Ethan noticed something was wrong instantly, because one moment he was assisting a customer, and the next he was standing in an empty shop. As in, a completely empty shop. Nothing in there with him but a torn cardboard box and some loose wires hanging from the walls.
“Bugger,” he said.
Right then. Alternate universe, most likely.
He headed for the high school.
It was possible, of course, that Rupert wasn’t here, or that he was here, but not there. Or that in this world, vampires and demons didn’t exist at all. Who knew? In any case, it was a good starting place.
Everything seemed normal on the walk there, and, in fact, everything remained completely normal right up until the moment he walked into the library.
And Rupert punched him hard enough to knock him out cold.
***
Rupert told himself that there was nothing to worry about the entire walk from the high school to the shop. Eyghon was gone, and Ethan would be fine, just as he, himself, was.
But when he rounded the final corner onto Revello Drive, all those assurances collapsed in a heap of nothing, and he found out that there was nothing in the world--not vampires or demons or all the evil the Hellmouth had to offer--more terrifying than an ambulance parked in front of the building you know someone you love is inside of.
He broke into a jog, and reached the ambulance just as the EMTs brought out the stretcher.
A police officer caught him and gently pushed him back.
“I’m sorry, sir, you need to step back--”
Ethan. God. Ethan. Pale and motionless.
“He’s, that’s--”
“You know him?”
“My partner,” he said, “Lover. Please, what’s--”
And suddenly the cop was passing him over to one of the EMTs, and they were loading Ethan into the ambulance, and firing a thousand rapid questions at him, and he couldn’t think enough to answer any of them, couldn’t stop struggling just to get a glimpse of him--
Couldn’t do anything until they let him climb in the ambulance and take Ethan’s still hand in his own and thank god that at least it was warm.
***
He woke, and his head was throbbing and... he was apparently tied to a chair. This was not a good thing. He opened his eyes and found Rupert standing a few feet away, looking quite hostile.
Rupert’s scowl deepened.
“I told you to leave town.”
His head throbbed a little more, and he tasted blood.
“Look, Rupert. There’s a bit of a mix-up here.”
And Rupert lunged forward and hit him *again.* Not as hard this time, but he still saw stars.
“I am sick and tired of your games, Ethan. Whatever you’re trying to pull, here, I’m not interested, and my patience right now is very, very short.”
Ethan decided that pointing out that he couldn’t very well leave while tied to a chair was not a good idea at the moment.
“Ow,” he said, because it was the foremost thought in his mind at the moment. He was still trying to work out what exactly he could say without inspiring the wrath of Ripper when a new--well, no, not new, actually--voice spoke from back toward the stacks.
“Actually, he’s not playing anything, Ripper.”
Rupert’s eyes focused on something behind Ethan, and his fists clenched.
“What the hell is this?” he said.
Ethan craned his head over his shoulder to get a glimpse of, well, himself, and said, “I, for one, would love to be enlightened. Preferably without the rather nonconsensual bondage.”
“Shut up,” Rupert said.
***
Buffy froze in the door of the hospital room, suddenly uncertain. A machine, beeping steadily, an IV dripping, sterile white sheets. Giles, sitting in the midst of all this, clasping Ethan’s hand in both his own, bowed over the bed, not wearing his glasses, eyes clenched shut.
“Giles?”
He sat up and shot a look over at her. His eyes tinged with red. Her heart beat a little faster.
“Is he--”
It seemed strange that when Giles spoke, after one small, polite sniff, he sounded completely normal.
“They don’t know. It’s... it’s some kind of coma.” He looked to his lover’s still face, and said, “I suspect it’s mystical in nature, but... this isn’t anything like what--” His voice caught for a moment. “What Eyghon might do. I’m... I don’t know where to start.”
She went to him, then. Got her first good look at Ethan.
“They say he’s dying,” Giles said, softly.
“Oh, god,” she said.
“I don’t want to leave him.”
“Don’t. You don’t have to. I’ll... I’ll get Willow on it. And, and, I’ll look around the shop.”
Her mind was still reeling.
”Thank you,” he said, and the fact that he didn’t even protest worried her even more.
“We’ll fix this,” she said, and only then did she realize she believed it. They would fix this. They had to. They always did.
They weren’t going to lose one of their own.
***
Ethan’s neck ached in this position, but he couldn’t quite look away as his presumably-local, short-haired self swaggered down the stairs, grinning that grin that always made his Rupert give him one of those concerned looks when he used it. The local Rupert stalked across the room and the two met at the bottom of the stairs with a practically tangible crackle of tension.
Unsurprisingly, at this point, Rupert hit him. The other him, that is. That Ethan stumbled back against the stair rail, but caught himself and just laughed. Rupert grabbed his shirt and drew his fist back.
“You did this, Ripper,” the other Ethan said, and Rupert’s arm relaxed a bit. Ethan continued, “Well, of course, I set it up, but you... you were the catalyst.”
And even from across the room, Ethan could see that Rupert was intrigued in spite of himself, and the other Ethan saw it too, and continued.
“All you had to do, Rupert, was wonder. Just for a moment.”
Rupert’s fist clenched again, and the other Ethan said, quickly, “Wonder what might have been.” Then he nodded towards Ethan. “He’s it.”
There was a moment of silence as Rupert glanced over at him.
“So you wondered,” the other Ethan said, “I’m touched.”
And it was said with sarcasm, but it was hard to miss the flicker of real feeling behind it. Then, he suddenly shoved Rupert back and made a break for the stacks. Rupert let him go, and turned his attention to Ethan.
***
Rupert set aside the book, his throat aching from reading aloud.
It had been several hours and the hospital room was quiet and the world seemed empty, abandoned. He watched Ethan’s chest rise and fall, and hunger hit him in a dizzy rush. Didn’t know what time it was, only that it was getting late in the day.
He was a man of action. Needed to do something. Even if all he was doing was keeping this constant vigil.
But maybe that wasn’t really the best thing to do, because in this stillness, his mind was drifting. Was beginning to wonder.
What the hell he would do if he lost Ethan. Who he would be without the man who’d defined him for over twenty years. What life would be like, waking up alone everyday, not having someone to talk to on quiet evenings, not having someone to lean on when things got insane, as they inevitably did.
Never again seeing Ethan’s lopsided grin, hearing his voice on the phone, feeling his body moving against his own.
Life without Ethan.
***
So this was Rupert without Ethan, then. Ethan really couldn’t say it was any kind of improvement. In fact, he was rather shocked by the thought, but it seemed he was maybe even a good influence on the man. Well, at least, his Rupert hit him a whole lot less.
Speaking of which...
Ethan jerked against the ropes binding him to the chair as Rupert stalked across the floor towards him.
“Look,” he said, because the ropes were well-tied (this Rupert had that much in common with his own...) “I can see that you’re angry, and I appreciate that, really, I do. I’m rather irked myself, to tell the truth. But hitting me is not going to accomplish anything.”
Rupert looked unimpressed, but he didn’t hit him.
He didn’t untie him, either, though.
“What do you know?” he asked, as though expecting Ethan to reveal the whole evil plot.
“Nothing.”
Rupert got that I-feel-violence-coming-on look in his eyes, so Ethan quickly amended, “Nothing much more than you do. I was in my shop one moment, and the next, the shop was empty, of everything. I assumed it was some sort of spell or alternate universe, and I came here, to find you. End of story.”
“I’m disinclined to believe you.” Rupert said. Then added, “And aren’t you rather old for that kind of hair?”
“You know,” he said, in spite of the constant threat of punching, “My Rupert is a great deal more tactful. And less inclined to hit people who’ve done nothing to deserve it. And, for the record, he’s the one who wants me to keep my hair long. Honestly, it’s a hassle.”
And Rupert actually looked taken aback. Then he went back to looking suspicious.
“Your Rupert.”
“My Rupert, yes. Mine, in all senses of the word, thank you very much.”
And finally, this Rupert seemed to be catching on.
“You... you really are...”
“From an alternate universe, I suspect. Yes. And it’s a much nicer universe. I’d really like to go back, as soon as possible, if that’s quite all right with you.”
Beneath the burn of sarcasm, though, the twinge of desperation was growing into a full-fledged throb, and the ropes were beginning to panic him, just a bit. He hated being tied down.
Well, except under certain circumstances. Which these were most certainly not.
Rupert, meanwhile, had sat down heavily in another chair.
“Would you mind terribly much untying me? This isn’t exactly comfortable.”
Rupert just said, “Hmm?” and distractedly pulled off his glasses, and for a second, he was the man Ethan knew. It hurt to see.
It was also the last straw.
“Damn it, Rupert. Untie me right the hell now. Red light, full stop, I don’t give a flying fuck what happened between you two, it has nothing to do with me, and I want to get out of here.”
And Rupert blinked, and then stood up and untied him. He even said “sorry.”
Ethan rubbed his wrists and shook the feeling back into his hands. For a moment, they stood, facing each other. Rupert looked... fascinated.
“I-- I lost him... you... twenty years ago.”
“Not thoroughly enough, it would seem,” Ethan said.
***
“Anything?”
Giles looked so hopeful, Willow could hardly bear to shake her head.
“Nothing. The report says he just collapsed, and there’s a whole bunch of stuff on mystical comas, but... I dunno. Nothing so far has really sounded right.”
Giles also looked tired.
“Have you eaten anything?”
It was hard to talk like this, with Ethan all unconscious right there like that. Giles shook his head. “No, not really.”
“You should, Giles,” she said, hurting for him.
“I-- I can eat later,” he said.
“When he’s better,” she said.
Giles didn’t meet her eyes.
“Yes. Of course.”
Willow’s heart sank.
“How... how bad?”
Giles crossed his arms, almost hugging himself. He shrugged slightly.
“He’s... getting worse.”
***
The bad part of town was still in the same place, so it was easy for Ethan to find that, and get what he needed. The locator spell, however, took far longer than necessary. As Ethan was walking up to the old motel, he was still muttering, “I know where *I* am, for god’s sake...”
He was quite thoroughly angry by the time he reached the proper door. He didn’t bother to knock. Said a quick chant, sketched a few runes and the door opened on its own.
And then he discovered that *that* smirk of his really *was* exceedingly annoying.
He didn’t waste time. He kicked the door shut behind himself and trained the gun on his smirking doppleganger.
“Reverse it.”
His counterpart laughed, and said, “My, aren’t we fierce?” and Ethan began to understand why this universe’s Rupert was so prone to hitting him.
The other Ethan looked thoughtful for a moment, and added, “And the royal ‘we’ works very well in this scenario, now doesn’t it?”
And, much as he hated to admit it, even to himself, Ethan had just had that thought. Which was beside the point.
“Reverse it,” he repeated.
This Ethan was extremely unconcerned in the face of firearms, and that made Ethan think that he faced them on a regular basis, but he couldn’t really bring himself to care. The other Ethan smiled.
“Oh, but you could have gone home this whole time,” he said, with a hint of singsong in his voice. “Just click your heels together and--”
Oh for god’s sake. Ethan really wasn’t sure whether he should shoot the other Ethan, or just shoot himself. Or both of them.
“Rupert was right,” he said, more to himself than anyone else, “I am a sadist.”
“Although, one might wonder if this technically qualifies as masochism. If one happened to be feeling metaphysical.”
“Not particularly, at the moment.” His arm was getting a bit tired from gripping the gun so tightly. He really disliked weapons. “Send me back, or I’ll be forced to wonder if this technically qualifies as suicide.”
“Oh, come now. Is the thought of a bit of minor humiliation really all that bad?”
The other Ethan was edging towards the back window. Ethan shook his head and glared a little more as he moved to maneuver them until his counterpart was trapped against the wall without access to either exit. So, this was why Rupert tied him up.
“I’m not playing your games. Not jumping through your hoops. Unsurprisingly, I know you. And I won’t do it.”
“We’re not the same man,” the other Ethan said, and for the first time, looked earnest.
“No,” Ethan said, “But I used to be you, and I remember.”
“In fact,” the other Ethan continued, as though he hadn’t spoken, “You sound a lot like Rupert.”
“Happens, when you spend your entire life with someone. Stop stalling.”
And maybe he was kind of a sadist, because he enjoyed the flicker of emotion that crossed the other man’s face at that comment.
“Well, I suppose it all depends on how badly you want it,” the other Ethan said.
“Badly enough to make sure this never happens again.” Then he smiled as a thought hit him. “And since you’ve already given me means to undo it myself, I suppose I could just... kill you now, couldn’t I?”
A flicker of doubt, and then: “Er. Excellent point.”
***
Ethan woke up in a hospital bed, and was convinced that his counterpart had shipped him off to another, even less pleasant reality. Which really, now that he was thinking about it, would have been a very good idea.
He groaned.
But then someone was gripping his hand, and Rupert’s voice was saying, “Ethan!”
That was much more like it. He risked opening his eyes.
“Why am I *here*?” he said.
Rupert didn’t answer, just kissed him, desperate and clumsy, one hand under his head, digging into his hair. Ethan decided answers could wait a while.
“What happened?” Rupert said, barely pulling away enough to speak, half-sprawled across the bed with him.
“I asked first,” Ethan said. His voice, though, came out hazy and dreamy. He rubbed Rupert’s back and pulled him closer, loving his weight and warmth.
“You collapsed, this morning.”
“Ah,” Ethan said.
“You were... we were losing you.”
That bastard.
“I should have killed him,” Ethan growled.
“Who?” Rupert said, pulling back a bit in a way that suggested he was ready to go finish the job for him.
“Never mind, love. He’s inaccessible.”
Rupert looked down at him quizzically, and he felt a rush of loving affection, and grinned sappily.
“Alternate universe,” he said. “Get back down here.”
Rupert seemed to debate whether to accept that or not. Then, apparently, he decided he would, and he pulled himself the rest of the way onto the bed and settled alongside Ethan, resting his chin in the crook of Ethan’s neck.
They were quiet for a few minutes, both of them no doubt feeling the exhaustion of the day catching up to them.
Then Ethan turned his head towards Rupert, nuzzled his fluffy bangs.
“Love you,” Ethan said.
Rupert clutched him tighter, buried his face against his neck. He didn’t answer in kind, and it wasn’t until Ethan felt him shudder, felt a tear drop fall on his throat, that he understood why. He snuggled closer, and couldn’t help but think it:
There was no place like home.
***
Somewhere in different dimension, Rupert Giles sat down at his desk with a glass of scotch and wondered again what might have been, in another life.
The End