Archive of Our Own ^beta

The guy that comes to the camp in Cairo looks like he is already dead. He tells them that the people Emeka and Vesseek met in Rome are dead, Emeka's sister and Grizzop's friends are dead. Emeka insists he is lying, that he is infected, sent to mess with them. That's not why they lock him up, they do it because it's standard procedure. Seven days and no sign of the infection and Emeka breaks down and Oscar Wilde looks like there is nothing left to break.

"You sure he's alive?" Vesseek asks the guard, who just shrugs. "We're all dead anyway."

"How philosophical of you, Phil, didn't think you had it in you," they say in false cheeriness.

"It's Dave!"

Vesseek ignores him and instead looks at the guy still sitting in the cell despite the door being open, they catch a glimpse of something in his face. Not a full emotion or thought, but more than he had been showing in the last few days. He finally gets up, gathers the few things up he had with him, a set of anti magic shackles, an unread book and a lumpy hat.

When he passes them he pauses for a second, voice flat and quiet. "Thanks for the company, Phil."

Vesseek decides that they like him.

---

"So you are saying he is an idiot because he had hope the world could be saved?" Vesseek feels a little bit affronted on the guy's behalf. Not enough to stop them from shoveling more of the somewhat decent porridge into their mouth. Freud shifts uncomfortably next to them.

"That's not-" he stops himself, rethinks his words. "Some men can't deal when they lose their purpose and try to find meaning by chasing figments of their imagination. Wilde thought he had a lead despite all evidence pointing to the opposite. And now it got more valuable people killed and it changed nothing."

Vesseek rolls their eyes. "I really need to find more cheerful people in here," they mutter and clean out the bowl in their hand. If only Emeka hadn’t returned to his family or Dave wasn’t still prickly over the name joke. "Always a pleasure talking to you Sigmund." They dash off, only halted by a quiet voice from the shadows.

"You know he is right?"

"You like listening in to other people's conversations, don't you?"

"My apologies," Wilde says, but his voice sounds so flat Vesseek can't even tell if he means it or if it's a joke or if it's just a mechanical reply.

Vesseek takes in his thin, pale form and curses to themselves. They are at heart still weak to lost causes and strays. "Have you eaten anything today? The porridge is pretty good today, comparatively."

Wilde blinks at them.

"Well, come on, I could go for a second helping if I'm honest and if nothing else you can keep me company. Can't do worse than good old Sigmund." Wilde blinks at them again but he follows them anyway. They both eat in silence for most of the meal and that already makes it better than listening to Freud's theories on people's behaviour.

To their surprise it's Wilde who actually speaks up. "So do you have hope left then." His voice is still flat, devoid of actual interest, perhaps a mild curiosity.

Vesseek coughs out a laugh and grins without humor. Their family and clutch is dead, their best friend is dead, their new best friend's sister is dead and the world is doomed. "Hope is for beginners."

---

Of all the ways Vesseek thought their day would go, ending up fucking the guy they barely exchanged more than ten words with wasn't anywhere even remotely in the vicinity of that thought. By the way Oscar - and they figure they are now on a first name basis, all things considered - stares up at the ceiling, surprise clear on his face and chest still heaving, they don't think he expected it either. 

They escorted him back to his room in the Tahan mansion that someone higher up likely organized for him. Vesseek can't think who would be that fond of the guy to do it, considering everything they heard since his return, but they suspect it might be someone with Tahan in their name. 

They still are a bit fuzzy on how they ended up fucking on the large bed though. 

There is the vague memory of an open door and a half hearted awkward invitation for non-sexual company. And okay them jumping on the bed because it's been some time since they had been on a human sized bed may have somehow started things. And yeah, okay so they had pulled Oscar down in their excitement and suddenly things got heated very fast in a way they can only do when you haven't had any significant physical contact in ages and are scooped up in some godforsaken outpost of the doomed world and you have nothing to lose and nothing to gain. And well, Vesseek always liked sex and despite it all being rushed and awkwardly short lived, Oscar is an actual decent lay.

Oscar wets his lips, eyes a bit wild when he looks at them, but at least there is some kind of life back in them, Vesseek muses. "I- that was unexpected."

"Yep," Vesseek agrees and leaves it at that in favour of curling up on top of Oscar.

"What are you doing?"

"Sleeping, now shut up and get some rest," they yawn, eyes drifting close already. It's been some time and this is nice and warm and their brain stopped buzzing for once, so they might as well make the most of it. Oscar can move them if he likes. He doesn't.

---

Sometimes Vesseek wonders if they have any hope left at all or if it is just the knowledge that Grizzop would kill them again if they turned up in the afterlife now that keeps them going. That and the promise to write a young halfling regularly.

---

"It's Vesseek by the way," they mumble against Oscar's still sleep warm skin. "Vesseek drik Vierzehn Berlin." It has occured to them that they never introduced themselves properly, and they doubt their name is as much rumored about in the camp as that of a disgraced former meritocratic agent chasing figments. Or maybe it is, considering they are the only goblin around giving Freud grief.

"Oscar Wilde," Oscar says after a moment, his hand still resting on Vesseek's back.

"I know."

“You are Grizzop’s hos- friend.” 

“Yeah,” they say, catching on the unsaid word. “Something like it.” Oscar grunts in the way of someone who knows precisely what Vesseek is not saying. 

They’d always wondered if Grizzop hadn’t been a Paladin, if he hadn’t always put duty before anything, if they might’ve been something else, something more permanent than fleeting what ifs. But then again Grizzop wouldn’t have been Grizzop if he had been anything other than what he was. 

“You knew him.” It’s not a question, because he clearly knew Grizzop’s friends, dead as they are now.

“For a while,” Oscar says and his fingers tighten on Vesseek’s back, before he notices and forces them to relax. Vesseek squints up at his face and doesn’t like the lost look he sees there, mixed with grief and the kind of betrayal that comes from someone who promised coming back dying. 

They curl up back on Oscar’s chest, not saying anything and furiously holding back sudden tears.

“Let’s sleep for a bit longer,” they mutter and Oscar doesn’t argue.

---

The last thing Vesseek ever expected at the end of the world was to start a relationship with someone who was still grieving over a lost almost love too, but oddly it works for both of them. 

Oscar tells them about the letter from the past one night and lets Vesseek ride him after, furious and grieving and just in need of feeling something else. 

Vesseek tells him about Emeka and Ishak and Ed and the promise they couldn’t keep and then lets Oscar suck them off.

Oscar wanders the halls of the former Tahan mansion like a ghost, until Curie puts him on communication duty alongside Vesseek. She takes him out after a few days, two panic attacks and Vesseek having a few choice words. 

---

Vesseek sometimes finds him outside the mansion, scribbling poems into a notebook. They get to read one and it’s the saddest thing they’ve seen - and they have seen how the porridge looks when Olivia is on cooking duty. They tell Oscar so and it coaxes a brief smile out of him.

They end up sleeping in the same bed more often than not and more and more of Vesseek’s things - few as they are - find themselves in Oscar’s room. 

One day, almost a month into their arrangement, Vesseek wakes up and has the oddest feeling in their chest, not quite like they’re in love, but that they could be. It’s probably the most dangerous feeling one could have in times like these, but Vesseek is thankful for it, because for the first time in what feels too long they feel alive again.

---

There hasn’t been a letter or a message from either Emeka or Ishak in over a week. Saira and Apophis have gone quiet too. 

Vesseek tries to not think about either of it.

---

Vesseek is the one on duty in communications when the message comes in.

Hiroshima has been taken over.

Curie just looks tired.

The news spread fast and the mood plummets, the air charged with a nervous energy that could probably power their generators for a year. They thought they had it finally contained, but it’s not. Vesseek isn’t surprised, just surprised how easily everyone else got lulled into that kind of thinking.

Oscar doesn’t look at Vesseek when they tell him, just stares out of the window. “I’ve heard,” his voice is flat and empty and Vesseek doesn’t like it. But they feel empty too and so they just leave and hide in the bed in their own room. Their own silence preferable to the clanging silence Oscar and them can create between them.

---

With Hiroshima taken over it spreads to the Americas and Australia.

Vesseek still doesn’t manage to contact Emeka or Ishak. Neither does anyone else.

---

The next few days Oscar’s room is locked and Vesseek would worry more if they had the time and if it wasn’t for Olivia assuring them that the tray with food and water she left each morning at Oscar’s door was empty in the evening.

The whole situation finally calms down, or rather settles into a sense of defeat on almost all ends.

“It is how it is,” Sigmund says during dinner. “We can only do so much.”

Vesseek puts down their spoon and gets up. “To be honest Sigmund, I haven’t seen you doing much.”

They bang on Oscar’s door. “Open up, I’ve had enough of Freud as a dinner partner for the past few days, and I am not leaving until you open the damn door.” They keep on banging until the door finally opens and Oscar looks at them bedraggled, hair a mess, clothes still the same he wore days ago - with a smell to match - and dark rings under his eyes. 

Vesseek looks at him, not impressed in the least, and pushes their way into the room.

The room looks a mess, some leftover bread moulding on the edge of the small desk crammed into a corner, papers strewn everywhere. 

“Did you get into a fight with your notebook?” They raise an eyebrow at Oscar. He runs his hand through his tangled hair and then slumps on the bed. There is a twisted smile on his face. 

“You might consider me crazy, but I think I figured out another lead.” Vesseek doesn’t ask what kind of lead, they can guess. Instead they walk over to him and rest their elbows on his knees. Oscar’s eyes are bloodshot and haunted.

“Might be a little bit crazy, but it’s not like anyone else has any better ideas.” 

Oscar blinks at them. “So you’re not going to talk me out of it.”

Vesseek shrugs. “Eh, not in the mood. And your crazy lead is more entertaining than Dave’s fatalism or Sigmund’s philosophical theories.”

Oscar’s breath hitches and his eyes shine wet in the dwindling light. “Hey,” Vesseek says and pats his hand.

“Hey,” Oscar answers softly and entangles their fingers. 

“Oh come here.” Vesseek reaches up with their other hand and runs it over Oscar’s unscarred cheek. Oscar leans into the touch and then leans down to kiss them.

“As lovely as it is kissing you again, I think you should brush your teeth. Maybe take a bath. Have something to eat. And then let me rail you into the mattress. Maybe afterwards tell me all about the crazy plan of yours.”

Oscar laughs.

---

Oscar wants to leave the next day and has wisely decided to not let Curie know about it. Vesseek tells him that they will come too.

"Everyone I have ever worked with or cared about is dead or presumed dead. And I don't want to risk you," Oscar argues back.

Vesseek glares at him. "Yes, well, everyone I ever cared about is also dead or presumed dead, so chances are fifty-fifty on which of us dies first. And I'd rather not outlive someone else, so I'm coming with you."

Oscar has this habit of blinking at them like a confused owl whenever they manage to outmaneuver him with words, it's rather adorable and it usually means Vesseek gets their way.

----

The lead goes to an almost abandoned temple of Hephaistos near Alexandria and then nowhere.

When they return Curie is furious and Vesseek suspects she throws them into the containment cells more as a punishment than out of protocol.

---

Finally a letter makes it through. 

It isn’t from Ishak or Emeka. 

But it bears the seal of Hephaistos and is addressed to Oscar Wilde.

Vesseek leaves it for him and then leaves him alone to go for lunch. There is something in Oscar’s eyes that is too fragile for Vesseek to watch shatter.

---

Oscar stares at the letter by the time Vesseek returns in the evening and he looks like he's been staring at it for the entire time too.

"What does it say?"

When Oscar doesn't respond, Vesseek reaches up and pulls it from his grasp and that's what makes Oscar look at them. He has a frozen look of near hysteria on his face and something glimmering in his eyes that looks dangerously like hope. Vesseek has to avert their eyes and focuses on reading the letter instead.

My colleague is not inclined to share much about it, still bound to the promise he made, however I am not bound to the same vow and if you happen to bring your goblin friend to Damascus he might actually be willing to share, as this is who he made his promise to.

Vesseek raises an eyebrow at Oscar. "I don't think that means me."

"No, but what would you say about pretending to be Grizzop?"

Vesseek shrugs. "As long as it's not for a sex thing." Then they ponder that a second longer. "Okay maybe also if it's for a sex thing."

Oscar chokes on a laugh. There are tears in his eyes too.

Hope is for beginners, Vesseek thinks, but you have to start somewhere, even if it is chasing figments.