Disclaimer: They're not mine, no matter how much I moan. Only the ideas and the words are, so if you want to borrow please ask. :-)

Author's Notes: Huge thanks to Nicci for alpha reading, handholding and courage in the face of massive dimwittedness. Thanks also to Cimmie and Missapocalyptic for brilliant betas and useful comments - not all of them rude, either! This story is for Sean - not that he knows who Ray and Frase are!

Story Notes: There's language and sap and not a lot more!

The first thing he noticed was that he wasn't cold. Which was odd. Because there was snow. Lots of snow.

The second thing was that the sky was in front of him...not above and that just seemed fundamentally wrong. If the sky could just decide, on a whim, to be in front instead of above, then what was there to stop everything else from freaking out too?

Ray sat up and immediately felt better about the whole sky thing. However the snow thing still had him stumped. He gazed around at the pristine white landscape. The sun shone weakly through high cloud making the scene bright, but it wasn't enough to cast shadows. The whole view looked kind of flat and unreal. Which was odd.

Craning his neck to the left, he could see a wooden cabin, tucked up hard against the trees with grey smoke from the chimney, curling lazily up into the sky. It looked kind of reassuring, solid and familiar in this hard, unforgiving terrain.

"Built it with my own hands."

Ray snapped his head round and contemplated the man sitting beside him, who was in turn contemplating the cabin. Odd.

"Took me three weeks to get the basic shell completed. The roof was the worst; you wouldn't believe the trouble I had. Do you know anything about roofing?"

"Errr....no," Ray admitted. "Sorry," he added when this seemed to meet with disapproval.

"Well, can't be helped," the man shrugged and got to his feet, brushing the snow off his coat.

"So, if you've finished lying in the snow, we should probably go inside before you get too cold."

"I'm not cold." Ray sounded confused.

"Huh." The man didn't offer an explanation or wait, but scrunched off towards the cabin without looking back. Ray scrambled to his feet and eyed the scenery warily again, just daring it to turn into something even more incomprehensible. When it didn't, he gave a satisfied nod and followed the retreating figure of the strange, old man.

The inside of the cabin was basic but homely. A fire burned in the grate, the wooden floors were dotted with muted coloured rugs and all the furnishings looked either homemade or decidedly ancient.

The man was already busy, setting a kettle over the fire to heat and clattering around in the kitchen area pulling out mugs.

"So, you're Stanley Raymond Kowalski, then. Do you want tea or...well, there is only tea. Do you want it?"

Ray ignored him. He didn't answer to Stanley and besides, he knew what this was; it was a dream. Any moment he'd wake up and this would be gone the second he opened his eyes. He moved around the room, looking at the dcor and the little hints to the personality of the owner of this place: oil lamps, old newspaper cuttings in a book on the table, fishing tackle by the door. A wall of certificates caught Ray's eye and he went to look more closely.

Whoever this guy was, he'd received a lot of honours and medals. Ray picked the one that had pride of place in the centre and screwed up his eyes to read it.

Commissioner's Commendation for Outstanding Service. Awarded to Sergeant Robert Fraser on this the 23rd of August...

Ray turned on the spot to stare at the old man who was taking a deep sniff of the tea caddy contents. Of course it was Frase's father - the red serge jacket and the ridiculous pants gave it away. Ray frowned - had he been wearing those all along?

"You're Frase's Dad!"

"Yes. How very perceptive of you," Fraser Senior replied without turning. He finished pouring the steaming water into the mugs and brought them back to the fireplace, putting them down before lowering himself into the battered looking armchair.

"He doesn't look like you."

"No, he takes after his mother," Bob explained.

Ray looked around the cabin for a picture of Caroline Fraser or one of Benton, but there were none, just the commendations and awards.

"Don't you have any pictures of him?" Ray asked, thinking of the Vecchio's house, which was stuffed with photos of Ray...well, him now...and his siblings; graduations, weddings, confirmations, holidays - all captured and kept forever.

"No, I don't. I ought to have. We just never had...Maybe I'll ask him for one."

"Yeah, maybe you should." The Bob in his dream was turning out to be exactly what Ray had imagined. Ben only spoke of his father infrequently and his manner was always respectful or when asked about his prolonged absences, guarded.

"Now we have established who we are, would you care for a game of Ludo?"

Ray gave a huge gust of laughter, smacking his hands on his thighs. "This is the single fucking weirdest dream I have ever had!"

Robert Fraser's eyebrows registered surprise at the younger man's language but he said nothing.

"I mean, I've had some weird dreams in my time, but this is something else."

"It's not a dream," Robert said quietly. "It's very real...in a deeply unreal sense."

"Yeah, whatever. Wait until I tell Frase that I was dreaming about his Dad. Actually maybe not - he'll think I'm some sort of freak or something." Ray was excitedly bouncing around the cabin, grinning like an idiot.

"You're not dreaming about me. I would know if you were. You see, I'm dead and it follows that if this is where I spend all eternity being dead, that you must be too." Robert took a small sip of the scalding tea and gazed into the fire.

"Dead? You're telling me I'm dead? Wow - that's deep - never had a dream where I was dead before."

"Go to the back door, Stanley. Look out and tell me what you see."

"It's Ray," he corrected firmly then, slightly unnerved by the direction this dream was taking, he walked over to the door that Fraser senior was indicating and opened it a crack. Cautiously, he stuck his head through. An empty room, a desk, some boxes; Ray recognised Ben's office at the Canadian consulate. Odd. Ray leaned back and shut the door, then repeated the exercise with the same results. Very odd indeed.

Quickly he walked back to the front door and opened it to be confronted by the stark whites and dark greens of the frozen landscape he'd awoken in. He stepped outside and made a circuit of the cabin before returning and shutting the door.

"Where am I?"

"Northwest Territories," Robert Fraser pointed at the front door, then flipped his hand 180 degrees "My son's office."

"This is fucked up!" Ray said. He had a feeling this was going to be one of those dreams that stayed with you, leaving you feeling hinkey all day.

"Go to that window," Robert directed mildly from his chair by the fire. He looked calm and slightly bored, which irrationally pissed Ray off even more.

As he moved a strange lassitude came over him. He felt like he was walking through water. When he finally reached the window, he looked out into a scene of chaos.

Bright lamps cast a horrible, hard light on a large, cold-looking room. Green-gowned people were moving around a central bed, working on a patient. It was frantic; surgeons called for instruments and stats updates, people moved back and forth taking measurements, delivering requested items like some kind of grotesque dance. It was plain that the guy on the slab wasn't doing well and the tension in the room was palpable.

"Who's that?" Ray whispered, already fearing Fraser's answer.

"Well it's not me, thankfully. I was shot. Nice and quick. None of this messy lingering," Bob said briskly.

Ray moved away from the window, feeling the disconnected sensation drop away from him as he stumbled for a chair in front of the fire.

"That's the drugs you're feeling," the old man told him, fixing him with a bright, beady eye. "Have some tea."

Ray complied, the swimmy image of the operating theatre still swilling through his mind. Strangely, the tea seemed to help.

"Why am I here?" he asked when he'd drained the mug.

"Good question. That's the first sensible thing you've said since you arrived. Why ARE you here?"

"Not a clue," Ray replied. He tried to pull himself together and disassociate himself from the pale, smashed body he'd glimpsed on the gurney.

"I suspect it's because you're in love with my son," Bob nodded as if he'd just said something utterly mundane.

"No, I'm fucking not!" Ray barked banging his mug down on the table. He was DEFINITELY disliking this dream now. If he was gonna dream about a Fraser, he'd rather it was the one with the kind eyes, the wolf and the killer ass.

Sergeant Robert Fraser sat further back in his chair and crossed his arms. His intelligent gaze seemed to see right through Ray, defying him to lie again.

"And even if I did - it has nothing to do with you," Ray added spitefully, avoiding Bob's eyes but knowing it was pointless to deny it. The guy knew stuff. Which was odd.

"But everything to do with Benton. Yet you haven't told him."

"Yeah, the subject didn't come up in conversation," Ray retorted. "'Ben, you wanna come over and split a pizza? Watch the hockey? Oh and by the way I'm in love with you. Which side of the bed do you prefer?' That would be a really fast way to get a visit to the..." He'd been about to say hospital, but visions assailed him once again of the nightmare scene out of the cabin window. Ray fancied that he could still hear the heart monitor and its uneven beep.

"You don't have to become aggressive about it, son," Bob scolded. "And you know damn well that Benton would never hit you."

"He might. He's never given any hints that I might be...welcomed," Ray admitted. "He's as straight as...something very straight."

"Roman road?"

"What?"

"A Roman road. They're very straight. The military used to lay them out using a combination of..."

"Right! Roman Road," Ray agreed quickly, familiar with how a Fraser lecture could take years off your life expectancy. He was feeling a bleakness begin to bleed into his soul. Because now it looked like he'd never even get the chance to find out if Ben would've hit him or not.

"I didn't mean to. I never meant to fall in love with him," Ray said after a minute's silence punctuated only by the gentle noises of the fire. For some reason he felt he should be apologising to Fraser Senior, even though Ben had never known of Ray's feelings for him. "I mean you love who you love, right?"

"I suppose that's true. But you should have told him. I don't think you should assume to dictate Benton's sexual preferences for him. I happen to know that he is very fond of you."

"And you're okay with that?" The surreal situation took another massive leap into the downright fucking weird for Ray. Discussing Benton's sexual orientation with his dead father - that was waaaaaay up there on the seriously freaky shit-o-meter.

"I thought you were strict, inflexible, heartless...a bit of an evil old bastard to be honest." Ray knew he was being insulting, but it was what he thought and his brain was so fried from all this shit; he couldn't find a way to phrase it better.

"Did Benton tell you that?"

"No," Ray admitted. "I made up the heartless and evil bastard bit myself."

Fraser Senior chuckled and put down his mug. "You get a lot of clarity when you're dead, son. A lot more than you had when you were alive. Decisions that you made then, sometimes...well...it can't be helped." For the first time Ray saw something other than the Sergeant and the red serge - just for a moment, then it was gone.

"So you're okay with me being in love with your son? Not that I give a fuck either way, it's my life and his after all," Ray asked defiantly.

"Well I'll tell you something. It wouldn't have happened in my day," Bob asserted with a challenging glint in his eye.

"Right, because homosexuality only really started with my generation," Ray said sarcastically.

"Exactly. Although there was this one man...Peterson...odd fellow. Always gave me his chocolate ration when we were out on patrol. He was a terrible horseman too, couldn't stay in the saddle if his life depended on it - which of course it did..."

"What was that?" Ray interrupted quickly. Both men waited and the sounds came again. A thumping and scraping noise from outside.

"Oh, that's Benton. Right, how about that Ludo, then?"

"What?"

"He's just come back from the hospital, I expect he's..."

Ray jumped up and ran to the back door, pressing himself against the wall beside it. As if this wasn't fucking odd enough - he was about to be discovered by his partner playing board games with his deceased father. At that instant the door yanked open.

"Hello, Son," Robert said, walking towards the door and giving Ray an inquisitive look.

"Not now, Dad."

"Bad day?"

"Could say that." Ben's voice sounded strange, kind of strained and gulpy.

"I was just talking to your friend here," Bob chatted on, ignoring the lack of positive response from his son. He began to pass items from the cabin into Ben's reaching hands. Ray watched in shock as the second they left Bob's grasp they turned into something else. A letter opener became shorts; a book transformed into a dark t-shirt and a pillow from the armchair was a sweatshirt the second Ben grabbed it.

"What friend, Dad? I don't have time for this, I'm sorry. Ray..."

"Yes, Ray," Bob beamed. "Strange fellow, bit liberal with the profanities in my view, but honest enough."

Ben's hands paused mid-grab leaving a metal plate half way to becoming a razor.

"Ray? He's there?" His voice was a painful gasp.

"Oh, yes. We were just about to play a game."

A shuddering sob sounded from the other side of the door and the plate clattered to the floor of the cabin.

"Benton," Bob said, his voice ever so soft suddenly.

Ray couldn't bear to listen to this any more. He stepped out into the doorway and Fraser Senior stood back to give him a clear view of his partner.

In the background, Dief wagged his tail at the sight of Ray and seemed utterly unperturbed that there were people living in Fraser's closet. But Ben...

Ben looked like shit. His uniform jacket was dirty and torn, and he had bloody abrasions on his hands and left cheek. But it was his face that terrified Ray. Ben's jaw was clenched; his eyes screwed tightly shut, but not tightly enough to stop the great, fat tears that welled in the corners.

"Frase," Ray said gently.

"Don't be there," the Mountie said harshly without opening his eyes.

"Ben, it's okay. Look at me."

"No," the word was low and it sounded like it had been dragged from his partner without his consent.

"What happened?" Ray asked his gaze taking in Fraser's dishevelled state.

"Kidnapped - we were stuffed in the back of a van. You managed to get the door open, we...we jumped and you...you hit..."

"I get it," Ray cut him off. A new slew of images tumbled through his head. Rough hands pushing him, shouting, and Ben's eyes as the door shut, entombing them in darkness.

Ray shook his head to try to concentrate back on the here and now. He brought his gaze back to Ben's face to find two bright blue, bloodshot eyes staring at him.

"Ray," Ben whispered and he swayed a little on his feet.

"I'm sorry, Frase," Ray told him. He couldn't bear to be the cause of the anguish on his partner's face.

As if crumpling in on himself, Fraser slowly went to the floor, landing cross-legged and with his face in his hands. Dief crawled forward on his belly, and sadly put his jaw on Fraser's knee, offering support.

"I'm too late. You were taken in to surgery. They told me you'd be in for at least two hours and to get some sleep. I just came home to grab fresh clothes and request some leave then I was coming back...I was coming back, I swear!"

Ray felt a sudden stabbing in the back of his head and he winced. A dull ache seemed to be starting up in every part of his body and he wearily lowered himself to the floor to sit beside his friend.

"This is too much shit to take in at once, Frase," he murmured.

"God, Ray, what do I do now?"

"You think you're having a bad day? First I die, then I wake up in fucking Canada, then I have to explain to your father that I'm in love with you..."

"God, no..." Bens face emerged from his hands, tearstained and pale "...don't tell me that now...not now it's too late...."

"It's not." Bob's voice came from the other side of the cabin, but was ignored.

The pain in Ray's chest was becoming unbearable, but Ben was here and he didn't need to hide anything anymore.

"He was quite cool about it actually. I was expecting him to try and kill me...but I guess he was beaten to the punch...hehehehehe." It was getting hard to breathe and Ray lay down next to Dief with his head by Ben's knees.

Ben's tears tracked down his dirty face and Ray lifted a shaky hand to try and wipe them away.

"This isn't fair. This isn't FAIR," Fraser said angrily as Ray's fingers stroked against his face.

"Benton?"

"It's okay, Ben. As long as you know now." Ray's vision was dimming and he could barely make out the curve of Ben's jaw as he touched his face. If he was dead, then how come it felt like he was dying?

"Benton!"

"You should have said. I never knew. I didn't even let myself think that someone like you might be interested in someone like me. You're something I couldn't have..." Fraser rambled quietly as his shoulders shook with suppressed sobs.

"BENTON!"

"LEAVE ME ALONE, OLD MAN!" Fraser shouted, jerking his head up to glare at his father. He took a great, shuddering breath. "Please Dad, please," he said more quietly. "I should have been there with him. I was too late..."

"Well if you'd bother to listen, either of you, you'd know that it's not too late, but it's getting closer every minute you two make goo-goo eyes at each other on the floor here in this undignified manner."

Suddenly the pain in his chest, that Ray thought couldn't get any worse, did so - massively so. He arched off the floor with a cry of pain, his head and heels banging on the carpet of Ben's office and strangely, also on the wood of the cabin floor.

"What's happening?" Benton demanded.

"They're trying to resuscitate him."

"He's not dead yet?"

"Nope. Those surgeons are almost as stubborn as he is."

"Then why is he...?"

"I'm not sure. I did wonder when he started feel the affects of the anaesthetic earlier, if maybe he wasn't quite as dead as I had imagined. But now he's rolling all over the floor and wailing, well..."

"God, I have to go!" Ben gasped. He looked down at his stricken partner and back up to his father.

"Go, I'll take care of this," Bob told him, crouching down beside Ray.

Ben grabbed his duffle and ran, leaving the closet door open.

Ray was vaguely aware that Bob Fraser was helping him to his feet and steering his steps towards the window onto his operating theatre. At each step the pain intensified.

"Come on, son. No time for Ludo now, we'll play when you're better." With his free hand, Fraser senior opened the window, then propped Ray on the sill.

"You be good to him, do you hear me?" Bob said sternly into Ray's face. "And son?"

Ray lifted his head as much as he could with what felt like an axe embedded into it. "Yeah?" he whispered.

"You can call me Dad," Bob Fraser said with that same challenging spark.

"Not a fucking chance," Ray muttered.

Bob smiled broadly, apparently pleased with that and then gave Ray a massive shove through the window.

SIX WEEKS LATER

Ray Kowalski watched the door of his apartment shut on an anxious looking Ben and a hungry looking Dief. Frase was like this every time he had to go out for groceries, or to take Dief for a walk and for all that Ray moaned to him about being babied, he thought it was kinda cute too.

Making his way to the bedroom, he noticed how much stronger he was becoming. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror on the dresser. Even his hair was beginning to grow back where the assholes - sorry - medical practitioners - had shaved it off. The pink of the scar was still quite prominent from where they'd had to operate to relieve the pressure from the swelling in his brain. He might need to be a bit more artful with his hair gel when he went back to work to cover that up.

Opening the top drawer, Ray took a picture from beneath a pile of socks. Frase and him with their arms around each other's shoulders at a barbeque they'd been to at Frannie's last summer. He looked cocky, Ben looked relaxed and they both looked so happy to be pictured together and neither of them had admitted why until it was almost too late.

Stupid.

Ray took a marker from his pocket and thought for a moment.

For Dad/Evil Old Bastard with love from Ben and Ray.

Very cautiously he opened his closet door and wondered why he felt slightly disappointed that it wasn't snowing. Just his clothes shoved in anyhow and Ben's all lined up neatly and in colour order. Quickly he reached up and slipped the photo between a couple of t-shirts, smiled to himself and shut the door on the faint smell of wood smoke and ice.

Fin