However much of him she can see in the darkness, now there's a smile appearing on his face that's brighter and fonder than any other expression he's had since they'd met. "Alice is everything," he says simply. "My face was her first vision when she woke up after being turned."
He's silent for a few moments, wrestling the waves of his own desolation at being separated from her, at not knowing she's safe. "She's got no memory of being human, none at all. But we know a little." His voice goes flatter, more like that militaristic lecture. "She had visions as a human. Got put away for it. Insane asylum, sometime before she was turned in 1920." He glances up at her, tense anger in the lines of his shoulders. "They put her in there, and they put up a stone in the graveyard, with the same date."
He has to stop, or risk breaking something. Deep breathing doesn't work, it never has. He closes his eyes, brings her face to mind, her smile, the way her hair feathers across her forehead when they run, her golden eyes, the way she fits against him. His Alice. She's alive, she must be. She must be.
To her credit, Natasha doesn't move, she lets him reach the point he needs to reach, to calm down and start speaking again. "Alice saw me, and I kept her waiting almost thirty years before I finally showed up," he says at last, and now that little smile is back, and growing. "Meeting her that day, I felt hope for the first time in a century."
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He's silent for a few moments, wrestling the waves of his own desolation at being separated from her, at not knowing she's safe. "She's got no memory of being human, none at all. But we know a little." His voice goes flatter, more like that militaristic lecture. "She had visions as a human. Got put away for it. Insane asylum, sometime before she was turned in 1920." He glances up at her, tense anger in the lines of his shoulders. "They put her in there, and they put up a stone in the graveyard, with the same date."
He has to stop, or risk breaking something. Deep breathing doesn't work, it never has. He closes his eyes, brings her face to mind, her smile, the way her hair feathers across her forehead when they run, her golden eyes, the way she fits against him. His Alice. She's alive, she must be. She must be.
To her credit, Natasha doesn't move, she lets him reach the point he needs to reach, to calm down and start speaking again. "Alice saw me, and I kept her waiting almost thirty years before I finally showed up," he says at last, and now that little smile is back, and growing. "Meeting her that day, I felt hope for the first time in a century."