A/N: I laughed so hard at a specific review from the last chapter. I think you know who you are :) anyway, everyone is waiting so here it is.


~It Was Him Before You~


Sally looked at the reaper uncertainly. Something in her body quivered at the dark secret that was hovering around in the room, she was now against knowing something that could potentially harm her. All of the secrecy was putting a fear unheard of inside of her.

But her curiousity got the best of her.

"Like what?" She asked while staring hard at Aidan.

The reaper, Alex, could feel the aura of her curiousity bustling about her. It was something he hadn't felt from her in a long time, it was what had attracted him to her in the first place.

He walked around her and embraced her body from behind, whispering what Aidan has been keeping from her in her ear.

"Look around you..." He whispered.

Sally did so with just her eyes.

"None of this is real" he looked at Aidan as he said his next words. "This...is a world that he created to imprison your soul"

With logical thinking, Sally automatically put what Alex said under the category of ludacris in her mind. Then again, with all the strange dreams she's been having and all of Aidan's off-putting behavior...she was willing to believe anything to explain that.

Aidan wasn't having any of this. "Don't listen to him Sally! He's LYING!" He shouted.

The reaper, Alex, narrowed his eyes at Aidan from behind Sally's shoulders. How dare he try to tell Sally he was lying when he was the one that tried to imprison her here with him in the first place?!

"Do you remember Bishop Sally?" Alex asked slyly.

Aidan's eyes widened in fear. "Sally cover your ears"

"I'm not a child Aidan! It's already hard enough to believe anything he's saying, but when your over there denying everything he's saying...it...it doesn't put you in the best light" she whispered.

Aidan continued to watch on, now quiet because he could hear the pain in Sally's voice. It was tearing her apart that she was hearing these horrible things from a total stranger, and not from Aidan himself.

"Bishop?" She asked in question.

Alex nodded slowly. "You were there when Aidan killed him. He was the first vampire to be born into a reaper after being killed by his prodigy."

"Impossible!" Aidan spat. "I killed him with my bare hands, there's no way—

Alex smirked at him. "You out of all people knew he was alive, that Rebecca woman knew and so did your prodigy...Henry" Alex sat a distraught Sally down on the bed. "Everyone that was turned either by Bishop himself or had a direct bloodline of him at least felt something, but with you...you knew better than anybody"

Aidan stared at Alex with a cold fire. Each and every word he said bringing back the memories of that time and place, right before he made the biggest mistake of his life.


"Aidan there you are! Where were you? I was looking for you everywhere–

The rigidness of Aidan's back brought a cold air through the room of their shared apartment. A scary thought of everyone and everything pausing right before his eyes was happening.

"Ummm...Aidan...your not paused are you?" He asked warily.

It happened in slow motion, the rippling muscles that belonged solely to Aidan began to move as he turned around, a dazzling smile on his face.

"Paused? Josh you watch too many movies to call yourself a man" Aidan chuckled.

Josh remained his concerned face. "Are you sure your alright?" He asked again. "It was like you were frozen in place! I thought the worse had happened"

Aidan shook his head and patted Josh on the head. "I'm telling you I'm fine" He gave Josh a mock-shock face. "Your starting to worry about me too much, is Nora not doing it right?"

Josh bled red. "Aidan that's completely inappropriate!" he yelled.

"What's inappropriate?" Sally asked shifting into the room suddenly.

Both men jumped slightly. After staying in the same house together for three years, they still weren't use to Sally just popping in out of no where.

Josh whirled on Sally. "Can't you at least use the stairs?!"

"No Josh she can't, she'll go right through them" Aidan droned.

Sally nodded in agreement. "Then I'll end up in the basement" she noticeably shivered.

"It's not that bad" Aidan defended his underground haven.

Josh groaned and walked to the kitchen, leaving Sally and Aidan to themselves. After seeing Josh disappear behind the kitchen wall, his mask crumbled to dust. The stress of the news he just received stressed him to no end, the impending danger getting closer and closer.

Sally frowned, Aidan was usually so composed. "Aidan...what's wrong?" She asked.

He smiled sadly at her, he felt the most sorry for her. He wanted to give her everything, yet he couldn't give her one thing. If he walked through her right now, it would undoubtly hurt her physically, in a ghostly sense.

"Nothing Sally, tell Josh I'll be back later if he asks" Aidan said leaving out the front door.

Sally wanted to follow after him, but leaving the house for a couple of miles was all she could muster, and Aidan was moving at a speed she couldn't follow behind.

"Aidan be careful" she whispered.

Snow crunched under Aidan's feet as he ran. There was no mistaking this scent, and the overwhelming pressure of power. It couldn't be possible though, Bishop disintegrated into dust in his arms. There was no way he could be back alive and in the world, but this scent was unmistakable.

He was back in the warehouse he killed his maker in. The sawdust sand whirling through the air as he inhaled. A presense walked in behind him and Aidan's face grew grave.

"How..." Aidan demanded without turning around.

Bishop smiled at his first made, his confusion reminding him of the times when he told him to kill his own family.

"You know Aidan...it really hurt when I realized I was going to be killed by you. You of all people whom I trusted, managed to kill me...and in the most gruesome way too. Even after death..the chain links you engraved in my throat are still there" He said walking around.

Gravel crunched under his luxury shoes. "Do you know what happens to fellow makers when their son or daughter decides to kill them?" He asked.

"It probably has a lot to do with your revival"

He nodded and smiled. "You always were the smartest of my children...they get turned into-how did you put it?-Reapers"

Aidan scrunched his eyebrows up in confusion, impossible. "If that were true..."

"Then you would probably see lots of old faces, that's what I thought initially, but it's really simple. We are hand picked...by the angel of death, if we are deemed worthy enough..it's our job to grant wishes and steal souls" Bishop stated as if he was teaching a history class. "It's quite clichè ,but it's true and the most simple way to tell it"

Aidan swallowed and thought of all the possible scenarios that could go wrong in this situation. "Can you be killed?"

Of course Aidan didn't expect him to tell the truth crystal clear without asking for something in return, that's just how his maker worked. He wouldn't be surprised if the cost for having a conversation with him costed him little bits of his soul.

Bishop smiled, slyly like a cat. "No. Even if I could I don't think my boss would appreciate that very much"

"It's my first time hearing you call anyone your boss, he must've tamed you well, this boss of yours" Aidan snorted.

Bishop's face grew annoyed. "On the contrary. My boss has the power to turn my soul, a vampire's soul, into tiny little pieces for other reaper's to feast upon! My god Aidan, theres a thing called surviving. I'd rather survive than be stupid and let my mouth be my un-doing"

Aidan almost wanted to call him bluff on his answer, but the finality in his voice was as clear as his once love for Surren.

"But don't worry" Bishop said with his hands up in surrender. "I can't take souls as I please unfortunately. There are some sorry S.O.B's that I would love to see go, but it messes up the natural order of things. I'm only there when its time..." Bishop stated.

Aidan let out a breath of relief. Not only was Bishop harmless, he didn't have to see him as often as he had to when he was alive as a vampire.

Bishop chuckled. "Don't get so excited Aidan, you just might be coming to me sooner than you'd like"

"Is that...a warning?"

"No. Just a bit of healthy foreshadowing. It really was great seeing you again"


The memories whooshed away as quickly as they came, leaving behind a dull space from once it occupied. Aidan frowned, how was it that he was standing there so calmly when it was Alex, whom he was desperately trying to keep Sally away from, has once again snatched away the very thing he wanted the most?

But Alex continued on with the charade and Sally was as confused as ever, who to believe, who to trust, who's faith was never real to begin with. It was all fun and games for these two men, good intentions minus the bad ones, and it was Sally again who got caught in the fray.

"You don't really expect me to believe all of this do you?" Sally glared at Alex. "Aidan may be keeping stuff from me, but surely...they aren't as bad as you say" she cried.

Alex smirked. "Oh? so you didn't believe me when I said you were obviously attracted to me? In many more ways than one you said you wanted me, over and over again in that bed. Or is whats disgusting you more..is that sweet angelic Sally wasn't screaming her knight in shining armor's name, but mine?"

Sally looked at Aidan, waiting for his reaction, but a silent incline in his neck and the disappointed look in his face said it all...and that pissed her off to no end.

"Really? Your going to accept the fact that I slept with a total stranger!—

Alex cleared his throat. "But you know me, and it was consensual...and very needed if I might add, I missed you very much"

Sally glared at him for one interrupting her and two taking all the credit.

"How can you not be mad?! You seem to hate and despise this man! And your girlfriend, who you were pretty sure going to marry, fucked him! And your going to stand there?" she gave him an unbelievable look.

Aidan punched the wall behind him, making Sally jump. He hasn't done that before no matter how mad he got with her.

"I am mad Sally! It's because I love you that I don't express it, but your really testing my patience" he growled.

Alex chuckled out loud. "This is what I wanted you to see Sally, your perception of this guy is baffling to me. How can you say the things you do about him when it's not even true?"

"You killed her parents!" Aidan yelled.

Alex smirked at the road Aidan was taking with him. "I saved her mother from walking this terrible earth any longer than she had to and I eternally damned her abusive father to hell, what more could she want from me?" He shrugged.

Her parents were dead? As far as she could remember, the memory of her parents were a bit of a haze, as well as her childhood. A lot of what these two were saying eerily starting to make sense, and her body revolted at the idea. The more she excepted the facts, the more it seemed that her entrails were being culled from their rightful places.

She wrapped her arms around her stomach and groaned, earning Alex's attention again.

His face went from sadistic to vaguely sorry. "You feel it don't you?...what his lies are doing to you and your soul?.."

He turned towards Aidan and narrowed his eyes at him. "I may not have the power at the moment to necessarily keep you here, that narcissist Bishop will just free you again. You may come with us...back to the real world that is. But afterwards, I'm making Sally into a reaper"

"You can't!" Aidan rorared.

Alex grabbed Aidan by the jaw, crushing it with indents of his fingers. "If I take Sally back as she is now back to the world, she will die. But I can bypass her death if that means turning her into the same as me"

Alex disdainfully unhinged his hand from around Aidan's neck and wrapped his arms around Sally. It pained him to know that this might not turn out the way she wanted, but he wouldn't have to explain anything once they got back. She would know everything and remember everything.

The question was...what would she do with the reality he saw when he got there?


A/N: short and unfulfilling. This probably would've made it to mid-three thousands ,but I don't want the big part in this chapter. It's too soon to totally blow you guys away yet xD enjoy what's to come