Fic: The Sky Above, The Field Below (1/1)
Title: The Sky Above, The Field Below
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Daniel/Desmond
Word Count: 555
Summary: He recalls so little, just fleeting images that go as quickly as they come, but there are some things he knows. For the cliche_bingo Prompt - Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey: Time travel. Spoilers through 5.16 - The Incident, Parts 1 & 2.
Prompt Table: Here
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot. Title belongs to Explosions In The Sky.
Author’s Notes: Apparently, I just write Daniel/Desmond fic all the time now, which is news to me.
The Sky Above, The Field Below
The stone, the sky, the vast sea of milling, endless moisture - droplets of water invisible, but cool upon his skin like the tears of atoms themselves, endless and obscure as the pull of the breeze - it only comes in flashes, but sometimes he can taste green, and time, and the bitter threat of promise on his tongue.
Through it all there is one man, one glowing human essence - a single known thing, stark against the gaping universe. His touchstone. A beacon. Never changing. The constant in his equation, the cadence of his world. The echo of his heart.
Sometimes it’s only a whisper - sometimes it’s a scream. Sometimes it’s hands, or lips; sometimes it’s just two eyes, but whatever it is, it keeps the panic from swelling, the frantic, aching sense of who he is, who he really is that lingers at the edges of his consciousness, angry and hot like the sun, threatening to sear away the memory of dew and sweat and raindrops like glass, fracturing reality and leaving the brushstrokes of Monet to taunt the corners of his broken mind with impressions, vague hints; clues to an answer that no longer exists.
But the firm lines of his anchor, his bridge between past and present and past again - the halo of his hair, this guardian of Daniel’s immortal soul: he is made of water lilies, his touch the brush of petals, like satin, so smooth; the flush of his cheeks is sea-rose and soft, delicate - his desperate, heady gasps drawing the currents, the flow of the Seine. He exists in everything Daniel is, in everything that he thinks but cannot keep, what he reaches for but can never touch.
He recalls so little, just fleeting images that go as quickly as they come, but there are some things he knows. Daniel knows the rub of sand, the way it grates against skin with the steady tempo of deep and wanton passion. He knows the musk of decades, the way it clings to precious air as the sweet scent of sex dissipates into the night. Daniel knows what it feels like to be pressed against dreaming spires, roaming hands and desperate gasps and the pounding of two hearts in the marrow of his bones teaching him what it means to be loved.
There are lips against his palm, tracing his Mercury line as if his constant, his rock knows something that Daniel never could, and the leaden weight of the unknown blossoms around him like a dying star, hot like iron, metallic like it too as it laces around his tastebuds - the promise of a knife to the gut, a bullet to the chest.
And by god, the tang of certain death has never tasted so sweet.
Sometimes, when he stares at nothing, that’s when he can see his lover’s shadow, his silhouette; when his fingers nick the keys of the dust-coated baby grand, dull with the the settling of age and neglect, Daniel can hear the way he breathes. And there’s no rhythm anymore, no melody, but the ivory shines like sweat-slick skin, and he remembers that, in the hollow of his soul. He remembers that.
So even though the song is dissonant, it never, ever stops.
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Daniel/Desmond
Word Count: 555
Summary: He recalls so little, just fleeting images that go as quickly as they come, but there are some things he knows. For the cliche_bingo Prompt - Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey: Time travel. Spoilers through 5.16 - The Incident, Parts 1 & 2.
Prompt Table: Here
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot. Title belongs to Explosions In The Sky.
Author’s Notes: Apparently, I just write Daniel/Desmond fic all the time now, which is news to me.
The Sky Above, The Field Below
The stone, the sky, the vast sea of milling, endless moisture - droplets of water invisible, but cool upon his skin like the tears of atoms themselves, endless and obscure as the pull of the breeze - it only comes in flashes, but sometimes he can taste green, and time, and the bitter threat of promise on his tongue.
Through it all there is one man, one glowing human essence - a single known thing, stark against the gaping universe. His touchstone. A beacon. Never changing. The constant in his equation, the cadence of his world. The echo of his heart.
Sometimes it’s only a whisper - sometimes it’s a scream. Sometimes it’s hands, or lips; sometimes it’s just two eyes, but whatever it is, it keeps the panic from swelling, the frantic, aching sense of who he is, who he really is that lingers at the edges of his consciousness, angry and hot like the sun, threatening to sear away the memory of dew and sweat and raindrops like glass, fracturing reality and leaving the brushstrokes of Monet to taunt the corners of his broken mind with impressions, vague hints; clues to an answer that no longer exists.
But the firm lines of his anchor, his bridge between past and present and past again - the halo of his hair, this guardian of Daniel’s immortal soul: he is made of water lilies, his touch the brush of petals, like satin, so smooth; the flush of his cheeks is sea-rose and soft, delicate - his desperate, heady gasps drawing the currents, the flow of the Seine. He exists in everything Daniel is, in everything that he thinks but cannot keep, what he reaches for but can never touch.
He recalls so little, just fleeting images that go as quickly as they come, but there are some things he knows. Daniel knows the rub of sand, the way it grates against skin with the steady tempo of deep and wanton passion. He knows the musk of decades, the way it clings to precious air as the sweet scent of sex dissipates into the night. Daniel knows what it feels like to be pressed against dreaming spires, roaming hands and desperate gasps and the pounding of two hearts in the marrow of his bones teaching him what it means to be loved.
There are lips against his palm, tracing his Mercury line as if his constant, his rock knows something that Daniel never could, and the leaden weight of the unknown blossoms around him like a dying star, hot like iron, metallic like it too as it laces around his tastebuds - the promise of a knife to the gut, a bullet to the chest.
And by god, the tang of certain death has never tasted so sweet.
Sometimes, when he stares at nothing, that’s when he can see his lover’s shadow, his silhouette; when his fingers nick the keys of the dust-coated baby grand, dull with the the settling of age and neglect, Daniel can hear the way he breathes. And there’s no rhythm anymore, no melody, but the ivory shines like sweat-slick skin, and he remembers that, in the hollow of his soul. He remembers that.
So even though the song is dissonant, it never, ever stops.