[oom] just a mind game
"Four, eight, fifteen, sixteen, twenty-three, forty-two."
Desmond's eyes snap open and he stares into the darkness.
"Four, eight, fifteen, sixteen, twenty-three, forty-two."
His eyes fall on the display of the digital alarm clock beside his bed; the red numbers tell him it's eight minutes past one o'clock in the morning.
"Four, eight--"
"Kelvin."
A light goes on and Desmond blinks, but it's not that bright. He sits up in the bed, covers slipping down, and stares at the familiar man sitting in the armchair in the corner of his room.
"Desmond," Kelvin says with a cheerless grin, and the light shifts as he waves the flashlight he's holding under his chin. "Like the effect? It's creepy, right?"
Desmond just stares.
"No?" Kelvin sighs and turns the flashlight off; but a moment later, the main light of the room goes on and Desmond squints at the older man by the light switch. "Better? Seems a little crazy, ruins the whole effect, but that always was you, wasn't it?"
With a dry mouth and a strained voice: "You're dead."
"Oh, that one's not gonna fly, Des!" Kelvin's moved back to the armchair now and Desmond thinks he really doesn't need a flashlight at his chin to look creepy. "You know dead people come here! End of the universe, right? You a hitchhiker, Des?"
"How did you get in my room?"
An easy shrug. "No idea. Same answer for what happens if you don't push the button. Four, eight, fifteen -- oh, but you know, don't you, Des? You found that out the day you killed me."
"I didn't--" But he did.
"Relax, bro. I don't hold it against you. Hurts like hell getting your brains smashed out against a rock, let me tell you. But I'm not here for revenge."
"What are--" Desmond swallows. "What are you here for?"
Because he's dead, oh God, he's dead, why is he here -- and Desmond knows dead people come to Milliways, dead people and witches and vampires, but not Kelvin.
"Thought I'd pay an old friend a visit, that's all. Why, am I making you uncomfortable, Desmond?"
Yes yes yesyesyes-- "No."
"I think you're lying, Des. But that's nothing new."
"Shut up. Shut the bloody hell up!"
"Do they know, Des?"
He hesitates (stop saying my name stop it stop) but says, "Who?"
"The survivors. You crashed their plane! Do they know?"
Desmond shuts his eyes tightly. "You died-- you were dead before that! You don't know that!"
"Sure I do," and he sounds a lot closer now, but Desmond doesn't, won't open his eyes. "I know a lot of things, Des. I know you're scared."
"I'm not scared."
"I know you used the failsafe, you blew up the hatch and all your problems went away."
"I--"
"Except now ... you don't know whether you're dead or not."
Desmond opens his eyes again to find Kelvin's face just a few inches from his own, and Kelvin grins.
"And you're too scared to find out."
He is, he is, he doesn't want to know. He wants to stay in this bar, this nice safe bar at the end of the universe with beer and chocolate and people; he doesn't want to step out that door.
And then he thinks, I'm back in that hatch, he's back in that hatch and never leaving and never seeing the outside world. But he did leave, once, didn't he? He did leave, and that's how Kelvin died and everything changed.
And he wants things to keep changing.
More quietly, more firmly: "I'm not scared."
Kelvin doesn't stop grinning, but he moves away, a little, and watches Desmond as if studying an experiment (do you ever think that--). "Isn't that why you ran, Des? When you killed me? Isn't that why you're always running?"
"I'm not scared!"
"If you say so," he says; and then, "Boo," and Desmond flinches and Kelvin laughs. "If you say so."
And he does, God, he does. But before he can repeat himself or tell Kelvin to fuck off -- Kelvin fucks off, and he's left staring at the clock (almost six o'clock) in darkness, lying down, blinking sleep out of his eyes.
Just a dream. Just a dream.
"I'm not bloody scared."
But he is.