Chapter 48

Purgatory

Author's note: For anyone who's ever held a vigil at the bedside of a loved one, you know how exhausting & discouraging it can be. You can't help…but you can't leave because if you do, the Angel of Death might slip in behind you. That's where Beth is now.

Side note: I love the songs for this chapter. I first heard Farewell My Friend on the BBC series, Being Human – which of course, has a killer vampire as a main character. Took me a long time to find a recording because it's an esoteric song, but when I did, I played it over & over as I wrote the opening of this chapter. The closing song is one fans of Moonlight will recognize immediately. It was a favorite of mine from long before the show, but they used it perfectly.

Intro Song: Farewell My Friend, Loner

Mick wandered through quiet streets full of familiar reminders of his long-ago childhood. He recognized the houses, a favorite climbing tree, the neighborhood grocery store...all sights he hadn't viewed in many years. The air around him was heavy and hushed; he saw everything only in varying shades of black, grey and white. Flecks of grey floated down from the leaden sky in an endless, dark storm.

Silent figures passed him, all traveling the other way. He recognized their faces - shadows of people he had known, and loved, looking as they had when he last saw them. Most he had been forced to abandon after his turning. His mother. His father. A bandmate. His… Michael! His older brother had been his hero when they were growing up. He had rushed to enlist in World War II when his family received word of Michael's death in the war effort. Now, he ran to him, desperate to talk to him and tell him how much he had missed him. Michael looked at him as if Mick were the ghost instead of him; he didn't slow or speak. "Michael, stop!" he shouted, stepping in front of him, but his brother just veered around him without responding. As Mick watched helplessly, Michael faded into the dull light.

He tried again with his mother as she passed by. Walking backward in front of her for a few steps, he reached out, trying to elicit a response. The loss in her eyes when she looked at him was painful to see. She halted, her hand moving to hover close to his face, as if she longed - but was afraid - to touch him. Mick clutched her hand, and lifted it to his cheek, closing his eyes against the rush of emotion that washed over him at the mother's touch he had not felt for so many years. Swallowing hard, he tried to get words out around the lump in his throat. "Mom?"

Even she did not speak to him.

After a long moment of standing there, connected but silent, she lifted her hand away, sidestepping him, and hurried to catch up with his father. She did not pause or look back at his call as she hurried to her husband's side. Mick didn't try to pursue her – he and his father had not parted on good terms and he doubted that the stern man would welcome his presence.

As the silent parade continued, he tried to stop each beloved person, tried to talk to him or her. Each would look at him sorrowfully, but no one spoke – and none ceased their movement away from him, the still air swallowing them up. Something prevented him from going with them. He could only move forward, never back. Mick grew increasingly frantic, turning his head from side to side, looking for some spark of awareness, some willingness to communicate, from anyone on the street. His long coat floated behind him in slow motion, the heavy fabric pulling through the thick air.

Suddenly, he spotted Lilah, the wife of the man he had called his best friend when he was human. Lilah, the girl he had fallen in love with, had an affair with, when he thought that same good friend had fallen during the war. Lilah, who had died in her bed, an old woman. Now she was as he had seen her face-to-face for the last time, right after she received notification that Ray had not died, but was coming home to her. The woman in front of him was as beautiful and vibrant as she had been that bittersweet day.

"Don't you know me, Lilah? Won't you talk to me?" he beseeched, planting himself in front of her. "I'm frightened." The lovely young woman shook her head but looked at him with love and compassion in her dark eyes. Mick held her arm, tightening his grip to keep her from moving away from him. She glanced from his hand to his face, then back over her shoulder at the approaching figure of her husband. His friend. Ray.

Mick kept his hand on her as Ray approached, loath to let her move on. Now, the airborne particles turned to red, the color startling in the achromatic universe. The ruby-colored flakes streaked the surfaces they touched with… is it blood? He lightly, tenderly, touched her face where the flakes had landed, the red fluid sliding down her cheeks like tears. His fingertips came away stained crimson and he tentatively touched his tongue to the color. It was blood. Ray came up alongside them, also looking as young as when they had last seen each other, as young as Lilah. He reached out to gently dislodge Mick's grip on his wife's arm. Taking her hand, he started off again, shaking his head at Mick when he moved to stop them. He stepped aside and watched them as they faded off into the gloom.

"Why won't anyone talk to me?" he shouted into the dead air, turning his face up toward the shower of red flecks drifting down onto his cheeks and hair, opening his mouth to capture them on his tongue, just as he had collected snowflakes as a child. They melted into blood, streaking his face and running down his throat. The taste was bitter and gritty, not at all like Beth's blood. Beth's blood! His mouth seemed to flood with its sweet taste, his fangs elongating. No! What had made him think of her?

He lowered his gaze to look down the street again, only to find that it had changed, the familiar houses replaced with churches and cathedrals, large and small, elaborate and simple. Perhaps there would be sanctuary there. Maybe he could find someone to talk to him in one of them.

He ran up to the first one and tried the door. Locked!

Dashing down the street to the next one, an impressive cathedral, he vaulted up the steep limestone steps, taking them two and three at a time, up and up to the heavy wooden doors, only to find them barred as well. He tried church after church, with the same results. There was no entry for him at any of them. No salvation for me. I am damned. Panting, he sat down on the steps of the last church he had attempted to enter, and watched the slow, silent procession of acquaintances going by, his heart heavy with loss.

Unexpectedly, he heard a feminine voice calling his name. Stretching up to his full height, he saw a small figure far down the street, waving to him as she shouted his name. She was holding open the door to a simple, rustic chapel, the crimson door shining wetly in the increasingly heavy storm of red.

A heavy-set black woman, passing in front of him at that moment, paused. Turning toward the sound, Mama Laura smiled and waved at the girl, then looked up at Mick, scowling. "Hear dat? It's love callin' ya, boy. What are you waitin' fo'? Now git! You got livin' to do!"

He didn't know whether he was more shocked by the appearance of Mama Laura - or her ability to talk to him when no one else could or would. But then, Mama Laura had always surprised him with her unconditional affection and acceptance. He asked the question he had always meant to put to her.

"Do you know what I am, Mama Laura?" He wasn't sure if he wanted the answer to be yes, or no. It would be wonderful if she knew about him and didn't care - but did he really want her to know that he was a monster?

There was no answer from the elderly woman, but she smiled at him and reached up to caress his cheek, her face creasing into a complex road map of wrinkles. After pointing toward the waiting figure again, and repeating, "What are you waitin' fo'?", she resumed her slow progress down the street.

Mick needed no further encouragement. He bounded off the cathedral steps, a blur in the grey air, running toward the open church door as fast as he could. He was deathly afraid that the person waiting for him there would disappear, or be silenced, before he could reach her. As he drew closer, he could see that she was a young child, her hair golden and gleaming in the dim light, standing out like a beacon amid the black, grey, and red that was the rest of this world. Her lengthy wait for him had streaked her blond hair heavily with blood.

When he reached her and took the heavy door out of her grasp, she smiled and said, "I've been waiting for you, Mick. Come on." Fitting her slight hand into his, she led him into the church where a priest stood in the sanctuary, facing the back of the church expectantly, a black missal in his hands.

"Welcome, Mick," the priest called out. "I've been waiting for you too. We have a lot to talk about."

Mick looked down at the small face beside him in wonderment.

"Go ahead." She smiled up at him, giving his hand a squeeze before disengaging it. "I won't leave without you, I promise. I love you, you know." She moved into one of the pews in the rear of the church, settling back with a look of satisfaction.

With a heavy heart, Mick walked slowly down the aisle toward the priest. There is no salvation for me. I am damned.

"Those are your words, not mine, Mick."

Shocked, he halted, looking up at the sanctuary and seeing, for the first time, the strong, bronzed face, split now by a dazzling smile.

The priest spoke again. "As far as I can recall, I never came to damn anyone... only to offer salvation."

"How do you know what I'm thinking? Who are you?" The tortured vampire whispered his questions, still rooted to the spot.

"I have so many names... Just call me what I am…Brother. I know you're scared - but I need to talk to you. Now, Mick." He still smiled, but his tone conveyed a touch of impatience that hadn't been there before.

"You're wasting your time, Father. After I was turned, I prayed. I needed God - but He wouldn't answer me. He doesn't want me. I'm a monster!" Mick's voice was despairing, but he desperately hoped he was wrong.

The priest's bronzed face was no longer smiling, his countenance transformed into a stern, somber mask. "Mick, you can always talk to Him. For a long time, you didn't want to. And now...you've just forgotten how." Then, he seemed to soften. "Do you think you are the first person to come before me with sin staining your soul? Trust me, you're not. You can tell me anything. And remember... I already know your darkest secrets."

Mick looked back at the small figure waiting, as she had promised, until he was ready. He could barely make out her features in the dim light, the quivering flames from the votive candles behind her emitting an eerie glow. He squinted and saw the blond child smile and wave at him encouragingly.

Beth blew him a kiss as he turned around to face his Maker...

Mick jerked abruptly and cried out without opening his eyes, his limbs trembling.

Throwing off the sleeping bag she had wrapped around herself, Beth jumped up from the bench by his side. Stripping off her heavy mitten, she placed her hand tenderly on his icy cheek. "Mick, I'm here. You're going to be okay." She said this with more conviction than she felt.

Lying in Josef's newly remodeled freezer room in the hours since his surgery, Mick had had numerous episodes like this. He would talk, thrash, cry out…but showed no signs of being aware of his surroundings - or of regaining consciousness.

Dr. Spector had warned Beth and Josef of this possibility.

"The ketamine that I used is known for causing hallucinations - oddly, when they wake up, patients often report that they involved God, or had religious overtones. You should expect to see signs of that - talking, crying, attempting to get up or move - before he regains consciousness. It would not be unusual for him to have some hallucinations even after he awakens. I have not had the opportunity to evaluate how strong that side effect would be with vampires, but I would anticipate that these episodes would be frequent for a period of time after the surgery, given the amount of drug I was forced to use."

Josef's quick mind had caught the gray-haired physician's words. "What do you mean, you haven't 'had the opportunity to evaluate' this? I thought you had experience with vampires!"

"Well, I do have experience treating vampires - and, I have been able to draw up solid hypotheses based on that experience. However..." Obviously uncomfortable, Spector had cleared his throat, eyeing Kostan uneasily before continuing, "…however, this is the first time I have had the opportunity to test all my theories and actually operate on one of...your kind." The physician had shrunk back then, away from the suddenly infuriated vampire.

Josef's eyes had gleamed blue as he bared his fangs and roared, "So, you're telling me that my friend was your guinea pig?! Is that what you're saying to me, you son of a bitch?!" His hand flashed out, grabbing Spector by the throat and pinning him against the wall.

"Josef, don't!" Beth had pleaded, grabbing his arm, as rigid and unmoving as a steel beam. "Josef! Look at me!"

The vampire had slowly turned his gaze to Beth without loosening his grip on the choking, struggling man. "Beth, this was just- Mick was just a... a scientific experiment for him!" His voice shook with emotion.

"I know, Josef. But we never asked him if he'd done this before, we just asked if he could help him. You told me yourself that we couldn't save him. Didn't you?" Her tone had been reassuring as she tried to calm the outraged vampire. "Josef, we need him. Please. For Mick."

Kostan had reluctantly eased his grip and stepped away, allowing the gasping man to slide down the wall to the floor where the physician sat, stunned, massaging his throat. Josef had taken a deep, shaky breath, fighting to get himself under control. "I- I'm sorry, doctor. Beth is right. I'm just-" he searched for words as his eyes reverted to their normal dark brown color and his fangs retracted. "This has been hard - I'm sorry. That's no excuse, I know." Appalled at his uncharacteristic lack of control, the vampire had shaken his head and darted out of the room, his hand to his face, leaving Beth to help Spector to his feet, her concern evident in her face.

"Doctor, are you all right? Can I do anything for you? I'm so sorry..."

The physician had waved her off, coughing, his hand still at his throat where bruises were already beginning to bloom. "Miss Turner - Beth - it's all right. I've been around vampires long enough to expect their...volatility...under stressful circumstances. I understand that Mr. St. John and Mr. Kostan are quite close, so an outburst like this is not completely unexpected ."

"Yes, they are. Very close..."

Beth thought about that comment now as she felt Mick slowly relax under her hand. She herself hadn't fully comprehended the depths of the friendship between the two men before all this. Josef had been distraught over Mick's condition, masking his grief by lashing out at anyone and everyone as he struggled to deal with the situation. He's used to being in control, she thought, and this is out of his hands now.

She sank back down, gathering the heavy sleeping bag around her again. It's out of my hands too. All she could do was keep watch. But she was so tired... Too tired to sleep - she had only thought she understood that saying before now. She was too tired to think, too exhausted to do any more than worry... yeah, there's always room for worry, just like jello...

Shivering despite the heavy parka, Uggs, and sub-zero sleeping bag a reluctant Logan Griffen had procured for her, she kept her solitary vigil in the freezer room of Josef's 'cabin', as he called it. Some cabin! Beth did have to admit, however, that the amenities of Josef's lifestyle had been a godsend in this situation. His recent addition of this 'cold room' to the vineyard facilities allowed Mick to rest here and still be under the constant supervision of Dr. Spector... and her.

It certainly wasn't what he had envisioned using the room for, Josef had admitted to her, without elaborating. The tiers of mesh benches were arranged much like a sauna room, with many of them wide enough for two. Mick lay on one such broad platform, waist-high to Beth. The room itself, with its expensive lighting and state-of-the art sound system, conjured up images of wild parties with drunken, sated vampires sprawling on the benches after orgies involving both humans and the 'undead'. Beth shook her head at her out-of-control imagination. You are worse off than you thought!

It had been an excruciatingly long night.

Mick had not been out of her sight since she arrived at Josef's villa and burst through the kitchen doors. Even though she had not been allowed in the room while Spector operated, it had not prevented her from watching the long, complicated surgery. Both Beth and Josef had followed every move by Spector, every twitch and groan from Mick, on the monitors displaying the images captured by the security cameras in the kitchen.

Beth had tried her best to ignore Spector's increasingly pessimistic comments as he was forced to extend the incision higher and higher, trying to capture all the elusive silver fragments and flush the silver dust from Mick's system. More than once, she had thought, maybe having those microphones wasn't such a great idea.

Josef had paced, unable to sit still as the surgery progressed, but equally incapable of taking his eyes off the monitors, the visual comprehension abilities of a vampire allowing him to scan all the screen images almost simultaneously. What he saw gave him no comfort.

The empty bags of blood had piled up, seemingly in synchronization with the advance of the incision and the collection of silver fragments. Ryder and the two vampire assistants were constantly in motion, replacing one tank of gas with another, handing Gabrielle vial after vial of the injectable drugs to administer in the IV, bringing out more bags of blood...all at the surgeon's direction as he choreographed their movements.

Josef could read the frustration on Guillermo's face, the look of anguish on Gabby's. Dr. Spector kept operating, his face grim as he glanced at the x-rays, then cut again...and again. Jesus, is he going to keep going until he cuts Mick's throat?!

The physician had finally finished, seven long hours after he began. Glancing up at one of the cameras as he stretched and massaged the small of his back, Spector had said simply, "I've done all I can for him."

They had taken his patient into the freezer room, the two anonymous vampires transferring him to the mesh bench with the help of Guillermo and Ryder, the physician directing every action. They moved slowly and carefully, mindful of Mick's extensive injuries, while Gabrielle supervised the IV line, left in place to continue delivering blood to his fragile system.

Beth had been watching over him ever since, resisting all attempts to talk her out of spending long periods in the room, and rejecting Ryder's offer to set her up in a bedroom with a direct video feed. She had also dismissed Spector's offer to provide her with periodic updates, in place of being by Mick's side, as unacceptable. She wanted - needed - to be close by, available if he woke up, even though the physician had told her that was unlikely to happen for many hours, if not days. That didn't matter; it wasn't logical, but Beth knew she had to be with him. She felt it in her very bones. Her jaw set, she had announced, "I'm going to be there in case he needs me." The net result of her stubbornness was that, instead of having one patient to check on in the cold room, John Spector had two. He had insisted on taking her vital signs each time he came in to check on Mick and hang a new bag of life-sustaining blood. Finally, he laid down the law to her.

"Okay, Miss Turner, this is going to be the schedule – no more than one hour in at a time, followed by one hour out. And," he had held up his hand to stop the protest he could see her forming, "if you don't agree to this - and stick to it - I'll tell Mr. Kostan of my concerns. I'm fairly certain he'd have you carried out! I don't think even you would want to mess with him right now. And I'd certainly prefer to stay away from him after our little, ah, altercation," he'd added needlessly. "So please don't make me resort to that."

Beth knew Spector meant it. Everyone in the house was aware that Josef had been on the warpath all night and into the morning, spending hours on the phone with Victoria Silver and Elijah Lucas, their counterpart in Chicago, updating them, planning their next steps... and plotting his revenge.

She had given in and agreed to the physician's restrictions. By that time, she'd run out of the energy and will to argue with the physician, and she certainly wasn't up to fighting with Josef. The strain had been both physically and emotionally exhausting. Beth was tired through and through - in her bones, her head, her heart, her... soul. She was sure that Mick's screams would haunt her nightmares forever.

Sitting in the cold room with him wasn't much better.

When the vampires had moved Mick to the room, Spector and Gabrielle shadowing them, Beth had initially protested at stretching the naked man out on the bench... like meat on a slab... but they had overridden her arguments. Josef, who had made himself scarce after his attack on Spector, had shown up briefly when they transported Mick, and reinforced what the other vampires had been telling her.

"It's better that he be like this, Beth, honestly. No vamp I know of wears clothes in his freezer or uses pillows or blankets. Cloth just freezes and gets uncomfortable - and we don't want to be warm, we want to be cold. It feels good. Trust me - for a vampire, lying in here like this is the equivalent of a human snuggling up under a blanket."

Logan, who had trailed them in, shifted uneasily during this exchange, freezing when he caught a warning glance from Josef. Was he the only vampire who slept in sweatpants?

"He's right, Beth." Gabby had smiled kindly at the exhausted young woman. "I know it's hard to see him like this, but it really is the best thing for him now."

So Beth had discarded that argument as well, the point being driven home to her again and again that she did not really know, nor understand, vampires' odd ways and strange physiology. Would she ever fit into Mick's world? Would she even want to after all this?

Logan had taken pity on her, smiling at her encouragingly as he said, "Hey, Beth, don't worry about it. It took me a while to get used to all this and I'm a vampire!"

"Not much of one," Josef had muttered under his breath as he stomped out, trailed by the New York vampire and his two assistants.

One of the men had paused in front of Beth on his way out. "I'm sorry for what happened, Miss Turner." he said hesitantly. With a glance at Logan, hovering protectively next to Beth, he had hurried out after his companions.

Beth had turned to ask Griffen about these two strange vampires and where they had come from, but she was stopped by the crestfallen expression on the vampire's boyish face after Josef's comment. She had already forgiven him his part in the cover-up of Kostan's plans, realizing that he had had no choice but to follow the instructions of the vampire leader. Beth had resolved to take up that particular issue with the billionaire later. When Mick's better.

Instead, she had found herself wanting to protect Logan's feelings. Putting a hand on his arm, Beth had sympathized. "Don't mind Josef. He's still really upset over what happened to Mick. I think he'd give his own mother a hard time right about now."

"Thanks, Beth." Logan had smiled at her gratefully before hurrying off to gather up the sleeping bag and clothing she was making use of now.

He's so still!

She compared the way Mick looked now with the way he had appeared as he slept in his freezer. Curious about his sleeping arrangements, she had taken the opportunity to look in on him in the freezer at his penthouse during the days she had been spending there. Opportunity? Be honest, you snuck in! "Okay, I snuck in," she muttered irritably to the chill air. But now, somehow, he seemed more...lifeless.

She had no way to know if this was consistent with vampires under such conditions - or even if vampires ever were in this condition. Given Spector's confession that Mick was the first he had ever performed major surgery on, that seemed unlikely. Covered by the hooded parka and wrapped up in the sleeping bag, she stood next to him, her breath seeming almost to form ice crystals on the air as she watched over him.

Mick looked like marble, like... death. Say it. He looks like death. Hard as she tried, she couldn't keep the word from seeping into her consciousness. His skin was cold and grey, lips tinged with blue. A scattering of frost had formed on his eyelashes and hair. The image wasn't helped by the livid red wound across his abdomen and up his chest.

The physician had started out operating on Mick from the gash already stretching across his abdomen, his flesh ripped there by the vicious hollow-point silver bullets. He had focused on ensuring that Guillermo hadn't missed any of the silver fragments embedded there and that damage to vital internal organs was repaired, in order to minimize blood loss. He continually flushed the vampire's abdominal cavity with saline to try to remove the fine silver dust that had settled there.

He had been forced to keep extending the incision higher and higher to get to the silver scattered in the vampire's chest. The result was a wound that, from Beth's point of view, looked unsettlingly like an inverted autopsy incision. When she had queried the physician about why he had essentially left the wound open, only using steri-strips to secure the edges together, Spector had shared his reasoning.

"We've either removed enough of the silver so that Mr. St. John will recover - in which case, the wound will eventually start to close and heal of its own accord as his body rebounds from the silver exposure - or we haven't. And if we haven't, no amount of stitching or sewing will be able to save him, Miss Turner, so there was no point in putting him through it."

Seeing her tired eyes fill again with tears, he had softened. "I'm sorry to be so blunt, my dear. You struck me as a strong person - only someone with a backbone of steel could have stayed in there with Mr. St. John throughout the ordeal of operating on him without anesthesia. I assumed you would want to know the truth - but I could have been more tactful about it. I do apologize."

Beth had shaken her head, angrily dashing the tears away. I think I've cried more today than I have in my whole life... "No, you were right - don't ever keep anything from me because it's difficult to hear. I want to know the truth."

After a long pause, she had asked the question that had settled on her heart like a heavy weight.

"Do you think Mick will live?"

Spector had sighed and pushed up his glasses to rub at the bridge of his nose. He wasn't young, and the combination of the bi-coastal flight and the long, brutally difficult surgery, was catching up with him. "I'm going to disappoint you again, I'm afraid... I just don't know."

"So, what do we do now?"

"We wait."

So, Beth waited. Waited for the wound to show signs of healing, for Mick to wake up, for her to wake up - because, surely, this was a nightmare, not reality. Waited to know if she was watching someone else she loved die in front of her. Like her mother. Like Josh.

"No," she whispered into the frigid air, her warm breath swirling around her face. No, as hard as those losses had been, this was different. Until now, she hadn't fully realized how much she'd become committed to this man. The idea of a life without him was something she couldn't imagine. It was a black hole, yawning in front of her with no end. "No," Beth said again, tears spilling over to slip down her face as she waited in the cold silence, alone.

End Song: My Immortal, Evanescence