Time Of Dying
He sees her standing there, quiet and pale and uncertain, dark circles under her eyes. He can sympathize with the haunted uncertainty in her gaze. After all, a few days ago, she was dead. She died in violence, and from what he knows of the process, she was brought back in pain. And unlike his own experience, those who brought her back had little care for her well-being, mental or physical.
They don't have much time. But he thinks he can spare enough for a much-needed conversation. He moves to stand beside her. "Hey."
She doesn't move away. "Hey." Her voice is softer, more hesitant than he remembers it. Again, not surprising.
He leans against the wall next to her and slides down, biting the inside of his cheek on a flinch as his own wound throbs. He's been hiding the dying flesh, the outward sign of his failing body, for a while, but he's not sure how much longer he can go before either the pain or the injury itself goes beyond his capacity to conceal.
Tessa slides down beside him at his silent invitation. "You okay?"
Maybe he's not doing so great at hiding his struggle. Or maybe she just sees the echoes of her own recent ordeal in him. Either way, he shrugs and gives her a tired smile that only reaches his eyes because he's thinking how brave she is. "Just tired. You?"
"Just..." She trails off, and he understands. Been there, done that.
"Yeah. I've been there. It's hard."
She blinks at him. "You can't..."
"I can." He lifts his hand and taps his chest, bracing himself to hide the pain it causes. You'd think dead flesh wouldn't be so painful...but then, nothing about this experience is what he would have expected. "I took a spear to the heart, a few years ago. Was dead for a while. Then I came back. So...I've been there."
She looks into his eyes, and he knows when she sees the truth of his words, because she swallows and looks away. "I..bet that sucked."
"It did. But...then again, so did yours." He didn't see her body, but he didn't have to. She died in violence and in pain, and it was ugly. Horrible, based on what little Mack told him.
He could wait for her to speak more, but they don't really have much time. So he decides to push a little. "Look, I know how disorienting and painful this whole thing can be. And I totally understand if you don't want to talk about it. But if you do, if you want to talk to someone who's been there...I'm here. That's all I wanted to say."
For a minute, he thinks she won't speak. Then she tilts her chin to her chest, hiding behind her unkempt and curly hair. Halting words rasp out of her throat. "I...it's hard to know what's real, what's not...I keep waiting for… for..." She pulls her knees up and curls into a small ball.
He finishes her statement with the words that have filtered through his own thoughts more than once. "You keep waiting for the pain to come back. For your heart to stop again and everything to vanish. To realize that you're not really here and nothing you see is real."
"Yeah. Or...you know, maybe I dreamed of being dead. Made it all up in my head. Maybe...maybe Flint isn't an Inhuman, and I never got caught hiding him, and I'll wake up and everything will be...how it used to be. Maybe you'll be gone, and never have been here, and it'll just be the Lighthouse and Grill and trawling and Virgil and...everything else."
"I know the feeling." And he does. After he broke through the false memories of Tahiti, he had similar problems. Even before then, he sometimes dreamed of dying in the dark and the half-seen faces of his surgeons. Being stuck in the Framework and coming out with two sets of life memories didn't help in that regard.
"Does it ever go away?"
"The pain and the fear? Yes. Eventually. At least partially. I have bad days sometimes." More frequently since Ghost Rider. "But...the uncertainty fades. You just have to hold on to the important things. Hold on and never let go. Cling to the people who care about you, and who you care about. Build from there. One day at a time. And it gets better."
"Promise?" Her voice is so young. But then, she's not really much older than Daisy. If she's even that old. She's over 18, he knows, but beyond that, she's heartrendingly young. Like most of the people around her, she's grown up too hard and too fast, in a world that tears down more than it nurtures.
But she does have people she cares for. People like Flint. And Flint is a good kid, coming into maturity and his powers well. And he adores Tessa. He'd move the world, quite literally, for her.
He gives her a smile and reaches out to put a comforting hand on her shoulder. She doesn't shy away, which he takes as a positive sign. "I promise."
"And the bad days?" Because of course she needs to know. He was – is – surrounded by friends and support, and he still has bad days. Her world is much crueler, and her recovery is likely to be more so.
"Find something you can believe in. A cause, an idea, a person. A dream. A goal. Anything. A combination of those things. And you hold on tight. Find something you can keep with you and cherish, and whenever it gets bad, you hold that in your hands and remind yourself to take one more step. One more step forward. Find someone to hold you in the dark, whether they're a friend or something more." He hesitates on the last part of his words, but she needs them. Will need them. "And...it's okay...if you're not always okay. You have to know that. It doesn't matter how you deal, but...understand that, and let yourself deal with it rather than trying to pretend you're all right. It seems kind of dumb, I know, but it helps."
There's a breathy sort-of laugh. "You follow that advice?"
He might as well be honest. "Not always. Not as often as maybe I should." He's definitely been ignoring it since Ghost Rider. "But it works out better when I do." He remembers the comfort of May in his office telling him it's okay to feel different, and Daisy reassuring him after the Memory Machine's torture. May again, helping him through the erratic episodes of serum-induced carving and their aftermath. He thinks of how it feels to work on Lola, or tinker with his ancient technology, or spar with the others, or even just have a quiet guilt-free dinner of his favorite foods. Like cheeseburgers. He hasn't had a cheeseburger in months, but he's hopeful that he'll get at least one more before...before the end.
"I'm not sure I can..." She trails off again, her fingers twisting around each other. "I'm not..."
"Neither was I, at first. It's hard. But you're stronger than you know."
Her eyes flick up to his. "You don't know..."
"I do know that." He reaches out and brushes away the hair in her face, then takes her hand. "I know because you agreed to help us stop Kasius, and you protected Flint, even knowing the dangers, and you didn't let everything that happened to you stop you from doing the right thing for everyone else. And you're here, standing with us, even after all you've endured, and all the pain and danger that associating with us has caused you."
She curls her fingers around his, then looks him in the eyes. "You...you really think that."
"I really do." He wants to pull her into a hug, to hold her close, and never let go. He doesn't feel as strongly for her as he does for Daisy and May and Jemma, but it's close enough that he would absolutely…
He stops that thought in its tracks, then pulls her forward and offers her a hug anyway, in spite of the fact that they don't know each other as well and he's probably leaving her behind in a few hours. She doesn't pull away, so he tucks her close and gives her all the warmth he can, ignoring the pain of his wounds and his damaged flesh, the sparks of pain that radiate from all the places her bony frame comes in contact with his.
It doesn't last long. He didn't expect it to. But when she pulls away, her face looks less wary and hunted and hurting. So that's a win. She looks at him with eyes that are clear and less uncertain than they were. "You're going to try and change all this, yeah?"
"We are. We hope we can stop the Earth from being destroyed."
"I hope you do. I hope you make it so this future – this life - doesn't happen. But whether you do or don't...I'm glad you came here."
"So am I." And he is, in a weird way. He met some amazing people. And maybe the future sucks, but now he has a chance to change it. A chance he wouldn't have had if he hadn't come here and seen this. He wouldn't have known what was coming, or how to stop it, if he hadn't been brought to this time.
He could say more, but then May comes in and gives him a look, one he knows well. Time's up, and they've got to move. He wonders how much she heard of his conversation with Tessa, but it doesn't really matter. It's May. He can trust her with this. He's trusted her with so much more.
They both stand, Tessa with fluid ease and he with a grunt of effort that he hopes she won't see as anything more than an older man with aching joints. Then they rejoin the others and get to work. They have a past to return to and a future to save. Lives to live, however long they last.
***ToD***
She goes looking for him after it's over. After Talbot's been launched into space by a super-powered Daisy, after they've confirmed with Robin that the future has changed. After the Fitz with them dies, and they realize that somewhere out in space, Fitz is still alive, hibernating in a cryo chamber, and they can bring him back. So he's not gone forever.
She finds him in his quarters, sitting on his bed. He looks up at her. For a moment, she thinks he's going to maintain his mask of cheerful acceptance. Then it falls, and she sees the pain in his face. Pain and sorrow.
She stops in front of him. "You didn't take the serum."
"No. I...it felt wrong. And I was right. Without it..."
"Without it, Daisy wouldn't have defeated Talbot." She steps closer, closes his door behind her. "But you didn't know that it would work. She might not have realized she had it, or she might have refused to use it."
"True. But I knew her plan of having me talk Talbot down wasn't going to work at all, so...I figured the odds were better this way."
"You couldn't have known..."
"Yes, I could. You heard him. Accusing me of going behind his back to contact you, of betraying him. He wouldn't have listened to me." He stops, then speaks again in a quieter voice. "If it had started when you arrived on the Remorath ship, I might have taken the shot, but...he'd already decided I was untrustworthy. After he came back from the Confederacy meeting. He accused me of being his enemy." He looks at her, and there are shadows in his eyes. "He tortured me, and made me kneel before him."
She's going to find Talbot's frozen body, revive him, beat the snot out of him, repeat the process, then vaporize the Gravitonium out of him from the toes upward. Then shoot him in the balls and freeze him again, so she can repeat the process if she feels like it. To do something like that to Phil...to Coulson...and he knew Coulson wasn't well. But to humiliate him like that, to torture him after he risked life and limb and very nearly died saving him...well, she's not sure her revenge fantasy is actually brutal enough. But fantasy it will have to stay, because she's needed here more than she needs to chase vengeance.
She breathes deep and swallows back rage. Then exhales. "You never said anything."
"Didn't seem to be much point." He shakes his head. "We were already trying to stop him, and if I'd told you, you might have been too angry to think clearly. And we needed everyone thinking clearly. Everyone willing and able to do their parts."
Which was also why he let them think that he'd taken the serum, until it was too late for them to do anything about it.
As Agent May, she understands. His life for the world. She'd have done the same.
As Melinda May, the woman who respects him and loves him and has stood by him for so long, she's furious. And hurt. She wanted him to choose to live. She knows he's a hero, in the truest sense of the word. She knows he would always choose to save as many lives as possible. She knows he would die for any of them without a second of hesitation. But she didn't want him to make that choice. She wanted him to be selfish. She wanted to be enough to make him take a different approach. She wanted the feelings between them to be enough to keep him alive.
She takes a deep breath and swallows back the pain and the heat that makes it want to turn into icy rage. "I understand why..."
"I don't think you do." It's unusual for him to interrupt her. Let alone contradict her so flatly. And his tone of voice…
"What do you mean?" She leans against the door. "I know you, Phil. I know what you're capable of. I know you heard the warning Elena gave us, and I know that you would always choose to save the world instead of yourself. I know you have no trouble risking your life to save others..."
"And that is part of it. But it's not everything. There are things I...I haven't told you." He swallows.
Something cold and painful coils in her gut, a whisper of intuition that tells her she isn't going to like this. Still, she could no more turn aside than she could fly without a plane. "So tell me now."
He swallows again, then meets her gaze. "I'm tired. I...I'm just so tired. I've been living on borrowed time, and even though I don't regret it...still..." He breathes deeply, raggedly, and continues. "I've...even before I discovered the truth about Tahiti and my resurrection...I could feel it. I'm...I feel like I'm losing myself. Piece by piece." He raises his robotic hand with a wry smile that comes nowhere near his eyes. "Sometimes literally. I've come so close to death so many times...it's like a specter over my shoulder, one I can feel hovering there, all the time. And it hurts. It hurts and it feels like I'm splintering apart, one small bit at a time. What I did to Grant, some of the decisions I've made...the way the alien serum affected me...the dreams, the nightmares...it just keeps piling up. And honestly, I'm not sure how long I can go on like this."
He inhales, exhales. "And...everyone...everyone keeps looking to me...I thought, maybe, if I stepped back a little...but it never works out. And there's always some new crisis, something I'm needed for...it never ends. And I thought I was okay with that, but..." He closes his eyes and trails off, pale and trembling slightly.
He's so raw and open, speaking these things. He hasn't been like this since the carving compulsion nearly drove him mad. She speaks the first thing that comes to mind. "You could take a break..."
"When? And what would I come back to? What would I leave behind? The situations have been so volatile..."
He's right. She hates it. And she can't quite stop the words that emerge. "You never said anything."
He opens his eyes, and there's something raw and aching, like glass and salt has been raked across his soul. "Who would I tell? Fitz and Simmons? It would break their heart, and they'd be so busy trying to help me they'd never have time for anything else. And we need their talents in too many other areas. Elena? You saw how she felt. Daisy? You said it yourself...it's not something she can handle, and it's too much to lay on her. Mack? He'd try, but it would be hard on him, and the big guy wears his heart on his sleeve, so the rest of the team would probably figure out something was wrong pretty quickly." He shakes his head.
Which leaves the obvious one, the person he very pointedly didn't name. "You could have spoken with me." He did trust her once, enough to bare both physical and mental wounds to her judgment.
"When? In case you haven't noticed, you're usually too busy disagreeing with my attempts to step back to actually listen to me. When you aren't shutting me off entirely." His chin tips up in unconscious challenge, even as his shoulders stiffen in preparation for her response.
The words sting and make anger flare sullenly in her belly. But...he's not wrong. In fact, that's what stings the most.
He's right. Maybe not all the time, but frequently. When he wanted to step down because the alien serum was afflicting his mind and his habits with the compulsion to carve and nightmares, she shut down every attempt he made to have that conversation with her. She didn't agree when he stepped back and took up joint responsibilities with Talbot. She didn't agree when he made Mack Acting Director, or when he yielded his position to Mace. She definitely didn't agree with his attempts to make Daisy into their leader, and not just because her heart leads more than her head.
He tried to talk to her after the team found out he was dying, but she shut him down. She still remembers. 'I've said everything I needed to say.'
Hard on the heels of that comes another, more painful realization. He's been trying to step back, to step down and decrease their dependence on him, for a long time. A very long time. He's never come right out and quit, or implied that he would, but he's been steering all of them toward leadership roles. Even Fitz and Simmons, to an extent. Encouraging independence, even if it means a little more arguing and a little more difficulty.
But it's been crisis after crisis, and they've needed him. And he's too much a hero and a soldier and a metaphorical shield for his people to abandon them when he's needed. Even if the costs are high. Even if it tears him apart. It's who he is, and why they all love him and cling to him so fiercely.
And he loves them too. Enough to break under their need, rather than let them be hurt by it. Enough to suffer in silence, to die in silence and without support, rather than cause them more pain than he must. He is a willing sacrifice to both humanity's need for saving and his team's need for a father and a guardian.
He's endured a lot. She's only now beginning to suspect that it's more than even she knew.
He's still waiting for her response. Still coiled tight, waiting for her anger. And she is angry. She does want to shout or lash out with her words, cutting and abrasive and goading. She wants a fight. Things are so much cleaner and simpler in a fight. But it's not what is needed, and more importantly, she can't stand the shame and the anguish of inflicting yet more wounds on him, whether they be physical or mental and emotional.
She breathes once, twice, letting her anger flow away. What replaces it is not serenity, but it's better than rage and hurt. Then she moves forward to stand before him. "You're right." She bends, crouches until she's kneeling before him and looking up into his face. He's startled, not yet sure where this is going. "But you're telling me now. So..." She reaches out and touches his knee, feels him shiver under her fingers. "If I ask you how you're feeling, right now, would you be honest with me?"
He swallows once, twice. His hands curl together, white bandage against one tanned wrist. His expression goes soft and open and painful. His response is quiet, barely audible, but certain. "Yes."
She doesn't want to ask, to know. But she needs to. Even more importantly, he needs her to. So she holds his gaze and speaks, calm and level, as if this isn't tearing her apart on the inside. "How are you feeling?"
"It hurts." His voice cracks and he looks away, head bowing slightly as his shoulders curl inwards. "It hurts. So much. I can feel myself dying, a little more every day. Every breath is like being stabbed again, and every day movement gets a little harder, breathing gets a little harder. Like my muscles are just...well, they are dying, I suppose. And the phantom pains from my hand...they used to only happen in cold weather or when I was stressed, but now...now they're constant. Like my body is trying to reject the only part of me that can't actually wither and die. I thought, when I made this deal...I thought it would be like the feeling when the Ghost Rider takes over."
He looks at her then, eyes damp and face full of pain and anguish. "You can feel it, did you know that? When the Rider takes over. Sears the flesh from your bones. Literally. Then regrows it when you switch back. It hurts. But it's like a third-degree burn, it only hurts for a few seconds, and then the nerves are seared away, except on the edges. But this...this is different."
He swallows again. "It's like being bitten by a brown recluse spider. Feeling the flesh die and rot away...and it hurts so much. And when I remember dying the first time, and what it took to bring me back..." He shudders. "I can't do that again. I...it scares me. It's terrifying. The price of living, after I was supposed to die, of going through that again...I can't. I can't do it again. I don't want to do it again. Besides, everyone we've seen go through the process...everyone we've seen revived like that...it never ends well. Not even for me, really. I don't...I don't want to become...like that...like Garrett or Ward or Talbot..." He shudders again and closes his eyes, his face wracked with pain and a fear she's almost never seen.
Almost. And yet it is familiar. She saw it once before, when she found him lying in the memory machine. When his memories took him back to a torment so great that Fury had his mind altered to stop it from tearing him apart and destroying him.
'Please...let me die...'
Different words, but the same unbearable agony inspires and twists through them. The same suffering, building almost beyond endurance. Or perhaps, it has already gone beyond endurance, and only his stubborn courage has kept him going.
She wants to throw up. Or hit something. All the fear and the pain he is suffering...he has been enduring this silent and unrelenting torture for months, perhaps longer, and she never realized.
His courage, his love, so fierce and burning so brightly, even in the midst of such unrelenting agony...it breaks her heart.
So does the fact that he's right. Whatever methods are used to bring men back from the brink of death...so far they've had poor results. Madness at best. A painful number of them have become villains. They've had to kill a fair share. Deathlok is probably the best result, and even that was a close call. Aida, Garrett, Talbot, Ward – even Lash, to a certain extent – he's taken the lives of many a friend who has been twisted by evil and madness from a life that was never meant to be.
What does it say about the strength of his heart, his love for all of them, that he is the only one who has not broken under his own revival? He has bent, yes. Done things he wasn't proud of. But he remains true to himself and his genuine affection for them, as well as his determination to be a protector.
How did she never realize the cost of such unwavering strength?
She moves before she can really think about it, rising to sit next to him and draw him close. "I'm so sorry." Sorry she didn't see. Sorry she never listened, never realized the depths of his torment. His fear.
"Don't be." He leans into her, accepts her embrace, and absolves her of any wrongdoing so easily. He sighs into her shoulder. "I know you think I was being reckless...I really didn't want to die. It's just...all those times I was risking my life, getting into dangerous situations...it's not that I was eager to die, it's just...I thought it would be easier. To make it quick, and clean. Instead of...this."
Instead of wasting, fading away, he means. And she can see where he'd get that idea. None of them want to watch him die. To watch his pain, to watch him fall, fighting to breathe. She remembers fighting to make his heart beat again. Remembers blood from his mouth and his arm, and the slow spread of dying flesh exposed when Jemma was monitoring him.
In some ways, it would be easier. But she can't bring herself to embrace that idea, any more than she could let him die on the floor of the Zephyr when he came back from dropping off Daisy at the fight with Talbot.
A quick death doing something meaningful, or a long slow fade, in pain and sorrow? It's a terrible choice. And thinking of it like that, she knows she would choose as he did. Which begs the question. "Do you want…?" She can't finish it, but they both understand what she's offering.
In his condition, assisting a suicide would be laughably easy. She could do it without anyone even thinking to question 'death by natural causes'. And even if they did, she doesn't think any of the team would look into it. Not when they all know his condition.
"No. No. I won't do that to you. Or them." Brave as ever, and she almost wants to cry. She doesn't though. There will be a time for tears later.
"Then we need to decide what you're going to do." He's stepped down, passed the torch to Mack for good this time, so all that remains is deciding how and where he wants to pass his final days.
Where they're going to spend his final days. There's no question that she'll go with him.
He breathes against her shoulder again, and the tension slips out of his frame, before he lifts his head and offers her the crooked little smile that always makes her heart skip a beat. Boyish and mischievous, it transforms his face. "I have an idea, actually..."
***ToD***
In the end, making plans is easy.
First, he announces his retirement. His plan to leave and spend the rest of his life on a warm tropical beach with some good alcohol and some sun and no worries but what he'll eat and if he remembered sunscreen.
None of them talk about how short 'rest of days' is likely to be.
Jemma mixes him up some medicine. It won't stop his condition, but it will stop most of the pain and make breathing and moving easier. And it will help prevent him from choking on his own blood again, which he appreciates.
They have a retirement party, which is a bit more somber than he always thought his retirement would be. There's a plaque being fixed to the wall above the cockpit that he's carefully avoiding looking at. He knows what it says. Kind of embarrassing, really, but it makes the rest of them feel better.
He spends time with each of his team, saying his goodbyes and offering little words of wisdom and comfort to each. Except for May. There will be time for that later. He wishes Fitz were there, but he's written the young man a letter with everything he would have said, and he knows Jemma will see that he gets it and reads it.
He gives out hugs and mementos and advice and love and laughter to each of them. Sometimes it hurts, but he hides the pain away. He won't do anything to hurt them that he can prevent.
Daisy is by far the hardest. She's like the daughter he never had. Jemma is a close second though. It hurts to leave them behind, but he knows it's for the best. So do they. They have things that need taking care of, a world that needs looking after and a man to find, and they can't do all those things if they're watching him die and trying to save him.
He only has days, perhaps weeks, left. But it's okay. He saved the world. He made the choice and changed the future. He forged a team – a family – and now he needs to let them spread their wings and learn to fly without him. Mack's a good leader and a good man. He'll lead them well. Daisy will be their fire, Jemma and Fitz will be their minds, and Elena will be the voice of ruthless logic and devil's advocate. Mack will be their commander and the glue that holds them together.
He suspects that May will come back, after he goes, and she will be the voice of experience and patience and practice.
They go to Tahiti. The real Tahiti this time. He wanted to see it before his time was up. Wants to make real the memories that were once falsified to save his sanity.
He and May leave the Lighthouse and the Zephyr, then watch their family and friends fly away without them. Then they set about finding a place to spend their time. Somewhere near the waves and the wind and the blue sky.
The place they pick has a grass roof. It's small and perfect, sheltered in the shade of palm trees.
They spend days, and sometimes nights, on the beach. May, of course, tans. They try all sorts of different cuisine. Fly Lola on a tour of the islands. They spend their nights together, curled on the bed and listening to the surf, or on a towel on the beach, watching the stars go by.
They actually do go parasailing and snorkeling. It's not the wisest decision, maybe, but he doesn't want to live these final days in fear, any more than he has the days before. So he finds a sympathetic pair of islanders who rent gear, explains that he's always wanted to try these things but has a terminal condition, and asks for advice and help. The men are sympathetic, and find a way to do both that isn't too difficult for him. And yes, it hurts, especially the stresses of the parasailing, but it's so worth it that he can't care.
The time in the air and under the sea, seeing the world in weightless abandon...no, he doesn't regret it, even if the actions and their aftermath hurt.
Neither of them talk about the medicine he takes. Neither of them speak about the lines of blackened, dying flesh that spread with each passing day, the progression of his condition painted starkly on his body.
They don't talk about the night that they come together, seeking love and comfort in each other's touch, and his body fails to respond. They are neither one of them inexperienced, so they adjust and find new paths to their mutual pleasure and enjoyment, and neither of them address what might otherwise be a mortifying failure on his part.
They don't talk about what she will do when he is gone.
Even with all that is unsaid, there are no walls, no silences between them. He does not hide when the pain sweeps through him, as it does sometimes, even with the medication. When he writhes and chokes and gasps, feeling the white-hot daggers of his tortured body, the cramping of muscles dying and fighting each other as they atrophy, he does not try to force her away, and she does not go. He screams and groans and cries without shame, and she comforts him without reservation, until it passes. And then they leave it behind them.
He says what he feels, and what he thinks, and so does she. They both say 'I love you' more than once. As often as they can.
He doesn't turn away when the nightmares wake him in the dark, nightmares and pain. She doesn't leave either, only cradles him and comforts him.
Sometimes, there is grief and stillness and the awareness of coming sorrow and regret, and both of them weep, silent tears that neither of them are ashamed of. At times such as these, they curl together and share warmth, not passion as much as compassion, and a tenderness that is healing as much as it is soothing.
These times are a farewell, painful and bittersweet, but better than the lack of one.
And finally, a night comes when they're curled together, and he knows. And he whispers words he's spoken before. "I...I'm tired."
She leans up on one elbow and strokes his face. "Then rest. I'll be here in the morning."
He swallows hard, feeling grief settle over him, wishing he had more time. Knowing why he doesn't, and why he probably wouldn't take it if he did. "That's the thing...I'm not sure I will be."
Her hand stills, and then she curls closer and leans against him, mindful of his sensitive body. She listens to his heartbeat for a moment, then lifts her head and caresses his face again, and gives him a long slow kiss. Then she settles back into place against him. "Okay."
It hurts, because he knows she's hurting too, both of them wincing under the pain of what's coming. Easier for her than it is for him. Maybe. He swallows and strokes her hair and her shoulder. "I'm...sorry." For leaving, for not claiming her affections sooner, for not speaking his mind sooner, for not taking the cure...he's not sure which of these he mourns, only that he does.
"Don't be." She shakes her head against his side, silken hair brushing over his chest. "It's okay."
It isn't. But he can hear in her voice that she's made peace with it, in these quiet days. She will mourn him, and she loves him, but she understands. He is forgiven for leaving her, for all the pain between them. And that has to be enough.
They lay together and he fights the weariness flooding through his veins, fights for one more second of time with her. He half expects tears, but she is serene and still. For him, he knows. She will weep when his last breath fades, but she will not cloud even a single moment before then with her grief.
She speaks again. "Phil...it's okay." She sits up, leans over him, kisses his brow. "It's okay. You can rest now." And he hears in the subtle inflections of her voice what they both know, that 'rest' means something different than it did before.
He closes his eyes in gratitude for her love and her kindness and her understanding, her willingness to give him this despite how it hurts, nearly overwhelming. He feels a tear track down his face, brushed away by a gentle thumb.
Darkness swoops in, and he feels the first falter in his heartbeat, an all-too-familar feeling. Hears a hitch of breath, and a soft murmured 'I love you'.
And he is gone.
Author's Note: So...somehow this just had to be written. It is fluff and angst and...well, I don't know why it wanted to be written so bad, but it did. A little AU, a little 'what if', and hopefully a good read all the way around.