Pyre
A/N: Be forewarned, this is angsty. Spoilers for the promo for 3.22 'The Day We Died' as this is based on one of the scenes shown in that promo. This is part 3 of the 'Moments' series.
Disclaimer: I don't own it.
[There]
He's falling.
The ground has vanished beneath his feet and he has nothing to keep him above oblivion.
His phoenix that would always come to his aid has already fallen. She lays now in a coffin wrought in chestnut and good intentions.
He stands by the pyre, a torch in hand as his lips quiver; his throat is too tight for him to speak. Reality has abandoned him and left him to the mercy of nightmares.
He reaches the torch toward the coffin that holds the shell of his wife, his hand shaking as he touches the side of the case with the torch. The fire starts small and builds, climbing up over the coffin as they push it into the water.
It's the same that thing happens to his heart as he watches her float away, a soft throb reaching around his heart and then clamping down. It burns like hell but he can't stop it.
He's never been a believer in immortality and this only gives him more grounds for opposition; flesh and blood are but mortal instruments in nature's concerto.
He supposes now that even phoenixes, who rise from their own ashes; reborn from their wrongs and their own expiration are subject to mortality.
He doesn't know how long he stands there, only that he's still watching her coffin drift away when the sun sets and he sees no one else on the shore line.
He's alone.
The torch in his hand has long since burned out, and he discards it on the ground. He stands there on the shore, the shadows of clouds and grief swallowing up any notion of him as he watches her burning coffin tremble on the water, and it's so fucking beautiful that it breaks everything inside him.
He feels as if he's lost himself; as if some great chasm has swallowed up his body and left the rest of him hanging in a torturous limbo.
He's just waiting for the fall to come, since the world isn't strong enough to support him anymore.
His body is heavy and his limbs ache, every part of him feels thick like molasses and heavy like steel. The world around him is light like wind.
And so Peter falls.
His knees sink into the thick, clumpy sand as his right shoulder sags heavily and his left shoulder pitches awkwardly near his left ear.
He doesn't care anymore.
Olivia's coffin, now little more than a speck on the fringes of the horizon still holds his gaze as a tiny hand slips onto his shoulder. He looks over and sees his daughter standing next to him, her emerald eyes hazy with tears.
She whispers to him: "I'm here Daddy."
He places his hand on hers and whispers back, "I know sweetheart."
Fin
Well... what do think? Love? Hate? Hugs?