The Only Son

Chapter XXIII

The wooden floors were covered in snow, the snow had splatteres of blood and in the center of it all, a tombstone.

A tombstone that made Alexander sink to his knees and falls against the wall. His breathing came back harsh and more labored.

The world was spinning and it felt as if air wasn't allowed in his lungs. Everything got worse when the crying started.

A child was crying so loudly that Alexander felt as if his eardrums were going to rip apart.

Karl was running around the house, the screaming of Alexander was getting louder and yet more quiet.

It was a few moments later that Karl did something completely irrational, but he hoped it would clear his mind. Stepping in front of the solid concrete wall, he reeled his head back and slammed it forward against the wall.

Falling onto his ass, Karl clutched his head groaning. He was definitely bleeding, blood was practically flowing out of the wound he created.

But there was only one thing he was focussed on, the screaming had silenced and instead Karl could faintly hear sniffles and labored breathing around the corner.

Standing up with wobbly legs, Karl tried desperately not to focuss on the amount of pain coming from his head.

He used the wall to balance himself as he walked down the short distance of the hall and turned the corner. Despite the amount of pain his head was in and how dizzy he was, he could clearly see the crumbled figure of Alexander on the floor.

"Alex! Alex!" Karl had moved so fast that he fell onto the floor right next to Alexander. He then desperately grabbed onto Alexander, craddling him and inspecting every inch of Alexanders face for an injury.

Only finding a pair of gorgeous, teary ruby eyes staring into his steel ones. Just like always they seemed to make time stop and freeze everything around them.

"Karl?"

"Yeah?"

"Can we leave this place?"

Karl nodded, he gently grabbed Alexander and slowly picked him up. It all became much clearer around him, despite Alexander clinging onto him like he was a lifeline.

"I'm sorry" Karl nearly didn't hear what Alexander whispered, Alexander didn't expect him to hear.

"You don't apologize for anything, what happened was an accident and neither of us... Neither of us could've known this would happen, I never blamed you for it"

Alexander hid his face in Karls shoulder as Karl took wobbly steps forward. Karl knew that it wasn't smart to do this while being injured, but he felt like he needed to carry Alexander.

"You should put the ring around his finger" Karl froze in his step and Alexander stilled in his arms.

"Yeah! You need to visit us after killing the witch!" In front of the two men stood Donna and Angie was in her arms, Angie then floated over to them and gave Alexander another Rose flask.

With that the two ladies returned to their workshop, tinkering away at their latest project. Donna smiled underneath her veil as the continued to sew the hat for little Karl.

In the meanwhile Karl and Alexander had made it outside of the mansion, sitting on the slowly decaying wood.

Quietly, Alexander took care of Karls head wound keeping his vamperic tendencies at bay.

"What happened?" Alexanders hands stilled and the small frown that was present on his face deepened.

"If you're talking about the house, I can't really explain it... Everything felt... The air felt so tight and closed off, I panicked and I started hearing things-"

"I got mad again" Alexander was interupted by Karl, who looked at the floor guilty.

"I broke Donnas furniture and hurt myself... I just... I..." Karl couldn't form a proper sentence, Alexander softly shushed him and continued to clean Karl up.

It was silent again, the two men didn't know what to talk about. The air felt awkward around them, but Karl decided that it was a good time to follow Donna's advice.

"Alexander?" Alexander hummed, making sure that Karl knew he was listening.

It was quiet, painfully quiet for several moments.

"We should head back to the factory" Karl hurriedly said, standing up and walking away from the Beneviento house, ashamed that he couldn't bring himself to ask Alexander the burning question.

Alexander could only watch Karl stumble away, muttering to himself and shaking his head, he felt conflicted as he watched the man he shared a bed with for many months act so odd.

Putting the dirty and bloody rag away, Alexander stood up and followed Karl in his tracks.

They soon came back to the factory, Karl being inside earlier and starting a screaming match with Ethan, who had been snooping around.

"Who the hell gave you the right to do that?!"

"I was just curious! Besides it's just a bunch of postcards!"

Walking into the room, Alexander noted that a few scraps and metal pieces were floating as Karl was ready to rip Ethan apart.

"What's happening?" Karl and Ethan turned to Alexander, Karl red in the face from anger whilst Ethan looked both confused and annoyed.

"Ethan was snooping through our stuff!"

"It's just a bunch of cards!" If Alexander didn't have a headache before he certainly did have one now.

Alexander sighed audibly, making both men shut up.

"Ethan, why did you snoop through our stuff?" Alexander interrogated the human male, who seemed pretty flustered at being caught snooping.

"I wanted to make sure you weren't planning on double crossing me, what's the deal with the cards anyway?"

The mutants looked at each other and without a word they agreed that it was fair that Ethan felt untrusting of them, considering what has happened to him in the past years.

"We don't see much of the outside, the postcards are our way of seeing what's out there now. The only other way we've seen the world is books with drawings" Ethan didn't quite know what to say as he looked at the cards that were now spread on the floor.

Hawaii. A Zoo. Paris. Museums and a variety of other places were noticable on the cards that covered the floor.

"Y'know, if this all ends well, these places are fairly easy to go to" Ethan said, trying to hint that he'd take them to places like Zoo's and museums without a problem.

"That is if your boulder punching friend will allow us that type of freedom"

"Don't worry, I'll cover for you, besides I think I might put a bullet in his head for what he did to Mia"