Work Text:
Fallen Stars
Aramis’s God was sure puttin’ on a display, spilling out all the stars in heaven’s bowl, he thought numbly, as he stared up at the sky pouring stars like rain from the firmament. Firmament, now there was a word worth its salt, a word that like its sound, conjured big things! The whole wide sky from horizon to horizon, and tonight it was filled with brilliant whizzes of light from corner to corner. East to west and west to east, though he could barely turn his head to follow the brightly burning tails of the stars falling from the sky.
He wondered, idly, where they started and where they ended. Athos and d’Artagnan would be along to fetch him soon, he couldn’t remember how they’d been parted, or why he lay on the battlefield half buried beneath a pile of bodies he could not shift himself from beneath. There was no part of him that hurt monumentally, and no blood he could feel, though ma’be his legs had been blowed off and he was feeling no pain because all his blood was pumpin’ outta him s’fast it was carryin’ away all the hurt.
He flinched involuntarily as a gigantic star trailing a tail of fire sped downward straight toward him. Ma’be he’d find out where they ended and all Athos and d’Artagnan would find would be a gigantic hole in the earth. Ma’be he’d turn into star dust and float around up there in the cosmos – another big word he really liked since it covered a whole lot more than even the horizon. Okay, so it weren’t such a BIG word, but it was big in the sense of the vastness it encompassed. And he sure did love the bigness of it.
He didn’t like to think of Aramis, it made him too sad. But he couldn’t help but wonder if ma’be his former best friend in the whole wide world was sittin’ beneath this star shower. And if he was, was Aramis’ thinking about the rest of their quartet? He’d seen the monastery up on the big hill, and poked Athos this morning about goin’ up to investigate after the battle, though he was of two minds about that. Even after four years, he was still mad at Aramis for haring off like a scart rabbit, abandoning them for a life of contemplation he well knew the marksman was not suited for.
But they were close to Douai, he could not help but wonder if this might be the place his friend had retreated to. And a part of him ached to know that Aramis was safe and well. On the other hand, if they did find him safe and well, he might have’ta rip off a few of the deserter’s limbs before he could find forgiveness in his own heart. At the very least, blacken an eye or knock out a tooth. Though he prob’ly wouldn’t be able to, come to that. He’d loved that man like a brother.
He sighed. Still did, no deni’n.
Over the low moans and groans of the dying he was surrounded by, came the sound of musical chanting. It rolled down the hill like a beneficent blessing, covering him like God’s blanket of mercy.
Christe, qui lux es et dies ... Aramis had taught him the translation. Christ, who art the light and day, You drive away the darkness of night, You are called the light of light, For you proclaim the blessed light.
Prob’ly he was dyin’ after all, thinkin’ all these maudlin thoughts. But the sky sure was purty tonight, weeping stars like it was. If it was his time, then this was a good way to die, watching ‘em pour down like that, brightening his end with their Godlight, reminding him of Aramis, who he knew somehow, some way, was praying for him tonight. Like a feather it stroked his consciousness, sending a shiver down his spine that went clear to his toes. So then, he guessed, he had toes still, lessen they were phantom toes like he’d heard amputees talk about.
He tried to shift his legs; no dice. If he had ‘em still they were pinned to the ground like a specimen pinned to a board. No way, no how was he movin’ from this spot.
Ma’be they weren’t stars, but angels whizzing to the ground to take up the souls of the dying strewn across what he knew to be acres and acres of battlefield. Even after all Aramis’ preachin’ ‘bout forgiveness and been separated from yer sins as far as the east is from the west, he didn’ ‘spect to be headed for heaven given the life he’d lived. He’d never shook off what he’d learned growin’ up in the Court, it still stuck to him like dirty mud, so even if it was angels, they weren’t comin’ for him. All his hopes lay with Athos and d’Artagnan, who he knew damn well were scourin’ all those acres of battlefield looking for a needle in a haystack.
Over the swell of the chanting, he heard voices.
“I’m sure it was around here somewhere that we got parted.”
“Really? I don’t recognize a damn thing. If we ever find Aramis again, I’m going to wring his goddamn neck. Porthos is his responsibility, he should have been here to keep an eye on him.”
“That devolved to me and I have only two eyes. I keep ‘em on stalks as much as possible but Porthos doesn’t make it easy to keep track of him when he’s plowing his way through the enemy like they’re nothing more than sheaves of grain.”
Beneath the rain of stars, he opened his eyes wide and his mouth, too, turning over the hands that had gouged holes into the dirt, the better to catch and hold the beauty of the night. He would swallow a gross of stars and vomit them back up to mold them into star armor for his friends. And perhaps, he would save a small one back, just in case they found Aramis again.
He felt them pour into him and over him, felt them cradle his soul and carry it up and up on the winds of their fire. Felt the tether of earth drop away as if he had wings and could fly through the meteors to the moon. Saw the battlefield spread out beneath him. A desperate beat of darkness fought the light pulsing through him, attempting to spread its fulsome net over his spirit. He touched his winging heart in protest and felt himself falling … falling … falling … until that part of him that longed to stay among the stars ceded to the prior claim of the physical shell still lying in the muck and mire of the battlefield.
He heard Aramis in his ear, as if the man leaned to whisper a plan like in the olden days. “Not your time, my friend. Not yet.”
“HERE! Athos, over here!”
The shout came from a distance, a long, long distance away, but he heard it and knew with mingled sorrow and joy, he would not dance among the stars again this night.
finis