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Resurrection Blues	By : JackHawksmoor Category: DC Verse Comics > V for Vendetta Views: 2256 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own V for Vendetta, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-Resurrection Blues
- 2-ch 2
- 3-ch3
- 4-ch4
- 5-ch 5
- 6-CH 6
- 3
- 4
- 5
Resurrection Blues

Ch 4

“But she doesn't like him. I thought she didn't like him.” -Pride and Prejudice (2005)

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Her dreams were dark and full of shifting sands. Insubstantial terrors that melted away as soon as she turned to face them.

She woke with a gasp, as if she hadn't been able to breathe for a long time.

A heavy warmth shifted from her side.

“Evey?” The voice was rough with sleep. She looked up with a drowsy, weightless calm and saw V raising himself off the bed, reaching for her. There was a kind of controlled panic in his movements that surprised her. “Evey. Oh...”

He cupped her face, and she realized he wasn't wearing anything on his hands.

“Whuh...”she mumbled blearily.

“Let me look at you.” He touched his forehead to hers, the mask warm against her skin. "OH, my Evey...” His mask slid past her face as he cradled her to his chest.

Hesitantly, somewhat overwhelmed, she returned the embrace, sliding her hands up around him.

He was gentle with her, and he smelled wonderful. Comforted, she let herself start to drift without trying to think very hard about their situation. She felt him stroking her cheek and opened her eyes, not certain when she'd shut them.

“Ahh. There she is.” He was very close to her, and in the dim yellow light he looked soft and human despite the mask. She smiled up at him, unthinking and relaxed. There was a fuzzy space in between her and her memories, and for a moment she enjoyed it. The room was dark, but for a small, warm light positioned over a book. The book was on the bed with her. As was V. She frowned, lifted her head to look around. The bed was full of books. The floor was littered with them. Most of them were open. A good number of them looked as though they'd been tossed aside.

“What's all this?” she asked, amused. She moved to prop herself up and was shocked when it took real effort.

“Easy,” V admonished gently, moving quickly to ease her back onto the pillow. He touched her, on the side of her face, brushing down her shoulders, smoothing out the blanket that covered her. The gesture was almost unconscious on his part, but Evey had spent time in hospitals when she was a girl and she recognized it. It was the sort of thing one did for a loved one when there was nothing else that could be done for them. Suddenly frightened, she grabbed onto his arm, squeezing hard.

“V, what's going on?” she demanded sharply. She dug her nails in. She was probably hurting him. From the look of him, he needed a bit of a jolt.

He looked down at her hand on him with a kind of dim surprise radiating off his shoulders. After a moment of hesitation he took a deep breath and with a quick, expert flick of his fingers, uncurled her hand from its death grip on his forearm and brought it deftly up for a kiss from his painted lips.

“You've...been ill,” he said to her fingers.

Evey looked down at herself.

“I feel...” she said, and stopped. She'd meant to tell him she felt all right, but when she looked down she saw the bandage at the crook of her arm and the needles on the table beside her. Needles and bottles filled with liquid. Something horrible crawled into her chest and sat on her heart. She sat bolt upright.

“What have you done to me?” she demanded, holding the injured arm close to her chest.

V flinched.

With a disbelieving, furious shake of her head, she moved to get out of the bed, knocking several books onto the floor. She might have left right then, never to return, but he grabbed her hand before she even had a foot on the floor.

“Evey, please-”

“-No!” she pulled at the hand he held. “You drug me while I...” she hesitated, her last memories before waking finally swimming to the surface. Sleeping? Had she been sleeping?

V pounced on her uncertainty.

“You were so ill, I only-”

“-I feel fine!” she said with a flash of panic. An image of him welled up, that hopeless little straightening of her clothing, her covers, she'd seen that before...

He caught her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake, looking for all the world like a man at the end of his rope.

“It's been three days,” V said raggedly. “Three days.” He lifted a hand to touch her face and she jerked her head back mistrustfully.

V let both his hands drop, slumping. He suddenly looked smaller.

“The television,” he said quietly. “You can check the date.” He sounded very tired. She watched him carefully as she stood, but he made no move to stop her. By the time she got to the door she needed to lean on it. By the time she got to the couch her legs were shaking and she collapsed onto it, breathing hard. She didn't really need to check the day at that point. Her body was telling her quite clearly that she didn't have health on her side at the moment. She flipped it on anyway; after all, V was probably listening.

Evey took a few minutes to gather her strength before she began the trek back to her room. She could have called out for V to help her, he probably would have come running, but she didn't. Evey stopped in the doorway, partly to lean on it, partly just to look at him.

He was sitting on the edge of the bed, elbows resting on knees, intently studying the floor past his folded hands. He heard her enter, even though she was quiet and the door was open.

His mask lifted to look at her. The rest of him remained perfectly still.

Evey tilted her head down and lowered her eyes. She imagined most of the shame she was feeling was showing on her face.

V's mask nodded slightly, and from behind it came a soft sound of acknowledgment. Then, as if it meant nothing, he went back to regarding the floor. She felt a queer clenching in her stomach and wondered if it was actually his hands he was staring at. Even in the kind lighting they were gnarled and painful-looking without the gloves to mask them.

She made her way carefully to the bed. He did not look up, but she knew he was watching. If she'd fallen, he would've caught her before she hit the ground. His head turned a little in her direction as she sat beside him.

She was sure she should say something, but she couldn't think what.

V remained quiet for a moment.

“I love you,” he said then.

Her eyes went wide.

When he lifted the mask to look at her, to see how she'd taken that, she had enough self-possession to manage a faint nod. Her eyes were burning, but she did not cry.

'I know,' she didn't say. He heard her anyway, and accepted it, inclining his head.

It didn't seem like much. Not nearly enough. She reached out and touched the back of his hand. Pressed her fingers against the rough skin, covered his hand with hers.

“Ahh,” he sighed, as though she'd plucked the stars from the sky and given them to him in a basket. His palm turned up under hers, and then they were holding hands.

She rested her head on his shoulder. It seemed like the thing to do.

“Tell me what happened,” she said quietly. His fingers toyed with her hand as if he recognized the comfort being offered and appreciated it.

“I brought you back to the gallery.” He did not start with a question. It should have disturbed her. He did not ask what she remembered, did not ask what had caused her to drop so quickly. It should have bothered her then, but he so often seemed to pluck the thoughts right out of her head, she didn't even think to question him about it. “You were cold.” He spoke like a man haunted by nightmares. “For a moment, I thought...” he paused, shook his head slightly. "I brought you back, and you seemed stronger every moment you were here. I could almost convince myself I'd imagined it, and that you were only sleeping.”

She understood that feeling very well.

“The way it happened seemed strange. I wasn't sure what was going on but there was that man... so when I thought you were safe I ventured out again.” There was a break in his voice that spoke of long hours of self-recrimination, and she looked at him questioningly. Perhaps she should have pushed him for more detail, but she didn't.

“I took another path, through the underground. I didn't get far. Not to the surface, at any rate. I felt...” he hesitated, looking down at her hand in his. “ I felt odd. I went on for a few minutes but I knew something wasn't right.” He shook his head. “When I came back you were nearly dead. You didn't have a measurable blood pressure any more.”

There was silence.

“I get it,” Evey said finally. “I feel all right, but I shouldn't, should I.”

“No.”

Evey got a little chill right up the back of her neck.

“And the books?” she asked, more to distract herself than anything else.

He laughed once, faintly.

“Everything I have on the occult, supernatural events, mythology and the paranormal.” He turned to look behind himself. “I even have a few issues of 'Parabola' around here.”

Evey nodded blankly, not understanding much of that at all. V saw the look on her face and laughed again, just one breath.

“I'm sorry. I forget, sometimes.”

She suffered a rather useless pang of regret at not having read more when she'd been in the Gallery before, and had the chance. It was silly. He just seemed very alone for a moment and it made her sad.

He sounded exhausted, and she rubbed at the arm she was leaning against.

“Have you slept at all?” It felt strange and invasive to be asking; when had she ever seen him sleep? When had it started to concern her if he didn't?

“Here and there,” he said in a voice that was telling her 'no, not for years, thanks'.

Evey freed her hand and crawled back up onto the bed, nudging books aside as she went. He turned, pushing back from the bed as if he shouldn't be there. She held out a hand for him.

V made an interesting sound low in his throat. It sounded painful.

She leaned over and took his hand, pulling at him gently.

“Go on, have a lie-in, I'm all right now,” she urged.

“This is your bed,” V protested uncomfortably, settling in place but not lying down.

Evey rolled onto her stomach and rested her head on her hand, cocking her head to look up at him.

“This is my gallery,” she reminded him with a smile. "You should let me be hospitable.”

She'd managed to startle him with that one. He stared at her for a moment.

“Well,” he said simply, and lay back. Evey laughed a little, and that seemed to please him. She moved to get up, to give him some privacy but he pushed himself up immediately, unhappy.

“And you, will you sleep?” He sounded like the words had been forced out of him.

Was he...was he asking her to...?

“Yes,” Evey said slowly, “Eventually. I wanted to look at some of these.” She lifted one of the books off the bed.

His hand reached out and covered hers, pressing the book back into the blanket.

“Wait.” He reached up near the headboard and freed a book from between the pillows.
He handed it to her. “Here. This one. Start here.” She moved to take it, but he didn't let go of it right away, surprising her.

She frowned at him a moment, thinking.

“V, do you want me to stay?” she asked.

He let out a breath and shifted uncomfortably on the bed.

She slid back in next to him, watching carefully for any sign of rejection. V sighed like a large weight had just been removed from his chest, and relaxed back against the pillow.

Evey smothered a smile and settled in with her introduction to the supernatural. The book was called 'Myths and Folk Tales'. It wasn't very thick.

She could feel him looking at her, and turned her head. It was an unusual kind of intimacy. His mask was turned to look at her, so she curled up on her side, facing him. It shouldn't have felt so strange. She'd been closer to him than this before. Something about being eye to eye with him, maybe.

“V, we can't...” she hesitated, "I can't leave, can I.”

V thought about that, watching her as if she'd disappear if he didn't keep an eye out.

“I don't know. I don't think so.” He shook his head slightly, his voice already soft and drowsy.

As forthright as he always was, even now.

She supposed she should have been frightened. Instead she found herself in the middle of a swelling tide of affection. On impulse, she lifted her hand and touched his painted cheek. It was smooth and warm, and she cupped her fingers along the edge of it tenderly. The world had gone prickly and peculiar, but he was the same.

He took a sharp breath when she touched him. Perhaps he was pleased at her familiarity. He didn't do anything to dissuade her. After a moment frozen, he lifted his own hand, brushed it across her cheek with a feather touch.

“If you can't leave, then neither can I,” he said in a voice that could have tamed a wild dog. “I would not be parted from you again, wherever we are, wherever we may go.” He turned his head a little, as if admiring her. “I will be here as long as you can bear to have me, Evey. 'to the gallows' foot, and after.'”

With that voice, if they'd been outside he would have charmed the birds out of the trees. What could she do when he spoke to her like that?

She smiled at him.

“Good,” she replied, and to her own surprise, she meant it.

Unexpectedly, the book that V had given her was a children's book. It was full of stories that she was familiar with but could not really remember. After the first few tales she grew uneasy with it. The details were...different. Especially the endings. Darker. The children in the stories had a rough time. Their world was full of unnatural things lurking around every corner, snarling and slavering in the darkness. She drifted off while she was reading it.

Evey dreamed of her brother. They were walking together and it was getting dark. He drank from a stream, but it was poisonous and it turned him from a boy into a little golden deer. He ran away from her into the woods. She ran after him, crying, knowing that if she lost him there, she would never find him again, as long as she lived.

She got tangled in a hedge of thorns, and woke with a start to find herself in bed. Something held her tightly and in the first confused moment of waking she thought she was still caught, but when she moved something warm and solid shifted sleepily at her back, and she realized it was V.

She turned to look over her shoulder. He was spooned right up behind her, rather rumpled-looking and holding onto her tightly. In the soft light he looked rather dear. Not like a killer at all. She knew what he'd done, but looking at him it was hard for her to remember that.

She turned the light out.

He moved a little closer to her, made some soft murmuring noise at her back, but he didn't wake up. She reached down and felt for his hand in the dark. He still hadn't replaced his gloves, and she traced the unusual shape of them with the tips of her fingers. Hard knots and delicate, rippled valleys of flesh.

She thought idly about what she had seen of him, and what that likely meant for the rest of him. There was skin under that black cloth, though it was somehow unsettling to think of it. Hard to picture anything beneath his clothing, because it was difficult to imagine him without it.

V must have been practicing that unerring ability to hear what she was thinking, because he chose just that moment to present her with a sharp reminder of the humanity underneath his clothing.

He pulled her closer, pressing against her. Nudging up against her back. Evey felt it, felt him, quite clearly and froze.

“Evey...” V sighed in his sleep. He sounded so sad, as if even in his dreams she'd pushed him away. Like a man without any hope.

He'd told her he loved her, and she hadn't said anything at all. Lying there in the dark with V curled up against her, all at once Evey was ashamed of herself.

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“-the thousandth man will stand by your side; To the gallows foot, and after”-Rudyard Kipling
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Resurrection Blues