(no subject)

The next he's awake and aware, he's in a deep, comfortable four-poster bed, and General Alexei Sarov is sitting by with water, awaiting his return to consciousness. He apologizes, most sincerely, for Alex’s treatment, and informs him kindly that he is to think of himself as a guest at the Casa de Oro (a guest of, course, who cannot leave). He makes vague mentions of how he intends to restore Russia to its status as a world power, but refuses to elaborate, and then, quietly, he exits the room to allow Alex to rest longer, leaving a promise to explain everything in due time and a thoroughly locked room.

It’s not a very good start.

__

The next morning, he is politely but firmly invited to breakfast with Sarov before a morning ride. He doesn’t learn much more, except that the General is having very important guests over (that, naturally, he is not to interfere with, on threat of whipping).

Then it gets weird.

(I wish to tell you something about myself.)

“His name was Vladimir, and from the moment he drew his first breath, he was the best thing in my life,” Sarov says.

“This is the truth: there is nothing more terrible in this world than a father to lose his son,” he says.

“You will be my son, Alex.

“And you will continue where Vladimir left off.”

__

Naturally, he tries to escape.

They haul him out of the back of the car before they’ve even left the compound. They used a sensor to check inside and caught the sound of his heart. Conrad is all too happy to have Alex’s life in his hands again.

(“And when you hear silence – it may just be a few seconds from now – that is when you will know you have died.”)

He hears silence.

As Sarov and Conrad walk away from him, fallen to the ground in his shock but otherwise unharmed, he’s not sure if that means he’s dead or alive.

__

The order of events blur in memory. A few things stand out, clarity in the fog. Sarov drugging the president of Russia with Alex right there at the dinner table. Being bundled into the General’s private jet. “You will be home for an hour or two tomorrow, but please don’t get any ideas. You will not be permitted to leave the plane.” Setting off the flash grenade, escaping the plane only to be hauled back by a security guard. The sting of metal from the handcuffs slicing into his wrist as the lock shatters, Conrad’s hands around his throat.

General Sarov, standing in front of him with a gun as the land around them goes under siege, looking for all the world like a pained father disappointed by his son for the last time. The detonator in Alex’s hand.

“Give me the card or I’ll shoot you.”

It falls away in a graceful arc, slipping beneath the surface of the water with the briefest of splashes.

“Why?”

“I’d rather be dead than have a father like you.”

Sarov’s finger on the trigger.

“Good-bye, Alex.”

As the Russian forces drag him away from Alexei Sarov’s lifeless body, Alex feels nothing.

He’s not sure if that means he’s dead or alive.

(no subject)

The next few days are defined by a deep, drowning exhaustion that hollows out his feelings, leaving no room for anything but sadness and anger. He barely remembers anything about leaving Sarov, just waking up a day later in a hospital with five stitches in his wrist and bruises on his throat. He answers questions put to him, but doesn’t start any conversations on his own. A doctor talks to him, updating on the extent of his injuries (not good, but not more than a few weeks of healing could cure); later, another doctor talks to him, asking questions about how he feels as delicately as if he were navigating a minefield.

Jack doesn’t even bother asking questions, this time. She just sighs deeply like she’s in pain, too, and tucks him in bed for another couple days. He eats, sort of, and when he goes to sleep he has a new selection of ways to die in his dreams. When he wakes, he’s not entirely certain if he didn’t actually die, after all, and is just haunting his life, unable to let go.

He’s tired. He’s not sure if he’ll ever not be tired.