Falling Star
Summary: Headfic for James as he prepares to freeze Ashley's embryo.
Spoilers: Sanctuary for all, possibly very slight others in season 1.
Set: November 1888
Rating: K+ for implied violence and bad language, not proper swearing, but vulgar words.
Pairings: Magnitt (obviously) and implied Helen/James unrequited.
Genres: Angst, tragedy (elements of the classical), unrequited romance.
Disclaimer: This world belongs to the genii Amanda Tapping, Martin Wood and Damian Kindler.
Written for the Diehard challenge. Inspired by Bob Chilcott's song of the same name. Does not do the song justice. The quote is "Othello" Act III scene III line 165.
"Breathe" James spoke quietly, not trusting his voice. He had to stay strong, for her sake. She was the victim here, not him. He would do well to remember it. He felt the form in his arms inhale tremulously through the chloroform-soaked rag he held over her face. She coughed against the vapour. James lowered the rag and looked down at her. Her red-rimmed eyes met his, still fully conscious, fearful. "This cannot wait much longer, Helen." He said softly. "To tarry is to endanger the child. The chamber will hold it for as long as need be."
"I know." Her voice shook as much as her breath. She looked at the rag again. He nodded once and returned it to her face.
"Fight the reflex Helen, slowly and deeply this time." She near enough succeeded. He withdrew the rag, letting her exhale, turning his own head away to breathe. He raised the rag.
"Again." Her breath came more easily this time. Thank God the drug seemed to work on her. They hadn't tested it since '85, since that brilliant, terrible venture with sanguine vampiris .
Twice more, Helen breathed through the rag, then she slumped into James's arms. He laid her down on the table silently. Her eyes were still half open. It was so much harder to perform surgery alone, act as anaesthetist and surgeon at once, but he had no choice. So much of this came from having no choice. James felt his eyes flick down Helen's body. There was no outward sign of it yet. She couldn't continue the pregnancy and she couldn't contemplate terminating it, not just because of the horrors she'd seen desperate women inflict on themselves. Wire, caustic soap, it didn't bear thinking of...
She stirred. James's hand flew to the rag again. She spoke. His hand stilled. It was a name, faint, delirium-induced, but quite distinct to James's ear.
She was sighing the name of the man who had betrayed her, the man who she had trusted implicitly, to such a point it was foolish to a rational mind, a rational mind like Helen's. He'd never thought her the type to fall in love so, hoped she'd stay strong as a maiden, eternally beautiful, eternally alone, except, in his half-conceived hopes, never spoken, never acted on. She'd given herself to John utterly, she'd withheld nothing, and this was her reward: This woman, this magnificent woman, this swan, this pearl, this chaste morning star lay drugged unconscious, pregnant and unmarried, like the common whores John preyed on.
"Are you proud, John?" James snarled to the shadows, dropping the rag unceremoniously over Helen's face. "Are you proud of your works, Whitechapel ripper? Broken, fallen. What she was... What she could have been... I count this your eleventh, Jack, and if I ever find you, devil, I will kill you for each." He snatched the rag from Helen's face and reached for his scalpel. The white cotton of her gown yielded easily, revealing the silken, lily-white skin beneath. James's breath shook as he pulled it taut for the knife. This was John's job, to sever the skin and organs of a motionless, helpless fallen woman. To think of Helen as such... Society would. He could not, could never. To him, she was immortally pure, perfect. He would reach out his hand to catch her, would raise her up, if she would accept him, but she never would. He was her dear friend, always would be, never more, never her love. She still called John's name.
"Beware, my lord, of jealousy." James heard the words as if they had been spoken. "It is the green-eyed monster that doth mock the meat it feeds on." He bared his teeth and cursed softly. Literature was John's discipline. He didn't need its trite, contained, rhyming quatrains and couplets. He sighed, steadying himself. He had to do this. He had to do this now. He raised the knife again and felt it bite Helen's skin.