05-Aug-2002
Pet Shop of Horrors: Sequel (A Robin Hendrix Fic)
by bonnejeanne
Title: Sequel (A Robin Hendrix Fic)
Author: bonnejeanne (bonnejeanne@yahoo.com)
Category: AU
Rating: G
Spoilers: Series
WARNINGS: AU, Liberties taken.
Disclaimer: Pet Shop of Horrors characters and universe are the property of the copyright owners. Our stuff is ours. No money being made here.
As with all our fics, while our goal is to stay as in character as possible, any discrepancies are our mistakes.
Feedback: Any and all comments welcome, be they short or long.
Notes: This follows the PSH the story "Despair".
Sequel (A Robin Hendrix Fic)
It was cold.
One glimpse of the eyes of my beloved and all my ties to the world were severed in a frozen instant. Light died, warmth vanished, everything was gone.
And I was glad.
I didn't expect my thoughts to continue, how could they in the cold nothing?
Reveling in their silence, I waited for my self to cease.
But it took a moment too long. In that cold moment, as I tried to hold the last image of my beloved's face, it seemed to me that the look of mercy I had thought I had seen there was instead one of stricken pain.
In timeless nowhere, the realization stretched out endlessly.
Pain.
I had caused her pain.
I had left her with pain.
I have given her pain.
In the frozen nowhere, the knowledge, which should have had no meaning, filled the void with knives of anguish. How could I... how could I have found my peace at the price of hers? Sweet creature, who had done nothing but love me, had asked nothing of me but my love, had needed me... and it was that need that gave my life meaning. It was the knowledge that I would not be able to meet that need that decided me on my last course of...
Cowardice.
I never thought it would hurt her... but how terrified she must have been... how lost... how could she have understood my betrayal in her perfect innocence?
But there had never been hope. One betrayal for another, wasn't it? If only I had been stronger... but I was never that. I had never had the courage for myself, why expect to find it for another? Isn't that who I was?
And so my last fading thoughts were of grief, not peace and it was all for...
Nothing...
"My Prince! Please... please my Prince, wake up! You can't leave us now! We've no hope left, nothing, only you..."
The voice brought everything with it, snapping into existence painfully. A spasm wracked senses that should have been melted away. I winced from light I should not have been able to see, lifting an arm instinctively to shield eyes that opened instinctively.
"He's coming to!"
It was a cry, answered by others. The voices - some male, some female, seemed both familiar and at the same time totally strange.
Blinking, I noticed before anything else, the intricate metal artifact wrapped around my forearm, engraved and encrusted with gems that glimmered against the silver metal. What a beautiful prop...
Pressing fingers to my throbbing forehead, I felt a matching band of cool metal settled snugly around it, the embossing graceful under my fingertips. Eyes watering, I peered at the figures moving around me, just blurs of color at first, then shapes, then people with faces.
"Who..." my lips formed something like a word but it sounded odd to my ears.
"Your Majesty!"
One figure pushed the others aside. "He's disoriented, it's no wonder. By the gods, I never thought it would work." Turning to me, the man seemed to examine my face closely.
"Prince Starblade, it is your servant, Ardat Gley, do you remember my voice?"
I started to shake my head but his face *did* seem familiar, his voice as well. But there was something wrong...
My voice strengthened, one of those few natural gifts I had left, when I chose to use it, or had been... "I'm not a prince..."
The expression on the man's face was both relieved and exasperated. "Now is not the time for that old argument, my Prince. You are the last of the Starblade clan left, the rightful son of the beautiful Queen Shamina. Have you forgotten your vow to abdicate only *after* the Rainbow Kingdom was returned to a realm of peace and safety?"
No... I hadn't forgotten... that was part of the script, but...
"What is happening?"
The relief was stamped more plainly on the man's face. Relief and other things - stress, urgency... "I don't have time to tell you all in detail, but we almost lost you. Your gambit to save our world from the Ice Pirates worked, but it nearly cost you your life."
"It *did* cost him his life," a female voice cut in, the woman bending over me also oddly familiar, her ornate robes giving off an air of someone who had once held power.
The glare Ardat threw at her was matched by a few others but she ignored it. Bending closer, she said crisply, "They brought your body to me, Prince. Cold and lifeless. But they weren't willing to let you rest, so they overcame their distaste and begged the help of a Witch-Summoner. I brought you back. But it would not have been possible if your life-thread had not had length left in it still."
The woman made me uneasy, and I found myself struggling to sit, so people wouldn't keep bending over me. My limbs were cold but with only a little effort the strength came back into them. A sigh seemed to move through the small group at the movement.
"We don't have time for your prattle, witch," Ardat snapped. "Even you can't face what is coming, you've admitted as much, so be silent." The woman moved back with a little glare.
"What... is coming?" I asked, feeling the apprehension in the room as if it were a group of hopefuls after a casting call, when the hot new name has unexpectedly become available for the part they'd all read for.
Ardat swallowed, and the faces on the others became grim, frightened.
"The Ice Pirates were destroyed by your sacrifice maneuver, my Prince. But they called upon their gods to send a Stone Reaver. It's killed... hundreds. It's taken the Sanctuary of Starblade. We handful are all that's left. When it comes for us... the people will have no protection against the Reaver, or any scavenger race that comes upon our world in its weakened state."
"That's sounds bad..."
"My Lord!" A young man pushed forward from the edges of the small group. "The oracle says you are the only one... the only one who can stop it..."
For a moment I wanted to laugh. The urge seized me with both hands, but the faces of these people around me - they were not joking. They were in fear of their lives. Perhaps more.
With another effort, I made it to my feet. Absently I glanced down at the garments I wore, the oddly light metal shaped like exotic armor, the comfortable weight at my hip... glancing up, my eye was caught by a reflection, and I reached out for the round flat disk of polished metal, bluish in hue, that hung round the neck of the 'witch'. Staring at me consideringly, she quickly took it off and pushed it into my hand.
"If my amulet can help you, take it."
I looked at the polished surface and saw my face reflected back, familiar... even the long hair spilling over my shoulders was familiar thought it had been years since I'd worn it so long. Reaching up I let my fingertips trace the outline of one ear and felt... not the latex appliance but my own flesh... rising to a graceful point.
"What does it do?" I asked, not sure where the lines were coming from.
"The Reaver? All who look upon it... turn to stone, my lord! No one can approach it!"
Looking up, I dropped the amulet around my neck. Something I'd seen in a movie...
"You say it's coming?"
"I fear so, my Prince," Ardat's voice was grim. "It must have become aware of what we were trying to do, to summon you back."
Taking a deep breath, I nodded. I knew my business in this scene. Looking from one to the other of the small group, I smiled slightly. "Then you'd better go. Find the other survivors and keep them away from here. "You'll know when it's safe to come back."
Now there were a few tears, from some of the women, even from the boy. But this was what they'd summoned me for, wasn't it?
Ardat looked into my eyes for a long time, a look of respect and even of love, perhaps.
"Aye," he said at last, and gathered the small group to escape through a concealed exit.
Taking out the sword that was sheathed at my hip - I knew the laser weapon was spent - with the amulet held in the other hand, I sat on a broken piece of marble close to the room's entrance and waited. I could see anything that came through the opening in the reflected surface before it would see me. A simple trick - anyone could have thought of it. Perhaps there was some reason why it wouldn't work and I would die some painful meaningless death, but what did that matter to me now?
From the angle I saw the dress before I saw who wore it. It was a rich purple, decorated with ropes of pearls, and I thought, there's been a mistake, some poor woman has stumbled through the wrong passage, but I tilted the amulet up to get a look at her face before stepping out to send her quickly away, and stopped, stunned.
My... beloved...
I knew her face so well I could never be fooled. Only her reflected eyes were different. They didn't contain the peace I had looked for in them, nor the pain. They were vacant. As if the soul inside merely endured an endless and meaningless existence. I felt a sudden constriction in my chest at the familiarity of *that*.
And with the same recognition I knew that this was the monster I was supposed to kill to save the innocents of a lost planet.
My hand trembled and the reflection shuddered.
Heart hammering in my chest - surely she could hear it? - I stepped away from the entrance and my concealment, and turned my back to the doorway, holding the amulet up so I could watch her come in. She saw me at once, from the back only, and perhaps I imagined the brief expression I thought I saw flicker across her lovely face: weariness, incredible weariness...
Then she saw the amulet, and the sword in my hand. Her features stilled. She'd have two choices - accept death or try and trick me into looking at her face.
"Medusa..." I said softly, and she froze, her reflected eyes widening. It was nothing to her expression when I slowly set the sword on the ground.
"Don't be afraid..." I murmured softly, but clearly. "I'm not going to hurt you... and I won't let anyone hurt you. I don't expect you know me... but I was your Robin for a little while..."
Her already alabaster complexion somehow paled. Dared I hope that she too had somehow come to this place, wherever it was, with no more hope than I?
Closing my eyes carefully, I turned around. And waited. Completely vulnerable, she could pick up the sword from the ground - I'd seen that the edge was sharp, it was no prop weapon.
After what seemed like a long time, cool dry fingers brushed across my cheek. I smiled in relief and almost opened my eyes but she quickly flattened her palm over my lids, holding them closed.
I reached out and my arms found her. And for a brief moment, my lips, too. Then I felt her shake her head violently. She was as mute as she had been before, yet also every iota as eloquent. I felt her stoop to retrieve the sword. Then she pressed it into my hand and lifted the edge, I guessed, to her throat.
"No!!" I cried, flinging it away. Then more softly but strong, "No. No I will never do that. I know, I know, my love. You think there is no way out. No way for us to be together. But there is. I will make it happen. Just a little sacrifice and we can be happy finally, as perhaps we were meant to be. Trust me... I won't fail you this time!"
"Any word? Any sign?" the Prince's armsman paced, as the hour passed.
"No," the boy, back from scouting, answered quickly. "The Reaver went in - but has not come out. Nor has the Prince."
"Perhaps... they... he..." the young woman stopped at a forbidding look from Ardat.
"I will go," the man said, silencing the protests. "If I don't return, seal the Sancutary off behind me."
Cautiously, he made his way back through the secret passage. Opening the panel slowly, he listened for many minutes. His keen ears caught the sound of movement. Then the soft murmur of a familiar voice, though the words weren't loud enough for him to hear.
"My Prince!" he called, stepping out, but before he could get more than a few paces into the room he heard the same voice call out urgently.
"Stop! Do not come in any further upon pain of death!"
Freezing, the armsman looked around cautiously. "My... Prince... what..."
"I said stop! Ardat Gley, is it you?"
"Yes, my Prince. Please tell me what has happened? Did you not kill the creature?" The armsman suddenly realized he could see the Prince sitting on the edge of the stone altar where he'd been brought back to life. And another figure was beside him. It looked like the silhouette of a woman, though something like a reptilian tail seemed to come out of the bottom of the long dress it wore. It had turned quickly to have its back to him but he could see it holding up the amulet that had been around the Prince's neck, and for a moment thought he glimpsed a reflected eye...
"Don't look at the amulet!" The Prince called and he averted his eyes quickly. "Now listen carefully to me. You must obey my instructions to the letter, understand? I've made a... bargain with the, the Reaver as you call her. It wasn't right to kill her. She can't help what she is. None of us can do that, can we?"
Bewildered, the armsman shook his head. "I don't understand..."
"It's very simple." Even as he was answered, Ardat's eyes focused on the prince's face as he realized there was a blood stained bandage bound around his eyes, and a small dagger held loosely in his hand. "I have given her my eyes. She can't harm me now. And in return, she is going to take care of me. Do you understand? No I don't suppose you will. But that doesn't matter. She won't harm anyone, but you have to tell everyone to stay away from the Sanctuary. Bring us supplies from time to time, but leave us alone. Anyone who pries around will meet a disturbing fate."
Ardat's throat closed with sudden emotion. It was terrible... and yet it was exactly what his Prince would have done. Spared a monster, and saved his people, thinking nothing of the sacrifice.
"It... it will be done as you command, my Prince," he said, his voice thick with sorrow. His voice dropped to a whisper, "But... my lord, you're blind..." Swallowing with difficulty, the armsman gave his leader the deepest bow possible, knowing it would not, could not be seen. Then he turned and quickly left. The long war was finally, truly over, though the cost had been so terribly high.
Listening to the sound of movement, recognizing the click of the door's latch, Robin dropped the dagger and heard it ping softly on the floor. A cool, dry hand caressed his cheek and he turned his face and sought willing lips. "No," he whispered to the man who had already gone, a strange happiness lifting his features. "No you're wrong."
"I'm free."
~owari~