concave scream.
Lost to all and it is all my fault.
And so I fall, waiting for impact. . . ~
* * * * *
She woke to the sound of her own scream.
She felt the gentle touch of hands upon her shoulders and intense, dark eyes search her face with concern as her chilled and sweat-soaked body slumps exhausted into the sheets.
He had asked if she was alright.
She had said yes.
She lay back in the sheets and waited, listening to him as he returned to sleep, curled up so contentedly under the blankets she almost felt jealous of his comfort. It had left her so cold, and so painfully, pitifully lonely.
She did not know the "he" who haunted her dreams. His face was hidden to her and then he was always gone before she had a chance to see him. She felt it with her heart and soul that she loved him more than she had ever loved anyone, yet she had never even seen his face or felt his name pass her lips. The pain it caused when he left sent a dagger through her heart, but she shook her head and reminded herself that it was only a dream. She wanted so desperately to find him, but she knew that when she did it would be the beginning of the end. For when he had left, she had died again.
She had seen herself die like in the myriad of other, similar dreams that left her shaken and cold. She clenched and unclenched her fingers trying to ward off the memory of the pain. It bedded itself into her mind and she could still feel the blizzard that ripped through her skin leaving her heart frozen and her hands burning.
It wasn't every night but it was often enough. Snippets of the future were one thing but she knew the curse it was to know you were going to die. To see yourself die but to not know when. . .
Logan had had so many nightmares of his own he could see the deception hidden in her face. She was not alright. Everyone had their demons and he felt them nightly with the terror they bring. He had gone back to dozing quietly, listening to her heartbeat as it slowed and her breathing as it became smoother and more even. He did not sleep now like he had not slept earlier, and at her first terrified cries he had tried to wake her. Her skin had been cold as the winter outside and just as pale, and for a second he had been unable to rouse her. Her icy body had twitched under his grasp, until her scream.
His blood ran cold remembering it. He had screamed like that. . .
It was the scream of the damned. Those destined to return to their past every night, those who were to re-live the pain, day, after day, after day. . .
And he had screamed like she had done as it whipped and tore at his body, as the spectators watched, as he cried out, as the blades cut, as the water flowed. . .
He cringed and pushed the thought out of his mind. Not here and not now.
He settled back to dozing. For some reason curiosity was beating at his mind. He wanted to know what she had seen, wanted desperately to find what had scared her so badly and tell her it was over now, but she needed her time and her space so he continued to doze, looking to all the world like he was sleeping soundly.
She would tell him if she thought she needed to, he reasoned.
She looked at the warmth and comfort of his sleeping form and her own solitude ached within her body. She yearned for the strength and security of embrace but her own isolation held her back.
He was not the "he" of her dream, she was certain, but she was cold and alone as her body cried for warmth. And even if it was for one night, this night, and she was forced to move on again, then it was still so much gained.
She rose from the bed and padded almost silently across the floor.
Logan felt the pressure of her chilled body press up against him, molding to the shape his body had created as he feigned sleep. He restrained his flinch of surprise as she shifted herself slightly, getting more comfortable and pressing closer to the intense warmth of his body as the icy wind sliced the air outside.
She froze as she felt a slight twitch coming from him. She pulled away slightly and Logan could hear her heartbeat race with sudden fear. "Logan? You awake?"
She whispered it to the darkness, ready to run if he replied.
He stayed silent. The feeling of her body pressed close to his in the darkness was too good to spoil.
She breathed a small sigh of relief and relaxed back into the warmth he radiated. She lay silently for what seemed like an eternity, Logan just listening to her slow, steady breathing. It lulled him into a warm, sleepy stupor, lazing contentedly as her body grew warm.
Then she spoke.
It was slow at first, and so quiet that is seemed the night would carry her words away unheard. But they persisted in the bitter blackness, shattering his coziness more with every sound.
"I always had this crazy idea," She whispered, "That for every person out there, there was one person who was right for them. It's what I've believed for as long as I can remember. For as long as I've had these dreams." She paused slightly as if considering her next words. "I was waitin' for the right someone I guess." She laughed bitterly. "I knew one day he'd come and I knew that one day he'd leave, but I was gonna' save myself for him and when I found him then it would be something special, y'know? Something only he would appreciate. It would be right because he would be the one, there would be no questions because we wouldn't need words, and there would be no pain because it would be special." She faltered slightly.
He could hear the cracking of emotions in her voice.
"Don't tell me this, kid." Logan pleaded with his mind. "Don't tell me that you were. . . "
She sighed deeply.
"It don't take even half a brain to work out what that meant. I was a virgin and they took that from me. They stole the only dream I ever let myself have and I can't get it back again. . . "
Her words snapped Logan from his cozy daze like a bucket full of ice water. Laying with her back to him, she didn't see the expression of pain that crept across his features. He felt like someone had reached right into his body and twisted his guts out. "Kid I'm so sorry. . . " His mind whispered silently.
"They took it from me and it hurt so much. . . Oh God, I thought my whole body was going to shatter in two."
He could hear the tears in her voice as she continued her whisper to the darkness.
"Just. . . just because you're unconscious doesn't mean you can't still feel. I could feel it all. I could hear them talking about me and feel them around me, on me. . . in me. And God it hurt so much. . . It was like my body was asleep while my mind was awake. I wanted to cry but I couldn't. I couldn't do anything and he hurt me. . . "
For the first time he could remember, Logan wanted to scream. He wanted to rant and cry and scream and beat the shit out of anything that moved. He wanted to hurt them like that had hurt her. Death had been too good for them. How could they do that? How could they do that to her? Shatter her body and her dreams and never think twice.
Logan fought the urge to wrap a protecting arm around her and pull her close. It stung him to his soul to see her in so much pain. The unbearable reality of what had happened chewed at his senses, but if he had moved, shown he was awake, she would have bolted and he would have lost her.
The sleeping are good listeners. The sleeping and the dead.
Logan could see her gaze painted into his mind when he closed his eyes, and when he looked all he saw was innocence destroyed. He saw the razor sharp wreckage of a shattered life and broken dreams and he wanted to cry out and hold her close to him. He wanted to whisper that everything would be alright and that nothing mattered any more. . . but then he thought of THEM, and of what they had done to her, and of what touch would mean to her because of them, and he couldn't do it. He couldn't do that to her because. . .
Because of what?
He didn't know. His mind was churning in so many different directions at once. Pain and fear and sorrow and need. . . they all boiled and mixed and turned till he couldn't pull them apart any more.
He barely felt her slide from his bed, pausing only to brush the softest of kisses across his lips. Only her words glided through his mind. Whispered not to the night, but to him this time. "Thank you. . . thank you for listening. . . "
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