I spent four days rereading this series (reading Oblivion for the first time), and I don't think I'm quite all right yet.

He comes in from the cold tired and aching, able to stand on his own two feet but drawn back into his mind. Lohan is thin-lipped beside him, side-eyeing everyone in the tent, hand ready to make for his gun at the slightest provocation- friends, these are friends, but Matt doesn't bother even looking at him, doesn't tell him to stand down. The World Army is sad and ragtag and on-edge and on-edge is how they have to be. They have the illusion of safety down here, but the enemy fort is just a short distance away, and any shadow could be a fly-soldier, any soldier could be a shape-changer. Lohan gets it, too, but that doesn't make him any happier to be here (Matt's not too happy with him, either, but he wearily puts it out of his mind).

He's barely felt the gentle warmth on his cheeks before he hears his name, and then there's Richard, stumbling over to him, grin splitting his face. Matt knew it was going to happen, knows every word that is to come in this conversation and the next, but he smiles nonetheless.

In a brief moment of confusion, embarrassment, neither of them know what to do once they've closed the gap between them, but then they both shrug it off and Matt holds him tightly, squeezes as if his life depends on it.

(Ha ha, part of him whispers, giggling manically)

He buries his nose in Richard's neck and breathes in, knowing it's the last time he'll do so, and smells sweat, oil, alcohol, the faint, dry wisp of cigarettes. He's never paid attention before, and knows it's not the man's usual scent, but it feels like home.

Too soon, he's drawn into discussion, pulling away from Richard. And there's Scarlett, hair short and not quite covering her scar, and he smiles at her, too. She smells roughly the same as Richard, but it's not the same. He doesn't linger in her embrace.

There's a lot to talk about and not a lot of time, and this army is irrelevant but he can't just ignore it.

He almost just wants this all to be over already, except that he knows what that entails, and his heart clenches uncomfortably at the thought.

-o-

He knows the decision the commander is going to make, and knows what he has to do about it. Arguing would only have made the man more sure of himself, so Matt makes no protest.

They march, and Richard is fuming beside him, armed and angry and probably calling Matt a dozen rude names in his head, but he's there, nonetheless. Right beside him, as he has been from the start.

Matt wants to reach out and touch him, gentle fingertips to his arm, and he wants to explain all of this. Why he's putting himself in danger with the others, instead of sitting somewhere safe with Scarlett, waiting for a miracle (he won't open the gate, no, not him). He wants to say what's going to happen- how afraid he is, how he wishes there was another way but there's not, Richard, trust me, it'll be all right, you'll be all right, I'm sorry, thank you.

He bites his lip- hard- and turns away.

Later, he commands the ice to split, separating the two armies to give the World Army half a chance of survival. Hundreds of the soldiers of the Old Ones- human, shape-changer- fall into the abyss, and so do some of the men on their own side. The dead go without a fight, while a man in an American Navy suit scrabbles on the edge of the ice for a grip that he doesn't find.

A thousand lives lost, and that's only on one side. Pointless. Matt can't bring himself to feel any particular emotion as he looks out after the widening gap between them and the enemy forces.

Richard's face goes a bit white, and he gapes at the chasm for a few minutes before he turns to Matt and grabs his arm, pulls him back towards camp before the order to retreat comes, even as his thoughts turn over in his head. He probably suspects- something. Suspects something, but doesn't know what.

Matt's sure he doesn't know what to think.

In any case, he doesn't protest as the man drags him along, obediently keeping step with him and avoiding all the panic amongst the members of the army. His work here is done.

-o-

The note from Scott drags the echo of some emotion from deep within him- anger, perhaps. Scott's fault. It's Scott's fault.

It will be Scott's fault.

But it's gone as quickly as it comes, snuffed out as if it were never there. Scott must play his part. The two of them are the main events of this show. It has to be.

Matt has considered what he would do if he were in Scott's shoes, and, feeling the deep emptiness he has felt so often, he knows that he, too, would have crumpled. Scott is not to blame.

Matt knows that they will win, and he still almost wants to give up.

-o-

He doesn't dream. He doesn't go to the dreamscape. But he wakes up once, in the middle of the afternoon, and Richard is on the next bed over, facing him, arm stretched towards him in his sleep. Matt drowsily twines their fingers together and returns to his nap- the last bit of peace he'll have in his life.

-o-

If Richard was angry about him going out on the ice, he is furious about Matt's insistence upon going to see Scott. It's a bad idea. It's a trap. What if he's not telling the truth? What if he has a hundred soldiers behind him ready to take you back to Chaos?

Matt does the only thing he can: he ignores him. Yes, it's dangerous. He knows exactly how bad it could get.

But he has no choice. Not if they want to win this fight.

Instead, he insists he has some faith in Scott, and it's not even a lie.

He's positive Scott will do exactly what he needs to do.

And Richard, angry, devastated Richard, makes the decision Matt knew he would make. He would follow Matt to hell, maybe, if he needed to.

It breaks Matt's heart, and fills it up again with affection for the scruffy journalist who has a little apartment in York, a big heart, and a strong distaste for artificial strawberry flavoring.

Maybe he speaks too soon, too calmly, because Richard's face becomes a bit pinched, as if he's in pain. Matt isn't the same, there's a chasm between them, and there's nothing they can do about it.

He wants to break down and explain everything, but if he does, Richard would never allow this all to happen. More than that, if he says a single word, he's sure he'll lose his nerve, won't be able to go through this at all.

I'm scared, he thinks, and, I don't want to die, but he clamps his lips shut and doesn't say a word.

It's my duty, he tells himself tiredly, for the world. For my friends.

He's accepted this. He has. He has.

-o-

Richard must know for sure, when Scott comes, when Matt is utterly unsurprised and unruffled by his betrayal. Richard fights back, or tries to, and Matt does not. He is resigned to his fate.

He watches Richard from the corner of his eye. He'd be worried- worried they'd hurt him, worried they'd kill him- except that he knows they won't. So he doesn't lift a hand to throw back the fly-soldiers, lets himself be taken in.

Strangely, he feels nothing in particular as they lead him to his death, as if the ice has numbed even the deepest parts of him.

-o-

They spit on him and cut him up and break his bones and burn him, and he hardly makes a sound. He imagines he would be more responsive if he didn't know that it would end soon- though the end would mean death.

He's afraid, but only just. Fear has gone out of him, like everything else.

"Next we'll bring your friend up," one of the men says- maybe a man, maybe a shape-changer, disgusting all the same with his rotting teeth bared in a grin and scarred hands. "We'll torture him a bit, then kill him, and then cut your eyeballs out. It'll be the last thing you ever see. You'll go mad from it," he says giddily.

Despite himself, anxiety rises in Matt's gut. It won't happen.

It won't happen, but it's true. If they did it- if they killed Richard right in front of him, where he can almost touch but can't do anything to stop it, if that is the thing he has to think about before he falls asleep each night, it would be worse than any of the torture they've put through him so far. He'd go mad.

He considers his bonds, the amount of people- creatures?- in the room, and wonders if he could get them both out. He might have the energy. He might not. He's not going to try.

This is when he dies, he thinks, as Richard is brought into the room with teeth bared. It takes barely a moment for their eyes to meet, and Matt can easily read the emotions that flicker through Richard's- horror, worry, anger, shame.

This is my time to die, Richard, he wishes he could say. It's all right. You'll get out of here and the Five will come together and the world will be saved, like it's supposed to be.

I'm glad it's you. If it had to be anyone, I'm glad it's you.

How convenient it would be to have Jamie's ability, to be able to say those things without opening his mouth. He's barely able to look up as it is, and his cracked lips part but no sound comes out.

Do it, he mouths, and watches helplessness turn to resolve in Richard's eyes. He tries to convey gratitude, acceptance, the ever-present affection, peace, maybe, with his gaze alone. But the heavy grief takes Richard over before the blade is even in Matt's heart.

Sorry, he wants to say. It has to be this way.

Has to be.

For a moment, before he dies, Matt thinks, wouldn't it be nice if we could live another life together. One without the Old Ones, where none of us have to die.

-o-

When he comes back, he's Matt, but he's not Matt. He's past. He's a tired leader of all armies who has spent his entire life fighting, who recalls, out of the blue, a small stuffed bear he had had when he was young. He remembers struggling in a bog, saved by the grace of a man who wrote him off a day before. He's future.

He Knows, nothing and everything. Maybe he's not Matt at all.

He's not Richard's Matt, but he feels that boy stir deep inside.

He tells Richard thank you. Sorry. He- I- never wanted you to have to hurt so.

Other things, he keeps to himself. Things that will do no good spoken now, that could only hurt worse with the weight of all that's happened. He sees them reflected in Richard's eyes, right next to a spark of hope that Matt will have to crush.

He is empty, and he is full, and all there is to do is keep moving. He has no place here, even if Richard's Matt might have, could have, if he had survived.

He has lifetimes of memories to sort through, himself to figure out, and they'll see each other soon enough. He leaves.