Work Text:
Frost-covered grass crunched under the heels of her Docs. Lucy shivered so hard her teeth chattered, breath puffing white in the frigid air. The world lacked color, a thousand shades of grey on the spectrum between black and white.
She didn’t know where she was, until all at once she did.
The sign still hung as crooked as the day her life changed forever. A frozen padlock and thick chain looped through the chainlink fence, acting as a deterrent to any potential visitors. Though Lucy didn’t understand why anyone would want to visit this horrid place, filled with the screams of the dying.
Clutching the feathered spirit cape close, she pushed open the gate and stepped onto the overgrown path. There was no way out but through. She didn’t know her destination, only that this place was part of the journey.
Inside, the dead milled listlessly. The agents whose lives she had failed to save fixed empty gazes on her. Norrie wasn’t among them, to her relief. Spirits clustered around Lucy, their keening harsh on her ears as they reached for her, only to be repelled by the dull grey feathers of her cape. Then, without warning, they receded.
Lucy , Lockwood cried in relief. There you are!
He was just as monochrome as their surroundings, yet his presence shone golden and warm like the summer sun. Lucy reached for him with a choked back sob, thankful she wasn’t alone in this cold realm of death. A nagging feeling deep in her gut stopped her mere centimeters away. She stepped back warily, watching his smile fade and turn to confusion.
Straight on, he looked just like her Lockwood.
If she turned her head and looked from the corner of her eye, his body flickered like a guttering candle, unsubstantial. Just like the hollow boy she had seen in the room under Aickmere’s. Unlike her, there was no feathered cape wrapped around his slim body to ward away the bitter chill.
“Where’s your spirit cape?” Lucy asked, hand settling on the hilt of her rapier even though she knew it would do nothing in this place. Old habits died hard, gruesome deaths.
Not-Lockwood shrugged nonchalantly, knowing he had been caught. I don’t need one anymore, he confessed. An outstretched hand, an offer to join him in this frozen wasteland. C’mon, Luce, you always knew it would end this way. I can’t do this without you. It’s always been us , you know that. His smile was tantalizing.
There was a small part of Lucy that longed to take his hand, forget her mortal worries. A bigger part wanted to scream at him to piss off, that he wasn’t allowed to join his parents and sister in that third grave.
He couldn’t be dead. Couldn’t be.
She would know if he was gone. The world would shift fundamentally, and she would know.
Right?
Not-Lockwood reached for her, hesitating a hairsbreadth from her cheek. Cold burned her skin, so at odds with the heat of the tears tracking slow paths down her cheeks. They stared at the other, frozen in this sick one-act play and unable to move forward.
Lucy jerked free of the ghost-lock, stumbling backwards. She drew her rapier and pointed the tip at Not-Lockwood’s chest, a silent warning. The silver blade had no effect on him, passing right through his airy body. Then he stood before her, that little difference in their height leaving him towering over her.
I’m sorry it’s come to this , Not-Lockwood said with a sad smile.
“Wait, what?” Lucy spluttered. “Why? Lockwood, what are you doi一”
Icy lips captured hers, equally frigid hands cupping her face. He was so gentle, even as he was killing her. The cold rushed in, following the trailhead he marked and sinking into her blood. Lucy could feel her heart slowing, feel the steady thump-thump growing sluggish.
I can’t lose you again, Not-Lockwood confessed. Lucy opened her mouth, nothing coming out.
In another world, she was screaming.
Lucy thrashed violently in her bed, the covers tangled in her legs. From the windowsill, the skull watched silently, unable to do anything. She awoke in a cold sweat, throat drier than a desert under the scorching midday sun. Outside the window, there was a mechanical whir and the green glow of the ghost lamp down the street reminded her that she was alive. Driving the heels of her hands into her eyesockets, Lucy relished the pain for a few seconds before it became unbearable.
Then she carefully untangled herself from her bed, staggering to the little sink and filling a cup of water and downing it in one gulp. Lucy caught her own reflection in the mirror, half of her face in the dark and half illuminated in glowing green. The grey streaks in her hair were more prominent tonight. She hated them and what they reminded her of.
In her hand, the handle of Lockwood’s bedroom door turned easily. Too easily. He never locked it and kept the hinges oiled, so it opened without a sound. Clouds obscured the moon tonight, so there was no light in his room and wouldn’t be even if it was a full moon, for his curtains were drawn.
Lucy hesitated on the threshold.
Cursing under her breath, she stepped into his room and shut the door quietly behind her. She padded over to his bed, the side he didn’t sleep on, and pulled the covers back just enough to slip under them. The bed creaked and the mattress shifted as Lockwood rolled over, sighing softly. He blinked, still half-asleep.
“Nightmare?” he murmured in question.
She nodded, then realized he wouldn’t be able to see it in the dark. “Yeah,” she answered, the word a rasp from her still-sore throat. Lockwood reached for her, accidentally smacking her in the nose in the process. “Ow.”
“‘M sorry,” he mumbled sleepily. Lucy couldn’t even be annoyed, allowing him to cocoon himself around her. His bare chest pressed flush against her back, warmth radiating off his body and chasing off the lingering chill from her bad dreams. Lockwood’s nose grazed the spot where her neck connected to her shoulder and he sighed contentedly.
Lucy knew he was already slipping back into sleep. Behind her, his heart beat a steady cadence. She listened to his breathing even out and deepen, relaxing a little bit with each breath.
Lockwood was alive and her nightmare was just that一a nightmare.