fall in decay (helen/john, r)
Title: fall in decay
Rating: R, for violent thinking
Pairing: Helen/John
Spoilers: "Into the Black."
Summary: He finds a way to follow her.
John doesn’t actually watch Helen disappear into the time rift. He sees her refuse to look at him as she spits “The hell I can’t,” and then stride, determined, toward it. But his eyes are closed by the time she reaches the rift, his concentration focused entirely on drawing up enough energy to follow.
He succeeds, barely, the explosive wave reopening the rift just enough to let him through, and he tumbles out into a busy London street; part of his coat is missing, undoubtedly left behind in the Hollow Earth tunnel. Instinct and adrenaline take command, his body no longer exhausted and drained, and he steps backward to blend into the shadows afforded by gaslight, coal smoke, and night. Helen’s reactions, he notices, aren’t quite as quick; she looks around her, confused, as if she’d assumed they’d appear somewhere more useful than the middle of the street, before she comes to the same conclusion as John.
He follows her in the dark as she clings to the walls and storefronts, seemingly melting into the shadows. Her entire body is tense, on guard with her sense of danger in overdrive, but she walks with purpose, like she knows where she’s going. Helen turns down twisting and barely-lit alleyways; John wonders if this is to avoid detection by anyone who would be shocked by her state of dress, or if she can feel him behind her and is trying to shake his pursuit.
John loses her when the alley empties out into the walk alongside the river. He looks both ways, straining to make out her silhouette amongst the couples out for a stroll after taking in the theater or dinner. He curses inwardly and when a well-manicured couple looks at him strangely and hurries their steps, he realizes that he blends in during this year almost as badly as she does. He ducks back into the shadows to consider where she might be headed, and if he can beat her there, when his entire body freezes: the unmistakable muzzle of a gun presses against the small of his back.
“What are you doing here?”
“Helen,” he says quietly, relaxing just an inch. He could teleport away, but that would only make solving his current trouble more difficult. She’s certainly made her anger known and, for the first time, he genuinely believes she may kill him.
A click and a subtle shift in the position of the gun and he stills again, not wanting to test her with the safety off.
“Why did you follow me?”
He could ask her the same question about Adam but her answer would be more valiant than his. Taking her hesitance at pulling the trigger as a sign, he slowly turns to face her, the gun now aimed straight through his stomach. “We’ve always been stronger together,” he says. It’s not an answer, at least not to the question she asked, but it is the one that will keep her from killing him on the spot.
He watches as she clenches her jaw and visibly holds her ground, despite a momentary flash of desire to step backwards. Conflict races over her face and he knows that she’s accomplished great things without him by her side (perhaps precisely because of that), and he braces himself for the inevitable slap across his face as she realizes that he’s just demeaned her entire life’s work. His cheek stings and he feels a trickle of blood against his skin, but he’s still standing.
Her shoulders momentarily slump before straightening again and the steel determination returns to her eyes. She holsters the gun, seemingly coming to the same conclusion that John had back in the tunnel: Adam will be easier to track down with the two of them working together.
They’re too exposed for him to teleport where they are and they’re beginning to get strange looks, even if they are half-covered in shadow. Helen refuses the arm John offers her, instead leading the way back to the alley. Once safely out of view of the public, she gives him an address, a Sanctuary safe house that, once she catches view of the day’s newspaper and precise date, she knows she hasn’t bought yet but should be empty. John knows the place well and cups his hand around her shoulder. She tenses and he knows that he hasn’t yet heard the end of what she thinks about his plan.
They disappear in a flash of orange.
---
John leaves the safe house, claiming need for money since they certainly can’t go about the streets of London dressed as they are and despite Helen’s protests that they could find a way to obtain appropriate clothing and food without resorting to John’s methods, he vanishes in front of her.
She glares at the spot he once occupied. Overcome with sudden rage - at John, at Adam, at herself, at the entire situation - she picks up an abandoned book and throws it with all her strength against the opposing wall. It doesn’t solve anything, but it does make her feel better.
She searches the house for anything they can use; she remembers it being completely empty when she and James first stepped in to begin outfitting it for use by abnormals, but James had handled all the communication and the actual purchasing and she hadn’t seen it until it was hers. She finds several threadbare blankets, the second volume of a history of the Roman Empire, a lantern, a hatpin and a mattress she’s fairly certain is occupied by a family of mice.
She empties her own pockets next, squinting in the dark. An iPhone, two guns and extra clips, a knife sheathed to her ankle, and three tubes of lip balm. She begins to make a mental note to herself to clear out her pants pockets more frequently - this is perhaps why she can never find chapstick when she truly needs it - until she remembers that there isn’t much point. There is no drawer, no dresser, no home waiting for her belongings.
John returns, changed into clothing of the time period, with a box containing a dress for her and a bag of basic supplies: bread, cheese, a few apples, a bottle of wine, and lamp fuel. Helen frowns, wondering where he acquired the funding for all of that, and her eyes settle on his hand, knuckles wrapped in white linen stained with blood.
“John,” she begins until her mind recalls a memory of James returning to the Sanctuary with a black eye and bloodied nose, claiming mugging and robbery by a man whose face he never saw. She squeezes her eyes shut against the headache that will appear if she thinks about it too much; Henry had once tried to explain a time travel film to her and she’d left the room confused, determined to never again ask him what movie was on.
She takes the dress from him without another word and walks into the other room to try it on. It fits, perfectly; John’s always had an eye for measurements, though hers haven’t changed much over the years. She glares at the corset in the box and wonders if she can get away without it. She’s more concerned with John having to lace her into the contraption than the inevitable breathing constraints. Changing back into her own clothing, she decides to ignore the shoes he’s purchased; the dress is long enough that she can hide her boots under it and they’re far more comfortable than any fashions this decade ever sold.
“Really, Helen. Modesty?” John asks when she returns, mocking her decision to change where he can’t see. He’s started a fire and the flames flicker, casting his face into mottled shadow where he sits, fluidly draped into one of the room’s chairs. They’re in for the evening, certain that Adam won’t try anything now while his current self is undoubtedly at the hospital next to Imogene.
Anger bubbles up inside of her as she sees him sitting there as if everything is perfect; she wants to lash out at him, hurt him, slide the knife from its sheath in her boot and hold it to his throat. She seethes, anger turning into fury at what he’d planned for her. Destroying and erasing her life, everything she’d worked for and accomplished, everything she loves and cares about, all gone without consideration for her own feelings just so he could be with her. She clenches her fists, perfectly-manicured nails sharply digging into her palms.
---
“How,” she starts, voice eerily calm but betrayed by her body language. Firelight glints off her eyes, wide and harsh, lighting them like pinpricks of demon fire from legend. Her jaw clenches and her arms flex, revealing just hard she’s working to remain still. “How could you dismiss my life so easily? Do I mean that little to you?”
John sits rigidly, afraid that if he stirs merely a millimeter he’ll spur her into action. Her foot twitches, almost imperceptibly, and her right hand unfolds from its fist for just a moment before she calls it back; she has a knife hidden there in her boot and he has no doubt in her current state she could have it unsheathed and at his throat before he has a chance to teleport to safety. “Helen,” he whispers her name, wishing to explain himself, to say that she means the world to him, that he’d do anything to be with her, that - despite everything - he isn’t about to back down from for all eternity.
“Don’t.” She swallows visibly. “No more excuses. We’re done, John. This is over.”
Rage threatens to overcome him, a wave of violence building steadily as the edges of his vision turn red. The last time he heard those words from her, her hair was blonde and he’d just washed fresh blood off his hands. A growl settles in the back of his throat and he grips the arms of the chair, ready to push off and reach her before she can react, lock his hands around her neck and squeeze, lift her off the ground and watch her struggle for her last breaths.
A swirl of movement and there’s a gun trained evenly at his head, safety off, her finger on the trigger.
He smiles dangerously and the red tint fades just slightly. “You need me.”
“I don’t.”
He’s never heard such acrid conviction in her voice, not even when she tried to shoot him the first time. “I can make this easier,” he says, noting the desperation that creeps into his tone. He passes it off with a tilt of his head and a small smirk, but the subtle change in her eyes, a quiet spark, alerts him that she noticed as well.
“Fine,” she says unexpectedly, keeping her gun steady, and he wonders what her motivations are. “We find Adam, prevent him from changing the timeline, and then,” she takes a breath, “then you are gone.”
“Gone?” He knows what she means and though he’s aware that he’s ruined things beyond repair, he needs to hear the words from her mouth.
“Gone,” she repeats. “Out of my life. Out of hers. You are not what I want, John. Respect that, and leave me be.”
His teeth grate against each other and he nods his head once, as much of an acknowledgement of her terms as he’s willing to give.
Helen drops the gun, just barely. It’s now aimed at his chest. “You’re exhausted. Get some sleep.” She gestures with her head to the other room.
He’d prefer to stay where he is, where he can keep an eye on her and ensure that she isn’t going to slit his throat in his sleep. She’s as dangerous as he is now, but he realizes that leaving the room is the only way she’ll put the gun away. Feigning sleep is a better plan than spending what remains of the night staring down the barrel of a gun. He stands, quickly, and steps next to her, so close that if one of them breathes too deeply their arms will collide.
“Don’t touch me,” she says, words dripping with venom. Her eyes shift to lock with his, still burning bright.
He brushes past her into the dark room.
---
With the feel of John’s breath still fresh on her skin, Helen exhales and closes her eyes. She allows herself a single moment to regroup before she sits down in the chair opposite the one he vacated.
She waits for the sun to rise and knows that the only way to end this for good is to put a bullet through John’s head.
Rating: R, for violent thinking
Pairing: Helen/John
Spoilers: "Into the Black."
Summary: He finds a way to follow her.
John doesn’t actually watch Helen disappear into the time rift. He sees her refuse to look at him as she spits “The hell I can’t,” and then stride, determined, toward it. But his eyes are closed by the time she reaches the rift, his concentration focused entirely on drawing up enough energy to follow.
He succeeds, barely, the explosive wave reopening the rift just enough to let him through, and he tumbles out into a busy London street; part of his coat is missing, undoubtedly left behind in the Hollow Earth tunnel. Instinct and adrenaline take command, his body no longer exhausted and drained, and he steps backward to blend into the shadows afforded by gaslight, coal smoke, and night. Helen’s reactions, he notices, aren’t quite as quick; she looks around her, confused, as if she’d assumed they’d appear somewhere more useful than the middle of the street, before she comes to the same conclusion as John.
He follows her in the dark as she clings to the walls and storefronts, seemingly melting into the shadows. Her entire body is tense, on guard with her sense of danger in overdrive, but she walks with purpose, like she knows where she’s going. Helen turns down twisting and barely-lit alleyways; John wonders if this is to avoid detection by anyone who would be shocked by her state of dress, or if she can feel him behind her and is trying to shake his pursuit.
John loses her when the alley empties out into the walk alongside the river. He looks both ways, straining to make out her silhouette amongst the couples out for a stroll after taking in the theater or dinner. He curses inwardly and when a well-manicured couple looks at him strangely and hurries their steps, he realizes that he blends in during this year almost as badly as she does. He ducks back into the shadows to consider where she might be headed, and if he can beat her there, when his entire body freezes: the unmistakable muzzle of a gun presses against the small of his back.
“What are you doing here?”
“Helen,” he says quietly, relaxing just an inch. He could teleport away, but that would only make solving his current trouble more difficult. She’s certainly made her anger known and, for the first time, he genuinely believes she may kill him.
A click and a subtle shift in the position of the gun and he stills again, not wanting to test her with the safety off.
“Why did you follow me?”
He could ask her the same question about Adam but her answer would be more valiant than his. Taking her hesitance at pulling the trigger as a sign, he slowly turns to face her, the gun now aimed straight through his stomach. “We’ve always been stronger together,” he says. It’s not an answer, at least not to the question she asked, but it is the one that will keep her from killing him on the spot.
He watches as she clenches her jaw and visibly holds her ground, despite a momentary flash of desire to step backwards. Conflict races over her face and he knows that she’s accomplished great things without him by her side (perhaps precisely because of that), and he braces himself for the inevitable slap across his face as she realizes that he’s just demeaned her entire life’s work. His cheek stings and he feels a trickle of blood against his skin, but he’s still standing.
Her shoulders momentarily slump before straightening again and the steel determination returns to her eyes. She holsters the gun, seemingly coming to the same conclusion that John had back in the tunnel: Adam will be easier to track down with the two of them working together.
They’re too exposed for him to teleport where they are and they’re beginning to get strange looks, even if they are half-covered in shadow. Helen refuses the arm John offers her, instead leading the way back to the alley. Once safely out of view of the public, she gives him an address, a Sanctuary safe house that, once she catches view of the day’s newspaper and precise date, she knows she hasn’t bought yet but should be empty. John knows the place well and cups his hand around her shoulder. She tenses and he knows that he hasn’t yet heard the end of what she thinks about his plan.
They disappear in a flash of orange.
---
John leaves the safe house, claiming need for money since they certainly can’t go about the streets of London dressed as they are and despite Helen’s protests that they could find a way to obtain appropriate clothing and food without resorting to John’s methods, he vanishes in front of her.
She glares at the spot he once occupied. Overcome with sudden rage - at John, at Adam, at herself, at the entire situation - she picks up an abandoned book and throws it with all her strength against the opposing wall. It doesn’t solve anything, but it does make her feel better.
She searches the house for anything they can use; she remembers it being completely empty when she and James first stepped in to begin outfitting it for use by abnormals, but James had handled all the communication and the actual purchasing and she hadn’t seen it until it was hers. She finds several threadbare blankets, the second volume of a history of the Roman Empire, a lantern, a hatpin and a mattress she’s fairly certain is occupied by a family of mice.
She empties her own pockets next, squinting in the dark. An iPhone, two guns and extra clips, a knife sheathed to her ankle, and three tubes of lip balm. She begins to make a mental note to herself to clear out her pants pockets more frequently - this is perhaps why she can never find chapstick when she truly needs it - until she remembers that there isn’t much point. There is no drawer, no dresser, no home waiting for her belongings.
John returns, changed into clothing of the time period, with a box containing a dress for her and a bag of basic supplies: bread, cheese, a few apples, a bottle of wine, and lamp fuel. Helen frowns, wondering where he acquired the funding for all of that, and her eyes settle on his hand, knuckles wrapped in white linen stained with blood.
“John,” she begins until her mind recalls a memory of James returning to the Sanctuary with a black eye and bloodied nose, claiming mugging and robbery by a man whose face he never saw. She squeezes her eyes shut against the headache that will appear if she thinks about it too much; Henry had once tried to explain a time travel film to her and she’d left the room confused, determined to never again ask him what movie was on.
She takes the dress from him without another word and walks into the other room to try it on. It fits, perfectly; John’s always had an eye for measurements, though hers haven’t changed much over the years. She glares at the corset in the box and wonders if she can get away without it. She’s more concerned with John having to lace her into the contraption than the inevitable breathing constraints. Changing back into her own clothing, she decides to ignore the shoes he’s purchased; the dress is long enough that she can hide her boots under it and they’re far more comfortable than any fashions this decade ever sold.
“Really, Helen. Modesty?” John asks when she returns, mocking her decision to change where he can’t see. He’s started a fire and the flames flicker, casting his face into mottled shadow where he sits, fluidly draped into one of the room’s chairs. They’re in for the evening, certain that Adam won’t try anything now while his current self is undoubtedly at the hospital next to Imogene.
Anger bubbles up inside of her as she sees him sitting there as if everything is perfect; she wants to lash out at him, hurt him, slide the knife from its sheath in her boot and hold it to his throat. She seethes, anger turning into fury at what he’d planned for her. Destroying and erasing her life, everything she’d worked for and accomplished, everything she loves and cares about, all gone without consideration for her own feelings just so he could be with her. She clenches her fists, perfectly-manicured nails sharply digging into her palms.
---
“How,” she starts, voice eerily calm but betrayed by her body language. Firelight glints off her eyes, wide and harsh, lighting them like pinpricks of demon fire from legend. Her jaw clenches and her arms flex, revealing just hard she’s working to remain still. “How could you dismiss my life so easily? Do I mean that little to you?”
John sits rigidly, afraid that if he stirs merely a millimeter he’ll spur her into action. Her foot twitches, almost imperceptibly, and her right hand unfolds from its fist for just a moment before she calls it back; she has a knife hidden there in her boot and he has no doubt in her current state she could have it unsheathed and at his throat before he has a chance to teleport to safety. “Helen,” he whispers her name, wishing to explain himself, to say that she means the world to him, that he’d do anything to be with her, that - despite everything - he isn’t about to back down from for all eternity.
“Don’t.” She swallows visibly. “No more excuses. We’re done, John. This is over.”
Rage threatens to overcome him, a wave of violence building steadily as the edges of his vision turn red. The last time he heard those words from her, her hair was blonde and he’d just washed fresh blood off his hands. A growl settles in the back of his throat and he grips the arms of the chair, ready to push off and reach her before she can react, lock his hands around her neck and squeeze, lift her off the ground and watch her struggle for her last breaths.
A swirl of movement and there’s a gun trained evenly at his head, safety off, her finger on the trigger.
He smiles dangerously and the red tint fades just slightly. “You need me.”
“I don’t.”
He’s never heard such acrid conviction in her voice, not even when she tried to shoot him the first time. “I can make this easier,” he says, noting the desperation that creeps into his tone. He passes it off with a tilt of his head and a small smirk, but the subtle change in her eyes, a quiet spark, alerts him that she noticed as well.
“Fine,” she says unexpectedly, keeping her gun steady, and he wonders what her motivations are. “We find Adam, prevent him from changing the timeline, and then,” she takes a breath, “then you are gone.”
“Gone?” He knows what she means and though he’s aware that he’s ruined things beyond repair, he needs to hear the words from her mouth.
“Gone,” she repeats. “Out of my life. Out of hers. You are not what I want, John. Respect that, and leave me be.”
His teeth grate against each other and he nods his head once, as much of an acknowledgement of her terms as he’s willing to give.
Helen drops the gun, just barely. It’s now aimed at his chest. “You’re exhausted. Get some sleep.” She gestures with her head to the other room.
He’d prefer to stay where he is, where he can keep an eye on her and ensure that she isn’t going to slit his throat in his sleep. She’s as dangerous as he is now, but he realizes that leaving the room is the only way she’ll put the gun away. Feigning sleep is a better plan than spending what remains of the night staring down the barrel of a gun. He stands, quickly, and steps next to her, so close that if one of them breathes too deeply their arms will collide.
“Don’t touch me,” she says, words dripping with venom. Her eyes shift to lock with his, still burning bright.
He brushes past her into the dark room.
---
With the feel of John’s breath still fresh on her skin, Helen exhales and closes her eyes. She allows herself a single moment to regroup before she sits down in the chair opposite the one he vacated.
She waits for the sun to rise and knows that the only way to end this for good is to put a bullet through John’s head.