Work Text:
His father’s wind-up clock reads five-thirty and Will is drowning in his own skin.
The sheets are rank and soaked with sweat, but he doesn’t have the energy to rise and change them. Not even enough to shake the dust from the folded linens in the closet in the hall. His hand shaking, he wearily drags the bottle of water resting against him towards his mouth and gropes among the blankets for the bottle of Tylenol.
He pops another two pills and washes them down with a gulp of water, steadfastly ignoring his body’s instinctive panic as its already meager supply of oxygen is cut off. He swallows painfully, wriggles higher against the pillows propping him up, and takes a few more deep breaths.
He doesn’t know how much good it’s doing, but he’ll try anything at this point to stave off the delirium. He refuses to die like his father, barely conscious of what is happening to him; he needs to keep his mind.
He’d thought the virus would take him quick, like Caroline, and when he hadn’t gotten sick right away he’d assumed he was genetically immune. Turned out it just needed time, time to outrun his immune system, the way he’d trained it to do.
And now he’s out of time. Out of the antivirals that kept him mobile and fighting as the virus twisted and mutated inside of him, out of the oxygen tanks that allowed him to maintain some semblance of life as he dragged his aching body through the motions of finding a cure, still certain even now that he could do it, out of power, out of light, out of strength.
This is the hot zone; it’s anarchy out there, in spite of all the CDC’s efforts. Those who haven’t fled are turning on their fellows or forming small bands to fight off those who are. He can hear them, the gunfire, the distant shouts, the growl of engines roaring past oblivious to the architect of their destruction lying helpless in a pool of his own fluids just meters from them.
His eyes are gummy and he splashes some water on the edge of the sheet, stained with blood from his mouth and nose, before wiping them. The sun, just starting to sink to the horizon, casts a long beam of light across his bedside table, illuminating a small photograph, its edges curling. A photograph of himself, with an infant chimp curled against his chest, pressing its small pointed face into his sweater.
Will closes his eyes.
When he opens them, the sun has vanished, leaving behind the kind of darkness that seems unreal to one raised in the perpetual glow of electric lights. The moon is streaming through his open window and there is a chimp sitting in the branches of the tree outside.
For half an instant he thinks it’s Caesar, but the chimp shifts and he catches a glimpse of its face and body, narrow and lanky, nipples protruding slightly from beneath a thick layer of hair.
A female.
He shouldn’t, but he knows he’s dying. Doesn’t know how much time he has left. It makes him weak, makes him selfish. He raises a trembling hand. It might mean nothing to her, but it’s worth a shot.
Caesar, he signs.
Her eyes glint, but she doesn’t move.
Caesar, he signs again. Please.
She remains motionless, watching him.
His eyes burn and tighten and his chest seizes in protest. Before he can stop himself, he’s hacking, spitting blood on the coverlet as he tries desperately not to choke. Fighting back his breath, eyes streaming, he reaches out towards the window, palm up.
For several moments there’s nothing but the sound of his wheezing breaths, but then, delicate and rough at once, fingers sweep across his palm and she’s gone.
He’s focused inwards, bending concentration and willpower to the act of breathing. Inhale deep, absorb oxygen, exhale stale air. Such a simple and unconscious process, now an arduous task. His attention inside, he only opens his eyes when there’s a light thump on the hardwood floor of his bedroom.
Caesar’s standing over him, a shadow in the gloom. His posture is stiff and uncomfortable, but Will can still read him well enough and his face is tight with distress. Will smiles.
“Caesar,” he rasps. “It’s good to see you.”
Caesar flinches. I’m sorry, he signs.
“Why?”
Should have… Caesar looks away and his hands tremble. Should have come earlier.
“I understand. You have responsibilities. I wouldn’t push.”
Should have pushed! Caesar’s signing is becoming erratic and Will struggles to read it in the dim light. Will sick. Caesar did not know… His hands drop to his sides and a deep shudder wracks him.
“Well then, are we going to stand on ceremony?” Will’s stomach does an odd flip, remembering rejection and refusal, but opens his arms anyway, as best he can from a supine position. “Come here? Please?”
It’s a revolting offer in retrospect, asking him to approach the miasma of contagion, but Caesar’s eyes go wide and then he’s beside Will on the bed, arms around him. He’s taller and heavier than when they parted, but he buries his face against Will’s neck like he’s still the infant that Will cradled in his lap that first terrible night after he thought he’d lost everything.
Will rests his chin against the curve of Caesar’s head and that’s when he hears Caesar speak, low and guttural, the words halting but deliberate, learning.
“Missed you.”
“I missed you too.” He squeezes Caesar tighter. “I’m so proud of you.”
A deep, chuffing breath, “Not disappointed?”
“Never.” The weight of Caesar’s body is pressing on his chest, making it more difficult to breathe, and Will urges him to one side but clings on, reluctant to let go.
Caesar shifts over, freeing one of his hands and signs, Apes have new home. Clean water, dry place to sleep, plenty of food. His signing becomes more abrupt and rapid, embarrassed, Cornelia is pregnant.
Will laughs, a horrible, hacking sound, “That’s wonderful.”
Caesar’s hand tightens around the back of his neck, Caesar not always know what to do.
“You’ll learn. That’s what children do.”
Caesar not child.
“No,” says Will quietly. “No you’re not anymore.” He sighs. “You’re a leader now.” His energy is draining and he gropes unsuccessfully for one of Caesar’s hands. “Tell me, can a leader spend a final night with a foolish old man on his last legs?”
Tough, elongate fingers wind around his own, and the hand behind his neck pulls his head forward to press against a rough, wrinkled forehead, “Caesar will stay.”
“Thank you,” he sighs, their breath mingling. “Thank you.” Exhaustion drags at him and he closes his eyes, “It’ll be alright in the end.”
Caesar doesn’t reply, his fingers combing through the damp hair at Will’s nape as he sinks into endless dark.
-
“Child, child have patience and belief, for life is many days, and each present hour will pass away. Son, son you have been mad and drunken, furious and wild, filled with hatred and despair, and all the dark confusions of the soul—but so have we. You found the earth too great for your one life, you found your brain and sinew smaller than the hunger and desire that fed on them—but it has been this way with all men. You have stumbled on in darkness, you have been pulled in opposite directions, you have faltered, you have missed the way—but, child, this is the chronicle of the earth. And now, because you have known madness and despair, and because you will grow desperate again before you come to evening, we who have stormed the ramparts of the furious earth and been hurled back, we who have been maddened by the unknowable and bitter mystery of love, we who have hungered after fame and savored all of life, the tumult, pain, and frenzy, and now sit quietly by our windows watching all that henceforth never more shall touch us—we call upon you to take heart, for we can swear to you that these things pass.” – Thomas Wolfe