Finders, keepers, losers, weepers
The loser has to pay the score
~ "Finders Keepers, Losers Weepers", Elvis Presley
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"Do you have anymore information about them, or not?" Stefano shouted, waving the pistol in his face, furious that he'd just lost the only prism he had in the ocean below.
"You think I'd tell you? You can rot in hell first!" he told Stefano.
Stefano laughed sardonically, "You will tell me, my friend, believe me, you will tell me. You see, in time, even the strongest of men, weaken with the right kind of, uh, persuasion."
"What I want to know, is why you stole the prisms in the first place?"
"I have many reasons," Stefano tells him breathlessly, wiping the sweat from his forehead. "None of which, you have to know."
"You don't look very well, Stefan—"
"Shut up, Sergeant! Oh, or should I say, Lieutenant Brady? Of course, your reward for sending me to my death, but you see...the phoenix rose again," Stefano tells him, still holding the gun on him.
"But he can't forever..."
"We shall see about that, won't we? Now that you are on my side."
"What are you talking about? You're crazy!"
"Oh, yes, but we'll see about that too, because you are going to be with me, Roman. You, and your brother, who happens to be the one things that my lovely daughter Meagan seems to want. You see," Stefano said, swaying slightly on his feet, "you and I care about family. About love. You, and I, Roman. A family like yours...any man would want a family like yours. A wife like yours..."
John stood over the sink in the bathroom, running cold water over a washrag to wipe his face. The dreams were coming more frequently, and not always at night. Yesterday he had been bombarded with memories of Roman's life. His marriage to Marlena, when he had thought she was murdered, more memories of Eric and Sami's birth, and the first time Roman made love to Marlena. He didn't know how much more he could take. Marlena was begging him to go to the hospital, and have some scans done on his brain. She was worried that since she'd removed the chip they found in his neck, this had gotten progressively worse. Looking at himself in the mirror, he said, "Who the fuck am I?"
"The man that I love," Marlena said from the doorway. Walking into the bathroom, and smoothing her hand along his back, she leaned her chin on his shoulder, and looked at him in the mirror, saying, "The man that I will always love."
"You loved Roman, too. I remember," he whispered.
"I did, and then he died...and I met you."
"You thought I was Roman."
"I fell in love with you before I thought you were Roman, John," she told him. "Do you remember kissing me by the river?"
He smiled slightly, "I do."
"You were still John Black then...we thought you might be Stefano. As much as I wanted to loath you, I loved you," she said. "I was drawn to you from the beginning."
"Doc, these memories...they make me so confused. They make me feel like...like I am Roman," he whispered. "Do you know how confusing that is? My mind is telling me that I am Roman."
