Important: this fic is the sequel (more or less) to Crimson Like, so you might want to check that one out first, in the interest of not being horribly confused. (story id= 1576749)

A/N: I blame Kay. All of this, from the whimpers to the bathtubs is Kay's fault. So basically, if you like this, you should fall down and worship her. If you think this is pure and utter carp, well you should still fall down* and worship her. She is Kay.

*Caution, falling can hurt you. Always fall away from the sharp, pointy rocks. Very important.

Gray Purity

He's been having trouble sleeping since they moved back to Olympus. Though 'they' doesn't mean quite what it used to. April is still back in Dagger Mouth, working with Etain and the Druids on some amazing medical discovery or another. He expects that when he next sees her, she'll be performing open heart surgeries.

Jalil is in Asgard, wiring up Loki's castle with electric lights and a telegraph branch, and probably the internet by now. The delegates who went with his crew are trying to negotiate Odin's release from the ironic-as-hell prison the chaos god has him in. As if another stubborn father god will do anything to tip the scales in a war were immortals are about as useful as cocktail sausages.

These days there's just the two of them in Olympus. The motel six is gone too, it's new occupants lesser dignitaries from the societies vying to get in on the war. They've been upgraded to a new location, only about a mile from Athena's own quarters.

It's a noisy part of town, with soldiers and gods and their flunkies always coming and going, but once he's inside, it seems like the quietest place on earth. He never realized before how much difference April's laughter and random outburst of song made. Or how welcome the scratching sounds of Jalil's quill pens and graphite sticks on parchment had become. These days he's alone most of the time, his house-mate always off to gods know where to do gods know what.

It gets lonely. He's not used to being so alone and these days most people are too busy to even notice the unimportant, mortal, sort-of friend of Athena's grand general, much less throw parties in his honor. Sometimes he wonders if he would be this lonely if he hadn't given up his shot at immortality. The gods all seem to have each other. And no one ignores them.

That's when all the thought and loneliness and silence and noise all start to mix together and he throws back the bedclothes and goes for a late night walk through his too-big for sixteen people, let alone two, apartments. But the shadows and echoes of his feet don't do anything to help the restless, detached feelings in his body and he decides that maybe it's a bath he needs. A long, hot soak in the private bathing chamber that came with the new domain.

There's no light on in David's room when he walks past it, for once. But then he remembers that the boats just came back from the Aztec war that day, and maybe the general is out celebrating. Getting toasted with his men or something. Or maybe he's simply asleep, for once.

He should have gone out with the army, should have fought along with David. But the other boy had refused to let him—had gone so far as to have a few of the reserve forces lock him in his room until he had been out of the Greek harbor. It was about 'keeping as many old worlders alive for as long as possible' or something equally morbid. He hadn't slept at all during those two weeks. Hadn't talked to anyone, either.

The bathing chamber is tiled in a cool, aqua-blue color which, when coupled with the reflection of water from the big tub in the floor, looks a little like a tropical sea, the kind only seen in cruise brochures. The room is already steaming a little when he walks in, which isn't unusual. The water is kept hot at all times by either magic or one sneaky-as-hell servant whom he hasn't managed to meet yet. He grabs a towel from the stack by the door and peels off his shirt as he walks towards the water.

And stops.

He sees brown hair first, the ends floating in the steaming water, but most just hanging in the air, dripping water across its owner's face. The head that owns the hair is tucked against a chest, making it impossible to see. But he recognizes the other figure anyway.

There's only on person in all of Everworld that he knows of who still owns a Radiohead t-shirt. Said shirt is stained dark from water, so are the jeans the other boy wears, along with his shoes. David Levin is sitting in the tub, knees pulled up to his chest. Fully clothed.

The other, wetter boy looks up when he makes a sort of embarrassed/surprised noise. "Christopher." he says, duly, before lowering his head again, as though there were no one else in the room.

"Is... something, uhm." How do you talk to someone sitting in the bath? It would have been bad enough to walk in on David naked, but walking in on him fully clothed somehow manages to be worse. "You know, dude, if you need to get your clothes washed, we have guys who do laundry."

The other teen shrugs his shoulders a little, ignoring his attempt at humour. But the gesture makes something noticeable. The bottom of the tub is tiled in a light pink color, giving the water a rosy cast. But the water in David's bath isn't rosy, so much as it is that off-pink color he's seen in washbasins when he's been washing off... blood. Shit.

He drops to a crouch, then eases into the water, a little nervously, still clothed from the waist down. If David's hurt he shouldn't be sitting here, where there's all sorts of possibilities that involve bleeding to death. He slides himself towards the other, curled up, boy.

"Hey man," he tries to start, but his mouth feels like sawdust. Emotional confrontation has never been his forte. Not when he's been sober, anyway. "What's up?"

"I killed someone." The mumbled phrase just sort of hangs there, between them for a moment, but then David starts talking again, "A Viking. One of ours. One of mine. How great is that? Killing one of your own troops..." He trails off, as though he's simply run out of things to say.

"Accidents happen." He says, hoping his tone is even remotely comforting, "You're not the first person to accidentally kill the wrong guy in battle." Though how you can mistake a big, bearded Norseman for an Aztec is beyond him. Maybe it's a battle thing. Some sort of bloodlust-vision impairing problem. No wonder it's cutting the general up, though. The guy's always trying to be Napoleon, Alexander the Great and the dude Mel Gibson played in The Patriot all at once. A mistake like this is bad for the image.

"It wasn't an accident. I didn't accidentally anything."

He isn't expecting that response and, as such, is completely unprepared when it does come. "I, oh, well. What?"Is he still talking to the same David Levin? The same boy with the heroics hangups? "How come?"

The dark haired boy ignores him again, his face still tilted down towards his knees, which makes Christopher want to grab him by the chin or the hair or whatever and yank it back up into visibility. But he doesn't. Truthfully, he's afraid to touch him. It's hard to say what would happen, considering the mood his friend seems to be in. Galahad's sword is sitting on the edge of the tub, too, within easy grasp.

"Have you ever wondered if something you didn't do hurt someone else? That maybe if you had done something you could have prevented something else that might have made life better for someone else but by not doing it you screwed up their life—or lives?" David is talking again, but the words coming out don't seem to make any sense. "And that maybe because you didn't do that thing you've hurt people even though you've never met them?"

"Like what?" The other boy is looking at him for the first time since he came in. He's surprised by his eyes. Unlike the rest of his body, they're dry.

"Like, say someone stole something from you. And if you didn't tell anyone else, they could go out and steal things from other people."

"Well, the next person who got knocked off would probably call the cops. Although if it were my stereo system on the line, I'd call someone." Another lame attempt at humour goes unnoticed, because now David's gaze is almost intense enough to burn.

"But if you call the cops first, they'll arrest the guy who took something from you, and no one else has to deal with it." It's lousy logic, but the look in his eyes say that the argument is completely sincere.

"Dude, that only works if you know who ripped you off. Or if the cops are really fast in your neighborhood. Or if there's a suspicious looking guy trying to sell off your stuff two blocks from your house." Every stupid joke makes him want to impale himself on Galahad's sword, but he never expected to be sitting, mostly clothed, in a bathtub, having an ethical discussion with David. So maybe he's allowed to be nervous. "What did the imaginary burglar take anyway?"

It's the wrong question to ask, because the other teen curls back in on himself again, hiding his face once more. It's sad, really, like watching something broken, and getting the feeling that it might have been beautiful at one point. And did he just refer to David, using the word beautiful? Maybe there's just no other word to describe it.

The general never smiles. Maybe all this ranting is why. Maybe this conversation, no matter how weird it is, will be good for him somehow. David looks up again and Christopher braces himself for the next awkward subject change.

"My virginity."

The phrase is out of context and meaning. It takes a long moment for him to realize just what the other boy might mean. Another long moment to process David's earlier questions. And another moment, in which nothing happens at all. It's only then that the expected change of topic comes.

"He was hurting a kid." the other boy takes a long drag of air, but it sounds as though he's breathing broken glass. "He was hurting a kid and I had to stop him, you know. Nothing for it. Had to kill him. Maybe not. But I did." He's starting to shake, but the water is still warm. "Fuck. I—sorry, Christopher." One hand covers his eyes and his shoulders heave a little.

No. David is not crying. Please god no. He can deal with just about anything, but not tears. He'd rather have the other boy trying to chop his head off, while screaming bloody murder. A small, half-stifled whimper leaves the other boy's mouth.

"Hey," now he's the one talking without making much sense. "Hey, don't cry. Come on, it's ok. It's not your fault. It isn't." He's not sure where the last bit comes from. A flash of inspiration, maybe. Or desperation. Maybe being lonely isn't all that bad after all.

"I just wish I could have said something. What if there was someone else? Some little kid?" David's all over the place now, his voice changing pitch and volume at will. "Why is this so hard?" His face is turned to him again and he can see the few lonely teardrops trickling down the other boy's face. They don't look right there and he leans out to clumsily brush them away.

"Not your fault, man. Not your fault." The words are familiar. David's own words to him, in Ka Anor's temple, regurgitated and forced back at him. There has been no forgiveness for him in that moment, he remembered that. Maybe the other boy could find none here.

So he does now what his friend did for him then: wraps his arms around the other boy's slim frame and holds on as tightly as he can. And maybe David recognizes the parallels, or maybe he's just so tightly wound that he's willing to take comfort from any outlet. Either way, he rests his forehead against Christopher's shoulder and shudders, making those soft, whimpering noises again. The sobs of someone who's never really known how to cry, perhaps.

"Not your fault." he whispers that over and over, until he's not even sure what the words mean and simply knows that somehow they're important. The other boy never moves to pull away, and after a while he begins to wonder if he's fallen asleep or even passed out. It's only when he loosens his grip to check that David stirs. His eyes are red, but dry once again.

"Thanks." he whispers. Christopher nods, staring at a clump of dried blood still in his hair. He hadn't noticed it before, but now he does, and there's no gentle way to tell someone that there's blood on them, especially when it's likely not their's.

He reaches a hand out and runs it through the other boy's hair. Flakes of red drift down to the water around them with the action. "You've got something in your hair." he says, in the way of an unsolicited explanation. "Just hold still and I'll get it out." David says nothing, and he takes the silence as permission and slides forward. There are small, perfumed bars of soap laying in strategically placed baskets around the tub, and he takes one of these to use on the general's hair.

There's something oddly soothing about the feeling of David's hair between his fingers as he works it into a lather. The other teen never moves and never speaks as Christopher washes a war's worth of sweat and dirt and blood from his hair. He meets the same lack of resistance as his hands move down David's chest, gently peeling off the wet shirt.

He's not badly hurt. There's a nasty looking bruise on one forearm, but only a few light cuts dot his chest. Christopher tends to those anyway, his hands slipping their way across the general's upper body. The dark haired boy's breath hitches and one hand comes up to grip his wrist, stopping him. The contact drives him back to earth, bringing the intimacy of the moment into focus. He can feel his cheeks turn red and he moves to pull his hand away, but David still holds it in place. He looks up into dark eyes, and can't read the emotion he sees there.

"I don't know what to do." The phrase could mean so many things, could be about so much. It could involve death or war or morality or guilt and maybe it does involve all of these things. But it also seems to involve the hand pressed to the other boy's chest.

"David," There's too much in his head. Too many of snippets of tonight's conversations floating back up to taunt him and make him nervous. Confessions that weren't meant for him. And stranger things. The feeling of David's skin under his fingertips. There are questions, too. About why he's still here, sitting in this tub when the other boy gave him every chance to leave. He sighs, "I don't know either. Just... something." More nonsensical statements.

The other boy nods, as though he's just said something important, rather than a bunch of dazed nonsense. His hand is released and he starts to pull away. A hand on his face stops him. Fingers slip up through blonde hair, smoothing it back from his face. He stares down a the other boy, who slides closer to him. An arm wraps around his upper body as David returns his earlier hug.

His hands find places on the dark haired teen's back. Blonde head bows, placing itself cheek to cheek with David.

"Thank you." the general whispers again. He can feel David's head turn, until his lips brush against Christopher's cheek.

"You're welcome." he smiles to himself and stands up, the other boy still in his arms. The water is getting cold, and it's getting late. Or maybe early, it's hard to tell now. "Maybe we should get some sleep, hey?" David yawns, which works just as well as a yes.

They walk back to their rooms together, wrapped up in as many towels as they could carry. Christopher ducks down for a quick kiss just outside David's bedroom, then watches him go in alone, looking a combination of confused, embarrassed and pleased.

He doesn't sleep well that night. Too much has happened for that. But his insomnia isn't the usual restless kind. There's a lot to think over that night, and probably will be for many nights in the future. But he knows that when he wakes up in the morning, his new home won't feel quite as empty.

And maybe, if he's lucky, David will feel exactly the same way.

_

Fin

So, there was another part after all. Now go hug someone you love. You know you want to...