By D.C. Parker
Please send Feedback to: d.c.parker@web.de
Disclaimer: Xena Warrior Princess, it’s characters and all related materials are the property of MCA/Universal and Renaissance Pictures.
Those lucky dudes.
Character uses are for entertainment only, not to hurt any rights. As always.
Warning: We are talking about Xena here guys…so there is always the chance of something dangerous happening, in one way or the other ☺.
Anyway, this scene is about two women finally getting a clue about what the rest of the world has known long before them. So if you are under 18 years old, or this kind of story is forbidden where you live, please do not read it.
Or move… ;)
Xena’s POV: After having been resurrected from death, the Warrior Princess suddenly sees herself confronted with the consequences of her actions.
***
Silence.
It surrounds me, covering me like a thick blanket, and for the first time in I don’t know how many years, I am not sure whether I should be happy about, or actually scared by it.
Scared…yeah. Maybe I am that.
We came here just a couple of hours earlier. It’s one of the Amazons secret hideouts, because we can’t go back to the village right away after everything that happened. The good side is…at the moment, I am sitting in a small, thermal pool that is at the far back of the caves we are in, and since there are quite a few bends separating me from the rest of the group, I am relatively left in peace.
The down side…I am going to have to bunk out with a bunch of whiny Amazons until tomorrow morning in a very, very close space. Maybe they are counting on me not being back up to full danger mode, or otherwise they wouldn’t have gotten that idea in the first place. Or maybe their queen told them to stay the hell out of my neck.
Gabrielle…except for the few words we shared after I came back from death, she hasn’t talked to me again. She has been busy with her Amazons, talking to Ephiny about what to do next, and I let her be. I can’t even begin to imagine how she must feel right now.
I caught her looking at me while we were sneaking through the woods. Every now and then I would turn my head and catch her eyes just the blink of a moment before she turned them away again. Just the shortest of chances, really, and yet, what I could see made my stomach turn.
I sigh and let my body sink a little deeper into the warm water. It is really relaxing, and after the forced stillness my body has been through these last couple of days, that’s all it needs right now. I can still feel some of the stiffness in my legs, and between my shoulder blades, and I groan silently as the warmth starts creeping through my skin, starts loosening up sore muscles.
And it does wonders for the pounding headache that is short of driving me insane, too.
I wish I would finally work up the nerve to be the one start talking to Gabrielle again. Every time we had a few moments to ourselves during our trip here, all we did was stand there in the dark, both of us looking anywhere but at each other. And no matter how loud my rational mind is yelling at me not to act surprised about her being mad at me for dying on her, somewhere inside myself I am starting to fear that her silence has a completely different reason.
I close my eyes and lean back against the hard stone wall of the pool. My hearing picks up the chatter of the small group of women down the narrow pathway, and even though I can hear some words, my senses tell me that it will be some time until everything will be up to speed again. I catch a few shreds of theirs talks, something about that Velasca, and the Ambrosia we found, and about the things that are about to change in the village. But my rational mind is still too clouded from not having been used for so long, it is hard for me to put the pieces together.
Every other second I can hear the distinctive voice of my bard. Funny, though, how after just a few months with her I can always make out her light voice, even in the middle of a crowd. Then again, the way things have been going lately, maybe I shouldn’t be surprised about anything anymore.
I didn’t plan on leaving her. Tartarus, I didn’t plan on dying in the first place. But…
Yeah. But.
I flex my shoulders as they start cramping up again, and this time I know damn well why my body tenses up all of a sudden.
I wish I could explain what happened. I know I owe her more than just some stupid comments after returning from the dead. But how should I explain something to her I am not able to explain to myself? Well, maybe I can. Yes, yes I know why I gave up, why I let go, but what should I tell her?! And what would she think once I do? Would she think less of me? Would she stop seeing me as the strong woman she always describes me as in her stories? Would she start to feel different when she looks at me?...
Gods…whoever said dying would be easy?
All I can say is that no matter how quiet Gabrielle has been, her blond Amazon friend surely made up for that. Boy did she ever! I must look weaker than I thought, for that spunky little gal dared talking to me in a way that would have guaranteed her at least a broken yaw under normal circumstances.
When we entered these caves, I instantly smelled the water and volunteered to go look for it. Hadn’t made more than a few steps before I heard her stomping behind me. I tried to ignore her, really I did, but when we made it to the pond, I’d had enough of her silent, brooding presence at my back. I turned and confronted her…and thinking about it now, a few candlemarks later, I can only guess that it must have been her lucky day. And that I am really still more tired than I thought…because when she started her rant, I wasn’t able to say anything at all.
To none of the things she accused me of being.
Or of having done to Gabrielle.
After all, she hasn’t said anything to me I hadn’t already figured out myself. But the moment she said them…she might as well just have slapped me across the cheek. It felt as if everything she said, everything I knew, was just becoming reality when said out loud.
‘Do you have any idea what seeing you die did to Gabrielle?!’ …well bitch, I do know, better than you might think. After all, we have been through this before and…what am I telling myself?! That the fact that she has already been through this once makes it less painful?
‘Don’t you have any clue what you mean to Gabrielle?!’ …no, I don’t. I just know what she means to me. And if what she feels is anything close to what I do, my death surely would have killed her inside…
I open my eyes with a gasp, staring disbelievingly at some point on the dark stone wall in at the other side of the pool.
What have I done to her?! ‘What in blazes have I done?!’
All of a sudden, panic rises within me, closing my throat, almost choking me, and I can feel my breathing slowly spiraling out of control.
It killed something inside her. It hurt her in ways nothing ever has before. If she really feels what I do, have felt for her from the very first moment I laid eye on her, me dying ripped open places that never will be able to heal again.
I remember fragments of the things I heard her say while I was in that dreamscape. About her telling me she needed me, that she was lost without me, that she…loves me…
Gods…I am so stupid!
There I was, thinking that dying would finally save me from those hurtful memories of my past, would bring me peace. That with that I would finally escape the things I have done. That Gabrielle would finally be able to return home, where she belongs, and wouldn’t have to stay around some run down, ex warlord anymore, who wouldn’t see a tree from the forest when confronted with anything emotional.
Never, not even for the shortest moments did I think about her feelings. Or about what could happen to her suddenly left alone in a world full of thugs, and thieves, and bounty hunters who would surely have a ball with my carcass.
Damn!
Now what do I do? How can I even begin to tell her how truly sorry I am?
“Xena?”
Her voice behind me scares me so bad that I only barely manage to keep from leaping out of the pool. Now my heart is pounding so hard inside my chest it starts hurting, and I lift a shaking hand to wipe the cold sweat off my face that is surely white as a sheet.
“Xena? Hey…are you all right?” Gabrielle slowly walks over to me, I can hear her steps through the rushing pulse in my ears. They are hesitant. Almost fearful.
‘How about getting a grip on yourself, eh? You are probably giving her the scare of her life…again!’
“Yeah I…I am fine. Just thinking, that’s all.”
Amazing how my voice sounds when I am completely out of my depths. There is nothing left of tall, dark and deadly, how her Amazons use to call me. Weak, dumb and a coward – would be more like it right now.
“I just wanted to tell you we got some stew going…if you are hungry.”
“Depends…who is cooking?” Finally something normal. I take some deep, calming breaths, and instantly feel my heartbeat settling into a more healthy rhythm.
“Solari is.” I can’t help but snort at that.
“Thanks…but I think I’ll pass.”
She takes a few more steps, more confident now, and just a moment later she is standing to my left, leaning her arms onto the stone wall of the pool, her face suddenly very close to my own.
“I snagged some of the supplies they brought and made a soup of my own. Hid it next to our blankets behind a couple of stones for you. But don’t you tell anyone.” There is a definite twinkle in her eyes and I can feel my spirits lifting, allowing a sly grin on my face, wincing silently as yet another muscle long forgotten is used again.
“Hah, are you kidding? I won’t share your soup with anyone but you, and you know it.”
“Are you complaining about my Amazons cooking skills?” She grins too, now, and even if I have no earthly clue as to what happened between the silent staring in the woods and now, I don’t care as long as I can keep looking at that stunning smile of hers.
“You bet your boots I am. I’ve known bad food in the past, but one piece of that stuff Solari is making and my stomach will feel like a one way ride to Tartarus…”
The moment I say that word, I regret it.
Gone is the light in her eyes.
Gone is her smile.
Damn it all to…well, Tartarus! Can’t I do anything right anymore?!
“I…I didn’t mean to…I didn’t want…I…” ‘Say something, you idiot!’
Her face looks so crestfallen, her eyes filled with so much sadness and pain I can almost physically feel it. I sigh, slowly shaking my head, and then, finally, I find the courage to say what I should have the moment I came back.
“Gabrielle…I am so sorry.”
For a moment long enough to last half of a lifetime, she just looks at me. The dim light a few torches having been lit in the distance provide reflects off glittering tears that fall down her cheeks, and I can feel my heart getting heavy again. Never, not in this life nor the next, will I be able to make up for what I have done to her.
“I know Xena. And it’s okay.”
I cough a laugh at that, shaking my head again, daring to look right into her beseeching green eyes.
“No, it’s not! And don’t you tell me otherwise! I know what having someone you care about die does to you. I know how much it hurts when you can’t do anything to stop it! I know how you feel!”
I am angry. At every damn demon of my past for haunting me until I couldn’t take it anymore. At myself, for not being able to fight more, harder, longer. At her, for making me feel again…
Suddenly, her smile is back. Not as radiant as it was before, but sure, and gentle, and soft…the kind of smiles that makes me fall for her all over again.
“No, you don’t.”
And then she kisses me.
It’s not much, really. A brush of lips over mine, then she leans in to deepen the contact, letting her mouth linger on mine just long enough for me to understand what she was saying.
Did I ever have any doubt as to how me kissing her in the dreamscape would be for her, had I ever been scared of her not liking it, of her despising me, of her not feeling what I do, this is the most perfect way of answering questions I never would have dared ask.
Then she is gone, leaving behind the warmth of her breath on my face, the smell of sunlight and grass that always wafts through her hair, the gentle tingling feeling her lips on mine has caused within me.
I sigh once more, leaning back again, sinking even deeper, the grin on my face slowly submerging beneath the gently swaying water.
She was right. I had no idea how she felt.
Not at all.