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He’s familiar with this situation: doing the right thing even though he shouldn’t.However, David is terribly unfamiliar with the layout of the sprawling estate, thick with fog and the memory of its dense grass. The architecture tells him it's from a memory of somewhere in Japan, and though he can recognize which building is in which corner of the fenced yard, he knows it's a different beast to remember which direction leads him to gates, resources, or dead ends. He stands on a low arched bridge that carries him over a shallow river of dead koi that flows from the clouded forests surrounding the gated estate, and he tries his best to look through bamboo that is taller than him.Behind him, past a fallen structure of painted red wood, is his exit, the cobbled path leading to a hazy nothingness. Meg Thomas lingers in the door where he left her, if she chose to stay at all. And somewhere ahead of him, in the grass, mud, and buildings long since collapsed, is both Ace Visconti and the good Doctor.He isn’t sure where either one could be — his heartbeat pounds sharp and quick in his chest, a weight that creeps up his tongue and makes it hard to breathe when he breaks for a run. Behind a broken wall of splintered wood and old brick is an empty hook, its ugly blade rusted and dark in the shrouded moonlight. Mud sticks to the curve of the blade. In his time within the fog, David Tapp has learned the approximate distance between these sacrificial altars. Finding the wrong one makes his skin crawl, the same way an empty room makes him feel. But it means he's close. He has to be close. He just has to know which way to turn.His blood thrums in his ears. Worse than drums. Like a fist pounding hollow metal, begging to be released. Perhaps their tormentor is close behind, monitoring him as he crawls through bloody mud. David continues to run. His lungs burn with the taste of gritty dust. Electricity tingles his skin, a threat that is always there and waits to strike. He fears many of the threats that linger in the fog. The Doctor reminds him of the worst the world has to offer, the kind of monsters that take lives into their own hands and creates a game out of them. Kramer would have hated the man, but David thinks the only difference between their sadism is how their egos formed.Then, copper pennies. Salt water. Dead animals. Blood thickens the air, heavy from a gouged wound. He’s familiar with the taste when he approaches the bodies, both here and elsewhere.His heart swells into something painful when he sees Alessandro— Ace— limp and weak on the hook. His clothes are bloody and the wound is putrid. Their bodies are pierced by a magic he has learned exists but does not want to understand; on the hook, they are prey, and on the ground they are targets. David wastes no time slipping his arms up under Ace’s body to pull him off the hook, slick with his blood and torn flesh. Ace gasps in vicious pain and braces himself against his saviour, unable to find just where he needs to grab ahold."I've got you," David says. The wound seals itself with an auric glimmer, but Ace's body is hardly healed. All it means is there's no bone to peek through the gouged hole of his ripped jacket. His blood is thick on David's hands."Fuck," is what Ace manages to say first. He says it again, quieter under his breath, as David slips his arms tighter around his torso, bringing his hand up to his hair. The hat got lost somewhere earlier. It'll show up again. "Don’t— why's you here, it was gonna...""Stay with me," David continues. He leans Ace against him and puts his hand on his shoulders. One reaches up to his cheek, wrist slick with blood from his back, staining his jaw and the half-shaved stubble. The realm likes to keep you as it wants to. Keep you presentable after it gets to chew on your bones and spit you back out. "Let me look at you."Ace nods against him and nuzzles his cheek into David’s palm. His skin is clammy with sweat, but feels cold, like food left to rot. With the arms of the spider still circling the sky, he might as well be. Ace looks at David with tired brown eyes— his glasses having been lost somewhere too, kicked into the dirt when their hunter dragged him through earth. One eye blinks before the other in hazy focus. "Darlin’, you gotta stop comin’ back for—""Don’t," David warns, pressing his thumb against Ace’s lips to silence him. Ace visibly purses them beneath the firmly pressed finger. At least his humour didn’t bleed out. "Don’t you ever suggest I leave you behind.""Seems we both got bleeding hearts," Ace mutters against David’s thumb, and moves his head lazily to kiss it, with half of David’s nail under his upper lip. He can't swallow the smile down, but the relief is cut by a sharp feeling runs up his spine. Like touching conductive metal."We have to go," he says, quickly. When he goes to move, Ace nearly collapses against him. David almost doesn’t catch him, swinging down towards the ground when his body drops."I can’t—I can’t walk," Ace heaves, a painful sob through grit teeth. "It— he— Doc hit me in the knee. Earlier.”David looks down. Ace leans on his left foot, and his right leg is bent in an unnatural and uncertain way beneath his thin denim jeans. His knee is swollen. Blood seeps deep into the faded blue, limb knobby and fabric coarse. The tremors up his spine keeps the adrenaline pumping, but the aura of the horrible man hunting them down does nothing for the beaten one in David’s arms. Without stalling, David kneels down and allows Ace to sway and collapse over him, fireman-style. Pushing up on a bent knee, the almost-corpse of Ace Visconti rests across his shoulders. He can hear Ace wheeze when his stomach is pressed into.“C’mon..." Ace says as David begins to run, far more slower than he wants to be. "Just— put me down, ain’t worth—""Alessandro," David warns, "Stop talking."Ace never stops talking. He always keeps a smile tucked behind his lips, or a hand over his mouth, or a devilish look behind expensive sunglasses that threatens to tell you everything. Ace has something to say when you’re elbow deep in pustula nectar, when you’re fumbling with wires inside ancient machines, when you’re stuck inside a locker with hatchets digging into your back as the monsters pass by. He's laughed his way to the horizon with even worse injuries than this one. Ace never stops talking because he always wants to get the last word in, slip it by you when you can’t do anything about it. He does it to everyone. He closes his mouth for David Tapp.The electricity rattles through David and makes the ground feel uneven. A rolling wave that keeps trying to throw him off, send him to the ground and break Ace some more. But he can run if he’s careful, no matter who chases at his heels. David sees the grass move, so he grips Ace’s arm and legs a little tighter as he breaks into a run, steady and careful as the drumming gets louder. The good Doctor has returned.Now that he knows where they are, it is faster to find the exit and the hum of a powered gate. As he expected, Meg has long since left. It leaves him sour, but it is not the first time someone has made the difficult call to escape when another one of them ran back into the fog to find a fallen friend. Sparks crackle over the dirty tile and burns David’s skin, hissing through a violent cough to keep any scream under his tongue, as his lungs burn, as his hands go numb, as Ace’s body knocks against his with every step. The grass turns to tile then to grass once more, and David crosses the threshold of horror and salvation with Ace heavy, but alive.David heaves and stumbles through the mist. When the lights of the estate dim behind them h chooses to walk slower, because he knows there’s nothing between the camp fire and the exit. There never has. For once, the Entity allows him that constant.When you return from the trials, it is very rare that you are not in mourning. Sometimes, you escape without any of your blood shed, and you rejoice by the fire until you will be tested once more. But more often than not, you return to the fire with something to grieve.It's a blessing tonight that David only mourns a mark of pain and not the loss of life. In every death, there is the fear of total loss, succumbing to absolute despair and submitting yourself to the god with too many arms. But he reminds himself, as Ace lingers in his arms against one of the more isolated tree trunks, that death is not the case. Meg gives him an apologetic look when the fire comes into view, especially when she sees Ace half-alive and dragging his feet along the packed down earth. No apology is spoken, for David shakes his head at her before she can stand from her spot at the firepit.Ace breathes in his arms, low and shallow. Without his glasses and his hat, he looks older. Not through weary eyes or an empty smile, but through aged skin and the silver hair. If it wasn't for Alessandro and Bill reminding him of the years still left for them all, David would forget he isn't the oldest one among the forsaken.Ace's eyes are closed, but he's breathing. He rests his head on David's chest, and though the campfire is quite some distance from where David shelters him, the light still reaches, and Ace's skin flushes a warm colour. Nobody bothers David when the trials end and they wind themselves down before the webs of blood and searching hands of God come down to claim them again. Meg Thomas isolates herself with Laurie Strode as David does with Ace— he can't remember if there was anyone else with them, or if that's all who wandered to the Yamaoka estate. It doesn't matter. He's quickly learned to stop dwelling on things like that, which is more than what he could say about himself in life.In his arms, Ace mumbles something. David wants to ask what he says, but he rests his whole face against his chest after he shifts, so maybe it was nothing at all. He runs a hand through Ace's coarse hair, hair that Ace insists is still more black than grey. The dusting of age and silver runs through him, but it looks good. He's not that old yet. David looks ahead into the fog that seeps through the distant bushes that hide only shadow, and leans forward to rest his chin on Ace's head. Ace makes another sound, something curious this time. Still, he doesn't stir much.The bleeding stopped when the campfire came into view. As if the Entity drew the last of its desired bloodfeast and let the healing begin, through bone, muscle and fat. You don't need to patch yourself up when the trials end, but most people like to, David included. It gives them a sense of recovery, of reality. A hope that things can remain normal in the realm of shadow, as well as reclaim a bit of humanity robbed form them. Ace doesn't go through the efforts, and that's why he sleeps in his bloody shirt in David's arms. Half-sleeps. He keeps shifting, turning, and soon, he rolls on to his back, leaning into David still, and opens his eyes. David looks down."Mornin'," Ace mutters, tilting his head up."How's your leg?" David asks. Ace only looks down for a moment. The bloodstain remains but the knob-shape of his knee has disappeared."I think it's settling. Guess the Entity's got its eye on me," he says, with a touch of a sigh. "Probably gettin' tossed back in pretty soon."David, with his arms folded around Ace, strokes his thumb against him. He presses his mouth against the top of his head, patiently. "Don't think about that right now.""Try not to." Ace looks over to the campfire, where long shadows of their fellow survivors stretch up to where they shelter themselves. "Could'a kept me over there. Asked the girls to make sure I was all set, lis'sen to Meg pretend to feel bad she put herself before a couple'a old men. I'd be ready in no time."David rolls his eyes. "I'm afraid you're stuck with me."Even without blood, Ace's grin is still as exuberant as it ever is. "Then again, I'd pass up any pretty woman for you.""Is that so?""Cross my heart, baby."Ace settles himself back into David's arms, bringing his own up to hold on to his forearms. David shakes his head and looks back to the shadows instead, where the grass is thick but feels wrong to sit in. He doesn't know where Ace turns his head to next or how he might be tapping his good foot, but when he looks down, Ace's eyes are on him. From upside down, his eyes look a lot more brighter, a lot more round."Do you want to say something?" David asks."I told you a while ago to stop runnin' back to help me if I get my ass kicked," Ace says, reaching his hands to cover David's across his body. "I know that ain't your style, but—""I can't do that," David interrupts, sighing— coarse and rough but without edge. He looks at him with a gaze of mourning, and also shakes his head. "I've told you why. If I left you, it'd be leaving..."Steven is another lifetime ago, almost literally. He's something different than fog and meat hooks through the heart; he's the life David left behind long before the spider legs of the Entity took him down to whatever Hell this is meant to be, the one he gave up to bring Kramer to justice, which he still failed to do. David clenches his teeth with his mouth shut, and Ace reaches up to touch David's cheek, a tender look to his eye that David's unfamiliar with. It's always a warm eye, a mischievous eye, a look of humour and good intentions. Tenderness is something new. Concern is a foreign concept to Ace Visconti, but it's reaching its way back inside of him. The hand slowly reaches across the back of David's neck, and Ace exhales audibly."Sorry." He hasn't stopped looking at David. "Just not used to it."Ace's smile isn't much of a smile at all, but a careful, sad motion of heavy grief. "You're not the only one."His eyes drift to the sky, starless and empty. The moonlight creeps through the trees, and even with the light and shapes of the fire, it's starting to become their only source of light this far from the encampment. David doesn't want to look over and see who might be passing curious looks between themselves and the older men. They know what they are to one another— but maybe it's youthful ignorance, assuming you can't fall in love past a certain age. It might not be the youngest crowd out there, but there's still a couple of things he prefers to keep to the survivors his age.Ace‘s eyes flicker back to him. Like he can't stop looking at David."It means a lot," he confesses; earnest, under his breath. "Not used to people doublin' back for me.""I think you've told me that.""Yeah, but— for real. I'm not used to it. Too much of a burden when I was— when everything was about money and opportunity. It means... means a lot, David."Ace sits up. Slowly, because his chest hurts, and he holds a hand against where the wound sits, festering and cold. Then, he turns to David, glancing at the trees and the horizon before looking at him, and David can't read what his expression is meant to be. But it's warm."Alessandro?""Marry me.""Pardon?""Marry me.""You're joking.""I ain't joking."He's taken David's left hand into both of his, and though they're both sitting, Ace has managed to pull his knee up, and kneels for him. David stares heavy into Ace's— Alessandro's— eyes, and they're so much rounder without the glasses to hide them. So much more inviting."We can't have a—" wedding, of course they can't, and if he says anything about the chapel then David is going to get up and walk over to the firepit without another word, "—we shouldn't think about this. Right now. Not while we're in here.""If we ain't gettin' out of this—""Don't think like that.""If we ain't gettin' out of this," Ace repeats. A little firmer, but still shared between them both—any eyes don't matter. Just them. Only them. "And the fog gets a whole lot thicker... I want to go knowing we're somethin' real."It's a different scene, not having a ring to look at, or a sun setting on the horizon, a million promises yet to make. It's just them, just the worst gambler in the world betting everything on a disgraced cop. That's a kind of privacy they haven't had in however long they've been in here—living on top of one another in a pit of woodchips and ash, pulled from slumber and mourning with only moment's notice. Ace pulls David's hand closer to him, like he wants to kiss it, but instead, he just keeps him close to his chest. "There ain't a lot I can give you, I know, but—God, David, you keep me goin' out here. Keep me breathing. I just want to convince you that.""You're serious," David almost-whispers, having to lean back against the tree to keep his balance, like the ground might roll once again and tip him over. Ace's grin forms, the kind he reserves only for David, and he holds his hand a little tighter. "This isn't just the bloodloss talking.""I'm not a— a good, or honest person," he admits, and he can tell he doesn't want to. Facing facts is a lot more harder when you're a gambling man and the odds aren't yours. "But lemme be one for you. That's how bad you got me.""This—" David reaches to Ace's hands, feeling the flutter of his heart and tightening of his chest protest moving even so slightly. He doesn't look at Ace, only because he thinks his face is getting warmer. "—I didn't realize you felt so strongly.""I wanna be yours.""Alessandro—""Tapp," Alessandro says, popping his lips back into a grin. "Alessandro Tapp." He says it like he's speaking his language again, and David's face is warmer than any campfire. "David Visconti. Like that one.""Alright, easy," David says, this time— with a smile of his own, and something like a laugh. "Jesus. You're going to cause a scene if they hear you.""C'mon," Alessandro settles closer, stepping down from the kneeling to crawl just a bit closer, back between David's legs. Something about it reminds David of those younger years, crouching beneath trees in the evenings and kissing sweethearts you don't want to forget. But it's a lot more real this time. And this time, that's a good thing. "Marry me. 'Cause if we don't make it, I'm gonna die yours. And if we do— I wanna stay yours."There's a long pause. David's eyes give Alessandro a long enough answer to keep him smiling, and when David finally breaks their gaze to look at their hands, he closes his eyes to breathe in."You mean it.""Only thing I might ever mean again.""Yes.""Yes?""I will."Alessandro makes the push between their limbs to kiss him. It's fierce, and whole, and feels like fifty years of practice for the one that matters. David's head knocks against the tree trunk, and he scrunches his nose for just a moment before he wraps his arms around Alessandro, hand back in his hair and over his back. Alessandro struggles to get his arms around David and the tree, so David leans forward, and Alessandro grins against his mouth. David can feel Alessandro turn them, like he's taking him away from the group, or maybe he's trying to swing him, sway him, something bursting with happiness in absolute darkness. It feels— right. Proper, perfect. As it should be. As Alessandro should be. As David should be. Like the darkness and despair can be conquered, just by a kiss.Whenever David moves against him, changing how they kiss, how he wants to hold Alessandro, he's given little air. He only breaks Alessandro apart from him with a physical pull back to breathe, and he watches his wild grin with near-reverence."You don't have a ring, do you," David asks, with the answer already told in Alessandro's beautiful laugh."Maybe I can grab one somewhere.""You're going to piss one of those monsters off doing that.""So long as they're pissed at me and not you," Alessandro winks, and kisses him again, like a husband would.