Across the Great Divide by Isis/Isiscolo (PG-13)

[mergatrude.livejournal.com]

Fandom: DUE SOUTH
Pairing: Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski
Length: 16,000 words
Author on LJ: isiscolo
Author Website: heirologyfics
Why this must be read:

due South is rich with ghosts, and the fandom is rich with ghost stories. However, Isis has written not simply a ghost story but a time-travelling story. It's a beautifully constructed story about miscommunication, not just between Fraser and Ray, but between Fraser and himself.

He looked out at the route they planned to take. The avalanche chute was clearly visible from the top of the rise, gleaming in the new-risen sun, soft and sparkling and dangerous. Lifting his binoculars to his eyes, he scanned the trail where it passed just below the gully. "It ought to be safe for the next few hours," he murmured to himself.

"It isn't," said a voice next to him, and he nearly dropped his binoculars in surprise as he turned toward the figure that stood there. It wasn't Ray, of course. He would have heard him wake and unzip the tent, had it been Ray, and although Fraser could see no more than blue eyes between the figure's turned-up parka collar and fur-lined hat, he could tell it wasn't Ray.

The man wore the same sort of clothes Fraser himself wore, so perhaps he was a fellow RCMP officer. There was something familiar in those eyes, in the man's bulk and the set of his shoulders. Fraser's first thought was of his father, who had turned up so frequently in unexpected places over the past several years that Fraser had ceased to be startled by his appearances. But his father's ghost had been put to rest, or so he'd thought, with the capture of Muldoon.

Then the man pushed his collar down, and Fraser stared. He might have been looking in a mirror; it was himself.

Across the Great Divide