title Scream
author pinkeop
summary From now on when I think of you, I scream. -Companion Fic to Girl Anachronism- -AU-
authors note I know... I couldn't help it! And you ALL know you wanted it! You ALL knew you wanted this damn follow-up fic! This is dedicated to the AMAZING Finny McFinster Finmiester XV. Because she had a dream about Ana and Todd and i dont know what happened in the dream, but I'm just ASSUMING that it was some crazy kinky sex thing. -shrugs absently-
Anway... I also wrote this because I just can't leave anything alone. I've always wondered what would have happened if I left Nellie dead and Ana and Todd alive. How differently events would have played out? How would Ana deal with having to continue to be in vicinity of the man who killed her Nellie? What about Toby?
I needed answers! So, here you have it folks. Chapter one of god knows how many. this is a COMPANION FIC to my original story, Girl Anachronism and I suggest that those who are just joining us MIGHT wanna go read that one FIRST. Or not. If not, then turn right back around and wag your little booty outta here.
I tried VERY hard to keep Todd in character, all things considered. Or... characterisically out of character... Kinna like when Ana and Todd did it.
Lmao.
ENJOY! And don't forget to READ AND REVIEW!
Love!
Pink Elephants on Parade
--
chapter one
So now I scream
I hope it's a dream
It's hard just to breath
when we said, "Goodbye".
Oh, Scream
It's not what it seems
I still can't believe
that we said, "Goodbye".
Ana tried to keep her unsteady breath calm. Against her throat, with each shaking, raspy breath, she could feel the cold sting of the metal razor, held aloft in her quivering hands. The light coming from the closed furnace in the dark bakehouse was dim and it cast chadows that danced along the walls, swelling to twice the size of their makers. Her eyes, flashing the dim light from the oven, struggled to adjust. Around her wrist she could feel a tight grip that was slowly prying her hand away from her throat. Her lips were bruised and flushed, stinging from the kiss that had just wracked her body. The man in front of her, the barber with the disheveled apperance and the spiney white streak through his hair, gazed down on her with a very determined look in his eyes. It scared her, almost- he pulled her razor wielding hand from her throat and slammed it into the wall by her head, kneeling over her.
"Don't you dare leave me alone," he hissed in dangerously low tones. Ana's brows knit together in what felt like confusion. She was all he had left. His wife lay a few feet away, dead and cold. Her Nellie met the same, albeit worse, fate. Alone, that's what they were- alone. But togehter they at least had someone. Someone left. Alone they didn't have that. Together they had each other. Could she truely take that away from him- even now as he looked at her with those cold, desperate eyes, Nellie's screams still ringing in her ears, her throat hoarse from her won pathetic screams. Ana's limp fingers dropped the razor and she listened to it clink on the cold stone floor. Sucking in a breath, she forced the tears that threatened to spill away.
Ana sniffed and burnt flesh flooded her nose and made her sick. Her stomach churned.
The barber crushed her body to him, pressing his cheek against the top of her head. She burried her face into his neck, taking deep, slow breaths. Her arms moved to shakily engulf the barber, hugging him close to her. Her hands smoothed almost soothingly along his back. She lifted her face slightly, peering over his shoulder. One of his large ahnds pressed the back of her head. Behind where they crouched, Ana could see the limp body of Lucy, still lain where the barber had left her. The Beadle and the Judge lay still under the trap door in the corner of the bakehouse. She felt sick all over again. She almost wished he had let her slit her own throat, take her own life. But he had practically begged her not to leave him all alone. Who was she to take the last person he had left away? A shuddering sob escaped her lips. The man held her tighter.
Ana pulled back just enough to look Mr. Todd in the face. His pale features looked strikingly harsh when held against the dulling, dried blood. Her hands shook as they cupped his cheeks, her hands small against his face. She brushed her thumbs against his cheek bones. He met her eyes- his were almost dead, but she could see a small glimmer in those black irises- a small sliver of humanity. But not enough to feel romorse for that he had done. She let out a shuddery breath.
"I'm sorry, Mr. Todd," she whispered. The man shook his head. They sat there, arm in arm, unmoving. His fingers rose to her lips and forced her to stop speaking before she could begin. She knew why she was apologising, but the barber did not. She knew she should have told him that his wife, his beautiful Lucy, was still alive the moment that she found out. She knew, but she didn't tell him. Her stomach felt sick- if she hadn't kept it from him, perhaps her Nellie would be alive now. Maybe Mr. Todd would be heart broken, but at least he would have known. Wouldn't he had wanted to known? At least known that his wife was alive, somewhere, instead of leaning that she had been, killed at his own hand? But all she could think was how this was all her fault. But he refused to allow her to appologise and she was almost too afraid to tell him now. Would she meet the same fate as her darling Nellie? She couldn't stop it- it escaped her lips along with a shuddery sob.
"I knew!" she choked. "I knew, I knew, I knew and I didn't say a word! I didn't- I'm-" she shook her head harshly when he clapped a hand to her mouth. Free again, she continued, "I knew your Lucy lived." His eyes widened as he looked down at her, her feeble frame still in his arms. She clutched his shirt and shook him roughly. "I found her by accident- she was hanging about the shop. When Nellie told me, I wanted to tell you, but I couldn't. Nellie kept telling me it would hurt you, that you'd gone through enough, and she loved you so much that she feared you and- I... Just.. couldn't... say a word." she threw her arms around his neck and drew him closer to her, feeling his hands go limp around her. "I thought it was for the best. She kept talking about a home by the sea. I thought it would be nice." She sniffed and bit her lip, awaiting his reaction. "I'm so sorry."
Suddenly, his hands were on her shoulder and her body was pressed back into the wall behind her. She let out a gasp of air, stolen from her lungs. She thought maybe he was going to be brutal, perhaps beat her for her sin, then leave her alive. That would be worse. To see the accusation in his eyes every day. If they lived to the morning. That thought made her shudder more than it should have. Her thoughts were drawn back to the barber as Sweeney Todd shook her with violence.
"Shut up," he was growling at her, and she realized he'd been repeating it as she still hadn't stopped sputtering out weak, "Forgive me"s.
She bit down on her lower lip. He grabbed her face in his hands and leaned his own very close. He scared her- oh, how she feared him. He didn't say a word. Instead, he pressed his forehead against her own and his grip on her shoulders tightened so much she could feel the bruises seeping to the surface of her pale skin.
"Just shut up," he begged. The grief in his voice broke her heart, and she sucked back a suddery sob. Her eyes flicked passed him as a bit of movement in the corner of the bake house made her heart beat wildly in her chest. From the grate below where the stink came up from the sewers, was climbing a figure. It took her a minute to realize it was Toby- his hair was completely white, dusty looking, perhaps from climbing in the sewers. Perhaps he'd gone just as insane as the rest of them. She moved her lips to Mr. Todd's ear, franticly whispering,
"Toby," she breathed. "Toby. It's Toby."
Mr. Todd whirled back, releasing her arms and letting her slump limp against the wall. The boy stopped dead in his tracks. His eyes flashed with the fire as they flickered towards the open bake-house door, and he made a wild dash towards it, but Mr. Todd was quicker. Ana looked away when the man grabbed the boy by the scruff of his neck, throwing him back with one strong arm. Compared to that, he'd been right gentle with her all those times, she thought idly.
Toby fell back into a puddle of red, watery liquid with a splash on the floor. A hard look covered his face, glaring with all his might right up at the man who towered over him with a branished razor in his big hand. As Ana looked on, she couldn't find the fear in the young boy's eyes- it was all drowned by rage and accusation. He pushed himself away,s liding over the floor on his haunches, away from his fate. That would be his fate, she knew almost as instantly as Sweeney Todd raised his hand, the one that held his razor. That precious razor. Poor thing, poor thing. Ana felt another tug at her snipped heart strings- Nellie wouldn't have wanted Toby to meet the very same end as every other poor bloke that crossed the path of Sweeney Todd- at least not at his same hands. Ana opened her mouth, but it was dry as was her throat, and not a sound escaped her vocals. But Toby managed to beat her to the punch,
"Did you harm 'er, too?" the boy spat, his young voice a high-pitched trill. Ana's eyes grew wide when his shaking finger pointed directly at her. She swallowed thickly and met Sweeney Todd's eyes as he looked down at her. The stricken look of grief on his face surprised her and weighed heavy on her heart. "You shouldn't harm nobody," he boy continued, sounding just like a poor, crazy nutter. Poor thing. Poor, poor thing. Ana looked on, her eyes on Sweeney Todd, more importantly, Mr. Todd's face. He looked back to Toby, and that grief was gone, replaced with vengence. Or rage. Or both and many more.
"Look away, Ana," the barber warned, his voice strangely boyant. He glanced at her briefly, before turning his head towards her completely when she did not obey him. "Look away!" he roared between clenched jaws.
Ana drew her knees to her chest, looked down and clapped her hands against her ears. She squeezed her eyes shut. She didn't want to look, to hear or to know at all what would be young Toby's fate. She thought, maybe she should have protested against what were about to happen. Didn't she owe it at least to Nellie to keep her young Toby safe? The boy she'd grown to see as a little brother? She couldn't let him kill him- he didn't deserve to die at the hands of Sweeney Todd. No, not a demon. No, not Toby. Poor, young Toby---
"No!" Ana found herself screeching, her voice dry. When she looked up, Toby was heaved off the ground, against the farthest wall, Mr. Todd's arm raised poised over his head, razor ready to slice open one last throat. The boy stared his death bravely in the eye, but the moment Ana's yawp escaped her strained vocals, both men turned their heads sharply. Mr. Todd looked concerned, Ana noted- but it had to be a trick of the light, because he instantly darkened to a look of annoyance. Toby looked impatient, even a bit crazy. After so long, with death dangling in his face and nothing left to live for, Ana figured she would be a bit impatient as well. But for Nellie, she couldn't- she just couldn't let Sweeney Todd take young Toby's life. Poor thing. Poor thing...
"Ana, do as I say," Sweeney Todd snarled. "Look - Away - NOW!"
"Don't kill him!" Ana said limply, begging with him. The man curled back his lip at her out burst and gave a heaving sigh of annoyance. Toby turned his face away, lifting his chin, exposing his throat even. Ana whimpered. "Don't kill him. Please, just don't kill him."
The barber looked between the dangling boy and Ana, then nodded his head towards the bakehouse door. "Get upstairs," he commanded. "Clean yourself up. Go..." Ana didn't move. "I said, GO!" His voice was loud and filled with annoyance and impatience at Ana's disobeying. Realizing she was getting no where, Ana shot him one last look- one that told him, clearly, that her immediate forgiveness on this matter was shot out of the window, and she stood, clutching her stomach, and feeling her legs about to give out as she moved to the bakehouse doors. She didn't look back as she closed the door behind her, leaving it unlocked. Everything was instantly cold, as the night air traveled down the stair well and hit her face and her arms. She looked down at her hands. They were stained with blood from where she'd so tightly gripped Mr. Todd's still soaking wet shirt.
She felt oddly subdued. Unable to feel. It occured to her, breifly, as she climbed the stairs into the street around the pie-shop, that if Toby had been in the sewers all the time, then the law hadn't been notified. The Judge and the Beadle and... and Nellie... they would be all gone, evidence ridden of, if Mr. Todd had his way, by morning. Toby, as well. She was shaking by the time she actually made it inside the pie shop. It was just as she'd left it. Part of her was expecting to be having to clean up some big mess, as the bake house had left the images of orange light and red blood burned in her eyes.
Sitting down at the booth, Ana crossed her arms and laid her head down on the table top. She took three, shuddering breaths before she let out a terrfied little sob.
"Get up," a rough voice commanded and Ana's head shop up with a scream. Mr. Todd hovered over her, grabbing her by the arm and pulling her around to the counter. She saw that he'd already filled the wash basin with cold water, and a rag was in his free hand. He moved stealthily, Mr. Todd did. She winced when he pulled her to a stop on the other side of the counter.
"Where's Toby?" she whispered. The barber said nothing as he began pulling at the ties and laces on her dress, pushing it every so gently off her shoulders, helping her step out of it.
"What'd you do with Toby?" she asked. "He's comin' up, isn't he? Silly thing, always was a little on the slow side... always liked to dawdle..."
Mr. Todd remained silent, his eyes forced on her face as he pulled the corset off her body and letting air rush greedily into her lungs. He pulled off another layer, and left her simply in her pink stockings and her slip. But, modestly, he did not look at her body, slightly see through witht he cool silk slip. He forced her to sit on the stool and she did so without question, turning her head to look around the shop absently as he dipped the rag into the water.
"I wish Toby would hurry back up here," she murmured. "Do you think he would help me make the pies now? What with Nellie gone back home all sudden-like..." Her mind felt like it was folding in on itself. In the back of her brain, she knew exactly why Toby wasn't up, where Nellie was, and such like and forth with. She knew without a doubt. But the child in her- the innocence that Mr. Todd seemed intent to squish -make up excuses. Made up stories.
Were the visions of her home just stories, then? She wondered. Were they really just stories? If she was making up where the boy and the baker were now, why couldn't she have made up her life before her fever? It was plausible. Perfectly plausible. But she didn't feel ill. She just felt in shock. Could someone die of shock? Surely, they could... Mr. Todd again did not respond to her babbling, and he gently moved the cloth over her face, coming away with sweat and dirt and grime and even some blood. She closed her eyes as he gently swept the rag over her lids and along her cheek bones. He scrubbed down her neck, to the swell of her breasts, then over her arms, taking care with her hands, holding each one in his own. She shivered as the cool water droplets dried on her skin.
"Is he coming back up, Mr. Todd?" she asked, her voice strained. "Where is he, Mr. T? Where's Toby?"
"Gone home, alla sudden," the man said gruffly, almost annoyed as his eyes snapped back up to her, holding no tolerance for her to be going crazy. "Said 'e missed 'is mum. I 'elped 'im back home, is all, Ana. Just helped him back home, is all."
Ana nodded softly as he ran the rag over her forehead once more. Giving a sigh, he stepped back and began to undo his vest. "The good news is, you don't have a fever," he said. "'Fraid another one of them might do you in." He began shrugging out of his blood-stained shirt, kicking it below the counter to be dealt with later.
"C'mere, Mr. T," Ana found herself saying, fascinated with the way the blood had seeped through and stained his bare skin, his chest broad. She could see a purple bruise in the middle of his chest where she'd accidently hit him in the middle of the night... that night, not long ago at all. A days hours, maybe. The man stepped towards her and stood between her legs as she sat there on the stool. Taking the cloth, she began to gently scrub at his face like he had done for her, watching the blood slowly reveal the hardened face of a man that had, at one point, been almost gentle with her. Now she was sure when he touched her, he left behind a harsh purple mark. She washed the blood away from his arms and chest, even daring the run the cloth over his stomach, though there was clean.
Ana looked up at him as he gently took the cloth away from her.
"What's gonna happen, Mr. Todd?" she whispered.
The man placed his hands gently on her shoulders and heaved her to her feet. Turning her, he moved her through the shop, and into the parlor. The fire still crackled. The world seemed to have been completely untouched above the bake-house. Ana felt disoriented, as if the whole of London should know what had just gone on down there. "You," the barber said in response to her earlier question. "Are going to lay down and sleep. I'm going to stay awake a while, make sure the Judge's disappearance wont draw questions here. And if they do, with no chance of escape, I will wake you, and we will escape."
Ana turned sharply before he managed to get her inside the room. "I want to say up with you," she said softly.
"You need sleep," the man ordered, wrapping one large arm around her shoulders and pulling her into the bedroom. He helped her into bed and under the covers, turning to leave without a word. Ana shivered as she was in just her slip and not the warm cotten night gown she was very accustomed to. She pulled the quilt high around her chin and pressed her face into the pillow. It smelt like cinnamon and flour and warm pies. All the smells that surrounded Nellie every waking moment, and here it was, ground into the old matress and the warm sheets and the soft pillows.
She didn't realize she was crying under the sound of her own shattering sob reached her ears. She was doing a lot of this, she realized offhandedly as she rolled onto her back and tried to catch her breath. Crying. Far too much for her own self. If her mother saw her? Oh, what a whipping she would get! She supposed she could look at all the tears as a good thing- maybe it meant she had actual emotions.
Ana rolled over, far too accustomed to feeling the bakers body beside her, far too used to the woman grumbling about her cold toes and wrapping an arm around her shoulders as she snuggled into her shoulder. She grasped frantically around where the baker should be sleeping and found herself crying harder, so much to where she could hardly breath. Her legs, tangled in the sheets, kick and her hands clawed to be free of the quilt, of the smell, of the guilt, of the memories- of the memories, Nellie's soft hair scratching her face and the woman's warm embrace in the middle of the nights. How her heart hammered in her viens whenever she was caught sneaking back into bed after a midnight think out in the shop.
The bedroom door was banged open and a body nearly lept onto the bed, arms grabbing at her wrists and yanking her upward, forward, and then down. The blankets were moved off her, and she was suddenly captured in a tight embrace. "You want to wake all of London?" a harsh tone snarled in her ear as she continued to sob. "Quiet yourself!"
Ana supposed Mr. Todd had no idea how to console someone, but just being in his cold arms- a new, white shirt now adoring his chest -was enough to enrage her and calm her all at once. The fury came first as she twisted and writhed and hit her hands against his chest. She was shouting things at him, but she couldn't make out her own words, but she figured he could. And he only held her tighter, not letting go. Rocking them. When she found it hard to breath, she fell limp in his grasp, taking large gasping breaths as she pressed her forehead into his throat, the tears drying on her cheeks.
"Breath," he instructed every once in a while when she would hiccup and have a small panic attack.
"I hate you," she gasped out.
"As you should," the man grumbled back, seeming to clutch her closer.
"I have nothing left," she managed, sniffing her words.
"That makes the two of us," he responded blandly.
"Don't leave me alone," she begged suddenly. The man did not respond to this, and instead just menuvered them to both be laying on Nellie's bed- she noticed how slyly he put her on the inside by the wall, so that he could possibly sneak out of bed later in the night- or early morn -when she'd finally fallen into slumber. The bed, she discovered, was better than the cot, and he lay with her head in his shoulder, tucking her close to his body.
Ana fell into a restless slumber. Throughout the night she was plauged with dreams of what would come by morning, and of what happened the night before- the events that had taken place in the bakehouse. She woke at random intervals to choking on her own sobs, and a figure would enter the room, the door wide open, and sit there on the edge of the bed. She found this oddly comforting, and would soon slip back into sleep.
What would happen the moment the morning gray touched the sky, Ana did not know. What did know, however vaugely, was that Mr. Todd needed someone to look after him- and god forbid she leave him to fend for himself.
