What I've Done
A/N: I'm starting to think writing the story of Bill Sykes has given me an oh so slight obsession. XD
Therefore, a Bill Sykes songfic; What I've Done, by Linkin Park.
Song lyrics in italics, although there's a few Dickens quotes in italics in the main paragraphs. Also, not all of the song is included/in verse order. Just so you are aware.
Dedicated to all my amazing reviewers; you guys rock my fuzzy socks off. ^^
WARNING: Rather gruesome descriptions of 'a bloody deed most desperately dispatched' (thank you Richard III for that quote). But seriously. I may have gotten a bit carried away. =P
--
In this farewell
There's no
blood
There's no alibi
Bill staggered away from the fallen Nancy, closing his eyes to try and blot out the terrifying picture before him. No matter how hard he tried, the image refused to fade, branded in his mind. What had he done? Her screams and pleas for mercy still echoed about his head, taunting him mercilessly.
"Bill, dear Bill, you cannot have the heart to kill me!
Bill, Bill, for dear God's sake, for your own, for mine, stop before you spill my blood!
I have been true to you, upon my guilty soul I have!"
Why had he killed her; what was the reason? She'd peached, hadn't she? But what if she hadn't…what if…
'Cause I've drawn regret
From
the truth
Of a thousand lies
Why? Why did he feel such regret, such self loathing, such horror at what he'd done? She'd done the worst thing any member of the gang could do…she'd informed on them all, they were all as good as hung… He risked opening his eyes again, nausea welling up inside him at the sight of the blood, the mangled flesh…such flesh, and so much blood!
So let mercy come
And wash
away
What I've done
He tore bloodied scraps from his clothes and burnt them, washed his crimson hands, his red-flecked face. How those stains were dispersed about the room! The very feet of the dog were bloody… But tryas he might to wash away the blood, he couldn't wash away the guilt.
I'll face myself
To cross out
what I've become
Erase myself
And let go of what I've done
What had he become? He was no longer a mere housebreaker, no, now he had become a whole different class of criminal. In this space of a few frantic and furious minutes, Bill Sykes had become a murderer. The thought sickened him as he tossed his club into the grate, burning it, as if trying to rid himself of all the evidence pointing to his horrific deed.
Put to rest
What you thought
of me
While I clean this slate
With the hands of uncertainty
He wasn't the same man and he never would be again. He couldn't think of himself in the same way he once had nor, he knew, could anyone else. He had always been cruel; a heartless drunken bully, Fagin had once hissed behind his back. He knew that.
But this...he wouldn't even have thought it possible…he was a murderer.
He had killed her.
He had killed Nancy.
Of all bad deeds that, under cover of the darkness, have been committed within wide London's bounds since night hung over it, that was the worst. Of all the horrors that rose with an ill scent upon the morning air, that was the foulest and most cruel.
What I've Done.