Razzle (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} lady_razzle) wrote in ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small} capricornkiller,@ 2005-04-06 17:05:00 |
|
| Current mood: |  cold |
Heartless Chapter 7
This chapter by: lady_razzle
Previous chapters by lady_razzle and mysse
Rating: NC-17 overall
Pairing: Viggo Mortensen/Orlando Bloom, VM/CP
Content Warnings: Lord, where to start. Alternate Universe, angst, violence, sexual abuse (NO RAPE) - you're going to have to trust us.
Disclaimer: This is fiction. F-I-C-T-I-O-N. Got it? Good.
Summary: The trail of a ruthless serial killer leads Detective Viggo Mortensen to London.
New Heartless Artwork by lady_razzle
Dedicated to and betad by the wonderful claireyfairy1
Previous chapters:
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Viggo wasn’t so apprehensive when he entered the house this time. This time he was entirely comfortable about what he would find and it was an excruciating sort of fury that accompanied him. He was gradually turning the anger he felt at himself towards the architect of his unhappy situation.
There was, unsurprisingly, nothing new to report about the house. It was an ordinary townhouse, empty for some years and falling into disrepair, scheduled for renovation in the near future as part of a citywide rejuvenation and preservation project. The past, it seemed, was in danger of being lost.
In the meantime, it should have been resting empty and nobody had had much of a reason to believe otherwise, until Orlando had pointed them there. Viggo was fairly confident that, had they needed to find it under their own steam, Orlando would still be there. Knowing that Orlando was, once again, removed to an undisclosed location, Viggo tried not to think how unlikely it would be that he would escape, or be found, without some sort of miracle.
But Viggo couldn’t convince himself to believe in miracles, not even for the man he had so recently fallen for.
The kitchen was the only room on the upper floor that had anything in it, and that was only an extremely old range. The cellar was where all the action was. The cuff that had shackled Orlando to the wall, Viggo shivered to recall, had been extracted carefully and removed to a place where all the tests that could be devised had come back inconclusive.
Despite Ian’s insistence that Viggo should take a patrol with him, Viggo had demanded that they not accompany him on his every step. He entered the basement alone.
Alone in the darkened room, he switched on his hand torch to illuminate it as little as he could, maintaining the atmosphere as the killer would see it. He walked to the hole in the wall; the inside of the wound a paler brick that was reflected in the dust that lay on the ground, a golden cloud where Orlando once rested.
Viggo slid his fingertips down the wall, around the hole in the brick, causing a few more grains to loose their grip on the edges and join their brothers on the uneven stone floor. He breathed out carefully as he descended to kneel on the ground and turned to lean against the wall, sinking to sit, and letting his head fall back against the cold gritty surface. He lifted a hand to beside his head, drawing his fingers up over the rough bricks until they found the hole. He left his hand hanging there, just where Orlando’s would have lain.
He checked his fury, breathing deeply and trying not to let his blood boil to think of Orlando restrained in this way. He felt a jolt of disgust, perhaps fear, high in his chest, to think of the terror Orlando must have felt. No wonder he let you touch him, a treacherous voice told Viggo, after such acute solitude.
Viggo let his eyes open slowly to sweep the dark room, searching for shadows and wondering where the killer would have been best placed to watch him. Viggo didn’t want to turn around, didn’t want to assume the position of the killer. He was too afraid that, in gaining such an insight, he would allow himself to be consumed by the evil in the perpetrator’s mind. If he understood, even for a moment, how anyone could tear the beating heart out of an innocent chest, or touch and mortify such angels as his own Orlando, Viggo might never recover.
He couldn’t dream of hurting Orlando, or anyone like him, lest it poison his spirit.
Nevertheless, he pulled his hand down from where it had been pressed against the wall, becoming numb without blood and uneven with the print of the bricks, and put it on the floor with the other, ready to push himself to his feet.
Before he could complete the movement, the door opened and the light pouring through blinded him. He lifted his hand to block it out and hissed at the pain. When he was used to it, he squinted up into the light, where a silhouetted figure illustrated Viggo’s, and hence Orlando’s, powerlessness.
“Sir,” the constable said again.
“What is it?” Viggo asked, his voice sounding strange even to himself.
The constable, whose surname, Viggo recalled, was Gee, cleared his throat.
“The gaffer radioed in, wants you to give him a call.”
Viggo nodded and pushed himself to his feet at last, shaking his head squeezing the bridge of his nose to try and clear the cloud from his mind. PC Gee left before him and, as he reached the top of the stairs leading out of the basement, Viggo turned and looked back into the room. This place was cold and felt like evil. It made his stomach turn and he balled his fists to think of Orlando, naked and alone, in such a place as this, right now.
He hoped they knocked the place down.
#
“Yeah,” Viggo said in a needlessly short tone of voice.
“Viggo.” Ian’s voice came crackling through the radio. “I was going through the MPIs. I think you ought to go and talk to this Dominic Monaghan. There are some inconsistencies.”
Viggo huffed and dropped his head down between his shoulders.
“Viggo? You there?”
#
“Dominic Monaghan?”
The figure in the doorway nodded nervously. He had taken a while to answer the door when Viggo had knocked, during which Viggo had steeled himself to concentrate very hard on the job, not on Orlando’s well-being, or indeed, his own knowledge of the man. This was well beyond personal now, but he couldn’t let the witnesses know that.
He introduced himself, explained that there were a few details missing from his original interview and was admitted, along with Gee, who was stuck to his shoulder. They sat on a threadbare sofa and declined offers of refreshments. Dominic sat opposite them in an equally ancient lazyboy, staring at his hands.
“He’s dead, isn’t he?”
Viggo blinked at the unexpected question. Before he could form an answer, Dom went on.
“He’s my best friend. I shouldn’t have let him walk home alone. I can’t save him now, though, can I? Is he dead?”
Viggo shuffled forward on his seat and shook his head.
“Dominic, he is not dead.”
PC Gee looked at Viggo in shock. Dominic looked at Viggo in hope. Viggo nodded definitively.
“This guy has been going after Orlando, and he would have gotten him, no matter what. You leaving Orlando alone made no difference. And he didn’t do all this just to kill Orlando now. I’m certain Orlando is alive.”
“Your colleagues don’t share your confidence,” Dominic replied, although his voice was less desperate than before. “That Bean bloke didn’t think there was much hope for him.”
“They don’t know him like I do.”
Whether Viggo was referring to Orlando or the Killer was academic. He didn’t explain himself, just pulled his notebook out of his pocket and moved on. He flicked to the last page that had writing on and looked at the notes he had made during from his conversation with Ian.
“You were in a play with Orlando, yes?” he asked, before that train of thought could be pursued. Dominic nodded. “He was abducted on the last night, correct? It might not have been a coincidence. Did Orlando mentioning seeing anything odd? Maybe he received some strange fanmail?”
Dominic cleared his throat again. “Orlando was swamped. He, um...” Dominic paused as he tried to phrase something delicately. He gave up. “He gets his kit off in the play. He was comfortable with it, as he should be,” Dominic added. “No reason not to be, he has a terrific body.”
Viggo restrained himself from saying that he knew.
“He got a lot of mail, from men and women, both approving and disapproving. Flowers, too.” He paused. “You know he’s gay, right?” Viggo nodded slowly, not trusting himself to answer vocally. “But it wasn’t a worry, particularly,” Dominic went on. “He didn’t get anything scary, he would have shown me.”
Viggo nodded, flicking through pages in his notebook as he remembered what he wanted to ask, making notes as Dominic answered his questions. The obviously tired and emotional man had very little of import to add to Viggo’s investigation. Viggo was quietly getting frustrated, wondering why Ian would send him on a wild goose chase and irritated that he was being distracted from his primary purpose.
Viggo looked down at his page again and knotted his brow. “You spoke to Sean?”
“Who?” Dominic replied.
“Sean Bean. You spoke to a man called Bean after Orlando went missing?”
Dominic nodded slowly, and Viggo turned to PC Gee.
“His name isn’t on the interview statement,” Viggo was told.
“He came after,” Dominic interjected. “A few days. He asked me about Orlando, what he was like, what kind of relationship we had, even asked about his social life. I couldn’t much answer that one. He was on his own, though.”
“Okay,” Viggo said, clicking his pen in and shoving his notebook back into his pocket. “I think we’re done here,” Viggo added. He stood sharply, reaching out to shake Dominic’s hand before walking to the door, Gee following in his determined wake.
PC Gee had thanked him and had him sign a sheet saying to prove he’d been present for the interview. There wasn’t one for Bean’s visit. Gee found Viggo pacing beside the car, talking on his mobile with forced calm. Viggo sighed, thanked the person on the phone in a petulant tone and hung up. He looked up at Gee, who was watching him with anxious curiosity.
“You know where Peyton Drive is?” Viggo asked sharply.
“Near the station? Sure. I live round there, half the Met do.”
“Good,” Viggo replied. “Take me there.”
~*~
“Why are we here?” Gee asked carefully as he pulled up outside the house Viggo indicated.
“Existentially?” Viggo asked as he climbed out of the car. Gee got out the other side and Viggo glanced over at him. “It’s Bean’s house. You’d better come with me, make sure I’m behaving myself, right?”
“I’ll catch up with you,” Gee said, and Viggo couldn’t be bothered arguing.
Bean’s terraced house was, from the outside at least, indistinguishable from its neighbours. There was no room for a storm cellar or handy outhouse in which one could stash a victim, but then Viggo hadn’t expected there to be. This place was far too personal and public for him to bring Orlando to and, besides, Sean didn’t shit on his doorstep. He was much too clever for that. Or he had been, in the past.
Viggo pushed at the windows, with no real idea what he’d do if he got through them, or what he hoped to find if he did make it inside. Even if he did get inside and find something relevant, his complete lack of official business or permission would make anything he found inadmissible. He had decided however, that the repercussions were more than worth it if it meant he could find Orlando.
But the windows weren’t moving and he wasn’t getting anywhere. A security light was blinking high up on the wall in the darkened front room. Viggo slammed his hand into the window frame and his phone rang. He pulled it out and answered it petulantly.
“Get back in the car.”
Ian’s voice was shaking with anger. Viggo didn’t bother to argue. He glanced towards the car. “Ian, let me go in here. He could have left something...”
Ian interrupted. “Why in the name of fuck would you turn on Sean like this? Are you out of your mind?”
“Ian,” Viggo said angrily, taking to pacing the pavement in front of Sean’s white house. “He went back and talked to Dominic- the last person to see Orlando before his abduction - without telling anyone. The minute I leave them alone, he disappears. Fuck, he even called Orlando special. It just didn’t mean anything to me when he said it. He has Orlando and I have to find them.”
There was a pause. “Sean Bean is one of my finest officers. He could be dead for all you know, protecting a man you saw fit to fuck when you should have been taking care of him. I’m not having it, you little shit.”
“Ian, come on,” Viggo argued. “Don’t fuck with me now.”
“I’m not,” Ian said levelly. I’m taking you off the case. Now get in the fucking car.”
“Bullshit, Ian, you can’t do this.”
Without waiting for an answer, Viggo hung up. He strode over to the car, where PC Gee was standing on the other side, door open and presumably ready to run if Viggo took a shot at him. Viggo didn’t rebuke him, verbally or physically. He knew he was over the line and he couldn’t really judge the man for squealing. He settled for clenching and unclenching his fists.
“I’m not going with you,” he said, matter-of-factly. “I’m not going to hurt you, but this is more important.”
The other man opened his mouth, but whether he was going to argue or agree was never to be known, as they both turned to the sound of a second panda turning around the end of the street.
For one, bizarre moment, Viggo wished he had his gun. And that was why he didn’t run. Although the impulse to draw on his colleagues had only lasted a moment, it shocked him. The little sanity he hadn’t forfeited reined him in. He closed his eyes and let his head fall between his shoulders.
“Okay,” he said quietly, a tiredness settling heavily on his shoulders as he tried to remember when he’d started to fall apart. Tears pricked his eyes and he sighed.
“Okay, Okay.”
#
Orlando woke with a jolt. It took him just a few moments to realise his situation. He took in his hands, tugging at the handcuffs that were tight around his wrists. The darkness surrounding him wasn’t as imposing as his previous prison and he could see the walls. He looked up past his shackled wrist, past the metal bars through which his shackles were wound, and up to the alcove beyond.
His mouth dropped open around a gasp of horror and he craned his head around, swivelling his body the full ninety degrees it would move so he could see the rest of his jail.
“Oh my god,” he said underneath his breath. “Oh, fuck.” He swallowed hard, tears of panic stinging his eyes as he turned back to his restraints and started to tug at the metal, twisting his hands to reach the cuff with his opposite hand.
These were real, solid handcuffs, forced in as tightly as they would go without cutting him, and they bit into his skin as he moved in them. He stopped his frenetic struggling after a few panicked minutes and slumped to the floor in abject misery.
Yet again his abductor’s cowardice had been perfectly illustrated by his method of subduing Orlando. The last thing Orlando could remember, as he sat on the cold stone ground and sobbed wretchedly, was a hand in the middle of his back and a cloth across his face. Whatever chloroform equivalent had been used had done its job and he hadn’t stirred in the least until now. Orlando would have appreciated the classic touch, had it happened in a play or a book, not to him, and not in his real and currently extremely miserable life.
His mind slid to Sean and he wondered if he had been abducted alongside him. “Sean?” he said, loud enough to be heard but without a lot of confidence. “Sean?”
Of course, there was no answer.
“Help!” Orlando cried instead, shouting up toward the small metal grill that seemed to be the source of the little light there was. “Help me! Viggo, help!”
“Viggo, help me!”
Orlando froze at the mocking, high pitched-echo coming from the darkness. “Quiet now, Sunshine.”
The owner of the voice followed it from the shadows, creeping around to stand in front of Orlando. The man sank to a squat, bringing their eyes level.
~*~
Patience, Sunshine, he’s coming.
~*~
TBC...
