"Come on, Echo, you can walk..." Skulduggery was muttering angrily as he half-dragged half-carried up the steps to her porch, then found her keys in her jacket pocket. There was a confusing array of them, and he wondered just how many she had: One or two looked several centuries old, so did she keep all of them, from every house she moved to? Curious.
A fog seemed to have taken residence in his skull, something that happened every couple days. His body did not need rest but his mind was tired from all the activity and he wanted to get home. Echo murmured sleepily as he gave up on letting her walk and carried her bridal-style up the spiral stairs and into her room. After fighting with her and winning over removing her jacket and shoes, there was still the matter of getting her under the covers.
With her still leaning on him (and now shivering), he pondered this. After a second he leaned her on the wall (where she barely stayed upright, he noticed) the detective pulled back the sheets, retrieved her, placed her on the matress, and was about to pull the sheets back over her when the infuriating woman grabbed his sleeve.
...It was too early for this. The skeleton glared at her and considered his options.
1) Drag his arm free and risk her waking up.
2) Let her keep the jacket.
3) Stay the night.
That first one was out the window, because he did not have the energy to drag his arm free of her steel vise. Not that he would mind waking her up. The second one had a history of bad moments, most of them having to do with snow.
He gazed at the offending limb, shaking it a couple times. Her arm flopped sleepily but she kept hanging on.
Option 3 it was.
...........
.........
.......
He was bored. Echo shivered to remind him that he had yet to pull the covers over her, preoccupied as he was by her arm.
Sighing, he stretched as far as her arm would allow and grabbed the nearest corner, dragging it up.
Even Paula has to grant her points for what happened next. As he leaned over her to grab the opposite corner of the blanket, she let go of his arm... And latched onto his rib-cage. (As well as all the clothes on it.)
Okay, right about now he was getting ready to yell profanities. Really, was this woman INSANE?! He looked down, and yes, she was asleep.
...
God, what the hell is TANITH like when she's asleep?
The fog in his mind rushed in, demanding to let him sleep. Alright, alright, I'll sleep, you crazy little...
He drifted off beside her without a second thought... Or even much of a first.
He couldn't breathe, couldn't hear, couldn't think. All he knew was that there was danger, he was in danger, but he wasn't the only one!
Alison! Alison was in danger! He ran, ran, ran, he needed to find her-
A cruel laugh. Skulduggery turned around, or was it the world turning around him...
Echo fell out of the bed, pushed by Skulduggery turning over in his sleep. She sat up, wondering just what the hell just happened.
...Serpine! He held a woman by the throat, suspending her without any effort. Skulduggery could not make out who the woman was, only brown hair... Echo!
"Echo...." Echo stood in a snap, ready to fight the intruder... But realized it was only Skul and he was... Asleep? Huh, she didn't think that was possible.
And he was... muttering her name? While looking like he was having a nightmare? Woah, major brain-breakage over here.
Serpine continued laughing and Echo screamed, not words, just screaming. Serpine looked at him, and grinned. It was Dusk's face. "You cannot protect her..." It hissed, and Skulduggery tried to run forward but he was held back by some invisible force, like a gale from a hurricane.
Echo sat down on the edge of the bed, her bed she noticed, and frowned. He was calling her name, kinda muddled since he was asleep, but it was her name. He had kicked off the blankets and tossed and turned every few seconds.
"Skul," she whispered, leaning over him. "Hey, Skul."
Echo was calling him, asking for him, but he couldn't move, couldn't breath...
"Skul! Wake up!" Echo put her hand over his shoulder to support her weight, one hand tracing his skull. He did not look like he enjoyed his dream very much. Her hand was gentle against his 'face,' marveling in a quiet voice at the smoothness of the bone.
And- SNAP! He was up, his head jerking upwards to see her leaning just six inches from him, shadows making her nearly invisible. Echo drew back, and he sat up in a rush.
"Wha...?" She whispered, voice hoarse.
Skulduggery looked around for a moment, before coming to terms with the fact that he was in Echo's room in the middle of the night, and that she was just a foot away, staring at him with what he assumed was an expression of innocence and concern. Or it could be horror, if she was surprised he was in her moonlight room, her bed.
"E...cho?" He asked tentatively, given the fact that he had just woken up out of a nightmare in which she died....
In return, Echo leaned closer and wrapped her arms around him. Oh, God, Echo! He could have cried. In fact, he was shaking and Echo felt it, burying her head in his shoulder, the trembles transferring onto her.
Skulduggery was surprised by that, afraid that she would kick him out of bed. Instead, she seemed to welcome him. He looked down at her head and saw her eyes were open, focused on nothing until she felt his gaze.
Echo looked up, meeting his bottomless pits of eye-sockets with her intelligent eyes, turned black by the minimal lighting. He cocked his head to the side, wondering what to do next. She smiled at the gesture, before closing her eyes and snuggling back onto his shoulder. Sighing, he lay back, moving one arm to hug her half-way, still wondering exactly what to say. Echo was warm and obviously very much comfy where she was.
Echo moved away for a second and he looked after her sharply before she moved back. She had the blankets and he realized he must have kicked them off in the night with his nightmare.
Nightmare about her, about her dying the way Alison had... She must have been so alone after that! Him, her sister, her niece, all gone in one fell swoop. Her parents had already passed, and no other relatives would have stepped up. He knew the noble's type. How could she still love him after he left her like that, and when he came back... He hadn't been anything like the Apollo she knew before that. Was it the memory of the bright young man she had been she loved? Just that? The doubts plagued him.
"Echo?" He asked quietly, wondering if she was even still awake.
An affirming "Hmm?" met his... Oh, wait... Well, he heard it.
"Why do you still love me?"
...Echo's eyes fluttered open, surprised by the question. How could she state it in so many words? "Uh... You're smart, you're funny... You're bad ass when you want to be..."
No, no no. He cut her off. "Do you love me because I was once Apollo?"
...Oh. OH! Echo understood, and smiled. "...Sort of... I suppose I'll always see you and see a little boy ith long hair chasing a leaf around my room, but... He was young. When I look back at him I see a naive little thing that I want to protect, to shelter from the world the way he sheltered me, in a way. I think of Apollo and think of being safe, warm, and out of the rain. Even though that didn't happen often."
Skulduggery was not hearing what he wanted to.
"But, this new you... It's so much more! Sure, Apollo was smart, but this Skulduggery Pleasant is... How do I say it? You're smart, of course, and funny, but you were always smart and funny. It's... Hold on."
Echo fell silent and Skulduggery waited, confused. He could feel her hand, making little swirly patterns on the blanket beside her, and he knew without looking that she was making that face she did when she was deep in thought.
"Okay, got it." He paid attention. "I love you and not Apollo, because I trust you."
...What? "That's it?" Not very reassuring.
"Lemme explain. I know I can trust you to stay out of trouble, whereas if Apollo was here I would have to check if he was safe every few minutes because I'm a Mother Hen and that's what I do. I can trust you to trust me, which you have done on numerous occasions. I can trust you with my life, no explanation needed. But, most of all, I can just... trust you. If I need you, you'll be there... If I'm happy, you'll share it. If you're sad, you'll accept me trying to help you. It's..."
She fell silent, trying to articulate her words. Skulduggery was in awe. Echo, so smart and so shy and so quiet, was holding this sort of thing inside her all these years? How many times did he break these trusts? Did she trust him not to look at her and see Alison? Did she trust him not to make a stupid mistake and have them hating each-other again?
"...I can't explain, I'm sorry."
"Don't be." Skulduggery wormed onto his side, so he faced her properly. A bony hand ran over her face seemingly of it's own accord while he thought. His heart was at once sinking and floating, torn between elation and guilt. Endless, swirling pits of Guilt. That's a lot of Guilt for him to sink into.
Echo merely smiled, her arms snaking around him as if simply having him there wasn't enough: She wanted to keep him, forever. For tonight, Skulduggery was hers, and hers alone. Her heart was not torn between emotions like it was being dragged apart by Amigo and Sklyar, so she felt like she was flying when he, in turn, wrapped his arms around her.
A song popped into her head of it's own accord, dancing around and demanding to be let out. Okay then.
Skulduggery was surprised when she began humming some random tune. It seemed peppy and happy, something he would hear pumping out a teenage girl's car.
"Do you think you love me?" She whispered, and it took a moment for him to realize it was the song. "I think I love you!"
A smile split her face, and he wondered at how simple and happy she was. Echo... Was being Echo. His vision faded, 'closing his eyes' to hear her more clearly. The sound reverberated through his chest, a pleasant hum to off-set the stillness. He could almost pretend he was alive. He felt her eventually grow more and more quiet, until she was asleep once again, before he could finally drift back off.
And all was calm in the world of the living...
A/N: I would just like to state that I love Paula to death, and that this is dedicated to her. Because of unmentionable conversations. Via Gmail.
Moving on~ I love Echo and Skul. That's all there is. <3<3<3<3
1 comment:
:P I wuv you too waifu!
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