There Must Be Something More ( Bellroc x Jim Lake's older sister Iris Lake)

Ashes to Ashes, Stone to Stone

There was a price to pay, when you followed your higher calling.
Greatness, whether inborn or achieved or thrust upon, required sacrifice.
She'd waited for a message from Jim, waited until the boy himself came home. By then, he wasn't a boy anymore.
He confessed as if he'd sinned; perhaps against his own principles .

Ashes stained his face, and blood stained his adolescent hands.
He cried out, his voice scraped his throat. It bounced off the walls and rattled her soul.
Self-defense, Blinky had told him.
For the greater good.

His eyes were aged, now. Aged, and full of disgust, regret,sorrow.
He wanted this to not have been. Let it not be so, that this person, Changeling or no, had been slain by his hand .
He had wielded the weapon. It had done as weapons do. Cut deep, and carved a mortal wound into her stone .

The last thing she'd ever expected her brother to say to her ...had been, I love coffee. Never had such dark words as, I killed her, ever come to mind.
Jim ran for the door, gritting his teeth, tears in his eyes, wiping at the ashes on his jacket. She grabbed him and dragged him back.

She held onto him tightly. One way or another,she didn't want to lose him.
Gladys would disappear into thin air. A grave would be made, but Jim's innocence would lay in it.
" You avenged every victim she's killed or tortured before. You saved the lives of countless people who will never know the fate they were spared," she whispered as he clung to her, hiding his face.
" Toby. Toby , your best friend for life. He's home,and he's fine. That's only because of what you had to do. He would have done the same thing for you."

Jim sniffled, and looked up at her .
" I- I...'m just glad it wasn't him, then. He-he doesn't ha-have to know what, what this feels like. I'm not happy. J don't feel like this is some proud victory. But it was what I had to do. I did...I did the right thing. The right thing shouldn't feel so, so wrong, though."

" You wanna sleep here? You can bring your sleeping bag, and I'll let you have the bed."
" No no, it's fine. I'm fine. "
" Jim, you couldn't possibly be ' fine'. Stay here for one night."

He did stay, but he wouldn't take the bed. In the morning, he seemed okay, but they both thought about what had happened.
She wished he'd never have had to cross such a line, but there was no changing the past.
Her desire had gone from, I hope blood never stains that big sword, to:
May he not kill very many, or very often. Let it always be the last resort.