the city on the edge of forever

He had found the package while sorting through presents of the right size, shape and weight to be either a packet or carton of cigarettes. It had been long, narrow, and relatively lightweight, richly wrapped in black paper with a slightly velveteen feel to it and a dark red (sanguine was the color Bert's mind supplied) ribbon. Thinking it was much too nicely wrapped to be one of the useful presents, he opened it, taking great care not to tear the paper, which would've been re-used back at home and was really too pretty for kindling, and drew out a long, black box. He lifted the lid and sighed a sigh of sad dismay: no cigarettes, not even a nip of bourbon, but a fairy-doll dressed in swathes of sparkling lace, her porcelain starkly white against the box's dark satin lining.

He set the box down, glanced around the Hub as if a child in need of a thing like this might suddenly appear, and then set it in the pile of other unclaimed presents situated on the side of the tree closest to the large encampment.

Later on, when they came that night, Bert would not even make the connection, not until he managed to pull away and look into those lovely, hungry glass eyes.

- - -

Cuthbert wakes up with a start from one of those terrible jolting dreams, which wouldn't be so bad if he wasn't sandwiched in one of the larger yurts, sleeping practically puppy-pile with the others partly on the pretense of keeping warm. The bad dreams were the other reason-- somehow, sleeping in a tent, cooking over a fire, and the utter exhaustion from the first few days of the blizzard have stirred something in his brain he's done a fair job of burying since he got here, and he didn't catch a wink the first night he tried to stay in his own pup tent. Having people around helps, and the body heat doesn't hurt, either, so that's where he is when he awakens tonight-- wedged in a Bert-shaped slice of the yurt, so tightly that it takes him a good five minutes to get to the exit as he's strategically stepping on blanket-covered floor and not bodies.

The dream was an ugly one, and it calls for his last cigarette.

He finds a stump by one of the low-burning fires and huddles close to the embers, first warming his hands, then lighting the tip of his final coffin-nail. Once it's propped on his lip, he guards it against the wind, inhaling deeply until he's sure it's caught.

He smokes and quietly contemplates the slow-motion effect in his dream, how it was a flawless recollection of the actual moment: his finger on the trigger, realizing even as the spring inside his pistol compacts that it is not one of Grissom's men at all but Alain. In Bert's dream, though, Alain doesn't go down; he takes every bullet and laughs as he takes them, laughs deliriously and points at Cuthbert, an unrelenting, accusatory finger that trembles realistically with each bullet that wracks his body.

He finishes the smoke-- which was meant to take his mind off the dream, and ended up only serving as a kind of crutch while he replayed it-- and stands up to head back inside, grateful to be around people even if he's wide awake to hear every rustle and snore. When he stands, he sees someone way across the Hub, walking toward him. There's a fierce wind, then, and Bert tugs his hood up and leans into it, but the figure doesn't flinch, doesn't even slow down. After a moment, he sees that the figure is female, and dressed-- that's a generous term-- in a gossamer-fine, lacy gown that leaves little even for Bert's ample imagination. He should be thinking that she's cold, wondering who she is-- there ought to be a thousand warning bells going off in his head, right now, but none of them are. All he is noticing is the way she's looking at him like he's the only man in the world-- and, considering he is actually the only one stupid enough to be outside in these cut-throat winds, it makes the whole scenario almost believable.

"Excuse me," he says mildly, stupidly, once she's close enough to hear him. She puts a finger up to her lips and then, once she's standing toe-to-toe with him, she presses the finger to his. Even in the ridiculous furry parka he's wearing, he can feel all of her soft, cold curves pressed up against him; she moves his hands to her hips, where his fingers-- which moments ago he would've described as freezing-- seem to burn her skin like a brand.

"All apologies," he tries again, about to ask her tenderly who she is and if she needs his coat, his blanket, his tent, his fire, or if a more physically exerting method of heat-production might not be in order, but the words die on his lips, and then she's kissing him, deep and slow and so, so cold.

[ GP/EP! Cuthbert usually has questionable taste in women but this is ridiculous. Please find him either getting hot? and heavy with the evil warmth-stealing fairy wench or as a passed out, slightly blue and non-responsive Bertsicle on the ground in the aftermath. xD Also feel free to top level, finding your character in the same predicament (there are multiple fairies but Bert, being the romantic that he is, only has eyes for his own ethereal man-eater)!]