Ch.1 Survivors

"I suppose there's strength in numbers," I think to myself as I plan our next move "even if it's a grand total of two and half of that is made up of my formerliege, Bill Compton."

Think, Viking... think. They know Nan arrived at the palace, of that I am certain. But without proof of her final death there may be a chance of survival. Yes, we need to clean up and then find a safe place where I can try to reach Nora. I can't call from here it would be too risky and expose her to the threat as well. Did she know of the orders given to Nan? Has she set up a plan from the inside? Probably, knowing her. Godric had great taste as a maker. If anyone can find a way to convince the authority to let us live, she can.

I force myself back into my conversation with Bill. "Maybe you should tell Jessica the truth," I suggest "she'll worry if we don't return." Or 'when.' I add to myself, ever the pragmatist.

"Eric," Bill's voice rises an octave as he says my name; it's the equivalent of vamp-whining and I wait impatiently for him to finish "Jessica is still young. I may have failed her in the past but I can protect her from this at least. Last time I left her without anyone to look after her, without True Blood no less. At least this time she'll have everything she needs while I am away and the palace staff can keep an eye on her. I owe her this."

"Lies?" I quirk an eyebrow. He scowls and replies, "Safety. Comfort. Protection. I'll be back soon and she'll never have to know that anything was amiss." He widens his eyes and tilts his head. Maybe he's forgotten that I don't fall for his 'puppy dog' look. Never have. Never will.

This is getting tiresome. I try logic: "Except that you probably won't be king when you return." Stony silence. I try shock: "Even if you're not finally dead." Nothing. OK, logic it is: "Did you think she might be safer knowing what is coming?" Bill simply shoots me a dirty look.

"Whatever, Bill." I continue, knowing that time is running out and that Bill is only going to get more stubborn if I continue to challenge his parenting skills (or lack thereof). "Call her if you must. I'll start cleaning the Flannigan off the walls while you coddle your spawn. But be quick about it. We don't have much time before they get here." That earned me a withering look, as though somehow I was trying to be difficult by pointing out the inevitable. Did he think I wanted the Authority to come stake our asses?

I pull on some gloves and get to work, enjoying how vamp-speed lets my mind race almost as fast as my limbs.

"Listen Jessica, this is Bill..."

As his voice takes on that more affected southern cadence, my mind drifts off right away. He should make audio tapes for insomniacs. He sounds like pulling taffy: far too sweet and never ending.

Shitty Maker or no, I have formed a kind of ... regard for the former King of Louisiana during the last two weeks. I respect him, somehow. I'm not sure how. It grew slowly and then, suddenly, it sprung up. Like fungus. Or cancer. Hell, maybe it's just easier to respect him now that he's not lording his cheaply-won throne over my head or shoving his nose (and blood) between me and a certain fairy-human hybrid who will remain nameless. But, no, it's not just that he's got less to be smug about, although that doesn't hurt I suppose.

No, like me, Bill's a survivor. Sure, he's a self-loathing, insecure, insincere, ass kissing brown-noser who doesn't get his hands dirty ... but he's survived (so far) and even if I can't respect how he's survived, the fact that he has is better than nothing at this point. Hell, surviving decades with that psychopath Lorena has got to count for something, It's no wonder the vamp's got issues.

So I'm allied with my former... my former what exactly? What was Bill to me a month ago? A year ago? Not an enemy. A rival, maybe? An annoyance. He was definitely that. He still is to some degree I suppose, but I find myself more and more ... fond of him as time goes on.

Bill Compton. Farmer-turned-father-turned-soldier-turned-unwilling-vampire-turned-sociopathic-murderer-turned-procurer-turned-telepath-seducer-turned-puppet-monarch-turned-wanted-vampire-turned- ... well, who knows? Only time will tell.

Me? I stayed pretty much the same for the past 1000 years, making a single seamless transition from "sexy-as-fuck-badass-Viking" to "sexy-as-fuck-badass-Vampire". Although, I suppose I was recently transformed into "sappy-ass-flannel-wearing-amnesiac-Vampire."

But now I'm 'back' again. But back to what exactly? I'm not sure what "sappy Eric" turned me into but whatever it is, I feel like shit.

So, no, "sappy vamp" is gone. I'm turning back my back on him: I'm turning back to what works. "Sexy-as-fuck-vampire" it is then. I do that well.

"...I've been called away on business for awhile..."

But, most importantly of course, we've both survived Sookie fucking Stackhouse. Nothing can top that catastrophe; not even the authority. Honestly, our chances are better against 10,000 years of combined Vampire Fuckery than they are against the single goddamn one-eighth-Fairy that broke both our hearts (and her own) to avoid hurting one of us.

We have a shot. A small one, but I'll take it. After all I do know something of battles and strategy. Bill might have been a soldier (of sorts) but I was a commander. And my men didn't follow me to the end of my human life because of my smoldering eyes, my world-class ass, or my (very) talented cock. No, I earned their respect. I led them well, I fought at their side, and I survived... just like I will now. Somehow...

Yes... somehow... We're both survivors and we're definitely more likely to survive together than apart. Although it would be easier if Bill would actually get his fucking hands dirty for once. I mean, seriously, mowing down Marnie with a machine gun is one thing (ripping out that hippy dipshit's heart was infinitely more satisfying I can guaran-fucking-tee you) but Bill's spotless hands are going to get bloody soon enough. Nope, you can't pretend not to be a vampire going up against the Authority.

"Needless to say... "

God it's easy to tune him out when he gets going. I swear he could get off on the sound of his own voice. Pam and I used to wonder if we were the only ones who see through his southern gentleman routine or of we were just the only ones who were bored to death by it...

"...my palace is your palace..."

Oh and there it is: that oh-so-familiar and slightly condescending 'do-gooder simper' he would put on for the cameras whenever he'd cut a ribbon. Does he actually think he's helping Jessica this way? Not that I did much better with Pam, I suppose. She defied me and deliberately tried to exterminate the only woman I'll ever love ...

"... within reason of course."

Ah, there's my favourite Bill special: the disingenuous implied chuckle. Honestly Bill's forced levity seems to be more for his benefit than his childe's.

No, for all his smooth lines, he's somehow never quite able to get the job done. Notice that the 1000-year old Viking Prince is scrubbing down a tacky-as-fuck rent-a-throne-room as its deposed figurehead manages to pull off yet another SMEM (Shittiest Maker Ever Moment).

Honestly it'll be a miracle if his baby vamp makes it through her second year. Pam won the bet when she got through her first. Something about female solidarity. My guess is dumb luck; Jessica's a ticking time bomb.

And through all this I can feel her moving further and further away from me. Sookie Stackhouse. She's almost at the house now. Our house. Mine. I wish I couldn't feel her. Why did I make that fucking bond? I hate it. I resent it. But I cannot let it go. I will not. It stretches between us and as much as I yearn for it to snap, I fear what will happen to me if it does. So I fight my own body's instinct and her blood in my veins that is calling me to her. It would be so easy. So right. But something keeps me where I am. For one thing, the memory of her feelings as she left the palace: a deep hopeless confusion. And all I felt was certainty.

But as she moves further away from me, her confusion lessens. Her strength and determination return slowly; despair transforms into resolution and acceptance. But she is pretending. I feel it. I can only hope that soon she will find her way. She's a survivor too, after all. I would know. I fell in love with that strength.

So why does she find the strength to fight for others but not for me? If only I could excise her from having ever existed at all. But I can't imagine a world without her in it. My heart clenches when I remember her saying the same thing, just not about me.

No, maybe the scarier thought is that I can't imagine me in a world without her in it. That's why Pam is acting out I suppose. She knows: she knows me well enough to see this ending badly. Not that Pam's retaliation at Moon Goddess would have helped that. Meeting Sookie Stackhouse cannot be undone.

And it is, it appears, ending badly.

I move toward Bill. "How about wrapping it up? I could use a hand here." He's hung up the phone already so what the fuck is he waiting for? Could he havepossibly dragged that unnecessary conversation out any longer? What part of "The Authority is after us" does he NOT understand?

I'm jerked out of my thoughts by the morose ex-King as he finally snaps a pair of gloves. About fucking time.

As soon as I slow down I feel itagain. It. It's not her. It's the lack of her. I feel ... sick. It's not pain, at least not exactly. I know pain well. No, it is like pain... but it is just so much that it turns in on itself. It's in my gut like white fire and I feel nothing but burning. Nothing but an endless 'nothing' that is something... that is everything. It is something like... numbness. Like a phantom limb where there was nothing before. Or like a shadow following me: one that I cannot get out from underneath, even though there is nothing there to cast it. A phantom of a phantom. I am haunted by something that never was.

She's gone, Viking. Fucking face it. She's gone, Godric's gone. They both left you. Worse, they both CHOSE to leave you.

So fuck both of them and live. That's all you can do.

But how? How do I continue in a world with her in it but without her in my world? Especially when there's this fucking bond. Goddamnit. At least when Godric left me I didn't have to feel him afterward.

What the fuck was I thinking in the cubby? I wasn't. "We will be one." Nice sentiment but look where that got me. Fucked. Disturbingly fucking human indeed. But the most disturbing part is not her feelings. The most disturbing part is my own. I gave her everything and it wasn't enough: I wasn't enough.

Worse than that, I feel as though I can't trust myself anymore. How could I love such a weak creature? How can I still love her? Anything is possible indeed.

She walked out the mother fucking door. I will never forget the sound of her gasping sobs on the other side of it while all the time her blood inside me screamed "ERIC! I choose ERIC."

She will fight for those she loves, but she won't fight for herself. Not really. She ran away from the possibility of our love and her own future rather than fighting for it. Sookie Stackhouse is a coward. Maybe that is why I feel sick. Because I see now that she and Bill might actually deserve each other after all. They might deserve to spend their lives running around pretending to be human; they might deserve to continue denying what they are; they deserve to ignore what they could be.

Fuck that, I'm done.

Her blood roils unhappily inside me at my resolution. Too bad.

And at that exact moment the bond is suddenly flooded.

PANIC. FEAR. Bill's head snaps up at the same time as mine. "Sookie..." his voice is a mixture of uncertainty and , that plaintiff tone drives me crazy.Wanting something doesn't mean you get it Billy boy.

"Fuck Sookie."

Bill's incredulous look almost made me scoff in his face (A simple bitter scoff would suffice. My days spent smugly mocking Bill are behind me now). I do pity him though. Does he really think that he can save her? Does he really think she wants him too? Seriously? Even beforeshe rejected us I knew that was never what she wanted. And now that she has rejected us he's running back for more.

"What? Didn't you hear her? She rejected both of us."

Pam tells me that Dear Abbey advises that all human women want to be listened to. Bill never quite got that part of playing the 'human' male I guess. Or maybe that makes him even more human, since if Dear Abbey was called in then clearly human males fail in this task as a general rule. So if he doesn't listen to Sookie, it's just more proof of his humanity. I'm not sure that's what he had in mind when he started mainstreaming. I smirk to myself but my face drops as soon as I realize Sookie wants human.

I hear a shot ring out from far across the graveyard. SHOCK. FEAR. SURPRISE. DESPERATION.

Her emotions course through my veins and grip my body like a vice. ANGER. HATRED. VENGEANCE.

I hear another shot from a different gun. Now a new one: SATISFACTION. Interesting.

Bill shoots out the door. I am frozen in place. Vengeful satisfaction is turning into something else entirely. A feeling that I know all too well.

The familiar agony ripped through my heart: GRIEF. DESPERATION. LONLINESS.

Fuuuuuck! It was like Godric was gone again. I can't do this. Not again. I almost groaned as it moved through me. Fuck!

No. Fuck Sookie.

And with that, I shut down the bond.

A/N: This is simply my reflection on Eric's plot and dialogue during True Blood Season 5 through the Viking's POV. I won't include every scene nor will the arc of the plot diverge from the show at all. Sadly, I'm just not creative enough to do that. However, I will add a few extra bits to scenes here and there to bolster the reader's understanding of (my understanding of) Eric's motivations.

Please keep in mind that I am not a creative writer. This is the first effort to write something here, so don't get your hopes up: my EPOV will have none of the sexy sarcastic 'je ne sais quoi' channeled by amazing authors like CaliforniaKat, Wylis, Ficlit78 or DeedeeINFJ.

Besides Charlaine Harris and Alan Ball, I must give a shout out - across the pond - to my own personal (Over) Analysis Guru CaliforniaKat. So much of my own (over) thinking through True Blood has been done with her and through her stories, so this wouldn't have happened without her. Kat, you're the best.

I don't own anything.