Disclaimer I own nothing! Tim Burton does! The lucky bastard.
Warnings: Alternate Universe, Victor/Victoria, Corpse Bride/Victor, SPOILERS
CHAPTER TWO
"Victor!" Victoria cried!
Mr. Von Dort couldn't answer her. His coughing was just too harsh. Blood began to taint his hands from his throat and he became weaker and weaker. The elder skeleton looked into his book. "Oh dear." he said.
Victoria looked up in horror. "What is it?"
"He's been here in the land of the dead for too long."
"And?"
"He's losing his life force."
"Which means he's dying."
"Yes. It's a side effect from being trapped in the opposite world for too long."
Victor's hacking coughs stopped, but he was wheezing now and clutching at his chest. He looked even more tired than before and as he stood up again, Victoria noticed how he shook now. He looked like he was shivering uncontrollably. "I-I'm alright." he said unconvincingly. "I just don't feel very well right now, I good night's sleep should take care of that."
"If I could make a suggestion…" the elder skeleton advised. "I know of a small alleyway that no one visits that has a shelter there for you. He will be able to recover a bit there as long as the dead don't come near him."
"How will that help him recover?" Victoria asked as the older skeleton had a crow bring her a set of blankets.
"It is the dead that walk that drain him, not the place of the dead."
"Is there a way we can go back to our own world for good?"
"The Corpse Bride has to release him from her grasp first."
Victoria sighed and looked back to Victor who seemed to be having trouble standing. Scraps, the skeleton dog, was at his feet, whimpering his concern for his master's safety. Victor's hand clutched a tight more tightly at his heart as he struggled a bit more to breathe. Victoria walked over to the dog and shooed it away from him. Victor relaxed a bit.
"Alright," she said. "If you need us, we'll be in this alley way. Where is it by the way?"
"Third alleyway on the right once you head out of the door."
"Thank you."
Victoria then turned and took her fiancé's by the arm to lead him outside to the place where they would be staying the night. She wrapped a blanket around his shoulders. His shivering didn't stop. The woman sighed. This was going to be difficult. "Victor, if you can make it to the alley way, then I'll let you rest alright? We just need to make it there first."
Victor smiled weakly. "Yes, I'll try."
As the pair stumbled into the street, Scraps got the idea that the two wanted to be alone and ran off to his Emily, to tell her about the news.
"Victor's sick?"
Scraps barked urgently in response with concern laced in it. Even though he dog was dead, he couldn't stand the thought of his master hurting, that is if he could think.
The Corpse Bride thought everything over for a moment. If what the elder had said was true than that could be a good and a bad thing at the same time. The good thing would be that Victor would die and he'd have no choice but to stay with her. The down side was that he would be suffering until he died and having died unexpectedly she didn't know what it was like to pass away like that.
"Where is he staying?"
The dog barked some more and Emily somehow understood.
"Alright, I'll go and see him in the morning." She said and got up to go to her room but the dog still barked at her as they went. Scraps was sure that if Emily went and saw Victor being nursed by the living woman, she might go into a fit and take Victor further into down town , where he would die for sure. The dog knew his master better than anyone and knew how lost the family would be without their only son, no matter how 'pathetic' they deemed him. The dog's barks fell on deaf ears however and eventually he gave up. He tried to warn her.
Back in the alleyway, Victoria was happy to find an abandoned building that had all the usual trappings of a home in the world of the living. There was a fireplace, which she immediately sat Victor beside and when she went into the kitchen, she found food and tea bags and such, as if this was the replication of an home that was really abandoned in the land of the living. The Everglot didn't mind though. She just hurried about getting some hot water in a basin and quickly prepared some tea to try and being a bit of warmth back into her soon-to-be husband's frozen hands and feet.
By the time she got back, Victor had stopped shivering but still looked exhausted and drawn, as if he was an old man. Strands of his dark hair had become white, a sign of the drain of his life force, and the way his hands clutched at the blanket around his shoulders made Victoria fret a little. He was still cold.
"Victor…" she whispered as she approached him and set the warm things aside for a second so she could sit down without fear of spilling them. "…are you alright now?"
Victor turned his dark eyes on her and smiled. Their was a little more light in them than before. He had recovered a little. "Yes. I feel better. Thank you Victoria."
She smiled and handed him some tea. "I wasn't sure what kind of tea you liked so I made you some green tea. It's said to be the healthiest tea and will help you regain your strength quickly."
The Von Dort smiled and took a sip, his eyes widening a little. "Wow, this is really some excellent tea!" he complimented. "Exactly as I like it! How did you know?"
Victoria blushed and shrugged. "Oh, I just guessed."
They laughed about it for a second or two when Victor finished off his tea and moved to lay down, Victoria moving her hands so his head to rest in his lap. Normally this would have been considered very improper for a young man to do this with a young lady but the dead were a lot more lax than the living in these rules, as Victoria quickly learned, and so enjoyed this small amount of freedom while they still could. Her fingers ran lovingly through his black hair and Victor sighed into the wonderful massage, his shivering finally stopped. "You have very gentle hands Victoria." he said. "So soft and warm…
She blushed but said nothing, simply continued to let her hands work their magic until her husband had fallen fast asleep in her lap. Victoria then watched him with a smile. This is what he should look like all the time, she decided. Peaceful and happy, not worn and stressed. What Victoria didn't notice was the fact that a pair of eyes, okay four pairs of eyes watched her from the window sill with disapproval in them. "So she's the witch that got him seduced under her power." she spider muttered to itself as it turned and walked back into the land of the dead. "Well, Emily would have a word or two so say about that."
Okay, Chapter Two is finished. I am warning you now that here on out the characters get pretty OOC. Please bare with me. As to the final pairing of the story, I won't tell you how it ends yet, you have to keep reading to find out! The more you review, the faster the update, m'kay?
