Ghost

Hello everyone! So, I've come back with another "Book of Secrets" deleted scene. Ben/Riley friendship, except it's a bit more bittersweet, and a bit more slash-ier. Hope you guys like it! Thanks so much for all of the reviews on my first fic, and I hope this one is just as liked! blush

SUMMARY: "Book of Secrets" deleted scene again. Ben/Riley friendship, slash if you read into things. Riley took a few hard falls on the second quest for fame and fortune, but as one treasure is found, is another one already lost? Physically hurt and mentally denying, Riley is surprised to find it is not Ben who is asking if he is alright. IS a Ben/Riley friendship, I promise, but focuses a lot on Riley at first. Bittersweet.

Err, slightly AU but not much, just a slight variation with dialog and little movements by the characters, if that makes any sense.

Disclaimer: I do not own "National Treasure", nor any of its characters. Just having some free fun! waggles eyebrows

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Riley hefted his bright yellow backpack higher onto his back. He shook his head in disbelief, asking himself why he had brought this stupid thing in the first place. It was easily twice his size, and unbelievably heavy for carrying nothing but...well, Riley had no clue what he was packing. Raising an eyebrow, he came close to actually stopping to see for himself, but Wilkinson was striding ever onward, and Riley was already behind the group. Grumbling as Ben called his name to catch up, he jogged forward.

Stepping over uneven rocks, covered by a shallow pool of clear water, the group finally made it into the dark crevice that Ben had opened with the eagle. As everyone looked around in awe at nothing but a bit of dusty junk, Riley made his way towards the center, where a large wooden structure seemed to be holding the "door" open. Riley, sometimes slow on the uptake of obvious stuff but a genius when it came to computers, electronics, or anything mechanical with a purpose to be dissected, was entranced. He leaned forward, wondering just how this contraption worked, the inner gears of his mind in full motion. While everyone was cooing over ancient artifacts that would bore Riley in a museum, let alone give him an asthma attack with all of the dust here, he wanted to see the behind-the-scenes. Looking up to the cave's ceiling, Riley wondered how the rope that was wrapped around the base had survived this long. It looked to be on its last legs, frayed at the edge and yellow with age. He reached a careful hand towards the rope, muttering under his breath that he thought that this was hypothetically impossible.

Suddenly, the rope seemed to fall apart, snapping from the opposite side that he was on and falling to the damp ground in a pathetic heap. Riley jerked his hand back, feet slipping leaving a rip in his precious Converse, and loosing his balance off the rock he was teetering on. He fell with a sickening crunch onto his back, as the cave rumbled and rocks fell all around. He covered his head with his hands, hissing in pain as the slight motion sent waves of pain down his back. He could see something red seeping onto the rock, and had to think a moment before he realized that that was probably from his back.

Soon the rumbling stopped, and Riley thought it safe to sit up. Bad mistake. His world dimmed as everything still jostled around, although this time it had nothing to do with the actual cave. He moaned, trying to see straight up but finding everything to be a bit dizzy. He was still shaking, slight tremors running through him and agrravating his already sore back. Eyes glazed over and he himself feeling a bit confused for some reason, he saw a hand reach down towards him to help him out of the darkness.

Accepting the hand and letting it pull him up into a wobbly standing position, Riley was shocked to find that it was not Ben's hand as he had assumed. Mouth wide open, Riley was sure he looked ridiculous to any outside onlookers. But he didn't care, and couldn't have stopped himself from looking slightly stupid even if he wanted to. And since there was no real babe he was trying to woo in the immediate vicinity, he didn't particularly care at the moment. He was staring, wide eyed at Wilkinson, who was staring back at him with his piercing blue eyes. Riley shifted uncomfortably under the unwavering scrutiny, feeling like a specimen being looked at through a microscope with clinical detachment. The guy's eyes were freaky, like he could see into your very soul and know you were lying. Not that Riley was lying about anything, and in fact had nothing to hide from this man. But he still felt like a little kid guilty and waiting for punishment. This was crazy, Riley hadn't done anything, at least nothing to piss this guy off. He hadn't even said any of his trademark sarcastic comments in moments of danger like everyone expected him to. Looking deeper into Wilkinson's eyes, he thought he saw a flicker of emotion. Was that...concern? For him, the sidekick who only comes along for comic relief?! Of course not, he must have knocked his head harder than he thought.

Coming out of his trance, Riley realized that Wilkinson was saying something. Blinking a few times at this man and his strange communication, he tried to translate the words being said to him, but his head pounded, leaving a strange pressure on his ears. "What...?"

"You okay, kid?" Wilkinson asked again, putting a hand on Riley's shoulder to steady him. Riley wrinkled his brow in confusion, Why would you care? on the tip of his tongue to ask. Instead, he nodded his head quickly, saying a quick, "Yeah", as the rest of the group started moving again. No one even looked back to see if he was alright, and he had to wonder if any of the others had even noticed. Wilkinson hung back from the front of the group, keeping a wary eye on the youngest member of their party. The boy still looked a bit out of it, and he was afraid he was going to collapse right there.

Riley hurried to keep up with the gang, trying to hide the slight limp in his left leg. He felt achy all over, but wisely kept his mouth shut without complaining. It felt like his blood wasn't being circulated, but he knew he was just being paranoid about that. Slightly worried, Riley felt his whole body slowly becoming...numb. His brain was a flurry of thoughts, though, as he contemplated the last few minutes. The others hadn't even noticed that he had been hurt, in fact forgetting about him completely. Riley didn't mind that too much, since he didn't know the one lady he assumed was Ben's mom, Ben's dad never really liked him, and Abigail was obviously jealous of the vast friendship that Riley had with Ben, even to the point where Ben would pay more attention to him. No, what hurt him the most was...Ben.

Not once had his best friend glanced back to see if Riley was still even following them. Not once had his friend noticed that something was wrong and Wilkinson wasn't even leading the front now. Not even a single thought was spared for Riley. Ben's full attention had been on Abigail's safety, and as an afterthought, his parents. Riley hung his head, trying to tell himself that it didn't matter much. He didn't care. But as much as he tried to convince his heart that, he knew that it was much harder to lie to yourself.

His best friend hadn't even noticed that he had been hurt, but what was really weird was that a complete stranger who had supposedly been the "bad guy" before they teamed up, had. This other guy had helped him up and asked about his well being. Was Riley the only one who found that a bit strange?

Wilkinson looked back again, putting a leading hand on Riley's back as the boy swayed on his feet again. And Ben didn't spare a glance. Head down in defeat, he trudged on with lowering spirits, telling himself that big boys didn't cry, so he had no idea what the hell was this wet stuff near his eyes.

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Riley stared in awe at the glint of gold on the edge of his vision. Moving closer to it, his eyes lit up at the vision before him. He chuckled to himself, having a flashback to their first treasure hunt findings. No, not the Stairs, although that had been the best sight in the world since he had seen the world through the eyes of knowing something Ben and Abigail didn't know.

The awe of seeing the tall, blue statue with the goatee came back in full force. He remembered fondly how he had been drawn to the strange statue, feeling the impulse to hug it even. He had a fascination with it for some odd reason that he could not explain, and that same feeling came back to him now. He was staring at a small golden statue of a "man", small enough to fit in his palm.

Everything else faded away in his mind, the voices of the others becoming slight murmurs. He was so intent on the object in front of him, that it wasn't until he recognized his name within their conversation that he started paying attention. The voices became clearer, as he stopped tuning them out.

"Well, there's only one way to get out of here, and that's forward, since Riley here effectively blocked our known exit." Riley whipped around, immediately regretting it as a headache hit full force. Today was just full of surprises, since it wasn't Wilkinson as he had thought that said that cutting sentence. Not that it was any shocker that Patrick said it, but still. You thought you knew who the bad guy was, and who the good guys were. That's how all these fairy-tale-stories-come-to-life played out. The grounds of who's who were black and white, and there was no second guessing.

Just as Riley was thinking of the injustice of not knowing precisely who the enemy was, and the irony of it all, he caught on to the injustice getting blamed on him. "Hey! I didn't do it! That rope broke all on its own, from the other side."

Most of the company rolled their eyes and shook their heads, and Riley felt a pang of betrayal. No one believed him. He tried to tell himself that it didn't matter what they thought, because him and God knew what really happened. But he was just no good with bluffing to his heart today.

Scoffing, he took another step towards the statue, determined to feel some happiness in his heart on this stupid adventure where he wasn't appreciated by anyone. Well, at least the strange golden man would appreciate him for rescuing him from this dank prison. Riley felt a hysterical laugh bubble the surface, when the completely random thought came to his mind, I wonder if the Little Gold Man is related to the Goatee Blue Man.

Suddenly, Riley felt like he was falling, his foot stepping forward and having nothing to set down on. Panicking, he looked down as soon as gravity caught up, and found himself tumbling down, head over heels. With a muffled yelp, he impacted with solid ground again. His world was blurry again as he forced his eyes open, seeing his three other companions down here, too. Well, the good thing was that the numbness was gone, and now his whole body was tingling all over. Better than feeling nothing, but now every slight move he made sent ripples of agony through him. He started coughing on his hands and knees, but didn't get to enjoy is lung coming up for long. He was jerked out of it as the floor started tilting to one side dangerously, as he scurried to get onto even ground...

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Riley's hand grasped Ben's as he hung precariously from the swinging ladder. He heaved Ben up to the ledge, as he himself struggled to get up. A hand helped yank him up, and he nearly fell over onto the person.

By now, he was used to the sight of Wilkinson instead of Ben. Ben was being held by Abigail, whispering sweet nothings into his ear of how he was alright now. Riley felt a sudden pull at his heart, as he tried to place the burning emotion. A wave of...jealousy? Wilkinson helped Riley up again, patting him on the shoulder and telling him that he was alright.

"Are you okay?" There was that question again, from the man who he thought would care the least of the group. Riley gave him a weird look, but smiled and nodded his head. "Yeah, been better, but thanks." That earned a slight chuckle from the other man, which made Riley smile more openly. At least someone appreciated him. Dang it, there was that stupid mist again in front of his eyes. Seriously, it was like it was stalking him. At least his body had stopped protesting at the pain, and actually felt normal again.

As they started to go forward again, Riley glanced at Ben. His stomach squirmed as he saw Ben looking back at him. Taking his arm from Abigail's shoulder, Ben fell back in step with Riley. "You okay, Riley?"

Riley raised his head up, breaking out in a full smile. Leave it to Ben to realize his friend was going through emotional upheaval, and not when he had broken his leg. He rolled his eyes fondly, accepting that his friend had his best interest at heart, and just noticed things a bit differently. But at least Ben cared. And that meant the world to Riley.

"I'm fine now...thank you."

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I didn't want Ben to be a complete bad word, so I thought of this idea. I found it weird that Wilkinson asked him twice if he was okay, and Ben never looked in his direction. And I thought it would be a kind of sweet thing to do at the end, with all of the bitterness Riley has towards Ben through the rest of the story, that Ben notices when Riley is in emotional hurt, just not physical. eye roll. lol I know, probably either really corny or makes no sense. Sorry. The title refers to the "ghost" of Riley and Ben's friendship, or Riley himself as a ghost, no longer getting noticed and stuff. lol I hope you like this one, too, although I must say I like my first story, "Risk All" a bit better. What do you think?!