In which the epilog turns out to be the longest chapter. Because apparently that's the way I am.
Defeat of the Bandersnatch: Epilog
His first awareness was the sound of late-morning birds, followed by a gentle draft buzzing the warm skin of his toes. Toes that felt heavy to no account. Attached to legs that felt like mastic.
A blurry sensation between his ears fogged his memory, thoughts slinking away from him like pouring sand.
His fingers were the first appendages willing to give in to his request for movement. Fluttering, they curled inward towards his palm before spreading their wakefulness down to his wrist—which lifted and stopped short, catching against some sort of resistance that jolted the rest of his body to attention as sharply as a snapped twig on a quiet battlefield.
Opening his eyes to a blue sky glimpsed through leaved branches, Aramis tensed as a matter of course, tracking his bleary confusion to the rope wrapped around his wrist. And from there, to its anchor—finding the tether looped around Athos's boot as the man lounged nearby with a book in his hands.
Dropping his head to his bedroll, Aramis groaned. "Athos."
"That is what you usually call me."
Conscripting his untied arm into action, Aramis flexed his fingers raggedly and scrubbed his eyes closed, focusing on the shapes and lights slogging behind his eyelids as he increased the pressure. "I could think of other names to use."
Athos huffed, closing his book. "All invoking great esteem, I'm sure."
Eased to hear the warmth under the dryness, Aramis allowed himself a genuine grin, then tugged groggily on the lead capturing his wrist, uncomfortable with the blank space it taunted at in his awareness. "Was this really necessary?"
"Imperative," Athos intoned.
Aramis listened to him moving—heard the diffused sounds of rope being freed from Athos's boot, and felt the slackening tautness on his bound wrist.
"Porthos, of course, favored bets to see if we could get you to make friquassee if we gave you the correct ingredients, and d'Artagnan wanted proof you were capable of darning shirts as finely in sleep as when you are awake. Eventually, we decided this was best."
Aramis grimaced, not opening his eyes until he felt himself under the nearer and more serious scrutiny of Athos's shade.
Even then, he hesitated. He felt altogether heavy. Head and toes and skin. Some weighted thing had turned below his sternum. Cumbersome, and unsettled in such a way that he could not remember how it fit.
Asserting a final mulish dig into his eyelids, he hauled his hand away and blinked the light back in.
Above, though the frame of him was clouded, Athos was frowning. Staring back, Aramis tightened his brow as the expression pulled something from the fog—an image of Athos standing in moonlight, sword poised. I'm here, Aramis. I asked—are we fighting?
New words hung forgotten on Aramis's tongue and he swallowed.
"Aramis," Athos prompted as though repeating himself. "Sit up and drink some water?"
Through the fading vision, Aramis nodded, dragging up—with Athos's help—to put his back against a tree and swallow a sluice from the waterskin. His blood felt grateful for the effort but slow to respond and he stretched the moment, swallowing thrice more before bending his head down and swiping at his chin. "What happened?"
When he looked up, Athos graced him with a dark and obvious head-tilt, tugging pointedly at the cordage on his wrist.
"What did I do?" Aramis clarified, hating the blush of heat that bunched through his muscles. For the first time, he noticed his feet, marked and bruised—the left wrapped in cloth that pinched below the arch. "Assuming we did not have the ingredients for a proper friquassee?"
"You took umbrage with the foliage. Defended our camp and defeated a leaf."
Aramis breathed and frowned.
Here—The Bandersnatch lies dead, Aramis.
Wincing, he stared at Athos's face. Is it really dead? —Why, then, does it thriver? Lowering his chin, he shivered, trying to make the memory thrive, but it vanished nearly before it appeared.
A dark mass crawled forward to replace it, crowding his mind and rising out of the woods without fear.
Scanning their bright surroundings, Aramis marked the shapes of Porthos and d'Artagnan in the distance. His heart tripped and settled when he saw them and he flinched for his reaction, boring knuckles back into his eyes.
Seconds later, Athos's hand folded over his wrist to pull it away, thumb rubbing gently over the bone.
"I'm all right," said Aramis.
"So am I."
Aramis blinked at that, locking eyes with Athos openly. The unsettled weight in his chest rolled and he felt the odd desire to hold his breath.
Athos didn't let go of him, though his gaze fell distant for a moment, turning towards what could be made out of Porthos and d'Artagnan as they cared for the horses, far towards the water. "We all have demons, Aramis." He squeezed his wrist. "You know that more than most." Then, looking back, watching Aramis's eyes—"We've seen more of them this year, perhaps. Still, they haven't taken us."
Aramis released the fire from his lungs slowly, uncertain of how to account for the sudden prickling at his neck.
He prized these moments when he and Athos would speak in honest turns as much as he hated them.
Darkness, by nature, could be undefined, and words could not always cull foolishness, nor cast demons into silence. The stone in his chest had no name he could recall, and there were some things they could not protect each other from, no matter what they wished.
Just the same, leaving his wrist to Athos's keeping, Aramis felt his gaze lower, finding the gap in Athos's collar and the absent space where he used to wear her locket. "You've truly let her go?"
Athos stared a moment more then looked away, briefly—his glance over the depleted wine marking only a fraction of his attention, but enough. "More than I had, I believe." A bird fluttered through the trees and the tentative interruption of focus made Athos's eyes seem that much bluer when they came back, curious and sincere. "Do you ask for more than that?"
"No." Aramis shook his head thickly, because he didn't, and desiring mercy for another was something else altogether.
Athos nodded, then seemed to consider, a small tilt to his head. "Savoy?"
Again, Aramis shook his head.
Athos cast a glance skyward. "Savoy?" he repeated.
Groaning a breath through his heavy body, Aramis sighed and dragged a knee up, resting an elbow on top of it and scraping a hand through his hair. "You are especially persistent today." He tangled his fingers and left them there.
"It's been some time since you've done this."
The thing in Aramis's chest tottered. It was not Savoy. He swallowed, losing ground. "I don't remember what I… Did I talk about Savoy?"
"Perhaps."
Aramis tossed back a glare. His skin was itching suddenly, still heavy, but wanting to move. The empty space in his memory thrummed with a vorpal, quilent, energy, and he closed his eyes to quiet the blur between his ears. He could not find where his mind had been and when the heat stayed prickling at his neck, he tugged more stringently against his scalp. "I don't know why, Athos. I've always told you, and Porthos—I don't know why I do it. I've never known. What did I say?"
"Something about warthers gwallowing," answered Porthos.
Aramis flung his eyes open, discomfited for not having heard his approach.
"No—gapering, wasn't it?" said d'Artagnan. "The warther gapered."
"The Bandersnatch gapered. The warther gwallowed." Porthos smiled until he dimpled, giving Aramis a wink.
Inexplicably, Aramis felt his lungs grow bright.
"The Bandersnatch clapped," Athos refuted with dry superiority. Then shrugged in concession. "And gapered."
"Uh huh," said Porthos.
Athos returned the head nod. "I was closer to it than you." His eyes were lighter when they met back up with Aramis's, his worry softer as he patted at his shoulder. "I think you need more sleep," he said.
"Not until he's listened to the recounting of his final triumph." Porthos raised a finger, smiling down at Aramis again. "It was a frabjous moment."
"Trave," added d'Artagnan solemnly. "Trave and brary."
"Trave," Porthos agreed after a moment of mock consideration and serious nodding. "Trave and brary was the frabious moment."
Aramis laughed.
"So trave and brary was the frabious moment, trilorious we were, in all our joy."
D'Artagnan slung a satchel down and dropped himself against a neighboring tree, prodding Aramis's ankle with his toe. "Until the hero went limp as a sack of rocks and refused to even flutter his eyelids for the rest of the night."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't make a habit out of it."
"I'll do my very best."
Seconds later, Porthos's hand alighted on Aramis's shoulder, crouching across from Athos. "I think we'd all appreciate that—d'Artagnan was very disconcerted."
Aramis eyed him and d'Artagnan shrugged. "It was disconcerting." His hands were laced across his stomach, casually, with one fluttering, telling the tale of his vexation.
Porthos squeezed Aramis's shoulder, drawing his attention back. "Better?" he asked, watching his face.
It didn't take much, and Aramis nodded, easier for the teasing. "I am sorry for worrying you."
Porthos traded a glance with Athos. "You've worried me before. I'm sure you'll worry me again." He shrugged and his smile gentled. "Now, what do you think? Sleep more?"
This time Aramis shook his head. The heavy thickness through his skin was abating. The sting behind his eyes dim enough to blink away. "I'd prefer food." He sighed. "Maybe a walk."
"No walking," said Porthos, flicking his ear. "But I'll let you cook."
"Bring me a rabbit—I'll make friquassee."
Athos laughed and Aramis looked towards him. Somewhere in his mind's eye he saw Athos again, poised calmly before a slew of unknown shadows, sword lifted and ready, taking up for his defense. It did something to the stone in his chest, and he narrowed his eyes, trying to define what it was.
Patting his leg and reaching forward, Athos untied the dangling lead from Aramis's wrist, and stood. "Until next you sleep," he announced archly, looping the rope into a coil with a mocking smile and a warning bow.
Aramis bumped his head against the tree and grimaced. "Suppose I strangle you with it in the middle of the night?"
"A risk I'll take over the alternative," Athos parried flippantly, but paused long enough to drop a hand onto his hair, mussing the strands on his way to his rucksack. Adding in a voice lowered just enough to be serious, "Until next the demast finds us, I'd have you safe."
Following with his eyes, Aramis watched him as he packed away the coil and reached for his sword belt, hanging on the adjacent tree.
You as well, he thought. You as well.
My beamish brother. My frabjous friend.
The End
I don't think the viewpoint switch for the epilog should have thrown anyone here, but let me know.