Things Lost in the Rain
Life is a lamp with the glimmer gone,
A dank and darkened cave;
Yet still I swear by the light of dawn,
And not by the grip of the grave.
- "Hope Empty of Meaning" by Robert E. Howard
The room fell silent at the wake and the mourners as one turned to Doyle as he rose. He'd remained the most stony anyone had ever seen him throughout the night.
"So, there I was." he began softly, his words falling like lead.
"Fiona - Fi always used to start her stories like that. Anybody who knew her and heard those words knew that they were about to have something to enjoy, whether to...hear something amazing, or something to roll their eyes at how ridiculous it sounded. That's the kind of person Fi was - the laughter, the spirit, the bright young thing in a world populated by people like us." His eyes fell on the petty, the inhumane, the angry, the unjust, the greedy, the wrong and the foolhardy. None of them failed to feel the contempt in that gaze.
"So there I was," he continued, "being introduced to a woman that barely understood what she'd become. So there I was, taking a risk I couldn't afford. So there I was, going across the world with the only person I wholly trusted." His thoughts filled with the rain, the rain and the heavy steps as he fought to get up.
"Fi-!"
Warchylde's manic grin as blood dripped across his wounds and he raised the mace.
"Fiona!!"
Her angelic face, asleep and torpid after taking a strike meant for him, asleep the way he'd seen her a hundred times, just as they'd woken up, eyes closed just so gently. He struggled to get his footing under him from the sprawled position he'd been in after Warchylde had ducked his grasp, willing his legs, begging please, god, please let me move just a little faster, please please please god...
The mace crashed down into her head with a dull, wet thunk, her features shattered with her skull as her form started to fly into ashes, her flesh blackening and hissing into powder as the rain poured.
"GOD, NO!"
"So there I was..." he said, struggling against the red tears that started to fall. "and I couldn't stop him." He paused, taking a breath and biting the pain back, events flashing, haunting every nerve in his dead body.
The yellow eyed monster was out, shouting in his mind, kill kill kill it she was yours don't let it get away kill it now - and Doyle pushed hard in his thoughts, the chain snapping tight. He sprang right past Warchylde - collapsing over what had been Fiona, pulling ash to him, covering it from the rain, thick, red tears flowing unceasingly.
"No, no, no no no...Fi, come back, please not now, please god..." he took what had been her hand, the hand that had held his so tightly, crumbling fingers slipping through his grasp leaving only the ring he'd given her, the ring from before Prague, his promise, his surprise for her, telling her they'd be coming back.
He didn't even register Warchylde's death steps from him, swiftly followed by Grant, the others securing victory. He groped and strained through reddened vision, pulling Fiona's ashes closer, holding on to what remained of her tightly as the rain threatened to wash her away.
"So here I am, and the light's gone out." he at last finished with his eyes to the urn that contained her, the iron, unforgiving grasp of the Defiance both controlling and deepening his misery. He looked to the mourners again.
"She wouldn't have wanted us like this, wanted me like this. It's difficult not to be though, knowing what an absence it brings to us. Someone opened the story we'd been living and tore out all the other pages. I wanted...I wanted to keep reading. Now, I know we can't. There's no more, there won't be." He closed his eyes, taking another hard breath, keeping back the tears.
"My great-grandsire told me once, that this existence was about living more than you ever did when you were breathing. Fiona...Fi was all that was right about that belief."
----
Doyle felt numb, the dull thrumming of rage beneath the surface as he looked across the lobby of the facility the Sanctified had been using for the wake. Others were already fighting, Hale peppering enemies with arrows, Gado ripping into the skull of one of the attackers. Brood, likely. Nomads, just as possible. Maybe even VII agents, following him from Tupelo.
Metal skidded across the armor he wore along his back, and Doyle didn't look back to the two kindred that appeared with knives in hand, ducking back to lessen the blow as the claws of one grinning gangrel flashed past his chest, light red streaks slashed across him. He grabbed the gangrel's wrist with criminal ease, forcing his arm into a bar and ramming him down to the floor with Doyle's Italian leather shoe stomped across his throat. Shouldn't have worn these, Doyle thought casually. The tread's worthless.
"You should leave now." he said evenly to one of the knife-wielders behind him, still not looking as the other was hacked into by a rusty machete, the incensed Bishop of Grand Rapids laying into the interloper. The knife-man quipped something Doyle didn't catch and quickly moved to oblige. Doyle returned his attention to the Gangrel snarling and struggling under his heel.
"Do you know what this is? What you just interrupted?" A hint of emotion crept into his tone, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "This was a funeral." He eased off on the pressure on his throat, giving him enough ability to talk.
"I don't give a fuck what it w-" he started to say, with typical bravado. Doyle punched his outstretched elbow joint, snapping it the wrong way.
"This was for my wife." Doyle seethed, his beast dripping through his words.
"Good!" The gangrel laughed.
Doyle let the yellow-eyed monster to the front, and roared.
It was a simple trick, one he'd been taught at expense from Johnathon Crane years ago, back in Coldfire's time. His eyes locked on the squealing gangrel beneath him, the monster's face was full and raw and terrifying before him. The gangrel screamed in abject terror, thrashing and struggling, his own beast gripping him with fear, and Doyle pressed down harder, keeping him immobile as the weak little thing struggled to free itself in vain.
Fiona. Fiona is gone. Gone because of things like this. Gone because I couldn't make them fear me? Gone because they didn't care. They never would. It's all gone now and it can't be fixed, it's just lost. Another turn of the wheel. Another loss. Forever. They said she's burning now. God's purifying flames. Alone. They want fire?
Doyle looked to Bishop Sancoeur, who stood motionless nearby. "Get me kerosene."
...I'll give them fire.
Sancoeur seemed taken aback by the suggestion, looming imposing as only she could be, shadows seeming to lengthen as her expression took on an enraged cast. Gabe at last walked up, blood on his blades and a softness in his eyes.
"Doyle, don't do this." Gabe said cautiously, holding out a hand. "Ash the fucker, be done with it. But don't torture him. You're better than that."
Better? Doyle's thoughts seethed. What the fuck is that supposed to be, better? She's gone, I can't even be mad? I can't even give them what they fucking deserve? His claws flashed into existence, and his teeth clenched, eyes squeezed shut tightly.
Fiona's last letter to him flashed through his thoughts, the letter he'd struggled to read, forced himself to memorize.
Do me the favor, and the honor, of keeping going. You are the strongest man I have ever known, body and soul. You are a survivor. Do not stop just because I'm not alive. I am not dead. I will never be as long as you keep me alive in you. And you can't do that if you stop. Don't stop, Doyle. Never stop. You can do so much for the world, and I sincerely hope that you do. You have been a better influence than I could ever hope to be. I believe that your life is greater than mine, much more worth living. The greatest thing I could ever have done for you is die to keep you alive. Carry on. Prove me right. Carry on.
Please remember me. Remember me fondly. I wasn't a great person or a noble human being, but I was great. Remember that Ronan might feel something, he'll need to be consoled. Please look after me kids. I have two. I imagine the other one will surface eventually. I was ashamed to tell you before: Jonathan made me do it, when I was only a week old. Please take care of Anna Mae's grave. Please look after the rest of me family's graves at the mausoleum, mine included. Please take care of yourself. And please forgive me. For anything, for everything. I'm sorry I never learned to commit, but I hope you understand why and don't blame yourself. I will be missing you. But if I died in your service, it was so worth it.
Love you, Doyle.
-Fi
Doyle's claws scythed through the gangrel's arm at the elbow. Grabbing it up as it began to ash and flipping it so that the severed, clawed hand pointed down at the pinned attacker, Doyle wordlessly rammed it through the nameless gangrel's chest, the kindred shuddering and expiring, beginning to disintegrate.
Sancoeur and Gabe's gaze followed him as he walked back up to the memorial, sitting down next to the urn, taking off Fi's ring from around his neck and holding it tightly.
"I love you too." he whispered, alone.
A dank and darkened cave;
Yet still I swear by the light of dawn,
And not by the grip of the grave.
- "Hope Empty of Meaning" by Robert E. Howard
The room fell silent at the wake and the mourners as one turned to Doyle as he rose. He'd remained the most stony anyone had ever seen him throughout the night.
"So, there I was." he began softly, his words falling like lead.
"Fiona - Fi always used to start her stories like that. Anybody who knew her and heard those words knew that they were about to have something to enjoy, whether to...hear something amazing, or something to roll their eyes at how ridiculous it sounded. That's the kind of person Fi was - the laughter, the spirit, the bright young thing in a world populated by people like us." His eyes fell on the petty, the inhumane, the angry, the unjust, the greedy, the wrong and the foolhardy. None of them failed to feel the contempt in that gaze.
"So there I was," he continued, "being introduced to a woman that barely understood what she'd become. So there I was, taking a risk I couldn't afford. So there I was, going across the world with the only person I wholly trusted." His thoughts filled with the rain, the rain and the heavy steps as he fought to get up.
"Fi-!"
Warchylde's manic grin as blood dripped across his wounds and he raised the mace.
"Fiona!!"
Her angelic face, asleep and torpid after taking a strike meant for him, asleep the way he'd seen her a hundred times, just as they'd woken up, eyes closed just so gently. He struggled to get his footing under him from the sprawled position he'd been in after Warchylde had ducked his grasp, willing his legs, begging please, god, please let me move just a little faster, please please please god...
The mace crashed down into her head with a dull, wet thunk, her features shattered with her skull as her form started to fly into ashes, her flesh blackening and hissing into powder as the rain poured.
"GOD, NO!"
"So there I was..." he said, struggling against the red tears that started to fall. "and I couldn't stop him." He paused, taking a breath and biting the pain back, events flashing, haunting every nerve in his dead body.
The yellow eyed monster was out, shouting in his mind, kill kill kill it she was yours don't let it get away kill it now - and Doyle pushed hard in his thoughts, the chain snapping tight. He sprang right past Warchylde - collapsing over what had been Fiona, pulling ash to him, covering it from the rain, thick, red tears flowing unceasingly.
"No, no, no no no...Fi, come back, please not now, please god..." he took what had been her hand, the hand that had held his so tightly, crumbling fingers slipping through his grasp leaving only the ring he'd given her, the ring from before Prague, his promise, his surprise for her, telling her they'd be coming back.
He didn't even register Warchylde's death steps from him, swiftly followed by Grant, the others securing victory. He groped and strained through reddened vision, pulling Fiona's ashes closer, holding on to what remained of her tightly as the rain threatened to wash her away.
"So here I am, and the light's gone out." he at last finished with his eyes to the urn that contained her, the iron, unforgiving grasp of the Defiance both controlling and deepening his misery. He looked to the mourners again.
"She wouldn't have wanted us like this, wanted me like this. It's difficult not to be though, knowing what an absence it brings to us. Someone opened the story we'd been living and tore out all the other pages. I wanted...I wanted to keep reading. Now, I know we can't. There's no more, there won't be." He closed his eyes, taking another hard breath, keeping back the tears.
"My great-grandsire told me once, that this existence was about living more than you ever did when you were breathing. Fiona...Fi was all that was right about that belief."
----
Doyle felt numb, the dull thrumming of rage beneath the surface as he looked across the lobby of the facility the Sanctified had been using for the wake. Others were already fighting, Hale peppering enemies with arrows, Gado ripping into the skull of one of the attackers. Brood, likely. Nomads, just as possible. Maybe even VII agents, following him from Tupelo.
Metal skidded across the armor he wore along his back, and Doyle didn't look back to the two kindred that appeared with knives in hand, ducking back to lessen the blow as the claws of one grinning gangrel flashed past his chest, light red streaks slashed across him. He grabbed the gangrel's wrist with criminal ease, forcing his arm into a bar and ramming him down to the floor with Doyle's Italian leather shoe stomped across his throat. Shouldn't have worn these, Doyle thought casually. The tread's worthless.
"You should leave now." he said evenly to one of the knife-wielders behind him, still not looking as the other was hacked into by a rusty machete, the incensed Bishop of Grand Rapids laying into the interloper. The knife-man quipped something Doyle didn't catch and quickly moved to oblige. Doyle returned his attention to the Gangrel snarling and struggling under his heel.
"Do you know what this is? What you just interrupted?" A hint of emotion crept into his tone, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "This was a funeral." He eased off on the pressure on his throat, giving him enough ability to talk.
"I don't give a fuck what it w-" he started to say, with typical bravado. Doyle punched his outstretched elbow joint, snapping it the wrong way.
"This was for my wife." Doyle seethed, his beast dripping through his words.
"Good!" The gangrel laughed.
Doyle let the yellow-eyed monster to the front, and roared.
It was a simple trick, one he'd been taught at expense from Johnathon Crane years ago, back in Coldfire's time. His eyes locked on the squealing gangrel beneath him, the monster's face was full and raw and terrifying before him. The gangrel screamed in abject terror, thrashing and struggling, his own beast gripping him with fear, and Doyle pressed down harder, keeping him immobile as the weak little thing struggled to free itself in vain.
Fiona. Fiona is gone. Gone because of things like this. Gone because I couldn't make them fear me? Gone because they didn't care. They never would. It's all gone now and it can't be fixed, it's just lost. Another turn of the wheel. Another loss. Forever. They said she's burning now. God's purifying flames. Alone. They want fire?
Doyle looked to Bishop Sancoeur, who stood motionless nearby. "Get me kerosene."
...I'll give them fire.
Sancoeur seemed taken aback by the suggestion, looming imposing as only she could be, shadows seeming to lengthen as her expression took on an enraged cast. Gabe at last walked up, blood on his blades and a softness in his eyes.
"Doyle, don't do this." Gabe said cautiously, holding out a hand. "Ash the fucker, be done with it. But don't torture him. You're better than that."
Better? Doyle's thoughts seethed. What the fuck is that supposed to be, better? She's gone, I can't even be mad? I can't even give them what they fucking deserve? His claws flashed into existence, and his teeth clenched, eyes squeezed shut tightly.
Fiona's last letter to him flashed through his thoughts, the letter he'd struggled to read, forced himself to memorize.
Do me the favor, and the honor, of keeping going. You are the strongest man I have ever known, body and soul. You are a survivor. Do not stop just because I'm not alive. I am not dead. I will never be as long as you keep me alive in you. And you can't do that if you stop. Don't stop, Doyle. Never stop. You can do so much for the world, and I sincerely hope that you do. You have been a better influence than I could ever hope to be. I believe that your life is greater than mine, much more worth living. The greatest thing I could ever have done for you is die to keep you alive. Carry on. Prove me right. Carry on.
Please remember me. Remember me fondly. I wasn't a great person or a noble human being, but I was great. Remember that Ronan might feel something, he'll need to be consoled. Please look after me kids. I have two. I imagine the other one will surface eventually. I was ashamed to tell you before: Jonathan made me do it, when I was only a week old. Please take care of Anna Mae's grave. Please look after the rest of me family's graves at the mausoleum, mine included. Please take care of yourself. And please forgive me. For anything, for everything. I'm sorry I never learned to commit, but I hope you understand why and don't blame yourself. I will be missing you. But if I died in your service, it was so worth it.
Love you, Doyle.
-Fi
Doyle's claws scythed through the gangrel's arm at the elbow. Grabbing it up as it began to ash and flipping it so that the severed, clawed hand pointed down at the pinned attacker, Doyle wordlessly rammed it through the nameless gangrel's chest, the kindred shuddering and expiring, beginning to disintegrate.
Sancoeur and Gabe's gaze followed him as he walked back up to the memorial, sitting down next to the urn, taking off Fi's ring from around his neck and holding it tightly.
"I love you too." he whispered, alone.