Rating: PG-13 for violence, slight adult situations.
Genres: Drama, Angst, romance, GJR, MJF
Spoilers: Fallen Angel, Back in the Bottle, Looking Death in the Eye, Livia, Eve, Motherhood
Summary: Joxer's life is cold without the women he loves...in his dreams.
Language: A few small profanities.
Sex: Innuendo, but little more.
Violence: Yes. About the level of violence in a battle scene on "Xena". If you are offended by this, please choose another story.
Subtext: None.
Inspiration: Musical notes--the all-haunting "Keep Myself Awake" by Black Lab, "Full of Grace" by Sarah McLachlan, and "And She Dreams" by Swan Dive. Also influenced by the jaw-droppingly good novel The Silver Metal Lover by Tanith Lee.

"Keep Myself Awake" is the companion story to "When She Talks", an earlier story of mine set around the episode Fallen Angel. You don't have to have read "When She Talks" to understand "Awake", but it might add an extra dimension to the reading...plus, it just would be NICE. ^_^

Everlasting gratitude and affection is owed to Lori Bush, my extremely creative, intuitive, and above all patient beta-reader. If this story sucks, it's really not her fault--I've just missed her frantic email screaming "Are you CRAZY?! Don't release it NOW!!" She lets me gripe, she lets me moan, she lets me think her good ideas were mine to start with, she lets me go off on weird ranting meaningless tangents and pretends to be deeply interested. Likewise I owe deeply Rebecca Littlehales, who gave me great advice on several key plot points, and Mel Bradley, who helped me out on some vital stats from "Fallen Angel". You are the greatest, chicas. Thank you so much.

KEEP MYSELF AWAKE
by Black Lab

I hate to talk like this
I hate to act as if
Something's wrong that I can't say
I have this dream at night
Almost every night
I've been dreaming it forever
It's easy to remember it

It's always cold
It's always day
You're always here
You always say
I'm all right
I'll be okay
If I can
Keep myself awake
(Keep...myself...awake..)

I get up early and
I look around me
And can't help but wonder what you mean
Cause while I'm sleeping
I'm so deep in
It's so much more real to me
Closer than reality

It's always cold
It's always day
You're always here
You always say
I'm all right
I'll be okay
If I can
Keep myself awake
(Keep...myself...awake...)
Keep myself awake
(Keep...myself...awake...)

I get up early
I look around me
I'm buying coffee by the pound
But when I'm sleeping I'm
So deep in it
I can't keep myself awake

Keep...myself...awake...
Keep...myself...awake...
(Keep myself awake)
Keep...myself...awake...
Keep...myself...awake...
Keep...myself...awake...
Keep...myself...awake

The smell of rosemary flooded the air, assaulting the senses like a piney ball of Greek fire. He stood breathing it in, his hands tangled in the mane of the palomino mare beside him. The glowing entrance of the tavern both beckoned and repelled him in the twilight.

Rosemary for remembrance, the scholars said. There were so many memories here.

Argo fidgeted, her tail flicking against him in annoyance. He patted her on the flank; then, taking one last deep breath, he went in.

The tavern bustled at this time of night, loud and cheerful. At the back tables, parents murmured to each other while their children squawked with delight and threw food. The warrior element clustered at the bar, singing a very loud and very slurred rendition of a gory folk song. Smoke drifted throughout the room. The air was filled with the smell of sweat and burnt food, and the heavy scent of the rosemary bushes that grew thickly just outside.

Presiding over it all was the tavern mistress, her long dark hair tied back in a severe bun above her long neck. She was obviously cleaning; her plain work dress was grimy and spattered, and she grimaced in frustration as she scrubbed at a particularly stubborn stain on the bar.

Joxer watched her silently for a while, enjoying the feeling of stealth as all her attention was on her work. At last he couldn't take it anymore.

"Hallo, Meg," he said loudly.

The result was almost comical. Meg jumped straight into the air with a strangled squeal, her scrub-rag flying into the air to land on an oblivious drunkard's head. She stared at him, open-mouthed with shock. "JOXER!"

"Oh, come on," he protested. "It's only been three months. It's not like I was going to the other side of the world or something."

"Egypt is close enough," Meg retorted. She leaned across the bar and tousled his hair affectionately. "Gods, it's good to see you, Joxer. So much's happened." Her face clouded for a moment. "So much to tell you."

"This place, for one!" He nodded toward the noisy crowd that stuffed the tavern. "This place has really picked up--you only opened a month before I left!"

Meg beamed at him. "It's great, Joxer. The girls and I are making more money than we ever did before." Her grin grew wolfish. "And it's a whole lot cleaner work, if you know what I mean... I ain't gonna work much longer, but I think I got Polysa trained enough to take my place for a couple months."

"A couple of months?" Joxer asked, surprised. "Why won't you be working? Is there something wrong?"

Her clouded her face again, briefly. "No, there's nothing wrong. Look, we'll talk about it later, okay?" She leaned forward, resting her head on her wrists. "So what's up? How was Egypt?"

"Hot," he said, grinning at her. "You wouldn't believe how hot. And sandy, and they had all these big stone buildings. And crocodiles..." He took off his battered helmet and stared ruefully at a large bite-shaped dent. "I found out about the crocodiles personally."

But Meg had not really been listening to him. "Any luck?" she asked, her voice soft.

Something changed in his expression. "No," he said quietly. "No luck. I looked in Alexandria, I looked in Cairo, Memphis, everywhere. Nobody knew anything."

She covered his hand with hers. "I'm so sorry, Joxer."

"It's been almost six years, Meg," he said brokenly. "They could be being held prisoner by the gods. They could have drank Lethe water and forgotten who they were. They could be too far away to ever come home." He drew his hand from hers and took a deep, ragged breath. "Xena and Gabrielle could be dead."

"I don't know, Joxer," she said with awkwardness. "Xena's so strong. She wouldn't let something happen to her or Gabrielle, would she?"

He stared into space, not seeing her. At last he spoke in a low voice. "I don't know if I can do this anymore. I look, and I watch, and I never see anything. I wake up every morning...I spend the whole day waiting until I can go back to sleep again. I can remember when I dream....I can remember, and it doesn't hurt."

Meg looked at him for a long time, not speaking. Finally, she squeezed his hand gently. "It's getting late, Joxer," she said quietly. "I'm sure you must'a had a long ride. Go on to bed and I'll be there in a little while." She tried to smile. "Get some sleep while you can, okay?"

"Yeah." He pushed himself back from the bar and headed for the back rooms. "I'll get some sleep while I can."

There were trees. Trees meant a forest, right? He was alone in a forest...completely alone. Something's wrong. Where did that thought come from? And why was he alone? Where were Xena and Eve--

Something's wrong. "Gabrielle!" Joxer fought his way through the thick underbrush. All around him he could hear the panic cries of birds, the rustling of fleeing animals. A nameless dread forced him forward. Something's wrong. I know something's wrong. Fleetingly, he saw light ahead and pushed faster. Maybe a clearing... "Xena? Evie!" he called. "Gabrielle, can you hear me? Tell me if you can hear me!"

He was met with silence.

Panting with fear, Joxer shoved through the last bush and...his breath caught in his throat.

Gabrielle knelt in a meadow full of flowers, each more brilliantly colored than the next. The overpowering perfume hit him like a stone wall. The sunlight danced across her blonde hair, seeming to set the air ablaze with white fire. She bent forward, gathered an armful of daisies, and buried her face in their petals. She was so beautiful.

"Gab-Gab?" Joxer gulped. He was still standing at the edge of the forest. "Are-are you okay? I'm sorry, I just..I couldn't find you and I..."

Slowly, Gabrielle looked up at him. Her face was tear-streaked. "Joxer!"

"Gabrielle...you're crying," he said blankly. "What's wrong? Where's Xena and Eve?"

"They're gone," she sobbed, clutching at the flowers. "He took them and they're gone, Joxer!"

"What are you talking about?" He looked frantically about the clearing for some sign, some clue as to the whereabouts of his friend and her daughter. "Who took them? Where are they?"

"Help us," she said pleadingly. "You've got to do something! Joxer!"

"I don't know what to do!" Joxer half-shouted at her. The thought pounded mockingly inside his brain: Something's wrong, something's wrong, something's wrong. "Please, tell me what to do!"

Gabrielle put her face in her hands, letting the daisies fall from her grasp. They vanished as they fell, melting away into the air. Suddenly the flowers in the meadow began to disappear. Gabrielle was left kneeling in a barren, rocky field, crying as hard as she could.

"Gods help us," Joxer whispered. He stepped forward, reaching out to take Gabrielle in his arms...

Something exploded. He threw his arms up over his face, trying to shield himself from the flying dirt and debris. The harsh smell of black powder burned made him cough violently. "Gabrielle!" Joxer screamed. He could hear here still sobbing somewhere in front of him, hidden behind the cloud of dust. He stumbled forward, coughing. "Gabrielle, talk to me!" He couldn't breathe. Joxer stumbled and fell, coughing. He tried to pull himself forward. He could hear her! Gods damn it all, he could hear her!

She sobbed his name, growing fainter and fainter. "Joxer...Joxer..."

"Joxer."

He opened his eyes, not even daring to hope. Meg stood beside the bed, shaking his shoulder gently. "You wanna get up?" she whispered. "There's some stuff to eat if you want it."

"Unnhh." Joxer sat up slowly, rubbing his forehead. "What time is it?"

"After midnight. You've been asleep for a while. I thought you might be hungry..."

His stomach rumbled then, loudly. Joxer smiled wanly. "I guess I am." He rolled to his feet. "Thanks, Meg."

He followed her through the hallways into the tavern. The place was empty, the patrons having left to go home or to a more serious hard drinking establishment. Meg motioned him into a stool at the bar and put a steaming plate in front of him, then poured a mug of ale for herself. "Gods, what a night," she sighed, taking a drink and running her fingers tiredly through her hair. "I don't think this place has been this busy since that convention of Aphrodite's priests was in town. "I'd do anything for a good night's sleep."

"I wouldn't look forward to that for tonight, at least, darlin'," a strange male voice said behind Joxer. Meg tensed visibly, her eyes narrowing and her lips curling back in a snarl.

Joxer looked over his shoulder. A huge nasty-looking warrior towered over him, all leather and scars and cold steel. He was fingering a money pouch at his belt and eyeing Meg with relish. "Been a while, Meggy," he said, grinning. "How's about a romp for old time's sake?"

"I told you, Konops," Meg spat. "I ain't in that no more." She stepped back from the counter. "And after the way you hurt Lucia bad last time, you're not coming near any of us again. Get out. I'm through."

"Once a whore, always a whore, darlin'," the warlord drawled, seeming to relish the drawn-out nastiness of the word. He patted the bartop encouragingly. "Now why don't you come along like a good girl, and we'll talk about payment later."

Joxer stood up, slowly. "She doesn't want to go with you," he said, his voice shaking slightly. "And I think you should leave. Now."

Konops looked at him with distaste. "I don't remember telling you you could be part of this conversation, kid," he snarled. "So why don't you sit yourself back down and shut up before you get yourself hurt?"

"I..." Joxer swallowed involuntarily. The guy loomed over him like a mountain...but he caught a glimpse of Meg's white face out of the corner of his eye. "If you touch her," he said coldly, "you're the one who's going to get hurt."

"Oh, really?" Konops spat on the ground at Joxer's feet. "Go for it, pipsqueak." With one sudden move, he leaned across the counter and backhanded Meg viciously across the face. She crumpled with a surprised squeak of pain. Joxer lunged at him, punching and kicking with all his strength. The warlord smashed his fist into Joxer's nose, sending him to the floor with a grunt. "Weakling," Konops taunted, pulling a dagger from his belt. "Loser scum. Nobody talks to me that way, you hear?"

From behind him Meg jumped on his back, shrieking and clawing at his face. Konops stumbled forward as he tried to shake her off; from the floor, Joxer kicked up at him with both feet, catching him in the stomach. Meg in tow, Konops collapsed on top of him with a curse. The three of them struggled, Joxer and Meg punching and kicking while Konops fought to free his dagger hand, pinned under him against Joxer.

Finally, with a mighty heave, the warlord threw Meg off and stumbled to his feet. "Whole lot of good the pipsqueak's gonna be to you now, darlin'," he sneered at the dazed woman. "I ain't waiting around for the magistrate. Be seeing ya." He threw something at her feet as he hurried out of the tavern.

His dagger, wet and shining with blood.

"Oh gods. Oh gods." Meg dragged herself over to Joxer. He was still lying where Konops had left him, crumpled on his side on the floor. She pushed him onto his back and saw it--a neat, deep hole in Joxer's chest, blood flowing from it with increasing speed. "Oh gods!"

"Gabby?" Joxer whispered hoarsely. "Is that you?" He coughed weakly.

"Hold on, Joxer," Meg said desperately. "Just hold on, okay?" She pulled herself up by the bar and stumbled to the open tavern door. "Help me!" she shrieked. "Somebody get the healer! Please, gods, somebody help me!!"

"It's all right," Joxer croaked. "It'll be fine, Gabby, you'll see."

He wondered, as his eyes slowly fell shut... if he'd ever drifted off to sleep so peacefully before.

He stumbled forward, his arms outstretched in the darkness. The ground crunched unpleasantly underfoot, sharp and slick all at once. Ice. Joxer felt cautiously to his right, coming up against a chill, slippery wall. He followed its upward curve with his hands, fingers beginning to go numb. Some kind of tunnel made of ice, he thought. He shrugged. Stranger things had happened. How he had come to be in a tunnel of ice was not the least of them.

He edged blindly along the wall, pretending not to notice the way his feet kept threatening to skate out from under him. He cupped his hands in front of his face, trying in vain to warm them with his breath...and saw a sliver of light between his fingers.

Joxer opened his hands. Wan light sparkled off the ice in front of him, shining from around a bend in the tunnel. He slipped and slid his way toward it with agonizing slowness, until his feet gave up their battle with gravity and slipped, shooting him down the tunnel. Joxer scrabbled desperately at the ground as he flew wildly along, but to no avail. Finally he threw his arms over his head, closed his eyes, and prayed to whatever god was listening that he at least end up headfirst.

The world spun crazily around him, faster and faster...he was going to be sick...but then everything was still. He was lying sprawled on the ground, the chill of the ice creeping through his armor. Cautiously, Joxer opened his eyes.

He was in a cave, surrounded by walls made of ice. Faint blue light filtered down from somewhere above him, giving the cavern a blue, eerie quality. His breath steamed out in front of him, the only motion in the cold dead air. He shivered. What's going on..

Joxer groped blindly beside him out in the cave, coming up against some kind of ledge. He pulled himself up carefully so as not to slip and...his heart froze.

He had pulled himself up by the side of a perfectly rectangular prism of ice--a coffin. Inside it Gabrielle was still, eyes closed, frozen under glass like some macabre dessert. She was still dressed in battle gear, her hair still perfectly framing her face; but her skin was pale and lifeless. Beside her...slowly he dragged his eyes to the coffin resting beside hers. Within it, Xena lay cold and immobile, a frozen princess from a horrible fairy tale. And there...there were the weapons of the warrior princess, entwined and upright in the snow as though waiting for their owner to pick them up again. As she never would.

"No." Joxer tried not to retch. "Oh, gods, no." As he draped himself miserably over Gabrielle's frozen prison, tears welled up in his eyes...almost blinding him to the faint, involuntary intake of breath in the woman below him. What? He stared at her intently...and saw it again, barely: her chest rose and fell the barest degree. He rushed to Xena's side--just in time to see her slowly exhale.

"You're alive," Joxer whispered. "Oh my gods, you're alive." He hammered on the icy lid of her coffin. "Wake up. Please, you've got to wake up!" The warrior princess slept on in silence.

Panting for breath, Joxer turned to Gabrielle. "Gabrielle!" Joxer pounded desperately on the ice that separated the unconscious bard from the world. "Wake up! You're not dead. I won't let you be dead!" he shouted. His voice echoed off the icy walls, throwing his words back at him with mocking hollowness. He looked about the cave, some powerful unnamed emotion driving him to his feet. The sword! He threw himself at the blended weapons that served as Xena's memorial, wrenching at her blade with all his strength. The icy steel burned him with piercing cold, but it stood firm, frozen.

Joxer stumbled to the wall, the silence deafening him. He brushed against an outcropping of ice; with a crack, it fell into his hands. He stared at it blankly. Gabrielle. The silence roared at him, demanding to be filled.

"Gabrielle!" Howling her name, Joxer threw himself at her icy tomb; hacked away at the ice that separated her from the world. "Gabrielle!" Again and again, he slashed with the ice, with his bare hands, until Gabrielle slept beneath a translucent curtain of his own blood.

"Wake up," Joxer pleaded. His throbbing hands dripped scarlet onto the snow. He watched in horror as the red disappeared into white, swallowed up by the chill ivory. "You're alive." Joxer screamed into the emptiness. "You're ALIVE!"

The words echoed and re-echoed, louder and louder, deafening him with his own shrieks. He covered his ears desperately with his hands, still crouched above the silent woman on the ice, as the ice around him began to rumble and shake. Ice and snow rained down, faster and faster, slicing into him with frozen shards. He wiped the blood away from her distant sleeping face.

"You're alive," Joxer whispered. Beneath her long frost-covered lashes, he saw a glimmer of green.

And then the world went white.

"Joxer." Meg's voice. Joxer tried to say her name, but the words were lost in the mist. She brushed his face gently with her hands.

"You gotta hold on," Meg whispered, her voice raw. "You gotta go find Xena and Gabby, remember? They're counting on you, out there somewhere. I'm counting on you." Her voice cracked. "Your baby's counting on you."

A strange calm came over him as he felt himself pulled deeper into the fog. It was so hard to fight back anymore.

"I'm gonna have your baby, Joxer," she told him. "I didn't think I could, but I guess I am. So you gotta stick around and take be its dad, okay? There's nobody else who can do that. You gotta take it fishing, and give it baths, and tell it stories, and dad stuff. So you can't leave now. We're all counting on you, Joxer. Joxer?"

So easy to just let go..

"Joxer? Joxer! Son of a bacchae! Joxer!"

It was day.

It had to be day. Stark light tore at his eyes, rasped harshly across his face; but there was no warmth in it. Joxer hunched himself inward, trying to pull away from the driving sting of the wind and sleet.

Someone moved beside him. "You'll be all right," a man said, amused.

He looked quickly at the man standing by his side. That is...he looked like a man. He stood a few inches taller than Joxer; thick blond hair swept straight back from his ruggedly handsome face. But how many men dressed in such stylized armor, polished to an otherworldly sheen? How many human men had huge black wings that moved restlessly about in the wind?

How many times had Joxer stood beside an angel?

"Are you--" Joxer swallowed. "Is this Tartarus?"

"No. Not exactly." Brown eyes were inscrutably sad as they gazed into his. "You have to wake up now, Joxer."

"Who are you?"

"It doesn't matter," he said. "This is a dream."

Another icy spasm went through him. "It feels real to me," he said almost accusingly.

The man smiled faintly. "I didn't say it wasn't."

"Wait." Joxer's voice trembled. "Are they here? Gabrielle and Xena?"

"In a way. They're not dead, if that's what you're asking." He looked up at the slate-blue sky. "You have a lot waiting for you, you know."

"If I wake up, they'll be gone," Joxer said quietly. "I'm a little cold, but it doesn't hurt anymore. Not like it does back there."

The black-winged man's face was pale, but he said nothing.

Something in him wanted desperately to explain. To beg. "My entire life...I felt like I was in ice. Struggling to breathe. Gabrielle--Xena--they made me feel like I was alive for the first time. Like I was awake. I watched my whole life for that. I'd give anything just to have that again. I love them. I love them."

"Your child," the blond man said quietly. "Would you give me your child?"

"My child?"

They stood in silence for some time. Joxer moved restlessly, staring out across the barren tundra, but the winged man's eyes never left his face.

"I can't," Joxer said brokenly. "My child's life...it isn't mine to give."

"I understand." The angel put a hand on his arm. "I wouldn't have taken your son, anyway." He grinned mischievously, his face a sudden strange echo of Gabrielle's. "Probably wouldn't."

"Take me to them." Joxer did not smile. "Please."

"You have to wake up, Joxer," the man repeated. "You don't belong here." He closed his wings around himself against the rising bitter wind. "This is a dark place. You weren't meant for dark places."

"I was meant to be with them!"

"Joxer."

The snow blinded him, drove him to the ground like a knife. The angel's touch burned across his face, fiery cold.

"You always will be," he said.

six weeks later

He closed his eyes and inhaled, letting the succulent aroma wash over him. "My gods. This is familiar....Why does this smell so good?"

"Because I'm a good cook, you idiot!" Meg grinned at him as she set the platter down on the table. "One of my mom's boyfriends taught me. Roast chicken with rosemary is why mine is the best tavern around."

"I can smell why," Joxer told her. He reached for the knife, wincing as the movement pulled at his wound.

"Rosemary is kinda what saved your life, you know," she said seriously, sitting cross-legged at the table across from him.

He paused, one bite already on its way to his mouth, and deliberately rolled his eyes at her.

"I'm serious," she protested. "Rosemary helps keep wounds clean. Mom's boyfriend showed me that too."

"Should I be thanking you, or your mom's boyfriend, then?" he asked with his mouth full.

"Thank me. That boyfriend ran off with all our stuff." She regarded him thoughtfully. "You're damn lucky to be alive."

"I know," he told her softly. "Believe me, I know."

"I'm glad you didn't die," she said, her voice quiet. "I know what it's like to have to grow up without a dad."

Their eyes met. Joxer leaned forward and squeezed her hand. "This baby will have a father, Meg. Even if I have to tie him and you to Argo's back and haul you around the world with me, this baby is going to have a father."

"Yeah. I know." She glanced away. "Where do you think you'll look next?"

"Britannia," he told her, taking another bite. "Maybe Eire and the Highlands. Ares might have taken them there, because of Hope. Next week or the week after, I'll go see if I can catch a boat to the islands."

Meg looked back at him, startled. "Two weeks?" she objected. "Joxer, you're hurt. You need time to get better..."

"I need to do this, Meg."

She paused, then rolled her eyes dramatically and blew her bangs up in amused disgust. "Suit yourself." She rested her chin on her hands. "You ain't gonna be here when the baby's born, you know. So what you want to name it?"

"Name it?" Joxer said, surprised. "I don't know. Don't you have a name you want?"

"Well, yeah. If it's a girl." Meg looked shyly at him. "I thought...Megara. Like me."

"That's a pretty name." He grinned at her. "I like it. What if it's a boy?"

"I don't know. How about...Joxer?"

"Not in this lifetime," Joxer objected hotly. "I'm not going to make my son be the fourth name like that in his family!" He looked surprised. "I said 'my son'. My son."

"Yeah. Your son," Meg said. She leaned forward and smiled. "What you wanna name your son, Joxer?"

Brilliant blue-green eyes grinned up at him, the curve of her smile hidden behind a bouquet of daisies that matched her golden hair. All his life he had waited for her, wanted her, tagged along beside her in his dreams. He'd always hoped they'd have a son to name. Always hoped, someday...

Joxer shook his head as if to clear it. "Hey." He looked at Meg pensively. "How about...Virgil?"

"Virgil?" She wrinkled her nose. "Kind of a sissy name, ain't it?"

"Hey!"

"All right, all right. If it's a boy, we'll name it 'Virgil'." Meg wrinkled her nose even further. "For its sake, I hope the poor thing's a girl..."

With a good-natured growl, Joxer sat back in his chair and tried to become interested in his food again. The crisp scent of rosemary flooded through him, tart and piney. "Virgil is a good name."

Virgil is a good name.

Virgil.

Vigil.

I will watch for you, Gabrielle. I will never stop watching for you.

Please take a moment to write to Kawcrow at kawy@cox.net and let her know how you liked the story!

COPYRIGHT NOTICE:
Xena: Warrior Princess, Xena, Gabrielle, Joxer, Meg, and all other characters who have appeared in the series, together with the names, titles and backstory are the sole copyright property of StudiosUSA and Renaissance Pictures. The lyrics to "Keep Myself Awake" by Black Lab, "Full of Grace" by Sara MacLachlan, and "And She Dreams" by Swan Dive are owned by the appropriate copyright holders. The Silver Metal Lover is © 1981-1999 Tanith Lee and is excerpted without permission. No infringement of copyrights or trademarks is intended in the writing of this fan fiction. This story is copyright © 2000 by Kawcrow and is her sole property along with the story idea. This story cannot be sold or used for profit in any way. Copies of this story may be made for private use only and must include all disclaimers and copyright notices.