femgenficathon

Title: Bridges To Babylon
Author: xahra99
Fandom: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Mild violence, some innuendo
Prompt: 142: 'The people who say that you are not facing reality actually mean that you are not facing their idea of reality. Reality is above all else a variable. With a firm enough commitment, you can sometimes create a reality which did not exist before.' -Margaret Halsey
Summary: A brief encounter on the rooftops of Babylon.

Bridges to Babylon

A Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones fan fiction by xahra99.

The people who say you are not facing reality actually mean that you are not facing their idea of reality. Reality is above all else a variable.

-- Margaret Halsey

Author's Note: This story is set during the Two Thrones, after Farah discovers that the Prince and the Dark Prince are the same person but before she gets kidnapped by the Vizier. As ever, the Prince of Persia and all related franchises featured in this story belong to Ubisoft.

Babylon burned.

Farah watched the flames warily and planned her next move. Far to her left, the remains of the city granaries smoldered. To her right a minaret blazed like a candle. Molten bronze dripped from its spire and ignited the surrounding buildings. The alleys of the old quarter, directly ahead, offered the only clear path. Farah rubbed her hands on her filthy skirt. She backtracked a few paces and leapt from the roof.

She hit the next roof running and dived onto the landing of the adjoining house without missing a step. The houses were all empty. Their inhabitants were dead or gone, dragged away by the Vizier's soldiers. Farah scoured the city for those that had slipped through the Vizier's net. They were not her people, but as their own ruler seemed concerned only with revenge, Farah considered it her responsibility to aid them any way she could.

She leapt from the balcony to a windowsill and hung there for a second before she dropped to a conveniently placed flagpole. The pole bent beneath Farah's slight weight and deposited her on a tattered cloth awning. She rolled across the awning before it had a chance to tear, dropped down to a second floor rooftop, hurdled a row of storage baskets and leapt across an alley to the roof of the next house.

"Hello, Farah," a voice said from behind her. "We meet again."

Farah half-turned in mid-jump and hit the tiles with sufficient force to knock the air from her lungs. She skidded down the pitched roof towards the street below. Her clawed fingers caught the edge of a tile and she stopped with a jerk that nearly ripped her nails from their beds. She spun sickeningly over the street, anchored only by one hand's failing hold. The tile creaked ominously. Her free hand scrabbled over sheer mud brick as she swung, desperately trying to gain enough momentum to grip the roof both hands. Her body arched, and her fingers slipped from the tile's glazed surface.

It happened too quickly for Farah to feel frightened. She flailed at thin air for a handhold as the cobblestones approached with alarming speed, realizing how futile the attempt was but unwilling to give up. As she was not expecting to grasp anything (both walls were sheer and several arms-lengths away) she was surprised when somebody grabbed her wrist and hoisted her onto the roof with no apparent effort.

Her rescuer was a man of average height and average build. His eyes burned golden as candle-flames, his skin was a crazy patchwork of glowing lines and charcoal-black crusting, and his hair waved gently in a non-existent wind. He smelled of charcoal and cinnamon.

All in all, Farah would have preferred to take her chances with the cobblestones.

The Dark Prince held her arm a second longer than Farah considered necessary. "Release me, demon," she snapped, her voice cold enough to douse the fires of half Babylon.

The Prince raised an eyebrow sardonically, but he let her go and lounged against the low chimney. "That is all the thanks I get for saving your life?"

Farah glared at him. She wiped the Prince's blackened fingerprints from her arm with distaste. "If you had not startled me, I should not have needed to be saved."

"If you had been more alert, then I would not have startled you," the Prince retorted. "Need I remind you that the Vizier's soldiers are all around?"

"I didn't think that you cared what became of me."

"I don't."

"So why save me?"

The demon signed, as if he found the whole situation rather embarrassing. "A rather inexplicable fondness for you is one of my Prince's many failings."

"Your Prince?" Farah snapped. She took a step away from the demon and took the bow down from her shoulder.

"Yes. My Prince. My alter ego. My better half, you might say." The demon made a noise like the crackling of flames. It took Farah a moment to realize that it was chuckling. "It's really rather simple," it said after it had finished laughing. "I provide the brains, and he the muscle. He makes foolish decisions, and I must suffer the consequences," It smiled like a viper. "A rather unequal partnership, in my opinion. But the poor fool loves you, and it seems that I have no choice but to endure his besotted musings." He ran glowing golden fingers down the razor edge of his whip and shrugged. "I would have let you fall."

"But you didn't."

"That signifies nothing."

Farah shuddered, despite her resolve to show no unease. "There is obviously more of my Prince in you than you know."

"Perhaps," The Dark Prince said. He glanced down at the street for a second before his eyes flicked quickly to Farah. It was a few seconds before the sound was loud enough for Farah's to hear. It was the noise of running footsteps, far below.

Farah dropped lightly to her hands and knees and peered over the eaves of the roof. A woman fled through the streets below. Her scarf flew out behind her as she darted from door to closed door, beating frantically on each one like a netted sparrow. A soldier tracked her leisurely.

"Open up!" the woman screamed.

Farah rose on hands and knees and flung herself to the edge of the roof. She vaulted over the parapet onto the balcony below. The soldier passed beneath her as she landed silently. He absently flicked a morsel of plaster from his helmet as he walked but did not look up as Farah nocked an arrow to her bow. As she aimed, he moved behind some pillars, out of sight.

Farah cursed.

The woman was nowhere to be seen. Farah heard a scream, and then silence. She squinted down the shaft of the arrow. Her arm ached from the strain of holding the bow at full extension. The soldier emerged a moment later with the woman's scarf in one hand and a long knife in the other, the blade stained crimson. The soldier wiped his knife on the scarf and tossed the fabric aside. Farah's arrow took him through the throat before it had fluttered to the ground, but she took no pleasure in it.

The Dark Prince peered over the parapet. "Too late?" he asked. "Such a shame."

"You are no Prince!" Farah shouted up at the demon. She scrambled up the wall without care for scraped hands or bruised knees. "You care nothing for anyone!"

"And you know nothing about anything," the Dark Prince replied. He flicked his whip so that it chimed against the ceramic tiles, a warning that Farah was too angry to heed.

"How dare you?" she hissed. "I am the Maharaj Kumari! I know how to care for my people, but you-" She shrugged, as if he had insulted her too severely for words. "You will be lord of a burning city."

"A thousand apologies, my liege." The Prince sketched a courtly bow. "You remain, of course, as compassionate as you are beautiful." He smirked. "One of your many faults."

Farah closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. The city smelt of smoke and destruction. She ached in every fiber: her tendons and muscles, her crackled and bleeding palms, and her too-soft heart. When she opened her eyes again, her gaze was fearless. "I do not need your help," she said clearly. "I shall destroy the Vizier myself. I wish you joy of your kingdom, my Prince. That which remains."

She turned away to continue her journey over the roofs, and the Prince moved to block her exit. Farah spun to jump down onto the balcony, but he blocked her again. He stood slightly too close for comfort. One hand cradled the barbed strands of his whip. "Excuse me," Farah snapped.

"I merely find your behavior odd." the Prince remarked.

Farah put her hands on her hips. "What do you find odd?" she said silkily.

"This intense dislike of me. You were not the same in Azad."

"I have never been to Azad."

"Oh, you have. Seven years ago, true, but you were there. I was hardly born then, but I remember." He smirked again. The bright tattoos on his forehead and cheeks lent his expression a mocking cast. "Don't tell me that you can't remember? You were in need of a certain marvelous trinket, as I recall. The Dagger of Time. The Prince, all unwitting, came to you. You seduced him, and as he slept, you stole away with the dagger." He pulled a knife from the red sash at his waist. "This dagger."

Farah scowled. "Demons lie," she observed.

"Not always."

She frowned. She had no clear memory of the Prince before their first, hostile encounter on the rooftops of Babylon, but she still remembered that she had expected him to be different. Younger. Less grim. She closed her eyes, and the noise of burning buildings became the sound of falling water. An insistent voice repeated her name. Sometimes it was hesitant, sometimes irritated, sometimes concerned. Always, it searched. Despite herself, she felt a flush of anticipation.

"Ring any bells?" the Dark Prince smirked. He circled her, charred boots moving silently across the tiles. Farah spun to face him, and they rotated in a slow dance. "Shall we take a bath?" he mocked. "I've been waiting...so long."

Farah blushed.

"Why do you act so distant, my Maharaj?" he taunted her. "You are a distraction, true, but a very...appealing one." He tilted his head and scanned Farah intently. She slapped his hand away and yanked at the neck of her tattered blouse. The fabric rose up to conceal her chest but displayed an expanse of lean, concave abdomen between blouse and skirt. Farah's blush deepened and the Prince's smile widened. "Please, do not take my comments too seriously," he said. "Sometimes I am ungracious, it's true. Your assistance has been most valuable. Permit me to ah, show my gratitude."

"I would rather die." Farah snapped.

"That can be arranged."

Farah selected an arrow from her quiver. She nocked the shaft and raised her bow to aim at the Prince. "Don't come near me."

"I wouldn't want you to do anything you might regret, Maharaj."

"Trust me," Farah said. "I won't regret anything."

The Prince chuckled. He resumed his slow circling, lithe as a stalking cat. Farah backed towards the edge of the building. She glanced over her shoulder as she shuffled backwards. The flat roof of a building beckoned. In a few arms- lengths, she would be close enough to jump.

She closed one eye and squinted along the arrow shaft at the demon. The tip of the arrowhead traced slow figure of eights in the air as her arms shook. It moved from the left side of his ribcage to his right nipple and back again. Farah slid one sandaled foot backwards and willed strength into her arms.

The Dark Prince laughed. He threw his head back and opened his arms wide. "Shoot," he said, and smiled, his teeth white against the charred blackness of his face.

Farah drew the bow back another inch.

"Farah?" the Prince whispered. He sounded uncertain, less mocking, and more like the Prince Farah remembered. She knew that it was just another trick, but she did not release the arrow. Her hair fell into her eyes, sticky with sweat. The hot wind of Babylon tugged at her hair as she lowered the bow.

"Good girl," the Dark Prince whispered sibilantly. He moved closer. Farah could smell the strange scent of his skin, like hot desert sand. She risked a glance behind her. The Prince reached out to touch her cheek.

Farah batted his hand away. "I said don't come near me!" There was a tiny pool of water caught in the ruined chimney. Deprived of a more effective revenge, she dashed one hand across the puddle in frustration. Tiny droplets of brackish water hit the Prince's bare chest. His hands flashed up to cover his eyes. Farah saw her opening. She grasped her bow in one hand, turned, and jumped.

She felt a heart-stopping moment of weightlessness before her outstretched hands hit the roof and she pulled herself up. Her heart jolted against her ribcage. She heard the Prince cry out as behind her she dodged around the corner of a ramshackle rooftop granary, but she did not slow down. She paused only after she had put a couple of houses between herself and the demon. The mudblock walls of the next block's granary were warm and comfortable and high enough to conceal her. She squatted on the tiles and waited for the panic to subside as her breathing slowed.

As she squatted there, she heard the distant sound of voices from across the rooftops, half-hidden by the insistent crackling of flames.

"You had no right to do that!"

"I merely felt that she owed us an obligation."

"Why would she? That never happened."

A small explosion echoed from the rooftops and made the Prince's reply inaudible. Farah stood up slowly. Her head was camouflaged among the granary's rush roof. She was sure that it was a good disguise, but the Prince did not even look her way as he dropped down from the roof and set off south along the narrow alleys. His skin was dusty brown rather than charred black, and most of his arrogant confidence had vanished with the skin change. Water dripped from his chin.

Farah shook her head and emerged from the security of her hiding place. She charted the Prince's course and set off in the opposite direction. They'd meet again, she knew.

She was sure of it.