Fanfic 100 - 011, Red
Feb. 8th, 2006 09:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dolevalanTitle: Fracture, part 2
Fandom: Sweeney Todd
Characters: Revealed(!), plus mention of Todd and Beggar Woman
Prompt: 011, Red
Word Count: 492
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Part two of five.
Author's Notes: As promised, the next installment. As a reminder, the lyrics are from Leonard Bernstein's mass with additional lyrics by Stephen Schwartz.
What are you staring at?
Haven't you ever seen an accident before?
In his nightmares, everything was tinted red. Not wine-red, but blood-red, the hot, sticky red of fresh, flowing blood, pouring over his hands. He didn’t have the nightmare every night anymore; not even every month. But he always knew, instantly, when it was beginning.
It wasn’t just the scarlet hue, soaking into everything. It was that he could feel the darkness rising inside him, like a caged animal set loose. He could feel words coming out of his mouth without thinking them first, he could see his hands moving to do things without his permission.
Impossible, to explain to a sane person what madness was like. All the lines were sharp and crisp; everything was harshly thrown in to relief. And above all, everything was clear. There was no doubt left about anything. And as his sane self drowned in the nightmare, the madness filled the cracks and pores of his mind, like the ruddy light from the oven turning everything the flaming red-orange of a sunset.
He couldn’t smell, in the dream, but he reacted to the smell nonetheless; the awful, horrid stink that filled the bake house. He could see the pool of blood, flowing over the table to drip down to the floor. Drip. Drip. Drip. It almost fit one of the rhymes he parroted, like a broken toy.
He remembered speaking, but in his dreams, he was always walking, inexorably, towards the man. The barber looked more like a demon than ever, crouched in the devilish light of the oven, cradling the corpse of the beggar woman in his arms. As if he was ready to carry her spirit down, off to hell.
In the dream, he never had to pick up the razor – it was always in his hand as he walked. It glinted, casting a light on Todd’s eyes. They looked up and met his and distantly, the part of him that wasn’t completely lost to the clean certainty of the madness could see that the man was broken. The demon had broken the man, finally, after he had taken enough lives, enough blood. But it didn’t matter. He knew what he was going to do, because he had to do it.
He couldn’t smell, but he could feel. The thick, hot liquid pouring over his hands as he drew the unforgiving steel across the barber’s throat. It covered his hands up to the wrists. Sometimes the people rushed in to stare in mute horror, but not always; the dream varied here. But it didn’t matter; he never spoke to them in the dream. He just sat, watching the light leave Todd’s eyes in the hellish red glow.
Tobias always awoke in a sweat, but he didn’t scream anymore. If he started screaming, he might not ever stop again. But no matter how many times he told himself that he was safe and free, his hands always felt warm and sticky for hours after he awoke.
Fandom: Sweeney Todd
Characters: Revealed(!), plus mention of Todd and Beggar Woman
Prompt: 011, Red
Word Count: 492
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Part two of five.
Author's Notes: As promised, the next installment. As a reminder, the lyrics are from Leonard Bernstein's mass with additional lyrics by Stephen Schwartz.
What are you staring at?
Haven't you ever seen an accident before?
In his nightmares, everything was tinted red. Not wine-red, but blood-red, the hot, sticky red of fresh, flowing blood, pouring over his hands. He didn’t have the nightmare every night anymore; not even every month. But he always knew, instantly, when it was beginning.
It wasn’t just the scarlet hue, soaking into everything. It was that he could feel the darkness rising inside him, like a caged animal set loose. He could feel words coming out of his mouth without thinking them first, he could see his hands moving to do things without his permission.
Impossible, to explain to a sane person what madness was like. All the lines were sharp and crisp; everything was harshly thrown in to relief. And above all, everything was clear. There was no doubt left about anything. And as his sane self drowned in the nightmare, the madness filled the cracks and pores of his mind, like the ruddy light from the oven turning everything the flaming red-orange of a sunset.
He couldn’t smell, in the dream, but he reacted to the smell nonetheless; the awful, horrid stink that filled the bake house. He could see the pool of blood, flowing over the table to drip down to the floor. Drip. Drip. Drip. It almost fit one of the rhymes he parroted, like a broken toy.
He remembered speaking, but in his dreams, he was always walking, inexorably, towards the man. The barber looked more like a demon than ever, crouched in the devilish light of the oven, cradling the corpse of the beggar woman in his arms. As if he was ready to carry her spirit down, off to hell.
In the dream, he never had to pick up the razor – it was always in his hand as he walked. It glinted, casting a light on Todd’s eyes. They looked up and met his and distantly, the part of him that wasn’t completely lost to the clean certainty of the madness could see that the man was broken. The demon had broken the man, finally, after he had taken enough lives, enough blood. But it didn’t matter. He knew what he was going to do, because he had to do it.
He couldn’t smell, but he could feel. The thick, hot liquid pouring over his hands as he drew the unforgiving steel across the barber’s throat. It covered his hands up to the wrists. Sometimes the people rushed in to stare in mute horror, but not always; the dream varied here. But it didn’t matter; he never spoke to them in the dream. He just sat, watching the light leave Todd’s eyes in the hellish red glow.
Tobias always awoke in a sweat, but he didn’t scream anymore. If he started screaming, he might not ever stop again. But no matter how many times he told himself that he was safe and free, his hands always felt warm and sticky for hours after he awoke.
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Date: 2006-02-09 08:31 am (UTC)I'll give you real comments when it's all posted, I swear.
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