Okay so I totally didn't think of these two until I caught up on Sanctuary and watched the season 2 premier. And OMG these two are just beyond awesome together.
This is a tag on to that episode. After she runs off.
Oh and the song Breathe by Alexi Muroch is what inspired this as well. I love the lyrics and I think they really work with the two of them.
"Helen."
The voice jerked through Helen's madness. That calm, collected, comforting voice. She hated how her heart seemed not to pound as hard when that voice came to her. She hated the comforting effect it had. All she had to do was listen to that voice, to his voice, and everything in the world would be alright.
Except that wasn't the case.
Because they had taken Ashley. They had taken her and they had warped her. Her beautiful, strong daughter had attacked them without a moment's hesitation--she had attacked her without a moment's hesitation. No matter what she had seen, no matter what she had done she had thought that she could always trust Ashley. Well, except for a rebellious streak around Ashley's sixteenth birthday. But Ashley wasn't sixteen, wasn't a child. She was like a partner to her, a partner with her own strengths and abilities. And yet not like a partner at all. Because while Helen would fight to get the people she loved back, she wouldn't have fought like that. She wouldn't have pulled guns or fired them for that matter. But she had and she would, she would go right into the clutches of the Cabal if she thought that it would bring Ashley back.
But it wouldn't. Because she knew Ashley and the eyes she say looking back at her, they were not John's eyes, they were not Ashley's eyes. They were eyes she had never seen before and they chilled her to the bone.
"I'm in no mood, John," Helen said, trying to ignore the tremble in her voice.
John Druitt clenched his fists angrily. It had been an exceedingly long time since he had cared so much about another person. Helen had always had the capability to stir the emotion in him, be it anger or love. But the worry in him, the raw fear that cut through him like a hot knife through butter, it was not for her. Not entirely. He was worried about Helen, about how she was reacting. But he was far more worried about Ashley. What he had seen was terrifying, but more than that, it was how quiet she had been. Every interaction with the young woman had been fraught with sharp words and fast kicks and only one of those things had been there in their past interaction.
And it was the one that affected him physically.
He knew that Helen was furious as well. Mostly at the Cabal but also at him. Even if removing her was the only way to assure both their safety, it would not take much to make Helen think his actions had malicious intent. It would be easy for her to see him as the enemy. One of many but the only one who was right in front of her. He knew and he did not care. Because if she needed an enemy, if she needed a fight then he would give it to her gladly.
"I had to get you out of their, Helen. We both know that--"
"She was Ashley!" she cried, spinning around, her hair flying out with the movement, "deep inside she was and if you had let me take her back, I could have helped her!"
John looked at her, recognizing the fear in her eyes. The pure instinct that accompanied it--that maternal instinct. He had no doubt that if she thought his death and her own would bring Ashley back, she would kill them both without a moment's hesitation.
"Hysteria does not suite you," he told her, finding no joy in the anger that sparked her eyes, "she would have killed you before you could have subdued her."
"You don't know that!" she shouted, her words laced with raw emotion, "and we'll never know that! They've taken her and we might not get another chance!"
"I assure you we will," John said, "the Cabal know that. They will send her simply because she knows the most about this place. About the Abnormals."
"No!" Helen cried, "no they cannot use her! Not like this!"
John knew she was past the point of reason. Ashley's kidnapping and alteration had thrown her over some edge. The calm, brilliant woman that he had come to know was not there. In her place was this hysterical creature, someone that John did not know how to deal with. He was not accustom to dealing with hysterical people of any kind--none that he wanted to deal with anyway. The prostitutes that he had killed, they had been hysterical. Screaming and pleading and crying. Half of him justified the killing with the need to shut them up. And now Helen was standing up there, looking as if she was going out of her mind with fear.
"Calm yourself, Helen," he said, "you are of no use to anyone in the state you are in," her eyes widened, "what do we need to do to prepare?"
Helen closed her eyes, knowing what he was doing. Repeating her name, he was not allowing her to pull away, to think his words were concerning someone else. And to her great shame she realized that it was working. Her heart was pounding and her chest was rising erratically but she was aware of her body's physical reaction to the adrenaline that pounded through her. She forced herself to focus on that, on her physical reactions and not the raw wound in her chest. She had to focus. Because despite what she wished, despite the fact it disgusted her, John was right. She was of no use to anyone in her current state. Taking a deep breath, she tried to calm the pounding of her heart, tried to gather herself.
"What do we need to do, Helen?" he asked again, his voice low and calm and such a contrast to her hysteria.
"We--we need to let the other Sanctuaries know," she said, "the Cabal will use her face to get in. The other Sanctuaries might be fooled if they are unaware," she took another deep breath, smoothing the fabric of her pants, "and we will need to inform them of the effects we know of--Tesla will be able to help with that."
"Is there anything else?" he asked.
"I--" she stopped, her fingers digging in as she thought of Ashley's face, "I don't know!" she cried desperately, "I cannot think!" her voice pitched, turned formal, all signs of how rawly emotional she was.
"Helen," he did not use his power to stride over to her, knowing teleporting would only remind her of Ashley. His hands grabbed her shoulders, "You can. Focus. What do you need to tell your other Sanctuaries."
Truthfully he did not care about the other Sanctuaries, he did not care about her mission to save the world and the abnormals in it. But he knew she cared. He knew she cared enough that she would be able to focus on it, that she would hopefully be able to reach through her fear and focus on that. He could see it work as well. She still looked hysterical but she looked like she was fighting it. He knew Helen would be able to focus on it, that she would be able to reach past the madness that engulfed her to find the strength he knew she possessed.
Her eyes locked with his, probably the shock of him touching her that caused it. But that defiance, it was the same. He had always been taller than her and she had always been stubborn in her defiance of even something as natural at that. She had always raised her chin, met his eyes squarely even in the midst of a society that said she should not. And now in a society that probably viewed her as far higher than him, she still met his gaze without any sort of hesitation or shame. But now there was something else in her eyes, something John didn't fully understand, something he wasn't sure he wanted to fully understand.
"She has your eyes," Helen said, her voice soft and choked. John felt his own widen, "it was the first thing I noticed, when she was born. And I knew I should hate it--that i should hate you for it. But I knew what looking in those eyes meant. Before the madness, before the insanity--I knew what those eyes meant and I was happy she had them."
"Helen," he began.
"Her eyes were--oh God her eyes," she closed her own, shaking her head at the horrible sight of what her eyes had been, "I want her to have her eyes again--I want her to have your eyes!"
Helen's final words echoed on the roof as she closed her eyes, her head shaking as if to deny what she had just admitted. John felt his fingers tighten on Helen's shoulders, knowing that she was right in what she had said. It was the first thing he had noticed when he had seen the girl. Not that she had his eyes precisely, but that she had eyes that looked frighteningly familiar. It was not until later, when he washed the latest blood off his hands, that he had looked in the mirror and realized why those eyes had looked so familiar. But Helen had said nothing of the sort, though he knew she had to have noticed the similarity. He simply had never thought she would say she did not hate it.
"And she will," he found himself promising on the roof, "you can bring her back Helen."
Helen knew the truth in his words, knew that if anyone could bring her back it was her. But it was different. If it had been any other Abnormal, Cabal involved or not, she would have found a way. But standing on the roof, the place she went for comfort, she found the situation seemed impossibly hopeless. Because this was not any Abnormal, this was her daughter. This was Ashley. She felt John's hands slip off her shoulders and suddenly found it impossible to breath. She turned around, pressing a hand to her mouth. She was going to be sick. She was never sick but now she was sure she was about to be.
But what spilled from her lips was a sob.
The sound was wretched as the tears she had barely held back broke free. They streamed down her cheeks, feeling as though it was fire, not water that streaked her face. The sobs tore at her as she desperately tried to muffle them, tried not to show her weakness. She heard his feet move, heard his purposeful stride towards her and one of his hands pressed against her upper back. Helen Magnus did something she had not done in many years and reacted on pure instinct, pure adrenaline. She turned around and slammed her fist into his eye, throwing her full weight behind the blow. He knew how to take a hit, a good hit, not the sloppy one she threw but he took it all the same.
Half mad with rage, blinded with tears Helen punched John anywhere her fists could reach. His chest, which she had once thought the perfect rest for her head. The arms that had held her so tight, so perfectly. The face she had thought handsome. Anywhere her fists could hit she did. And he took each blow, barely even flinching as her knuckles bruised and tore with the blows she rained on him. Her tears crippled her as she gasped for air, finding barely any of it though they were outside. Her fists beat his chest in synch, bruised bloody knuckles staining the darkness of his shirt.
Her hands slid down his shirt, opening against the fabric before seizing it in her grasp, as tight as she could. The adrenaline was still pounding through her but she could not breath, not here, not anywhere. Not until Ashley was safe. Her fists tightened in the silky material as she struggled, wishing she still had the strength to fight him. Her hands loosened with the intent to punch him once more but John had enough. Before she could move his arms were around her, one encircling her waist, one encircling her shoulders, just over her curls. Helen felt her entire body tense for a moment before it went traitorously limp.
Before air flooded her lungs.
"Its my fault," she whispered, closing her eyes, "its because of what I am."
"Its us, Helen," he said, tightening his grip on her, "its our fault. Not just yours, not just mine. Ours."
Helen sobbed harder. John tightened his grip on her as her hands held his shirt like it was the last solid thing in the world. There had been a time when he would have known what to say to comfort her but now he had no knew that Ashley's return was the only thing that would help her but he did not know how to accomplish that, only that he could not do it alone. So, despite words failing him, he held her tightly, knowing that perhaps the thing she needed was someone there to hold her. And a secret, terrible part of him rejoiced at the fact that she still showed weakness to him, that she let him in past the face she showed to the world.
When the adrenaline drained and the tears exhausted her. When her eyes fought to stay open, John bent just enough to slip an arm under her legs and sweep her fully into his arms. Perhaps because she had cried herself into exhaustion against his chest, or perhaps because of something he would never understand, her head remained against his chest. The only change was her arms which came up around his neck. The action was familiar, though it had been many years since it had been done. She had her pride, he had his but sometimes, on the rare occasions when she had been unable to walk due to her adventurous nature or the even rarer occasions when she drank too much in her youth, she had let him carry her home.
John had never informed her how it made him feel to be allowed the honor of carrying the great Helen Magnus. Despite the fact she squirmed sometimes, or the first time when she had crossed her arms and refused to look at him until he had told her she had to hold him or he would drop her on the ground, he liked carrying her. Because it was in those moments, those precious few moments, when Helen let him in. And though he would never admit to another soul, John Druitt liked it when the beautiful, vivacious woman he had once called his let him past the walls the century or so she had lived had forced her to build up.
Holding her now, John tightened his arms around her just fractionally and teleported from the roof to her room. She didn't protest, she didn't even look at him as he walked the pristine carpet, past the windows that overlooked the water outside the Sanctuary and to the bed. It was old fashioned, still with four posters and a canopy, the fabric tethered neatly to the posts. He walked over and laid her on the bed, her arms coming down off his neck. He reached down and pulled off her shoes, placing them on the ground. She laid there, her eyes half open as tears still trickled down her cheeks. He reached out and picked up the comforter, exposing the sheets underneath. A quick movement of her legs and he pulled it over her still fully clothed form.
He stood up, stepping away from her. She didn't move, didn't even respond as he looked down at her. For some reason he found it difficult to teleport out of the room and leave her alone in the darkness. But it was not something he dwelled on as he vanished, appearing back in the sanctity of the guest room that had been given to him.
In the darkness of her own room, illuminated only by the city lights, Helen felt her fingers dig into the fabric over pillow.
"John," she whispered his name, too tired to feel shame over the fact she wished desperately that he was there with her.
That his arms were around her once more.
But soon sleep swelled up and took her and she thought of John Druitt no more.
Please review!
The next chapter takes place well into the past. Before the Five, back when John and Helen were kind of new to each other and he helps her after she sprains her ankle.
