Here we are, folks, we're at the second to last chapter here. Are y'all excited? Cuz I sure am. It's been a hell of a ride!

Short chapter is short. But it's hella important. This chapter essentially sets up how the story is going to end. Our poor Vanya finally comes to a terrible realization….There's some brief gore at the end, but nothing else in terms of a warning. And angst. Lots of angst. But you already know that.

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Ch 9: Healing

"Baby maybe you've got something

I think that maybe we're on to something big,

Bigger than I could have ever imagined."

Ivan growls through the pain, uninfected hand grabbing onto the coffee table in an effort to pull his weighty body up, to put him back on his feet. He can feel the muscles in his legs clenching and cramping, knees shaking from— what? From illness? From what sickness?

Ivan's movements are absent, even as he grits his teeth in concentration, as his mind is still somewhere else, still taking him back to last night's dream. What it had meant.

It doesn't make any sense. Last night he had found Alfred, had found him and held him and made love to that precious body, but yet when Ivan had woken up and traversed the house for any signs of the tiny American, he had found none. And then, all of a sudden his legs had given out in the living room and he had crumpled to the floor.

Finally, after what felt like hours of ache and weakness the strength finally comes back to his legs, halting the shaking and allowing him to rise to his feet. Though the newfound physical wellness cannot quite alleviate the throbbing memory inside his head

Ivan found himself struggling with some of the things that dream Alfred had said. Dream Alfred, who had said he was dead, said he was gone forever—

But how had Alfred, how could he have—

Could he— could Ivan have—

No.

Ivan had told it to Alfred in his dream. He loved him. Loved him more than anything. He had sacrificed his own life for Alfred.

Ivan takes in a harsh breath. Every time he thinks of Alfred recently his chest tightens, his breath shortens, and he feels his throat go raw.

Ivan wheezes, clutching onto the doorframe, leaning up against it.

Beautiful Alfred, flushed and wanton and gorgeous beneath him—

Ivan gasps for breath, leaning his forehead against the frame, clutching at his chest with his uninfected hand.

"Alfred...Fredka…" He feels a wetness cling to his eyes as he tries to compose himself, bringing thoughts away from Alfred to stave off the pain. He grits his teeth angrily. The physical pain had not bothered him before, why did it hurt so badly now?

He feels something gnawing at his stomach and decides to respond to it. Anything, anything to take his mind off of Alfred. For the first time in weeks, Ivan actually feels the pang of hunger.

Ivan hobbles into the kitchen, cradling his left arm against his chest. The wound in his wrist was hurting more than ever, the pain making Ivan slow, sluggish. There were moments when the Russian's eyes began to blur, or when he became dizzy and had to sit down, chest heaving, for a few moments.

Ivan grips the counter tightly as he scours the kitchen. Mentally, he imagines himself cooking for Alfred as he pulls utensils out from the cupboards with shaking hands, his little sunflower's voice ringing in his ears, because he had heard it so clearly, so perfectly last night—

His chest pangs again.

Ivan turns on the stove, clumsily dumps some oil into the pan, and sets out the long, flat butchers knife that he had found in one of the drawers onto the wooden cutting board.

But as he moves over to the refrigerator and puts his hand on the handle, Ivan freezes.

He hadn't looked at the fridge, obviously, in a very long time, considering he had been simply living off of store bought vodka and air up to this point.

There is a picture put up on the refrigerator, a standard rectangle of white paper, held up by the magnet of a brilliant yellow sun that he briefly remembers had been bought for him as a birthday present. He recalls, the day before all of this had begun, only hours before he held Alfred for the last time, the young American had been making a big fuss over the paper, which he had chosen to display proudly in their kitchen.

Ivan had not given it much thought when he had put it up, as he was too busy slipping his hands under Alfred's sweatshirt to feel the curves of his stomach underneath, softened with the thin remaining layer of baby fat that made Ivan want to squeeze him to his body like a down pillow and never let go, to behave like a young child holding their favorite teddy bear close—

"Hey! Vanya, stop it for a sec, will ya? Don't you want to look at the picture?"

Ivan noses the American's ear from behind and sighs.

" Что? Picture? Picture of what?"

Alfred squirms as Ivan's hands trail upward to glide along his chest.

"W-well, it's of you and me— "

"Why must I be looking at pictures? I am having my little one right here."

Ivan fades out of the memory and instead focuses on the picture. Alfred's skills at drawing had always left much to be desired, as the American pop styles he was so proud of were hardly derived from reverent European forms, and were barely anatomically correct. Still, the colored pencil drawing of Alfred and Ivan, holding hands and standing in front of a crudely drawn house with swirls of grey smoke coming from the chimney, the entire thing dabbed in glitter and bathed under a highlighter-yellow sun, was endearing in its childishness, and the numerous erased lines of colored pencil showed that the American had clearly placed a lot of time into making it, from his point of view, perfect.

Ivan smiles at the idea of Alfred, a grown man and a nation, nevertheless agonizing over the details of his colored pencil masterpiece.

It was so perfect, so utterly Alfred, that Ivan feels that if he touches it he may be able to grasp a little bit of Alfred's warmth and comfort.

Ivan reaches out, touches the picture, and stops.

Hands.

His are cold and pale, lifeless except for the pulsing bruises around his wrist wound, just like—

Hands, hands that touch, hands that hurt, hands that squeeze and shake and choke, hands that-hands that kill—

He clenches them, looking at the shaking fists, cold, chapped lips parting to bare teeth.

Hands— it was all the fault of these hands—

And something snaps in his head.

Alfred's— Alfred's body— his hands on Alfred's throat, choking his precious sunflower to death, Alfred gasping his name, trying to throw him off, struggling and fighting until he stilled, then Ivan leaving him crumpled on the floor and fleeing in his hazy panic, wandering the neighborhood in the night and finally collapsing on the grass—

Coming back and finding Alfred cold and still, but no, it was impossible, no no no no no he couldn't have, it couldn't have been Ivan who crushed his beautiful flower—

There had never been any vengeance to be had, Ivan had never been a martyr, no, no, Ivan was nothing, Ivan was— a murderer—

His breathing comes harder, faster.

He had done it. He had. Nobody else. Alfred was gone, Alfred was dead and it was all the fault of the hands, all the fault of his hands, his hands that had torn away the most precious creature in all of existence-that had ripped out his own sun from his sky and sent his world's orbit askew.

Ivan bites his lip until it bleeds and resists the urge to scream, because screaming he had already done enough screaming, he had screamed until he was empty and now all he felt was a numbing throbbing anger in his chest and screaming wouldn't help, wouldn't help the feeling wouldn't bring Alfred back to him—

He grabs his wounded hand as if it's an enemy, as if it has attacked him and slams it on the cutting board, breathing heavily as he stares at the hateful things and stares and stares and stares and he knows what he has to do—

His right hand is lined with thick red lines creeping outwards, trailing up the length of his arm from the wound on his wrist, the edges of which have begun to turn black. Ivan imagines that it would hurt more if his body was not already numb, if his body hadn't been numb for weeks now. He clenches his left hand and watches the veins bulge out from the pale skin. This hand was still healthy, this hand could still feel pain—

He releases the grip on his right wrist and instead places his healthy, left hand onto the wooden board. His ring fingers gives an involuntary twitch, as if it was an animal, struggling away from its inevitable slaughter.

Ivan picks up the carving knife in one hand, a gift from his sister many years ago. He holds it in his shaking right hand, barely able to keep a firm grip as his fingers tremble from infection. He didn't think about repercussion and consequences, he didn't have to wonder how he would survive with only one grossly infected hand, all he knew was that he had to get the hand away from him, to sever the foreign and treacherous limb from his body—

He puts the knife to the skin of the hand on the counter, tracing the line across his wrist back and forth without yet putting any pressure on it.

He grits his teeth and narrows his eyes and feels them wet as he presses the point of the knife into his flesh.

Alfred— I'm so sorry.

His waning strength doesn't fail him in this final act. The spurt of red arches gracefully in the air before splattering on the white linoleum of the floor.

"But I feel like I forgot something,

I'm thinking maybe I'm missing something big,

Bigger than I could have ever imagined."

Are you guys ready for the grand finale? I really can't believe this fic has made it this far.

The picture thing was a little random, but its been floating around in my head since about chapter two and I wanted to put it in somewhere. And besides, Ivan needed a trigger object to go absolutely nuts.

If you read, please review! I don't like to beg, but if you review, it really lets me know that people are reading and enjoying! And thus I will feel more motivated to make my work its best, and end this sucker with a bang!