Title: Dog Days
Author: alyse
Fandom: Blade: Trinity
Pairing: Abigail Whistler/Hannibal King
Rating: PG13
Warnings/Spoilers: No warnings. Set post movie
Genres: Established relationship
Word Count: 1,900
Status: Complete, one shot
Disclaimer: Blade: Trinity, the motion picture, is owned by New Line Cinema. This is a not for profit fanfiction, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Notes: Thanks to![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
aithine for beta reading duties. Any mistakes remaining are my own. Title and quote from 'Dog Days Are Over' by Florence and the Machine. Written for my ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
kissbingo square 'type: gentle'.
Summary: Her mom used to say bad things came in threes, always waiting for the next shit thing to happen. With Zoë, Blade and King still breathing, Abby figured that it was about time the universe balanced the crap a little.
-o-
Run fast for your mother, run fast for your father
Run for your children, for your sisters and brothers
-o-
Blade's skin was cool to the touch, and Abby's fingers fumbled as she pressed them into his neck, looking for something, anything to give her hope.
There was nothing, not at first. Not for long moments and then - so faint that she thought she'd imagined it - she felt it. The slow, solitary thump of a heartbeat too stubborn to quit entirely.
It seemed to take forever until she felt the second beat, time stretching out with her fingers pressed so firmly into his skin that they were starting to cramp. If he were human, entirely human, she'd leave bruises. As it was, she pressed harder, willing Blade's heart to keep beating as though just wishing for it hard enough would make it happen.
It had been a long time since Abby had believed in happy endings. Her fairy tales were the original ones - blood and gore and death, like Zoë's would be now.
She leaned in closer, until she was barely an inch from Blade's mouth, listening, waiting for the sound of a breath, the feel of it against her skin.
"If you kiss him," King said behind her, his voice gravelly and hoarse, used, "I'm going to pout." He sounded like crap, but she'd take that any day just as long as he was still around for her to hear him. Sometimes happy endings happened whether you believed in them or not.
Blade's breath brushed against her skin, and she sat back on her heels, something like grief or relief prickling in her eyes, tightening in her throat as she looked up and met King's eyes. "He's alive," she said.
King let out a breath of his own, some of the tension easing out of his body, and for a moment Abby imagined that she could feel King's breath against her skin, too, sour with pain and fear, but steady and strong. "Great," he said. "Carrying him out of here is going to fucking suck."
There was a little gasp of breath as Zoë crept closer, her eyes fixed on King and the expression on her small face disapproving. "That's a bad word," she said, although she'd heard far worse, especially from King. Abby could feel the laughter bubble up, bringing everything else with it, all the things she'd buried after she'd finally lowered Sommerfield's body to the ground. It escaped as a little huff, halfway between a laugh and a sob, before she managed to clamp it down again, burying it deep.
Her mom used to say bad things came in threes, always waiting for the next shit thing to happen. With Zoë, Blade and King still breathing, Abby figured that it was about time the universe balanced the crap a little.
-o-
They made it as far as the bikes before calling Caulder, and King's near constant low-grade swearing, the words said under his breath so that Zoë wouldn't hear, stopped the laughter and eased the grief. There was pain in his voice and Abby got it; she had her music to focus on when her muscles ached and burned, and each twist and kick stretched her body to its limits. King had his voice like she had her music: reminders that they were still alive and had better concentrate, push past the pain and keep going if they wanted to stay that way. But even they had their limits.
She called Caulder while they were huddled together in the dark alleyway where she and Blade had stashed their bikes, listening to the sound of sirens in the distance and praying they didn't come any closer. Blade was a not-quite-dead weight at her feet, and Zoë a warm stillness, pressed against her side.
King met her eyes across the alley, his back pressed against the far wall and his face creased with exhaustion. The cuts on his face were dark and deep in the dimness, and Abby let the wall behind her take her weight.
-o-
Caulder took charge of Blade, his face as solemn as always. She had no idea whether that was a good or bad sign; she'd never seen Caulder crack a smile, even on the good days.
King was left to Abby's tender mercies. It made sense from a triage and resource point of view, but perhaps Caulder had simply seen the look on her face, the one that told him and the whole damned world to back the fuck off. She didn't say as much out loud, not in front of Zoë, but she didn't need to. The message came through, loud and clear.
She was familiar enough with Sommerfield's makeshift infirmary back at the Honeycomb Hideout to find her way around Caulder's. It didn't take long to find what she needed, even if she had to improvise. She ended up using a wad of bandages to clean the worst of the blood from King's face, smoothing it gently over his skin while he bit back on the most outrageous of his curses. Zoë still watched him, wide-eyed, while he hissed and snarled as the antiseptic burned and stung in his cuts. He was going to need stitches once Caulder finished with Blade.
"Where's my mom?" Zoë asked, her voice small and fragile. "Why isn't she doing that?"
Abby's eyes met King's; the grief and the guilt in King's expression mirrored the surge she felt rising up inside her, catching in her throat until she could barely breathe with it.
"Oh," said Zoë, because she was six, not stupid; death was hardly unfamiliar to her. "Is it okay if I miss her?"
Abby's knees buckled, the weight of her grief - for Zoë; for Sommerfield; for Dex and Hedges and her father; and for Blade, whose breathing was too shallow and heartbeat too slow in the next room - too great for her to bear. She would have staggered, fallen to her knees and let out the howl that was tearing its way out of her chest, if King hadn't reached out and caught hold of her. His fingers were steady on her skin, cold and gripping painfully tightly, but there were worlds of pain in his eyes, depths he never let anyone see, no one but her.
Abby took in a deep breath, but it was King who answered Zoë, his voice a lot less steady than his grip on Abby. "Yeah. It's okay to miss her, sweetheart." He cleared his throat uncomfortably, his eyes skittering away from Abby's as he added, awkwardly, "We all do."
Zoë took this in, her hands twisting together, and that was just another reminder of what they've lost. All of Zoë's clothes, the stuffed rabbit she carried around with her when she thought no one was watching, when she didn't feel like she had to be the world's smallest grown-up around the Night Stalkers - all of that was gone, too.
Abby didn't feel like a grown-up. She felt hollow, empty, like the task in front of her was too great for her to handle on her own, but maybe that was what adulthood meant.
She swirled the bandage in the bowl again, watching as it turned the water bright red. The antiseptic in it stung her fingers, burning in all of the little cuts and grazes she always had, the ones left by the force of her blows. It was still easier than meeting King's eyes, or Zoë's.
"Zoë, honey," she said, and her voice seemed to come from a great distance. "Could you get me some clean water, please?"
It sucked to send a six-year-old off with a bowl stained red with someone else's blood, but Zoë had seen worse.
She waited until Zoë's small hands had taken the bowl from hers, and Zoë was out of earshot, before she turned back to King.
"What happens now?" he asked, and he wasn't talking about their war against the vamps. She didn't need the little jerk of his head in Zoë's direction to tell her that much.
"Sommerfield asked us to take care of her." It was close enough to the truth for Abby to live with.
King's face froze, the cracks on the surface letting everything through that he was too tired to hide: all of the grief and the fear; the doubt; the reluctance.
Abby took in a deep breath, leaning down to press her forehead gently against King's. When she pulled back, King was watching her, more scared now, it seemed, than he had been when Danica had him. She reached up and stroked her thumb slowly over his cheek, keeping her touch gentle and avoiding the areas where the skin was swollen and sore.
There were so many things she could say, things that were already forcing their way up into her throat. 'Don't fucking do this to me' and 'I know you're scared; I am too' and 'sometimes you're a selfish prick'. And the ones behind those, the one she could never say, that would never force themselves past her teeth, no matter how hard or how deeply she felt them. 'I need you.' 'Don't leave me.'
I love you.
Instead, she took another deep breath, letting it steady her, and said, "My guess? Sommerfield figured someone should stop you from feeding Zoë a diet made up of caffeine and jellybeans. And she probably thought I..."
Her voice broke.
"You were a little too uptight to be the 'fun parent'," King said. His voice was still raw, too, and not all of it had to do with the bruises that were slowly blossoming around his throat. He took in a shaky breath, sounding almost broken as he added, "I guess I could do the fun parent thing." His fingers brushed against her waist and settled there, and if they were unsteady at first, his touch grew firmer as his fingers pressed against her skin. "If there are jellybeans on offer. I mean, you know I'm a complete slut for those."
Abby's eyes prickled and burned; falling towards him was gravity, the momentum of an unstoppable force once the immovable object gave way. King caught her and held her upright, both arms wrapped around her waist as she tried not to cry. But even that was inevitable it seemed.
He reached up and brushed the tears from her face, but for once he didn't ruin the moment by saying anything. Instead, he kissed her, his mouth moving slowly against hers, a gentle pressure that kept her anchored until the world steadied around her and she could breathe again.
When she pulled back, her fingers tender against King's skin, Zoë was waiting, a bowl of clean water in her hands and her small face solemn.
"Are you going to look after me now?" she asked, and there was perfect faith in her eyes, a trust that maybe, just maybe, they'd already earned.
"Yeah," said King, and his voice didn't crack as he let go of Abby with one hand to reach out and ruffle Zoë's hair. He grinned a little at the face that Zoë pulled as her hand shot up to smooth it down again.
"Both of us," added Abby, because sometimes happy endings were what you made of them.
The end
Author: alyse
Fandom: Blade: Trinity
Pairing: Abigail Whistler/Hannibal King
Rating: PG13
Warnings/Spoilers: No warnings. Set post movie
Genres: Established relationship
Word Count: 1,900
Status: Complete, one shot
Disclaimer: Blade: Trinity, the motion picture, is owned by New Line Cinema. This is a not for profit fanfiction, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Notes: Thanks to
aithine for beta reading duties. Any mistakes remaining are my own. Title and quote from 'Dog Days Are Over' by Florence and the Machine. Written for my kissbingo square 'type: gentle'.Summary: Her mom used to say bad things came in threes, always waiting for the next shit thing to happen. With Zoë, Blade and King still breathing, Abby figured that it was about time the universe balanced the crap a little.
-o-
Run fast for your mother, run fast for your father
Run for your children, for your sisters and brothers
-o-
Blade's skin was cool to the touch, and Abby's fingers fumbled as she pressed them into his neck, looking for something, anything to give her hope.
There was nothing, not at first. Not for long moments and then - so faint that she thought she'd imagined it - she felt it. The slow, solitary thump of a heartbeat too stubborn to quit entirely.
It seemed to take forever until she felt the second beat, time stretching out with her fingers pressed so firmly into his skin that they were starting to cramp. If he were human, entirely human, she'd leave bruises. As it was, she pressed harder, willing Blade's heart to keep beating as though just wishing for it hard enough would make it happen.
It had been a long time since Abby had believed in happy endings. Her fairy tales were the original ones - blood and gore and death, like Zoë's would be now.
She leaned in closer, until she was barely an inch from Blade's mouth, listening, waiting for the sound of a breath, the feel of it against her skin.
"If you kiss him," King said behind her, his voice gravelly and hoarse, used, "I'm going to pout." He sounded like crap, but she'd take that any day just as long as he was still around for her to hear him. Sometimes happy endings happened whether you believed in them or not.
Blade's breath brushed against her skin, and she sat back on her heels, something like grief or relief prickling in her eyes, tightening in her throat as she looked up and met King's eyes. "He's alive," she said.
King let out a breath of his own, some of the tension easing out of his body, and for a moment Abby imagined that she could feel King's breath against her skin, too, sour with pain and fear, but steady and strong. "Great," he said. "Carrying him out of here is going to fucking suck."
There was a little gasp of breath as Zoë crept closer, her eyes fixed on King and the expression on her small face disapproving. "That's a bad word," she said, although she'd heard far worse, especially from King. Abby could feel the laughter bubble up, bringing everything else with it, all the things she'd buried after she'd finally lowered Sommerfield's body to the ground. It escaped as a little huff, halfway between a laugh and a sob, before she managed to clamp it down again, burying it deep.
Her mom used to say bad things came in threes, always waiting for the next shit thing to happen. With Zoë, Blade and King still breathing, Abby figured that it was about time the universe balanced the crap a little.
-o-
They made it as far as the bikes before calling Caulder, and King's near constant low-grade swearing, the words said under his breath so that Zoë wouldn't hear, stopped the laughter and eased the grief. There was pain in his voice and Abby got it; she had her music to focus on when her muscles ached and burned, and each twist and kick stretched her body to its limits. King had his voice like she had her music: reminders that they were still alive and had better concentrate, push past the pain and keep going if they wanted to stay that way. But even they had their limits.
She called Caulder while they were huddled together in the dark alleyway where she and Blade had stashed their bikes, listening to the sound of sirens in the distance and praying they didn't come any closer. Blade was a not-quite-dead weight at her feet, and Zoë a warm stillness, pressed against her side.
King met her eyes across the alley, his back pressed against the far wall and his face creased with exhaustion. The cuts on his face were dark and deep in the dimness, and Abby let the wall behind her take her weight.
-o-
Caulder took charge of Blade, his face as solemn as always. She had no idea whether that was a good or bad sign; she'd never seen Caulder crack a smile, even on the good days.
King was left to Abby's tender mercies. It made sense from a triage and resource point of view, but perhaps Caulder had simply seen the look on her face, the one that told him and the whole damned world to back the fuck off. She didn't say as much out loud, not in front of Zoë, but she didn't need to. The message came through, loud and clear.
She was familiar enough with Sommerfield's makeshift infirmary back at the Honeycomb Hideout to find her way around Caulder's. It didn't take long to find what she needed, even if she had to improvise. She ended up using a wad of bandages to clean the worst of the blood from King's face, smoothing it gently over his skin while he bit back on the most outrageous of his curses. Zoë still watched him, wide-eyed, while he hissed and snarled as the antiseptic burned and stung in his cuts. He was going to need stitches once Caulder finished with Blade.
"Where's my mom?" Zoë asked, her voice small and fragile. "Why isn't she doing that?"
Abby's eyes met King's; the grief and the guilt in King's expression mirrored the surge she felt rising up inside her, catching in her throat until she could barely breathe with it.
"Oh," said Zoë, because she was six, not stupid; death was hardly unfamiliar to her. "Is it okay if I miss her?"
Abby's knees buckled, the weight of her grief - for Zoë; for Sommerfield; for Dex and Hedges and her father; and for Blade, whose breathing was too shallow and heartbeat too slow in the next room - too great for her to bear. She would have staggered, fallen to her knees and let out the howl that was tearing its way out of her chest, if King hadn't reached out and caught hold of her. His fingers were steady on her skin, cold and gripping painfully tightly, but there were worlds of pain in his eyes, depths he never let anyone see, no one but her.
Abby took in a deep breath, but it was King who answered Zoë, his voice a lot less steady than his grip on Abby. "Yeah. It's okay to miss her, sweetheart." He cleared his throat uncomfortably, his eyes skittering away from Abby's as he added, awkwardly, "We all do."
Zoë took this in, her hands twisting together, and that was just another reminder of what they've lost. All of Zoë's clothes, the stuffed rabbit she carried around with her when she thought no one was watching, when she didn't feel like she had to be the world's smallest grown-up around the Night Stalkers - all of that was gone, too.
Abby didn't feel like a grown-up. She felt hollow, empty, like the task in front of her was too great for her to handle on her own, but maybe that was what adulthood meant.
She swirled the bandage in the bowl again, watching as it turned the water bright red. The antiseptic in it stung her fingers, burning in all of the little cuts and grazes she always had, the ones left by the force of her blows. It was still easier than meeting King's eyes, or Zoë's.
"Zoë, honey," she said, and her voice seemed to come from a great distance. "Could you get me some clean water, please?"
It sucked to send a six-year-old off with a bowl stained red with someone else's blood, but Zoë had seen worse.
She waited until Zoë's small hands had taken the bowl from hers, and Zoë was out of earshot, before she turned back to King.
"What happens now?" he asked, and he wasn't talking about their war against the vamps. She didn't need the little jerk of his head in Zoë's direction to tell her that much.
"Sommerfield asked us to take care of her." It was close enough to the truth for Abby to live with.
King's face froze, the cracks on the surface letting everything through that he was too tired to hide: all of the grief and the fear; the doubt; the reluctance.
Abby took in a deep breath, leaning down to press her forehead gently against King's. When she pulled back, King was watching her, more scared now, it seemed, than he had been when Danica had him. She reached up and stroked her thumb slowly over his cheek, keeping her touch gentle and avoiding the areas where the skin was swollen and sore.
There were so many things she could say, things that were already forcing their way up into her throat. 'Don't fucking do this to me' and 'I know you're scared; I am too' and 'sometimes you're a selfish prick'. And the ones behind those, the one she could never say, that would never force themselves past her teeth, no matter how hard or how deeply she felt them. 'I need you.' 'Don't leave me.'
I love you.
Instead, she took another deep breath, letting it steady her, and said, "My guess? Sommerfield figured someone should stop you from feeding Zoë a diet made up of caffeine and jellybeans. And she probably thought I..."
Her voice broke.
"You were a little too uptight to be the 'fun parent'," King said. His voice was still raw, too, and not all of it had to do with the bruises that were slowly blossoming around his throat. He took in a shaky breath, sounding almost broken as he added, "I guess I could do the fun parent thing." His fingers brushed against her waist and settled there, and if they were unsteady at first, his touch grew firmer as his fingers pressed against her skin. "If there are jellybeans on offer. I mean, you know I'm a complete slut for those."
Abby's eyes prickled and burned; falling towards him was gravity, the momentum of an unstoppable force once the immovable object gave way. King caught her and held her upright, both arms wrapped around her waist as she tried not to cry. But even that was inevitable it seemed.
He reached up and brushed the tears from her face, but for once he didn't ruin the moment by saying anything. Instead, he kissed her, his mouth moving slowly against hers, a gentle pressure that kept her anchored until the world steadied around her and she could breathe again.
When she pulled back, her fingers tender against King's skin, Zoë was waiting, a bowl of clean water in her hands and her small face solemn.
"Are you going to look after me now?" she asked, and there was perfect faith in her eyes, a trust that maybe, just maybe, they'd already earned.
"Yeah," said King, and his voice didn't crack as he let go of Abby with one hand to reach out and ruffle Zoë's hair. He grinned a little at the face that Zoë pulled as her hand shot up to smooth it down again.
"Both of us," added Abby, because sometimes happy endings were what you made of them.
The end
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