Warning: Contains slash-if-you-squint
Pairing: Guil/Ros
Words: 523
Disclaimer: I am not Tom Stoppard any more than Stoppard is Shakespeare.
Written for the prompt of, "You promised!" Based more on the play than the movie, although I think all the lines I looked up for reference are in both. They may not be, though -- it's had me confused a few times already today.
The Endless Time of Always Coming Back
It is quiet. Dim, but not dark. Rosencrantz is lying on something soft, but his neck still hurts from the hard bite of the rope. The last thing he remembers is falling…
Beside him Guildenstern twitches and gasps his way to sudden consciousness. A second ago Rosencrantz hadn't even known he was there, and the terror of being (or having been) alone strikes him suddenly, moving him to roll over and clutch at his friend's arm.
"What's happening?" he whispers, because Guildenstern is always the one with the answers, even if they're not always very helpful ones.
"—Don't," Guildenstern says weakly, and coughs.
Rosencrantz holds on tighter. He feels his eyes start to sting, because he's confused and scared and he's pretty sure he might have just died and now he's also worried that Guildenstern is trying to yell at him for being stupid again. "What's happening?" he asks again with an unsteady voice. "Is this England? Is it over? Did we… Are we dead?"
Guildenstern turns his head and stares at him, as if he can hardly believe that their noses are only about three inches apart. "Rosen—?"
"Because when I said I'd had enough, that wasn't what I meant," Rosencrantz continues, babbling. "But I think I died, and my throat hurts, and you said that death was about not coming back, and— And you said we'd be all right. You promised!"
"Rosencrantz," Guildenstern interrupts hoarsely.
He stops, bites his lip, and tries to blink some of the tears away. "What?" he asks in a small voice.
Guildenstern just looks at him for a moment, then sighs. "I don't think we're dead," he says finally. "At least, I don't feel dead."
"I don't either," Rosencrantz says quickly. "I… think."
He almost adds that he's not sure he knows what being dead would feel like, but then he remembers falling, and dark, and a feeling like… like a book being tucked away on a shelf and forgotten for a long, long time. Shivering, he ducks his head down and presses his face against the other man's shoulder.
"I don't want either of us to be dead."
"Neither do I," Guildenstern agrees wearily. He presses his mouth against Rosencrantz's hair, trying to reassure him, but the truth is that he's never been very good at that sort of thing and probably never will be if he continues to feel as bone tired as he does right now. His body aches, and he's having trouble keeping his eyes open. "Look, maybe we should try to figure this out in the morning…"
Rosencrantz nods against his shoulder. "All right," he says, sounding relieved to have at least some sort of instruction to go on. But he doesn't pull away and roll over – just curls up right there, which Guildenstern actually finds reassuring. Whatever has just happened to them, he thinks, it's not something they'll be able to just write off and forget.
He doubts that anything will ever be the same again.
~/~
They wake again sometime before dawn to a pale sky and a man standing on his saddle to bang on the shutters…