semby
in
ficofsemby
The Monster Within
Title: "The Monster Within"
Rating: PG13ish
Characters/Pairing: Darla/Lindsey
Setting: Undisclosed location between Ats seasons 2 and 3
Summary: Darla shows up in Lindsey's life once again
Thanks to: carlyinrome for the beta! With more time, I could have done so much more with this thanks to her comments, but I was feeling the pressure of the deadline, so wherever this is still lacking is entirely my doing.
A/N: Written for the cya_ficathon, for a request of Darla/Lindsey, with Angel and/or Angelus (sorry, I skimped there because I wanted to keep it as close to canon as possible), pregnant vampire Darla, and no happy endings
She walks back into his life on a Tuesday night. It's been five months. He's sitting at an almost-empty bar. He's drunk.
His eyes are immediately drawn down towards her mid-section. “Something's . . . different.”
Her eyes narrow. “How observant of you.” He falls out of his chair. She sighs. “Get up. I need to talk to you someplace alone - someplace quiet. Show me where you're staying.”
He sits up and reaches for her helplessly. She yanks him up by the wrists and throws his arm over her shoulders; even with her support he's barely standing. “Fine. Tell me where you're staying, and I'll do all the work to get us there. You're quite the gentleman.”
They stagger through the door and he's too focused on her hair to even notice they're out of the bar. She looks at him and he averts his gaze, feeling inexplicably guilty. “It's left at the end of this street, right?” she asks.
He nods and lets her pull him along, and it's not till they're halfway down the street that he wonders, “How did you know that?”
xxxxx
He chugs down half the glass of water she gave him and pants, wiping his mouth with his sleeve. “What are you doing here?”
She doesn't say a word, watching him carefully but briefly shifting her gaze to his glass, silently prodding him to finish. She's in no mood to talk to him while he's in this state.
He stares back for a moment, then rolls his eyes. “Why are you-“ He breaks off and huffs. She looks again at the glass and he takes the hint and finishes it, feeling a wave of nausea instead of relief as it flows down. “Did I - did I invite you in?” he asks in confusion, his arm swinging loosely in a motion towards the door.
“Yes,” she replies coolly.
“I'm starting to wonder why.”
“I asked nicely.” She grins.
“Why are you here?”
“I have a problem.”
He stares at her belly. “That . . . thing?”
“Yes. I thought you might help me.”
He laughs bitterly. “Why? Why me?”
“Because you care.”
He smiles, but it's a cold, ironic smile. “Sweetheart, right now I couldn't care less about you or anything at all. I'm gonna take a shower, I'm gonna go to bed, and you can ask me if I care in the morning.”
She scowls. “I might get hungry. I might kill you in your sleep.”
He turns back and shrugs on his way to the bathroom. “I don't care.”
**
He wakes up in the morning and she's asleep next to him. He doesn't wake her; he just goes about his day. He goes to work, and gets yelled at for being an hour and a half late and looking like shit. He doesn't understand how he hasn't been fired yet; he's been living by this routine regularly. Showing up late, a total mess with barely brushed hair, and just going through the motions of this job that means nothing to him. But he's still here. Maybe there's still some unseen force pulling the strings in his life; maybe it's fate - he was supposed to stick around here long enough for her to show up again.
Or maybe his employers are just that desperate.
He comes home and she's looking through his clothes. He's got a little in the closet, but most are in piles on the floor. She's wearing his robe, and her hair is damp.
“I took a bath,” is the first thing she says to him.
He instinctively reaches up to remove his tie as he moves further into the room, even though his current job doesn't require him to wear one. He worked at a law firm for far too long.
“Your hand.” She notices belatedly, and doesn't quite hide her surprise.
He lifts it and wiggles the fingers. “Yeah. It's new. Evil. Does things I don't want it to do.”
Her mouth slowly widens into a grin. “I'd like to see that.”
“What are you doing here?” he asks, sick of dancing around the obvious, sick of her pretending it's okay for her to just show up, to just be here and stick around with no explanation.
“You're not happy to see me?” she approaches him so quickly he doesn't see her movements, but then it's like she's in slow motion as she runs a hand along his shoulder, down his arm.
He shivers, then places his hand on her stomach. “It's his?”
Her face hardens. “Yes.” He doesn't need to clarify who he means, and she doesn't need to pretend she doesn't understand. They're just saying out loud what they both already know.
He pulls his hand away suddenly, his lips curling in disgust. “I need to take a shower.”
As he walks away from her, she asks him, her voice small and quiet like a girl much, much younger than her years, “Will you help me?”
From the bathroom doorway, he asks her back, “What makes you think I know how?”
The door slams behind him.
xxxxx
The baby has arrived, and it's not the monster they were expecting. At least, it's not that monster yet. His parents are both there, looking down at him lovingly. His mother holds him tight. His father, true to his name, smiles almost angelically down at the child, but when he looks up to meet the mother's eyes, there's no trace of that pesky soul there. The moment the child came out was too much joy for it to withstand.
He leans down, his face changing, and takes the infant's throat in his mouth. His mother watches enraptured for a moment before she takes the other side and joins in. Blood drips down the boy's chest.
They're going to make their monster.
She's staring at him as his eyes open.
“What were you just dreaming about?” she asks, and it's almost like she cares. She noticed he looked troubled in his sleep and the fact that it even occurred to her to ask is . . . well. For a moment he almost lets himself pretend they're something that they're not. She's been around for five days now and this is the first indication she's made that she might be thinking of him, thinking of anything other than that . . . creature inside of her.
“Nothing,” he grunts, and avoids her eyes as he gets out of bed. It's still the middle of the night, but he can't stay lying there next to her right now. “I'm gonna take a shower.”
“Surprise, surprise.”
“What's that supposed to mean?” he demands.
“It's two or three times a day with you, now. Always washing, never clean. Soap won't get rid of that damn spot. You don't live a clean life, Lindsey. I can tell.”
He stops, but doesn't turn to look at her. She's right, of course, and he hates that she's right. He's not in that . . . that place . . . anymore, but it's in him. It's always in him, this grime. He's starting to wonder if it always will be. “What do you know about it?”
“I know a thing or two about living dirty. Not much about living clean.” She pauses. “That, and I've been paying attention. I've been watching you since I've been here. I watched you even closer for days before I approached you. You can learn so much about a person when they don't know you're looking.”
He turns to her now. “I thought I felt . . .”
She cuts him off. “Please help me.” Her voice is desperate. For once, she's not playing games. “Please, help me.”
His face hardens. “I can't.”
“No, I can't.” She leaps from the bed, in a fury. Her face is hiding nothing now, she's sick of pretending “I . . . can't . . . go on like this. I can't keep living with this . . . thing . . . inside of me. You don't know what it feels like. It feels like . . . it feels . . .” She breaks off, gasps, and bends over, leaning with one arm pressing into the bed. He swears he sees a drop, a tear, fall from under her hair down onto his sheets. “It feels.”
He softens and it's that . . . that old weakness he always got when she was around. He can't pretend she doesn't affect him, that seeing her broken doesn't break him. He exhales slowly, walks to her side, rests his new hand gently on her back, and swears he can feel the extra life through her skin. “I wish I knew what to do.”
She stands up suddenly, her face twisted into the shape of the demon he so often forgets lives beneath her skin. She runs her hands down both sides of his face before she clutches his head tightly. “But you don't know how. You said. You're useless.”
He feels her teeth sinking into his skin, feels the blood flowing from his body. She lowers him to the bed slowly, gently, straddles him. All the while her mouth never stops. It feels like it lasts longer than it does, but it's over before he realizes. He's a little nauseous, a little light-headed, but nowhere near dead. That wasn't her intention. She sits up, but her legs remain spread across his middle.
“You didn't kill me,” his voice croaks out weakly.
“I didn't want to.”
He turns his head slowly towards his nightstand, nods a little in that direction. “There's a pen and paper in the top drawer. Hand them to me?”
Her eyes narrow suspiciously at the sudden change in topic, but she lifts herself off of him to do as he says. She passes him the writing materials and he rolls slowly, painfully to his side, and scribbles something down. He rolls back, sits up as best as he can, and passes the paper to him.
“That's directions,” he explains. “I know a guy. A shaman. He's the best at . . . well, if anyone's got your answer, he's the one.”
She raises an eyebrow. “You 'know a guy'?”
“A former client of a former client . . . . Trust me. He can help.”
She folds up the paper and clutches it tightly in her hand. “And this just occurred to you this very moment?”
He smiles slightly. “I didn't really want to be rid of you yet, before.” His smile fades. “Now, though . . . Get out.”
He sees something flicker in her eyes at that. It almost looks like hurt. Almost. She backs away, the wall rising back into place. “Alright. Now that I've got what I wanted - gladly.”
She takes a few moments to gather up her clothes and the few belongings she'd brought with her and spread around his place like it was her own.
She pauses in the doorway, gives him one last lingering look. “Goodbye, Lindsey.”
He merely nods in response, and then she's gone. He wonders if she'll find her answers. He wonders if she'll have her monster. He lets himself wonder, briefly, if he'll ever see her again.
He struggles back to his feet and heads to the bathroom. He needs to take a shower.
He ends up sitting in the tub for a long time that night, the shower spray raining down on him long after the hot water has turned cold, never quite feeling clean.
Rating: PG13ish
Characters/Pairing: Darla/Lindsey
Setting: Undisclosed location between Ats seasons 2 and 3
Summary: Darla shows up in Lindsey's life once again
Thanks to: carlyinrome for the beta! With more time, I could have done so much more with this thanks to her comments, but I was feeling the pressure of the deadline, so wherever this is still lacking is entirely my doing.
A/N: Written for the cya_ficathon, for a request of Darla/Lindsey, with Angel and/or Angelus (sorry, I skimped there because I wanted to keep it as close to canon as possible), pregnant vampire Darla, and no happy endings
She walks back into his life on a Tuesday night. It's been five months. He's sitting at an almost-empty bar. He's drunk.
His eyes are immediately drawn down towards her mid-section. “Something's . . . different.”
Her eyes narrow. “How observant of you.” He falls out of his chair. She sighs. “Get up. I need to talk to you someplace alone - someplace quiet. Show me where you're staying.”
He sits up and reaches for her helplessly. She yanks him up by the wrists and throws his arm over her shoulders; even with her support he's barely standing. “Fine. Tell me where you're staying, and I'll do all the work to get us there. You're quite the gentleman.”
They stagger through the door and he's too focused on her hair to even notice they're out of the bar. She looks at him and he averts his gaze, feeling inexplicably guilty. “It's left at the end of this street, right?” she asks.
He nods and lets her pull him along, and it's not till they're halfway down the street that he wonders, “How did you know that?”
xxxxx
He chugs down half the glass of water she gave him and pants, wiping his mouth with his sleeve. “What are you doing here?”
She doesn't say a word, watching him carefully but briefly shifting her gaze to his glass, silently prodding him to finish. She's in no mood to talk to him while he's in this state.
He stares back for a moment, then rolls his eyes. “Why are you-“ He breaks off and huffs. She looks again at the glass and he takes the hint and finishes it, feeling a wave of nausea instead of relief as it flows down. “Did I - did I invite you in?” he asks in confusion, his arm swinging loosely in a motion towards the door.
“Yes,” she replies coolly.
“I'm starting to wonder why.”
“I asked nicely.” She grins.
“Why are you here?”
“I have a problem.”
He stares at her belly. “That . . . thing?”
“Yes. I thought you might help me.”
He laughs bitterly. “Why? Why me?”
“Because you care.”
He smiles, but it's a cold, ironic smile. “Sweetheart, right now I couldn't care less about you or anything at all. I'm gonna take a shower, I'm gonna go to bed, and you can ask me if I care in the morning.”
She scowls. “I might get hungry. I might kill you in your sleep.”
He turns back and shrugs on his way to the bathroom. “I don't care.”
**
He wakes up in the morning and she's asleep next to him. He doesn't wake her; he just goes about his day. He goes to work, and gets yelled at for being an hour and a half late and looking like shit. He doesn't understand how he hasn't been fired yet; he's been living by this routine regularly. Showing up late, a total mess with barely brushed hair, and just going through the motions of this job that means nothing to him. But he's still here. Maybe there's still some unseen force pulling the strings in his life; maybe it's fate - he was supposed to stick around here long enough for her to show up again.
Or maybe his employers are just that desperate.
He comes home and she's looking through his clothes. He's got a little in the closet, but most are in piles on the floor. She's wearing his robe, and her hair is damp.
“I took a bath,” is the first thing she says to him.
He instinctively reaches up to remove his tie as he moves further into the room, even though his current job doesn't require him to wear one. He worked at a law firm for far too long.
“Your hand.” She notices belatedly, and doesn't quite hide her surprise.
He lifts it and wiggles the fingers. “Yeah. It's new. Evil. Does things I don't want it to do.”
Her mouth slowly widens into a grin. “I'd like to see that.”
“What are you doing here?” he asks, sick of dancing around the obvious, sick of her pretending it's okay for her to just show up, to just be here and stick around with no explanation.
“You're not happy to see me?” she approaches him so quickly he doesn't see her movements, but then it's like she's in slow motion as she runs a hand along his shoulder, down his arm.
He shivers, then places his hand on her stomach. “It's his?”
Her face hardens. “Yes.” He doesn't need to clarify who he means, and she doesn't need to pretend she doesn't understand. They're just saying out loud what they both already know.
He pulls his hand away suddenly, his lips curling in disgust. “I need to take a shower.”
As he walks away from her, she asks him, her voice small and quiet like a girl much, much younger than her years, “Will you help me?”
From the bathroom doorway, he asks her back, “What makes you think I know how?”
The door slams behind him.
xxxxx
The baby has arrived, and it's not the monster they were expecting. At least, it's not that monster yet. His parents are both there, looking down at him lovingly. His mother holds him tight. His father, true to his name, smiles almost angelically down at the child, but when he looks up to meet the mother's eyes, there's no trace of that pesky soul there. The moment the child came out was too much joy for it to withstand.
He leans down, his face changing, and takes the infant's throat in his mouth. His mother watches enraptured for a moment before she takes the other side and joins in. Blood drips down the boy's chest.
They're going to make their monster.
She's staring at him as his eyes open.
“What were you just dreaming about?” she asks, and it's almost like she cares. She noticed he looked troubled in his sleep and the fact that it even occurred to her to ask is . . . well. For a moment he almost lets himself pretend they're something that they're not. She's been around for five days now and this is the first indication she's made that she might be thinking of him, thinking of anything other than that . . . creature inside of her.
“Nothing,” he grunts, and avoids her eyes as he gets out of bed. It's still the middle of the night, but he can't stay lying there next to her right now. “I'm gonna take a shower.”
“Surprise, surprise.”
“What's that supposed to mean?” he demands.
“It's two or three times a day with you, now. Always washing, never clean. Soap won't get rid of that damn spot. You don't live a clean life, Lindsey. I can tell.”
He stops, but doesn't turn to look at her. She's right, of course, and he hates that she's right. He's not in that . . . that place . . . anymore, but it's in him. It's always in him, this grime. He's starting to wonder if it always will be. “What do you know about it?”
“I know a thing or two about living dirty. Not much about living clean.” She pauses. “That, and I've been paying attention. I've been watching you since I've been here. I watched you even closer for days before I approached you. You can learn so much about a person when they don't know you're looking.”
He turns to her now. “I thought I felt . . .”
She cuts him off. “Please help me.” Her voice is desperate. For once, she's not playing games. “Please, help me.”
His face hardens. “I can't.”
“No, I can't.” She leaps from the bed, in a fury. Her face is hiding nothing now, she's sick of pretending “I . . . can't . . . go on like this. I can't keep living with this . . . thing . . . inside of me. You don't know what it feels like. It feels like . . . it feels . . .” She breaks off, gasps, and bends over, leaning with one arm pressing into the bed. He swears he sees a drop, a tear, fall from under her hair down onto his sheets. “It feels.”
He softens and it's that . . . that old weakness he always got when she was around. He can't pretend she doesn't affect him, that seeing her broken doesn't break him. He exhales slowly, walks to her side, rests his new hand gently on her back, and swears he can feel the extra life through her skin. “I wish I knew what to do.”
She stands up suddenly, her face twisted into the shape of the demon he so often forgets lives beneath her skin. She runs her hands down both sides of his face before she clutches his head tightly. “But you don't know how. You said. You're useless.”
He feels her teeth sinking into his skin, feels the blood flowing from his body. She lowers him to the bed slowly, gently, straddles him. All the while her mouth never stops. It feels like it lasts longer than it does, but it's over before he realizes. He's a little nauseous, a little light-headed, but nowhere near dead. That wasn't her intention. She sits up, but her legs remain spread across his middle.
“You didn't kill me,” his voice croaks out weakly.
“I didn't want to.”
He turns his head slowly towards his nightstand, nods a little in that direction. “There's a pen and paper in the top drawer. Hand them to me?”
Her eyes narrow suspiciously at the sudden change in topic, but she lifts herself off of him to do as he says. She passes him the writing materials and he rolls slowly, painfully to his side, and scribbles something down. He rolls back, sits up as best as he can, and passes the paper to him.
“That's directions,” he explains. “I know a guy. A shaman. He's the best at . . . well, if anyone's got your answer, he's the one.”
She raises an eyebrow. “You 'know a guy'?”
“A former client of a former client . . . . Trust me. He can help.”
She folds up the paper and clutches it tightly in her hand. “And this just occurred to you this very moment?”
He smiles slightly. “I didn't really want to be rid of you yet, before.” His smile fades. “Now, though . . . Get out.”
He sees something flicker in her eyes at that. It almost looks like hurt. Almost. She backs away, the wall rising back into place. “Alright. Now that I've got what I wanted - gladly.”
She takes a few moments to gather up her clothes and the few belongings she'd brought with her and spread around his place like it was her own.
She pauses in the doorway, gives him one last lingering look. “Goodbye, Lindsey.”
He merely nods in response, and then she's gone. He wonders if she'll find her answers. He wonders if she'll have her monster. He lets himself wonder, briefly, if he'll ever see her again.
He struggles back to his feet and heads to the bathroom. He needs to take a shower.
He ends up sitting in the tub for a long time that night, the shower spray raining down on him long after the hot water has turned cold, never quite feeling clean.