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Shane gripped the wooden railing with both hands. With little more effort he could snap it to splinters.
A man’s life. Maybe a good man, but that didn’t matter, Shane guessed. It was a life. A whole life.
Shane still felt the crash of Rick’s body against him when he’d returned from the run. At the time, it seemed less like a hug and more like Rick had collapsed against him. The full weight of his shellshocked body fell into Shane's arms. Rick held him too, but the embrace was weaker than Shane remembered it. And when they pulled apart, he saw that all the color in Rick's face was concentrated to the red of his eyes and the blazing blue within them.
Shane had handed over the medicine then, and when he looked down at his empty hands he noticed something strange about them. It had taken him a moment but he soon realized what it was. They weren't shaking. They were completely still.
When he’d looked up again, Rick had gone, stumbling back inside the farmhouse to deliver the medicine. Lori was left, her own eyes shining with overflowing gratitude as they lingered on Shane a moment before she too went back inside.
Shane wondered about whether he should've been shaking. Rick had been shaking— shaking badly. Shane had felt it later as he helped his friend up the stairs after the medicine was in Carl and Lori had assured Rick that she would stay by their son's side. Even then, Rick had been reluctant to leave the boy, but his own obvious fatigue and Shane’s firm assurances eventually won out.
Rick had been so trusting, so reliant on Shane, letting his friend take the bulk of his weight as they maneuvered to the upstairs bathroom. Shane didn’t mind it. Rick was lighter than he remembered too.
Shane had lingered in the bathroom until Rick had given the nod that he could handle it from there.
There was something about seeing Rick there, swaying on his own legs, struggling even to keep his head up. Shane had never seen him like that. So helpless.
Now, on the banister outside the bathroom, Shane waited. He gripped the wooden railing, not to steady himself, but to brace himself against the strange sensation that had been growing steadily in him since he’d driven away from the school with one less passenger than he’d arrived with. It spread through him, causing bursts of cool tingles to erupt in his hands and the muscles in his arms, up his spine, behind his eyes... It felt like it was growing stronger by the second, threatening to burst from his pores. Earlier, as Shane had lead Rick with an arm around his waist, he’d feared he might crush the man from the sheer power consuming him. He’d managed to keep it contained though, keep it focused. Somehow, Shane felt fully in control of it.
The memory reminded Shane that he hadn’t heard from the other man in a little while.
Releasing the railing, he turned and approached the bathroom, noting how solid his legs felt beneath him.
“Everythin' alright in there, Rick?” When he leaned his head against the door, he heard shuffling and what sounded like a struggle inside.
In an instant, Shane burst into the bathroom, arriving just in time to catch Rick as the man was tottering forward. Rick’s arms and head were tangled in his upturned shirt. He seemed to have gotten caught mid-way through pulling it off when he lost his balance. If Shane hadn’t been there, the dazed man might've knocked his head against the counter and bled out on the tile floor before anyone could get to him.
He hadn’t called out for Shane as he'd been instructed to do.
“Help me get this off,” Rick mumbled from somewhere in the twisted fabric. The sight of him so helpless made Shane forget the scolding the prideful man had earned along with the surging heat that had risen in himself at the disobedience.
“Yeah, buddy. Hang on.” While still supporting Rick, Shane kicked the bathroom door shut behind them. “What are you tryna do, man?” he asked as he peeled the undershirt the rest of the way off.
Shaking his head as if to clear it, Rick righted himself then moved to the bathtub where he leaned over to turn on the faucet.
“Whoa, whoa, Rick!” Shane followed his friend's movements closely, hand’s hovering nearby to catch the man if he slipped.
“It’s alright, it's alright,” Rick sighed.
“You think it’s a good idea to be slippin’ around in a tub— the way you are right now? Huh? Wanna fall over and knock your head in, lose what little blood you got left? That what you want? Hershel already told me if you lose consciousness like this, it’s a good chance you might not wake up again. Don’t get stupid now, Rick.”
Rick’s worn voice was so soft beneath the heavy stream of running water that Shane only realized by the end of his scolding that Rick was speaking to him.
“Hush, hush. Not takin’ a bath, Shane. Just…” Laboriously, Rick pushed himself up off the rim of the tub to stand. As he swayed, Shane was there, instinctively.
Heedless of his anxious friend, Rick’s hands moved now to his waistband to pry at his belt buckle.
“Rick,” Shane said.
Once he’d unfastened the belt, the former deputy struggled with the buttons of his pants a moment, then froze, sighing deeply.
Shane, who was already confused by Rick’s determination to undress, was at a further loss by the sudden halt in the process.
He glanced at the downturned face of his oldest friend and saw a look of such overwhelming defeat and loss that Shane suddenly couldn’t move fast enough to help him. He was propelled bodily forward, his hands moving quickly to pick up where Rick’s fumbling fingers had faltered. Right now, for whatever reason he'd formulated in his blood-depleted brain, Rick was dead set on getting his pants off. So Shane, who loved Rick more than any brother he had, was sure as shit going to help him get the goddamn pants off.
To his own surprise, Shane’s hands were as steady and sure as ever next to Rick’s, which quaked noticeably.
Shane tugged the zipper and knelt to pull Rick’s pants the rest of the way down his legs. The long limbs looked pale and lean. Shane tried not to notice the way they too trembled as Rick carefully stepped out of the garment, using Shane’s shoulders for support.
When Shane glanced up, he was relieved to see that the awful anguish from moments ago had faded from his friend's features. A distant look replaced it.
Still thinking that Rick meant to bathe, Shane reached up to remove his boxers next, but that's when Rick gently brushed his hands aside. Moving around Shane, Rick kneeled down at the tub and proceeded to place both the discarded shirt and pants into the steaming water.
Shane watched silently as swirls of pink blossomed from the submerged uniform. Rick pressed his clothes down until they were fully soaked and set about scrubbing away at what appeared to be blood. Carl’s blood.
Shane could have been invisible then, Rick’s attention was so fully trained to his task.
Slowly, Shane rose to lean against the countertop. He couldn’t help thinking that he too should be washing some blood away. Try as he might however, he couldn’t find a single drop of Otis on him. It was as if he’d absorbed the fallen man completely. Now, aside from the few scrapes here and there, Shane was clean. It was laughable how clean he was next to Rick, who was anemic and sweating and all but covered in the blood of his son, and who’d spent his night saving a life.
Shane’s eyes traced Rick’s back, where dehydration had made the skin cling to muscle. The back and shoulder muscles rippled as Rick vigorously scrubbed his son’s blood from his clothes. The man was working so hard that his breaths grew harsh and shaky.
Some part of Shane thought he should stop Rick then, thought that maybe, in Rick’s state, he shouldn’t be exerting himself like this. He didn’t stop him, however, but instead stood silently, becoming increasingly aware of the quiet calm in his own body.
As Rick labored on the floor beneath him, wrecked inside and out, Shane, who had watched the gruesome death of a man— had actually been the cause of it— was completely at ease. Shane’s shoulders were lax, breaths deep and full, hands steady, head clear.
It was unreal.
Shane would never forget the first time he killed a man on the force. He’d been a thief and threatened Shane with a gun, but his death had still rattled Shane to the core and he’d needed counseling for half a year afterward. Shane remembered how he’d been projected from his body after it happened, how he’d felt like he was floating. He couldn’t find his feet and for months felt like he was slipping away from reality. This was different. Otis hadn’t done anything to deserve what he’d got, but Shane felt nothing for him. There was only this deep, reverberating sense of calm. It leveled and empowered him. Shane didn’t think he’d ever felt so firmly rooted in his skin.
And again there was Rick at his feet, a shell, less than that— a ghost. Formless, malleable. Shane imagined pressing Rick’s head down into the shallow water. With the faucet running hard and Rick as consumed in his task as he was, the former deputy wouldn’t see or hear it coming. In his condition, he certainly couldn't fight it. If he had any voice left to scream, it would be drowned out. The others would believe that he’d tried to bathe and slipped. Rick had no idea how vulnerable he was there, how much raw power stood in check at his back.
As if sensing Shane’s gaze, Rick turned and suddenly those radiant blue eyes were fixed all on him. They were shimmering with moisture and seemed to glow brighter from within their bruised sockets. Rick’s lips were parted and he looked more tired than Shane had ever seen him. He was speaking in a voice that sounded as broken as he looked, and pointing to something behind Shane.
Mechanically, Shane looked to where Rick was indicating and saw the small bar of soap on the rim of the sink. Distantly, he realized that Rick was asking for it.
Shane handed it to him.
Taking it, Rick turned away again, leaving his bare back exposed once more and Shane, a living furnace, watching him.
For a while, Rick kept working as if Shane wasn’t even there. His tireless fingers wore at the blood as if ridding his clothes of the stains would rid his boy of the injury— or more, undo the entire event so that Carl had never been shot in the first place. Shane knew that if Rick could somehow reverse the last twenty-four hours, he would save two lives. In that event, Shane would not be standing there, would not be consciously aware of the not-unpleasant tingling in his knuckles where he’d punched Otis with all of his strength to dislodge the man. He would not now be feeling this heady calm that extended from the top of his head down through his feet, rooting him where he stood and enforcing his presence.
Shane didn’t want to undo any of it.
When Rick was done, the bathwater was nearly opaque with crimson.
Shane held Rick steady by the arm as the man rose to his feet.
Rick seemed to want to keep moving, to proceed to the next thing, but Shane persuaded him to stay and rest there a while.
Shane wrung out the clothes and hung them over the shower rod then joined Rick where he stood leaning against the counter.
For some time they both stood there, staring at the tub. There was a residual reddish ring along the inside of the porcelain, which Shane said Rick could come back and clean after he’d gotten some rest. Rick protested a little but gave in.
They remained there leaning against the counter as if waiting for the clothes to dry. Shane could've pointed out to Rick the lapse in judgment in washing all of his clothes and leaving only his boxers to walk around in. But he supposed he wasn't exactly the arbiter of good judgment himself at the moment and said nothing.
“Thirsty. Fuck. So thirsty,” Rick croaked, swaying beside him.
Shane was quick. He turned to the sink and ran the water. Making a bowl with his hands, he collected it in his palms and brought it to Rick’s lips.
“Come on now, Rick. Drink up, brother.”
Rick opened his mouth readily, trusting, reliant. As Shane tilted his hands up to allow Rick to sip from them, however, more water seemed to pour around Rick’s mouth than in it. Shane tried again but the angle paired with Rick’s apparent loss of basic swallowing functions made it impossible. Finally, with a hand clasped gently behind Rick’s neck, Shane guided his friend’s head down to the faucet.
As Rick settled in the bent position, Shane moved his other hand beneath his head, cradling it so Rick could rest there as he drank.
It was laughable how gently Shane was handling the other man now when he’d come from such brutality only hours earlier. The same hands that had clenched into fists and battered Otis into submission, now slowly traced the ridges of delicate vertebrae on the back of Rick’s neck.
Did Rick know how easy it would be for Shane to wrap his fingers around his neck and squeeze until he couldn’t breathe anymore? Did he know how little force it would take for Shane to just slam the butt of his gun against the tender crown of his head, washing the remainder of his life-blood down the drain, leaving his son fatherless and wife widowed once more?
Rick didn’t know. His life was completely in Shane’s hands and he didn’t know how precarious a place that could be.
Suddenly there was a hiss below him.“Hot... hot— Shane,” Rick gasped, his eyes scrunched tight as the splash hit his face.
Noticing the rising steam, Shane realized his mistake. He quickly shut off the hot water valve and turned on the cold one instead. Rick’s mouth went slack then as he collected more than sucked from the cool stream. He looked more relaxed and peaceful than Shane had seen him in weeks. When the eager bobs of his Adam’s apple slowed, Shane helped Rick to an upright position once more and began drying his face. Despite how lightly Shane pressed the cloth to his skin, Rick rocked backward from the impact and would have likely toppled over without Shane’s sturdy hold on the back of his head.
The water had splashed onto Rick’s hair and eyes, and now clung to his already sweat-logged curls and lashes. Shane wiped his face like a mother wiping smears from the face of a messy eater. Rick didn’t seem bothered by the thoroughness, though his cheeks and lips blossomed with color as the course material passed over them. In fact, Rick seemed hardly present, staring through his friend as the larger man tended to him. Whatever occupied his mind while he’d been scrubbing at his uniform earlier had evidently taken him again now.
Shane swore he’d wiped Rick’s eyes at least three times now but water continued to bead and leak from the clumping lashes.
“Hey, it’s alright. It’s alright now,” He soothed. “Got the medicine. Everything’s gonna be just fine.” Shane wiped at the new streams on Rick’s face. His eyes trailed down past trembling lips to the damp neck and chest, where water had dripped down.
Rick was beginning to curl inward, his head sinking down onto Shane’s shoulder as if seeking shelter. The act made him seem even smaller to Shane who was still fully clothed and in his boots. Shane eyed himself in the mirror over Rick's bowed head. He didn’t know if it was just in his mind, but he felt larger now than when he’d left for the supplies, like he’d absorbed the life of the fallen Otis and now both physically and spiritually loomed larger.
Rick’s shoulders were rising and falling rapidly as his breath hitched and quaked. Shane patted him and told him everything was fine. Idly, his eyes followed a trail of water that pooled in Rick’s collarbone before it dripped down his bare chest.
Rick was babbling.
“Was either— was either him or— him or me.” Rick was saying between painful hikes in his breath. “Was gonna give him— all I— all I had left. Even then it might not have…If you hadn’t— If you hadn’t come when you did…Jesus, Shane. My-my…my boy. I almost l-lost…”
Shane felt moisture seep through the fabric of his shirt where Rick’s face was nuzzling against him. Something tugged at his side and he realized one of Rick’s hands had come up to grasp a wad of his shirt in a kind of weak embrace.
Shane still patted at Rick with the towel, seeking to perform a function of some normalcy while his mind soared with thoughts that were anything but that.
“Shane,” Rick said again, lifting his head with some apparent difficulty to look his best friend in the face. The streams beneath his eyes had returned.
Again, Shane looked into the blazing blues and saw that naked trust. Rick wanted so desperately to thank him, but he couldn’t organize his words. Shane hushed him softly.
He continued pressing the towel, now to the excess water dribbling in rivulets down Rick’s torso. When the rough linen caught on a nipple, the tender nub snapped back and flushed a deeper maroon. Shane lamented how abrasive the towel must have felt against the sensitive skin, which looked alarmingly tender and vulnerable to Shane. Skin like that should only be handled with care.
“Sh-Shane,” came a soft rasp.
Shane’s attention was drawn to the weakened fingers that had left his shirt and now wrapped ghost-like around his wrist, tugging almost imperceptibly at his hand. Shane didn’t know how long he’d been rolling Rick’s nipple beneath the pad of his thumb.
The subtle contact seemed to have a disorienting effect on Rick, whose heavy-lidded eyes watched Shane with faint concern. The trust remained though, as if Shane, his dear friend and brother-in-arms, would have good reason for touching him this way.
The skin was so soft— too soft even as it stiffened beneath the ministrations. It reminded Shane of women’s skin. But Rick didn't have the warmth of a woman's skin. He was so cold. Shane was reminded that the man had given much of his blood and now there wasn't much left to keep him warm. Craning his neck down, Shane opened his mouth around one stiff nipple. Without touching the skin, he breathed hotly on it.
Rick made a small sound like Shane had burned him.
Shane did it again and earned another sound.
With a last glance at Rick’s haunted face, he closed his mouth around it.
Rick gasped.
It didn’t take much to get Rick completely naked.
Shane held Rick’s gaze as he did it. The blue eyes fluttered only slightly as if struggling to focus. Rick’s hands stuttered between grasping the countertop for balance and trying to keep Shane at bay. The pose held as much conviction as Rick’s stumbling pleas.
“Shane. Shane. What are you—what are you…?” There was that Grimes rationality. He just couldn’t accept that Shane would do something like this without a reason. He was still committed to trusting his friend.
As shaky and wavering as Rick was on his feet, Shane was steady and solid as he sank to a knee, his sure grip taking Rick’s boxers down with him. The slow, deliberate removal of the final garment seemed to strip away the last of Rick’s resolve.
His mouth hung agape as he looked down at Shane, his pleas all dried up.
Shane needed Rick naked, exposed and defenseless like this, while Shane himself was fully clothed, firm and unwavering. It heightened the truth that he was everything Rick wasn’t: Large, steady, powerful, sure. It was already obvious to Shane, but he needed Rick to see it. Rick would be dead without Shane, he'd said it himself. Rick needed Shane’s strength, his raw power, always had. Shane knew that too.
Now, Rick was bared completely to him. Shane might have seen Rick naked before but not like this. Shane had been asleep then. Now he was awake.
Rick was inevitably soft. Bloodless and horrified as he was, his manhood was flaccid and shrunken. Still, Shane found something delicate about it. So exposed and vulnerable there between his pale thighs, Rick’s manhood was breathtaking.
Like the velvety nipples, Shane wanted to feel this part of Rick in his mouth.
As Shane downed him whole, Rick hunched forward and groaned as if he’d been punched in the gut.
Rick didn’t have much blood to lend to the appendage. In fact, it was likely dangerous to attempt it. Shane didn’t try to stir him but just held him there in his mouth, rolling the cooled member around on his hot tongue. On Rick, it made sense that his most masculine feature would also be his most fragile.
Although Shane was enjoying how silky smooth and pliable Rick felt in his mouth, almost melting against his tongue, he didn’t mind as he felt him begin to thicken.
Rick’s hands pressed feebly at Shane’s head. He tried shaking his head in discouragement but stopped as if the act was dizzying for him. His vocal protests were even more measured. Rick swallowed repeatedly between clipped phrases, extreme dehydration likely turning his tongue and throat to paper.
It would be dangerous to go further, Shane knew and let Rick slip from his mouth.
Rising smoothly to his feet, Shane dragged his lips up the clammy expanse of skin, planting chaste kisses over Rick’s trembling belly, flicking his tongue across a bruised nipple in passing and seizing a breathless sound from Rick in turn.
Now at eye level, Rick looked even more vulnerable and fragile. Once more, he pleaded dumbly and with as much force as his depleted state would permit. Like this, he was so reliant on Shane, so completely at his mercy. The man could do nothing but what Shane allowed him to do. His nakedness only heightened the illusion of helplessness.
Taking Rick by the hips, Shane turned him around so they both faced the mirror.
Shane wanted to see with his new eyes how powerful he’d become. More than that, he wanted Rick to see it.
In the reflection, they both watched Shane smooth his hand over Rick’s bare and heaving chest, spreading his fingers to catch Rick’s erect nipples between them. Then his hand dipped downward to do the same to Rick’s softened cock.
Rick began struggling in earnest then, with strength Shane didn’t know he had left. It was likely taking a lot out of him. It wouldn’t matter; Shane was too powerful, more powerful than Rick knew. Shane could do anything he wanted, take anything. He could take his cock in hand right now, bend Rick over the counter and fuck him dry if he wanted.
Shane didn’t want that though. Right now, Shane wanted to prove a point. He wanted to take his time with Rick, be gentle with him, show him how much more strength it took to contain this kind of power. Rick had no damn idea.
After tiring himself out, Rick tried appealing to Shane’s compassion. He caught and held Shane’s eyes in the mirror, silently imploring him, trying to find something he felt Shane had lost. He didn’t realize that Shane hadn’t lost anything but pretense. He was more himself now than he’d ever been before and it was now Rick’s turn to see it. Shane didn’t hide from Rick’s gaze at all, but bared himself to Rick, showed him exactly what he was looking for. Meanwhile, his fingers worked.
Rick was too exhausted to keep him out and so Shane breached the weakened ring of muscle with little resistance.
Rick was close to sobbing again but Shane could see he was too exhausted, too shocked for even that.
It was when Shane began pumping into him deeply that Rick abandoned his silent pleading in the mirror and looked away. Shane wouldn’t have that. He grabbed the stubbled jaw and directed it forward, gentle but firm; Shane understood the full breadth of his power and how to rein it in. It was important that Rick understood though. Rick needed to know what kind of power had been sitting dormant in plain sight all this time. Rick had to know how much power Shane held in his hands, that Shane had looked a man in the eye and left him to die. Heard his screams as he was torn to pieces behind him.
Shane shut his eyes to the reflection then, feeling them burn beneath the lids.
Withdrawing his fingers roughly, he flipped Rick over, pushing him back onto the counter face-up. The position was awkward, forcing Rick’s neck to bend unnaturally to accommodate his upper body on the shallow counter space.
Lifting Rick’s legs from beneath the knee, Shane slid his own hips between them.
Again, Rick tried shaking his head, but the position made it difficult. His hands gripped the edges of the counter for balance as Shane manipulated his body.
Shane hadn’t taken out his cock but pressed the clothed girth of it against Rick, thrusting so the course denim rubbed abrasively against the naked man’s bared opening, reddened and tender-looking from Shane's rough handling. He held Rick’s eyes firmly as he did it, letting the very real threat linger. The effect was captivating.
Rick’s wet, expressive eyes stared wide at him, stricken with horror and bald delirium. Another thrust and the man whined.
Shane almost moaned then. He didn’t. He had more control than that. He was strong and steady and sure. Of course he could take Rick right there, curled up on the counter, slide his cock into his slack hole and make him watch as a more powerful man took complete mastery of him. It would have been easy. But Shane saw something click in Rick’s eyes as he stared up at him, naked and completely undone, and in that moment Shane understood.
He didn’t need to.
Instead, he dropped Rick’s legs, took his arm and helped the shell-shocked man to his feet. As he slid the boxers back up the quavering thighs, Rick grasped for words. They were clipped beginnings of questions, half-pleas, and wisps of his friend’s name, but nothing whole or substantial. It seemed Rick’s mind was as shaken and traumatized as his body.
With a hand around his waist, Shane lead Rick to the guest bedroom Hershel had offered. By the time they were alone in the dim space, Rick was silent and avoiding Shane’s eyes.
As Shane pulled the cover up Rick’s body, he leaned in to press his lips to his friend’s head, which was still slightly damp. When he pulled away, he found Rick’s eyes on him.
There were no words, but Shane got it. Rick had finally seen him, seen who Shane was, what Shane could do. More than that, Rick saw who he was next to Shane, how utterly powerless the other man could make him.
Shane held Rick’s gaze for some time longer, during which he felt like Rick was reading through his eyes everything that had happened during the run with Otis. Rick watched the two men scrambling as the walkers approached, saw Shane strike Otis down and leave him behind, saw Otis, as Shane had seen him, being torn apart.
It was Rick who blinked first. Even in the dim light pooling in from the hallway, Shane could see the gleam in the other man’s eyes.
Without a word, Shane turned and left him.
Over the next few days, Shane found the feeling hadn’t left him. Although he’d expected it might wear off with time, it remained as present and heady as the night he’d returned from the run. It was as if the life energy of Otis would be with him always.
As Rick recovered, he became active in the group once more. It wasn’t lost on Shane that Rick didn’t interact with him the way he used to, nor did he seek out his old partner's council. It was usually Shane who had to address Rick and when he did, there was a noticeable tightening in the other man’s stance. Each time Shane caught it, he felt that familiar swelling in himself, like he was much larger than before.
Nobody brought up Shane’s hair and Rick certainly didn’t talk about what had happened that night in the bathroom. Somehow, Shane knew he wouldn’t.
He did catch Rick alone sometimes. On those occasions, Rick would visibly stiffen and go pale as a sheet. The older man would begin sweating and Shane could see his chest rise and fall rapidly as his breathing quickened. As Shane drew near, Rick would fight to stand his ground, never fleeing, never hiding. Shane usually reached out to touch him then, because he knew Rick would let him. On his shoulder, or his arm, or sometimes his neck. It would be with an intentional care, an exaggerated tenderness, as if he was testing the waters. Really, it was to remind Rick of how much more Shane could do, of how much more power lay dormant beneath the surface, carefully contained and mastered.
He found he never needed to do more.
Rick saw him now.