Pietro's #1
Crush – Chapter 13
(See Chapter 1 for full
disclaimer and legend)
Darkness was all around him and Lance wondered exactly where he was. It felt as if he were standing on concrete or something equally as solid. He couldn't feel any walls around him but his senses told him that the space was vast. "Hello?" he called out. 'Where the hell am I? Where's Pietro?' The echo of his voice resounded all around him and he covered his ears as it became louder and more deafening. A few moments passed before it began to fade away and he took a few tentative steps forward; his feet making little sound over the ground.
After traveling a short distance he stopped, realizing he didn't know where he was going or if he was actually making any progress in getting there. Sighing, he looked around to try and see something, anything, in the darkness. For all he knew he was blind and was in the middle of the most brightly lit room in existence. "Hello?" he tried calling, covering his ears as the echo started up again. This was unnatural. It wasn't real. It couldn't be any place that existed in the real world. Sound didn't behave that way in reality. Lance wasn't much for theories or science, but he had watched enough television to reason that he might have been transported somewhere else. Somewhere else, or… 'Dreaming! I must be dreaming… maybe I could…' he closed his eyes and concentrated; trying to change something about the place he was in. When he opened them he was in a brightly lit chamber.
The floor beneath his feet was black marble; veins of sliver ran through the dark surface that spread out around him and beyond his field of vision. It was a vacant sea of black underneath a blue light that hovered in the middle of an equally empty sky. "Alright," he sighed aloud. "So I'm dreaming, but I still don't know where the hell I am," he grumbled, straining to look all around him. The expanse of the place was overwhelming and all too real for the perplexed dreamer as he desperately searched for something to focus on. He closed his eyes again as he felt himself begin to panic. 'Alright, what's going on here? Where's Pietro?' he was sure that Pietro had been there with him, but he couldn't remember when the other boy had left. He opened his eyes to take in the expanse of the room. "Pietro!" he called out.
He was expecting his voice to echo uncontrollably as it had before and covered his ears as it started up. He knew he'd develop a nasty headache if he didn't resolve this situation soon and tried to figure out what to do next. He waited for the echo to die down, wondering that the hell was going on and where Pietro might be. He might have been able to create light out of darkness, but his control wasn't absolute. Not in this place.
He seemed to remember something like this happening to him before, but he couldn't remember. He knew he had to find Pietro before he left, but a voice at the back of his mind began to question his motives. Was he only concerned for a friend? A lover? Shouldn't he just leave Pietro behind and save himself? That option was dismissed as soon as it formed into thought. He'd never leave Pietro behind! He wouldn't be able to live with himself if he did that. 'Leaving him behind would be safer, Lance,' the voice purred in his head.
The light that had been so bright before was fading to a dull glow as the voice in his head spoke, seeming sucking the life out of the place and causing the ground to shake. Clusters of rock rose through the floor and formed walls all around him, molding together and creating a ceiling of stone above his head. Lance suddenly felt very closed in as he realized he was in a passageway with many chambers breaking off on all sides of him. The open chamber that had once overwhelmed him had transformed into an underground tunnel. He began to wish for the power to wake from it all as the little voice at the back of his head became louder and more insistent. 'There's no reason to worry about him. What do you think will happen?' it purred sinisterly. 'That you'll save him and you two will live happily ever after? You know that'll never happen! Can you be happy with him? It would be far safer to like Kitty Pryde. Much safer that people don't know the real you.' "Shut up!" he yelled, covering his ears to try and block its mocking laugh. "I don't care! It doesn't matter! I'll save him, damnit!" The laughter grew in pitch and volume, rising to a deafening screech as Lance bolted, running along the tunnel to escape the maddening sound.
The ground beneath his feet sloped downwards, taking him deeper beneath the surface of the earth. The further he went, the less the noise became until it left him completely. It was instead replaced by a lower, more ominous rumbling that echoed along the tunnel walls from deeper within. The path did not end, but led him further and further into the bowels of the dream; his legs never slowing their fast pace as he raced into uncertainty. Openings appeared on all sides, but he stayed true to his path, familiar with it as if he'd traveled along it before. An opening appeared to his left and he instinctively turned down this new path as he rushed to reach his goal. The steep slope of this new tunnel forced him to slow down drastically, lest he tumble all the way to the bottom and make his presence known to whatever was making that inhuman noise. He shivered, the darkness around him growing in pitch as the terrible noises struck fear into his soul. Everything began making sense to him. It was too familiar and he knew he'd find Pietro when he got to the room at the end. The voice of doubt in the back of his mind was strangely silent which did little to ease his fears as the strange voices beyond grew louder.
Lance pressed his back to the cold stone as he approached an archway in the wall. He held his breath and peeked around the corner into the chamber beyond, somehow knowing what he would find within. The first thing the rock tumbler saw caused his breath to catch in his throat and he prayed that he had not been spotted as he ducked his head back within the shadows. Three extremely large creatures were sitting around a fire that burned fiercely in the centre of the barren chamber. Every time they spoke the air around them seemed to thicken with fear and Lance froze in place, unable to move as a sick terror sank into his skin. His brain was screaming at him to run away but he wasn't sure if it was the voice of doubt or his common sense telling him to flee. It didn't matter either way as he couldn't even move his feet from where he stood if he'd wanted to. He knew these creatures. He was having a very strong sense of deja-vu, like he'd been here before and this had already happened.
Despite the fear that weighted heavily upon him and made his body feel like lead, Lance peered around the corner once more. This time he saw that Pietro there; was bound and naked on the floor at the feet of the beasts. The older mutant couldn't see if he was alive or even conscious, but the fear that had held him in place so firmly before began to give way to his anger. The air around him reverberated and he could feel the bile rising in his throat as the stone around him broke apart, powerless under the vibrations that his anger brought forth. Lance took a deep breath, turning the corner to face the creatures and rescue his lover.
x-+-x
The moment he entered the room, Lance knew exactly what he should do. The creatures turned to him, guttural roars bellowing from their gaping maws as one of them began to charge him. He ducked out of the way, kicking it in the side as it crashed into the wall behind him and he turned to face the remaining monsters. They stood on the far side of the fire, whereas Pietro was closest to him. Lance briefly thought of grabbing his friend and running, but knew that he should defeat his opponents first. He didn't know what condition Pietro was in and jostling him in a frantic escape attempt might only wound him further. He could sense the creature behind him recovering and he found himself in a bad situation as he was surrounded with no escape.
The fear descended upon him again as the monsters began talking to each other in their foreign tongue. He had no idea what they were saying but their laughter filled his ears and brought a sickening feeling to his stomach. A few moments passed before the creatures seemed to finish their conversation, one beginning to speak to him in English as the remaining two laughed in their dark voices. "You can leave, but you can't bring him with you," it said. "You can only be safe if you leave him behind. We will kill you if you are with him."
"No!" Lance yelled, confused and angry at the option laid out before him. "I won't leave him behind! Who the hell are you? What do you want?" he stepped closer to his friend, ready to defend him from anything they had planned.
"Don't you know?" the leader of the creatures asked, it's features twisting into a grotesque grin. "We are fear. We are always with you whenever you are with him," it said, indicating the unconscious form of Pietro. "You can be safe if you leave him behind!"
Lance closed his eyes, his emotions swirling within him. Why were they saying this? Why didn't they just attack him and get it over and done with? There was no way he'd leave Pietro behind with them! "Why the hell do you care?" he shouted above the laughter. "Why don't you just fucking attack me?"
"You just don't understand. If you stay with him then we'll never leave you alone. Do you really care about him that much?" the creature grinned, it's face melting slightly. Pieces of skin were slipping along the contours of its face; dripping off its features in mushy globs like wax under an intense heat.
"What?" Lance was confused. Things were different from last time. "I care…"
"Do you love him?" the creature clarified. The demonic features were melting, revealing the pale, pink human skin beneath. Lance saw that the other creatures were undergoing similar changes; their monstrous bodies melting away to reveal familiar human forms.
"I…" Lance's voice cut off in his throat. He didn't know. If he didn't love Pietro could he leave him behind? Save himself while letting his friend suffer in his place? His memories washed over him, chilling him to the bone as he recalled how his friends had been given a similar option from the bullies at his old school. They had gladly left him, letting the older boys beat him bloody. He'd thought they were his friends, but they had abandoned him. He'd been left alone to realize that nobody cared whether he lived or died. Nobody would mourn if he'd died there. He shook his head, clearing the tears that threatened to fall from his eyes. "Just let him go!" he yelled as he steeled his resolve. "Don't take him away from me! I won't fucking leave him!" He straightened his back, feeling his powers reverberate through his hands as he tried to keep them under control. The desire to protect his friend swelled inside him and he was ready for the first attack as the creature he'd dodged earlier lunged at him from behind. He caught the thing's body, his hands reverberating in anger. The creature had shed its bestial skin and now appeared to him as Greg Adams, the jock who had taunted him earlier that day. Lance held the things face between his hands, wanting to kill him where he stood. "What the hell are you!" he yelled, punching it repeatedly until his hand was covered with blood. He let the boy drop to the floor with a satisfying thud before turning his attention to the other two creatures. They had also shed their skins and now wore the faces of the other two jerks who had bothered him that day; Duncan and Paul.
The rock tumbler readied himself as Paul lunged at him next, easily side-stepping the attack and grabbing the taller boy by the neck. He used the boy's momentum to throw him into the wall with enough force to knock him out cold. "Why are you here?" he demanded, squaring his shoulders as he turned to face Duncan. He was through playing games.
Duncan smiled, his unnaturally white teeth gleaming in the dark. "You still don't get it," he laughed. "You brought us here! Your fear is like a drug that we can't resist… so sweet…" it grinned, bringing a hand to its face to pick and tear at the flesh there. It tore with short nails at its eye before reaching up to an ear and ripping the skin, pulling it across its face to expose the muscle underneath. Lance didn't look away, not daring to show any emotion to this creature that seemed to live off his fear and discomfort. "We only exist here," it continued picking at an eye. "You give us life and feed us. Your reluctance to leave Pietro will weaken us somewhat, but your inability to fully accept him and who you are is what will make us come out on top in the end."
"What?" Lance asked, still confused. This was getting ridiculous and he had had enough bullshit. He was ready to kill this final thing and get the hell out of there with Pietro in tow.
Duncan finished peeling the flesh from his face, smearing the blood around before wiping it away to reveal yet another face.
"You…" Lance began, stumbling back. This new face was familiar to him yet he hadn't seen it in years, not since he'd left home.
His father stood before him, larger than he remembered and clutching at a bottle like it was vital to his existence. "Goddamn it, ya bastard!" the creature yelled. "I can't believe it! You're a fucking disgrace!" the large man towered over Lance, swinging the bottle at him and spilling its contents on the ground. "I ain't raised no faggot, boy! Git over here so you can see what happens to fairy boys in the real world! I'll teach ya what ya gotta look forward to, ya goddamn bitch!" His father moved with inhuman speed, catching Lance off guard and grabbing his arm.
"Y-you're not my dad! Get off of me!" Lance screamed, pushing the creature away with as much force as he could muster.
The creature appeared unfazed, still wearing his father's cold, drunk expression as it turned its eyes down to Pietro. "This yer boyfriend, huh?" it grinned, reaching down to grab a pale wrist between thick, dirty fingers.
"No! Get the fuck away from him!" Lance yelled, voice wavering with fear. He tried to lunge after the creature, to get between Pietro and his father, but his feet refused to move. He was terrified of the older man, even after all these years he still couldn't stand up to him. 'For christsakes it's not that goddamn bastard! It's not him!' he chanted in his mind, trying to convince himself to move, yet his fear gripped him like a vise.
"You can still leave, Lance," his father grinned, mouth drooping to the side. "Forget about Pietro and you can leave and be happy. It's only when you try to be with him that you will feel fear. Your acceptance will come when you forget about him." It's fingers tightened around the thin body, causing Pietro to unconsciously moan from the pain.
Lance looked down at the pale face of his friend-now lover, tears coming to his eyes as he despaired at the situation. It would be so easy to leave and forget about everything, but that just wasn't an option. Lance knew he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he left Pietro behind, even in this dreamscape. He could feel his heart threatening to break as he watched the life being squeezed from his lover, wondering how he would live knowing he'd stood there and let it happen. There was nothing stopping him, just his fear of a man who was in all likelihood dead. All these thoughts raced over and over in his mind, bringing his anger to the surface and overriding all sense of fear that he had. "Let him fucking go!" he yelled, voice sure and deadly. "I don't give a shit what the fuck you are but this is MY goddamn dream and I'll fucking kill you if you hurt him," he stood his ground, the earth breaking apart beneath his feet. "Leaving him behind is not an option so you might as well save your breath because I couldn't live with myself if I did it," he shook as he spoke, taking a few steps towards the creature. "If you want to fight, then do it. I'm right here. You don't scare me. I don't give a rat's ass if I'm accepted or not, because I'm already a fucking outcast anyways! What does it matter? I'm going to kick your ass and then get the hell out of this dream, ya got that? Pops?"
The creature's grin vanished, its eyes betraying its sudden disappointment at the turn of events. It opened its mouth to speak but Lance lunged at it, knocking its feet out from under it and grabbing Pietro as it fell. He scooped the boy up, holding the unconscious form tightly against him as he buried his face into the downy hair, tears slipping from his eyes. After a moment he looked down at the creature, eyes hard again as he lifted his foot and placed it against the throat of his doppelganger father. Its voice gurgled as Lance increased the pressure of his step, fully intending to kill the thing that had caused him so much anguish. It weakly flailed about beneath him, seeming to beg for its life. It was a cold hand on his neck that caused Lance to pause in his actions. The form in his arms had moved and he looked down into the eyes of the only person he cared about in that place. "Pietro! Are you alright?" he asked, voice trembling as he forgot the creature for a moment.
"Lance? You've got me, can we go now?" Pietro's voice was weak, like he was speaking in a dream.
"Mmm, yeah," the older boy nodded, smiling at his lover. He removed his foot from the creature, forgetting all about it and carried Pietro away, back up the passage that he'd come from.
End Chapter 13
