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Night
in Hell by
Lizbetann Email | Blog | Archive | Author's Note |
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PG. This story is set between the scenes of "The Human Factor." |
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"Those without hope live in desire."
Dante's Inferno
"Damnit, damnit, damnit." Natalie kept up the steady stream of cursing just under her breath to hold at bay the cold terror that was knotting her stomach up into painful contortions.
She was in Nick's Caddie, heading home after what could safely be called a hell of a night. Seeing Nick with his immortal love, after Janette had been gone for so long, had rocked her to the core. Janette had always made her feel inadequate, had always been the one person who could truly come between Nick and his desire for mortality. Even LaCroix did not have such a potent effect on his vampire child. Nick hated LaCroix, even if in a part of himself he needed the elder vampire. But Nick loved Janette, no questions, no qualifications. And compared to poised, graceful, elegant Janette, Nat felt like an unwashed, ungainly child.
When Nick had pulled Janette into the morgue and started blathering about pain and stitching up, Natalie was too stunned to realize what he was saying. It was when she realized that Janette had a pulse, for God's sake, that it all came together. What she had been working on for four years, had devoted more of her life to than she wanted to remember, Janette had found in five months.
And now Natalie's humanity was no longer the prize it had been. Nick could have Janette as a mortal, without having part of himself recoil because she drank blood. Nat was simply another human among humans. She certainly didn't have the near eight hundred years of history that Janette and Nick did.
None of this was thought out clearly, of course. Little of it registered. But it was there, in the snap of her voice as she spoke, the harshness of the words she chose. The stake in her own heart was driven in deeper with every tender look Nick gave Janette, every gentle touch. It was hard not remembering his hands on her, his kiss, gentle and easy when he thought himself nothing more than an ordinary man and she a woman to whom he was attracted.
"Damn him, damn him," her muttered cursing changed. He and Janette had shot out of the morgue when they realized that Patrick and his aunt were in trouble. Nat had tossed Nick the keys to her car and they had fled. With outward composure, Nat took care of the pick-up that was scheduled, then retrieved the phone number from the automatic redial and used the police computer system to look up the address. She wasn't going to go there, she promised herself. She wasn't going to get any more involved than she already was. She was in over her head--or up to her neck, as the case might be. Her own bad pun had her smiling grimly as she took Nick's car home.
That's when a night that was already in the third circle of Hell dropped deeper.
Nick's police scanner had picked up a report of shots fired at a residential home. The address was given in a rushed and bland voice, but Nat recognized it as where Janette's "son's" aunt and uncle lived. Terrified, she yanked the car from its path to her apartment and directed toward the disaster that was unfolding. Why, she didn't know. For Nick. For Patrick, a child who didn't deserve the hell that was going on around him. And even for Janette.
"Fire reported. No signs of life in the house. Over."
The blasphemies she had been spouting under her breath died. Her heart stopped in that moment, then continued, pounding so hard that her head spun dizzily. Dear God, fire. The one thing above all that would put Nick in danger.
The house was crawling with police and the fire department when she got there. She didn't even bother trying to fight her way through the crowds. If Nick had gotten out, but was hurt, he would be nearby. He would need her. She refused to consider the thought that he hadn't gotten out.
Several minutes of searching found a quiet wooded park about half a block away. In a slight hollow, Nick sat on the ground, dazed. His face was badly burned. Janette's head lay in his lap, utterly peaceful, utterly beautiful, still as death.
As death...
Nat approached them, and found she didn't have a word to say. Nick needed help, needed blood to heal, but she was fresh out of vampire first aid. The only blood she had was that in her veins.
Even as she watched him in the dim moonlight, however, the burns faded.
Natalie knelt beside him, touched her fingers to the pulse in Janette's neck. Dark splotches against the creamy white of her sweater told her who had suffered the "shots fired." Janette's skin was cold. Her heartbeat was nonexistent.
"Nick." Carefully, Nat laid a hand on Nick's arm. "Nick, she's dead. No one could survive those shots."
Nick brushed a strand of dark hair off of Janette's face. "I did," he murmured.
Nat could see the holes the bullets had ripped in his shirt. "Yes, Nick," she said, as gently as she could. She needed to get him away from here, leave Janette alone so that her body could be "discovered." "But Janette isn't a vampire anymore. She can't survive what happened to you. She's dead. She's dead, Nick. She's with her Robert." Nat mouthed the same platitude that everyone used, her mind racing. Later, she could grieve for a woman she was not sure she had ever liked. Now, there were things that needed to be done. "Let her go."
"She's not dead," he said dully. "And she's not mortal. I brought her across, Nat. God help me, against her pleas, against her will, I made her a vampire again."
And Nat could say nothing.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
The made it back to Nick's loft without being seen. Nick carried Janette inside, arranged her on the couch as carefully as though she were conscious to feel it. Nat went to the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of blood. Janette would need it, she assumed.
"No." Behind her, Nick took the bottle out of her hand and put it back, selecting another, this one horribly similar to the one LaCroix had brought him when Nick was "recovering" from his wound to the head. He uncorked it and drank deep, then moved away to place the bottle by Janette's head, ready for when she would awaken.
"Nick, what happened? Why?"
As she watched, the last of the burns faded. But the blank horror in Nick's eyes didn't. "I couldn't stand it. I couldn't watch her die. God, what a hypocrite I am. She begged to be allowed to die, to stay mortal even if her mortality killed her, and I... couldn't."
Because he loved her, Nat thought. Her senses had gone through too much that night to let the pain of that thought register yet. It would. Tomorrow. The day after. Probably for the rest of her life. Nick loved Janette too much to let her die.
Nat retreated behind her coldly clinical facade and knelt beside the sofa. If she had been asked to give her scientific opinion, she would have to say that Janette was dead. She had only Nick's word that Janette wasn't. "How long till she wakes?"
Nick flinched at her voice. It was as cold and dead as Janette appeared. "However long it takes. She might refuse to come across."
Nat remembered Nick's explanation of the process that created a vampire. First the blood and then the choice. "If she was asking for death, Nick, you know that she is likely to not want to come back."
Nick didn't say anything. Couldn't. Nat remained kneeling by her rival, her hand waiting for the throb of a pulse. Even a vampire's heart beat occasionally. She had no idea how long she was there. Long enough for the muscles in her legs to get cramped and cold. As cold as Janette's skin and her own heart.
When Janette awoke, it was with a shocking suddenness. Moving on blind instinct, she hauled Natalie closer, searching for the tantalizing scent of blood in Nat's body. Without a chance to run, to escape, Nat felt her head wrenched aside and Janette's fangs enter her neck.
From a great distance, she heard Nick's roar and felt her own body fall to the floor. Dizzy, she was so very dizzy...
Nick pulled her up from where she lay, putting his fingers to her throat to stem the flow of blood. The shock past, Nat quickly recognized that Janette hadn't drawn that much from her, not so much that she wouldn't survive. She was too weak to rise, but she focused enough to realize that Janette was backing away from the two of them on the ground before her. "Sacre bleu, Nicholas, what have you done to me?" she cried out. "How could you--you above all? How could you bring this curse on me again!"
~Tell her, Nick,~ Nat thought fuzzily. ~Explain to her... tell her you love her, you couldn't let her be. Say it so I can hear it, once and for all. Tell her!~
Nick said nothing, merely bent his head over Natalie's body. A slight hiss of breath came from the newly created vampire.
"Ah, I understand. How you must hate me, Nicholas, for gaining what you had sought so desperately for so many years. Is this then my punishment, for succeeding where you failed?" Janette moved closer. "But you forget, Nicholas, the last condition for my coming back. Robert's love did not heal me, nor mine for him. It was his death broke the final barrier, let me come into the light again." She knelt beside Nat on the floor, and pressed her fingers to the other woman's neck. Nat wanted to close her eyes at the sight of two vampires hovering over her, but didn't dare. "What say you, Nicholas? If in this moment I could promise you your mortality back, would you let this woman die? If you could have your heart's desire, would you throw away your heart?"
"Don't harm her!" The words were quick and involuntary. Nat felt herself gathered more closely to Nick's body, as though he were trying to shield her from the vengeful Janette.
"Why not, Nicholas? Because you love her?"
"Yes," Nick said quietly. Nat closed her eyes and turned her head against Nick's chest. "I love her. Punish me for my crimes, but leave her out of it."
Janette rose to her feet again, and the twist of her lips was a horrible parody of a smile. "I was not given a choice, Nicholas. Neither about losing my love or losing my mortality. And I curse you for what you have done to me. That will be your punishment, then--to know that there is a way to come back across, but to be damned to take it."
With an unearthly rush of speed, Janette disappeared. Nick continued to hold his love in his arms and safe, Nat finally let go of her hold of consciousness.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
She woke in her own apartment, Sydney walking on her face, demanding to be fed. The wound at her neck was bandaged tightly. There was no sign of Nick, no note.
There didn't need to be.
Pulling herself out of bed, she dressed for work. A high collar and her hair loose would cover the marks in her neck, and makeup would hide the paleness of her cheeks. It wasn't until she had finished eating and was about to leave that she realized that she was strangely calm. The world had gone to hell the night before, but in that darkness was one flash of light.
She would find a cure for Nick, find a way to bring him back to the light without the sacrifice that Janette had endured. Because now, she had as much to hope for as he did.
And as much to lose.
End
Author's Note: This story is in response to some comments made about "Nick the Wuss" and his actions in the tag of "The Human Factor." This story takes place during the commercial break. Many thanks (as usual) to the Fang Gang for the interesting and stimulating discussion. Mes chere amies, merci beaucoup! Standard disclaimer: These characters are not mine, and are used without permission.
Praise, non-carbohydrate chocolate, and offers of FK Mercenary employment happily received. ~~ Arnyd yw Ewyll hyd yw ~~