Raison D'être | Chapter 3
A LXG Fanfiction by Majokai Yukiko
Pairing: Dorian + Tom
Warning: Slash. Wicked Dreams.
Timeline: Post-movie cannon.
This is an amateur effort and does not intend to infringe on the rights of Alan Moore, Kevin O'Neil, the filmmakers and their associates.
A/N: Thanks to inasense and prodigette for the encouragement. I'd jump for joy if the filmmakers will use this plot to bring Dorian back. I'm sure we can do with more slash in the movie.
Sorry to Ally for not letting you beta this. You can help me beta it when you watched the movie…[actually, it's because it's ending soon and I don't want to spoil the movie for you.]
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I know you! I walked with you once upon a dream
I know you! The gleam in your eyes is so familiar a gleam
Yet, I know it's true that visions are seldom all they seem
But if I know you, I know what you'll do
You'll love me at once, the way you did once upon a dream
~ONCE UPON A DREAM
"Mrs Harker! MRS HARKER! Are you awake?! I need your help!" Tom shouted, pounding on the cabin door frantically.
Outside the rain was pouring, and the waves were violent. It was as if Neptune had taken it upon himself to punish the Nautilus for invading his realm. The lights flickered.
"Coming!" Mina opened the door with a half-worried, half-annoyed look on her face. She was still dressed in her nightgown; her luscious blonde curls falling over her shoulders wildly. "What's wrong?"
Without hesitation, Tom grabbed her hand and pulled her down the corridors and into his room. He flicked a light switch on and pointed at the painting on the wall.
The wet paint on Dorian Gray's immortalized face reflected the light and glinted. Beside Tom, Mina shuddered lightly and hissed in anger. She then turned to the American with a look of exasperation on her face.
"What is it, Tom?" She asked.
"The picture!" Tom exclaimed. "The paint's fresh! See!" He thrust his stained fingers in her face.
"Tom," she sighed and spoke very slowly, as though trying to explain something ridiculously simple to a retarded child without losing her patience. "You left the windows open."
Blue eyes widened as Tom turned away from Mina to inspect the far end of his room. He had indeed left his windows open, and a puddle of water was already forming on his floor.
"But…but…" He sputtered incoherently, blushing furiously in embarrassment.
"It's only a picture, Tom." Mina whispered sadly. "Only a painting."
"But what if he can return? What if, so long as the painting is not destroyed, he can come back to life again?"
"I hate to say this, Tom, but Dorian is gone." Mina walked out of the room, turning off the lights as she went.
Tom stared from the open window, to his bed and to the painting. The portrait was facing his bed. If it got wet, why was his bed still dry then?
Also, the American narrowed his eyes and took note of the water on his floor. The rain tracks never reached that far.
***
"A penny for your thoughts?" Tom looked up from his sausage (mutilated by the constant stabbing with his fork) and offered a weak smile.
Jekyll tilted his head to one side and regarded Tom with a concerned expression his face. After thinking about it for a while, the scientist pulled out the chair beside Tom and sat down.
"You've changed." Tom realized. At the beginning of the League, Jekyll was a timid doctor who could barely keep his demons in check. He had indeed changed for the better, more confident, more in control.
They had all changed.
"And you look terrible." Jekyll retorted. Tom gave a wry grin. He knew. There were dark rings around his eyes, and heavy bags hanging from his lower lids. He was getting thinner too, losing weight faster than he could replace them, the combined result of a horrible appetite and even worse sleeping habits.
Or the lack of them, in any case.
Tom had not slept a wink for three days, ever since that stormy morning when he work up to wet paint. The canvas had not dried yet, but Tom dared not mentioned it to Mina. He had made enough of a fool of himself before her, and had no wish of doing so again.
He was also afraid of what he would dream of if he sleep.
"I think you need help, young Sawyer." Jekyll got up from the table and put a hand on Tom's shoulders gently. "Come see me in my office when you are done. I'll give you something to help you sleep."
"Poison can do the job." Tom muttered to himself and returned to murdering his lunch.
***
He should not have gone looking for Jekyll like he was told to. Tom cursed himself and the good doctor repeatedly as he paced around his dream world, Dorian Gray's library, waiting for a certain obnoxious ass to show himself.
"I wasn't expecting you to come." Tom spun around and caught sight of the man standing at the doorway of the library, soaked wet to his skin. Was it raining outside?
Duh, it was London. It was either raining, or just rained or about to rain.
"You haven't been here for a few days. I thought you weren't coming at all." Dorian continued, shrugging out of his wet waistcoat and hanging it up at the corner of the room.
"Not that I have a choice. I have to sleep, sooner or later, right?" Tom was angry. Whose fault was it that every time he sleeps, he would dream of the immortal? How dare Gray even think he had the choice of not showing up?
"A dream is a wish your heart makes, Tom Sawyer." Dorian smirked. "The usual?" He asked, holding up a clear bottle from his liquor collection. Tom nodded.
The American took the moment of silence to ponder upon what the other man had said. He definitely had no wish to keep seeing Dorian Gray in his dreams. A dream had all the makings of a nightmare if it contained the immortal. Not that it had ever been particularly scary. Not unless you count the last time when he woke up to find the paint on the portrait as fresh as if it was newly painted.
"I—"
"Don't ask a thing!" Dorian yelled furiously, slamming the bottle back onto the tabletop. He marched over to where Tom was with wide strides, grabbing the boy by the shoulders and pushing him down onto the leather couch, glaring at him with fury and what could be read as hurt in those eyes. Tom was shocked. This was probably the most variety of emotion he would ever see on the immortal's face. For some reason, it had dissolved the otherwise aloof and distant air around the man.
For other reasons, it had frightened yet intrigued him to see the man like that.
"I didn't want you to see you, but you had to turn up, didn't you? You simply had to, butting your nose into any thing and every thing as if it were your birthright to do so!"
Tom raised an eyebrow. "Why didn't you want to see me?"
Dorian took a deep breath, as if trying to calm himself. All his anger seemed to have been peeled off after that loud tirade. He was not offended by the question, only contemplating the best way to go about answering it.
"You have questions," Dorian finally replied. "Questions that I do not wish to answer, or do not have answers for."
"And that is supposed to stop me from asking them?" Tom reclined back onto the couch, making himself comfortable. How quickly the tables turned. Tom had the vague idea that the European was treading on dangerous ground here, exploring a new territory that he had never been to before.
"You should go," Dorian sighed, picking up his cane and began to walk out of the library.
"Wait!" Tom got up from the couch and followed the other man a step or two. "Why was the paint on the portrait fresh?"
Dorian stopped in his steps and lowered his head. Without turning back, he answered.
"You will know what you wake up later. Ask Mina or Jekyll to give you something strong enough to knock you out without dreaming. I had been uncharacteristically kind to you, but don't expect any encore performance."
Tom looked thoughtfully at the waistcoat hanging from its rack. And then he woke up.
End of Chapter 3
Continue to Chapter 4