Disclaimer: I don't make characters, I just fawn over them and kill 'em out of love. Morbid, isn't it?

Author's Notes: For the ds_flashfiction Forgiveness Challenge.

Story Notes: F/K pre-slash happening, but not slash, and there's no pre-slash category, so I put gen.

Ray sits in the snow and tries to ignore a lot of things. Mostly, he tries to ignore how his ass is freezing and starting to get kind of wet -- he hadn't had time to find the right kind of snowpants, or find his old ones. He also ignores how the sun's glaring off the sheets of snow and giving him a headache. He ignores the bright blue sky, because it just hates him. What with all this ignoring, it's not really anything special for him to be ignoring the shallow pit that he's sitting next to. It's just a pit; it's got a little more snow on it than it did the last time he saw it, but that just makes it easier to ignore. It just makes it easier for him to pretend that Fraser's not in that pit -- that Ray hadn't been digging here three weeks ago, or putting Fraser in, or trying to cover him up and finding that all the snow he'd dug out had melted and refrozen, so that he couldn't.

It's not like he really needs to remember any of that.

He doesn't even know why he's here. He'd thought he was going to talk everything out, because he needs to talk it out, and Fraser's the only one who ever listened to him when he foamed at the mouth like that. And sure, he's got stuff to say -- but talking to a stone's bad enough, and here there isn't even that. Here, it's just a pit, and a little bump next to the pit, where Ray'd put the ice he'd dug out. Ray's not pathetic enough to talk to snow. He's not gonna do it.

Except he needs to. That's why he came back. It won't help to leave here without doing what he came to do -- so Ray looks away from the pit and blinds himself with the ice-glare. That's better -- now, Fraser could be sitting next to him, and Ray'd never even see him. That's it -- Fraser's just sitting on Ray's left side, breathing real quiet and waiting for Ray to start rambling.

"I went back," Ray croaks, "after -- after. You know." Ray swallows. After burying you, he was going to say, but that just sounds weird, and it makes his stomach churn. He'd done it, yeah. He'd been real careful about putting Fraser someplace totally isolated -- he can't even see Fraser's cabin from here, or spot any low flying planes on their way in or out of Inuvik -- because that's what Fraser'd wanted. Fraser told him that, once -- his face'd been painted flickering orange by the firelight, creases etching themselves into parts of his forehead that had always been smooth before. "Heaven is," he'd said, smiling at Ray tiredly, "I think, entirely overrated. There's rather a lot of good people in this world, and if every one of them goes there, I expect it'll soon become too crowded for my tastes." It'd been a joke, but Ray remembers. He might forget to put all his layers on every morning, or take off all the wet ones at night, and he always forgets to tell Fraser when his teeth start chattering, because he never thinks it's a big deal -- but he can at least remember this. Now that Fraser's gone, and remembering doesn't do anybody any damn good -- yeah, sure, count on him.

Ray rubs the bridge of his nose. This isn't what he came here to do. He's not too clear on what he's here for, but it's not to dribble some snot onto Fraser's -- grave. Grave. That's what it is, so that's what he's gonna call it. He is almost forty fucking years old, so he can handle death, thank you...kindly.

Fuck. Fraser's gotta get out of his head sometime, right? Sometime soon, if Ray's ever gonna be sane again. "Chicago's not the same," he croaks inanely, because the only way he's going to say anything important is by getting his mouth flapping, and he's just gotta keep talking if he wants to get it flapping fast enough. "Never realized how annoying everybody is there -- guess I just got used to big empty nothin', right? Big empty nothin' and no cop stuff -- got me outta practice."

Not that he hadn't tried to get back to work -- he had, because what the hell else was he gonna do? Only everybody kept giving him funny looks, trying to talk and not-talk about Fraser with him -- and it hadn't helped none when Frannie dragged Vecchio, of all people, into the station and shoved him over to Ray's new desk. Ray hadn't wanted to talk to him -- hey, the guy's got his own problems, without taking Ray's on too. What with his wife finally getting fed up with bowling, and his best friend dying -- easier to think of Stella as Vecchio's wife, really, and Fraser as Vecchio's best friend, 'cause that way Ray's not really involved, you know? -- he's gotta be pretty messed up.

Ray coulda killed Frannie for doing it, but he hadn't -- he'd just sat at his desk and pretended to ignore Vecchio while he went on about how Stella'd left him the bowling alley, which he didn't really want no more, and the house, which wouldn't do him any good if he moved back up to Chicago like he'd been planning. After a while he'd started not-talking about Fraser, and then just talking about him, straight, like there's nothing wrong with with doing that to Ray. He'd talked about how he remembered Fraser driving the dogsled, that one time he went up there in '94; how of course he didn't know much about dogsleds, but thought that Fraser wouldn't normally sink his dogsled into thin ice.

Ray'd looked at Vecchio's half-crumpled, concerned face, and considered decking him out -- and when Vecchio blurted, "Shit, Kowalski -- are you crying?" he'd just hauled off and done it. And it'd felt good, yeah, felt fucking good, so even though Ray doesn't actually know how many people hate him now, it's totally worth it. Totally worth the two days he'd spent locked up in his apartment after, and the cigarettes he'd smoked that he'd once promised Fraser he'd never touch again, and the embarrassingly drunk phone call he'd made to Maggie and Dief. It'd been especially worth the plane tickets he'd bought at two in the morning, and spent three hours folding into eighths before finally boarding and coming here. Canada, again -- and how fucking circular is that?

"So, uh, I thought I'd come up and visit. You know. Buddies, right?" It's easy to pretend that Frase's just left Chicago, because Ray'd always half-expected him to; Fraser'd always looked a little frayed at the edges there. Coulda been something simple, like the fact that he was probably getting laid less than regular -- the stuff Mountie morals'll do to you sex life, seriously -- but then Fraser's not what you could call a simple guy. Besides, Ray knows for a fact that Fraser hadn't ever got laid in Canada, what with being there in the tent with him every night, and he'd looked happy then. Tired, yes, hell yes, but happy. Personally, Ray thinks there's gotta be something wrong with you, if you're happy when something or another keeps trying to kick your bucket for you -- but then he always knew that, about Fraser. Guy's got a coupla screws loose in the self-preservation department, but then he's got standard issue Mountie competence, so --

Most of the time, Ray reminds himself. Most of the time. Not when -- fuck, he can't go there. He cannot go there -- except isn't that what he came here for? He came here to go there, so he's gonna go there, dammit -- 'cause it's gotta be said, even if Fraser's dead, because holding it inside like this's starting to kill Ray.

Ray twists the thumb of his glove, stalling for time -- even though hell, he's got time, doesn't he? -- under the politely impatient look Ray's pretending Fraser's giving him. "See, what I'm thinking's this," Ray starts, lying through his teeth, because he hasn't thought this for a while; even he'd had to give it up, eventually, somewhere between half-pitying Vecchio and smashing his face open. He'll start with it, though, 'cause what he's thinking now's just...too vol -- dangerous; it's gonna make something important inside him blow up into little messy bits. He just -- fuck, he wants to not know this, he wants to cut it out of his brain -- "I'm gonna bet Canada's different too, right? It's, uh, more dangerous. Right? You know, ice fields've got more crevasses in 'em, rivers've got more rapids in 'em, something -- " Ray squeezes his eyes shut. "'Cept I figure not. 'Cause you're crazy, but you've always made it -- made it out alive, and that's not luck, Fraser, that's just -- just you being a freak. You do stupid shit good; you got it down. And you gotta know what you can't do." Ray pushes hs palms into his eye sockets. Little green fireworks go off behind his eyelids. "The only thing that's different," he croaks, "is me."

This isn't why Ray's a cop -- he wasn't supposed to figure this kinda stuff out. He cannot fucking handle this, even though it's obvious, now. He knows that Fraser skipped hours of shut-eye to watch him sleep, 'cause he remembers waking up shivering his skin off, Fraser's warm hand on his neck and Fraser' voice keeping him awake so he wouldn't actually freeze to death. He knows that Fraser was always watching him, always had one eye on Ray in case he tripped on his own snowshoes and fell on his face. He knows that Fraser'd channeled his mom and Ma Vecchio both, every time they stopped for a meal.

"You shoulda -- " Ray starts, sounding annoyingly young and whiny 'cause his nose is stuffing up and his head hurts and why can't he ever remember that he hates crying like this? " -- you shoulda told me you couldn't hack it. With me, I mean. If you'd just -- just gotten your snobbish Mountie ass to -- " He snaps his jaw shut. That's not buddies; it's not buddies to blame Fraser, 'cause Fraser -- wherever he went -- is probably blaming himself anyway, and it's not his fault. It never was.

In Chicago, Fraser'd been the one who actually went and grabbed perps' empty guns -- but Ray'd still kept himself down while they while Fraser was counting rounds, you know? Even when they weren't being a duet, exactly, they still hauled their own weight and nobody got killed. Fraser'd probably never even suspected that Ray wouldn't even try, just 'cause it was more fun to get Fraser worried. And now -- and now --

Ray raises a hand and rubs the back of his neck, like Fraser had that one time Ray'd cried in front of him. 'Course, Fraser's hand was warm, and space age nylon just isn't skin, somehow -- but it's close enough, gets his head cleared enough for him to talk straight. "I should've tried harder," he says hoarsely. "Hell, I coulda at least quit complaining long enough to listen to you when you said something important." The wind smacks against his back, hard, and Ray hunches into himself some more, gritting his teeth together to keep them from making any noise. "I woulda done it," he whispers, pretty sure that Fraser wouldn't be able to hear him even if he were alive; half the time they hadn't talked, and the other half they'd screamed themselves hoarse. Whispering never got anything across. "If I'd known you'd -- " He can't say it. "I was just playin' the part, Frase. City boy, Chicago cop -- " He'd kept waiting for Fraser to say something about it: "Ray, you learned to swim in five minutes; you're perfectly capable of learning to snowshoe, if you'd just apply yourself," -- except Fraser never had. He'd been gentle and patient with Ray, and that'd pissed Ray off, too -- what the fuck was that? Had he had a big red stamp on his forehead saying, "Fragile: please handle carefully; this way up"? You don't need to be Fraser to live here. Hell, even Ray'd found Fraser's cabin, hadn't he? He'd found the cabin, he'd hiked out to the middle of nowhere, and he'd come back -- how's that for a Yank, huh?

Except he's not really mad. Fraser's polite -- that's just the way he is -- and he'd probably just somehow said it was his fault when Ray fell on his face. Freak. Idiot. Goddamn idiot --

Ray hugs his knees to his chest, pressing his eyes to his kneecaps so he can maybe make them stop burning; but instead he's choking on something lumpy in his throat, and his face's wet, and after a minute he just gives up on looking tough -- who's gonna see his act out here, anyway?

And 'cause he's sunk as low as he probably can, he doesn't feel it hurt too much when he mumbles "I'm sorry," against his knees. Maybe it did hurt, and he just didn't notice -- either way, he's said it. He's said what he had to say, and now his chest feels drained, empty, like he might just blow off to to the Beaufort Sea if the wind gets it into its head to take him there.

He feels better. He does. He's gotten that curling kettle off his chest. He should feel better.

Except what he really wanted was some kind of sign -- some sort of eagle feather hitting him in the face so he'd know that Fraser doesn't hate him. And there isn't one.

Little by little, it sinks in: Fraser can't forgive him, because he's dead. No matter how many times he says sorry, Fraser's dead -- he hadn't actually realized what that meant, or maybe he'd thought that somebody had saved him and Ray didn't notice. Ray'd tried -- he still has the scar over his forearm where the sled runners'd caught him. And Dief'd tried, just like he had when he'd gone deaf -- except this time, Dief hadn't been able to find Fraser fast enough. They'd all failed, and Ray hadn't really figured that out.

He doesn't cry. He's cried enough. He's done with that. He's gonna go back to Chicago and be a cop, and do somebody some good for a change. He turns his back on the pit and the hill, not really ignoring them but kinda just -- leaving them behind. He can't do anything more about this. He can't do anything more for Fraser.

But still --

-- there's this feeling at the back of his head, telling him to get his ass someplace warm, 'cause there's a storm coming. He doesn't know why he knows, but hey -- he'll go with it. Can't hurt, anyway.

'Sides, maybe this is what having a guardian angel feels like.