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purple-dahlias · 3 years

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recovering- chapter 2

word count: 1742

trigger warnings: eating disorders, disordered eating, mental health

hello! this is the second chapter of recovering. it’s taken a while (oops) but i hope you enjoy <3

(also chapter 1 can be found here)

The days bleed by, agonisingly slow. Sarah goes about her last days in the emergency department almost completely on autopilot, in a daze. If she had to describe it, it was as though there was a wall separating her from everyone else, everything just felt far-off and somehow muffled. Perhaps it was an overreaction, but things just feel different somehow, ever since match day. Even the way the others behaved towards her.

How Natalie had reacted when Sarah had told her. Polite with her congratulations, but somehow different. Maybe even apologetic, as though she herself had been hoping to be told something different. And maybe Sarah was overanalysing, picking things apart too closely, reading into them when there was nothing to be found. But still. It only contributed towards making her doubts more pronounced, every part of her screaming out: you’ve made a mistake. And how was she supposed to tell anyone that? Especially when she had seemed so dead set on pathology. How was she supposed to turn it around? There was only herself to blame.

None of Sarah’s thoughts do any good for her, and she wishes, oh how she wishes she could turn back time. That feeling, that unhappiness, seeps into every part of her, taking a vice-like hold over her, rooting deep within. This is supposed to be her future, the rest of her life. And already, she’s completely messed things up. So she does what she always does. Retreats into herself.

But it’s on her last day, incidentally the night of her graduation, that things take a turn. Even then, she just can’t let it go. Can’t shake the feeling that she had walked into something so very completely wrong. And where does that land her? The nurses’ station in the PICU, waiting for little Michael’s test results to come back from the labs. Dr Manning had already told her to go, she had a graduation to attend after all, but Sarah couldn’t. She can’t leave now. Not until she knows Michael, lying a few feet away from her in a cot fighting for his life, is going to pull through.

It means she misses her graduation, but what does it matter? Her mother’s not coming. There’s no one else to see her. It’s of no real importance to her, she tells herself. It’s only a ceremony, a formality. She’ll still be a doctor without going. And in any case, it was worth it, because now, now she knew, Michael was going to be okay. The hug she gets, the smile from Doctor Manning, the way she gets be the bearer of good news: there was a happy ending to this story. It was worth it. All of it.

Apart, she remembers, from the fact that this wouldn’t be her life anymore. Today marked the day it was all over.

What should be a momentous occasion almost feels like a cruel joke, opening the box to find her lab coat emblazoned with pathology across the chest. She’d made it, she was Dr Reese now. But it was all just more than a little bittersweet. Even with Ethan, for all his kindness and congratulatory remarks, she can’t find it in her to be completely happy, as she knows she should.

The guilt wells up inside of her, until she can’t quite bare it any longer. Until there’s nothing else for her to do.

It’s a rash decision, one she’s sure will send the others in the ED reeling when they find out. But it’s her only option now, she doesn’t quite know what else to do. And Dr Shore telling her she won’t have a job anymore, well… it’s not like she hadn’t already thought of that.

For the first time in a very long while, Sarah Reese has no plans, no direction. Nothing. And yes, whilst it was a completely self-made problem, it was still more than a little daunting. To have your whole future, which had only moments ago been filled, now completely empty, stark and uninviting. A perfect blank canvas stretching out for miles ahead. No prospects.

One conversation and she’s gone. One conversation and it’s all over. No residency, no reason to stay: as far as she’s aware, there are no other residency posts open at Gaffney. But nowhere to go, either. It’s completely ludicrous, what she’s gone and done. Even if Dr Charles tells her she’s going to be “just fine,” it doesn’t feel that way. Not one bit. In many ways, it’s more like the world has ended for her. And for her, maybe it has.

–

There were not many things that remained constant in Sarah Reese’s life. But one that was, was the only thing that she had left now. And it’s all too easy to collapse into herself, let it fill up the gaping, empty spaces inside of her.

Her apartment seems darker, colder, lonelier these days. Which she knows seems irrational, because physically, nothing had changed inside of it. But it still all just all felt wrong. Like she had stepped into the twilight zone, was living someone else’s life.

She was alone now, completely alone. She knew it was only a matter of time before Joey stopped calling, stopped texting, stopped trying to go and get her to meet him. That was the way. Sarah always pushed everyone away, that was just how it went. Yes, she had been alone before. In grade school, at college, in med school. But this was different. Then, she had been alone but alongside other people, even if it was on the outskirts of their lives, it wasn’t total isolation. This, however: she was an island. A shell of her former self. A shadow, an outline of a person. And it’s an awful thought, but it crosses her mind, more than she’d care to admit. If she died, if anything were to happen to her, would anyone notice; who would care?

“You have nothing,” she says aloud to no one in particular, glancing at her reflection in the mirror, the morning of the fourth day after she had quit pathology. It was all true. What was she to do now? There had always been a goal to work towards. Finish high school. Get into med school. Graduate. Secure a residency post. And now? What was there for her?

Time slips by. Hours, days, and somehow, strangely, weeks, without Sarah quite noticing. What she does with that time, if asked, she would never be able to say. And not for lack of trying—it all just passes in a haze. Her lab coat remains crumpled at the bottom of her bag, stethoscope discarded in a drawer in the living room to gather dust. She won’t be needing either of them. Laundry begins to pile up, but Sarah doesn’t care. All she needs is the blue cotton sweatshirt she’s been wearing for days on end, the fabric softer against her skin, hanging far looser from her frame than it had ever done before. Groceries go neglected, not that she needs much. She finds she can hardly stomach anything much these days, apart from wafer crackers with peanut butter, the occasional bowl of cereal (without milk, of course).

The isolation doesn’t help; it makes everything a thousand times worse, she doesn’t know where to begin. Now there’s completely no one to hide from, no one to pretend for. Things are bad, and Sarah sinks into it. It’s like second skin. There again, there when she was absolutely alone.

When she finally manages to drag herself out from her apartment, summer is well and truly in full swing. She’s taken up long walks, through the parks and the streets of Chicago. Sometimes aimless, sometimes with purpose. Slowly she gets round to groceries, though never quite buying enough. But it’s not as though she uses it all up, anyway. Better to undercut, she thinks. Things seem to last longer these days, anyhow.

By the fourth week, Sarah knows this can’t go on. Her doing nothing. As much as she feels she has no energy, still no direction. Something has to change. In any case, with no job now, she needs to find a way to pay her rent at least.

She must be the most overly qualified barista in all of Chicago, with an MD attached to her name. Not that anyone knows that. Not that any of them would care in the slightest. She’s not so sure she deserves that title anyway, what with the way things turned out. But it feels at least a little better, having something to do, a little more routine, a little more structure to her days. It’s not ideal. No newly graduated doctor wants to be manning a till and serving coffee, but this was her life now. Small, quiet, trimmed down to almost zero people. The only person she still saw from her life Before was Joey. She’s pretty sure he’ll stop coming soon. And she’s right.

The upside, if there is an upside to any of this, is that Sarah Reese has always been good at working with what she had. She was used to getting things done alone, used to her own company, her own thoughts, however awful they might get. Just like in college. And medical school. She had been alone. Been there for herself. Pulled herself along. Her own champion and cheerleader in one. And maybe it hadn’t quite worked out perfectly; she hadn’t quite escaped without the scars, but still. She was here. And that had to count for something, didn’t it?

Sometimes, she thinks that when Will had asked her, she should have said something. What exactly, she doesn’t quite know. But maybe something. Because now, no one notices it happening this time. How groceries stretch further and further. How the gaps between her meals increase and the portion sizes decrease. How the dark circles under her eyes only grow. How she’s now a little more shaky, a little more unsteady. The dogs at the shelter she volunteers at on Saturdays don’t notice. The others on her shift at the coffee shop don’t notice. No one does. And it’s fine, it’s really all fine. Because there’s nothing wrong and Sarah’s never had a problem. Never.

And this is her life now, anyway. Just her, her apartment, the coffee shop a few blocks over and the dog shelter on Saturdays. That was her lot.

#recovering!au #recovering!fic #sarah reese #chicago med #my writing #eating disorder tw #chapter 2

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hermits-that-craft · 3 years

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In My Dreams (Will You Remember Me?)

Flower Husbands Fic - Chapter Nine - I’ll Keep Him Safe From The Dark Things That Wait

AO3 and Trigger Warnings in reblogs.

“Goodmorning Fwip!” Jimmy says, landing on the path outside of the Grimland city. Fwip smiles at Jimmy, his red goggles over his eyes. “How are you?”

“I’m doing great, Jimmy.” Fwip says, smiling. “How are you?”

“I’m good.” Jimmy replies, taking off his elytra. “So, trade deals?”

“Right.” Fwip laughs. “I forgot that’s why you’re here. I’ll be honest, I thought I would be giving you a tour of Grimlands.”

“I’d love a tour.” Jimmy smiles under his mask. Fwip lights up at that, smiling wider, less sheepish than only a few moments ago. “We can always discuss trade deals afterwards.”

“Speaking of which,” Fwip opens the gates for Jimmy, inviting him into his empire. “Did you have any ideas of what you would like?”

“Honestly, my advisors told me to go for an equal amount of gunpowder.” Jimmy responds, ducking through the gates. “But we can iron this out later.”

Jimmy whistles as he straightens up. The Grimlands are magnificent. People rush around the city, bumping into people and walking faster than Jimmy thought people would have any reason to. The city is filled with life, storefronts lit up with people looking around inside. Children in neat uniforms dash down the streets with their friends.

The city is lively, but there’s no street vendors. No people busking in the morning light, no one selling fresh fruit and freshly cooked pies on the intersections. People race down the streets, but no one stops. No one talks to each other, save for teenagers hurrying not to miss their first classes. The city is full of life, but does that life disappear with the end of the morning rush?

“You gonna move, or are you just going to stay there and gawk?” Fwip asks, leaning against a light post.

“It’s so busy.” Jimmy says, moving to avoid bumping into a woman in a suit.

“Oh, don’t worry. It practically empties in fifteen minutes.” Fwip smiles, something dangerous flashing in his eyes. He hasn’t removed his goggles yet, even though its not that sunny. “After we get something to eat, the streets will be ours.”

“I ate before I came.” Jimmy says quietly, trying to avoid taking his cod head off around Fwip.

“Aw, that sucks.” Fwip pouts. “I booked us in to eat at my favourite cafe.”

“I suppose I could get something small.” Jimmy winces, trying not to offend the other ruler. “As long as I don’t have to remove my mask!”

“Don’t worry, you won’t lose your head.” Fwip laughs, leading Jimmy though the city. The houses tower over the pedestrians, the streets narrowing and winding until Jimmy’s head is spinning.

“Can we slow down, Fwip?” Jimmy asks, trying to keep up with his guide.

“If we slow down the crowd will separate us, just try to keep up!” Fwip grabs Jimmy’s hand, pulling him along down the street. The streets blur together, sharp corners and large courtyards and narrow streets and large crossroads make Jimmy’s head spin. Will his empire become like this, after he’s dead?

He wouldn’t be able to recognise it.

Fwip pulls him through the open door of a small, homely cafe. A tabby cat stretches in the sun yawning as a young woman sweeps the floor with an old wooden broom. There’s plants stretching over every inch of spare space, including the ceiling beams and the edges of paintings that litter the walls. An elderly woman sings to herself as she washes some plates, soapy water barely remaining in the tub. A young man, his hair tied into a neat bun, smiles at the two emperors with a smile that screams home. Like Jimmy’s come home, even though he’s never been in this shop before. It’s…

It’s nice.

“Welcome to The Rockrose and the Thistle cafe, how can I help you?” The man asks, a kind smile on his face.

“Hey Iorro, could I have my regular?”

“Of course, Lord Flynn.” The man smiles, wider than before, and Jimmy can feel his heart begin to race. “And for you, honoured guest?”

“A hot chocolate and something small?” Jimmy asks, and Fwip gives him a nod, almost thankful.

“Could I have a name to go with that?”

“You can refer to me as Jacob, but you can’t have my name.” Jimmy says smoothly, and Iorro laughs, tilting his head back.

“You’re observant, it took Lexi hitting me to stop me from taking our lovely king’s name.” Iorro says, and the young woman stops her sweeping.

“Iorro, if you touch these men’s food, I swear-” She laughs. “It’s a pleasure to have you both, I hope you enjoy your meals. I’ll handle the cooking. Iorro, swap with me.”

The fae man - who’s tall, taller than Jimmy thought he was, towering over Jimmy - takes the broom off of Lexi before he starts to sweep.

Fwip leads Jimmy into a side room, one that forgoes the plants for window seats and a small block of deepslate redstone. Jimmy takes the seat closest to the window, watching as the people outside of the cafe mill about, laughing inaudibly and racing to the next place. The crowds slowly dissipate as he watches, and Fwip laughs.

“Not many cafes in the Cod Empire?” Fwip asks, a teasing lilt to his voice.

“None like this.” Jimmy admits. “This place is something else.”

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

“Good.” Jimmy says, as the door creaks open. “Definately good.”

“Coffee with three shots of espresso?” The elderly woman asks.

“Thats mine.” Fwip says, smiling. “Thank you.”

“Are you trying to give yourself a heart attack?” Jimmy asks incredulously.

“Don’t try to talk him out of it, boy.” The woman says. “He’s been ordering this for years. At this point it’s the only thing keeping him awake. I assume you have the hot chocolate?”

“That would be lovely, thank you.” Jimmy says, and the lady laughs.

“What would be more lovely is if you talk this man out of drinking that every morning.” The lady deposits their drinks in front of them, steam swirling out of the cups. “Have a good day, emperors.”

The woman walks out of the room, and Jimmy looks down at his drink. A small cod is made in the foam art that floats on the top of the drink, and Jimmy coos. Lexi drops off two sandwiches to the table, which Fwip takes with a smile.

“Jimmy, they gave me your marshmallows.” Fwip says, holding out two towards Jimmy. “You want them.”

“I’m not five, Fwip.” Jimmy says. “Of course I want the marshmallows.” Fwip drops them into Jimmy’s drink, and Jimmy laughs as Fwip hisses at the splash from the hot milk.

“Don’t laugh at me, that hurt.”

“What did you expect?” Jimmy says, taking a sip of the hot chocolate. “Wow, this is really sweet.”

“They must like you.” Fwip says. “Cause my coffee’s burnt.”

“That sucks.” Jimmy offers, downing the rest of his drink. The sweetness is strange - the marshmallows must have had extra sweetener, normal hot chocolates aren’t this saccharine.

“You ready to leave now?” Fwip asks, standing up.

“Sure.” Jimmy stumbles a bit as he stands, btu he lets Fwip lead him out of the cafe.

They walk through the empty city for a while, the silence overwhelming. Jimmy wants to say something, to break the awkward silence that threatens their every step, but he can’t. He knows the words he wants to say, but they get lodged in his throat and twist around his tongue, like a vine is creeping up and strangling him.

Fwip leads him into an alleyway, one too small to be of any use besides a shortcut, but the only place it leads to is the wall. Jimmy sways a bit, turning to face Fwip. This isn’t where they’re supposed to be.

Blink.

Fwip smiles.

Blink.

Sausage laughs in the distance.

Blink.

Jimmy’s swaying. He can’t stand up for much longer.

Blink.

Fwip takes off his goggles.

Blink.

Jimmy’s on the floor now.

Blink.

Fwip’s eyes are as red as Joey or Sausage's eyes.

Blink.

Blink..

Blink…

---

Jimmy’s head rests on some cold stone. It’s nice, really. He feels so hot, like there’s fire under his skin, burning at his lungs. But it’s also too cold, he’s shivering. Where is he? He was just with Fwip, what happened, did he faint? A breeze passes his face, and his eye slowly opens.

Where is his mask?

Why won’t his other eye open?

“Good morning Jimmy.” Fwip says, leaning against the wall. “Took you long enough to wake up.”

“Where…” Jimmy tries to sit up, finding himself unable to.

At least Dogwarts didn’t get him. I can’t lose him.

“What?” Jimmy mumbles out loud. What is dogwarts?

“Don’t worry, Timmy.” Sausage says, pushing Jimmy’s head back onto the altar. “None of this will hurt, we just need your help.”

“What’s going on?”

“Don’t worry about it.” Sausage kneels down in front of Jimmy, looking into the Codfather’s eyes. “You’re going to meet a friend of ours.”

“He’s already met me before.” A deep, warped voice says, and Jimmy’s heart leaps into his throat. No. Not here. Not now. “He’s much more expressive without the head.”

Jimmy flings himself backwards, putting as much space between him and the demon as possible. Sausage and Fwip laugh, pushing Jimmy towards the altar. Jimmy tries to struggle, but the world spins and-

And there’s blood on the floor. It’s dry, dark brown, but it’s his. His arm hurts. Why didn’t his arm hurt before? Why didn’t he notice he was bleeding? Why did Fwip hurt him?

“So he’s come out of shock.” Xornoth laughs. “Thank you both for collecting him, we truly can hit my brother hard, having something of his.”

“Jimmy isn’t Aeor’s champion?” Sausage asks, and Jimmy blinks.

The gods have never loved him, why would Sausage think one of the elfs would?

“No, he’s the champion's soulmate.” Xornoth laughs, walking up to the trio. “He’s important, not important enough to matter, but important enough to kill.”

“Too scared to kill me yourself?” Jimmy snarks, shaking. He’s not scared, really he isn’t.

He’s been here too many times, in his nightmares, for this to have any effect on him. He’s shaking because he’s cold, not because he’s scared. It’s too hot, but he’s still cold. The blood oozes out of him - will his arm go septic, if he escapes? How will he escape, why was he paying attention to Xornoth he should have focused on escaping.

“Too busy,” Xornoth says. “To bother myself with pest control.”

“Should we sacrifice him?” Sausage asks, and Jimmy stills as he feels the sharp blade of an axe gently tap his neck.

“Wouldn’t it be a shame,” Jimmy closes his eyes, trying to fight back tears as his fate is sealed. “If such a lovely altar wasn’t used.”

SolidarityGaming was sacrificed on the altar by MythicalSausage

#in my dreams (will you remember me?)#imd(wyrm)#empires smp fic

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youllallriseintheink · 3 years

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What is your BATIM crew like post-ink?

I'm going to use one of my old AUs for this!

I have this AU where everyone gets out. It begins with Henry timing his loops just right so he can use the phone in Joey's house to call the police while he's asleep. From there, Joey sacrifices himself to avoid the legal consequences of his actions, and the ink machine is taken by the government, who gradually evacuate everyone and give them human bodies again using the machine.

Alright-where everyone ended up.

Henry: He went home to Linda. He has trust issues due to Joey throwing him into the time loop, mild PTSD, and nightmares that he’s back in the studio. He was able to carry on with his normal life after escaping the time loop, and was able to recover with time and Linda’s support.

Joey: Joey eventually broke out of the sketch dimension while the government had control of the machine. He turned himself into a person that bore no resemblance to him and ran. He begged Nathan for help, since he'd been left with nothing, and Nathan gave Joey to his son as a "birthday present," since his son idolizes Joey. After a few months, Joey decided that he wanted to redeem himself, and tried to reconnect with some of the people he'd hurt in order to figure out how.

Sammy: Sammy and Susie live together, largely because Sammy needs a lot of support right now. He responds to mild threats (like someone sneaking up on him) with fear and violence because he’s used to such a dangerous environment, along with other symptoms of PTSD such as nightmares. He also never wants to be a leader again. He feels like he was terrible at it, and that it forced him to be strong for too long. He doesn't trust himself and has become pretty meek compared to the bold, demanding man he once was- in his words, a sheep. He and Susie are very involved with a cozy little church that he found. It's good to be the one receiving support and direction after having to give it for so long. He’s also one of the only people who got anything good out of the experience: he learned a ton of patience, tolerance, and leadership skills- not that it outweighs the bad.

Susie: Susie is doing better than Sammy overall, but she has her own host of issues. She spent years trying to get enough control of herself to kill Malice, and as a result, she has an instinct to harm herself when under severe stress. She has insomnia and nightmares about turning back into Malice, of doing terrible things, of losing control, or of everyone turning their back on her. Music also made her very uncomfortable at first- but Sammy got her over this over time. She's a resilient girl, and is going to make a full recovery. In fact, she’s going to be a much more forceful and independent person than she once was, to make up for the years she spent with no control of even her own body.

Jack: he became a barely-conscious ink blob pretty quickly, so he has fewer scars than most. What really hurt him was missing out on seventeen years of his family’s life- his adoptive children are grown up now and his husband is much older than him. He went back to them anyhow, eventually becoming a caretaker for his husband once he got old enough to need one.

Thomas: He and Allison were only dead for months instead of several years, so they would have an easier time coming back to their old lives. That is, if Allison hadn't lost her memories. Thomas has a long road ahead of him, explaining to her who she once was. They also requested to adopt Buddy once his soul is captured and transferred into a human body. Thomas is keeping himself as busy as possible and focusing on others as much as possible because he knows that he's going to have problems if he starts looking inwards. Before he started doing that, seeing how his invention hurt everyone made him a lot more brooding, sometimes disappearing all day (or longer) to work on machinery in the garage, walk through the woods, or lay in bed. His drinking and angry outbursts also worsened, to the point where he and Allison could barely keep their relationship together. He worries it'll be like that again once if he ever gives himself too much time to think.

Allison: The outside world is beautiful! Tom, what do you mean I can't carry my giant-ass machete in public? Okay, but if we get attacked I'm gonna say "I told you so!" Tom has his work cut out for him. He actually gave up on her at one point. On the bright side she's more cheerful than a victim of that much trauma has any right to be. She just wishes she could help Tom more. He's clearly suffering and trying to cover it up.

Wally: He was also pulled from his old life for months instead of years, and was only conscious for like a day before he was murdered. So he's a little traumatized about the two attempted murders (he can't go into people's houses unless he's with someone he trusts, for instance), but he's still able to live a normal life.

Norman: made out worse than anyone. Mentally, he's still the Projectionist- violent and barely capable of speech, Norman is gonna have to stay in an asylum for a good, long time before he rejoins society. He does get better over time. His wife, his daughter, and Grant visit him often and help him adjust once he's out.

Lacie: in the sketch dimension, Lacie figured out that you could bring a person back into consciousness by exposing them to something that triggers a trauma response. She did this to Shawn so many times that it stopped working. She also blamed Grant for Shawn's death and, once her personality had fused somewhat with Barley's and Shawn was gone for good, physically abused him. Now that she's out of the dimension, she feels a ton of guilt over it. She’s decided that the best way forwards is to form new connections with people she hasn’t hurt rather than to try and make amends. As a result, she cut ties with Shawn and Grant and didn't bother contacting her wife and child. Frankly, she thinks she'd make a poor wife in this state. She’s still working for Bertrum. She’s a lot more delicate than before and somewhat nastier to others. Bertrum forced her to go to therapy, since she didn't want to out of a combination of self-punishment and thinking she's too tough for it.

Grant: Thankfully, Grant's family is tight-knit and able to give him a ton of support. He's gonna need it. He's able to "live" "independently," but barely. He's holding down a job but doesn't have a life outside of it and is taking pretty poor care of himself. His family members visit him often to make sure he's alright. They're pretty much the reason he's still alive. He doesn't trust anyone outside of his own family (plus Norman and his family) and carries pepper spray. He cut ties with Shawn because he thought he'd be a burden on him. Despite doing so poorly initially, he’s eventually going to figure out that he’s a goddamn survivor and get his life together because he deserves it.

Shawn: Shawn went painfully emotionally numb to cope with what Lacie did to him. Thankfully, he also has a supportive family. (Ex-butcher gang members are very family-oriented, the same way they flock into trios. Lacie should really go visit her sister!) They're the reason he hasn't become an addict of some sort in order to feel something. He’ll become less numb over time and eventually get back to (a less reckless, cheerful, and carefree version of) his old self.

Bertrum: He was among the strongest ink creatures and didn’t see much due to being immobile, so he’s one of the least traumatized ones. He's also pleased with how his son has carried on his legacy. He's pretty worried for Lacie though, and does have some symptoms. Vertigo and nightmares, for instance.

#bendy and the ink machine #lowfructosecornsyrup #joey drew crew #Risen ink post-studio AU #thanks for the ask #tw: self harm #tw: suicide #ask to tag

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hardkinkbardkink · 4 years

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anon asked: I am once again sending you a prompt, which I think is like my third one? Sorry for the spam I guess. Eskel is the love of my life soo... Eskel meeting Jaskier after The Mountain, and quickly falling in love with the charming bard. He knows Jaskier’s heart belongs to Geralt, but his body belongs to Eskel. They get to Kaer Morhen, and ofc Geralt is there. Eskel having to deal with that- but it all ends happily with a big polyamorous fuck pile. Jaskier definitely has enough love for both witchers.

listen. i. Adore eskel. i fucking LOVE that bitch, i love him greatly and i love him fiercely, he is the light of my life & my forever favourite witcher character and not even sweet darling joey batey as jaskier can change that like?? eskel is It for me. i was maybe seven when i played the first game because it is a National Classic and you were legally obliged by law to play it and wee bairn me looked at this four pixels of a man on my screen and thought fuck guess i gotta be gay?? the fucking. quest. where he gets his face ripped open. when i tell you i cried. and then he got even hotter?? impossible. i’ll never love a character like that again, it’s been too long to change x

my mild obsession aside, did you mean for this to be so angsty? because it is, it’s fucking Sad and has Feelings and also a soft threesome that feels firmly out of place on my noncon-bestiality-centric porn blog (so i posted in on ao3 too)

as always i look at canon and i pretend i do not see it lovelies x

send in more eskel prompts if you want him to get fucked in true hard kink fashion & also send in more eskel prompts in general i will never refuse

***

Eskel has no intention to stop in that tavern at all, until he hears the singing.

It’s nothing, he tells himself.

It’s nothing, and yet he pulls Scorpion to a reluctant halt, pays the stablehand a copper and no mind as he makes his way, ensorcelled, to hover near the entrance. He’d heard the one particular song in so many renditions his head spins with it. Most of them lousy, some of them bearable. This one—

Oh, but this one seems like it’d been torn from the bard’s very soul.

Eskel waits until the final, unusually heart-wrenching notes of Toss a coin bleed into a brief silence.

He doesn’t enjoy taverns much—the burning glances when he settles at a table, swords at his back and hood pulled low over his eyes. The quiet chorus of gasps when he slips the bastard cloak off and people get a good look at his monstrous, twisted face, averting their gaze quickly but drawn in by morbid curiosity again and again. Their reluctance to serve him, to approach him, to trust him with his own damn job.

Eskel’s had decades to get used to it.

Maybe next century.

He pulls the door open with an unsteady hand, eyes falling immediately to the bard, centre stage as he can manage in a wayward tavern not designed for such performances. He’s dressed finely, lavishly, with great care and taste and Eskel lets himself admire, just for a moment.

“Oh,” the bard breathes on a sharp inhale, and his dazzling blue eyes glitter with a sort of recognition that punches Eskel right in the gut with its intensity.

It’s entirely quiet for a few painful heartbeats.

“Oi!” a man hollers to his side, clearly too deep in his cups to try at decency. “Y'heard the bard, toss a fuckin’ coin to the witcher.”

They don’t, and Eskel would never ask that of them—but he’s served a decent pint on the house as soon as he sits down in a darkened corner, and his cheeks can’t exactly burn, but he feels like they would.

The bard gets through another song, a bawdy drinking tune. Eskel keeps his eyes on him the whole time, though he barely hears the words, mesmerised by the sway of the man’s hips and the honey-warm timbre of his voice.

A faint panic rises up in his throat when the bard thanks his audience for their attention, bowing in a manner entirely too exaggerated for this place and time—and makes his way with a strange mix of confidence and reluctance to sit across from Eskel.

“My apologies for presuming,” the bard begins, and Eskel watches with bated breath as his long, shapely fingers wrap around Eskel’s own mug. He takes a deep drink, eyelashes casting lovely shadows on his cheeks. “Eskel?”

He nearly chokes on his own tongue, but manages to nod curtly.

“It seems that Destiny’s playing tricks on me.” The bard’s lips twitch up in a sad smile. “I’m Jaskier. Pleased to make your acquaintance, after all these years.”

Jaskier. Jaskier. Of course it’s Geralt’s fucking bard, his—

“I must say, I harboured my hopes that you wouldn’t be quite as broody and silent as Geralt is.”

Eskel manages to shake himself out of it, though only barely.

“Sorry.” He clears his throat in an attempt to make his voice less gravely. Less threatening. “Sorry, fuck, just spent so many winters with Geralt talking my ear off about you, I’d half-expected the bastard to’ve made you up.”

He tries for light-heartedness. A flash of poorly-disguised pain passes through Jaskier’s face, and Eskel realises it was decidedly not the way to go.

“Ah, you won’t have to worry about that anymore, darling. Geralt and I are no longer companionable, in any way.”

Perhaps it’s the darling that does him in. Perhaps it’s the overwhelming desire to never see this brilliant man sad or hurt again. Perhaps it’s Eskel’s own harrowing loneliness.

It doesn’t matter much, because he downs the rest of his ale in three gulps, and then there are warm fingers around his wrist, pulling him away and up the stairs, pushing him into a room and onto a bed with a lapful of bard.

“Goddess,” Jaskier says quietly, almost privately, except that his lips hover temptingly close to Eskel’s. “You do look just like him, if it wasn’t for—”

“The disfigured maw?” Eskel adds helpfully, out of habit if nothing else.

Jaskier puts a gentle hand on his cheek—the scarred one, gods save his soul—and Eskel leans into the touch involuntarily, like a dog starved for affection.

“I was going to say the hair,” Jaskier finishes with a hint of kind amusement, and winks.

Eskel knows, with that first hungry kiss, that he’s absolutely and utterly gone for the bard.

“Beautiful, darling—gods, you’re stunning,” Jaskier whispers later, hands roaming Eskel’s broad chest, and fuck, he hadn’t been touched like this in months, so he hides against the smooth column of Jaskier’s throat—sucks a vivid bruise there like he has any fucking right—and desperately ignores the praise that isn’t meant for him.

He sucks Jaskier’s cock to make him shut up, and gets called lovely and breathtaking and darling angel for his efforts. He opens Jaskier up—mouth latched to the pale insides of his thighs, littering them with bruises—on four fingers and so much chamomile oil the smell makes him lightheaded, and Jaskier tells him he’s a treasure, fuck, so good to me. He gets pushed backwards onto the bed, his wrists guided above his head in a soft suggestion of restraint as Jaskier rides his cock with determined fervour, and he's divine, gorgeous, my sweet, darling witcher.

Jaskier arches beautifully when he comes, spills all over them both, his eyes heavy-lidded, still holding Eskel’s gaze, and Eskel knows he’s only looking for an echo of Geralt in his yellow irises—but he flips them over, takes his pleasure in Jaskier’s body, and he can live with being a second choice when he’s used to being no choice at all.

***

“I’ve been—fuck, awfully lonely on the road, gods, darling—”

Eskel’s quickly found out Jaskier is quite keen on being held, suspended in the air with only Eskel’s hands underneath his thighs and a cock driving into him with haste and despair.

Especially out in the open, on the side of a well-traversed road. Eskel licks absently at the raised imprint of his teeth above Jaskier’s collar and yearns to deepen it, have it stay there forever.

Jaskier pulls at his hair, panting harshly, brings their lips together in a searing kiss. He whines at the back of his throat and his sinful hole flutters around Eskel’s cock, milking him into completion faster than anyone ever could, whispering low into his ear, that’s it, that’s it, love, fill me up ‘til I can’t hold anymore, fuck, so good like nobody ever did.

And if they’re never quite alone in their passions, if Jaskier still searches his eyes for a ghost of someone else—Eskel can pretend he doesn’t see, because he’s the one who gets to fall asleep with the bard pressed up against him, soft and warm and kind.

***

Inkeepers take him in more willingly, when he’s got Jaskier at his side, flashing them a smile full of promise.

He doesn’t need for brothels, when he wakes up to Jaskier lapping at the head of his cock like it’s the sweetest treat. When Jaskier’s unable to keep his hands to himself. When he stays nice and loose and ready for Eskel to pound him into the ground at any moment.

“I’m not a young man anymore,” Jaskier always says after, struggling to catch his breath, even if he were the one palming Eskel’s cock through his breeches.

“You don’t look a day over seventy,” Eskel offers in return, and Jaskier slaps him upside the head in mock offense.

Eskel’s never been happier than he is with Jaskier trudging the Path with him.

Which is why the frost crunching under their boots fills him with a hollow aching. A single snowflake lands pointedly at the very tip of Jaskier’s reddened nose, and Eskel glares at the sky.

He lets Jaskier fuck him, then. They get a room for the night, light the hearth and feed the flames. Share a bottle of wine, of which Eskel takes the brunt. Stretch out leisurely on the furs, and Eskel’s insides tie in knots when he watches the silver hairs on Jaskier’s dark head glimmer in the firelight.

Jaskier takes his time, as Eskel thought he would. Lavishes him with kisses and praise and adoration and Eskel still doesn’t think it’s all his to have, but he melts under Jaskier’s touches anyway.

I love you, he aches to say, to scream at the top of his lungs when Jaskier pushes into him, jaw slack and eyes squeezed shut in rapture.

“Come away with me,” he begs instead, on the verge of release and at mercy of the insistent snap of Jaskier’s hips. “To Kaer Morhen.”

Jaskier shushes him with a kiss and a gentle hand in his hair.

“I don’t want to leave without you.”

Don’t leave me alone, I can’t bear it again.

He tips Jaskier’s chin up, the bard’s pretty eyes brimming with unshed tears as he nods—and this time, just for a second, Eskel doesn’t feel like a shoddy replacement.

***

They beat Lambert to the keep by three days.

Three days spent reacquainting with the concept of heat and the feeling in their fingers after weeks traversing increasingly higher snowcaps.

Three glorious, uninterrupted days of having Jaskier share his bed in the only place Eskel could ever call home.

When he gets there, Lambert asks when he’s going to get a turn on the bard, and if Eskel beats his insufferable arse in training a little harder than he normally would on the first day—well. It’s what brothers do.

He makes sure to keep the ever-present mark at Jaskier’s throat a vibrant purple when it fades into yellow, and Jaskier begs him for it as sweetly as he begs for his cock, just within Lambert’s earshot.

Geralt doesn’t show for a full fortnight, and then some. The snow piles higher with each day. They all collectively agree that their last wolf won’t show this year, like he did so many years before.

Perhaps it is because Eskel thanks his Lady Destiny too soon, that Geralt staggers into the hall in the midst of a snowstorm, his cloak frozen stiff, frost melting on his silver hair.

They fall into each other’s arms, because they always do; because they're brothers, because they’d been through hell together, because they love each other fiercely even if Eskel can’t think of a single person he’d rather avoid more than Geralt, right now. They stand there in the hall, the snow on Geralt’s collar a shock of cold against Eskel’s neck. And then Geralt stiffens, suddenly, rigid in Eskel’s embrace in a way that has nothing to do with the chill.

“You smell—” Geralt begins, seemingly perplexed, and inhales deeply at the juncture of Eskel’s shoulder.

They fall away from each other abruptly, Eskel’s chest tight with a muffled pull of dread.

“Let’s get you warmed up, yeah? I’ll get Lambert to see to your mare. He might not be too happy to see you, though. You lost him a bet.”

Geralt follows him, almost reluctantly, and Eskel wants just one more night before it all goes to shit. Just the one.

***

Jaskier is sleep-warm and perfect and doesn’t appreciate the chill of Eskel’s skin once he finally gets back into bed.

Eskel takes him too roughly for the time of night, bites at his freckled shoulders and sharp collarbones, has Jaskier trembling and begging for it twice before he lets the bard come.

He muffles his own release against Jaskier’s lips, all too aware of Geralt in a room not a hallway away.

***

The door creaks when it’s pushed open. Faintly, but enough to rouse Eskel awake. He tightens an arm reflexively around Jaskier’s sleeping form, and the bard nuzzles up against the side of his chest.

Yellow eyes stare at them intently, Geralt’s expression unreadable, though the nod he gives can mean only one thing.

Eskel is careful as he untangles their limbs, and his heart decidedly doesn’t pound quicker for a beat when Jaskier reaches out after him and mumbles a sleepy Eskel.

Their footsteps are nearly soundless on the stone floor. Geralt is equally quiet, rigid as a bowstring. They walk for a long time, until they come to a place Jaskier didn’t yet get a chance to explore. Neutral ground. As neutral as can be, with Eskel still drenched in Jaskier’s scent.

“I’m not sorry,” Eskel says finally, and Geralt flinches.

They don’t look at each other.

“Why,” Geralt forces out. Eskel can hear the bones in his jaw click. “Why bring him here.”

Wind howls outside the walls, the storm unrelenting.

I didn’t want to be alone, he almost says, but bites his tongue. Instead,

“You broke him, Geralt. You left and he—he used to call out for you at night, you know? He’d have nightmares and wake up shaking. And I couldn’t help.”

They rarely talk like this, heart to heart under the guise of night.

“Why?” Geralt asks, softer this time. Kinder.

It doesn’t feel right, but it’s what’s going to make things right.

“I’m just a substitute. A lousy one at that. He still—he wants you. Loves you.”

And it’s the truth, when he finally admits it out loud. Eskel is more at peace with that than he thought he would.

“Please don’t take it from me,” he whispers, overwhelmed in a way that he was assured the mutagens were supposed to eliminate. “It’s all I have.”

Geralt doesn’t respond, though he does place a hand on Eskel’s shoulder, in comfort or understanding, he couldn’t know.

***

Jaskier keeps his head high.

“Geralt,” the bard greets him, in a manner far too cold and collected.

He doesn’t flinch under Geralt’s gaze, doesn’t look away before Geralt, but when he does—Eskel catches his expression shatter, fall into a million pieces that he desperately wants to collect and put back together. They slip through his fingers.

At night, Jaskier jolts awake clawing at his own throat, crying that he can’t breathe, asking Geralt to help him, please help him. Eskel holds him until the tremors subside. Neither of them sleeps well.

All the good evaporates from Eskel’s life.

The silly marks of faux ownership fade from Jaskier’s skin, eventually, and Eskel’s heart aches.

He kisses Jaskier deeply, puts all his horrible feelings behind it, and then just holds the bard close. For the last time. Eskel knows he isn’t meant to cry—but the trials merely took away his ability to shed tears, not this overpowering fucking desire to do so.

“Eskel?” Jaskier says, gently, the question of what’s wrong implied.

Eskel shakes his head and holds Jaskier tighter.

***

“You. Apologise.”

Geralt seems startled by the development. As does Jaskier, to be fair, shifting nervously where he’s gripping Eskel’s arm.

“I don’t want his apology,” Jaskier says weakly. “We’ve had our words, and they were very—pointed. Very definite. Eskel—”

Jaskier looks to him with wide, terrified eyes.

And it wouldn’t be enough that he has to give up the one good thing in his life, would it? It wouldn’t be enough that every time they fucked Jaskier looked beyond him and for someone else. It wouldn’t be fucking enough that he was madly, unreasonably in love with a man whose affections laid firmly elsewhere.

No, it wouldn’t, because now he has to—

He takes a deep breath and listens to the staccato of Jaskier’s quickened heartbeat.

“I wouldn’t make you do this, except you do want his fucking apology, and Geralt wants to give it to you, because you love him and he loves you and I'm—” useless, disposable, unwanted, "I’m done. I’m done. Figure it out. Please.“

Jaskier’s hands fall away from around his arm, and Eskel takes off.

He doesn’t really have anywhere to go, when every place he’d grown to love in the keep knows Jaskier’s presence, wears his mark and his scent.

The corridors are still and silent. Grey and imposing. Cold is seeping through the thick stone—cold from this winter and the hundreds before it, and Eskel thinks the walls had never truly known warmth. It’s all terribly dull, Jaskier had said when they’d walked the halls that first time, hand in hand with not a worry between them.

He’d been stupid to grow so attached when Jaskier was never his to keep. He’d been stupid to bring him here and expect everything to stay the same in blissful ignorance. He’d been stupid, and he didn’t want to be lonely again, even for just a few months—and now he’s going to be lonely until some merciful beast cuts his suffering short like it was always meant to.

It is, perhaps, too early in the day to drink, but Lambert’s eyes light up when Eskel goes to him with the offer.

Later, out of habit, he almost stumbles into his room before his drunken brain screams at him to keep going. Eskel falls asleep in an abandoned bedroom that smells of dust and time instead of his bard.

***

"You didn’t come to bed.”

Eskel hears Jaskier approaching, of course he does—but he doesn’t turn to face him, eyes firmly fixed on the window, even if it is just snow there. He does feel quite dramatic, sat in a windowsill like a maiden awaiting her beloved to come and whisk her away. Eskel awaits only peace and for his heart to feel whole again.

“Smells like you,” he says, too honest.

Jaskier shuffles closer.

“I waited up for you.”

A hand falls gently to his shoulder, and Eskel shivers at the touch.

“Thought you’d be staying with Geralt. You—you can keep the room, if you want.” Eskel couldn’t ever be comfortable there, anyway, not after everything.

“Darling—”

The hand moves from his shoulder to his cheek, soft and tender and Eskel meets the incredible blue of Jaskier’s eyes easily.

“I never meant to make you feel unwanted,” Jaskier begins. Eskel wishes only to shrink under his gaze. “I want you so, so much.”

Jaskier settles next to him, their thighs pressed together, the black of his trousers startling against wine-red silk. Eskel feels fucking dumb.

“I know it wasn’t about me, I—you should go be with your wolf. I’ll be fine.”

The scars pull tightly when he smiles, aiming for reassuring; it comes out tired and helpless.

Jaskier leans in impossibly close, the ghost of his breath on Eskel’s lips.

“You’re my wolf, too.”

They kiss before he knows it—desperately, hungrily, until Eskel’s head spins and Jaskier’s hands tug at the collar of his shirt.

Eskel pulls away with a deep, burning hatred of himself.

“Just go, Jaskier.” When did his voice grow so cold? He never wants to speak to Jaskier like this, never, and yet— “I don’t need your pity.”

He expects Jaskier to do just that. Go, and avoid him for the rest of winter, and walk around with Geralt’s scent all over him and a mark to the side of his neck and—

“No. Nuh-uh. Not happening. Eskel, gods, I—I’m sorry, yeah? That you couldn’t trust my affection was all for you, and perhaps it wasn’t, not always—”

Fuck, but it does hurt to hear it, just a bit.

“—but then you had to go and be the most splendid creature under the sun and I, well.”

The gold of Jaskier’s rings glitters enticingly in the sparse sunlight when he reaches for Eskel’s hand.

“I do love Geralt, but Eskel, darling. I love you just as much.”

Eskel could fall to his knees if he were the praying sort.

Fuck, he might anyway.

Jaskier kisses him, and Eskel carries the bard all the way to bed to show his worship in a different way.

***

It’s easy to kiss Geralt.

It’s not the first time he’d kissed Geralt.

“Fuck, look at you,” Jaskier moans, somewhere to their side.

Geralt arches his neck beautifully when Eskel grabs a fistful of silver hair and tugs his head backwards.

It is, possibly, the first time he’d kissed Geralt without the hushed secrecy of darkness and a hard scrubbing to get the scent of release off each other.

Jaskier leans over his shoulder to capture Geralt’s lips for himself, chest pressed tightly to Eskel’s back.

He’d thought the jealousy would smother him, when Jaskier first brought it up. He’d thought he would choke on the image of Jaskier laid bare before anyone else. He’d thought—

But it’s Geralt, isn’t it? It’s Geralt, and they’d already shared so much with each other, their joys and their pain and their lives, and—

“Eskel,” Geralt breathes like he used to so many lifetimes ago, except he doesn’t bite his tongue, now, and Eskel leans in to bite instead at the soft skin below his jaw, to leave his mark there, twin to the one he’d left on Jaskier.

They fall softly to the mattress, him and Geralt, with Jaskier crawling over them swiftly, a sun-warm smile on his pretty face.

“Gods. Gods, you’re stunning.”

Eskel turns his head slowly, lazily, and finds Geralt’s eyes heavy and sparkling. Not just yellow, anymore, no longer the colour of a beast's—rather, the exact shade of sunlight caught in honey. Of morning dew on dandelions.

Fuck, he’d grown mellow.

Jaskier comes to straddle him, all pale skin and gorgeous hair and bruises from his hips to his throat. He settles heavily over Eskel’s cock, the bastard tease.

“Jaskier,” Eskel near-hisses, because suddenly the head of his cock dips inside Jaskier’s oil-slick hole. “Fuck, you—”

“Of course I got ready for my wolves, darling,” Jaskier breathes, and laughs, and seats himself completely in Eskel’s lap like it's nothing. “In fact, you might be partial to know—I had to employ the use of my other hand, to prepare for what I have planned.”

Eskel’s head spins, thick with the promise that he doesn’t dare dwell on. His eyes slip shut; Jaskier coaxes them open with nought but a soft word.

He can feel Geralt stir next to him, watching with a tight grip on himself as Jaskier moves easily, like he’d been made only for this, his one divine purpose.

“Geralt,” Eskel hears himself call out weakly. “Geralt, Geralt—”

Words seem only a silly hindrance, so he doesn’t bother, grabbing instead at the thick muscle of Geralt’s thighs, guiding him to sit astride Eskel’s chest, crush him with all that glorious weight—stuff his cock in Eskel’s greedy mouth, fuck.

Eskel thinks he might combust, go up in flames as he’s caught between the agonising pleasure of being buried to the hilt in Jaskier’s slack hole and the heavy satisfaction of having Geralt’s cock glide wetly on his tongue, further and further as Geralt stares at him, bewildered.

It’s a wonder he doesn’t come as soon as the length of it slides seamlessly down his throat, so deep he can feel it when he wraps a hand around his own neck. He squeezes, just to make sure Geralt feels it, too, and the rumble of a groan from above him makes Eskel thrust wildly into the clutch of Jaskier’s maddeningly hot body.

“O-oh, you were made for each other, weren’t you?” Jaskier’s hand is petting gentle circles up Eskel’s heaving stomach. “Fuck, darling, next time I’ll watch you bounce on Geralt’s cock till you sob with it.”

He reaches blindly to grab Jaskier’s hand, entwine their fingers together. With heavy-lidded eyes, he watches Geralt’s head get pulled back for a messy kiss. The bruise on the elegant column of his throat stands dark and proud and Eskel’s chest swells with it, even if it’ll fade in hours. He’ll just have to try very hard to keep it vivid.

Geralt rolls his hips, knees tightening around Eskel’s shoulders, ragged moans filling the air, mingling with the sinful noises dripping from Jaskier’s lips. Eskel’s vision spots, air suddenly hard to come by, and yet it doesn’t cause him distress; fuck, of all the ways to die, being smothered between Geralt’s thighs with Jaskier tight and lovely around his cock is Eskel’s preferred demise, if given a choice. His heartbeat quickens, though, and Geralt stops his delicious rutting, moves away with a tender look and a touch to his swollen lip. He leans down to steal another kiss, but Eskel’s too floaty, too hazy to do anything more than open his sloppy mouth–for Geralt, and then for Jaskier, when he collapses on Eskel’s chest.

“Desperation really is becoming on you, darling.”

Feeling Geralt’s tongue lapping at his cock when it’s still moving in and out of Jaskier—

Feeling a finger press in alongside him, joined quickly by another and another, until the fit is so tight it seems like he’s suffocating—

Feeling the torturously slow drag of Geralt’s cock against his, contained so closely in the heaven of Jaskier’s body—

“Fuck,” Eskel and Geralt groan in perfect harmony, Jaskier trembling wildly in their arms.

“Gods, gods, fuck, I love you, love you both so much—”

Eskel can’t speak, can’t move, can’t do anything but suck in desperate breaths and look as Jaskier’s face morphs from pain into rapture, his brow smoothing out, his bitten-red lips coming apart in a perfect o.

Geralt roars, withdraws his hips just a little, and it jostles Eskel’s very soul.

Fuck, he can't imagine what it’s like for Jaskier.

He wonders if—

“Move,” Jaskier says in a broken voice. “You can move, you can fuck me, a-ah.”

Eskel wishes he could Axii himself into not coming. He wishes—gods, but he can’t, he can’t, and when Geralt starts moving with purpose, Eskel feels the crackle of release at the base of his spine, coiling tighter and tighter until—

“Fuck, Eskel—” Geralt moans, and it’s torture, when Eskel can feel his cock throbbing against Geralt’s, and then he’s coming and coming and coming, a shockwave of sensation.

His ears feel like they’re stuffed with thick wool.

Jaskier kisses him, quick and filthy and needy.

“You’re perfect, perfect, my darling—” he says against Eskel’s lips.

Eskel whines at the back of his throat, his hands trembling where they grab Geralt’s hair and tug him to lean down.

The raw, painful pleasure of his oversensitive cock still trapped within the suffocating heat of Jaskier’s body threatens to undo him completely. He claws blindly at any skin he can reach, to ground himself, to settle against the unrelenting drag of Geralt against him. He can feel his seed dripping out of Jaskier and down his balls. It’s fucking filthy.

He kisses Jaskier and he kisses Geralt and his lips go numb before Jaskier finally tips into a shaking release that rips a hoarse scream from his throat.

The bed is barely big enough for two people, but they make it work. They’ll make it all work, somehow.

Before sleep takes him, Eskel hears Lambert yell, I’m moving the fuck out from down the hall.

#cw SOFT #i'm so tender for eskel i cant

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feverinfeveroutfic · 3 years

Text

chapter thirty-seven: december thirty-first

Over Thanksgiving and over Christmas, Sam spent the days in her apartment alone: Ruben and Esmé had put a great deal of money into repainting the house and thus she couldn't fly out to visit them, and they couldn't do the same for her, either. She vowed to fly out for a visit at least before the school year was over, but at that point, she wished for some solitude. Time away from everything before she faced the world again; at least some time alone before her twenty second birthday. In the meantime, another year about to end and Sam couldn't help but feel that Cliff was being left behind in late September. All things had gone away and yet she still wished for his presence next to her, and yet she still wished for time alone, especially after such a loaded schedule for that fall term.

Christmas Eve alone, but Aurora and Belinda both had offered to bring her over for at least the next day.

“I at least wanna get you something,” Belinda had told her over the phone.

“Of course,” Sam assured her, “I just wanna spend some time alone.”

“You gonna be alright?” Sam thought back to when Belinda made that joke to her, and even though it was water under the bridge at that point, she knew she wanted to make it up to her.

“Yeah. Positive.”

Aurora had gone back out to San Diego to visit her parents for a whole week, and thus Emile was alone for Christmas himself, as far as Sam knew anyways. She wondered what was happening in between them, especially given Aurora never really spoke about it that much to her. But there was more to Belinda that she needed to know about: she only knew her through their classes. Maybe there was something more to her than she had originally believed: maybe there was more to her than meets the eye.

“Bel, I'm going out to Ithaca for New Year's,” she told her.

“Oh?”

“Y-You wanna come?” Sam offered with bit of a stammer.

“Um, sure? I gotta go upstate around then anyway. What's in Ithaca?”

“I was invited to sit in for a recording session for—that band Legacy. You know those guys, Legacy?”

“Vaguely, yes? I remember Marla talking about them a few times before but I can't remember if I actually met them, though.”

“But yeah, I was invited to sit in with them while they record for their very first album.”

“Oh, cool!”

“I don't—really want to go alone, though. I want to spend the holidays alone but I don't want to go to this alone, though. Aurora's out in San Diego right now—”

“And Marla and Charlie are down here in Hell's Kitchen with her parents,” Belinda added.

“—I'm the assistant to Aurora if anyone asks.”

“What about me?”

“I'll think of something for you,” she vowed. “If anyone asks, I'll say that you're a friend of mine and you'll keep it confidential. I mean, I already have told you about it somewhat. I might as well take you with and ask you to keep it under wraps.”

“I won't tell a soul,” Belinda promised. There was a voice in the background, and she hesitated. “I gotta go, Sam. Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas, Bel,” she echoed her, “I'll be going out there on New Year's Eve.”

“I'll see you then!” Belinda vowed. “You live in the Bronx, right?”

“Right up on the northern side of the Bronx—two floors upstairs from Frankie.”

“Oh, I know exactly where that is! I'll see you then. Merry Christmas, Sam.”

“Merry Christmas, Bel.”

They hung up at the same time and Sam ran her fingers through her dark hair. It was her first Christmas alone, and before then it was her first Thanksgiving alone, and yet she wanted it all to herself.

She had posted up a cactus on her coffee table and put a little glittered silver star in the soil, right where it pointed out to the rest of the room. Indeed, when she headed back to her bedroom, and turned off the overhead light, the silver sparkled in the low light. It followed her all the way into her bedroom, and when she lay down in her bed to go to sleep, the glittered light shone through the darkness outside of her room.

Sam closed her eyes and she thought about that mysterious man again with the streak in his hair, and he was the last thing on her mind before she fell asleep. No sooner had she fallen asleep when she woke up that Christmas morning. Christmas morning without anyone around her, but she had wished for it. Some time alone with her journal and her art before she went out to Ithaca with Belinda and Legacy.

Joey still had that canvas in the back seat of his car, or maybe he took it out and stashed it away somewhere in that apartment. She thought about Dan and his record player: she still had yet to play her copy of Spreading the Disease. She had to at the very least listen to it before they began work on their new album, whenever that would come about. As far as she knew, they were to make a new one once they returned home from the tour. But the question that rang through her mind until New Year's Eve itself was that of when.

When were Anthrax to head on into the studio for a new record on their part.

On that cold, snowy day, Belinda showed up to the curb in her little black car: she herself was wrapped up in a heavy black overcoat, and a fitted bright green sweatshirt. Her snake pendant twinkled under the bright white glare of the snow. Sam climbed into the passenger seat next to her, also in her black overcoat, and with those hockey gloves Joey had given her.

“So do you know the way?” Belinda asked her as they got rolling forth on the street.

“I sure do—I went there before last month with Eric and Greg. It's like—tucked away in the trees on one side of town.”

Belinda nodded and then she leaned back in the leopard print driver's seat with both hands on the wheel. Sam nestled down in the warmth of the seat next to her and tucked her hands into her pockets.

It was at that point Belinda started to feel more of a friend to her, as they wound their way through the trees and into the cold and barren upstate region. A blanket of fresh fallen snow covered everything, but she didn't seem too stressed about driving through that strip of bare dark road in that little car. The snow followed them all the way up to the Finger Lakes region, the dark waters of which appeared colder and blacker with the fresh new snow.

Within time, they reached Ithaca and Sam guided Belinda to that studio nestled back in the woods on the other side of town. Legacy's van was already posted up there outside the front ramp and the doorway, and Sam knew they had already made their way inside of there.

Eric bowed out of that door and he hesitated when he saw the car. Sam opened the front door and poked her head out to the frigid cold: he nodded at the sight of her.

“Oh, hey!” he called out to her, and he turned back to the doorway. “Sam's here—”

Belinda climbed out of the car next.

“—and she's brought a friend with her,” he added; their boots crunched over the snow there in the driveway. Belinda gave her blonde hair a slight toss back and Eric raised his eyebrows at her.

“Eric, this is Belinda Grimes,” Sam introduced her, “good friend of Marla and is gradually a good friend of mine.”

“The beautiful Belinda,” Eric declared.

“Or Bel as I go by,” Belinda herself added.

“I didn't want to come here by myself,” Sam explained as she shivered a bit under her coat, “'cause Aurora's back out in California to visit her parents, so I asked her to come along with me. She'll keep it all under wraps, though.”

“My lips are sealed.” Belinda made a twisting gesture over her lips.

“Well, good! Uh, well, c'mon in—it's freezing out here and we're letting all the warm air out.”

Sam and Belinda followed Eric inside of that front room, a narrow sparsely carpeted bright lit space that resembled to a closet than it did a foyer of sorts. To the left stood the actual studio itself: the door to the sound proof room on the other side of the pane of glass. Louie and his smoothed dark hair inside of that room; Greg had already slung his bass over his shoulder, and Eric himself was right in front of them. Nestled back in that hallway off to the left, Sam recognized his aquiline nose and his deep set eyes, but the little pearl of gray had gone away. He had buried it under the jet black curls about the crown of his head, right under those little bangs. Or so she believed: he nudged his bangs back a little bit and there was no sign of it. The grays were gone.

“What happened to the streak?” she asked him and those deep eyes seemed to slice right through her.

“Dyed it,” Alex replied, nonplussed. “I couldn't stand looking at it for any longer.”

“I kinda liked it,” she told him, to which he shrugged his shoulders.

“Yeah, I did, too,” Belinda added, even though she hadn't really met him before.

“It made me look old, though,” he said to them with his eyebrows knitted together. Even with the streak buried under the black dye, he still looked older than he actually was, even being eighteen years old, and with a round full face and smooth skin. He continued to frown at Sam.

“Hang on, Aurora's not here with you?” he asked her in a low voice.

“She's out in California visiting her parents. She should be back—I'm not sure when she'll be back, though. Belinda here'll keep everything that happens in here a secret, though.”

“Okay, okay—besides this is our first real big thing.” Alex fixated on Sam: there was something about those deep eyes, though. Something about them that drew her in: even with that streak hidden away under the black, she found herself wanting to move in closer to him. “If any mistakes happen, you've gotta tell her.”

“That's my job,” she assured him, and he kept his gaze on her for another couple of seconds before he turned away and headed into the sound proof room. Belinda turned to her with a frightened expression on her face.

“What's wrong?” Sam asked her.

“He's so precocious it's scary,” she whispered to Sam.

“That's what I said to Lars,” she confessed to her, also in a whisper. “Lars told me he's just really intelligent is all. Being smart ages you. He's really focused, too—it's kind of chilling, I'll admit it.”

She turned her attention to Eric right behind her, huddled right over a small black table with a big white sheet of paper taped on top. She stood right next to him for a look herself: it was a full schedule of the residencies there in that studio. On New Year's Day, they were to officially begin recording under the chosen name Legacy. Her eyes wandered down the page when she spotted a familiar name in the middle of January.

“Anthrax are gonna be here, too?” She was stunned.

“Yeah.” Eric hesitated and he showed her a baffled look. “Wait a minute. They didn't tell you?”

“No?”

“Well, let's see—it's written in pencil so they must've just allotted the studio time. We're written in pen so it's confirmed that we're here—but them... it looks like their dates were just added.”

“Wow! Another round of sit ins, I suppose?”

“If you'd like. You and Aurora work with the label after all.”

“Hey, Eric,” Louie called from the doorway, and he lifted his head.

“What's up?”

“Did you happen to get a hold of Chuck? Any chance at all?”

Eric shook his head. “He's supposed to be here like any minute, Lou. That's as far as I know.”

“Well, what do you think we should do?”

“Yeah, I don't really wanna be up here for a moot point,” Alex added: even tucked away in the far corner of the room, his voice was enormous, even from behind a sheet of glass and inside of an otherwise sound proof room. It even caught Sam by surprise.

“Well,” Eric started. “We're all here with our instruments, and with Sam and her friend here. Why don't we just jam together?”

“Don't see why not,” Louie replied with a shrug of his shoulders, and Eric padded over to him. He left the door ajar for Sam and Belinda to listen in for themselves. Tucked back in the far side of the room was the drum kit: Alex had taken his seat on a stool on the far side of the room with a little cherry red guitar cradled upon his lap. His jet black hair had more of a shine to it, too, and Sam could only assume he had ran the hair dye all throughout his hair.

“Watch this,” said Eric as he picked up a black flying V guitar which had already been plugged into the amp on the floor next to him. He took out the pick from the strings and he plucked those strings. Sam thought back to when Anthrax performed for her on that first day, but the riff he played made her think if they had played at a much quicker pace than they did in that room. His black hair spread across his face as he played that hard, rapid fire riff: so fast that it sent a chill up Sam's arms.

“Holy shit,” Belinda muttered. He slowed it down by half and not once did he look up at the two girls on the other side of the glass. That sound proof room filled with such a big wall of sound. A big wall of sound made by one man: Sam wanted to pick up a pair of headphones and let them record it right there, but she decided not to, especially when Eric jerked his hand back from the frets as if he had been burned.

“—like guarding a bridge,” Greg was saying.

“Pulled it!” Eric yelped.

“Pulled it out of your pussy,” Louie joked as he picked up his drum sticks.

“Pulled it out of my pussy, right,” Eric retorted with a straight face.

“Your pussy or your ass?”

“Both.”

“Your pussy or your dick?”

“Both. I have both, so—”

Alex then looked over at Sam from clear across the room: his deep set eyes gazed back at her as if he watched her every move. Deep and steely like brand new metal under a sheet of ice. They locked eyes for a moment, but it was long enough for her to think about that piece of rice paper in the bottom of the drawer. All the mentions in front of him sent his back closer towards the wall.

Indeed, he moved his gaze to the wall right behind him: his long lanky fingers moved about the upper part of the guitar neck. His guitar wasn't plugged in but Sam could tell he was playing something hard and fast. The drums tapped on the other side of the room, and Sam turned her attention to the kit there. Louie moved the sticks about for a drum roll, and he moved a little bit on the kick drums, but the cold in the room kept him from moving a lot. He stopped, and he reached down for a massage of his ankles with one hand.

“Got a problem, Lewis?” Greg asked him.

“Ankles are kinda sore.” He lifted his hand and sat upright. He turned his attention to Sam and Belinda for a few seconds, but then he scooped up his sticks again and he tried again with the snare right in front of him. He tried it again, and he stopped again for another ankle massage.

Sam lowered her gaze to his lap and those filmy black gym shorts. He lifted up again.

“Sorry—I've got an erection right now so I can't really do much more than that,” Louie said in a single breath and with a straight face.

“Damn, Lou's hungry right now,” Greg remarked.

“A couple of girls in the next room here,” Eric pointed out with a nod of his head.

“Nah—no, wait.”

Belinda burst out laughing; Sam chuckled a little bit herself but she wondered what Alex was doing right there at the far side of the room. He kept his head down, so his freshly cut bangs accentuated that sharp brow and those deep eyes. He moved his fingers about the neck and he was so tight with it. He moved about in silence, like a ghost, a slender little black haired ghost of a boy. Being smart aged him and yet, even as he was right there on the other side of the room, he still resembled to a young boy. Barely eighteen and he struck her as completely ageless.

She folded her arms over the edge of the panel in front of her. Something about the sheen on his black hair made her think of those ink drawings. Even though his guitar wasn't plugged in, she could hear the music he cranked out for them. A gentle faint plucking against the chatter right next to her. If only she could hear what he was playing for himself, and such that he

“You girls have yet to meet the other bands in this whole grand scheme of things, though,” Eric was telling Belinda. “Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, and Slayer—everyone is calling them the 'Big Four' because they're kind of the first ones to go to big labels. And then you have us, plus Overkill—Danny Spitz's old band—Exodus, Zetro's new band, and Death Angel—Sam met Death Angel at Cliff's memorial.”

“Not exactly,” Sam confessed, “I saw them but they wanted more lunch than anything.”

That brought a laugh out of both Louie and Greg. “The Big Four.” The name itself made Sam chuckle, but she paid more attention to Alex on the other side of the room. He seemed to be in a world of his own compared to them.

“So all you guys behind them are kind of like the little four,” Belinda told them.

“The little four?” Eric laughed at that.

“Yeah. Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, and Slayer are the big four—you guys, Overkill, Exodus, and Death Angel are the little four. The tier behind them. They're the big head honchos, and you guys are like the little ones holding them up like pillars or something.”

“The tiny four,” Louie quipped.

“The small fries,” Eric added.

“The little itty bitty four,” Belinda laughed.

“The four small dicks,” Greg quipped. “And the big four are the big four dicks.”

“That's a whole lot of dicks,” Eric added. “The big four dicks are the hot ones.”

“Who says the little dicks can't be hot, though?” Sam blurted out, and they all laughed out loud at that: Alex snapped his eyes shut and bowed his head. She had no idea if he was laughing at that but then he shook his hand about. He returned to the frets as if nothing happened.

“How's our lead doing?” Eric asked Alex, who finally raised his head a bit: the bangs still hid his eyes away from view.

“I'm just making it up as I go along,” he said, “I watched a Miles Davis concert on TV a couple of months ago and ever since then, I wanted to do what he was doing there.”

“Electric era or—?”

“Oh, yeah. Well, of course.” Alex gave the ringlets on the side of his head a slight nudge so it revealed his ear and the side of his neck. Something quite graceful about him. But then Belinda turned to Sam again.

“Yeah, he's really precocious.” But Sam frowned at that. So what if he was? The boy knew what he wanted out of laugh and that was to play his guitar and add something to the world. Indeed, Sam thought about her own artistry. To make something herself.

It may have been his jet black hair but she thought of herself as she watched him there. She thought of the first time she saw him up on stage, and how he seemed to paint with his fingers, and the guitar was his canvas. This boy was an artist and his playing there on the other side of the room only doubly confirmed that for her.

Meanwhile, Louie played a few drum grooves for them and he finally overcame the pains in his ankles all the while. Greg followed his lead and lay down a bassline for him: even without Eric and Alex with their guitars, their rhythms alone were enough to prove to both Sam and Belinda that they had such strong power. Sam thought about Chuck's powerful voice, and the night she and Cliff got to see them. It had been a full year since she and Cliff saw them in San Francisco, and she could still imagine Chuck there on stage as if it had just happened.

Within time, Eric joined in with that rapid fire riff and the three of them plowed forth. Alex finally leaned to the side and plugged in his guitar. The two girls on the other side of the glass watched the four young men, four artists in their prime, begin their very first master piece.

Sam recognized the song “Over the Wall” and she attempted to sing Zetro's shrill lyrics even though she only heard the song once before in L'Amour. But Alex's insistence on improvising extended it into this long elaborate jam session. At one point, he stood to his feet and strode about the room. He progressed high and low and every so often, he stepped on one of the pedals there on the floor for a different effect.

“Turning into the Grateful Dead in here,” Louie shouted in between tight drum beats.

They were in there for another half hour, and the three of them followed Alex's lead, until Eric returned to the door with the guitar slung over his back.

“We're gonna be here a while,” he told Sam.

“And Chuck's still not here yet,” she pointed out.

“And Chuck's still not here, right! And it's not like we're recording as of yet, either. I think you girls can go out and stretch your legs for a bit. Get yourselves something to eat. We are in Ithaca, after all. Not like we're going anywhere.”

“True.”

Sam then led Belinda back outside, where the clouds broke enough to show off the pure blue sky, but not enough to warrant sunshine over Finger Lakes. The cold of the snow felt so sharp after being in that warm room for so long; it was right then Sam started to feel hungry.

“There is just shit all to say,” she remarked as she walked to the driveway first. “It all speaks for itself.”

“It really does,” Belinda followed as she rubbed her hands together. “And how exciting, too! We're seeing these bands from the ground up.”

“Well, these guys are coming from the ground up, though. Anthrax has already put out a few albums, and Stormtroopers is kind of a spin off to them—but these guys are brand new, though. We're watching them start out fresh and new. We're watching Alex start out fresh and new.”

“Kind of makes you wish we could see Anthrax from the very beginning.” They stopped outside of her car.

“Well, that's really simple,” Sam explained. “Neither of us were here—well, I wasn't. You grew up down in Hell's Kitchen with Marla, and you guys hadn't met Charlie yet. The two of you grew up thirty minutes away from him and Frankie. So seeing them advanced along a bit, we started ahead in the watch process. So seeing these guys from the very beginning, we kind of have an idea as to what the future holds for them. Or least I do—I don't know about you, Bel.”

“Yeah, I've never really sat in with a band before. Charlie and I did hang out with that guy John—John Tempesta—when Charlie first met Marla, though.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. We were in this place in Brooklyn called the Iridium together and he bought us both a drink. Kind of an interesting night, though. We thought there were creatures coming out of the walls at one point.”

“Oh, my god.” Sam chuckled at that. She peered about the driveway for any signs of life. “I think we can just walk into town. We're literally right here.”

“But we're gonna have to walk through snow, though,” Belinda pointed out.

“Nah, we won't—besides, Bel, you're from New York. You're used to the cold.”

“Yeah, down in the city. Upstate is a whole other world.”

“Well, let's at least take a walk, though. It was getting kind of stuffy in there.”

Belinda let out a long low whistle and then she nodded her head, and she followed Sam to the end of the driveway. They stood there at the edge of the pavement, and there was a small cafe, to the right of them and up the street.

“Hey, there's Joey,” Belinda pointed out, and Sam's heart skipped a few beats. Sure enough, there Joey was on the other side of the pavement: his black curls streamed down his back and over a light red and white striped knit scarf wrapped around his neck, and he wore a fitted black peacoat so he appeared thinner and lankier than before. He waved and showed them a lopsided smile, and then he peered both ways before he crossed the street. Sam turned to Belinda yet again.

“Okay,” she began in a low voice, “if he asks us where we've been or why we're up here right now, tell him we just came here for New Year's.”

“Why?” Belinda frowned at that.

“He—” Sam peered behind her to ensure that Joey was still out of earshot. “He and Alex got into a fight a while back, and he's kind of vindicative about Legacy themselves.”

“Really?” Belinda raised her eyebrows at that.

“Yeah. It was insane, Bel. He and Alex got outside and he pushed him.”

“He pushed him?” Sam set a hand on her to get to keep her voice down. “But what if he asks why we're here by the studio, though? Especially with Anthrax coming here and whatnot.”

“Shit, I forgot about that! Um, let's just tell him that we're here to check the place out. And I'll tell you more about the pushing incident later on, too—” She stopped right in her tracks just as Joey strolled up to them with his hands on the lapels.

“Hey, you!” he greeted Sam.

“Hey, Joey,” she returned the favor.

“And Belinda,” he continued, “you're Belinda, right?”

“Little Bel, that's me,” she retorted. He craned his neck to the building behind them.

“What's all this?”

“Oh, it's the—studio that you and Anthrax are recording at,” Sam replied, and each word that left her lips felt as though she was having to force herself to say it.

“Oh, yeah, I remember this place,” said Joey. “Pyramid.” He stopped and he took another look. “Who else is here?”

“Maintenance,” Belinda filled in with haste and a clearing of her throat.

“Uh, yeah,” Sam added with even more haste, “—we just came over here to check it out. We really only came up here to Ithaca for New Year's.” She rubbed her nose. “What's up with you? What're you doing?”

“I just came here to see the place myself,” he answered as he lunged forward, but Sam and Belinda stepped in front of him.

“I don't think that's a good idea, Joey,” Sam assured him.

“Yeah—the place is kind of a mess,” Belinda joined in.

“Well, I at least wanna see the front door, though. Lived and did stuff in upstate my whole life and would you believe I've never been here before? And besides, why is your car here?”

“It's a good place to park,” Belinda said at a rapid clip. “We're coming right back for it, though. It's nothing to split hairs over.”

“Okay,” Joey said, reluctant and with a befuddled look on his face.

“Um, you wanna get something to eat?” Sam offered him.

“I just ate, thank you, though.”

“Shit—well, it's pretty cold out here—don't ya wanna go into that restaurant there?”

“We can't go in there?”

“It's a mess, Joey!” Sam exclaimed. “An absolute madhouse!”

“Hey, that song was a hit!” he said with a snap of his fingers.

“What song?”

“'Madhouse'! We got asked to make a music video for it—have you seen it?”

“I haven't, no.”

“Don't think I have, either,” Belinda added.

“Oh, man, I gotta show it to you girls. I hope that restaurant does have TVs in it—I'd like to show it to you both.” He wheeled around and stood there at the curb for a second: Sam and Belinda glanced at one another. The latter widened her eyes and let out a quiet sigh; the former opened her mouth but no sound came out. Joey then led them across the dark pavement to the low restaurant there on the other side, hugged by a few evergreen trees and some scraggly barren oak trees.

He held the door for them as they made their way inside. Warm and sweet with that aroma of coffee and fresh food: he led them to the counter where he took the seat closest to the register. Sam sat down at his left while Belinda took the spot to the left of her. Her eyes were still wide with fear.

“That was close,” she mouthed, to which Sam nodded her head. Joey then turned to them once again.

“Did Cliff ever tell you his fascination with pancakes?” he asked Sam in a low voice.

“I don't think he ever did,” she confessed.

“Oh. Well—” Joey pointed to the silvery counter in front of them, and the plate of pancakes slathered in syrup and melted butter which awaited to be taken to a nearby table. “—just looking at that fat stack of pancakes right there in front of us made me think of his obsession with pancakes.” Sam chuckled at that.

She and Belinda both asked for cups of coffee, but neither of them knew what they wanted to eat. It was the first time in a long time Sam had gone some place and she had no idea as to what she wanted. The thought of Cliff obsessing over pancakes made her curious. There was so much to him that she still didn't know about.

Cried all her tears and yet she still missed him. It was almost too much to bear, especially when she thought about Alex in that room. He and Cliff were both artists in their prime. Both artists, both unknowns to her, and yet they both felt so close to her.

“Excuse me,” she finally said at one point: she could feel the firm lump coming to fruition in her throat. She ducked into the hallway around the corner to make it look as though she was headed into the bathrooms. But she lingered there outside of the ladies' room, right next to the door, and the tears made their way forth. She flashed back on the sight of Louie behind that drum kit, and the memory of the five of them in the park so as to honor Cliff: he recognized Zelda almost immediately, even in the tapestry of total darkness, and she could only wonder what was happening between them. He hit those drums rather hard: maybe seeing her there opened something in him. She had no idea.

The mention of Cliff did something to her however. She brought her hands to her face to hide the tears away from prying eyes, but she couldn't cry. No tears to be found in there.

“Sam?” Joey's upstate accent caught her ear and she lifted her head for a look at him there at the far end of the hall. The lopsided grin had given way to a look of concern on his handsome face. He strode closer to her for a better look at her.

“You okay?” he asked her in a gentle voice, to which she bowed her head and kept silent. “Are you alright?”

She still didn't answer.

“That statement was in poor taste, I know,” he said in a near whisper.

“What statement?” she asked him as she raised her gaze to him; he stood right in front of her, and he stood so close to her that she could smell the soft cologne on the side of his neck.

“The whole thing with the pancakes. I just—I know how you miss Cliff so much.”

“I do, I do—but I swear it's not you, though,” she assured him.

“Oh. I just saw you run down here and I could only guess that it was 'cause of that.”

“I just—I have my moments,” she confessed to him. “I have moments where I miss him more than anything in the world.”

She gazed up at him, right into those deep brown eyes. As brown and soft as the earth, the very earth that Cliff had returned to. They locked eyes for a few seconds, but it was enough.

“Joey—” she started.

“What?” He then paused and she pursed her lips together. Her mind went blank, but then he showed her the first bit of that grin yet again.

“Remember when you were in my place and you made that joke about kissin' me?” he recalled in a soft voice.

“How could I forget?”

“Not gonna lie—I think about doin' that.” He raised his eyebrows at her.

“Oh, yeah?”

“Absolutely. All the time.”

“So—what're you saying?”

He nibbled on his bottom lip and he dropped his gaze to her mouth.

“I didn't have someone to kiss under the mistletoe back on Christmas,” he told her in the huskiest voice she ever heard.

“I didn't, either,” she added.

“And I don't have someone to kiss when the ball drops tonight.”

“Who says we have to have a New Year's kiss, though?”

“Good point.” He paused again, and again with a nibble of his bottom lip. “Just an idea.” He nodded his head back for her to go back out to the restaurant. “Run along—I gotta use the little boys' room.” And with that, Sam bowed out in front of him and she rounded the corner: Belinda still stayed seated at the counter and with a cup of coffee in front of her. But on the far side of the room, Sam noticed the four of them clustered into a booth. She kept going towards them.

“Hey! What're you guys doing here?”

“Remember when Greg made a flippant comment about Louie being hungry?” Eric said to her as he looked up at her like a prince.

“Vaguely.”

“Well, as it turns out, the bunch of us are, too.”

“Well, Joey's here with me and Bel, so you might wanna keep things down.” She made a lowering gesture with her hands and brought her voice down a bit.

“Not a problem,” he assured her with a shake of his head. “Alex is a lover not a fighter anyways.”

“I fight when I feel like it,” Alex himself pointed out as he took a sip of ice water. Sam hoped Joey wouldn't see them there as she returned to Belinda at the counter: and even with the pancakes gone, she still couldn't shake the firm feeling from her throat. First New Year's alone and without Cliff.

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consumedkings-archive · 4 years

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ancient names, pt. xi

A John Seed/Original Female Character Fanfic

Ancient Names, pt xi: what kind of man

Masterlink Post

Word Count: ~8.2k (I’M SORRY)

Rating: M for now, rating will change in later chapters as things develop.

Warnings: Gore/violence, Still Under The Influencer of drugs, uhhhh blood. There's a lot of mentions of blood and death and what have you. Elliot has a meltdown (surprise). Joseph is creepy (surprise pt. 2 electric boogaloo). People are confused about How To Feel. I don't understand how laws work and so I'm just literally out here trying my best, you know? Don't @ me.

Notes: I wanted to start off by saying THANK YOU everyone for your feedback! I was having a real hard time hitting my stride with the last chapter but all of your kind words has given me life. There's some still in these old bones yet and I really hope that you enjoy this one.

Anyway I'm a clown and I'm sorry this chapter took so long. Joke's on you, it's always clown hour here! Thank you forever and always to @starcrier for being the best proof-reader and somehow managing to make my incoherency readable?? Manageable??? You're an angel and ily! Also, @empirics , my writing aspiration forever, and @baeogorath who makes me cry literally every time I read anything they have to say about my writing. Thank you thank you thank you!

John had never seen a person’s head blown in with a shotgun, and he wasn’t sure that he really needed to.

Ase’s blood had splattered when Jacob fired the shotgun at what he was sure could be considered point-blank range, the spray of it nearly catching them in the process. But no, it was mostly on Elliot, like she was some Carrie at her first prom, a real tried-and-true Scream Queen.

“I knew you’d find a way to fuck it up,” Jacob said, no absence of venom in his voice as he stepped away from Ase’s dead body like she was nothing—and sure, she was nothing, and John didn’t necessarily have any qualms with getting rid of her (he had blown a shell straight through her spine), but that wasn’t what was making him nauseated.

It was Elliot. Baby-blues eaten away by her pupils, blown wide with hallucinogens, drenched in blood, making a noise something close to a rabbit that thought it was going to die.

He didn’t have the energy to tell Jacob that the blow to her skull had been unnecessary, that there was no way someone could walk away from their entire stomach being blown through by a shotgun. That Jacob’s idea of “fucked up” was greatly, massively warped if he thought that Ase hadn’t been finished after shot number one. Even if he’d had the energy it wouldn’t have mattered, because the next words out of Jacob’s mouth were, “You put Faith at risk going back for her.”

The eldest Seed didn’t need to say what it was he meant; John knew. The words were “you put Faith at risk going back for her”, but what he meant was, Joseph’s going to be furious when he finds out.

“Get your pet,” Jacob bit out, “and let’s fucking move.”

John’s limbs moved of their own volition, kneeling down in front of Elliot and turning her face away from the grisly scene laid out next to her. If she recognized him, it didn’t show; she trembled, and her eyes never stayed fixed for very long, as though everything in the entire world was assaulting her senses at every second.

“Elliot,” he said, pulling her to her feet as the sound of voices rising in the distance peppered the air, “we have to move.”

Some kind of guttural sorrow welled up and out of her as he pulled her along and down the hill, her feet stumbling. Around them, the night hummed with gunfire and shouting. John was certain that he heard something like grief wracking the air at the hilltop above them, and he couldn’t bring himself to look back, afraid of what he’d see—that redheaded monster of Ase’s bent over her nearly-decapitated corpse, or worse: coming after them.

He kept one hand on Elliot’s arm and the other out in front of her case she tried to plummet headfirst down the hill—whether by chance or accident—and by the time they had reached the bottom, the strange agony sounds that had tried to burrow out of her had mostly ceased; her gaze was still glassy and dark, and there was an odd sway about her, but she looked only shell-shocked now.

Oh, John thought, absently, if that’s all.

Joey’s dark gaze darted between the two of them. He released Elliot to her without a word, his hand dropping from the blonde as Joey fussed over her. Faith swayed dreamily just a few steps away from Joey, humming a song mostly to herself; beyond her, Jacob stood, his arms crossed over his chest while he toted the shotgun in one of his hands, before he apparently got tired of waiting and grabbed Faith’s hand.

“If you want to stand around down here and chit chat, that’s fine,” he said, tugging Faith—clearly still drugged, clearly unaware of the carnage occurring around them—off to the trail that led away from the lake. “ We’re leaving.”

“Jacob—” John started. It was too late. The redhead had set for himself and for Faith a brutal and punishing pace to return them to wherever it was Joseph waited, and though he was loathe to admit it, Jacob was on the right track; pretty soon, the members of Eden’s Gate that had been sent up to wreak havoc on the Family would be dead, and he was certain that once Ase’s death was fully recognized, someone would want revenge.

“Are we going home?” Faith asked, giggling as she toddled after Jacob, barely able to keep herself upright. “That lady said John was going to come and rescue me.”

John’s chest tightened at the sound of her laughter. She was so completely unperturbed by everything—everything she had been through, had seen. He wondered how heavily they’d had to drug her, and if she would even remember half of it come the moment that she sobered up.

He exhaled, glancing at the top of the ridge above them where the lights of the cabins and flashlights and whatever-the-fuck-else those monsters had at their disposal glimmered.

“When,” Elliot said, the word grinding out of her mouth haltingly, “when... did Jacob-”

“Drink some water,” Joey murmured. She uncapped the half-drank water bottle and pushed it into Elliot’s hand and added, “And we’ll talk about it later, but right now we need to move, Elli.”

Elli, John thought, and felt a faint glimmer of amusement at the absurdity of such a soft, round nickname for a girl who was only sharp edges. Well, but she wasn’t so sharp now, was she? As he led them along the dark trail, her fingers brushing his on occasion, he would glance over at her and find her staring at him like he was a stranger, like she didn’t recognize him. Maybe she didn’t; he wasn’t familiar with the drugs they’d put her on, anyway.

“What the fuck happened up there?” Joey hissed, her hand firmly rooted in Elliot’s as she tugged her along—not unlike the way Jacob was pulling Faith. She had taken the water bottle back when it became apparent Elliot wasn’t interested in it. “Why is Elliot covered in blood —”

“She’s alive,” John snapped, “isn’t that what’s important?”

“I suppose you’ll be wanting a fucking award.”

“Stop it,” Elliot managed out. “Stop arguing. You both are so fucking loud.”

Joey’s lips pressed into a thin line. They ducked into the treeline far below Sacred Skies Camp, picking their way as quickly as they could through the underbrush, but the journey was slow and arduous; guiding Elliot through the trees had, in the last twenty minutes, become no easier than guiding a toddler. A blind, deaf toddler, who spared no interest in staying upright, and also had a metric fuck ton of psychotropic drugs in her system.

The walk there seemed to take much longer than it had going up, but John was sure that was his own adrenaline crash happening. He’d been stressed—about getting Faith out, about what he’d find, if he’d find anything at all or if they’d have done away with Elliot seconds after getting her.

Fuck . The thought filtered through his brain with dismay at the realization that he had been worried about her. Jacob was right; he’d really only needed to get Faith. But Elliot had been—she’d gone in there for them , and Joseph wanted her alive, and—

“Tired,” Elliot said, her voice hoarse and cracking with exhaustion as she took agonizing step after agonizing step. “I’m so tired, J—”

“I know,” John and Joey said, both cutting Elliot off and overlapping each other at the same time. Of course, John already knew what it was like to handle Elliot like this. They’d toddled through one field with Elliot clutching him like an anchor, drugged to the gills, once already; this was new territory for the other deputy.

Joey gave him a dark, turbulent look—the kind that implied murderous intent—and John turned his attention back to the task at hand: getting the fuck out of there.

As soon as the truck came into sight, running with the lights off, John let himself breathe a sigh of relief. He hadn’t thought Jacob would really up and leave them, but it also wasn’t impossible that he would have insisted and said fuck off if Joseph had protested. His eldest brother had been notorious for pushing back, for picking fights, and maybe—just maybe—he was pissed enough to follow through this time.

“About time,” Jacob said from the driver’s seat. Joseph did not give his input, which only served to further John’s personal unease as he opened the tailgate of the truck. Joey climbed in first, swaying just a little. He’d noticed that her pupils looked blown, too, though not quite as much as Elliot’s, so it must not have been fully out of her system yet.

John glanced up the hill absently. The sound of Eden’s Gate members still echoed. Not quite done yet, he thought absently, and then said, “Alright, Deputy, let’s get a move on.”

“Too high,” Elliot sighed, and he wasn’t sure if she meant the tailgate or herself. John turned her around from trying to clamber into the back and gripped her hips; her hands fluttered unsteadily before holding onto his arms.

“Don’t throw up on me,” he said.

She looked tired. Each second her eyes spent open seemed to demand more and more energy from her. “Expensive shirt, huh?”

“That’s right.”

He hoisted her into the back of the truck; she sat on the tailgate for a second only, and swayed forward like she was going to tumble right off; she steadied her hands on his shoulders, fingers gripping his shirt and bleeding warm against his skin.

“You did it too fast,” Elliot muttered, her voice verging on spoiled brat. Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, John climbed in after her as she scooted to the farthest spot away from the tailgate. Jacob didn’t wait for the tailgate to close before he pulled out of the brush; the truck hit the dirt road with a heavy thunk that had his teeth rattling around in his skull. Fucker, he thought, slamming the tailgate shut before the dust kicked up beneath them.

Elliot had her back pressed against the window into the truck. Blood covered her face and matted strands of her hair where they’d stuck to her cheeks; the vicious edge to her was dulled, whittled down to the bone until she was just a small girl folded up into the side of Joey Hudson.

When her eyes had fluttered shut and the night had settled a chill over them, Joey’s gaze flickered across John for a moment before landing on his face. She was silent, studying him—in a most infuriating way, wordlessly —before she finally said, “What happened?”

John glanced out at the Montana wilderness stretching out behind her, late into the night; he thought about the way Elliot had balked at the sight of the treeline, like there was something in there only she could see, something horrible.

“Well, the boys and I thought it’d be a nice night to go out,” he replied flatly, cocking his head before looking at Joey. “It’s been a while since we’ve done anything fun, you know, so it was nice to get the gang all together again for a little fun .”

The brunette’s expression flattened. “The devil rebuking sin.”

“I shot the psycho and I got Elliot out of there,” John bit out. “What did you expect?”

“You, to leave her,” Joey snapped. “That’s what I would have expected out of you.”

The words shouldn’t have stung. They were coming from Joey Hudson, after all, the only person that Elliot really cared about and so clearly the only person that John could use against her. But these facts were minor details to him now, carefully pinned out somewhere in the back of his mind—always accessible, but no longer important. Hudson had stopped being very important at all when she stopped being something to dangle in front of Elliot. Now they stung for a different reason, something that John couldn’t put his thumb on.

That’s not very true, something in him said, rattling against the bones of his rib cage. You know exactly why that bothers you.

“Well, that’s on you, isn’t it?” John replied, keeping his voice sickly sweet. “I’ll have you know I took very good care of your hellcat.”

“Yeah,” Joey ventured dryly, “having her shoved into a cult that shot her so full of poison it was coming out of her eyes really showed some TLC.”

“I’m sure she told you the plan was different,” John bit out.

“She tried. Which is why I’m wondering why you even fucking came back for us at all, Seed.”

Though Joey’s voice was soft so as not to rustle Elliot, it was pounding with venom. Hatred. That was to be expected, he thought; after all, in the short time that she’d been his ward, he’d done his very hardest to lure Elliot in with her fear and then passed her off almost immediately to Faith. But still, the wording struck him—it was the same sentiment that Jacob had flung in his face after blowing Ase’s brains out.

You put Faith at risk going back for her.

I’m wondering why you even fucking came back for us at all.

It was never the plan to save Elliot. It was always: get Faith, get out, and if you can get the deputy too—sure. Why not? She’d be indebted to them. Even more so if they got Joey out with her. But Faith should have been the absolute priority first, and he’d left her down at the lake to go back up into the middle of a firefight to get Elliot and Joey out.

If we’re partners, you have to trust me.

“I don’t know why it bothers you so much,” he managed out, trying to keep his voice as clipped as he could. “Normally, when people are rescued, they’re thankful. ”

“You did kidnap me,” Joey snapped, “so you’re closer to us being equal than my being grateful, and even that’s pushing it. I just don’t know if the rescuing still counts as a good deed if you only did it for yourself.”

John stared at her, eyes narrowing and jaw setting, tense and tight until pain radiated up into his skull. “I don’t know what you’re insinuating, Deputy Hudson —”

“Then you’re a bigger idiot than I thought.”

Elliot stirred, eyelashes fluttering. She coughed into Joey’s shoulder—the gesture not lost on the brunette, who grimaced a little—and when her eyes landed on John there was an eerieness about them, like she was trying to pull him open and peer inside, peel back the vibrating tension and hostility that Joey Hudson’s interrogation brought of him.

“What?” John asked, barely masking his irritation. It shouldn’t have bothered him so much, but it did because he couldn’t get the way she’d said, John? out of his head, small and wounded so very afraid, with Ase’s blood drenching her.

“Just trying to figure out which John you are,” Elliot replied, her voice slick with exhaustion and the words rolling out of her mouth in something close to a slur. They sent an uneasy jolt through him. It was the drugs, surely—she probably said all kinds of weird shit while she was high. He didn’t know what she was seeing, anyway.

(—fucking hate you, John Seed, John Duncan, whatever the fuck your name is, whoever the fuck you are—)

The blonde sighed again. The breath sounded like some kind of exertion for her; she squirmed and tried to get more comfortable against Joey’s shoulder, the blood on her face staining the forest-green of the deputy’s shirt. John’s head ached. The memory of Joseph, silent while Jacob debated the logistics of getting a killing shot through Elliot, flickered through his mind, venomous.

(—should see yourself whenever Joseph says anything. You practically fall over to kiss the ground he fucking walks on—)

“Well,” he replied, settling more comfortably in his spot across from the two women, “let me know when you find out, why don’t you, Rook?” He let his head loll back against the lip of the truck bed, a dark, cloudless night spreading out above him. He wanted to brush aside the way Elliot looked at him, but he had learned long ago that was the quickest way to underestimate her.

“I’m just dying to know.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The truck came to a halting stop. John hadn’t realized he’d fallen asleep until the strange inertia-pull of the truck stilling rustled him from his sleep. It was hard to say how long they had been on the road, but if he had to guess—and, taking into consideration how Jacob liked to drive—he’d wager it had been only thirty minutes.

Across from him, Elliot was awake, murmuring something to Joey that he couldn’t hear over the sound of the engine giving one last kick before Jacob turned it off. There was a higher clarity about the blonde, now, one that implied that sleep had done her well—though the pupils of her eyes stayed wide, there was now a sliver of baby blue that he could see, if he looked close enough.

He grimaced as exhaustion burned through his body, and for a brief second, their eyes met; like before, they pried at him, tried to see something that maybe he didn’t want her to.

As he lowered the tailgate of the truck and slid out, John turned around and instinctively reached to steady Elliot as she tried to climb down.

“I’m fine,” she said, more biting than he anticipated. Just coming down, John thought absently, his hands only remaining in the air for a second after her assertion before dropping to his sides again.

“Oh, yeah,” John replied, “I forgot that you’d rather I let you eat shit than keep you from falling over.”

She’s always been willful, he mused. The thought occurred as though John had known Elliot for a long time. In a way, he supposed that he did; fuck, he’d tried every goddamn trick in the book to lure her in, and she’d still spit her venom into her walkie at every chance she’d gotten. There was nothing that John didn’t try and dig up, nothing that he hadn’t racked his brain for in the brief moment that they’d visited all those years ago. And still— and still, and still —she—

“Hudson,” John said, offering his hand to her because he was a gentleman and certainly not because he enjoyed the way the gesture made her squirm.

“Fuck off, John,” Joey replied tersely, sliding off the truck bed as well. John smiled dryly.

He said, the needling coming to him like second nature, “So nice to have both of you here at one time. It’s what I always wanted, you know.”

Elliot shot him a look, one that sucked the wind right out of his sails. It was a wounded look, like he had suddenly reminded her of the things he had done, and John felt an uncomfortable twist in his stomach. He didn’t know why the words came out—a force of habit, maybe, or the way that Joey Hudson’s animosity (and closeness ) to Elliot made his hackles raise. As though Joey’s presence made a choice immediately clear for her, and she chose Joey.

The clench of his jaw sent pain radiating up into his skull. He thought that things had been much simpler pre-Joey Hudson, and he was regretting having helped her.

“I knew you’d come and save me,” Faith said, her voice breaking him out of the turmoil of his thoughts. She smiled at him, and it would have almost been endearing if her pupils weren’t absolutely blown to hell, reminding him that they’d probably done more than just drug her with some weird hallucinogen—the way she’d been acting when he’d seen her on the road had been something more akin to the kinds of things Faith had partaken of before.

He reached up, pulling her into a one-armed hug. “Yeah?” he replied. “You listened to those crazies?”

“They’re not crazy,” Faith sighed. Her voice bloomed with something like affection, and when she looked at him, there was a startling clarity about her expression—keen, and a little sly. Not so innocent, our Faith, he thought absently. “Just different, John. And you came, didn’t you?”

A prickling sensation crawled up the back of his neck. John glanced away from Faith, his gaze meeting Joseph’s from where he stood in front of the car; per usual, his expression was unreadable, obscured behind a mask of tranquility that provided no insight on what his brother was thinking or feeling.

“Go on,” John said, patting Faith’s back, “get some sleep. You’re going to feel like hell in a few hours, you know.”

She laughed, like maybe she didn’t quite hear what he actually said, and slid out of his half-embrace to wander around to the front of the car where Joseph was waiting. He turned his gaze away, swallowing back the feeling that he’d somehow failed a test—something that only Joseph knew the meters and results of, that he’d have to sweat until he found out about.

Elliot had already started walking away with Joey, taking her back to the same bunkhouse that she’d been holding up in prior to their little excursion. They spoke in low voices to one another; Elliot’s expression was even soft, softer than it had been when he’d found her sobbing into the grass in the field, when she’d been terrified out of her skin. Softer than when she’d had Ase’s brains splattered all over her.

John sucked his teeth, pushing the tailgate of the truck up until it latched. The adrenaline crash was starting to hit him hard, now. Every muscle in his body ached with the effort of moving, as though they’d all tensed and held for hours at a time; maybe they had. Gunfire and screaming still echoed in his head, while corpse after corpse, and Ase’s shattered head, lingered just behind his eyelids. They didn’t bother him, these images of glory and gore—but he couldn’t shake the way that Elliot had looked at him from the ground, drenched in blood, terrified.

Terrified of him.

“It’s always going to be like that, you know.” It was Jacob’s hard, steely voice that pulled him now, like his siblings wanted to take turns interrupting his train of thought. “She’s always going to pick Hudson over us.” His brother leveled him with one swift, hard look. “Over you .”

“Funny,” John muttered, “I didn’t realize you were a psych professional, Jacob.”

“Faith could have died because you went back for that girl,” Jacob bit out, his voice low but vibrating with something more venomous. “I know you know that, you aren’t stupid. And you went back for her anyway. So—”

“So, what?” he interrupted, trying not to let the frustrated venom from watching Elliot take Joey’s hand and walk off bubble out of him. “Faith’s alive, that crazy bitch is dead. What else do you want?”

“For you to get your shit together,” Jacob snapped. “Like I said, I know you’re not stupid, but do yourself the favor and prove it to me anyway. That girl —”

That girl, Jacob said, like the words didn’t suddenly fill John with some kind of poison. The eldest Seed gestured toward the bunkhouse, where inevitably, Elliot and Joey were conspiring; to leave, to kill. At this point, John wasn’t sure, and he didn’t think that either would surprise him.

“—is nothing. Don’t let nothing fuck everything up for us.” Jacob’s words were hard and cold. He gripped John’s shoulder and added, “Don’t let nothing fuck everything up for Joseph.”

That’s what it really boiled down to at the end of it all: that Joseph had seen like he always did, because nothing went without Joseph’s seeing, and maybe he wasn’t sure that Elliot was really worth the trouble anymore. Before, Joseph had wanted her to add to their little collection of misfits, just like he’d added the sheriff’s receptionist, just like he’d picked up Faith when she was Rachel, just like when he let Jacob tap into the worst parts of him for use, just like just like just like . Joseph was hard-pressed to find a vicious misfit that he didn’t want for himself, and Elliot Honeysett had been no different.

But a hard-to-break will cost time, and resources, and maybe with these locusts in their garden, that just wasn’t going to cut it anymore. Not for Joseph. Not right now. Where was this, anyway, back at the start of it all? Back when John had wanted to do things his way?

“Whatever Joseph’s opinion on the usefulness of the deputy, Burke’s gone,” John said after a minute. Jacob’s hand still sat heavy on his shoulder; he passed a hand over his face and sighed. “That marshal, the one that was—”

“I remember.”

John grimaced. “He was with Faith, and Hudson, but he wasn’t at the camp that I could see.” He paused again. “Jacob, if he got out and he made it out of Hope County, he’ll be a problem.”

The red-headed nodded once, brisk. “A big fucking problem.” Another pause, and then: “Tell me you’ll get this whole issue with the deputy wrapped up.”

John’s jaw clenched. Tell me you can do this, Joseph had said. Tell me you’ll get this whole issue wrapped up. Hadn’t he proven he was capable of handling her? Hadn’t Joseph himself said that?

“There’s no issue,” he replied flatly, stepping around Jacob and heading to the church. “Never was.”

“Good.”

It was easy to say, and harder to believe. He knew—the rational part of his brain, somewhere inside of him—knew that he was jealous of Hudson. That he knew exactly what Hudson thought of him, and he hated that someone who hated him had Elliot immediately trailing after her like a puppy, as though the last three days—all of those moments hadn’t meant—

And what was he supposed to think, then, about the way that her lashes had fluttered when his fingers brushed her skin, the way the heat crawled under her freckles when he slid into her planetary pull? That it was just—passing? Nothing?

Does it matter?

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Elliot was having a hard time.

That was to say, there were a lot of conflicting emotions that were welling up inside of her, crashing down like tidal waves. Normally, she’d be able to bottle those pesky things up and bury them deep inside her, to access later (which could be minutes, or days, or years—whenever); but with the drugs still wreaking havoc on her, she felt like all of her normal defenses were crashed and battered, maybe even beyond repair. Maybe even permanently decimated.

It was lucky that she had Joey, she supposed as she closed the bunkhouse door behind them, letting the noise of it soothe her over-worked senses; lucky, because Joey had always been her lighthouse in the times that she needed it the most.

“We have to get out of here,” Joey said, and the words immediately exhausted Elliot further. She took in a long, suffering breath and sat down on the edge of one of the bunk beds, rubbing her hands against her face. She was far from out of the woods; she thought maybe she was starting to come down, or even crash, because it felt like electrical pulses kept ricocheting through her body and they wouldn’t stop.

Elliot managed out, “I’m in no shape to go anywhere, Joey, you know that I—”

She saw the look on Joey’s face. Distress. John had kidnapped her, and terrorized her with whatever it was he had originally planned to do to her, and now they were here, in the compound, where it had all began. And yes; John had kidnapped Joey, and her, and yes, he was a fucking psycho, and—

And yes, he knew her well enough to shove a cigarette in her hands when she was stressed, and he didn’t complain when her nails dug into him when she thought the world was going to split in two around her, and yes, he did come back for her when he didn’t have to, and yes and yes —

‘And yes’ what? A nasty voice inside of her head said. A man so much as looks at you and all of a sudden you’re on the other side?

“I can try,” she offered weakly. “I can try, if you want to go now, but I don’t know where Boomer is and everyone from Hope County is—hopefully—already gone. I don’t have anything.”

When the words came out of her mouth, she felt the last thread holding herself together snap. I don’t have anything, the words echoing hollow inside of her, reminding her that everyone was gone, maybe they were dead, that she didn’t know where her dog or her mama were and maybe that meant that she didn’t have anything left inside of her, either, nothing left to give. That she had scraped and scraped to the bottom of the barrel and now she’d have to start breaking herself into pieces to have anything worthwhile to give anyone.

“I don’t have anything, Joey,” she said again, her voice wobbling and wet and fuck, she hated it so much, the burning of her eyes stinging against blood and viscera collecting in the tears. “I don’t, I’m sorry—I’m really sorry—”

Joey crossed the small space of the bunkhouse to crouch in front of her. She pressed her hands into Elliot’s shoulders, and she was saying something, but Elliot couldn’t hear it over the pounding of blood in her head.

She pressed the heels of her palms against her eye sockets, but the gesture brought no comfort; each time she closed her eyes, she kept seeing Ase, skull caved in. Surely, one shot had been enough? Surely, the second shot to her head was just—

Just John being himself.

“God, he fucking—he mutilated her, Joey,” Elliot managed out, her voice breaking on something like agony as the panic started to set in. Her hands trembled and she pushed the hair from her face, a movement that she was sure was just packing the dried blood in. She couldn’t get her eyes to focus on anything; everywhere she looked, she thought she could see the dark flicker of Ase’s clothing, the haunting corpse come to finish what she started. “She was dead—all of her, just falling—spilling out of her, like she’d been gutted, and I thought that he was done, and we’d go home, but then he shot her again—God, fuck, Joey, she’s all over me—”

“Hey,” Joey said firmly. “El. Take a breath and look at me.”

“I am.”

“A bigger breath,” Joey insisted, taking her hands away from her face and pulling her to a stand. “Just one.”

She did. I see, she thought and failed. I smell, I hear, I feel, but nothing came. She was drowning in it, whatever it was; Ase’s blood and guts on her, the memory of her glassy eyes as Ase reached for her, the feeling of Kian’s hands on her neck, the horrific monster lurking in the woods, and…

“Take another,” Joey reiterated. “Just one more.”

Elliot knew this trick. It was the oldest trick in Joey’s book. Just ask for one, and then just one more, and then just one more, until she was breathing like normal. She did as the brunette bid her anyway, and because her normal grounding methods had failed her, she instead thought, I’ll just count to ten. If I can make it for ten more seconds… And then another ten…

“You’re still sweating hallucinogen,” Joey murmured, squeezing her hands to help bring her back down. “You should take a shower. Come on.”

The journey between the main room of the bunkhouse and the felt both like it took years and happened without her knowing, as though she’d blinked and suddenly found herself standing in the bathroom, the fluorescent on the ceiling digging into her irises.

Her gaze flickered up to the mirror hanging over the sink. The person that looked back was a stranger to her; blood splattered every inch of her skin, matted in her hair, staining her in dark, carmine gore. Elliot thought about the strange voice in the woods, crackling and snapping and trying her on for size as it slid under her skin.

As the glass of the mirror seemed to pulse and stretch, the sound of running water snapped her attention elsewhere, hands limp at her sides. Joey pulled the knob that turned the water into a shower and said, “Okay, Elli, you call if you need me.”

“Okay,” Elliot murmured tiredly.

“Okay,” Joey repeated, watching her for a moment. And then she pulled her into a tight hug, and whispered, “For the record, I never doubted you’d be able to get me out. From John, or from the other place.”

The words didn’t offer her any comfort, but they were nice, nonetheless. She nodded her head and waited until the brunette had left the room before she started to undress, her movements methodical but unsteady; it wasn’t until water hit her skin and she saw the streams of thinned blood touching down on the floor of the bathtub that she finally felt some relief.

Even if it was only a little.

I don’t have anything, she thought tiredly, her eyes closing as she ducked her face under the stream of the shower. I don’t have anything left. What am I supposed to do now?

She had Joey. She didn’t have any idea of how to find Boomer. Hope County was gone, if they were lucky, and dead if they weren’t. She hadn’t heard from her own mother in--weeks? Or was it days? How long had this been going on?

It felt strange, to not be able to trust her own memory—to not know when the last time was that she got a full night’s sleep, or the last time that she curled up in her own bed, or the last time that she spent doing something that she enjoyed. As Elliot scrubbed the blood off of her face and out of her hair, staining her fingernails rusted-red, she thought that the idea of continuing on , of doing more, was so very exhausting.

They didn’t hurt you? John had asked, his fingers brushing the bruises on her throat where Kian’s fingers had gripped. It bothered her, when people touched her—grabbed her like they owned her, like she wasn’t in control of her own body—but when John did it, it was different. Even when he’d dragged his finger under her collarbone and said, I think it’ll fit nicely right here, don’t you? Just over your heart.

John was only doing what he was meant to do all along: draw her in, keep her there, and Ase’s gruesome death was just a reminder of the person that he really was. She had forgotten that.

But she wouldn’t again.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The night felt sticky, sitting like a second skin on him. When John stepped into the church to find Jacob and Joseph talking in low voices, he felt a strange sensation prickle down his spine. It was anticipation, he realized, nearly a moment too late; by the time he was bracing himself, Jacob had turned and walked out the side door, leaving himself and Joseph alone.

“How is our deputy?” Joseph asked, his voice light and mild. John tried to lessen the tension in his jaw.

“Which one?” he replied dryly. “She’s fine.”

Joseph said, “You were worried about her.”

“Well, I did work really fucking hard not to kill her,” he bit out, and then sighed at the way Joseph’s brow arched, a visible change in his expression even in the dim, intimate lighting of the chapel. “Look, Jacob already gave me the whole speech about—”

“I think you’re doing a great job with the deputy,” Joseph interrupted, firm but not unkind, “and I want you to continue.”

John stopped. Maybe it was the adrenaline crash, or the way that he’d come into the conversation at what appeared to be the end of it, but he couldn’t wrap his head around what Joseph was telling him; especially after what Jacob had said to him.

So he said, very intelligently, “What?”

“Our friend the marshal got out,” Joseph supplied. “Hope County has evacuated, if they’re lucky. But you know, John, even if they come for us—even if they arrest us—there are…”

A pause lingered between them, just long enough for something close to dread to knot and writhe between his ribs.

“... ways,” his brother continued, placing each word meticulously, “to make a legal case like this one fall apart.”

I don’t know what you mean, John wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t come out of him. If Hope County was on the run, they might not ever look back; if the U.S. Marshal brought his buddies back, that would make Elliot the key witness in their case, while the other members of Hope County and the Resistance were…

“It’ll be all of them testifying against us,” John said after a moment. “I appreciate your confidence in my abilities, but—”

“You can convince people not to talk,” Joseph replied. He paced away from the table at the center of the chapel’s front room, absently scratching at his jaw, as though he were only just coming up with this idea; John knew that wasn’t the case. It wasn’t ever the case with Joseph. Nothing went without careful deliberation. “There are particular brands of persuasion that work better than others. But we’ll need more than just silencing our neighbors. We’ll need…”

Positive testimony, John thought, when the words didn’t come out of Joseph’s mouth.

“Yeah,” John murmured tiredly. “I know.”

“Good.” Joseph gave him a small smile. He reached out, gripping John’s shoulder. “I’m proud of you, John.”

He stared at the wood paneling of the floor. Maybe he was tired; maybe it was the exhaustion from the last few hours, but Joseph’s words didn’t strike the same match in him that they had before. If Joseph noticed—and he almost certainly had—he didn’t let it show; rather, he let the distance between them grow, hand dropping from his shoulder as he walked for the door.

“You were going to let Jacob kill her.” The words came out of John’s mouth before he could think to stop them, before he could say to himself, it’s not worth the fight. He’s your brother, John. He gave you everything. Don’t you always say that you waited your whole life for something to say yes to?

He felt, more than he saw, Joseph pause in the doorway leading out of the chapel. A strange silence stretched between them; it was one where John thought he might have felt the scrutiny of his older brother’s gaze on him.

And then, in a voice casual and light, Joseph said, “You’re tired, John. You’ve had a long day. Get some rest, won’t you?”

John was tired. Tired enough to think that he might fall asleep standing up if he wasn’t careful. “You’re right,” he said after a moment, turning his head to look at Joseph over his shoulder with a small smile. “I will.”

“Goodnight, John.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Night passed more quickly than he would have liked. By the time morning had arrived, he thought maybe his conversation with Joseph was a dream; that he’d hallucinated the whole thing. Maybe some of the Family’s weird drugs had rubbed off on him while he was in there.

By the time early morning had rolled around, he’d dragged himself through a shower and into cleaner clothes. He half expected to find the bunkhouse completely vacated by Elliot and Hudson by the time he walked out with an armful of clothes, pleasantly surprised that Elliot was leaned against the door. Smoking, naturally.

“You look more like yourself,” John said as he approached. Her gaze flickered over him absently. She looked tired, but had since washed the blood and guts off of her face and out of her hair; as she took a drag of her cigarette and tapped the ash out of the end of it, her eyes turned away from him. Weird, he thought. He added, “I know you’ve got the whole blood-stained look, but I thought you might like to get into some clothes that are a bit cleaner.”

Elliot smoothed her boot over some ash on the ground, waiting for a heartbeat longer than normal before she said, “Thanks.” She sounded sour , like John’s mere existence was a chore for her, and not the way that it had been before—like she really meant it.

“You’re welcome,” he replied, watching her curiously. Despite the dark circles under her eyes, and the sickly rasp in her voice—it had probably felt nice to be high in that regard—she looked clear-headed. Normal. “How are you feeling?”

“John,” Elliot sighed, “let’s not.”

“Fine,” John snipped. “Where’s Hudson?”

“She went to walk the perimeter to try and call Boomer,” Elliot replied tiredly. “And then we’re leaving.”

Fuck, he thought, remembering his conversation with Joseph. Fuck fuck fuck. “Well, isn’t that lovely.” The biting venom welled up in his voice. There was a strange panic setting in now. She wouldn’t look at him, not for longer than a second, and her tone rang hollow and empty. He swallowed thickly, teeth clenching as he continued, “And how do you intend to leave, then? On foot? You sure seem like you’re in peak physical condition to be walking cross-country, Elliot. But I suppose if you have Hudson, then it won’t matter, because Hudson rescued you from those cultists and—”

“I don’t know, John ,” Elliot bit out, a real flex in her voice this time. It was comforting, to have her be anything—anything but ambivalent, anything but absent from their conversation. “I think I could get pretty far if I decide to start blowing people’s fucking skulls in with a shotgun, don’t you?”

John stared at her. “Pardon?”

“Oh, fuck off,” the blonde snipped, dropping what remained of the cigarette and stomping it out with her shoe. “Don’t give me your fucking clothes. If I change out of these I might forget that you splattered me with that woman’s brains.”

She turned and opened the door to the bunkhouse, going to close it, but John shoved his foot in the doorway to stop her, tossing the clothes onto the bed the second he got inside.

“I didn’t ,” John seethed. “Maybe you were too fucking high out of your mind to tell—”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Elliot’s voice was flinty. “It completely slipped my mind that you’re incapable of taking responsibility for yourself. Remember, John, that time you rubbed it in my face that your fucking family made me into a murderer? Because I do, and the pure fucking irony —” She jabbed a finger into his chest, the anger seeping out of her now. “—of you trying to make me feel like shit for killing your idiotic little cultists and then obliterating a woman’s skull onto my face is palpable!”

“Are you deaf?” John snapped, snagging her wrist before she could turn and try to walk somewhere else again. “I didn’t shoot Ase in the head, Jacob did. I put both my fucking hands on you to get you off the ground. How am I going to do that holding a fucking shotgun, Elliot?”

“I don’t know!” she replied furiously. There was a reckless, high-color in her cheeks, her voice cracking and breaking on something that John couldn’t quite pin down, couldn’t quite get his hands on. Even now, he thought, even when she was spitting her venom she was so —

“I don’t fucking know, John, you do—crazy fucking things all the time,” she insisted, and there was an uncomfortable wobble in her voice as her lashes fluttered. “Half the time I don’t know which John is going to open his fucking mouth—I don’t know if it’s—if it’s the John that kidnapped my best friend or if it’s the John that… That can be… With me, he’s...”

Her voice trailed off, weaker now, her fire spitting furiously as it tried to stay alight. John’s fingers loosened around her wrist, but didn’t let her go.

“There’s only one John,” he said, and his voice came out hoarse. “It’s just me.”

“I hate you,” the blonde managed out weakly, her lashes dark with unshed tears, soft and doe-like. “I’ve never—”

“Elliot,” John, tugging on her wrist, pulling her forward until she was in his space, until he could feel the warmth of her body and smell the wild on her—pine trees and ash and the mild shampoo she had used, “you’re going to have to come up with a new slogan that you actually believe.”

“John,” she tried again, and she was soft, soft and tired, “please, I’m—so tired of trying to figure you out—”

He closed what little space remained between them to kiss her; for a second, her entire body tensed like an animal ready for flight, stony and immovable against the affection, but he let her wrist slide from his hand, concerned that any moment he might spook her, that she was frozen because she was deciding when to run.

Her wrist slipped through his grip, catching at the base of her hand. She knotted her fingers into the front of his shirt and when his hand came up to the slope of her jaw, she leaned —like a flower to sunlight, blooming under his touch, just like that. Just that easy. John’s other arm slid around her waist to tug her up closer, and her mouth parted against his like instinct, like it had never not been this way between them.

The moment stretched; reality swung back in, the warmth of her mouth against his leaning back until a bit of space stretched between them. Not a lot, just enough for their noses to brush, and Elliot said, “I don’t know which—”

“I told you,” he replied, threading his fingers through her hair, “there’s just the one. This one, El, me. I want—”

“John,” she started, her voice overlapping his, "tell me that you're not lying when—"

He went to say, I want you to stay, I want to kiss you again, you hellcat, I’ve wanted to kiss you for days, but he didn’t get the chance because the sound of Joey’s voice outside the front door had broken the magic of the moment.

“Elliot,” Hudson called, “guess who I...”

The door opened, followed quickly by a scattering of dog nails as Boomer came racing inside. Without a second thought, Elliot had crouched down to wrap her arms around the dog John immediately took a step back and cleared his throat, feeling as though he’d been caught-out. Maybe, in a way, he had. He wouldn’t have cared, if he didn’t think that the idea of Hudson catching them would have made Elliot bolt instantly.

I should have kissed her again, he thought absently, watching Elliot fawn over Boomer with the kind of delight that she reserved only for him, her lips kiss-reddened. Before Hudson.

“He must have followed you here and waited,” Hudson said, looking at John with a narrowed, suspicious gaze. “Everything okay, Elliot?” she asked, even when she was looking at John. “I heard arguing.”

“Fine,” Elliot insisted, crouched on the floor to get as close to the Heeler as possible. “Everything’s fine. John was just—”

“Just dropping off some clean clothes for the deputy,” John interjected, despite the anxiety he felt sliding around inside of him when Elliot looked at him. The flush in her cheeks remained, and he knew that it wasn’t just anger there, anymore. Not really.

Joey crossed her arms over her chest. “Great. So you can leave, then? We’re done with you.”

We’re, she said, like she spoke for the both of him, both herself and Elliot. We’re, like just seconds ago, John hadn’t been thinking about the way Elliot’s breath hitched when his fingers brushed her skin.

“Sure thing,” he drawled, taking a few steps toward the door. He almost walked right out the door, even with his hands itching for her again, but he stopped. I should just say it, he thought. I should just out it right now.

“What is it?” Joey prompted, her voice hard and flinty.

Elliot wouldn’t ever forgive him if he did.

“Nothing,” John replied after a moment. A little smile ticked the corners of his mouth upward, and for a second his gaze met Elliot’s. “Hope you get some well-deserved rest, you two.”

The brunette watched him with a dark, inscrutable gaze, and he stepped out of the bunkhouse, letting the door swing shut behind him. For just a moment, he paused outside the door; long enough to hear Joey go, “What was that about?”, and he started off across the yard.

Not done with me yet, deputy.

#far cry 5 #john seed/deputy #john seed/rook #my writing #fic: ancient names #when i say it's clowN HOUR #I MEAN IT #WELCOME TO CLOWN TOWN BABY #i'm the MAYOR

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direwombat · 1 year

Note

for the fanfic emoji asks:

😅 What's a story or scene you've created that you're a smidge embarrassed exists?

✨ Give you and your writing a compliment. Go on now. You know you deserve it. 😉

💖 What made you start writing?

🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

🤯 What's a genre you struggle with as a writer (ex. romance, action, etc.)?

thank you skelly! ending with the wip snippet (wippet?) since i answered 🤯 in the previous ask!

😅 What's a story or scene you've created that you're a smidge embarrassed exists?

oh god. anything and everything on my ff.net account (abandoned way back in 2011 jesus ...) we don't talk about those days. also the rpf fics that i wrote a while ago. less because i'm embarrassed by it being rpf (the people encouraged fic and also...technically it was an au) but more because one of the people i enjoyed writing rpf for turned out to be a MASSIVE dickbag. like. YIKES (i'll bake cookies for anyone who correctly guesses which fandom this was for lmao)

✨ Give you and your writing a compliment. Go on now. You know you deserve it. 😉

;w; i like to think i do a good job at capturing and communicating the emotions of the characters i'm writing. i generally prefer character driven stories and i think/hope that comes through in my writing

💖 What made you start writing?

gosh tbh i don't even remember. i was a creative child, so drawing and making up stories was something i was doing since i was little. i started writing and posting fic in high school and it was kind of an off-and-on kind of thing, but it really wasn't until i made it through undergrad/when the pandemic hit that i started writing longer form stuff. and then that was put on pause because of grad school. but after grad school (may 2022) i had more time and more importantly no outlet for a lot of difficult emotions i was feeling while job hunting and melting in the texas summer heat, so writing (working on fragile creatures) was my escape. i wrote because it was a safe space to deal with hard emotions at topics that i didn't have anyone to talk to about :') you know. normal lonely person who has no irl friends kind of things </3 writing (and finding this little bubble of the fc5 fandom) helped me through what was probably the worst stretch of months i've ever had.

🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

why of course skelly! under the cut is the rough draft for the ending of chapter 1 of kneeling at the crossroads :)

Climbing into the truck, she settles in behind the wheel and stares at the intersection in front of her. To the right is the road leading north, towards the bridge to the Whitetails. To the left, the bridge leading into the Valley.

Her knee bounces as she thinks and she shifts restlessly in her seat. Nervous energy is telling her to run, act, stop thinking, pick a direction, and fucking go.

She needs to find her brother.

But, Rae-Rae is in trouble and Dutch sounded genuinely worried about her.

Her brother is somewhere in the Whitetails, unable to call for help because radio signals are being jammed.

But, Falls End is being fucking occupied and who knows how many are injured or dead.

Her brother is likely also in a war-zone. Alone. Possibly dead.

But, Joey is definitely still alive. She saw proof of that. But, she also might not be alive for much longer, if Sybille doesn’t take John’s bait.

Whitetails or the Valley?

Her brother, or the community she swore an oath to serve?

The lives of the many, or the life of the only kin she has left?

The familiar, coppery tang of blood fills her mouth again, but the sting of reopening the crack in her lip barely registers. She can’t get the image of Joey, beaten and crying, out of her head. Her partner — her friend — is in immediate danger.

Augustine is smart. He’s a ranger. He knows the mountains better than most, and he’s armed. Sure, his issued rifle is more meant to scare off bears, but it’s enough to give him a fighting chance, at least.

A chance that Joey certainly doesn’t have.

She slams her palms down against the wheel and she kicks into the footwell with enough force to shake the cab. “FUCK!” she shouts. And with a violent twist, she turns the key in the ignition and turns left, speeding off into the Valley.

I’m comin’ for you, Augustine, I promise. I just need you to hold on a little bit longer.

#thank you for sending in questions <3 <3 <3

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hardkinkbadkink · 4 years

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I am once again sending you a prompt, which I think is like my third one? Sorry for the spam I guess. Eskel is the love of my life soo... Eskel meeting Jaskier after The Mountain, and quickly falling in love with the charming bard. He knows Jaskier’s heart belongs to Geralt, but his body belongs to Eskel. They get to Kaer Morhen, and ofc Geralt is there. Eskel having to deal with that- but it all ends happily with a big polyamorous fuck pile. Jaskier definitely has enough love for both witchers.

listen. i. Adore eskel. i fucking LOVE that bitch, i love him greatly and i love him fiercely, he is the light of my life & my forever favourite witcher character and not even sweet darling joey batey as jaskier can change that like?? eskel is It for me. i was maybe seven when i played the first game because it is a National Classic and you were legally obliged by law to play it and wee bairn me looked at this four pixels of a man on my screen and thought fuck guess i gotta be gay?? the fucking. quest. where he gets his face ripped open. when i tell you i cried. and then he got even hotter?? impossible. i'll never love a character like that again, it's been too long to change x

my mild obsession aside, did you mean for this to be so angsty? because it is, it's fucking Sad and has Feelings and also a soft threesome that feels firmly out of place on my noncon-bestiality-centric porn blog (so i posted in on ao3 too)

as always i look at canon and i pretend i do not see it lovelies x

send in more eskel prompts if you want him to get fucked in true hard kink fashion & also send in more eskel prompts in general i will never refuse

***

Eskel has no intention to stop in that tavern at all, until he hears the singing.

It's nothing, he tells himself.

It's nothing, and yet he pulls Scorpion to a reluctant halt, pays the stablehand a copper and no mind as he makes his way, ensorcelled, to hover near the entrance. He'd heard the one particular song in so many renditions his head spins with it. Most of them lousy, some of them bearable. This one—

Oh, but this one seems like it'd been torn from the bard's very soul.

Eskel waits until the final, unusually heart-wrenching notes of Toss a coin bleed into a brief silence.

He doesn't enjoy taverns much—the burning glances when he settles at a table, swords at his back and hood pulled low over his eyes. The quiet chorus of gasps when he slips the bastard cloak off and people get a good look at his monstrous, twisted face, averting their gaze quickly but drawn in by morbid curiosity again and again. Their reluctance to serve him, to approach him, to trust him with his own damn job.

Eskel's had decades to get used to it.

Maybe next century.

He pulls the door open with an unsteady hand, eyes falling immediately to the bard, centre stage as he can manage in a wayward tavern not designed for such performances. He's dressed finely, lavishly, with great care and taste and Eskel lets himself admire, just for a moment.

"Oh," the bard breathes on a sharp inhale, and his dazzling blue eyes glitter with a sort of recognition that punches Eskel right in the gut with its intensity.

It's entirely quiet for a few painful heartbeats.

"Oi!" a man hollers to his side, clearly too deep in his cups to try at decency. "Y'heard the bard, toss a fuckin' coin to the witcher."

They don't, and Eskel would never ask that of them—but he's served a decent pint on the house as soon as he sits down in a darkened corner, and his cheeks can't exactly burn, but he feels like they would.

The bard gets through another song, a bawdy drinking tune. Eskel keeps his eyes on him the whole time, though he barely hears the words, mesmerised by the sway of the man's hips and the honey-warm timbre of his voice.

"My apologies for presuming," the bard begins, and Eskel watches with bated breath as his long, shapely fingers wrap around Eskel's own mug. He takes a deep drink, eyelashes casting lovely shadows on his cheeks. "Eskel?"

He nearly chokes on his own tongue, but manages to nod curtly.

"It seems that Destiny's playing tricks on me." The bard's lips twitch up in a sad smile. "I'm Jaskier. Pleased to make your acquaintance, after all these years."

Jaskier. Jaskier. Of course it's Geralt's fucking bard, his—

"I must say, I harboured my hopes that you wouldn't be quite as broody and silent as Geralt is."

Eskel manages to shake himself out of it, though only barely.

"Sorry." He clears his throat in an attempt to make his voice less gravely. Less threatening. "Sorry, fuck, just spent so many winters with Geralt talking my ear off about you, I'd half-expected the bastard to've made you up."

He tries for light-heartedness. A flash of poorly-disguised pain passes through Jaskier's face, and Eskel realises it was decidedly not the way to go.

"Ah, you won't have to worry about that anymore, darling. Geralt and I are no longer companionable, in any way."

Perhaps it's the darling that does him in. Perhaps it's the overwhelming desire to never see this brilliant man sad or hurt again. Perhaps it's Eskel's own harrowing loneliness.

It doesn't matter much, because he downs the rest of his ale in three gulps, and then there are warm fingers around his wrist, pulling him away and up the stairs, pushing him into a room and onto a bed with a lapful of bard.

"Goddess," Jaskier says quietly, almost privately, except that his lips hover temptingly close to Eskel's. "You do look just like him, if it wasn't for—"

"The disfigured maw?" Eskel adds helpfully, out of habit if nothing else.

Jaskier puts a gentle hand on his cheek—the scarred one, gods save his soul—and Eskel leans into the touch involuntarily, like a dog starved for affection.

"I was going to say the hair," Jaskier finishes with a hint of kind amusement, and winks.

Eskel knows, with that first hungry kiss, that he's absolutely and utterly gone for the bard.

"Beautiful, darling—gods, you're stunning," Jaskier whispers later, hands roaming Eskel's broad chest, and fuck, he hadn't been touched like this in months, so he hides against the smooth column of Jaskier's throat—sucks a vivid bruise there like he has any fucking right—and desperately ignores the praise that isn't meant for him.

He sucks Jaskier's cock to make him shut up, and gets called lovely and breathtaking and darling angel for his efforts. He opens Jaskier up—mouth latched to the pale insides of his thighs, littering them with bruises—on four fingers and so much chamomile oil the smell makes him lightheaded, and Jaskier tells him he's a treasure, fuck, so good to me. He gets pushed backwards onto the bed, his wrists guided above his head in a soft suggestion of restraint as Jaskier rides his cock with determined fervour, and he's divine, gorgeous, my sweet, darling witcher.

Jaskier arches beautifully when he comes, spills all over them both, his eyes heavy-lidded, still holding Eskel's gaze, and Eskel knows he's only looking for an echo of Geralt in his yellow irises—but he flips them over, takes his pleasure in Jaskier's body, and he can live with being a second choice when he's used to being no choice at all.

***

"I've been—fuck, awfully lonely on the road, gods, darling—"

Eskel's quickly found out Jaskier is quite keen on being held, suspended in the air with only Eskel's hands underneath his thighs and a cock driving into him with haste and despair.

Especially out in the open, on the side of a well-traversed road. Eskel licks absently at the raised imprint of his teeth above Jaskier's collar and yearns to deepen it, have it stay there forever.

Jaskier pulls at his hair, panting harshly, brings their lips together in a searing kiss. He whines at the back of his throat and his sinful hole flutters around Eskel's cock, milking him into completion faster than anyone ever could, whispering low into his ear, that's it, that's it, love, fill me up 'til I can't hold anymore, fuck, so good like nobody ever did.

And if they're never quite alone in their passions, if Jaskier still searches his eyes for a ghost of someone else—Eskel can pretend he doesn't see, because he's the one who gets to fall asleep with the bard pressed up against him, soft and warm and kind.

***

Inkeepers take him in more willingly, when he's got Jaskier at his side, flashing them a smile full of promise.

He doesn't need for brothels, when he wakes up to Jaskier lapping at the head of his cock like it's the sweetest treat. When Jaskier's unable to keep his hands to himself. When he stays nice and loose and ready for Eskel to pound him into the ground at any moment.

"I'm not a young man anymore," Jaskier always says after, struggling to catch his breath, even if he were the one palming Eskel's cock through his breeches.

"You don't look a day over seventy," Eskel offers in return, and Jaskier slaps him upside the head in mock offense.

Eskel's never been happier than he is with Jaskier trudging the Path with him.

Which is why the frost crunching under their boots fills him with a hollow aching. A single snowflake lands pointedly at the very tip of Jaskier's reddened nose, and Eskel glares at the sky.

He lets Jaskier fuck him, then. They get a room for the night, light the hearth and feed the flames. Share a bottle of wine, of which Eskel takes the brunt. Stretch out leisurely on the furs, and Eskel's insides tie in knots when he watches the silver hairs on Jaskier's dark head glimmer in the firelight.

Jaskier takes his time, as Eskel thought he would. Lavishes him with kisses and praise and adoration and Eskel still doesn't think it's all his to have, but he melts under Jaskier's touches anyway.

I love you, he aches to say, to scream at the top of his lungs when Jaskier pushes into him, jaw slack and eyes squeezed shut in rapture.

"Come away with me," he begs instead, on the verge of release and at mercy of the insistent snap of Jaskier's hips. "To Kaer Morhen."

Jaskier shushes him with a kiss and a gentle hand in his hair.

"I don't want to leave without you."

Don't leave me alone, I can't bear it again.

He tips Jaskier's chin up, the bard's pretty eyes brimming with unshed tears as he nods—and this time, just for a second, Eskel doesn't feel like a shoddy replacement.

***

They beat Lambert to the keep by three days.

Three days spent reacquainting with the concept of heat and the feeling in their fingers after weeks traversing increasingly higher snowcaps.

Three glorious, uninterrupted days of having Jaskier share his bed in the only place Eskel could ever call home.

When he gets there, Lambert asks when he's going to get a turn on the bard, and if Eskel beats his insufferable arse in training a little harder than he normally would on the first day—well. It's what brothers do.

He makes sure to keep the ever-present mark at Jaskier's throat a vibrant purple when it fades into yellow, and Jaskier begs him for it as sweetly as he begs for his cock, just within Lambert's earshot.

Geralt doesn't show for a full fortnight, and then some. The snow piles higher with each day. They all collectively agree that their last wolf won't show this year, like he did so many years before.

Perhaps it is because Eskel thanks his Lady Destiny too soon, that Geralt staggers into the hall in the midst of a snowstorm, his cloak frozen stiff, frost melting on his silver hair.

They fall into each other's arms, because they always do; because they're brothers, because they'd been through hell together, because they love each other fiercely even if Eskel can't think of a single person he'd rather avoid more than Geralt, right now. They stand there in the hall, the snow on Geralt's collar a shock of cold against Eskel's neck. And then Geralt stiffens, suddenly, rigid in Eskel's embrace in a way that has nothing to do with the chill.

"You smell—" Geralt begins, seemingly perplexed, and inhales deeply at the juncture of Eskel's shoulder.

They fall away from each other abruptly, Eskel's chest tight with a muffled pull of dread.

"Let's get you warmed up, yeah? I'll get Lambert to see to your mare. He might not be too happy to see you, though. You lost him a bet."

Geralt follows him, almost reluctantly, and Eskel wants just one more night before it all goes to shit. Just the one.

***

Jaskier is sleep-warm and perfect and doesn't appreciate the chill of Eskel's skin once he finally gets back into bed.

Eskel takes him too roughly for the time of night, bites at his freckled shoulders and sharp collarbones, has Jaskier trembling and begging for it twice before he lets the bard come.

He muffles his own release against Jaskier's lips, all too aware of Geralt in a room not a hallway away.

***

The door creaks when it's pushed open. Faintly, but enough to rouse Eskel awake. He tightens an arm reflexively around Jaskier's sleeping form, and the bard nuzzles up against the side of his chest.

Yellow eyes stare at them intently, Geralt's expression unreadable, though the nod he gives can mean only one thing.

Eskel is careful as he untangles their limbs, and his heart decidedly doesn't pound quicker for a beat when Jaskier reaches out after him and mumbles a sleepy Eskel.

Their footsteps are nearly soundless on the stone floor. Geralt is equally quiet, rigid as a bowstring. They walk for a long time, until they come to a place Jaskier didn't yet get a chance to explore. Neutral ground. As neutral as can be, with Eskel still drenched in Jaskier's scent.

"I'm not sorry," Eskel says finally, and Geralt flinches.

They don't look at each other.

"Why," Geralt forces out. Eskel can hear the bones in his jaw click. "Why bring him here."

Wind howls outside the walls, the storm unrelenting.

I didn't want to be alone, he almost says, but bites his tongue. Instead,

"You broke him, Geralt. You left and he—he used to call out for you at night, you know? He'd have nightmares and wake up shaking. And I couldn't help."

They rarely talk like this, heart to heart under the guise of night.

"Why?" Geralt asks, softer this time. Kinder.

It doesn't feel right, but it's what's going to make things right.

"I'm just a substitute. A lousy one at that. He still—he wants you. Loves you."

And it's the truth, when he finally admits it out loud. Eskel is more at peace with that than he thought he would.

"Please don't take it from me," he whispers, overwhelmed in a way that he was assured the mutagens were supposed to eliminate. "It's all I have."

Geralt doesn't respond, though he does place a hand on Eskel's shoulder, in comfort or understanding, he couldn't know.

***

Jaskier keeps his head high.

"Geralt," the bard greets him, in a manner far too cold and collected.

He doesn't flinch under Geralt's gaze, doesn't look away before Geralt, but when he does—Eskel catches his expression shatter, fall into a million pieces that he desperately wants to collect and put back together. They slip through his fingers.

At night, Jaskier jolts awake clawing at his own throat, crying that he can't breathe, asking Geralt to help him, please help him. Eskel holds him until the tremors subside. Neither of them sleeps well.

All the good evaporates from Eskel's life.

The silly marks of faux ownership fade from Jaskier's skin, eventually, and Eskel's heart aches.

He kisses Jaskier deeply, puts all his horrible feelings behind it, and then just holds the bard close. For the last time. Eskel knows he isn't meant to cry—but the trials merely took away his ability to shed tears, not this overpowering fucking desire to do so.

"Eskel?" Jaskier says, gently, the question of what's wrong implied.

Eskel shakes his head and holds Jaskier tighter.

***

"You. Apologise."

Geralt seems startled by the development. As does Jaskier, to be fair, shifting nervously where he's gripping Eskel's arm.

"I don't want his apology," Jaskier says weakly. "We've had our words, and they were very—pointed. Very definite. Eskel—"

Jaskier looks to him with wide, terrified eyes.

And it wouldn't be enough that he has to give up the one good thing in his life, would it? It wouldn't be enough that every time they fucked Jaskier looked beyond him and for someone else. It wouldn't be fucking enough that he was madly, unreasonably in love with a man whose affections laid firmly elsewhere.

No, it wouldn't, because now he has to—

He takes a deep breath and listens to the staccato of Jaskier's quickened heartbeat.

"I wouldn't make you do this, except you do want his fucking apology, and Geralt wants to give it to you, because you love him and he loves you and I'm—" useless, disposable, unwanted, "I'm done. I'm done. Figure it out. Please."

Jaskier's hands fall away from around his arm, and Eskel takes off.

He doesn't really have anywhere to go, when every place he'd grown to love in the keep knows Jaskier's presence, wears his mark and his scent.

The corridors are still and silent. Grey and imposing. Cold is seeping through the thick stone—cold from this winter and the hundreds before it, and Eskel thinks the walls had never truly known warmth. It's all terribly dull, Jaskier had said when they'd walked the halls that first time, hand in hand with not a worry between them.

He'd been stupid to grow so attached when Jaskier was never his to keep. He'd been stupid to bring him here and expect everything to stay the same in blissful ignorance. He'd been stupid, and he didn't want to be lonely again, even for just a few months—and now he's going to be lonely until some merciful beast cuts his suffering short like it was always meant to.

It is, perhaps, too early in the day to drink, but Lambert's eyes light up when Eskel goes to him with the offer.

***

"You didn't come to bed."

Eskel hears Jaskier approaching, of course he does—but he doesn't turn to face him, eyes firmly fixed on the window, even if it is just snow there. He does feel quite dramatic, sat in a windowsill like a maiden awaiting her beloved to come and whisk her away. Eskel awaits only peace and for his heart to feel whole again.

"Smells like you," he says, too honest.

Jaskier shuffles closer.

"I waited up for you."

A hand falls gently to his shoulder, and Eskel shivers at the touch.

"Thought you'd be staying with Geralt. You—you can keep the room, if you want." Eskel couldn't ever be comfortable there, anyway, not after everything.

"Darling—"

The hand moves from his shoulder to his cheek, soft and tender and Eskel meets the incredible blue of Jaskier's eyes easily.

"I never meant to make you feel unwanted," Jaskier begins. Eskel wishes only to shrink under his gaze. "I want you so, so much."

Jaskier settles next to him, their thighs pressed together, the black of his trousers startling against wine-red silk. Eskel feels fucking dumb.

"I know it wasn't about me, I—you should go be with your wolf. I'll be fine."

The scars pull tightly when he smiles, aiming for reassuring; it comes out tired and helpless.

Jaskier leans in impossibly close, the ghost of his breath on Eskel's lips.

"You're my wolf, too."

They kiss before he knows it—desperately, hungrily, until Eskel's head spins and Jaskier's hands tug at the collar of his shirt.

Eskel pulls away with a deep, burning hatred of himself.

"Just go, Jaskier." When did his voice grow so cold? He never wants to speak to Jaskier like this, never, and yet— "I don't need your pity."

He expects Jaskier to do just that. Go, and avoid him for the rest of winter, and walk around with Geralt's scent all over him and a mark to the side of his neck and—

"No. Nuh-uh. Not happening. Eskel, gods, I—I'm sorry, yeah? That you couldn't trust my affection was all for you, and perhaps it wasn't, not always—"

Fuck, but it does hurt to hear it, just a bit.

"—but then you had to go and be the most splendid creature under the sun and I, well."

The gold of Jaskier's rings glitters enticingly in the sparse sunlight when he reaches for Eskel's hand.

"I do love Geralt, but Eskel, darling. I love you just as much."

Eskel could fall to his knees if he were the praying sort.

Fuck, he might anyway.

Jaskier kisses him, and Eskel carries the bard all the way to bed to show his worship in a different way.

***

It's easy to kiss Geralt.

It's not the first time he'd kissed Geralt.

"Fuck, look at you," Jaskier moans, somewhere to their side.

Geralt arches his neck beautifully when Eskel grabs a fistful of silver hair and tugs his head backwards.

It is, possibly, the first time he'd kissed Geralt without the hushed secrecy of darkness and a hard scrubbing to get the scent of release off each other.

Jaskier leans over his shoulder to capture Geralt's lips for himself, chest pressed tightly to Eskel's back.

He'd thought the jealousy would smother him, when Jaskier first brought it up. He'd thought he would choke on the image of Jaskier laid bare before anyone else. He'd thought—

But it's Geralt, isn't it? It's Geralt, and they'd already shared so much with each other, their joys and their pain and their lives, and—

"Eskel," Geralt breathes like he used to so many lifetimes ago, except he doesn't bite his tongue, now, and Eskel leans in to bite instead at the soft skin below his jaw, to leave his mark there, twin to the one he'd left on Jaskier.

They fall softly to the mattress, him and Geralt, with Jaskier crawling over them swiftly, a sun-warm smile on his pretty face.

"Gods. Gods, you're stunning."

Eskel turns his head slowly, lazily, and finds Geralt's eyes heavy and sparkling. Not just yellow, anymore, no longer the colour of a beast's—rather, the exact shade of sunlight caught in honey. Of morning dew on dandelions.

Fuck, he'd grown mellow.

Jaskier comes to straddle him, all pale skin and gorgeous hair and bruises from his hips to his throat. He settles heavily over Eskel's cock, the bastard tease.

"Jaskier," Eskel near-hisses, because suddenly the head of his cock dips inside Jaskier's oil-slick hole. "Fuck, you—"

"Of course I got ready for my wolves, darling," Jaskier breathes, and laughs, and seats himself completely in Eskel's lap like it's nothing. "In fact, you might be partial to know—I had to employ the use of my other hand, to prepare for what I have planned."

Eskel's head spins, thick with the promise that he doesn't dare dwell on. His eyes slip shut; Jaskier coaxes them open with nought but a soft word.

He can feel Geralt stir next to him, watching with a tight grip on himself as Jaskier moves easily, like he'd been made only for this, his one divine purpose.

"Geralt," Eskel hears himself call out weakly. "Geralt, Geralt—"

Words seem only a silly hindrance, so he doesn't bother, grabbing instead at the thick muscle of Geralt's thighs, guiding him to sit astride Eskel's chest, crush him with all that glorious weight—stuff his cock in Eskel's greedy mouth, fuck.

Eskel thinks he might combust, go up in flames as he's caught between the agonising pleasure of being buried to the hilt in Jaskier's slack hole and the heavy satisfaction of having Geralt's cock glide wetly on his tongue, further and further as Geralt stares at him, bewildered.

It's a wonder he doesn't come as soon as the length of it slides seamlessly down his throat, so deep he can feel it when he wraps a hand around his own neck. He squeezes, just to make sure Geralt feels it, too, and the rumble of a groan from above him makes Eskel thrust wildly into the clutch of Jaskier's maddeningly hot body.

"O-oh, you were made for each other, weren't you?" Jaskier's hand is petting gentle circles up Eskel's heaving stomach. "Fuck, darling, next time I'll watch you bounce on Geralt's cock till you sob with it."

He reaches blindly to grab Jaskier's hand, entwine their fingers together. With heavy-lidded eyes, he watches Geralt's head get pulled back for a messy kiss. The bruise on the elegant column of his throat stands dark and proud and Eskel's chest swells with it, even if it'll fade in hours. He'll just have to try very hard to keep it vivid.

Geralt rolls his hips, knees tightening around Eskel's shoulders, ragged moans filling the air, mingling with the sinful noises dripping from Jaskier's lips. Eskel's vision spots, air suddenly hard to come by, and yet it doesn't cause him distress; fuck, of all the ways to die, being smothered between Geralt's thighs with Jaskier tight and lovely around his cock is Eskel's preferred demise, if given a choice. His heartbeat quickens, though, and Geralt stops his delicious rutting, moves away with a tender look and a touch to his swollen lip. He leans down to steal another kiss, but Eskel's too floaty, too hazy to do anything more than open his sloppy mouth--for Geralt, and then for Jaskier, when he collapses on Eskel's chest.

"Desperation really is becoming on you, darling."

Feeling Geralt's tongue lapping at his cock when it's still moving in and out of Jaskier—

Feeling a finger press in alongside him, joined quickly by another and another, until the fit is so tight it seems like he's suffocating—

Feeling the torturously slow drag of Geralt's cock against his, contained so closely in the heaven of Jaskier's body—

"Fuck," Eskel and Geralt groan in perfect harmony, Jaskier trembling wildly in their arms.

"Gods, gods, fuck, I love you, love you both so much—"

Eskel can't speak, can't move, can't do anything but suck in desperate breaths and look as Jaskier's face morphs from pain into rapture, his brow smoothing out, his bitten-red lips coming apart in a perfect o.

Geralt roars, withdraws his hips just a little, and it jostles Eskel's very soul.

Fuck, he can't imagine what it's like for Jaskier.

He wonders if—

"Move," Jaskier says in a broken voice. "You can move, you can fuck me, a-ah."

Eskel wishes he could Axii himself into not coming. He wishes—gods, but he can't, he can't, and when Geralt starts moving with purpose, Eskel feels the crackle of release at the base of his spine, coiling tighter and tighter until—

"Fuck, Eskel—" Geralt moans, and it's torture, when Eskel can feel his cock throbbing against Geralt's, and then he's coming and coming and coming, a shockwave of sensation.

His ears feel like they're stuffed with thick wool.

Jaskier kisses him, quick and filthy and needy.

"You're perfect, perfect, my darling—" he says against Eskel's lips.

Eskel whines at the back of his throat, his hands trembling where they grab Geralt's hair and tug him to lean down.

The raw, painful pleasure of his oversensitive cock still trapped within the suffocating heat of Jaskier's body threatens to undo him completely. He claws blindly at any skin he can reach, to ground himself, to settle against the unrelenting drag of Geralt against him. He can feel his seed dripping out of Jaskier and down his balls. It's fucking filthy.

He kisses Jaskier and he kisses Geralt and his lips go numb before Jaskier finally tips into a shaking release that rips a hoarse scream from his throat.

The bed is barely big enough for two people, but they make it work. They'll make it all work, somehow.

Before sleep takes him, Eskel hears Lambert yell, I'm moving the fuck out from down the hall.

#cw SOFT #honestly that's it #god i'm tender for eskel i'm sorry #on another note #to the anon that sent me a leshen prompt yesterday #how fucking dare you?? fit all my biggest kinks??? in a two sentence ask?????#criminal

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mwolf0epsilon · 4 years

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Hello! Writing prompt for you! in your after studio au what about the point of view of the toons finally free inside an unknown world? Do this only if you want or if you haven't already done it. Thank you very much ^w^

Summary: After the studio, there's a lot of new development with the toons.

Another case of getting two birds with one stone. I had a request on AO3 for some Sammy X Norman goodness for Post-Studio AU and I also wanted to play around with the toons, so here you go!

[[MORE]]

One of the hardest challenges was without a doubt healing and rehabilitating the twisted and imperfect toons that had come out of Joey's revolting experimentation. Creatures that had once been broken, feral and horrifying to look upon if just from how wrong their forms had turned out. Pipers, Fishers and Strikers that hadn't been good enough to be Charleys, Barleys and Edgar's, among a few other creatures that had evaded Henry during his journey through the damned cartoon studio.

Toons that were slowly stabilizing and becoming less what he associated with danger and more similar to what they were truly meant to be, if not a little unique in their own way.

Well, not counting the ones that had been absorbed by those who had "donated" pieces into their creation that is… Some toons just weren't meant to be and others were just the missing piece that a Searcher needed to ascend into higher thought as a Lost One.

Still, even after a series of purges, there remained a few sets of Butcher Gang clones as well as one singular Chester creature.

There was also something else that had been a little alarming at first. What Henry could only describe as pulsating "embryos" (not really but he didn't know what else to equate them to) that had been formed from excess ink that had sloughed off from the more stable studio employees.

A process that didn't start immediately after leaving the studio, rather, a few months after everyone started to settle.

Henry still couldn't forget the vivid image of Sammy being sick for an entire week, spitting up ink every so often, and then throwing up a massive blob of congealed ink that had slowly shaped itself into a Bendy clone with the most unsettling pair of eyes he'd ever seen. He doubted Sammy himself could forget the disturbing experience, and was also pretty sure he was a little traumatized by it.

Even so he seemed to almost have taken to toon in as if he were his own child. Not as worrisome as veneering the little fella, but still quite hard to grasp considering his… unorthodox birth…

"Any more Searcher incidents since I've been gone to check on the girls?" Henry had asked as he was let inside by Allison, catching a whiff of breakfast being cooked. Pancakes and coffee from the smell of things. Like a quaint little cafe or the Stein household in his youth. Comforting.

"Not since two weeks ago. All Searchers have actually become Lost Ones since you've been gone." She'd responded as she led the old cartoonist into the spacious kitchen.

The table was quite long, and the seats provided were no longer mostly composed of pillows and stacks of books to boost certain inhabitants of the house. The Projectionist was still forced to kneel to eat thanks to the added weight of the machinery that was a part of his body, but he didn't complain from where he was leaning into Sammy and his height more than compensated for it anyway. Henry could just about see Susie carefully braiding the many tangled wires and thick cables connected to the Projectionist's head and back.

"Uh, really? How many toons left then?" Glancing around he noted that not everyone had come down to eat yet. Tom and Buddy likely both being in the bathroom washing up from running outdoors. A favourite activity of his.

"Three sets of Butcher Gang clones. Two are incomplete." Allison explained. "We think we know who was the originator of the complete set, but their Charley has stated that the trio is fairly happy to remain as they currently are. They are nearly perfect if you ignore the heavy scarring and prosthetics."

"I take it that's Mr. Allwine's set?" Henry guessed. Humming in understanding when she nodded rather than verbalizing her confirmation.

"I recall Mel now that things are coming back to me. He really enjoyed voicing those three, so I'm not surprised he'd rather remain as the Butcher Gang." Susie added as she finished the messy braid of wiring. "I'll miss his jokes though…"

"I certainly won't. He was a jackass at best…" Sammy huffed, eyeing the unblinking toon currently hiding under his chair. "Don't repeat that around the Edgars… Charley and the Barleys will wallop you into fine impish ink."

"M'not stupid." The little imp retorted in Sammy's own voice, although it sounded much younger. Less weighted down by a bitter and heavy conscience.

"I'm not implying that you are, just giving you a fair warning. Socialized or not, those crooks are always eager to pick a fight." Like a parent passing on sage advice, Sammy offered the little wandering menace a pat before pressing a kiss to the Projectionist's neck.

The larger ink man rumbled happily and seemed content between his two favourite people, and even passed a piece of toast to the little devil hidden under the chair. They made for an odd family unit, but Henry was very sure they were happier than they'd been for a long time.

"Sometimes I forget you had to raise a kid before all this…" Henry chuckled, amused by the domesticity of it all, before turning back to Allison. "The incomplete sets?"

"Not a clue. Well, there's one that's just an Edgar, but we know he was part of Grant… Although he reformed without needing to assimilate that piece." She shrugged "The little guy is more mature than the other two Edgars. I'd say he's more of a teenager even."

"And the remaining incomplete set?"

"An Edgar and a Barley. They lost their Charley a while back, but they haven't clung to any particular employee that we can tell… Grant's Edgar has been around them a lot though, so they seem content." Allison flipped the pancakes over as she spoke. "They also orbit around Mel's Butcher Gang. I think his Charley makes them feel safe."

"Good to always have an emotional safety net I suppose…" Henry was at least glad that they hadn't reverted into feral creatures. Socializing them had been pretty difficult considering how messed up they'd been from their failed creation process. Like teaching feral cats to trust. "Anything else?"

"Norman's been leaking a little." Sammy offered. "Not enough to be alarming, but just about enough that we're sure we're uh… Well. Expecting extra company."

As if to prove Sammy's point, the Projectionist let out a choked wet cough, the tube connected to his esophagus uncoiling and shuddering before a blob splattered onto Sammy's lap.

Henry winced at the mess, and gave the curly haired musician a sympathetic look as his face went completely blank. Likely registering what had just happened.

"Ewwww…" the not quite perfect Bendy clone inched away from the drippy mess, while Susie shook her head and got up.

"I'll get the napkins…"

In the Projectionist's defense, he looked quite sheepish for a creature that couldn't properly emote. Hunched shoulders and claws tapping together as he looked down at his knees in shame.

"Lovely…" Sammy pinched the bridge of his nose and just let the blob fall to the ground. It twitched slightly but remained as it was. "You'd think the miracle of childbirth would be nicer to bare witness to..."

"Even if it were the more conventional and biologically sound method, I can assure you it's not as beautiful as most would have you believe." Henry offered with a tight smile as he tried not to think about the tiny inky organism that was slowly reshaping itself into the vague figure of a comic strip character. "And I was there to see it happen twice."

"I take it there was a lot of screaming involved?" Sammy smiled at Susie as she returned with the napkins. He started patting the stains carefully, letting the ink soak into the napkin.

"On my part? Plenty." Henry winced "No one ever told me there's more after the baby comes out… And it didn't get easier the second time around. Linda nearly crushed my hands…"

It didn't take long for breakfast to be done and every single household member to rush down to eat once called upon.

Only now the Projectionist was holding a toon of his own, while he vacuumed up cut up pieces of pancake and orange juice.

All things considered, having a new playmate for the other toons wasn't a bad thing.

If only the little blighter wasn't a troublemaking super villain… His first action was to shoot the pancake pieces out of Tom's fork and the large toon wolf was none too pleased when the little jerk started giggling about it.

Binky was surprisingly the easiest of the toons to get along with, right after Buddy. Outside of the studio, the Ink Demon was no longer a sinister figure that haunted the imagination of those who'd suffered in Joey Drew's nightmare.

Instead he was something closer to the cartoon character he was meant to be. Except he was much less troublesome than the mischievous and often misguided devil darling himself. In fact, the lanky imp was rather shy.

Sure he still looked far too human in proportions, and he was still learning how to speak, but honestly nothing about him was as off-putting as Henry initially thought. He felt bad judging him on appearances alone. Just like Joey had…

And, knowing what he did now, Henry didn't blame Binky for any of what he did in the studio.

The tiresome plotline, the living Ink's conflicting will, and the isolation had been the source of the Ink Demon's violent actions.

A scared and confused toddler following the bad examples of others.

But not anymore.

Not for as long as Henry was here to protect these people and help them grow.

Binky's less rumbustious disposition also meant he had a tendency to opt for calmer and more relaxing things to do. Like sleep under the shade of a tree when the weather was nice, watching the fish swim by in the stream, or pick flowers of all shapes, sizes and colors. Often doing so while watching the other toons run around and frolik like wild children.

Most often the poor guy was the unsuspecting victim of the Wanderer's shenanigans (despite Sammy's constant reminders to play nice).

With the addition of Cameraman, things were more hectic.

Others had lost their own excess ink in the span of the few days of Henry's visit, so the roster of toons consistently grew the better some people recuperated.

Jack had actually come down to visit as well, looking positively happy to find so many were experiencing something similar to himself.

In the first week of living with his husband and roommates, he'd apparently shed some more of his own ink and later found a small cartoon sheep staring up at him from under his bathroom sink. That had been an interesting night for the Fains.

Said sheep was eager to meet two others who'd been formed off of two other members of the Music Department. Johnny Brokeheart, the organist that had once been imprisoned inside his beloved instrument, and Julian Whitaker, the cellist that had sometimes visited the Prophet's domain for protection as a Lost One with a prominent limp.

The Woolly Triplets were happy to be together for a few hours before Jack returned home with his third of the trio. The little guy was reluctant to leave Jack's side, and both he and Theo had grown attached to him anyway.

It'd feel strange to part ways so suddenly.

Henry had marveled at the interesting cast of characters that were still coming together.

There were now three wolves, three angel, a demoness, a living camera, two imps, a leprechaun, two pirates, a living pirate chess, and three spiders.

He could only imagine what else might pop up the next time he came around to check on everyone.

It was truly a full house.

One full of silly shenanigans and exasperated parents that didn't want to admit their kids were adorable but little hellions. Such an odd thought, being a parent to a cartoon character that had at one point been their means to earn money… Odder still how easily they connected with them.

Perhaps because they'd come from them? Like an actual offspring?

That seemed to be the case with Sammy at least. If anyone had reasons to resent a certain grinning devil, it had to be the false prophet who'd grown disillusioned.

He loved the little Wanderer though.

Unsettling eyes and grin be damned, he was a proud da and did what he could to raise him.

Same with Norman who actually had proper experience as a father, and then even Susie who'd been a little miffed that she didn't have a little Alice to tend to, but still took on the responsibility of teaching Miss Twisted to not be too much of a nuisance (she loved her really, like mother like daughter they ended up becoming in less than an hour).

Even those who Henry hadn't pegged as the sort to want to be parents were doing grand with their own toons.

Grant was an exemplary father despite his neurotic personality, and even Bertrum and Lacie seemed fond of acting as an uncle and aunt to the toons. Teaching them things and letting them get away with things their parents wouldn't.

It was… honestly very nice.

Nothing the toons didn't deserve after such a rough start.

#eps writes:#bendy and the ink machine #batim #Post-Studio AU

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