"They were lovers," she says. "My dad... was gay?"
"Bisexual is how I understand it," Luccio says, and starts talking about something else- that Maggie shouldn't regret the loss, and maybe she could take comfort from this and that fact- but Maggie's mind is locking onto all the pieces with frightening clarity, reaching into memory and finding out things that should have been so, so obvious.
-
Her father's shoulders are a straight, angry, perfectly tailored Armani line in the moonlight. She stands at the doorway of his office, bursting with self-righteous anger. "You never told me," she hisses.
"No." he says, and John Marcone turns around. His eyes cut through her. "You never told me you were looking."
"I was always asking you!" she screams, and the walls deaden the noise. He's probably killed people here before, she thinks, overcome with malice and hatred, he probably had them specially stuffed with horsehair to muffle the gunshots.
"Not really," The moonlight glances off his silver hair as he turns around to face the city again, and she catches the remote expression his face and grows even angrier. "You always thought it hurt me when you asked. You stopped around eleven years of age."
"It did hurt you," Maggie snaps, momentarily derailed. "Don't lie."
"I was never jealous. It was just that-" and her father is so honest with her right now, the rise and fall of his shoulders in a helpless shrug. "-things- move. They pass. Time. People. I wish you hadn't."
He must be very tired, to be speaking that frankly. She steps closer.
"Oh, Maggie," he says gently, old and weary and not faking at all. She catches his arm, uncertainly, realizing for the first time that maybe the pain is not entirely hers alone. "I really wish you hadn't done that."
"I'm sorry, I'm really sorry," she says, a little terrified and sorry, wanting to wipe that look off his face. "I- won't ask anymore, okay? You don't have to tell me. I won't go looking."
"I would have told you, in time," he says, focusing more on her now, and she swallows when she sees his eyes. They reflect light that isn't there and shine green in the night. "But it is rather too late for that right now."
He clasps her shoulder and turns her around, a little, to look outside of the window. She stifles her voice.
It wasn't the city he'd been looking out on, after all.
It was a gate.
"He wants to meet you," says John Marcone, voice steamrolled flat by the weight of the fear behind it.
-- "He won't hurt you," her father tells her as they step outside into the balcony. It's summer, but the nights are cold; she shivers. His arm tightens around her. "Not physically- he'd never lay a finger on you."
"I sort of got that," she says. "That's what everyone was telling me."
He ignores her. "But he- from all accounts, he's not- who he used to be. He might try to tell you things. They might be disturbing. Just ignore them. And when he winds down-" here her father let out a slightly bitter, sad laugh- "he always does, you know, wind down, he's quick to forgiveness, like the old Scriptures- you tell him to let you go. Repeat it. Make him see you sincerely went to get out of the Nevernever, and he'll let you go."
"What about you?" she says. "You're staying behind-"
"I'm not letting you go off on your own," he says fiercely, his green eyes perhaps a little overbright, and as they're jolted through the circle of light, she thinks: dad, you bloody idiot.
--
The sensation that she's flying through something abruptly turns into the sensation of having been upright and motionless for the last few seconds.
"Oh," she says.
She's in a room. There are lots of people. That does not precisely mean that it is a public place.
She knows about the Fae; her dad told her a lot of fairy tales when she was young. He also taught her to be an excellent shooter, a good negotiator, and terrifying in a judo match. Maybe it was just training, all along; her hand steals to the little horseshoe necklace he gave her for her eighth birthday, and she goes a little pale.
The fairies he told her about where backstabbing, frightening creatures who made vicious deals and were good with words. Later, as she grew up, he started mentioning parts about the gratuitous sex, but hearing that sort of fairy tale from your dad got creepy when you were fifteen, so she'd asked him to stop. He'd given her a book, anyway. He'd never known when to stop pushing.
He isn't here. She shoves down her panic and forces herself to look around.
There are a lot of naked limbs draped over each other. The nearest being is a dark-skinned, slender woman wearing just a string of small white pearls a few feet away- she lifts her head lazily, her sated green eyes giving Maggie a jolt. "Come and join?" she murmurs, her body moving sinuously.
"No," she whispers, a little fascinated, a little terrified.
"Oh god. You're late," a man says, on her other side- Maggie jumps, and then tried to look like it hadn't been a jump. The man has long legs draped over someone else's waist, and he ignores the murmurs of protest as he pushes himself up. "We had five fucking orgies while waiting for you, princess."
"Really?" she says.
The man rolls his eyes. He is young looking, maybe her age; good looking in a vaguely irritating way. "Margaret, right?"
"Yeah," she whispers. He has the creepiest eyes; the pupils are just dots in a circle of pale blue. He is wearing boxers, and oddly a belt with a sword on top of that- the effect is vaguely surreal, and it could have been humorous. She's just terrified.
"Margaret." he says, rolling the name around on his tongue. It's vaguely obscene. "Maggie."
She narrows her eyes. "Don't call me that."
"Maggie," he tosses out again, flippantly. "Okay, first lesson, Maggie? That necklace you're wearing? Iron? Bad idea. They're starting to wake up; we're really sensitive about this sort of thing."
"I'm sorry," she says, and then remembers herself. "But how the fuck was I supposed to know?"
He smiles. It's a nicer smile than before, but his voice is as annoying and condescending when he answers; "Maybe some common fucking sense? Let's go, can't keep Da Man waiting."
"My dad," she says, as he hustles her inside a doorway. "My biological dad, I mean. He's- really. The Knight. The Faerie Knight."
"The Winter Knight," he says, sounding annoyed. His palm is icy on her arm, and she tries to move away. It grips all the more tightly. "Okay, try not to forget that. He's not fucking Tinkerbell. You come into your magic yet?"
The question throws her off guard. "Uh- yeah," she says. "Yeah. I'm getting training from my dad's, um, employee."
"Valkyrie still working for him?" the man laughs. "Oh, that's a laugh. And he got so pathetic, too, after he got you under his wing. You know, he gave up about his his empire for you?"
There's something in his voice. It's not a nice thing. It scares her.
"I- know," she whispers. Fascination overcomes fear. "Really?"
"He controlled Chicago before he adopted you," he said. "And then he wasted his life on the daughter of some useless bastard who couldn't keep his head screwed on to do anything by himself."
"You can't talk about him like that," Margaret says angrily. "You're his- you work for him, right? You can't say that."
"Can't I, fucking," he retorts smartly. "It's not like he cares anymore."
"What do you mean?" she says, but they reach the right door. The man drags her inside a large room.
"Oh wow," she breathes, forgetting herself for a moment. "Does he live here?"
The walls and ceiling are made of some clear crystal that seems to fade into opacity miles away. Rugs litter the floor, and there's a bookshelf over there... and there... a half-open door through which she can see a porcelain sink. There's a mussed-up bed, and a neatly folded black robe on that; the man who just led her inside walks towards it and dons it.
"Sometimes," he answers.
"I- have questions," she says, and then shakes her head. "But who are you? What's your name?"
"Names are difficult in Faerie," he says. "But you can call me Blackstone. Good a name as any. I'm... well, I fought the Winter Knight once."
"And he let you live?" Margaret blinks. "I mean, well. Um."
"Not like he had choice in the matter," says Blackstone. "I'm pretty high up on the ladder. He wasn't in any state to protest when I got back at him."
"What do you mean?"
He grins with casual cruelty at her concern. "He'd been tortured. He was pretty much out of his mind. If he'd had any brain left, he would have asked me to kill him. Oh... well, I can't say he deserved it."
She flinches- thinks about being angry- curiosity wins over. "But... now?" she asks.
"More or less back on track," Blackstone says, lying back on the bed and crossing his legs. He has long legs. "But a little different, the last few weeks- he's got some crazy idea in his head, he won't let go of it."
"Does it have to do with me?"
He looks over, his eerie-blue eyes glowing. "You figure in the Winter Knight's plans, yes."
"How?"
"Tell me about yourself,." he says.
--
When they drag in John Marcone, he's a mess. There's an insane glint in his eyes, and he won't go of the ring they've been trying to tear away. A small chunk of iron glints dully from where it's set.
"Dad!" Margaret stands up, appalled.
"Unhand me," says the Baron coldly. "Or face me under the Accords, you dog."
He's talking to Blackstone. Maggie looks at him, uncertain for the first time. There's something on her dad's face, beyond rage. There's hurt.
"Let him go," Blackstone says, and the white-haired man who brought John takes his hand off his shoulder, looking frigid. He bows before leaving.
There is silence in the room.
"Let me take a look at that," Blackstone says, nodding at John's bloodied hand.
"No," snarled her dad. "Maggie. What did he do to you?"
"I'm touched. I really am," Blackstone says, and his voice is genuine. Glancing at him quickly, Margaret notices that his eyes have changed color. They're dark now, like her own.
Something locks into place in her mind.
"You're-" she searches for words. "You're the Winter Knight."
"At your service," Harry Dresden says, and he sounds defeated and weary and heartsick, and he's looking at her, and then at her father, who looks like he wants to kill Dresden. "John. Come and sit down."
"How dare you," the man says angrily, but he walks forward almost instantly. "How dare you take her."
"We just had a talk," Dresden says, and folds down when John Marcone stands in front of him. "I told them to leave you alone unless you resisted," he adds, clasping his hand.
"You're insane. Insane. Why." Her dad closes his eyes as Dresden murmurs something in Latin. There's a faint blue shimmer.
"What color are my eyes?"
John Marcone stares down at them, and then glances away. "Dark brown."
"You see," Dresden said, smiling painfully.
"What's going on?" Margaret bursts out at last. "What- what the serious fuck, guys."
"Mab's watch on him," her father murmurs. "He got away. For how long... what on earth are you up to? Harry?"
"You know better than I do. You've been developing it for eight years."
John Marcone seems to grasp it instantly. "You stupid bastard," he snarls. "You can't."
"Why else would you have come up with it?" Harry Dresden says softly. "You started working on it after that Accords meeting. You saw me..."
There's an entire conversation going on in the following silence, and Maggie tries hard to understand what's going on. It's difficult.
"It was just theory. Theory and guesswork," her father whispers. "You realize- you're asking me to kill you."
"It would be better," Harry Dresden says. "You've never shirked hard decisions, John. And I'm making this one for myself. This job's for life. I'm asking you to release me from it. Just like I released the last Winter Knight."
Maggie stands there, realizing she's not in this room anymore.
John Marcone's mouth twists angrily.
Dresden touches his shoulder, and then turns back to Maggie. "So, it's true?" he says, and there's something challenging in his voice. "You raised her alone?"
Her father bares his teeth, a little, in reply.
"You stupid monogamous bastard," Harry says.
Her dad- John- makes a small, pained noise in his throat. Harry Dresden shudders for a moment, physically resisting something, before letting out a faint gasp and jerking forth to kiss him.
She has- never seen anything like it before. It takes her completely by surprise, hurts her as much as it stuns her. Harry looks about twenty five, although she knows he's about forty now, but her dad looks every one of his fifty two years. They make the strangest picture, and perhaps even a wrong one. It's wrenching, and she realizes that they must have been-
Her first is 'younger', but the second thought overtakes it, overpowers it-
They must have been so very in love.
She- cannot look away, fascinated and horrified at once- not horrified because they're gay or because her dad looks so old and tired right now, she hastily corrects herself in her own head, but because what's been done to them- Harry's wearing the most miserable expression she's ever seen on a human face as he pulls away, and John's is blank, frighteningly blank, managing to look austere even with swollen lips and glazed eyes. The nearest she's ever seen that look on his face is the one time he found her doing drugs, the first and only time for her, after she'd come home from Evelyn's party. The expression had been enough to deter her from doing anything like that again, but-
But this was even worse.
"Dresden," her dad says, his voice hoarse, and he clears his throat.
Harry looks at her, and for the first time she sees what everyone else meant- he does look like her. It's the eyes; they've lost the insane, furious shine, and now he just looks tired and sad. "She's- oh, damn her." he says, and although the words are harsh, it's the most tender thing he's ever said to her so far, and Maggie feels her face move in a smile. "You've seen worse, kid."
She wants to joke with him, she wants to get to know him and make him laugh and get that goddamn tired look off his face, but she doesn't dare. John's staring at the ground, and she takes in his silver hair and the creases at the corners of his eyes and the sag in his shoulders with new eyes. She doesn't want to wear him out, she thinks, she just wants to take their hands and beg them to run away, let's just run away, let's get out of here and get to know each other and let's see if we can make each other laugh...
Instead, she says: "Hell yeah, I've seen worse."
She has so many questions.
"It's- complicated," Harry laughs, seeing her face. She likes his eyes, meeting them across the room. "John's going to do it. He might explain it to you later."
Her dad's face is frozen in misery, and she wants to say something to him, but Harry is striding towards her, long legs eating up the distance between them in seconds, and his hands are on her shoulder. He has to bend to to look at her face. "This is hello." he says as she meets his eyes.
-
She's gibbering when she comes out of it, and her dad is shouting something at Harry Dresden, who's wearing a slightly drunken smile as he stumbles back. Maggie wipes the tears from her eyes and stares at her wet hand, uncomprehending.
"What was that? What was that?" she keeps asking, even as John Marcone takes Harry's shoulder and starts shaking him, shouting something about you inconsiderate bastard. "No, dad, it's okay, I swear- it was so beautiful-"
"So was yours," Harry says, speaking to both of them before winding his hands into John's hair and pulling him close. "So was yours, I promise."
This is seriously awful, I am sorry. Try not to read it. You have better things to do. This just fails on so many levels. The reason I'm posting is that breaking a promise would be even worse.
You're full of wrong here, anon. This fill is really fantastic.
It's not terrible. It's so fucking far from terrible that I had tears in my eyes when I finished reading this. It was exactly what I was looking for, bittersweet and longing and so fucking in love, it hurts. My god if you think this is terrible, how much more brilliant are your other works?
Oh my fucking god. *incoherent* I...there are no words, because your beautiful, beautiful words have reached inside me and twisted up my heart into little pieces.
This was actually a lot longer first- this is about 5500 words, I think, but there were two thousand words I cut out that came after that explained more about that because it was completely reduntant and the story lost tone. Basically what I wrote but omitted was that John had been developing something that would destroy Harry's soul and mind but leave everything intact. So he'd run on automatic, and Mab wouldn't be able to tell because Faeries can't soulgaze.
But that was like abruptly introducing somethingmumblePLOT into what's supposed to be just, you know, a drabble-thing, so I left it vague. I thought that the eventually Mab would tire of him when he became boring and predictable and Lloyd Slate-y, and pass the mantle onto someone else without suspecting anyone's involvement in it. But again, unwelcome plot. Honestly, this part is the reason I hated the entire thing. Cutting the last parts off made it better, but it gained a lot of weaknesses, too.
So he'd run on automatic, and Mab wouldn't be able to tell because Faeries can't soulgaze.
I thought this came across pretty clearly, actually! Harry was so concerned about John doing it while her attention was elsewhere, it definitely made me think of a kind of mercy killing.
Okay, whew, then I somewhat managed to strike the balance between no-terrible-exposition and just-enough-information-to-make-it-plausible. That's good to know.
Wow this is good. Authornon I would have been so mad at you if you hadn't posted this. Well, no, because I wouldn't have known, but still. Awesomeness needs to be shared.
oh man it takes a lot to make tears actually roll but this did it. It was Maggie wanting so badly for them all to run away and then Harry telling them that both their souls were beautiful and the long-burning and deep love but also the waste *tears everywhere*
Oh... oh God. Anon! That was not terrible, that was heartwrennching! The pain and the bitter and oh God, Thomas in his crazy and misery, and Holy Fuck Harry is just....
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Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 02:10 pm (UTC)(link)"Bisexual is how I understand it," Luccio says, and starts talking about something else- that Maggie shouldn't regret the loss, and maybe she could take comfort from this and that fact- but Maggie's mind is locking onto all the pieces with frightening clarity, reaching into memory and finding out things that should have been so, so obvious.
-
Her father's shoulders are a straight, angry, perfectly tailored Armani line in the moonlight. She stands at the doorway of his office, bursting with self-righteous anger. "You never told me," she hisses.
"No." he says, and John Marcone turns around. His eyes cut through her. "You never told me you were looking."
"I was always asking you!" she screams, and the walls deaden the noise. He's probably killed people here before, she thinks, overcome with malice and hatred, he probably had them specially stuffed with horsehair to muffle the gunshots.
"Not really," The moonlight glances off his silver hair as he turns around to face the city again, and she catches the remote expression his face and grows even angrier. "You always thought it hurt me when you asked. You stopped around eleven years of age."
"It did hurt you," Maggie snaps, momentarily derailed. "Don't lie."
"I was never jealous. It was just that-" and her father is so honest with her right now, the rise and fall of his shoulders in a helpless shrug. "-things- move. They pass. Time. People. I wish you hadn't."
He must be very tired, to be speaking that frankly. She steps closer.
"Oh, Maggie," he says gently, old and weary and not faking at all. She catches his arm, uncertainly, realizing for the first time that maybe the pain is not entirely hers alone. "I really wish you hadn't done that."
"I'm sorry, I'm really sorry," she says, a little terrified and sorry, wanting to wipe that look off his face. "I- won't ask anymore, okay? You don't have to tell me. I won't go looking."
"I would have told you, in time," he says, focusing more on her now, and she swallows when she sees his eyes. They reflect light that isn't there and shine green in the night. "But it is rather too late for that right now."
He clasps her shoulder and turns her around, a little, to look outside of the window. She stifles her voice.
It wasn't the city he'd been looking out on, after all.
It was a gate.
"He wants to meet you," says John Marcone, voice steamrolled flat by the weight of the fear behind it.
--
"He won't hurt you," her father tells her as they step outside into the balcony. It's summer, but the nights are cold; she shivers. His arm tightens around her. "Not physically- he'd never lay a finger on you."
"I sort of got that," she says. "That's what everyone was telling me."
He ignores her. "But he- from all accounts, he's not- who he used to be. He might try to tell you things. They might be disturbing. Just ignore them. And when he winds down-" here her father let out a slightly bitter, sad laugh- "he always does, you know, wind down, he's quick to forgiveness, like the old Scriptures- you tell him to let you go. Repeat it. Make him see you sincerely went to get out of the Nevernever, and he'll let you go."
"What about you?" she says. "You're staying behind-"
"I'm not letting you go off on your own," he says fiercely, his green eyes perhaps a little overbright, and as they're jolted through the circle of light, she thinks: dad, you bloody idiot.
--
The sensation that she's flying through something abruptly turns into the sensation of having been upright and motionless for the last few seconds.
"Oh," she says.
She's in a room. There are lots of people. That does not precisely mean that it is a public place.
She knows about the Fae; her dad told her a lot of fairy tales when she was young. He also taught her to be an excellent shooter, a good negotiator, and terrifying in a judo match. Maybe it was just training, all along; her hand steals to the little horseshoe necklace he gave her for her eighth birthday, and she goes a little pale.
The fairies he told her about where backstabbing, frightening creatures who made vicious deals and were good with words. Later, as she grew up, he started mentioning parts about the gratuitous sex, but hearing that sort of fairy tale from your dad got creepy when you were fifteen, so she'd asked him to stop. He'd given her a book, anyway. He'd never known when to stop pushing.
He isn't here. She shoves down her panic and forces herself to look around.
There are a lot of naked limbs draped over each other. The nearest being is a dark-skinned, slender woman wearing just a string of small white pearls a few feet away- she lifts her head lazily, her sated green eyes giving Maggie a jolt. "Come and join?" she murmurs, her body moving sinuously.
"No," she whispers, a little fascinated, a little terrified.
"Oh god. You're late," a man says, on her other side- Maggie jumps, and then tried to look like it hadn't been a jump. The man has long legs draped over someone else's waist, and he ignores the murmurs of protest as he pushes himself up. "We had five fucking orgies while waiting for you, princess."
"Really?" she says.
The man rolls his eyes. He is young looking, maybe her age; good looking in a vaguely irritating way. "Margaret, right?"
"Yeah," she whispers. He has the creepiest eyes; the pupils are just dots in a circle of pale blue. He is wearing boxers, and oddly a belt with a sword on top of that- the effect is vaguely surreal, and it could have been humorous. She's just terrified.
"Margaret." he says, rolling the name around on his tongue. It's vaguely obscene. "Maggie."
She narrows her eyes. "Don't call me that."
"Maggie," he tosses out again, flippantly. "Okay, first lesson, Maggie? That necklace you're wearing? Iron? Bad idea. They're starting to wake up; we're really sensitive about this sort of thing."
"I'm sorry," she says, and then remembers herself. "But how the fuck was I supposed to know?"
He smiles. It's a nicer smile than before, but his voice is as annoying and condescending when he answers; "Maybe some common fucking sense? Let's go, can't keep Da Man waiting."
"My dad," she says, as he hustles her inside a doorway. "My biological dad, I mean. He's- really. The Knight. The Faerie Knight."
"The Winter Knight," he says, sounding annoyed. His palm is icy on her arm, and she tries to move away. It grips all the more tightly. "Okay, try not to forget that. He's not fucking Tinkerbell. You come into your magic yet?"
The question throws her off guard. "Uh- yeah," she says. "Yeah. I'm getting training from my dad's, um, employee."
"Valkyrie still working for him?" the man laughs. "Oh, that's a laugh. And he got so pathetic, too, after he got you under his wing. You know, he gave up about his his empire for you?"
There's something in his voice. It's not a nice thing. It scares her.
"I- know," she whispers. Fascination overcomes fear. "Really?"
"He controlled Chicago before he adopted you," he said. "And then he wasted his life on the daughter of some useless bastard who couldn't keep his head screwed on to do anything by himself."
"You can't talk about him like that," Margaret says angrily. "You're his- you work for him, right? You can't say that."
"Can't I, fucking," he retorts smartly. "It's not like he cares anymore."
"What do you mean?" she says, but they reach the right door. The man drags her inside a large room.
"Oh wow," she breathes, forgetting herself for a moment. "Does he live here?"
The walls and ceiling are made of some clear crystal that seems to fade into opacity miles away. Rugs litter the floor, and there's a bookshelf over there... and there... a half-open door through which she can see a porcelain sink. There's a mussed-up bed, and a neatly folded black robe on that; the man who just led her inside walks towards it and dons it.
"Sometimes," he answers.
"I- have questions," she says, and then shakes her head. "But who are you? What's your name?"
"Names are difficult in Faerie," he says. "But you can call me Blackstone. Good a name as any. I'm... well, I fought the Winter Knight once."
"And he let you live?" Margaret blinks. "I mean, well. Um."
"Not like he had choice in the matter," says Blackstone. "I'm pretty high up on the ladder. He wasn't in any state to protest when I got back at him."
"What do you mean?"
He grins with casual cruelty at her concern. "He'd been tortured. He was pretty much out of his mind. If he'd had any brain left, he would have asked me to kill him. Oh... well, I can't say he deserved it."
She flinches- thinks about being angry- curiosity wins over. "But... now?" she asks.
"More or less back on track," Blackstone says, lying back on the bed and crossing his legs. He has long legs. "But a little different, the last few weeks- he's got some crazy idea in his head, he won't let go of it."
"Does it have to do with me?"
He looks over, his eerie-blue eyes glowing. "You figure in the Winter Knight's plans, yes."
"How?"
"Tell me about yourself,." he says.
--
When they drag in John Marcone, he's a mess. There's an insane glint in his eyes, and he won't go of the ring they've been trying to tear away. A small chunk of iron glints dully from where it's set.
"Dad!" Margaret stands up, appalled.
"Unhand me," says the Baron coldly. "Or face me under the Accords, you dog."
He's talking to Blackstone. Maggie looks at him, uncertain for the first time. There's something on her dad's face, beyond rage. There's hurt.
"Let him go," Blackstone says, and the white-haired man who brought John takes his hand off his shoulder, looking frigid. He bows before leaving.
There is silence in the room.
"Let me take a look at that," Blackstone says, nodding at John's bloodied hand.
"No," snarled her dad. "Maggie. What did he do to you?"
"I'm touched. I really am," Blackstone says, and his voice is genuine. Glancing at him quickly, Margaret notices that his eyes have changed color. They're dark now, like her own.
Something locks into place in her mind.
"You're-" she searches for words. "You're the Winter Knight."
"At your service," Harry Dresden says, and he sounds defeated and weary and heartsick, and he's looking at her, and then at her father, who looks like he wants to kill Dresden. "John. Come and sit down."
"How dare you," the man says angrily, but he walks forward almost instantly. "How dare you take her."
"We just had a talk," Dresden says, and folds down when John Marcone stands in front of him. "I told them to leave you alone unless you resisted," he adds, clasping his hand.
"You're insane. Insane. Why." Her dad closes his eyes as Dresden murmurs something in Latin. There's a faint blue shimmer.
"What color are my eyes?"
John Marcone stares down at them, and then glances away. "Dark brown."
"You see," Dresden said, smiling painfully.
"What's going on?" Margaret bursts out at last. "What- what the serious fuck, guys."
"Mab's watch on him," her father murmurs. "He got away. For how long... what on earth are you up to? Harry?"
"You know better than I do. You've been developing it for eight years."
John Marcone seems to grasp it instantly. "You stupid bastard," he snarls. "You can't."
"Why else would you have come up with it?" Harry Dresden says softly. "You started working on it after that Accords meeting. You saw me..."
There's an entire conversation going on in the following silence, and Maggie tries hard to understand what's going on. It's difficult.
"It was just theory. Theory and guesswork," her father whispers. "You realize- you're asking me to kill you."
"It would be better," Harry Dresden says. "You've never shirked hard decisions, John. And I'm making this one for myself. This job's for life. I'm asking you to release me from it. Just like I released the last Winter Knight."
Maggie stands there, realizing she's not in this room anymore.
John Marcone's mouth twists angrily.
Dresden touches his shoulder, and then turns back to Maggie. "So, it's true?" he says, and there's something challenging in his voice. "You raised her alone?"
Her father bares his teeth, a little, in reply.
"You stupid monogamous bastard," Harry says.
Her dad- John- makes a small, pained noise in his throat. Harry Dresden shudders for a moment, physically resisting something, before letting out a faint gasp and jerking forth to kiss him.
She has- never seen anything like it before. It takes her completely by surprise, hurts her as much as it stuns her. Harry looks about twenty five, although she knows he's about forty now, but her dad looks every one of his fifty two years. They make the strangest picture, and perhaps even a wrong one. It's wrenching, and she realizes that they must have been-
Her first is 'younger', but the second thought overtakes it, overpowers it-
They must have been so very in love.
She- cannot look away, fascinated and horrified at once- not horrified because they're gay or because her dad looks so old and tired right now, she hastily corrects herself in her own head, but because what's been done to them- Harry's wearing the most miserable expression she's ever seen on a human face as he pulls away, and John's is blank, frighteningly blank, managing to look austere even with swollen lips and glazed eyes. The nearest she's ever seen that look on his face is the one time he found her doing drugs, the first and only time for her, after she'd come home from Evelyn's party. The expression had been enough to deter her from doing anything like that again, but-
But this was even worse.
"Dresden," her dad says, his voice hoarse, and he clears his throat.
Harry looks at her, and for the first time she sees what everyone else meant- he does look like her. It's the eyes; they've lost the insane, furious shine, and now he just looks tired and sad. "She's- oh, damn her." he says, and although the words are harsh, it's the most tender thing he's ever said to her so far, and Maggie feels her face move in a smile. "You've seen worse, kid."
She wants to joke with him, she wants to get to know him and make him laugh and get that goddamn tired look off his face, but she doesn't dare. John's staring at the ground, and she takes in his silver hair and the creases at the corners of his eyes and the sag in his shoulders with new eyes. She doesn't want to wear him out, she thinks, she just wants to take their hands and beg them to run away, let's just run away, let's get out of here and get to know each other and let's see if we can make each other laugh...
Instead, she says: "Hell yeah, I've seen worse."
She has so many questions.
"It's- complicated," Harry laughs, seeing her face. She likes his eyes, meeting them across the room. "John's going to do it. He might explain it to you later."
Her dad's face is frozen in misery, and she wants to say something to him, but Harry is striding towards her, long legs eating up the distance between them in seconds, and his hands are on her shoulder. He has to bend to to look at her face. "This is hello." he says as she meets his eyes.
-
She's gibbering when she comes out of it, and her dad is shouting something at Harry Dresden, who's wearing a slightly drunken smile as he stumbles back. Maggie wipes the tears from her eyes and stares at her wet hand, uncomprehending.
"What was that? What was that?" she keeps asking, even as John Marcone takes Harry's shoulder and starts shaking him, shouting something about you inconsiderate bastard. "No, dad, it's okay, I swear- it was so beautiful-"
"So was yours," Harry says, speaking to both of them before winding his hands into John's hair and pulling him close. "So was yours, I promise."
Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 02:23 pm (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 02:27 pm (UTC)(link)THIS IS SERIOUSLY THE BEST THING EVER
IT HURTS SO DAMN GOOD
:bows:
Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
Oh jesus christ, that hurt in so many ways. I should've seen the twist with Marcone coming, but I didn't and then it got worse and :criiiies:
Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 02:50 pm (UTC)(link)(and are you nuts Writernon? This was not terrible at all, it was fucking great. In a very heartbreaking way)
Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
You're full of wrong here, anon. This fill is really fantastic.
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(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 03:08 pm (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 03:11 pm (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 03:21 pm (UTC)(link)The last line! *cries*
OP Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 07:15 pm (UTC)(link)/endless fangirling/
Sorry for the incoherence. Summary: I loved it.
Re: OP Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 10:43 pm (UTC)(link)Expected about two lukewarm reviews. This is an unexpected surprise. (backs away) I'm glad you like it, anyway. Wow.
(loves you all totally)
Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-07 10:46 pm (UTC)(link)They must have been so very in love.
HOLY FUCK, ANON :goes off to find tissues:
Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-08 08:28 am (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-08 11:47 am (UTC)(link)But that was like abruptly introducing somethingmumblePLOT into what's supposed to be just, you know, a drabble-thing, so I left it vague. I thought that the eventually Mab would tire of him when he became boring and predictable and Lloyd Slate-y, and pass the mantle onto someone else without suspecting anyone's involvement in it. But again, unwelcome plot. Honestly, this part is the reason I hated the entire thing. Cutting the last parts off made it better, but it gained a lot of weaknesses, too.
Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-08 01:35 pm (UTC)(link)I thought this came across pretty clearly, actually! Harry was so concerned about John doing it while her attention was elsewhere, it definitely made me think of a kind of mercy killing.
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(Anonymous) 2011-03-08 05:24 pm (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-09 06:11 am (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-09 06:02 pm (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-03-21 01:41 am (UTC)(link)God, that was my favorite line. It hurts so much. It's a terrible terrible thing to be saying hello and goodbye all at the same time. Gods.
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(Anonymous) 2011-03-27 03:01 pm (UTC)(link)Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
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Re: Terrible Fill 2/2
(Anonymous) 2011-05-15 04:26 am (UTC)(link)Damn, Anon, that was amazing. Damn.
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Re: Terrible Fill 2/2