4: Cardiac Neurosis

"Do you want me to… do it?"

"No." Walter reached up to grip the offered shovel head, ignoring the pain of his cracking palms as he used the leverage to scramble up the nearly vertical side of the hole, dirt and rubble raining from his efforts. The dried surface soil was a powdery shade of grey against the dark, cold, damp of the bottom. Peter helped him up the rest of the way, and at last he stood, dusting his trousers. Peter stared at him until he was forced to meet his gaze, having looked everywhere else, "I need you down there to-" Walter cleared his throat, shaking his head.

"Okay. The back is open," Peter slipped over the edge, dropping down, "and don't even think of leaving me down here," he joked.

Walter stood, looking down at Peter for a few moments. He turned sharply, and ran for the car.

He bruised his knee as he climbed into the back of the Vista Cruiser, sweeping junk aside with his arms as he tried to clear the weight from an old, grey and blue U-Haul throw. At last he tugged up the blanket, sweeping it aside with a flurry of movement to reveal the inky black shine of a body bag. Walter recoiled, striking his head on the roof as he sat back on his ankles heavily. His trembling hand found his lips rather than either of his bruises, and he swallowed back the sticky feeling of grief in his mouth.

It was very hard to think of it as a necessity.

He thought that he'd be used to it, at this point. But it was even worse, when he touched her- if he only looked at the body bag, he could pretend that it was anybody. But when he gathered up the corpse, the weight and the slide of lifeless muscles in his arms and in his lap told him that it was Olivia.

He touched his lips to the dark plastic covering her shoulder as he weakly held her closely, knowing that inside, in the suffocating dark, she was flawless- he'd preserved her perfectly. He hadn't even cut her hair, taking every caution to care for it when he'd attached her to his machines, brushing aside the flaxen strands to attach the receptors. But he knew that if he opened the cocoon of black, and saw her face again, he'd take her back to his laboratory…

Walter had always been very bad with goodbyes.

xXx

They would sometimes talk in the dark, but it was rare, and only when touch had failed itself to communicate their every thought, after the threats and insults. Words were very weak, very limited- but, at times, necessary, it seemed. And she had desperately needed them, now that he thought back.

"Does this mean I'm yours?" Olivia asked, and Walter knew she watched him blindly from across the sheets. The white expanse was cold, her limbs light enough to blend with them, and he searched for only the tell-tale warmth and scent of her skin beneath the blankets, his hand stretching out for her voice at last.

"I don't own myself." His fingertips graced hers at a distance. They were warm, much warmer than his own.

"No one wants me."

"That's not true."

"If you and Belly could make me again, start over on me, would you craft me so that someone could love me?"

"I delude myself in thinking that perhaps at last I've created someone to love me," Walter said quietly, enjoying the way the clean linens felt against his ribcage, and he held his breath for a few moments to expand his diaphragm against them.

"Don't say that you love me, Walter."

"It takes more than a good lay to trick me into such things, agent Dunham." But he knew it was a lie- and it went much further. Perhaps he was that material, after all, or perhaps he was simply desperate for the company.

"A very good lay," Olivia pointed out, and Walter chuckled. She shifted under the blankets, and he could feel the warmth of her body grow nearer, as she ran her palm up the length of his arm, and slid her thigh over his hip. She kissed his throat, and hesitantly nestled into his collar bone.

"I don't love you either, Walter," she said, her voice small and weak. Her fingers against his chest curled into fists. Small, trembling fists- her knuckles were probably white.

Walter traced hair from the smooth curve of her shoulder, "I know." I know how it feels to be alone.

He'd started a fire, when they'd told him. The acid he'd been carrying had spilled onto the cotton hem of a dust cover when he'd dropped the containing cylinder to shatter on the floor, raising his hands to cover his mouth in horror. It had gone ignored.

"They found her this morning in her apartment," Peter said quietly, "they think… they think it was suicide."

"No." Walter managed to utter. And he meant it. Even as he stood over her listless form, Charlie stooping to gather the magnum from it's dropped place on the floor, he knew, he knew she hadn't done it. She'd promised him she wouldn't. This creature that had so recently been trembling and crying in his arms, telling him how much she hated him, simply couldn't have had the strength…

He still didn't believe it, truthfully.

He could only tell the difference between the tears Astrid cried into the collar of his black suit and the rain at the back of his neck from the temperature difference, and he was guilty of preferring the warmth of her sadness to the cold of the rain's indifference. At the funeral, he did not cry, as there would be time for such things later. To the contrary, Walter's mind was on fire- he had to find whoever had done this to her. It was obvious they had meant it to look like a suicide, but he was certain she had been poisoned- what the hell did the coroner know, anyways?

Whomever it was, he would find them. Heads would roll.

xXx