Author's Note: ellavee: Luke does deserve happiness and shall get some. But not before more angst chapters with him. :)
el85: Luke will find someone at some point. Not sure if I'll right a story on Luke handling her death. Probably, maybe. The girl from the future Peter ran into is a very good guess. She'll appear with Peter's wife and other women in the girl bonding chapter I have yet to write.
Oh everyone, I have a little poll up to see who you guys want to see most in these stories. So if you'd like me to know check out my profile. Also I am working on another epic story about Gabriel and Elle. One that takes place in an alternate season 1 where Elle does not work for the Company, yet meets and falls for the watchmaker just the same. Let me know if you'd like me to post it.
Anyway enjoy some Papa Gray.
SAMSON GRAY: Limits
I waited in my home for death. Every day I got closer to it. The feeling in my lungs weighed heavy on my body ready to give out for the dirt. I worked like I usually did trying to keep my mind off the fact that my oxygen tank could stop working or my lungs would decide to give up. Who knows my heart could collapse as well. Death like life was full of surprises.
In life I had been a rebel. A boy who didn't want to be the man his father wanted him to be. The boy who grew into the punk ass drinking individual who had run into the law more than enough times to count. I was a foolish little lost lamb in a pack of hungry wolves. My ability manifested at eighteen. In the prime of my youth when I was just deciding what I wanted out of life.
Watches weren't my thing. I always knew I wouldn't be forced into it like my brother. Poor Martin always got the short end of the stick. Always buckled under the pressure of family. Maybe I should have wondered what had become of him, but I could have cared less. I didn't care about anyone.
That was my life. Uncaring and unlawful. My ability manifested by learning the insides of a broken watch. Learning the insides of a broken animal I had killed for food. I knew the hunger was beginning. I found people with abilities. A woman with the ability to move object with a flick of her wrist was first. She had been my first murder. A poor prostitute I had done and killed. Taken her light from her felt like a rush. A new rush. A new found ability to use.
I take so many I lose count. I only remember the woman because she was my first and a man from a decade ago who put people in stupors because he was my last. All those in between were indifferent. Not worthy of remembering.
I remember when I changed just a little. I remember seeing little Natalia Bartello sitting in a booth at a truck stop all by her lonesome. Looking into her coffee as if she were looking at a new world. Sadness and beauty across her grand features. A beauty in herself. A beauty in life. I instantly knew she'd be mind. If not by force by convincing. I talked with her. I flirted. I pranced around showing off my ability of knowing.
She grew to become fond of me. Maybe love me. I did enjoy her company. It was the closest thing I would ever get to love. Her ability was known to me, but I couldn't take it from her. If she ordered me not to I couldn't, but she hadn't. I could have stolen her persuasion power, but I couldn't bring myself. I enjoyed her company. I didn't want to be lonely back then. I wanted a pretty little girl to use. Wanted to see dance across my world.
She got pregnant about a year after we met. I didn't want her to keep it. It would just make things more complicated than they already were. She wanted the baby and it was hard to say no to her, power or no power. Natalia was a woman who knew what she wanted and she wanted that baby. We moved in together. I became illusive travelling around the country for more abilities though she thought I was trying to make a life better for her and the little guy. I did that as well as a trucker, but if I found myself a pretty little power I coveted it.
When I came back the kid was two months old. Gabriel after an angel or something. When I saw him I probably should have felt some kind of fatherly bond to him, but there was none. No bond. No connection. Hell he could have been a dead cat on the side of the road.
Natalia felt it though. He was hers and hers alone. She adored Gabriel as her son. As her baby. Her boy. Her little guy. I had to admit by the end of his first year I was not finding him cute at all. He was stealing my girl from me. Taking her right away. I went back into the trucking business because I couldn't stand to see the kid be doted on by my lady. Its mother.
I wasn't much of a father. I stayed in time for periods of a week to two months. Nothing longer going away for months at a time. By the time Gabriel was five I was fed up with him. I was fed up with them both. Natalia had out stayed her welcome and so did the brat. Trucking did me no good and I really wanted to get into the taxidermist business. I needed money for the tools.
Luckily I had an idiot brother who married a psycho woman who was willing to pay for a child. Lucky I had one. I told Natalia I was going to bring Gabriel in to talk to my brother while she waited in the car. The exchange was quick and so was my former lover's death. It was as if I never had a son. Never had a woman.
Part of me was glad the strings had been cut, but part of me was always curious about the what ifs. What if I had actually stuck around? What if a bond had been formed? Would Gabriel have turned out the way I knew he did? Most certainly yes. It was the whole nature vs. nurture thing. Nature and nurture were both against my son. He was born to be a killer just like me.
I slept around and killed around after that. One such occasion was an affair with my neighbor Mary Campbell. Sweet little lost wife who had an abusive hubby. Sought comfort in a serial killer neighbor. She got pregnant and we all knew I was the kid's dad. I was beginning to wonder if my bad luck would ever run out. Mary was debating on abortion or keeping the kid. I tried to convince her to abort the kid, but she thought the baby could bring her and her husband back together.
Battered wife syndrome I think they called it. So Mary Campbell went back to being a battered woman and I went back to being the creepy neighbor who just watched after her kid when she needed it. Luke was a good kid. I felt more of a connection to him than Gabriel. Maybe it was because I felt sorry for him. His cuts and burns from his old man. The same my dad used to deal on us boys. I kept him company telling him stories. Some true some false.
I talked about my own son. Selling him away. I knew he reminded me of Gabriel and told him that. He asked why I sold him. I told him a little truth. I needed the money. It was true, but not the main reason I gave Gabriel away and killed my girl. They had betrayed me. Taken me out of their family, though I suppose most of it was my fault.
I left Luke and Mary just as the boy turned fifteen. No word from them. I told Luke where I was headed just in case he wanted to visit. Out of common curtsey. I went to set up a remote shop there killing animals for sport and food. It was then that I developed lung cancer. Very dangerous kind. So I sat doing my work preparing myself for the end.
My sons returned to me just as I was ready to give up. In truth I felt indifferent until I realized I could live again. Take the ability from the son I turned my back on. Take more. Change. Change the world into mine. I had big ambitions that faded as the tube wrapped around my neck. Gabriel, Luke, and his Elle left me with myself than. They had meant to kill me, but here I was alive.
I knew my limits. I know my limits now. I can only do so much with my time now. Work and sit. I can't kill anything bigger than a rabbit now. My limits were small, but they were mine. I knew some day I'd rot and decay here wondering if I could have done something different. Been something different.
Was my only choice to kill? Was that my limit? Kill or be killed. I knew in my heart I didn't have to. I was strong enough to fight the hunger, but I chose to let it control me. I knew at the end of my life I would have given myself to it and let it slowly rot me away.
