tampered | Log: Complete

Log: Complete

When; Very shortly after this
Rating; We'll see, though most likely R for the gore.
Characters; Frederick Abberline (

bloodyuseless) and Faye Valentine (

glock30
Summary; Faye meets Abberline at the Cathedral after the worst has happened.
Log;

Faye had always hated running. It was of her opinion that you should never have to run unless you were being chased. What was the point?

Right now Faye ran like she was being chased by a pack of wolves. The cramp in her side was burning her ribcage and lungs, and the sharp press of an extra Glock stung the outside of her thigh--but she ran so fast she couldn't see straight. The Cathedral was a good, long walk on a good day. Faye made it there, almost as she said she would, in about three and a half minutes. Her eyes were scanning the premises for Frederick, half-terrified that she would find him and half-terrified that she wouldn't. She kept a lookout for Scarab as well, the woman's face searing her memory and making a freezing fist squeeze her stomach.

She couldn't breathe by the time she leaned against the heavy door, clicking the safety off on her Glock and searching for Abberline in every shadow she could find.

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Abberline had spent the night covered in blood and gore from fighting - first with his guns and then with anything, knives he found, his hands - through the sea of creatures that had followed him about, tormenting and mocking him. They never quite attacked him, because his madness was akin to their own, but their voices... dear God.

Now he stood at the end of an alley near the church, staring blankly at the scene a few yards away. He heard someone running somewhere behind him. He didn't turn. He couldn't move. He was riveted to the spot. Her body was up ahead, but the moment he realized that's what it was, he found himself paralyzed.

Faye was having a hard time breathing. Whether or not it was due to the fact that she was winded or to the fact that she seemed to be utterly alone didn't matter. She pushed the sweat out of her eyes with her forearm, pushed off of the wall, and stalked in the shadows like she had trained herself to.

Around the corner of the place, she found a cliched dark alley, but at the mouth of the cliched dark alley she could make out the unmistakable figure of Abberline, staring ahead at something Faye couldn't see but could sense in the back of her throat. Not knowing where she found the energy, she started running, shouting his name. Faye wanted him to turn around before she reached him because she wasn't sure she would stop if he didn't turn.

He did turn hearing her should - Faye. He wouldn't have turned for anyone else. There were no thoughts of her accidental parenting comments or risque clothes, just the knowledge that it was a friend. He just turned his head, and met her eyes.

"Faye..."

"Fred-erick," Faye panted, nearly vomiting and having a hard time catching her breath. She touched his arm, clapping a hand roughly against it. Part of it was to keep herself from falling over, part of it was to make sure that she wasn't hallucinating from being breathless, and part of it was because a lot of this seemed very familiar and she couldn't help herself.

"Are you--all right?" she couldn't say much else. She looked up from bent over double, her shoulders heaving. She couldn't look beyond him, not when she could smell blood from here. She bit back bile and searched his face.

He'd looked past her again, staring at the scene. Metal bars... paintings around her... He began to walk forward, her mangled body coming into view.

Faye fell into stride next to him, keeping the Glock armed and ready in one hand at her side. The air was charged with the same energy she'd often get after shooting at something. Or after watching something die. Up ahead she could see Scarab--she was determined not to let her become the body--and dark, heated spots around her that were no doubt blood.

The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as they drew close enough to make out a sickening design. She felt Frederick's jacket underneath her fingers as she clutched it. "Sorry," she was saying, over and over.

She had to pull herself together, for Scarab if not for Abberline, and she told herself she would once she could clearly see the damage.

It was a massacre.

The ground was destroyed, and she lay in the center, run through with metal poles. Her fingers were missing and her flesh ripped and torn, a gaping hole in her chest. Blood - so much blood. It was all around her. All around them. He moved to her, and then slipped on the blood, falling to his knees - the pain shocked him into reality. He couldn't even hear Faye anymore.

"Oh my god... Oh my god..."

He reached out and touched her and she was cold, so cold, his mind knew she was coming back but the fact that she suffered this and he was sure she was conscious through all of it, the City would no doubt force such a thing, and oh god.. her face.. her skin.. he was covered in her blood now, it filled his senses. Oh god oh god she's dead she can't die but she's dead again she's dead no why Keico god no Scarab why--

He leaned over the broken corpse and tried to move her, but she was in rigor -- it terrified him further, feeling her so much like those women in the police morgue. He tried to move back but slipped again. "No.."

Faye turned and threw up.

Pictures in blood swarmed at them from the walls, Scarab's skin lingering on some of the cream stones. Behind her, Frederick was saying something, but Faye couldn't hear him over the buzzing in her ears. She tried to find him with her eyes, but they were dark with fumes and water.

Crawling over to him was the only thing she could do, gun sliding on the ground and grating against her ears. Faye had never seen something so disgusting, so horrifying, so unreal. She was tempted to pinch herself: these were the kinds of nightmares you woke up from right about now, but when Faye reached out a hand to touch Scarab--

The blood was everywhere and Abberline was slipping in it, trying to lift Scarab up. "I can help," Faye was saying, and she realized that her voice was shaking and she was kneeling in blood like it was water. "Let me help. I can help." She looked at Scarab's lifeless face that had laughed and pummeled her with snow. She bit her lip until she could taste it and looked at Frederick, seeing a man coming undone. Very quietly and feeling undone herself, she said, "I can help."

Looking this close at her, he didn't know what to do. His mind was racing so fast that there were no actual thoughts in his head, nothing to put together. It all was spinning and spinning until it was just a scream in his head, and then--

Faye and Scarab are talking. Smiling at another. At him.

BLOOD. PYRAMID HEAD. SCARAB IMPALED.

They're playing in the snow. Laughing.

RIPPER. MARY. SCARAB.

They're talking and he can't hear them. Talking and looking disturbed.

MONSTERS. SCREAMING. HANDS COVERED IN BLOOD.

Scarab talks. "I'll find him."

No. No. No no no No NO NO NO---

"NO!"

He yelled, the sound bursting through his body that was frozen in fear. He reached out and grabbed Faye's shoulders, not realizing how hard he was shaking her, his eyes wild. "NO SHE WASN'T! SHE WASN'T LOOKING FOR ME! SHE WASN'T OUT THERE BECAUSE I TOLD HER NOT TO I TOLD YOU BOTH NOT GO OUT HERE SHE WASN'T LOOKING FOR ME! TELL ME SHE WASN'T LOOKING FOR ME GODDAMNIT!"

Frederick's scream ripped Faye away from Scarab. She was wrenched around so hard and so fast that her gun flew out of her hand and hit the wall sharply. Abberline's fingers were digging into her skin with bruising intensity. He was screaming in her face, and Faye was so afraid that she could barely stop herself from crying.

She didn't know what to say! She didn't know what to do! She had no idea! He was shaking her so hard that her neck felt ready to snap. His eyes were burning, and Faye had no idea if he even knew that he was shouting at her. Gripping two fistfuls of his hair in her shaking hands and pressing her palms against his temples, she yelled back, "STOP IT! YOU HAVE TO STOP! You're going to hurt yourself! THE SOONER YOU CALM DOWN THE SOONER WE CAN FIGURE THIS OUT!" At this point Faye--who had always been self-centered and only concerned with herself--didn't give a rat's ass if he broke the skin on her arms.

As long as she could calm him down, it would be okay.

She told herself that.

Over and over.

It would all be okay if she could just calm him down. "Frederick, please," she nearly begged over his screaming. "It'll be okay if you just calm down."

Abberline shoved her away and moved back, still stilling in the quickly congealing blood. This couldn't be happening, no, why - part of him knew, logically, that she would be brought back, but that didn't quite matter. It was that she went through this and would have to live with it and the memories and she did go out looking for him. He knew it. Faye wouldn't tell him otherwise and he knew it would be true, he knew both women wouldn't be able to sit by idly if they thought a friend was in danger. But why.. why.. he didn't care if anything happened to him. He was already dead. Sure, so was Scarab, but what if it had been Faye?

He realized he'd been sitting on his knees with his hands over his face for some time. He pulled them away, and stared in front of him.

"We..." his voice was flat, and a bit shaky, but forced himself to speak. "We need to, ah.. I don't think the city will bring her back wi-without... we have to find all her.. parts."

Faye put a shaking hand underneath her, her head still buzzing from rocking back and fourth. She stood on legs that shook as much as her fingers did and said, "O-okay." There was really nothing else that she could say. Abberline was still crouched down next to Scarab, and Faye had a sudden, powerful urge to touch the crown of his head as she stood beside him. She settled for his shoulder, but only for a moment before she retrieved her gun from behind them.

She kept her eyes and ears open, looking back at Frederick often to make sure that he was still there, still sane. And also looking for anything that might jump out at them.

She had to walk carefully around the carnage, her white boots slipping in the blood. "I-I think I see..." she trailed off and scooped up two of Scarab's fingers with a painful knot in the center of her throat and turned to present them to Frederick.

Abberline had gone back to Scarab's body. She wasn't as stiff anymore, her body coming out of rigor, slowly. The process must have begun. He steeled himself, putting his emotions away, like when he was present for an autopsy. He could do this. He could be calm and he could cope with this, he could. He'd done it a hundred times before. He'd sat and let them poke and prod at Arda's body and let them call it Mary's, and he'd kept his game face. He'd upheld the ruse. He could control himself now.

With a sickening noise, he pulled her lower arm off one rusted pole. He could hear the grinding of the bone against the metal, and bits of her flesh stuck to it. Then the other. He had to break off part of one and move her torso to get the ones through her shoulders. His face was an impassive mask the entire time, frozen.

Once off of the grotesque cruficixtion, her body fell limply, still oozing blood and gore from the wound through her center. Abberline held her in his arms, and lifted her, finally turning back to Faye.

"We should get her inside."

Faye watched Abberline with a sort of muted fascination. She had never seen a dead body, much less one arranged in such a vulgar display, and the weight of what she was seeing finally seemed to settle inside her. Seeing a dead body was one thing. Seeing the complex twist of removed limbs and holes that made up Scarab, a friend was completely different. She hadn't even seen Spike's body, and now she was thankful for it. The damage his leaving had done was enough, and Faye couldn't imagine having to face something like this. But this was Scarab, not Spike, and this was different, and this struck her deep with fear and hatred of the thing that had done this to her friend.

She knew very little about Abberline's past, but the way he set his face as he slid Scarab off of the poles suggested that this wasn't the first time he had seen something so gruesome.

Faye nodded in response to his comment. "Where? I think my apartment is closer, but if you'd rather have her in yours that's fine," she replied, slipping her second gun out of the holster and clicking off its safety. She looked at Scarab's fingers in her hand, tore a long piece of her red sweater, and wrapped them in the fabric, sliding them securely into the empty holster. "Wherever we go," she continued, "let's get as far away from here as possible."

Abberline wasn't really listening to Faye's words, but her voice was comforting. A bit like Godley's presence when he was close to losing it. He just walked, carrying the broken body with him, back to his own building. He had no idea how long it took. Scarab's blood was dried and tacky by then, but everything else was still cold and pale. He laid her down on his bed, and stood there, staring.

Faye was a bit annoyed that he was ignoring her, but she didn't say anything, only silently followed him back to what ended up being his bedroom. She pulled Scarab's fingers out of her holster and held them out for Abberline. "Here," she said, but she wasn't sure Abberline heard her at all since he remained staring at Scarab's lifeless body. She clapped her hands loudly, trying to draw his attention. "Frederick!" she called, her tone betraying how worried she was about both Scarab and Abberline. "We're not gonna be able to do anything by just standing here. Do you have any bandages?"

She had played nurse before, and if Frederick was too paralyzed to play too then she would do it herself. Unsure of whether or not he was going to answer, Faye removed her sweater with a pang of loss and started tearing off a strip of fabric.

It started small.

Just a flush of color along ghost-white skin...
Then, gradually the punctures in her chest and arms started to close.

If you looked hard enough, and for a long enough time you could watch the change, but only if you watched closely.

Before long the punctures melded into star shaped knots of scar tissue. The wound in her torso had become a ragged line of similar tissue that ran from just above her navel all the way to her sternum crossing a number of cuts and abrasions along the way.

Her wrist aligning itself was the most obvious ( and thus unsettling ) portion of the process as bones moved beneath the skin to join up with each other and start to knit.

The sharp sound of Faye clapping her hands 'woke' Scarab, and witha scream she was scrabbling back across the sheets.

"STAY AWAY! GET THE FUCK AWAY! DON'T YOU TOUCH ME YOU FUCKING DEMON!!" She slipped on uncoordinated limbs and went sprawling onto her stomach, fighting with nothing.

The sight of Scarab actually regenerating was enough to shock Abberline out of his reverie. He knew she couldn't die here, and he knew she'd be back, but actually seeing it happen was too much for him to handle. Having held her dead body and carried it, slipping in her blood.. and not his.. he felt his stomach lurch. Her screams didn't help - Get away from her. You did this. It was because of you she was out.

He stepped back, just a bit. Then more. Before he really knew what he was doing, Frederick was locked in his bathroom, sitting on the floor with his hands covering his face.

Faye felt like a child walking in on an argument between her two parents. Her two very insane, damaged parents, one of who had just carried the other back bloodied and destroyed.

Scarab was screaming at both of them, and a moment later Faye turned to find Abberline gone and the door to a bathroom shut. She thought about getting him out of there. He needed to face this now, not later, and Faye knew that from experience too, but Faye also knew better, and she wanted him to come out in his own time. Not when she bodily threw the door down and forced him out.

She needed to get Scarab under control, however. Steeling her body against the possibility that Scarab might launch herself at Faye and attempt to tear her apart, Faye said to the woman, stepping closer, "Pull yourself together, Scarab. You're in Frederick's apartment. No demons here. I swear." It sounded lame, but it was all she could think of.

Pausing a few feet away from Scarab and glancing back at the bathroom, Faye waited to see what she would do next.

She was curled agianst the headboard, her arms up to protect herself from the attack that didn't come.

It was the sound of Faye's voice more than the actual words that made Scarab pause.
Pause and peek out from behind her mangled hands.

...."Faye"?...
She asked in a small, shakey and very brittle voice.

Trembling still, Scarab took in her surroundings...and noticed the blood stains smeared across the bed,... and across Faye.

It wasn't possible. It couldn't be possible.
No one could survive something like that...could they?

The trembling became more pronounced as slowly Scarab's eyes found her three-fingered right hand.

A little inarticulate noise of disbelief escaped her.

..Not possible...

Her eyes found Faye's agian, but her damaged hands stayed trembling where she left them; suspended before her as though she had forgotten thier existence, while silent tears began to mingle with the drying blood on her face.

Abberline had thrown up, and washed his hands and face. He concentrated on trying to get rid of the blood on him, but it wasn't really working. He pulled off his coat and jacket, and just stared at himself in the mirror for a long moment, trying to pull himself together.

After a long moment, he stepped back outside, and looked up at Scarab. Awake, and not screaming anymore.

Faye had never had another woman to comfort, and she couldn't remember comforting any of her friends from before the accident, but there was a sort of instinct in her that told her what she needed to do. And it was weird to her, because Faye had disliked or resented almost every woman that she had ever met, but she crossed the room and sat down next to Scarab.

The other woman was crying, and Faye felt a swell of emotion choke the breath out of her. "Yeah," she said shakily, "Faye."

She put a hand on Scarab's shoulder, not sure if she should hug her or even touch her. She would wait for Scarab to decide that. Her hand was mangled and Faye couldn't help but look at it, a taste for revenge and hatred bubbling in her stomach. She wanted that fucking thing to eat pavement, to eat gunpowder and bullets and she wanted the last thing it ever saw to be the heel of Faye's boot as she gouged its eyes out.

"It's done," she was saying, just as Abberline came out of the bathroom looking pale and wet but a little less bloody.

She looked at her hand, mesmerized, unable to comprehend how.

A grisly white hand putting her severed fingers to stone..

No. Don't go there. Not now...not now.

Tears were still rolling freely down her cheeks, but she didn't notice.
Instead she blinked once. Twice. And very slowly moved her left hand, her whole hand, to gingerly touch the long ragged scar showing through her ripped suit.

...I...I-I'm sorry... she whispered seemingly to herself, and brought her hand away.
The blood was still tacky in places, and absently she started to wipe at it.

..I'm sorry...

She looked at faye...then turned to see Frederick.

He was a mess. Blood everywhere.
But for just a moment she found and held his eyes.

"I'm so sorry"

Abberline took a few shaky steps forward, and finally made it to his bed, and knelt on the mattress beside her. He reached out and wiped the blood and tears off her cheeks. He tried twice to speak, but his voice failed him.

Finally, he said: "Let's get you cleaned up, eh?"

He gently took Scarab into his arms like he'd done earlier, but with even more care. She felt frail and delicate, and it disturbed him. "Faye, could you run a bath?" his voice was soft, and still a bit clinical. The bathroom was large enough, and the tub just as - Scarab would have to deal with being naked in front of them, because she didn't look like she had the strength to do it herself - but he couldn't stand seeing her covered in all that blood anymore.

Faye didn't need telling twice. She slid off the bed just as Abberline got on and hurried into the bathroom. On her way to turning the taps on, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. There was blood on her face, in her hair. Scarab's blood. She nearly lost it, but she dealt with it.

It just reminded her of how much she wanted to crush Pyramid Head, now that things were completely personal.

She turned the taps on quickly, sticking her hands under the running water and washing the blood away, checking the temperature at the same time. When it was warm enough to be pleasant but hot enough to, maybe, make Scarab think she was getting rid of that thing's filth for good, Faye stopped up the tub and waited for it to fill, thinking she would give them a moment before shouting that it was ready.

For the first time in far too long Scarab--

No..Keico.

--actually felt safe. She curled her ruined hands in Frederick's shirt front and rested her head on his shoulder.

She was so very tired...and she couldn't seem to stop shaking.

"I'm sorry, Frederick. We were worried..we were really worried..I'm so sorry...

Her voice was still rough, her throat still healing.

"..I'm getting you all messy.."

Her eyes kept drifting to her missing fingers, so she bunched that hand into the fabric further to hide it, and used the other to try and wipe some of the blood off of him.

He noted with a sort of detached calm that he'd been unfortunately incorrect about putting all her pieces back together - it seemed she'd be lacking a few digits.

Frederick sat for a moment, just holding her, one arm around her shoulders. He brought his other hand up to touch her face, petting back her matted hair. "It's all right, Keico," he whispered. It wasn't all right, and he didn't know if it would be again soon, but he knew now that he had to be all right. It was because of him that she'd been attacked, yes, but now it was his duty to be strong for her. He couldn't lose it like this. Faye'd seen enough of his mental instability, he would have to be done with it now.

"I'm fine now, see? Fine... you just relax." He leaned forward and kissed her forehead, stroking her cheek. "We're all fine now."

Yes. They'd all be fine.. fine. It would take some time, but they would be. He slid his free hand under her knees, and lifted her.

They'd all be fine.

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