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[assassinwithahairpin]

It was late, which was not uncommon for Billy Rocks, when he came home from his shift. He was dog tired and drifting, which was also not uncommon after such long shifts, and so when he rolled into the Bramford and found the elevator was, once again, out of order, he swore in a way that would have impressed some sailors.

He was getting spoiled in Darrow. But ten floors up with no elevator when he was exhausted seemed some sort of punishment for a crime he hadn't committed. Still, there was nothing for it. Who knew when they'd have the elevator back in commission?

He grumbled as he started into the stairwell, but the rhythm of climbing the stairs became a good cadence, the pulse of a living beat, the quiet methodical repetition as he wound up through the body of the building.

It was in this way that he saw him. Billy was blinking distraction and exhaustion out of his eye, and when he looked up from rubbing at them, clearing a flash of light out of the whole line of his vision, he saw him. A boy, about seventeen, dressed in all the neat trappings a boy would wear in the 1860s. Billy's breath caught in his chest. He had seen the boy in his dreams, his neatly combed brown hair and kind blue eyes, for years.

"Elias--"

The boy turned, and Billy flinched on the stairs. There was the sign where the bullet had left his body, on that crisp winters morning, before snow had really come to the Pacific Northwest. Billy remembered holding Elias after he'd shot him, startled by this violence for a boy he cared about, for a boy he hadn't wanted to hurt. He remembered that the life had already been out of his eyes--not like Elias's parents, who had bled and suffered because Billy needed that vindication in his rage.

He hurried up the stairs, chased after the apparition, calling his name again. Then he turned a corner on the stairwell, and Elias was gone as if he had never been there in the first place. Billy was left with a sick tangy smell of copper and sulfur in the air, the smell that had been on his clothes even after he'd washed them that night, before he ran.

He held it together the rest of the way up the stairs, all the way to the apartment. But it rushed at him as he stepped inside and locked the door. Sick hurried up his throat, and he ran for the kitchen sick, spitting and retching, running the tap to drown out the noise and wash it away.

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[goodnight_robicheaux]

"Billy?"

Mercy Beau beat Goodnight into the kitchen; Goodnight himself appeared a moment later in a flannel robe, frowning in concern when he saw Billy bent over the sink, still choking. He moved closer to smooth his hand over Billy's back.

"Breathe, mon cher. Take it easy," he murmured. When it seemed like Billy had finished, Goodnight took a glass down and filled it with water. He offered it to Billy when he started to stand straight again.

"You alright?"

[assassinwithahairpin]

Goodnight's voice came through a fog. Billy almost flinched, almost pulled--nothing. He didn't have his issued firearm or the one he normally had, any of his knives. He breathed with his head down on the edge of the sink, trying to banish the image of Elias in the stairwell, the back of his head, the blood.

He breathed. He tried to breathe.

"Tell me," he whispered. "Tell me about the owl. Goody?"

[goodnight_robicheaux]

"The ow-- Billy, what is this about?" Goodnight frowned. He had not spoken of the owl since Billy appeared in Darrow; he hadn't seen it since coming to Darrow. Something churned in his stomach at the very mention of it.

Why the hell would Billy bring it up now?

[assassinwithahairpin]

"I saw...something. In the stairs."

A ghost. A warning. Billy didn't know. A secret from the past that even, with everything Goodnight knew about him, Billy had never confessed to. He breathed, or tried to, but it was a watery hitch of a thing.

[goodnight_robicheaux]

"Mon cher," he murmured, moving close to try to coax Billy to look at him.

"Hey, look at me." He stroked Billy's cheek, full of concern as he looked him over. "What did you see?"

[assassinwithahairpin]

Billy straightened, finally. He turned and leaned against the edge of the sink, pushing his fingers into his hair. The smell of sick was still in the air, even though he'd run the tap. He felt infinitely foolish, now that the moment had passed.

"A boy I used to know," he said. And then, with careful precision, "The master's son."

[goodnight_robicheaux]

Goodnight felt an uncomfortable twist in his gut. "Come on, cher. Let's get you cleaned up."

He caught Billy's hand once it was out of his hair and gently pulled him toward their bathroom. A hot shower would help, maybe, but more than that it gave Goodnight a bit of time to think and to process what Billy just told him.

"And you saw him just now? In what sort of state?"

[assassinwithahairpin]

"In the stairs," Billy confirmed, voice willowy and tight. He went with him toward the bathroom, and when they reached in, he peered around as if he expected to see him there, in the dark.

"He--he just watched me," Billy said quietly. "And then he walked away. I could see..."

He gestured at the back side of his head, an inarticulate terror of the piece that had been missing out of Elias's head. He leaned against the sink, worried he might be sick all over again as he thought about it now.

[goodnight_robicheaux]

As Billy spoke, Goodnight started to get him out of his uniform. Every touch was slow, tender, and measured: he didn't want to startle Billy any further.

"It's alright, cher," he murmured. He hated that Billy had seen that, hated that he could understand that terror. He kissed Billy's brow. "I've seen things like that, vivid and terrible. Let's get you cleaned up. C'mon, I'll join you."

[assassinwithahairpin]

The uniform came away in pieces, but it felt like shedding bits of his skin, somehow. Billy felt curiously vulnerable with every stitch taken off, which was not a new feeling per se, but it had been years since he'd felt vulnerable around Goodnight. It wasn't about him, exactly. It was just that he was there for Billy to feel vulnerable around.

"Feel an idiot," he murmured, reaching down to pull off his socks.

[goodnight_robicheaux]

"Did you ever let me feel like an idiot when I-- saw things?" He stroked back Billy's hair and kissed his brow. Once they were both undressed, he coaxed Billy into the shower.

Goodnight pulled the curtain shut and eased Billy under the hot water. He ran his hands gently over Billy's shoulders, his neck. "Deep, slow breaths, mon cher."

[assassinwithahairpin]

Billy would argue that there had been more than a few times that he'd been short and misunderstanding with Goodnight, that there had been more than a few times where he just couldn't handle the weight of Goodnight's problems. He was haunted too, but they were never like how Goodnight was.

Tonight, it felt a little more like that. He tried to breathe. He stood there, barely under the water even as Goodnight coaxed him, and felt sick.

[goodnight_robicheaux]

Goodnight carefully stroked his fingers through Billy's hair and smoothed his hands down his neck, over his shoulders.

"You're alright," he murmured. Having been where Billy was right now, Goodnight knew it didn't feel okay and felt like it would never be okay again. But Billy was strong man, stronger than him maybe. They'd get through this.

[assassinwithahairpin]

They stood silently for a moment. Billy felt fragile and shook apart. The sight of Elias in the stairs was still haunting him, even if the physical image of it was gone. He leaned in toward Goodnight.

Goodnight knew about the master and his wife, the liberation from his indenture, such as it was, being on the lam. He knew the story of Billy before he was Billy. And he knew there had been a son.

"Did I ever tell you," he asked softly, "about Elias?"