Pull My Plug

AU from the events of 5x10 where Michael's injuries are fatal and Brian remembers a promise he and Michael made in 1x04. WARNING contains character death.

Here it was, in black and white, a promise made weeks, months, years before, and Debbie's screams and Ben's protests all faded until they were muffled from the other side of a distant ocean. They couldn't reach Brian Kinney, not while his name was there, printed beside Michael's.

It wasn't like Ted, Brian didn't just care in a haphazard way for an annoying gnat in his ear. It wasn't like Justin, who had stormed into his life, demanding attention, and throwing tantrums until it was given. It wasn't like Gus, reaching for a finger and grabbing a heart. It was Michael, Mikey, his oldest friend, his first love, his centre of gravity.

There was no room for hatred in Brian's grief. Whoever supported Prop 14 wasn't Brian's problem. They'd made a decision, taken action, and this was the consequence. Let the guilt consume them while Brian tried to pick up the pieces and force them back into shape. Babylon could be rebuilt. By someone else, but it could be. Michael would need Brian to heal.

And nothing Ben or Debbie or God did could undo this piece of paper.

"I want it to be you, too. You pull my plug."

Brian had never expected Michael to follow through. He had, of course. It had been Michael's decision all along, after all. It was always Michael's. But for Michael to do the same ... Brian couldn't understand why he hadn't changed it. They were broken beyond repair, Michael had shown that repeatedly. So why had he allowed this to continue existing?

Brian puzzled over that, clinging to the page as the minutes turned into hours. And all he could think of, a thought that he seized upon, was that they weren't broken that badly: Michael still held a shred of hope. It was all Brian had, that piece of paper, and nothing ever felt so precious.

When the doctor finally came, it was Brian he spoke to. Debbie and Ben had no right anymore. Michael had signed it away. His words grated on Brian's ears, harsh and brutal. It was the end of Brian's hope. The piece of paper was just that, and the world was a cruel place once more.

Debbie and Ben were in Michael's room, stroking his hair and begging him to wake up, and Brian knew the doctor was right. He entered the room and looked at Michael's body, and nothing. There wasn't a trace of Mikey left anywhere.

Debbie didn't believe him. Didn't want to ... couldn't ... but how could she? Brian let her rage and scream, accepting her blows. Every single one felt like a gift, an act of penitence, a replacement for the tears he couldn't cry. And Ben accepted it in the way he accepted everything. Accepted that Michael wasn't his anymore, was in Brian's hands as he had been since they were fourteen. Accepted that Brian was going to pull the plug.

The funeral was ... nice, as funerals go. Brian didn't absorb any of it. A short ceremony, bitter tears, promises of empty vengeance, and then Michael's body was lowered into the ground, roses red as blood resting on top. Brian had laid one, been the third to do so. He allowed Debbie and Ben to keep Michael's body. He didn't want it, had never wanted it. What he sought, Michael's soul, Mikey, was long gone.

The world was colder. Every edge was sharp, every sound screeched, every bullet of light fractured his skull. Brian had never felt so surrounded, and so alone. Numb, shellshocked, raped of his ability to care, Brian watched the grief in other people play out. He saw them remember how to smile. He saw them return to life as though it had begun to play out again.

It wasn't a particular event that made Brian go to his roof. There was no culmination, no upsurge of grief. The loft was quiet, it had been since – and Brian just got up from the sofa, where he'd sat every night, gazing at nothing in particular. He got up and walked to the roof and just stood by the edge, quietly contemplating what it would be like to jump. He truly had no intention of doing it.

He remembered Gus' birth, standing on the roof and being called melodramatic. He stepped to the edge, closed his eyes, and was back at the hospital, feeling Michael's hot body against his own. He could see Michael taking his hand, felt the cold tendrils of something too terrifying to face creep along his spine, and fell.

And as he fell, he dreamed. Of Mikey. Of course. Moments, snatches, glimpses of times he'd forgotten. And Mikey's face, smiling, laughing, comforting, but always loving. Always living. Always urging Brian to be better, to want more, to have everything.

And Brian saw him. He was no angel clothed in white sitting on a cloud. He was just Michael, at Babylon, and the sight of him filled Brian with such joy that it seemed appropriate for Babylon to be heaven. It was a dream, part of his mind whispered, when Michael forgave him for everything, reiterated feelings Brian believed had died, but Brian ignored that voice in his head, because it was the best dream he'd ever had.

The fall ended in a hospital bed. He was labelled a suicide risk. Brian never bothered to explain it had been an accident. The world was smaller still. He was no longer the bastard who killed Michael, he was the best friend again, so tortured over the loss that he couldn't go on.

Sometimes, Brian felt as though he'd cheated everyone. They stroked his hair and kissed his cheeks and urged him to carry on living, and Brian hated making them worry about him when they had so much else to worry about, a person far more important to remember.

He stopped talking, stopped thinking, stopped living. People gave up on him, remembered the man he'd been before, and drifted away. Only Debbie, relentless as ever, and Lindsey, childlike and stubborn with her belief in him, bothered to take care of him anymore. Both implored him to find some way to carry on, and their words fell through his mind like sand through his fingertips.

When he saw the scarf, he knew there would be no hospital this time. A wildness, a manic sense of joy filled him as he prepared everything. Earthly matters that held no attraction for him, but he sorted through them all painstakingly. And then, the scarf had looped over a beam, hanging down towards him, and Brian kicked the Barcelona chair aside. The loft distorted before him and he waited to dream again, hoping this dream went on forever.

There was no darkness, no white light. Only a body swinging from the rafters, soon tucked into a casket and lowered into the ground beside a recently mourned friend.

A mind, a soul, a heart soared free, still suffocating in the loft until Michael ran in, panicked and frightened. He let Brian down, his Brian, and the joy on Brian's face ... it was a rush so intense Mikey forgot to be angry that Brian had taken the forgiveness Michael offered as an invitation instead of a command to live. He forgot because it was done, over with, and forever was a long time to be angry. And so, they kissed, those friends, trapped in that moment when nothing mattered except a reunion long overdue, and they forgot about Debbie, Ben, Lindsey, Justin. Foreheads met and it was just them, together. Like it was always supposed to be, how they'd always wanted it. Their souls wrapped around each other, never to be parted again, to greet others not as two, but one, for the rest of time. For always.

NB - This is inspired by a fanvideo I made to this storyline: www [dot] youtube [dot] com/watch?v=3tGJbwur13E

What do you guys think? =]