#he wants good teeth but if he smells like he crawled out the sewers from a week of not bathing then so be it

[citrine-elephant]

thinking about leon having an EXTREME fuckin sweet tooth and getting absolutely shitfaced on those fruity drinks at the bars

[syoddeye]

the warren, part two

price x f!reader | 2.9k words

part one (prologue)

CW: blood (mentioned), dead animals, stalking

One bedroom. One bath. A screened-in porch. A carport. A woodshed. Fully furnished.

The old cabin in the woods is perfect.

No one answers the first call to the number on the ad, and the voicemail doesn't offer a clue as to who ought to answer. You leave a message anyway. After calling upwards of fifty places in the last week, you're desperate. The end of the month's coming up. Since you turned the motel manager down, he's wanted you out.

You fill out the rental application before hearing back, thank the gods there's no fee, and send it off with a sugary-sweet note and signature.

A woman calls back when you're in the middle of the supermarket. Congratulations, you want the place? You got it. It feels quick and surprising, but who are you to look a gift horse in the mouth? For the next four months, the cabin's yours. The landlady launches into details, forcing you to jot down directions on the back of your list. No GPS up here, she explained. The forest is too thick. Too many trees? Not a bad thing, in your opinion.

"Sure you're alright with sight unseen?"

"Yeah, I trust the pictures in the ad," You don't. "I'm itching to spend the summer in nature."

"Grouse Bay is a good spot for a getaway. You might not want to leave when the lease is up."

The sentiment makes you smile. "Sounds perfect."

~~

There is no welcome sign for Grouse Bay. No indication you're close until you're right up on it, or rather, over it.

A thick quilt of pine, fir, and cedar hugs the gravel roadway. Asphalt disappeared some ten miles back, and you pray your car and its ancient tires stick out the descent into town. You're careful not to lean your full weight against the overlook's worn wooden fence. Below you, the road carves a series of switchbacks until it sweeps through a dozen or so lakeside structures. Thin tendrils of smoke curl up from more properties hidden by trees. With the blues of the lake and mountains on the horizon, it's a regular postcard.

Your teeth clatter, and the car shakes the whole way down. You pass a few gated forestry roads and private drives with quirky names before the road curves a final time and spits you out onto the main street. The only street.

We are not in Kansas anymore.

You don't miss a single building, crawling along at the posted speed of 15 MPH. There's a motel, a veterinary office, a grocer, and a water and sewer utility building, and where the road splits to continue along the lake or further up a hill into the woods is the Foxhole.

A rough-looking pub, your lip curls at the horrifically taxidermied fox in the window beside the door. You pull into a makeshift parking spot next to an old Ranger, collect yourself, and head inside. 

Three heads swivel in your direction, two patrons and the barkeep. The men's expressions are unreadable, but the woman behind the counter offers a thin smile. 

"Sit where you'd like."

The stale air smells like heat and cigarette smoke, and the ceiling fans do little to dissipate either. "I'm actually popping in to pick up a key? To a rental?" Your eyes flick to the men at the bar, not wanting to state precisely where you're staying in front of them.

The woman's smile turns knowing. "Right. We spoke on the phone. I'm Kate Laswell. I own the cabin."

"Owns half the town," One of the men snorts, pinching the neck of his bottle for a swig.

"Ignore him," Her hand disappears into her vest pocket and produces a carabiner with one key. "You got the check?"

"Yes," You pull out your billfold, carefully slide the folded paper slip out from between cards, and exchange it for the key.

Kate inspects it briefly, then dips her head. "Need me to wait to cash it?"

Your face heats at the implication. You hadn't listed employment on the application but assumed the bank's letter spoke for you. After all, she accepted you. "No. Cash it whenever you'd like."

"Alright then. Know where you're going?"

"Yes ma'am, I do."

"So polite," she chuckles, glancing at the men who grin at you. "Well then, enjoy. Call me if you need anything or have questions."

You hightail it out of the bar, and try to ignore the weight of three sets of eyes on your back. 

~~

The engine clicks as it cools, the only sound louder than the birdsong. Wedged between the open driver's door, you stand, feet firmly planted, yet feel like you could float. You made it.

The cabin is a deep red oxblood, faded by weather and time. The carport sags more than in the pictures, and the woodshed is nearly cleaned out, but it looks like a dream. Sunlight drapes over the front half of the structure, and a breeze catches a wooden wind chime over the exterior door of the porch.

Hauling your bags out of the backseat, you trek up the gravel drive. The key slots in easily, like the hardware's brand new. The door inches open, and the smell of musty, trapped air leaks out. Here we go.

You exhale a shaky breath. So far, so good. The pictures continue to match reality. The door opens to the dining and kitchen area with a honey oak table draped in a checkered runner, coordinating cabinetry, a towering glass-doored cabinet on the wall, and the back entrance dead ahead. To the left are a couch and armchair, with a low table and a padded woolen rug beneath. The door to the screened porch also sits to the left, with the entrances you presume leading to the bedroom and bathroom ahead.

Wood paneling lines every room. Others might think it tacky, but you find it charming and warm. It makes it a bonafide cabin, one you've pictured a thousand times. The bedroom is sparse, with a simple furniture set including a dresser, a nightstand, a lamp, and a vintage brass bed frame.

You make quick work of settling in. The space is tidy enough, though it's clear that Kate probably hasn't stopped in since you signed the lease. You open the windows for fresh air and do a little dusting. The dining table swiftly becomes the catch-all, with the miscellaneous other belongings you brought scattered over its surface, including the prehistoric laptop you handed a middle-aged woman a wad of cash for in the parking lot of a Walmart. You'd left in a hurry but planned meticulously. Aside from a few necessities and groceries, you have everything you need.

In the screened porch, you discover a glider and ottoman needing new upholstery and a lacquered wooden sign with lettering spelling out The Warrens. It rests on a windowsill, covered in a thin layer of grime. You think it must be from the former owners and leave it out of an odd sense of respect.

An hour later, the place aired out, you shut the windows, clip the car and cabin key together, and hesitate at the door. What's the protocol out here? You've never lived anywhere that didn't require multiple deadbolts. The town's simplicity and the woods' peacefulness - you can't even see the end of the property's driveway from the step - make you think it's probably okay…But then you think of the men in the bar. They didn't look bad, but the bad ones rarely did.

Mind made up, you lock the door.

~~

The walk from the main thoroughfare to the cabin is ten, maybe fifteen minutes uphill. Sandals weren't the move, a reminder you tuck away for the next trip. Your focus stretches back to Grouse Grocery and its shopkeep, and you swallow hard at your naivete. 

"Aw, I didn't know you could feed the deer like this."

"It's bait, sweetheart."

Lingering humiliation propels you up the slope to your newfound sanctuary. It doesn't help the grocer's handsome. His eyes are the same color as the lake, his face framed by a beard and mustache, punctuating the mountain man look. Tall with a broad chest and shoulders that taper into a trim waist. Burly arms dusted with hair, chest too, far as you could tell through the open uppermost buttons of his shirt. Your mind fills in the blanks of what his bootcut jeans and flannel covered. Something peculiar to him, though, and you can't put your finger on it.

I'm overthinking this. It's a small town. I'm not used to it, yet. 

Not weird, just different.

The four words become your mantra when odd things start within days of your arrival.

~~ 

As you told the good-looking grocer, you are an animal lover through and through. The child who toted frogs home from the playground pushed their nose to the glass outside pet stores and braked for ducklings. You dabbled with a vegetarian diet, failed, and overspent at farmers' markets in weak absolution. But you had never been a pet person. Life never allowed for it. 

Which is why the cats are bewildering. Within the first week, three feral cats traipse about the property. By the end of week two, you count nine. Lounging in the woodpile, hiding beneath your car, or sitting on the step like they own the place. They skitter and hiss when you approach and don't touch the scraps of food you leave out to curry favor.

Then there are the 'gifts' they leave you. Headless birds, mice, and other small mammals. Entrails and viscera steaming on the cement step in the high noon sunlight. The Internet says it's normal, you say it's disgusting.

You read cats leave dead animals when they believe their human is helpless. That they see humans as big, furless, and inept hunters whose survival is in peril because they lack the innate ability to track, pursue, and kill.

Scraping the latest offering off their altar, you shrug off such notions. They're probably upset that their favorite place to squat is now occupied.

Then, the carcasses quadruple in size. One early morning, you decide to walk down to the lake to read with a cup of coffee, only to drop the mug and book into the dirt. A gutted doe is not fifteen feet from the front door beside your car. Black eyes lolled skyward, pinna flopped over its skull, and legs akimbo. After sprinting and vomiting into the kitchen sink, you call Kate.

"Sorry that's happened, I can send someone up to remove it in the next half hour. You ought to know that you might see more stuff like that, kid. Area's rich in wildlife - bears, cougars, bobcats, wolves, hell, even eagles drop half-eaten marmots from time to time."

You remain on the kitchen floor, repeating your new mantra, and not fifteen minutes later, tires on gravel announce someone's arrival. Mercifully, no one comes to the door. Whoever it is doesn't even kill the engine. You hear footsteps crunching on rock, the doe's body hitting the bed of a truck, the slam of a door, and the person pulling away.

Mustering the courage to stand, you stare from the front door, eyes transfixed on the blood left behind. You pray for rain.

It doesn't come.

~~

The front light won't turn on. You swap the lightbulb with a spare from the cupboard and zip. Nothing. You call Kate, whose patience seems a deep well. She promises to send the local handyman and gets off the phone in a hurry. Annoyingly, you don't get a name or a time.

It's noon when a red pick-up arrives the next day. You're on your feet, off the glider and its ottoman on the porch, and barefoot when the door to the truck swings open. The practiced smile you wear falters a little when a familiar cut of a man steps out, sizes up the cabin in a glance, and then turns to grab a toolbox from the bed.

You meet him at the door.

"You're the handyman, too?"

The crow's feet by his eyes tighten with a smirk. "And the locksmith." His chin lifts to the sconce. "This it?"

"The one."

"Right, I'll get a stepladder and it'll be in working order within the hour. Mind shutting off the power in the meantime?" 

"Of course. Need anything else from me?" 

His smile's a waxing crescent, mouth twitching like he's got something clever to say. You've seen it before on the mugs of men trying to get fresh with you, but he keeps whatever it is locked behind his teeth.

"No. I'll let you know when you can turn the power on."

The hum of the refrigerator dies with the electricity, leaving the cabin completely quiet. You return to the glider and book, thumbing through to find your place. Convenient, the screened porch catches the fleeting hours of direct sunlight that hits the cabin. It also allows you a chance to watch and listen to him work.

"Name's John, by the way," He says after a while, voice clipped, meeting your eye through the screen when you look up. "You didn't ask."

It's off-putting, the way he speaks. It wasn't as if he conducted himself with overt kindness at his store, but you hadn't expected him - John - to take a tone with you, a stranger. A newcomer. Your smile is eager to smooth things over, a beat faster than any instinct to fight, always has been. "You're right, how rude of me."

His focus returns to the light, giving a slight roll of his shoulders as if your apology lifted a weight off his back. "S'alright, reckon you're learning how things work 'round here."

You want to return to Winterson in your lap, but the poorly disguised condescension fans a spark of annoyance. "You haven't asked for mine."

"I know yours," He responds, pulling a rag from a loop on his pants to wipe at something. "Kate talks."

The paperback spine creaks in your grip. "I suppose that comes with owning the watering hole."

He chuckles, exchanging the rag for a pair of pliers. "Something like that."

You don't ask. Handsome John may be, but he is definitely weird. Best to avoid the bad side of the nearest grocer, handyman, and locksmith. You return to reading, and another half hour slips past. You don't notice until the hum of the refrigerator restarts, practically jolting you out of the chair.

John stands washing his hands in your kitchen sink. You did not invite him in. His head turns, seemingly hearing how your breath stutters, and he nods at the switch beside the door.

"Give 'er a try," He says, wiping his hands on a dish towel.

The light works, and you flick it a few times to be sure. You stare up at the light, listening to its muted hum.

"Y'know," John murmurs, suddenly behind you in the doorway, leaning, supported by an arm, on the frame well above your head. "This is an old place. Doesn't get let often. Probably more repairs hiding around here. Already saw a few holes in the screen. I can take a walkthrough and fix what I can while I'm here."

Your head dips back, neck craning to meet his eye at this angle. It doesn't occur to you to move despite the whole of the front yard before you. You swallow. He's only trying to drum up business. A small-town entrepreneur. Trying to survive just like you. "Maybe another time."

John raps two knuckles on the frame and pushes off. "Alright, I'll gather my things." He brushes against you as he passes and collects his tools and stepladder.

You watch him from the entry and offer a weak smile when he returns, holding a notepad. He fishes a pencil out from a pocket, scribbling a moment, before he tears off a page and holds it out – an old-fashioned carbon invoice.

Not weird, just different.

"Pay when you can. You know where to find me."

You take the invoice. "Not afraid I'll skip town?" You joke, trying to gauge his sense of humor.

He grins and huffs a laugh. It sounds only a little forced. "Not at all. I know all the best spots from the bay to the mountains, for hiding or otherwise." He rubs the back of his neck.

Your brows creep up. "Or otherwise?"

John's eyes widen a fraction, and his hand slips from his neck in a gesture of surrender. "Don't mean anything by that. More like…for food. Dinner, maybe? A hike?"

The sheepishness of his tone does him credit. So what if he's a little awkward or indelicate? Probably as nervous as you are, though clearly for different reasons. In town for all of two weeks and already a local's taken interest. Inwardly, you preen.

"That sounds like a date."

"It does." He concedes.

You start to shut the door on him, stopping when his expression falls into absolute confusion. A laugh bubbles up, and you open the door again. "Well? You didn't ask," You playfully turn his words back on him.

"Smart one, aren't you. Alright then," He muses aloud, smiling. "Would you like to grab dinner later this week? Know a good spot within a half hour of here."

The way he looks at you, eyes crinkling with interest, you don't suppose it's a bad idea to get out, make friends, and immerse yourself in the community. "I'd like that, John."

There's a triumphant glint in his eyes. "I'll be in touch, sweetheart." He dips his head, returns to his truck, and flashes a wave when he pulls a u-turn and drives out.

That night, when you return from a walk to watch the sunset, you flip on the porch light, grinning, thinking about your date.

You do not notice the little red dot within the bulb.

[janetbrown711]

Youth

Mikey is tired of the sewers. They're too dreary, too quiet, too... nothing. Not since two days ago, when a witness became a sacrifice and changed the course of everyone's lives forever.

Canon divergence fic based around s4e25 Requiem to explore grief and trauma in a different way <3

Part 1 Part 2

Ao3 Link

Lightning illuminated the night sky as Mikey lifted the manhole cover. On an average night, it would’ve frightened Mikey enough to decide this was a bad idea, and he’d walk back to the lair in shame, but not tonight. No, Mikey got out, barely making sure the manhole cover was back in place, before proceeding onto a rusty, old fire escape.

He welcomed the sound of thunder as it boomed and crashed. He welcomed the roaring, as it sounded more like home than home was these past two days. It was quiet, and the sewers weren’t meant to be quiet– it was unnatural, and Mikey just had to get out.

He welcomed the rain too, the water and earthy smell managing to break through the all consuming numbness that was threatening to consume him. He didn’t mind if it made the ladders and fire escapes more slippery, it was worth it to reach his destination– the roof of the Wolf Hotel.

A weight crashed down on Mikey, making his knees nearly buckle, but he managed to carry himself to the edge where he sat and closed his eyes, taking a deep breath.

It had been two days. Two days since Master Splinter suggested they split up. Two days since everything seemed like it might actually be okay again. Two days since Shredder– that stupid, ugly abomination– crawled his way back up and–

“Mikey.”

Leo.

Mikey wasn't surprised he was followed, even if Leo hadn’t left his room at all the past two days.

“Mikey, what are you–... what do you think being up here will do,”

Mikey rolled his eyes while still keeping them shut tight. He liked feeling the rain against his skin, even when he was a kid. Why, he and Raph would even–

“Mikey.”

“Leave me alone, Leo.”

“You know I'm not going to do that.”

Mikey rolled his eyes. “You didn’t have a problem locking yourself in your room.”

“Mikey, that– that's not fair, you know it isn't. I need time to… process too.”

“Then let me process and go away.”

“Mikey, we’re leaving for the farmhouse in an hour, we have to–”

“I don't have to do anything, so just leave,” Mikey snapped.

“Alone on a rooftop? No– not just a rooftop– the rooftop where– where Shredder–” Leo choked on his words, before shaking his head. “Fat chance, Mikey. We're leaving.” The older turtle grabbed Mikey's arm, but Mikey snagged it away.

“M'not going anywhere. Leave. Me. Alone.” Mikey sent a glare his brother's way.

“Mikey, cut it out, I'm not messing around,” Leo scowled and grabbed his arm again, successfully dragging him away from the edge before Mikey could break the grip again.

“Or what? Haven't I been punished enough?” Mikey laughed pathetically.

“Haven't you?! What about me?! What about Donnie?!” Leo cried, gesturing furiously. “Mikey, I am not going to lose another–”

Mikey took a step back. “I'm– I’m not doing that– I’m just–”

“‘You're just’ what, Mikey?” Leo scowled.

Mikey grit his teeth. “Just leave, Leo. Before I make you.”

Leo took a hesitant step forward. “Mikey–”

“I said leave!” Mikey shouted, jumping up and quickly going in for an attack with his nunchucks, which his older brother narrowly avoided. Leo barely had time to take his katanas out before Mikey went in again, and he grunted in frustration.

“Mikey, I don’t want to fight you!” he warned, thunder cracking in the background.

“Then leave me alone! I didn’t ask you to be here!” Mikey’s voice cracked, a sign of weakness he made sure to correct by striking back harder. He managed to get Leo in the side, and when he slid around the back he managed to buckle Leo’s good knee. Leo grunted, trying to get up hastily, but Mikey managed to wrap a nunchuck around one of Leo’s katanas, disarming him before Mikey kicked the blades away.

Leo shot a look of disapproval before trying to juke Mikey out, but Mikey expected that. He kicked Leo in the ankle, getting him a sharp look of frustration, which was just the distraction Mikey needed to disarm his oldest brother entirely.

“Mikey, stop! What are you even doing right now?!” Leo pleaded.

“I’m getting you to leave me alone!” Mikey punched an AC unit.

“Mikey… please… just come home.” His oldest brother was begging now, fully bowing to the ground.

“I don’t care,” Mikey’s voice turned to ice. “I’m not going to the farmhouse, or to that stupid funeral.”

Leo sat up. “Mikey– Mikey, c’mon–”

“Just shut up and go already.” Mikey was getting impatient.

“This isn’t what he would’ve wanted, Mikey, and you know that.” Leo stood.

“What do you know about what he would have wanted?! It’s your fault he’s even gone in the first place! You agreed to split us up!” Mikey tackled his brother and raised his fist, ready to punch Leo right in his stupid, stupid face before someone from behind grabbed his wrist and held it tight.

“Michelangelo.”

Lightning illuminated the night sky, showing Mikey the hand on his wrist was his Papa’s, and his anger dissipated in a blink.

“Papa– Papa, I-I– I don’t– I-I– I’m sorry.” Mikey’s legs shook as tears welled up fast, giving a warm contrast to the bitter rain.

Splinter closed his eyes and sighed, pulling Mikey off of Leo before wrapping him in a tight, tight embrace. “It’s okay, my son. Everything is alright.”

Mikey shook his head. “I-I can’t– I-I can’t do this without ‘im– I miss ‘im so much, Papa, I–”

“I know, akarui, I know.” Splinter hugged him tighter.

“I miss Raph– I miss ‘im so, so, so much,” Mikey buried his face in his father’s shoulder and wept.

“I know… I’m sorry, I know…” Splinter sighed and rubbed his back.

Mikey cried more.

.o0o.

“Raaaaaaaaph! Tell Chompy he needs to stop snacking on Ice Cream Kitty's sprinkles!” Mikey shouted to the pit from the kitchen. With a huff, he tried to pull the baby turtle-god away, but was met with a deceptively fierce bite.

“What? Ice Cream Kitty can't share?” Raph snarked from the other room.

Mikey rolled his eyes. “I don't even think sprinkles are healthy for little planet sized turtles, so unless you wanna make the little guy sick–”

“Quit your yapping, you big baby,” Raph sighed loudly as Mikey finally heard him get up from the couch, and he entered the kitchen with a huff. “He didn't even eat that much, he's fine.”

“Yeah! But at this rate we'll be out before April or Casey can get us more.” Mikey crossed his arms.

Raph rolled his eyes and picked up the baby turtle. “Whatever, I’ll get more when I’m out on patrolnext then.”

“Psh, you better,” Mikey huffed, putting the box away when his t-phone suddenly buzzed. He opened his phone to find a text from Mondo Gecko explaining he and the mutanimals were “throwing a total rager bro” and that “he and his bro bros and even his rat dad were totes invited”.

Mikey immediately sent a quick thumbs up + party emoji + turtle emoji + rat emoji + winky face + crazy face. “You down to hang with the mutanimals today? Mondo says they’re throwing a party.”

“What kind?” Raph asked, giving Chompy a good scratch on his chin.

“I dunno, but Mondo says everyone’ll be there, which means you and Slash can totally trash the place.” Mikey grinned.

“Sweet! It’ll be good to spar with someone with actual talent again.” Raph cracked his knuckles.

“Hey!” Mikey complained, but Raph happily ignored him.

“C’mon, let’s get Donnie, I don’t wanna be late.” He ran out of the kitchen to the lab, and Mikey followed despite his elder brother’s “relentlessly cruel” behavior.

“Yo, Donnie! Party at the mutanimals! It’ll be a total rager!” Raph shouted as he opened the door to his mostly-unamused brother.

Donnie massaged his forehead. “You know, as much as I love watching you and Slash destroy public property, I think–”

“Aww, c’mon, Don! It’ll be fun! Besides, you and Dr. Rockwell can totally talk nerd stuff!” Mikey caught up with Raph.

“Yeah, besides, it’s at their hideout, so it’s technically private property.” Raph smirked.

Donnie tapped his chin, looking all around the lab for a moment before shrugging. “Ah, what the hell? I could use a day off.”

“That’s more like it!” Mikey cheered. “C’mon! Let’s go get Leo and Master Splinter!”

“Master Splinter? Really?” Donnie questioned as he stood and stretched.

Raph shrugged. “Maybe they wanna talk to him about something important– or force him to take a day off.”

“Fair enough, let’s go,” Donnie laughed and the three of them ran to the dojo, where Leo and Splinter were talking.

“Hey, Leo! Wanna go visit Karai and them? Party at the mutanimal’s crib, yo!” Mikey gave a big thumbs up.

“And you can come too, Sensei!” Raph did the same, making Mikey laugh a little.

Their father stroked his beard for a moment before nodding. “Perhaps I do need to get out of the sewers for a time.”

“Alright!” Mikey cheered alongside Raph and Donnie, and they went to leave– though Leo stayed frozen for some reason.

Raph beat Mikey to the punch, turning back and asking, “C’mon, Leo, what’s the hold up?”

“Nothing! Nothing, I– let’s go have some fun.” Leo gave a weak smile and joined his brothers as they headed to the Shellraiser.

Leo smiled and started talking to Donnie and Raph like everything was fine, but Mikey didn’t buy it, frowning ever so slightly.

“Is Leo okay, Master Splinter?” Mikey ventured to ask.

“Do not worry, Michelangelo. It is nothing that will not be fixed with time.” His father smiled down at him softly as he placed a hand on his shell. Mikey still didn’t love the answer, of course, but he knew pushing wouldn’t get him anywhere– not to mention it would be a total mood killer. They were going to have fun– even Master Splinter! This was probably going to be one of their best nights ever in the history of forever!

… Or not.

As a ninja, Splinter often tried to prepare Mikey and his brothers to “expect the unexpected”, which Mikey was usually actually pretty good at! But certainly not this time, as he stood dumbfounded in front of the flaming mutanimal hideout with a very, very bad feeling in his stomach.

Immediately, Leo started calling out orders for rescues Mikey could barely hear before Leo and Raph worked together to remove a piece of concrete from the doorway and they all stormed in.

“Hurry, Leo!” Raph’s voice cracked with concern as he ran deep within the fires, searching for anyone he could find.

Mikey froze, not knowing what to do or who to look for, before realizing Leatherhead would be in big trouble– but he saw April and Casey helping him and Mondo out.

“Rockwell! Dr. Rockwell!” He heard Donnie shout before coughing from all the smoke.

The monkey man didn’t reply, causing Donnie to rush in further and almost right into a collapsing wall if Mikey hadn’t pulled him back in time.

“Careful, Don! We can’t get ourselves killed too!” Mikey barely resisted the urge to shake him.

“Right– right, besides, Maybe Rockwell’s already outside, he– Slash!” Donnie noticed the large snapping turtle struggling to stand and ran to his aid. Mikey and Raph both joined him in helping Slash up, making it out just before Master Splinter and Leo did with Karai, who did not look good.

Her face was pale and had a big slash on her right cheek bone that looked like a mix of a cut and scrape. Her arm also looked nasty– probably broken or dislocated or something– but either way, not a good sight. It also didn’t help that she was totally knocked out from all the smoke, though thankfully Leo seemed to fix it before it got too long.

“Karai!” Shinigami appeared from behind Slash and Leatherhead and ran to her girlfriend’s side, examining her up and down, before crying happily and smiling at Leo. “You saved her! Thank you… but– but Shredder– he doesn’t care about her anymore, he wants all of us dead, that bastard…”

Mikey’s shoulders tensed as he looked at Donnie, but he was too busy trying to do some mental math. He tried looking at his Papa, but he was obviously focused on Karai, so Mikey took a long shot and grabbed Raph’s arm for comfort. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to mind, and even patted his hand.

“The ambulances are coming; can you wait with her, Shinigami?” Splinter asked the young witch, who nodded and held Karai a little tighter. The rat nodded in approval, before beginning to sniff out Shredder’s goons, though he stopped after a moment.

“I see two clear trails leading off in opposite directions. Raphael, April, Casey, and Slash will come with me. Leonardo, you will lead Donatello, Michelangelo, and Leatherhead in the other direction, and take the Shellraiser. The rest of us will travel on foot,” Splinter commanded, and that bad feeling in Mikey’s chest only grew. He felt tempted to linger, but Leatherhead and Donnie were already on the move, so Mikey did as he was told.

Inside the Shellraiser, Mikey sat next to Leatherhead and immediately started trying to treat some of the big guy’s burns, especially on his arms. He barely even managed to find a cold compress before the engine of the Shellraiser revved up, and Donnie and Leo started talking loudly about a plan to find Bebop and Rocksteady.

“Your brothers are angry,” Leatherhead observed as Mikey pressed the first compress against the alligator’s right forearm.

“Well, yeah! They burned down your house! That’s a pretty huge deal, man,” Mikey laughed in confusion.

Leatherhead just sighed, taking a deep breath before looking at Mikey very seriously. “Something feels off about this whole thing, I just know it..”

“What… do you mean?” Mikey asked quietly so his brothers wouldn’t hear as the car started moving.

His beastly best friend shook his head. “I am unsure… but what I do know is I have a very bad feeling about this.”

“Well, at least that makes two of us, hm?” Mikey tried to flash a smile, but it faltered in microseconds.

Leatherhead smiled pitifully at him before placing a weak hand on his shoulder. “We’ll figure this out, Michelangelo.”

“Yeah, I know.” Mikey tried to be optimistic too, right before Donnie swerved the Shellraiser hard, and Mikey would’ve slammed into the wall if it weren’t for the alligator catching him.

“Sorry, Mikey!” Leo called back without even turning his head, eyes laser focused on whatever he saw on those cameras.

“S’all good, bro!” Mikey called back, but of course Leo didn’t acknowledge it. He sighed once more as Leatherhead set him back on the ground. “I hope Papa and Raph and them are okay…”

“They will be alright, Michelangelo. Your sensei is a ninja of unmatched talent, and your brother an equally fierce warrior. Let’s focus on our fight ahead, no?” The alligator patted Mikey’s back with a massive hand.

“Yeah, I can do that,” Mikey agreed just as the car swerved again.

The car would end up swerving two more times before Leo pulled up to Coney Island. They got out with haste, Leatherhead only getting a quick stretch in before going into super-focus-ninja mode. The group walked in eerie silence before arriving at the carousel, which suddenly rang to life.

“Turtles~! Come out and playyay~” Bebop’s voice rang in the cold night air. “Remember when I said that? Because it’s Throwback Thursday fools!”

“Da! We be throwing you all the way back to last Thursday!” Rocksteady joined in.

Bebop sighed like an annoyed housewife. “Shut up, Rock. I’m trying to intimidate them!”

Mikey looked at Donnie to try and exchange a laugh, but didn’t have time before the warthog shouted, “You’re going down, turtle fools!” and a barrage of rockets were launched from the carousel horses’ mouths. Mikey thought of a really funny joke about gift horses, but he chose to instead call it a ‘missile-go-round’, which annoyed his brothers just as well.

Keep it light, Mikey. Everything’ll be fine.

Mikey dodged another rocket, though his tuck wasn’t as clean as it should’ve been and he bumped his head. Frustration was quick to arrive, especially when he realized Leatherhead needed help with Rocksteady! But when Mikey finally got on his feet, Bebop and Fishface and Rahzar were all there to give him a good shove to the ground.

“This is your swan song, tartarugas. Tonight, you all fall.” The snakehead grinned and for a second, Mikey saw it.

Murder.

And not just in Fishface– but in Rahzar, and Bebop, and Rocksteady too.

Every single one of them had murder in their eyes.

Something bad was going to happen tonight.

The brothers let out something like a war cry before the fairgrounds turned to chaos– rockets and lasers and weapons flying everywhere. Unfortunately for Mikey, he was left with Bebop of all mutants. Granted, he’d usually be fine, but tonight he was just being extra annoying, and Mikey just didn’t have the patience. He kept trying to look for an out or if Leatherhead or his bros needed some support, but every time he did he'd almost get shot by one of his stupid lasers.

“Man, are you seriously still not taking me seriously?” Bebop complained, sending another stupid hip laser that Mikey ducked.

“Doesn’t help, your weapon is activated in the weirdest way possible,” Mikey huffed before attempting an upside down spinning kick that failed to strike.

The pig snorted. “Keep talking, turtle. It’s your funeral.”

The words hit Mikey like a brick wall, barely giving him enough time to dodge the stupid swine’s attack, though he mostly managed to recover without too many burns (which meant another dozen fun lectures from Donnie later, wahoo).

His frustration finally hit overdrive, allowing Mikey wailing every single move he had onto Bebop, which thankfully seemed to actually be more than he was expecting. The idiot still managed to dodge most of his hits, but the ability to scare him gave Mikey just a bit more satisfaction than he knew Splinter would like.

Being close enough to actually land hits obviously had downsides of its own though, but Mikey would take a few more burns if it meant this stupid fight would be over with so they could all just go home and be fine already.

Unfortunately, Bebop seemed able to adapt to Mikey’s quicker pace, swiftly moving in and out of the way while humming those same stupid songs, like how Mikey would when he fought Raph.

Raph– Mikey ached with worry for him and everyone else in his family– like Master Splinter, and Donnie and–

“Leo!” Mikey called out, finding his oldest brother pinned to the ground by Rahzar, whose jaws were inches away from making Mikey’s worst nightmare a reality.

Thankfully, Leatherhead heard his cry and abandoned Rocksteady to tackle the wild canine, dragging him deep, deep underwater.

Mikey’s eyes went wide as he ran to the pier. He searched desperately for his friend before calling his name as moments passed– too many moments– Was he okay? No, no he has to be. He’s Leatherhead, he survived the Kraang. It’s fine, Mikey, everything’s fine, it’s all a-okay.

When his friend finally emerged, it was as if a building were lifted off Mikey’s shoulders. He quickly helped Leatherhead back onto the pier, though as he looked back, he was surprised to find every other one of Shredder’s goons had left.

“Guys, we did it! We beat ‘em!” he cheered with a smile, ignoring the bad feeling in his stomach.

It seemed Leo was having those feelings too though, his eyes focused on the fleeing Bebop and Rocksteady before–

“Oh, no– we didn’t beat them, this was all a distraction to split us all up!” Leo realized, and the building from before came right crashing down on Mikey again, just as Donnie’s phone started to ring.

“Donnie! We need back-up! Raph is hurt– Super Shredder is too strong! Master Splinter is trying, but we need your help!” April urged, her voice clearly pained.

Mikey’s heart dropped at the mention of his older brother, and he felt Leatherhead’s hand on his shell in an instant. Whether it was supposed to be soothing or Mikey actively looked like he was going to pass out, he didn’t know.

“Where are you?” Donnie looked around as if he might see her.

“The Wolf Hotel rooftop! Please, we need you! Super Shredder is–” April’s voice was cut by grating static, causing Donnie to call out her name in distress.

“Donnie, there’s no time! Let’s go,” Leo ordered, successfully getting both brothers back into shape enough to run to the Shellraiser with everything they had.

They were all inside, doors slammed and engine started in what felt like seconds, and soon enough they were fully back on the road.

“I knew it was a set-up, I knew it– I knew it,” Leo kept muttering to himself, taking a sharp right turn.

“It’s fine– we should get there in time, right, Mikey?” Donnie glanced back at him, and Mikey nodded immediately.

It was true, the Wolf Hotel wasn’t far on the map, so they’d make it in time. It would all be fine! It would be great, even if Raph was hurt and April was panicking like that– jeez, was it just him or did it feel like the Triceraton invasion all over again?

It was like the Triceraton invasion all over again.

A firm and massive hand placed itself on Mikey’s shoulder, and it took a second for Mikey to realize it was Leatherhead.

“Are you alright, Michelangelo?” Leatherhead asked.

“It’s– it’s fine. We’re gonna get there in time, and it’ll be fine, it’ll be fine.” Mikey forced a smile, heart pounding in his chest. Leatherhead’s posture stooped, but Mikey managed to ignore it and stand to his station, finding the Wolf Hotel on the map. They were already headed in that direction, of course, but Mikey needed to do something– and staring at the Wolf Hotel location and making sure it didn’t move or disappear seemed as good a job as any.

He could feel Leatherhead's eyes on him, but Mikey didn't want to break his focus– he'd need it if he wanted to help save the rest of his family.

In no more than three-and-a-half minutes, the Shellraiser rounded the last corner and the Wolf Hotel was in sight.

“There's the building! I hope we're not too late,” Mikey pointed out and Leo drove even faster before parking sloppily. In fact, the eldest turtle brother didn't even turn the engine off before bursting through the door, looking up with his spyglass before a guttural cry left his throat.

Mikey rushed outside, searching desperately for what could cause such a reaction, before he saw it– the hellish mutant climbing up and aiming its claws right for Splinter's back– and all Mikey could do was scream.

He screamed as he watched the abomination get its footing, as it wound up its final punch. He screamed as Raph suddenly sprang to action, his posture stooped and weak, but determined. He screamed as he watched Raph then shove Master Splinter out of harm’s way, his Papa falling harshly to the ground.

Mikey screamed as Shredder’s mutated steel claws tore right through Raphael’s plastron.

Voices howled and cried around him as Mikey watched the mutant megalomaniac roar in frustration, tossing his brother’s limp body over the ledge like it was nothing– like Raph was nothing. Mikey raced to catch his brother, eyes following every inch of Raph’s descent with desperation

But Mikey was too far, too little, too late– and Raph landed on the asphalt, his body bouncing once with a loud crack, before laying completely still.

When Mikey finally reached Raph, he held his hand and squeezed it tight. He ignored the blood oozing out of Raph's stomach, and all the other scrapes and cuts and burns and bruises– hell, even the fact that his shell was completely broken, bits and pieces everywhere because this just– it couldn't– no! This couldn't– it didn't–

“Raph? Raph– Otōto– please.” Leo appeared on the opposite side of Mikey, kneeling and shaking Raph's shoulder desperately.

There was screaming from above– a wave of energy, a slam by a garbage truck, and a crunch of a compactor– but Mikey didn't look away, not even for a second.

Donnie searched desperately for a pulse, his fingers twitching and searching and feeling around desperately for something that could be fixed, a thing Mikey had seen in his lab time and time and time again. But like with many experiments in the past, it all came to nothing, and eventually Donnie pulled away and sobbed.

Mikey wanted to say something. Something important. Something that could make Raph's eyes stop being so glazed– that he would sit up and punch Mikey in the arm before hugging him tight, thanking him for saying just the right thing to make it all better.

“R-Raphie,” was all that came out.

Mikey bawled into Raph’s hand, before suddenly being pushed away from Raph by Leo. Mikey quickly went to fight, but stopped when he saw his brother begin reciting the healing hands ritual again, and again, and again, and again. Each failure made his voice falter more and more, and his laser focused eyes were quickly overwhelmed with tears. Still, Leo continued on and on until his voice gave out with a pitiful crack and even then his hands tried to carry on until even they too gave up.

The three of them wept a long, long time before there were footsteps next to them, and they heard their father let out a dreadful gasp. Leo and Donnie both got up and stepped aside to make room for him, but Mikey couldn't move if he tried.

He watched as Splinter slowly cradled his second oldest son, large pieces of his shell falling back to the ground. His hands were trembling, but still he raised them to wipe off Raph's dirt stained cheek before looking at his glazed, green eyes.

“Hontōni mōshiwakenai, my son. O yurushi kudasai,” he whispered. Shaking fingers closed Raph's eyes before it was all too much. Splinter embraced Raph tight before his posture collapsed, and he let out a haunting cry of pure agony.

Raph was gone.

.o0o.

Two days– how on earth could it have been two days? It felt like everything stopped once Raph’s body hit the asphalt, but no. Time marched on, despite Mikey’s pleas for the contrary.

“I-I can’t– I can’t do this without ‘im, Papa– I miss ‘im so much.” Mikey hugged his father tighter, barely even able to choke the words out.

“I know, Michelangelo, but we must… for– for Raphael’s sake.” His father was struggling too.

Mikey shook his head. “I can’t– I don’t wanna– I just– I can’t do it.”

Splinter didn’t say anything, just holding Mikey close and crying as he caressed his head over and over again. It made Mikey feel so small, like he was nothing more than a kid who wanted to stop being a burden and help his Papa.

Guilt ate at him, so Mikey forced himself to speak again. “Papa, I– I’m sorry, I-I just– I don’t– I can’t– b-because– I– he can’t just be gone, Papa– I didn’t even say goodbye.”

Splinter hugged him tighter. “I know, my son, I know. It’s–... it’s hard. Everything is so quiet now, and I just– I can’t lose another son, Michelangelo, I can’t–”

“Papa, no–! I-I–” Mikey’s eyes went wide as his father gave into sobs once more, and before he knew it, Leo joined the embrace too.

“We aren’t going anywhere, Father. I promise,” Leo spoke up, clearly trying to not let his voice break.

Mikey nodded as best he could. “I’m so sorry, Papa, I just wanted to be close to ‘im– I didn’ mean to scare you– I’m so sorry.” He buried his face deeper in his father’s chest, relieved to feel him relax a little.

“I didn’t mean to frighten you either– both of you, I’m so sorry.” One of Splinter’s arms moved to embrace Leo too. “I love you, my sons. I love you so very, very much.”

Mikey wanted to say it back– of course he did, what kind of a son would he be if he didn’t?– but his father’s words of comfort crushed him like a boulder, and he wanted nothing more than to sink deep, deep into the ground and away from his loving family’s arms.

So he said nothing, letting his family hold him tight while regret and sorrow weighed heavier and heavier on his shoulders until Leo eventually sniffled and let go.

“We should go home, Donnie’s probably waiting with the van already,” he suggested, and Splinter nodded.

“Yes, yes, we should.” Splinter let go too, taking away any bit of warmth and comfort left in Mikey as he did. In that moment, Mikey wanted nothing more than to force himself back into his father’s arms, but a certain numbness flooded his senses and he was left practically paralyzed by yearning.

His father noticed his still behavior, though, and placed a delicate hand on his shoulder. “Are you okay to go to the farmhouse now, akarui?”

Akarui. “Sunshine”. The title was hardly fitting these days, and added another stone slab atop his boulder.

Mikey nodded and tried even forcing a smile, which seemed to relax his father somewhat as his hand left Mikey’s shoulder.

“Let us go, then. I’m sure all the fresh air will do us all some good.” Splinter tried to smile too, patting both of his son’s shells and guiding them back down the fire escape. Mikey glanced at Leo, whose face was calm and serious like in training, making him feel even more unsettled and guilty.

Still, he didn’t say a word, just doing as he was told until he caught only one last glance at the Wolf Hotel– the place where his brother’s life was taken– before ducking back into the sewers.

[scribespirare]

i’ve been thinking about miguel being a cat. like a mama cat whose kittens got taken from him but is left out on the streets. idk why but it fits him so much. and miles as the guy that’s kind enough to take a stray cat in

So idk if this is how you meant for this request to go but 👀 I am a slut for were creatures

Miguel has lived on the streets for a while now. It’s not exactly through choice but it’s not not through choice either.

He could shift. He could go back to being human. Find a job. Rent an apartment. Settle.

But he doesn’t.

Life is simpler when he’s a cat. Yeah he eats things his human side balks at, sleeps places no human would ever touch, smells like something the crawled out of the sewer. But there’s nothing to be anxious about in the day to day except survival. And seeing how Miguel is smarter than your average alley cat, that’s not much to be anxious about at all.

New York maybe isn’t the best place to be a stray cat, but it’s not the worst either. Lots of rats to catch and garbage to pick through for food. Sometimes people even leave kibble out for cats like him, which is why Miguel doesn’t think anything of climbing up a fire escape one night, following the scent of dry food. He finds it outside a window looking into the messy room of a teenage boy.

And that’s how it all starts.

Miguel feels a draw to Miles that he can’t explain. At first he thinks it’s the kid’s youth, that Miles reminds Miguel of the child he lost and the life he used to live.

Then he gets a good hit of the kid’s scent and…well. He’s certainly not comparing Miguel to his daughter anymore after that. Miles smells like warmth and home and spice and sex.

So yeah. Not a child surrogate.

Miles has friends that come over that Miguel feels a little more paternal towards though. Hobie and Ganke and Pavitr and Gwen. None of them smell like sex to Miguel, which is quite frankly something of a relief. They’re rowdy teenagers that Miguel wants to cuff around the ears and then feed.

But Miles? Well, the less said about what Miguel wants to do to Miles the better.

So Miguel keeps coming back to that window over and over again, keeps sitting on the fire escape and listening to Miles’ life play out. Even when Miles doesn’t put food out, Miguel is still there. Occasionally Miles even notices him, says a few words, asks him how’s he doing. He doesn’t name Miguel, which is nice, just calls him ‘That brown tabby tom. You know, the one with the big jowls? The one who looks like he’s listening and understanding me. Yeah, with the freaky red eyes, that one’. And Miguel enjoys these little interactions. He figures they’re all he’s going to get, and he’s fairly content with that.

Then one night he jumps up on the window ledge and yeah okay he’s dripping a bit since he’d managed to get himself caught in the spray from a car going by and it’s raining and thundering and isn’t going to be letting up anytime soon, but he still insists that’s not a very good reason to open your window and snatch up a stray cat.

If Miguel were a normal stray, he’d hiss and claw and bite the shit out of Miles. And quite frankly Miguel has to fight the instinct to do just that. Luckily Miles drops him pretty quickly, apologizing the entire time.

“I just can’t let you stay out there in that tonight, okay?” he says.

You’re an idiot, Miguel thinks.

“I’ll let you out again in the morning and you…try not to fuck up my room too much. Deal?”

Miguel doesn’t deign that with a response and instead focuses on trying to groom some of the muck and water out of his fur since he’s apparently staying the night.

Stupid fucking kid. Doesn’t he know he can catch disease from the claws and teeth of a cat?

Miles goes about his evening of doing homework and fucking around on his phone, feeds Miguel some dry kibble, then strips down and goes to bed. And Miguel…well, he’s only a man. Sometimes. Not any time recently, but still. He figures, well he’s not going to get this chance again. Miles is a good kid even if he is a bit naive and Miguel likes him a lot. He shouldn’t be rewarding Miles for letting dangerous, disease ridden alley cats into his bedroom but…Miguel still jumps up onto the bed anyways.

Miles starts then laughs. “Sorry, you scared me. Never had a pet before. Didn’t take you as the cuddling type either.”

Once upon a time Miguel very much was the cuddling type. But now he just takes the unused pillow next to Miles’ head and curls up there, relishing in the softness and the way Miles’ scent rises up around him. The rain is still coming down in buckets outside but for tonight Miguel is warm and safe and Miles is scratching him behind the ears before whispering good night.

This is in direct contrast to the way he yells, “What the fuck!?” as he’s falling out of bed the next morning.

Miguel sits up, alarmed, looking around for danger. Then he realizes that something doesn’t feel right. His senses are off, as is his equilibrium, and his vantage point is a hell of a lot higher than it was the night before. With a sinking stomach he glances down at himself and. Yep. Naked man.

Naked man in the bed of a terrified teenager staring up at him with wide eyes from the bedroom floor.

Miguel clears his throat awkwardly, rusty after so many years of disuse. He can’t remember the last time he’d taken this form.

Then he decides fuck it because there’s nothing he can say to make this situation better, actually. So he climbs out of the bed, throws open the window, and is shifted back into his cat form before his paws hit the fire escape.

He hears movement behind him, hears Miles yell, “Wait!” but Miguel is already gone.

[theoddcatlady]

They've Taken Our Tongues

I knew something was wrong when Greg came home and didn’t even so much as give me a kiss before he ran into our bathroom.

Obviously the first thing I did was run after him, knocking on the door after finding it was locked. “Is something wrong, dear? Are you sick? I thought you’d be out fishing for a few more hours,” I asked.

Greg’s response made something inside my skin crawl. “Everything’s all right, lovely!” I heard his voice respond in a tone far too chipper than the look of sheer panic I saw on his face when he sped past me. “What’s for dinner tonight?”

“Uh, what did you catch?” I tested the doorknob, finding it locked.

“Oh, I’m sorry, didn’t catch a damn thing!” Greg gave the most hollow laugh I’ve ever heard. “How about you make some of your delicious lasagna? I’ve got quite the appetite!”

“Is everything okay in there?” I gave the doorknob another pull, only for Greg to pull it open a few inches and poke his head through.

Everything about his expression was wrong. His smile was as wide as it could physically go, but his eyes were filled with terror. “Everything’s. Fine,” He said before slamming the door again.

I wasn’t born yesterday. Something was very wrong. But I chose to go get dinner started instead of pursuing the matter further. He looked all right, except for his eyes. I figured he might’ve gotten sick from pounding too many beers at the lake and just didn’t want to tell me. Even if he went about it in the most unsettling way.

The lasagna was in the oven when I went to go check on Greg again. He was still barricaded in the bathroom, I knocked before saying, “Greg? Do you need something?”

I heard a muffled sob before he responded.

“Everything’s fine! Are you making green beans too? I am famished!”

Now I knew this was something more than just some bellyache because of cheap beer. I grabbed a pin off my side table and began prodding at the lock. “Greg, you’re not fine. Whether you like it or not, I’m coming on in,” I snapped.

“No! Please! It smells like a sewer in here! Darling, you really don’t want to do that! Stay out! Go make dinner like a good wife!”

“Greg, you better hope you’re dying, because if you accuse me of being anything but a good wife…”

I felt the lock pop and I shoved open the door, taking one step inside before nearly slipping in a puddle of blood.

My husband was sitting on the toilet, clutching a dripping razor between his fingers. His lips were cut up and oozing red, his right cheek slashed open to the molars, giving him the most sinister of exaggerated smiles. I gasped, running to his side. “Greg! Jesus Christ, what happened to you?!”

Greg dropped the razor and with a distorted scream, he grabbed onto his lower jaw and yanked down to reveal what was inside of his mouth.

It looked like some sort of bug. Silvery in color with spiny, thin legs burrowing right under his teeth. It’d gotten a grip onto his tongue, swallowing it down right to the base. Just as I was finally getting a good look Greg’s mouth slammed shut, taking off the tip off the four fingers that were between his teeth. Tears sprouted at the corners of his eyes as he dropped his hand, cradling his maimed fingers against his chest.

“Oh my god, Greg, we gotta get you to a hospital,” I said, although I made no attempt to get to the phone. What the actual hell was that thing in my husband’s mouth?

“Dear,” Greg swallowed, his eyes leaking more tears, “Everything is fine. I think the lasagna is burning, how about you go tend to that?”

I shook my head. “Is that thing controlling what you say?”

Greg nodded before he made this pained gurgle, blood squirting out of his slashed cheek. Whatever that thing was doing inside his mouth, he was in the worst kind of pain.

“Jesus Christ…” I picked the razor off the ground. “Can you open your mouth? Or does it got control of that too?”

He shook his head to the negative, another spurt of blood came from his cheek and Greg nearly fell off the toilet.

It took all my strength to drag Greg into the bedroom. I finally managed to get him on the bed before I held up a finger. “I’ll be right back, don’t you move a muscle,” I said before I ran to the kitchen.

I did take the definitely burnt lasagna out of the oven before I grabbed the knife block and a wooden spoon. When I got back to the bedroom Greg was looking pale, his unmangled fingers clutching onto the quilt so tight I swore it was going to tear. “All right, we got this, dear. We’ve been through worse, right?” I lied as I set down the knives.

“Bitch, don’t you cut me!”

I flinched as Greg screamed at me, bloody spittle landing on my cheek. “And you know Greg would never call me a bitch. Do you even know my name?” I said as I started going through my knives. Butcher’s knife wouldn’t be precise enough, wasn’t going to take the risk of accidentally killing Greg while cutting this little shit out.

“You don’t need one. You just need to listen to what I tell you to do.”

What was worse was hearing this nasty filth coming from Greg’s mouth. “And what you need to do is get the hell out of my husband,” I snapped before I worked in prying open his mouth. It was harder than you’d think, and I nearly lost my fingers twice before I finally got the spoon in there at an angle to keep it open. The creature inside growled as I picked up a steak knife and began poking at it.

It writhed and I heard an inhumane hiss before Greg’s eyes popped wide open. He wasn’t screaming with his mouth but he was with his eyes. I bit my bottom lip until it bled as I began slicing through the legs it had embedded into his jaw. The legs were thin, no bigger around than a piece of straw, so they cut pretty easily. I got through all the ones on the right side before the spoon snapped.

I jerked my finger back in time to avoid getting my fingers chopped off. Greg chewed up the spoon in his mouth before spitting it into my face. “Go. Away,” He growled.

I sat back in my chair, shaking my head. “I’m not leaving until you leave Greg,” I said.

“Then we’re going to be here a long time.”

When I managed to pry open Greg’s mouth again, I discovered that the parasite had regrown its legs, once again inserted in Greg’s jaw. He mockingly snickered as I let his mouth close.

“All right, first round goes to you, but I’m gonna be right back,” I said, shaking my finger at him before running into the kitchen.

When I returned with a metal spoon, Greg’s body was so still I thought he was dead. I ran to his side, giving him a shake.

His bloodshot eyes popped open and I felt his hands grab onto my shoulders before I was slammed into the floor. Dazed, I stayed still as Greg pinned me down before roughly kissing me. I felt something slide into my mouth before he got up in a jerky motion. He sat down on the bed and grinned, the parasite poking out of his slashed cheek. The smooth thing inside my mouth wriggled about before I felt my tongue be bitten off.

I screamed as my mouth filled with blood, the creature attaching itself to the stub left behind from my tongue. I desperately clawed at my lips, trying to get past my teeth to grab onto the parasite. When I opened my mouth to scream, all that came out was a flood of blood. I passed out as I felt those small legs drill into my jaw.

It’s taken my tongue and mouth. I have no control of it. I feel it squirming around. Greg’s gone, he left a note saying he’ll be back soon and to have dinner ready for when he gets back.

I can feel my body grow numb as its control starts to grow. They’ve taken our tongues and they’re going to take the rest of us too.

[poryphoria]

who wants to hear some fucked up crackpot headcanons. TOO LATE IM SHARING THEM NOW BOY!

some of these ive definitely already said before but they're going on here for the sake of categorization anyways. cw for uhhh body horror, parasites, emeto, cannibalism and necrosis, all the fun stuff you'd imagine go along with this

•after a certain point in dissonance overexposure his face literally just Melted Off. Gone. it's mostly just bandages, exposed muscle & scar tissue under there now which is why he kept the helmet on fulltime & wears a mask. he also used to have bleach blonde hair which he lost pretty much completely along with the face WHOOPS!

•speaking of that plague mask DOES NOT COME OFF! like, it's literally part of him at this point. it fused to his skin after a while of him constantly wearing it & then his skull grew out underneath it to fit it so that is quite literally just his face now. it's made of metal but he still has sensation in it like it's skin! it'll still bleed if you lash him across it hard enough. (if you decked him good enough in the center of the beak you would PROBABLY hear the disconcerting crunch of bone.) THIS IS ALSO THANKS TO DISSONANCE! HURRAY DISSONANCE!!!!

•his old anti-dissonance helmet also had some dull feeling in it, mostly towards the end of his career, though it was never able to get to the level of attachment that his current mask now has <3

•post-nexus he is constantly losing teeth and growing new ones in like a shark and it hurts like fuck and he basically has to teathe on shit like a dog sometimes to alleviate it. also in this vein his bite is INFECTIOUS like that's a given for any person but i think his especially would quite literally BURN from the very get. he has a super nasty bite bc his lips are just jagged metal so it can rip and tear like shit. coincidentally he is definitely not above biting people in combat and probably might even if he's already armed. Just for fun!

•actually in general i think he fights like a wild goddamn animal. he doesn't like guns (re: sucks dick at using them) and only likes melee bc it's *honorable" and Blades Pretty but he is QUICK o resort to biting, kicking, clawing, etc etc and he's damn good at it too. he's probably impaled someone through the head on that beak of his before. i would LOVE to animate how i imagine him to fight in the good ol fashioned style of Madness Combat: The Series About Animated Violence bc it's SUPER vivid to me

•his mouth will seal over & will have to rip itself open if he goes a while without using it. he's pretty much completely numb to it by now after so many times but it definitely catches other people off guard when he smiles or something of that nature i think

•hes super drooly. weird mouth situation and it's honestly probably a good mix of blood from his tooth situation/mouth constantly tearing itself apart

•i honestly dont think i even need to say this but he smells. Bad. like. as bad as youd anticipate a sewer zombie to smell, yk. it kind of sucks bc he USED to be like hyperaware of his own hygiene but after the facemelter incident that kinda gradually declined until he was. just okay enough with it to Live In The Sewers. sometimes he will have moments of self awareness where he can feel every inch of grime on his body and it makes him SICK TO HIS STOMACH so he tries his absolute best not to pay any mind to it

•after being enmeshed he is so full of maggots and flies and mold... and other such detritivores YUM!!! he lost a lot of feeling in his extremities bc a lot of nerves died off so he barely notices but sometimes he will catch one crawling up his shirt or something & hold it and maybe talk to it a little bit and admire it.....he likes bugs idt he minds to be frank <3 (well. he does and doesn't. similar deal to the general hygiene yk? really not much to be done about it anymore and if he thinks about it too hard he WILL freak out so it's best not to!)

•the fact that i color his saliva/internals that bright ass green is not just stylization for fun I do legit think this boy has glowstick blood. something to do with constantly handling other people's S-3LFs during enmeshment. i think he quite literally has fragments of countless people's souls stuck in his system & they often manifest as hallucinating random voices/people

•hes so stupid proud of himself for managing to come back as a zed and also. Inwardly a little horrified by it. his body definitely isn't up to full function like it used to be (it was already kinda deteriorating due to dissonance poisoning so ERM!) & if he isn't careful about when he eats he WILL just dull back into blind hunger and attack & eat the nearest person he can get his paws on! it's kinda scary to black out and lose control of yourself like that over something you almost never think about being a huge issue.... OF COURSE. not that he'd ever TELL anyone it scares him. GOD FORBID HE ADMIT HIS LINE OF SCIENCE IS KIND OF FUCKED UP!!!!

•he was also a cannibal before becoming a zed so the whole fact that he eats people now isn't really an issue and didn't . really change lol. NOT WHEN HE WAS A SCIENTIST but like. post nexus he Absolutely resorted to cannibalism almost concerningly quickly. HMM!

•he definitely makes stuff out of people bones too. you can't look at him and tell me he doesn't

•he's specifically become a swamp zed and sometimes he WILL have to physically hold himself back from throwing up as a stress/defensive response

•however, BECAUSE he's a swamp zed he's adapted to be semi-aquatic by now so he can hold his breath for a pretty good while & he's a REAL good swimmer! he has webbed paws and a strong ass salamander tail for this purpose

•he has very vivid nightmares almost every night and tries to avoid sleeping as much as possible due to this. this was something that started while he was still working for nexus due to dissonance exposure but it just got worse and worse and became ESPECIALLY bad following phobos's death. he'll push himself days and even weeks on end without sleeping until he quite literally passes out...

uhmmm probably forgot some i intended to add here but OH WELL! this post is already gigantic i can just make another one. I HAVE THOUGHTS!

[rinwellisathing]

You're Awful, I Love You: Part 29

Enver Gortash/Trans Male Tiefling Durge

Finally, Sentry and Fel crawled out of the correct sewer entrance and stood on the nearly empty moonlit streets of the lower city. The graveyard was misty tonight and Sentry took that as a good sign. Just like a copper dreadful. He turned his gaze towards the rather ostentatious building beside the cemetery gate. Golden demon heads gleamed on the walls, lit with hell fire, or at least that was the look the owner seemed to want to portray. Sentry passed through the gate and drew closer to the building. A wave of nausea washed over him, the familiar undertone of his paladin senses detecting hellish influence. The nausea was a new aspect however and he vaguely wondered if this was similar to the hyper sensitivity to smell he'd read about in some of his books. He was certainly surprised his 'condition' would start affecting him so suddenly, but there was a bit of satisfaction that his act of rebellion was successful. A smaller part of him felt a pang of sadness, wishing Commander Mum was here to talk to about it.

He was pulled from his thoughts by a hand on his shoulder and he looked behind him to see Enver standing there with a rather fine bag of holding slung over his shoulder. Sentry smiled and inclined his head with a confident, winning grin on his face, sharp teeth glinting in the firelight. “Hullo love, shall we?” Sentry asked, nodding towards the door. Enver looked down, giving a dismissive expression when he saw Fel standing there by Sentry's side looking rather irritated. “Yes. But before we go any further, your servant will behave, right?” “Yeah, Fel's just here to help with acquisitions...I mean, hopefully we just sneak in and sneak out, but if we DO get to kill something interesting down there in the hells, I'd be pretty devastated if I couldn't even bring home some parts for my work.” Sentry explained. “But yeah, trust me, father's explained the importance of this plan.”

Enver looked at Fel again, who gave him a haughty sniff of disapproval, but nodded in agreement with Sentry's response. Gortash knew he could trust Sentry's word, one of the few people he could, and he inclined his head in approval, turning to open the door. The three crossed the threshold to the strange shop. It smelled heavily of incense and the aura of the hells was strong. Sentry felt another wave of dizziness and nausea, but fought it back. His focus was drawn to the various specimens displayed throughout the shop and he was briefly distracted by wondrous thoughts of terrifying sculptures he could add to his garden with a fruitful harvest from creatures like this. Fel wrinkled his nose and shuffled behind Sentry. “This tawdry curiosity shop is quite ill kept, my master. Sacred artifacts of murder and death allowed to gather dust. Perhaps we ought to liberate them.” “Relax, Fel. We need this diabolist's help...We'll worry about that if she decides to be a problem or if I think she can't keep a secret.” Sentry whispered, eyes flicking towards the attractive dwarven woman at the counter. Enver motioned for Sentry and Fel to follow his lead as he approached the shopkeeper. The three fell into a sort of formation, Enver at the front to do the talking, Sentry behind as the muscle, and Fel to the side, out of the way.

“I welcome thee to The Devil's Fee.” The woman behind the counter greeted them in a somewhat sing-song, dramatic tone. Sentry couldn't help but chuckle, one had to appreciate the showmanship after all. “Yes, thank you...I've heard you and your patron offer a certain service to adventurers seeking treasures in the hells.” Enver gave a charming, winning smile, leaning carelessly on the counter as he spoke to the woman.

“Then you've done your research, I see.” The woman responded, eyeing up the group before her, seeming to assess her clientele carefully. “And where is it you're asking to infiltrate?” “The vaults of Mephistar. Surely nothing to a warlock of your caliber.” Enver's voice oozed with flattery. “You can get us in, can't you?” The woman gave a derisive little laugh and rolled her eyes. “You plan to steal from Mephistopheles himself? Do you have a death wish? I can get you in, but it will be 100,000 gold and you perform the ritual yourself, I need full deniability.” 100,000 gold? That was insane. There was no way she could be serious. Sentry stepped a bit closer, teeth bared, hands pressed to the counter, long, sharp nails digging in. He let out a low, feral growl, ears pinned back against the sides of his head, tail raised and flicking aggressively. “Yes, yes, you're quite intimidating, but no tiefling is going to possibly be able to do worse to me than a Lord of the Hells.” The woman's expression was utterly nonplussed. Enver placed a calming hand on Sentry's shoulder and gently guided him back behind him. “My partner was merely taken aback. He's not familiar with these sorts of negotiations.” The Tyrant explained calmly. “How about this? You charge us half that and we bring you back a lovely little souvenir from the vaults, hm?” The woman thought a moment and then slowly nodded. “Alright, I suppose I could use more stock for the shop. 50,000 and some of those cold resistant cloaks, they should be an easy sell and more than that, useful should I ever find myself in Cania.” “You have a deal.” Enver extended a gauntlet clad hand to shake the woman's hand, passing her a pouch filled with gold in the process and receiving one filled with reagents in return.

“Hmmph...foolish, disrespectful peasant. You could do far more than some tawdry devil.” Fel murmured, patting Sentry's hand. “She knows not to whom she speaks!” He gave a pointed glare at the woman, who to her credit, was still quite unbothered.

“Come along, gentlemen. Our time is limited and The Crown of Karsus will not liberate itself.” Enver nodded towards the door that would lead to the ritual room, gently taking Sentry's hand and guiding him in, leaving Fel to scurry along after them, his hat tumbling from his head in his hurry.

[softscummymammon]

©Stress©

Inspired by:: @zed-sabre

And there post //here//...

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚❃.✮:→⋇⋆✦⋆⋇←:✮.❃˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆

Jason wasn't in the best condition, he knew it. Well, after being beaten by the Joker, killed by a bomb, woken up in his grave, crawled out of his tomb, and thrown into the Lazarus Pit to be used as a weapon against the man that replaced him, he was just fuckin dandy. Thanks for asking.

He was stressed, but didn't do anything to help. Headaches frequented him, even though it was a phantom reminder of the times Joker used his skull as a drum. The Lazarus pit made him, angry, blood thirsty, and he hated the feeling. His immune system was shit, even after the Lazarus pit dip, so heat fevers and colds were almost a constant. But, he pulled through. He was a bat, and he'd been to hell and back, nothing would keep him down.

So, the white strands of hair was a surprise to him. To be honest, nothing should really surprise him anymore, but the universe always seems to find a way. It first started out by a white patch of hair along the hairline of his forehead. He swore, wondering why he was looking like an old man faster than the actual old man in this dysfunctional pigpen they call a family.

But, it didn't spread like normal grey hairs. To add to that, his hair wasn't grey, it was pure white. Looking in the mirror, his dull eyes stared at the white patch of hair in mild discomfort.

Jason didn't know why he was so off set about this, it was just another way of showing him that he was the black sheep of the family. Bruce tended to have a running theme going on with children; black hair, blue eyes, orphan. And by being Red Hood, a mob boss that distributed drugs and killed people, he was even more caste out. The demon brat always liked to point that out.

It happened a few days ago. The bats had spent a whole night recapturing convicts that escaped in the mass Arkham breakout. He had been fighting Killer Croc in the sewers for almost 2 hours. He smelled like shit, he felt like shit, and really, he was sick of all this shit!

Alfred demanded he take a shower immediately, or he would be forced to sit in the cave until the stink wore off. He'd rather take a shower that sounded really good right now than miss out on Alfred's tea and cookies.

He timidly stripped his suit off, piece by piece. He wasn't uncomfortable with his body, per se, but he knew Dick and Bruce were. Jason couldn't take his gloves out without Dick looking sick and Bruce having that expression like he'd rather be in a whole other dimension.

For good reason, he went to the locker rooms and set his stuff aside before wrapping a towel around his waist and walking into the showers. The sound of running water told him it was already pre-occupied, but the sound of a voice calling his name made him stop.

Tim's muffled voice cane from the shower room, " Come on in, I'm almost done and the water's still hot. "

Sighing, Jason hesitantly grabbed the sliding door and opened it. He caught Tim sliding on some sweatpants and most likely one of Dick's hoodies. Tim turned and waved, a tired face giving away nothing but exhibition. Jason nodded and stepped over to one of the showers to the side. Turning a shoulder towards Tim, he made sure to keep the squirt in peripheral.

What he didn't expect, was a slight touch to his shoulder after he turned on the water. Quickly grabbing the wrist and spinning, he held the idiot's wrist in a lock before gasping when he saw Tim gritting his teeth and holding his wrist.

Jason grunted and let go of Tim, " How much of an idiot do you have to be to do that, Replacement? "

Tim shook his hand but soildered on, " I wasn't gonna do anything-" Jason made a face that clearly showed his disbelief, "but there was nothing on your file saying you have vitiligo. "

Jason rose an eyebrow, " Because what's the use of putting something in a file that's not there? Seriously Tim, vitiligo? You sniffing the steam in here or are you just that sleep deprived? "

Tim made an incoherent noise, " Wha- I'm not doing drugs if that's what you're asking, I got four hours of sleep last night actually, and go ask anyone else. They'll see exactly what I'm seeing Jason. I wouldn't lie to you about this. "

Jason grunted and turned away towards the running water of his shower, " Mind your own business, Tweedle Dee. " Tim sighed, but made his way out of the room. Getting into the shower, Jason let out a sigh and let his shoulders droop. Closing his eyes, he thought over what Tim had said. Something about vitiligo, but, if he ever had it, why hadn't he seen it? He'd never seen it on his body before.

Sighing heavily, he put that thought on the back burner for now and set on scrubbing the sewage out of his hair. Once he was done, and decided he smelled marginally better, he got out of the shower and put on the clothes he picked out for himself.

Once he was covered, he breathed slightly easier. Shutting the water, he made his way out of the showers and towards the main center of the cave. What he didn't like, was that fact that it felt like he was walking into the wrong classroom at school.

You ever get that feeling? Walking into the wrong classroom, and everyone stares at you? Yeah, that's what he's feeling right now, and he's late. Tim at least has the balls to look sheepish. Bruce and the others however, are staring right at him. It makes his skin crawl.

Dick slides up to him with faux cheer, " Hey Littlewing, how was the shower? You smell better at least. " Jason growled, " Thanks, Dickweed. I used that new shampoo. "

Dick put a hand dramatically over his heart and hung off of him, " You wound me so, Jason. How could you? " Jason shrugged him off and felt a little satisfaction when he heard the telltale thud of Dick's body hitting the stone floor, “ Very easily, actually. " He turned to Bruce and Tim, " Alright, what did the tattletale tell you this time? "

Tim raised his hands, " I was only asking if he had ever seen the patches of skin I saw-" Jason glared and Tim shrunk away, " Again, not your fucking business, Replacement. " Tim had the gall to shrug, " I'm a Robin, staying out of people's business' is my Kryptonite. "

Jason growled but was stopped when a heavy hand was placed on his head. He snapped up, watching carefully as Bruce, not the Bat, looked at him curiously. Taking in everything about Jason's appearance and reactions. Jason felt like he was under a microscope, and he didn't like it at all.

Before he could pull away, Bruce laced his fingers through Jason's hair and gently rubbed some of the white strands between his fingers. Jason blue screened. Frozen as Bruce played with his hair. Don't laugh at him, he'd hasn't gotten this close to affection from the Old Man in what feels like forever.

Whatever spell was cast over the cave was broken when Bruce titled his head and pressed a soft, almost feather light kiss to his hair. Jason gaped in awe as Bruce leaned back to look him in the eye. He couldn't stop the tears the spilled past his defenses. His father wiped them away with a thumb, his hand had moved from his hair to his cheek.

Bruce's eyes widened and he went to take his hand back but Jason quickly grabbed his hand and held it there against his skin, "Don't you dare fuckin start what you can't finish, Old Man. " Bruce chuckled, but sighed heavily, as if the world sat on his shoulders. Knowing Bruce's self destructive tendencies, the old man probably felt like it too.

Bruce sighed, " I know you hate me, Jason. But son, don't leave us out on anything that could eventually hurt you. " Jason, once again, froze, " You think I hate you? " Bruce rose a brow, " Don't you? Everything I've done to you... " Jason sighed and shook his head. He couldn't explain it, but his tongue felt like cotton in his mouth. Without saying what he was trying to show, he took Bruce's hand and leaned further into it.

Grabbing the strap of shirt over the patch of skin Tim had mentioned, he pulled it back for Bruce to see. His father's eyes snapped to that spot, and his meticulous gaze scanned over the skin. His other hand came up to trace part of the skin where it abruptly changed into a paler tone.

Jason could see the change into skin in the reflection of Bruce's eyes, and wondered how he missed such a change. It felt kind of awkward; his father tracing his skin with light fingers while his siblings watched from afar. The tense air still and suffocating while Bruce analyzed.

With a heavy sigh, Bruce looked to the same patch of skin that seemed to appear on his forehead too, by Tim's words, not his own. The same look washed over Bruce's eyes before he completely let go. Jason cursed himself for wanting the warmth back. But before he could complain, Bruce turned to the Batcomputer and searched up the skin condition Vitiligo.

By now Jason had already accepted his fate, so he watched as Bruce pulled up pictures and turned to look at Jason again. A deep hum snapped the tense air like a coil spring and Jason was suddenly bombarded with his most clingy siblings hugging his tightly.

Dick was pouty that Jason had dumped him off earlier while Steph was telling him how cool he would look. None of them could compare though, to the warmth in Bruce's eyes as they locked gazes. Jason wondered if Bruce always had that look in his eye, or was the pit covering it up for the longest time.

That thought brought tears to his eyes, and Dick, Steph, and even Tim who was most likely pulled into the hug held him tighter. Bruce too even set his hand over Jason's cheek. Jason sighed heavily and leaned into the touch of his family, perhaps he could get used to this.

»»————>»»——⍟——««<————««

[ricinbach]

howlin’ for you. | chapter 2 - who was trapped

the ticket to freedom brings nothing but confinement.

New York City.

What the regular humans, Mundies as they taught you to call them, deem the most beautiful and vibrant city in the entire world. The city that never slept, and most likely never will. Out of all places to exile yourself, this had to be the one in dreams - with the flickering neon lights, bright and worn-down medley of advertisements and signs, the constant smell of grease mixed in with cigarettes - all enhanced by the vapor emanating from the sewer lids embedded in cracked asphalt.

All those years ago, when your kin decided to break all hell loose in the Homelands and eventually relocate, it was the general consensus amongst Fables that a fresh start in an urban city would be the most viable option. Starting out with a clean slate, the idea of commencing anew appealing so much to so many who have lost money, family and pride. Settling into a city that could seemingly offer so much, blending in with the rest of the human population did not seem to be that hard of a task to accomplish back then.

The Homelands had been old and full of major drama - moving to designated apartment blocks close to one of the world’s biggest metropolitan hubs surely could not be that bad of an idea.

Could it?

Well, to you, it seemed like as long as there were Fables involved, with them living in close proximity to each other if not neighboring, there was bound to be some sort of ruckus starting - no matter the location, yet it was of course an added ingredient to the recipe of chaos.

It was as if this secluded part of Brooklyn, its atrocities and “marvels” magically hidden in plain sight from the mundane eyes, attracted all sorts of trouble like a damn magnet. At every single corner and crevice of these streets there was some Fable getting their first sexual release for the night or some others looking for a quick fight with their rivals older than time itself.

The latter never seemed to end well for anyone involved and around, once the rumored Big Bad Wolf intervened into the scene.

Yet, it was hard for you to know for sure other than echo the gossip around since he did not frequent this part of town - it was a long-lived wonder of yours whether he got tired at all, running all around this cursed town as the only source of visible authority and enforcement.

He was a beast walking amongst men, after all. That much you had seen for your own bare eyes back in the Homelands. There was a reason why everyone thought twice before crossing him, or attempting something borderline illegal by his terms. A visit from him meant trouble and you had succeeded in your attempts of keeping a low profile, thus far.

Maybe you would get an answer to your worries and wonders that particular night - by the looks of how it was unfolding, it could very well end in either you crawling to the Fabletown office for his help or your quick and inevitable demise in that forsaken club.

The little polaroid in front that seemed to send shivers of disgust along with fear down your entire body was the one to blame.

There was a lot of messed up shit happening in Fabletown, and you had seen your fair share of it, both when hooking and living. Out of everything, this had to be the most fucked up you had the pleasure of witnessing. Oh, how you wished you had not, as you kept on staring at the scene it depicted in utter disbelief, eyes wide and hand over mouth. The more you stared at it, the more you wanted to storm out of there and run the farthest away your legs took you.

“How the hell did you guys get this?”

“That’s not important,” she had simply stated, the traces of disgust mixed in with some sort of hope evident in her dark green orbs as she glanced at you. “This is our one-way ticket out of this hellhole.”

The dimmed lightbulbs of the worn makeup mirrors seemed to focus all their everlasting glow onto the photograph in question, the weight of the conversation at hand naturally muffling the usual bumping of the raunchy bass coming from the main room as you holed up near the closets. Taking your eyes off focus for just a split second to calm your heartbeat down, through the smoky reflection, your eyes would spot the clock just ten short of hitting midnight.

For fuck’s sake, it was supposed to be the beginning of your pole time that night, but you had absolutely no confidence on your feet to carry you in six-inch platforms after what you had just seen.

“Well, we found it back in the motel. You think we could use it against him?” a feminine voice would interject from over your shoulder, her tone sounding equally as confused if not more. The faint breeze carried her scent as she approached - a seductive musk mixed in with oud that you could swear only Faith wore. A side glance would confirm her identity to you - Nerissa, with her white halter dress tightened up around her figure, her pink ribbon identical to yours. Hazel eyes looking ever so soft - worried, more like, as her gaze switched back and forth between Faith and the picture she was holding onto so firmly.

Having half a mind into what Faith had been thinking, even the thought of planning it scared you to your core. “That's exactly what we could do,” your lips would softly echo their thoughts, almost in a fading whisper, teeth gently biting down your lower lip in thought. “This right here is proof that even Fabletown’s finest are sick fucks.”

“That’s right,” Faith added, her rose-colored lip curling just a tad bit upwards, stepping around the room pensively as her heels clicked in a methodical rhythm. “Word gets out, no, better yet - ” she halted gently in her step, holding the picture up to the both of you as if to emphasize her point, “ - this damn thing gets out, Georgie’s fucking toast.”

A feeling of great unease lulled you in, engulfing your nerves, the faint hints of music outside the door echoing off. Something was not right. No, this was just too good to be true.

How many times had you tried to escape? To just tear that ribbon apart and not give a damn about the consequences? Begged and pleaded the owner, tried to conspire with the girls? True, now you had actual solid evidence that could get you out of there unlike all the other futile attempts - yet would it work for sure?

That was when you saw it. It took you a bit of time to connect the dots in your mind after the initial shock of seeing the explicit picture had worn off just enough - you were not sure if you were glad you could make better sense of this because apparently the deeper you tried to dive in, the uglier it got.

“Wait a minute,” you thought out loud, eyebrows furrowing. “Isn’t he a regular of - ”

“Now, now,” came the accented, dreary voice that froze you in your place and hung your words dry in your throat, “ - why the fuck is the pole empty?”

It was like someone had shot you. Not that you were entirely sure how that would feel like, or how much it would pain you to have lead lodged inside you if it did at all, but this cold and terrifying feeling that washed all over your body had to feel damn near close.

Time was bent, all three girls frozen and staring at the floor as the door creaked open while it let him in, along with the sudden burst of raunchy beats that filled the small powder room instantly. In the heat of the moment, Faith had proved to be the cunning lady she was known to be as she had managed to tuck the photo somewhere in her skirt - it was nowhere to be seen, and you certainly hoped the bastard had not taken a glimpse at what you three where hiding. She would sneak a side-eye glance at you, ready for the wrath that was to be delivered by the devil’s incarnate.

His heavy footsteps filled in the room yet stopped midway, the low eyes fixating on you - you could almost feel the fiery daggers burning into your skin from his daunting stare. Heart almost skipping out of your chest, you dared look up to meet his eyes.

“I don’t fuckin’ keep you so you can gossip with your friends in the fuckin’ dressing room, do I?” came Georgie’s mad hiss, the words spat out of his mouth as he tugged onto your wrist, dragging you on his way out of the door and into the club - into the purple and pink, crowds of nearly naked men and women with no modestly left to show, and the gleaming pole.

“C’mon, let’s fuckin’ go.”

A little wash of relief descending over you, your eyes would catch your friend’s pairs in a small, reassuring wink over your bare shoulder as you stepped out from the doorway and into the madness.

Luck, whatever that was at that point in your life, seemed to be on your side - if you had managed to hide this just a little bit longer from him, something inside you believed. Believed you would all become free from this prison, if you played your cards just right.

Yet it also told you that things could go so wrong, oh so wrong - after just one small mistake.

[dvixiecups]

"Go go go go!" Osamu shouted as gunfire rained down on the pair, their backs to a flaming building.

It was a classic case of a mission gone awry, the two's incessant bickering alerting half the building of their presence during their "quiet" escape.

"It's your fault we're doing this in the first place!  No we're gonna be here for so much longer," Chuuya snapped, his powerful legs quickly closing the distance between him and a random car parked on the curb.

Thoughtlessly, he smashed open the window while Osamu looped around the car, smashing the opposite window.  The two quickly pulled the car doors open from the inside, slipping in and shutting the doors with a slam.  Chuuya reached in front of him to begin the hot wiring process.

"Wrong side!" Osamu sang, his hands playing with the wires under the wheel.

"Hey!  Let me drive you bastard!"

"No can do, we're out of time. Besides it's not like you could reach the pedals anyway," Osamu chuckled, slamming his foot on the gas as their pursuers hopped onto moterbikes.

Chuuya glared at Osamu's irritatingly smug face, ignoring the ear splitting shatter of bullets against the back window.

"You suck ass at driving!  If those guys don't kill us, you will!" Chuuya shouted just before he was thrown against the car due to a sharp spin of the wheel.

"Yea well you drive like a grandma!  Remember when you stopped at a stop sign while we were being chased?"

"There was a cat in the middle of the road!  We're mafia, not heartless!  I mean at least I can turn without the car going on two wheels."

"How is that a good thing?  Where's the fun in having all wheels on the ground?" Osamu punctuated his point by drifting down an allyway, slowing down their followers just a little, "okay now shoot at them, it's a narrow road even you can't miss."

"The hell's that supposed to mean?" Chuuya pulled a handful of bullets out of his pocket, leaning out the passenger window and throwing them behind the car.

Rubber squealed as bullets punctered the tires of the bikes, sending their drivers careening into one another.  Chuuya silently congratulated himself.

"Don't get too happy, we're still far from headquarters," Osamu nudged at Chuuya with his free hand, the car weaving down the empty road.

"If we even make it that far in this coffin on wheels," Chuuya gritted, his arms braced on the center console and door respectively.

"Awh, have a little more faith in me chibikko," Osamu pouted, the car flying over a speed bump, sending the riders and any object not nailed down flying.

A sudden bubble of air forced it's way out of Chuuya, alerting him of the nausea which had been lingering in his gut since entering this death trap.  He clapped a hand over his mouth, shocked at the sudden intense feeling.

"Holy shit," he hiccuped, "Your piss-poor driving actually made me fucking carsick."

"That sounds like a you problem," Osamu retorted, turning away from the road to smirk at his passenger.

"It's gonna be an us problem when I puke on your smug ass."

Osamu's smile dropped.

"You wouldn't dare."

Chuuya fake gagged at the driver, eliciting a scream out of the latter.  The car swerved precariously as Osamu took his hands off the wheel in favor of pushing Chuuya away.

"Dude!  Keep your hands on the fucking wheel," Chuuya cried, using his hand to supress a gag.

"Keep your stomach in your fucking stomach!"

Seething, Chuuya turned away, instead trying to distract himself with the horizon.

"Just, drive a little softer... please," he requested, voice faint and genuine, completely unlike his usual tone.

Ignoring him, Osamu pressed down on the pedal faster- opting to arrive at the center of the city before Chuuya had a chance to get sick.  Chuuya's mouth was downturned, his arms hugging his midsection.

His plan worked, as they usually do, and the car came to a squealing stop outside the main building.  A man in a suit was waiting for them.  Stepping out of the car, Osamu rested his head on the car roof to prompt the member.

"Boss would like to speak with you," he informed, deadpan.

Osamu cursed under his breath, already knowing what the meeting would be adressing.  Putting on a smile, he drummed the top of the car, avoiding where bullets had sharpened the car.

"Well you heard him!  We should go, it's bad to keep the boss waiting."

Chuuya groaned, the world still spinning around him as Osamu pulled him onto his feet and towards the familiar buidling.  The former knew better than to protest, having experienced Ougai's silent rage towards whoever leaves the boss expectant.  That feeling of shame was far worse than the nausea fiercely gripping his stomach.

The elevator ride was a living hell, Chuuya's stomach remaining on the first floor as the rest of his body travelled up.  Seeing the city grow smaller through the glass walls was vertigo inducing, a feeling Chuuya had never felt even when meters in the air using his ability.  Maybe it was due to the lack on control.  When using his ability or driving, Chuuya never experienced a problem akin to this.  Closing his eyes didn't help, the neverending movement only playing against his eyelids like a shitty projector.

After a truly painfully long time, the elevator stopped with a ding, it's doors opening slowly.  Trying to present himself as best as possible, Chuuya crossed the threshold and into the boss' office with a straight back and one step ahead of Osamu.

His jaw was clenched at this point, respect and fear for the boss being the only thing holding his lunch in place.  What would happen when that wore off?  When the nausea came to a breaking point which loomed like a wave, large and close to break, what would Chuuya do then?

He didn't have long to ponder this, his body lurched forward before even being able to adress Ougai.  Appauled with his bodys betrayal, Chuuya apologized.  Osamu side eyed him, before speaking with Ougai.

"You called us?" Osamu prompted.

"I did.  What happened today?"

"Someone," Osamu nodded towards Chuuya who was struggling to hold himself upright, "got too offended by a joke and started yelling."

"Oh, as if it's," he paused to stifle a burp, "my fault!"

"And how did that happen?" Ougai motioned towards Chuuya.

"This bastard never learned how to drive!" A retch tailed his statement, much to Chuuya's horror.

Osamu stepped away silently and Chuuya fell to his knees, hands in fists against the floor.

"And he never learned how to handle a couple bumps and turns!"

"Shut. Up," Chuuya demanded through his teeth, eyes closed with concentration.

The guards shifted uncomfortably across the room.

"Help him to the restroom," Ougai commanded, staring Osamu in the eye.

"What!" He all but yelled, "why me?  He can crawl there himself!"

"Osamu.  Now."

Scowling at Ougai, Osamu grimaced down at Chuuya before offering his hand.

"Is this," Chuuya paused to swallow down his nausea, "our punishment?"

"Only if you look at it that way," Ougai responded as Chuuya reluctantly look Osamu's hand.

Chuuya was able to hold his composure- or what shreds were left of his composure- until the pair made it into the hallway.

"If you puke on me I will put dried shit in all of your cigarettes," Osamu threatened through clenched teeth.

"Don't tempt me," Chuuya retorted through similarly clenched teeth.  It's not that he wanted to get sick on his "partner" but the odds really weren't in his favor right now.  Plus, it's not like Osamu didn't deserve it.

As soon as the bathrooms came into view, Chuuya peeled himself out of Osamu's hold and stumbled over to one of the sinks.  Planting his hands firmly on the basin, he allowed his upped back to arch with a heave.

"You're disgusting," Osamu stated plainly from the entryway.

"Like you're," he gagged openly, "one to talk."

"At least I'm not retching like a cat choking on a hairball!"

"At least my hair doesn't look like an overgrown sewer rat wearing dollar hair extentions!"

"Oh hoh hoh, YOU'RE one to talk about hair."

"The hell is that supposed to me-"

His head was still facing towards Osamu when a final gag brought up a mouthful of sick.

Both their eyes went wide as they registered what had just took place.  Osamu was mortified, looking at the splatters of illness on his finely polished shoes.

"Awh fuck!  Go back over the sink!" Osamu jumped into the hair.

"Shut u-" a burp over took his threat, leaving his attempt at enounciation sounding more like a frog.

Another, far heavier wave came out, splashing messily into the sink basin.  His fingers were dirtied with the foul substance, it's smell permeating the small room.

"This is your fucking fault you overrated, bland ass, one man Romeo and Juliet remake.

"You're buying me new shoes."

"Fat chance, JD"

[laur-rants]

Fic Update: Blood Wolf

Chapter 2

Fandom: Dishonored

Rated: Mature to Explicit, Strong Violence and  Gore Ahead!!

Synopsis: Daud-Centric Prequel to Wolfbann. The story centers on how Daud turned, and his subsequent marking by the outsider and his formulation of the Whalers. Notes: There probably won’t be nsfw content in this fic, but it WILL be… violent. I want to play with my own boundaries of written violence and also Daud’s start wasn’t nearly as clean as Corvo’s. Their contrast on dealing with the werewolf transformation is one of the things I want to really explore, and Daud gets very close to falling off the wagon.

CHAPTER TAGS: Graphic depiction of nasty injury. AO3 link Previous :: Next

--------------------------------------------

Dunwall, Gristol

Month of Clans -- 1820

He woke with a gasp that burned and seared and lit his body on fire. He drew breath with a cough so painful it cracked his ribs and pulled him apart, fighting every aching inhale. Moving was an agony. His face and throat screamed at him as he rolled over, his fists clenching and teeth gnashing to try and quell the cry that threatened to burst out of him.

He settled for a muffled, tortured groan. His arms were bruised to the Void and back, but he pulled himself up, heaved an empty stomach, then lurched, willing his unresponsive body upright against a cold and slime-covered wall.

Daud breathed, in and out. He opened an eye only to find the world spinning dangerously, vertigo threatening his senses. He winced, shutting his eyes and trying to simply calm the rushing in his ears and head. Every pulse of his heart throbbed into his aching face, the sear of it blinding. Slowly, he lifted a shaking, gloved hand to delicately grace his features. The touch was tiny, as gingerly as he could manage, and still the pain screamed through him, sending shockwaves all the way down his spine and chest. The huge divot in his skin turned his stomach and his fingers pulled away, feeling sticky. Infection was setting in; not a good sign. He cracked his good eye open again, trying to focus on his hand in the gloom. He could feel shock setting into his limbs and he squeezed his fist, open and closed. He breathed, swallowed his nausea, and clung to the wall for dear life.

He should be dead. The wound on his face was beyond standard repair. He could practically feel his pulse jumping out of his neck; there was no reason that his jugular shouldn't be spilling his blood everywhere. He shuddered and coughed and tasted iron. Sweat beaded up on his forehead and his grip on reality loosened. It was too much, all too much. The fever and bile hit him hard and all at once. His eyes rolled back and Daud crumpled to the floor again, swiftly slipping into unconsciousness.

------

He jerked violently out of his second bout of sleep. Or could it be called sleep? He hadn't dreamt of anything, he had no idea how long he'd been out, and he remembered nothing of what he had been doing…

But the smell. Oh Void, the smell.

It smashed into his face like a sucker punch, the offense of it causing his brain to derail into survival mode. His nose wrinkled and a hiss escaped him, the odor assaulting him like an enemy. The pull on his features renewed the pain lancing all down the right of his face -- and the memory of his wound struck him like a crossbow bolt. He checked his hand -- still gloved -- before more tenderly touching fingertips to throat; the wound was, somehow, healing, but in the most festering way possible. The masses of gouged skin were scabbed, but he could feel the flesh at the edges, angry and red and swollen. He cursed under his breath; oh yes, definitely infected. He could feel the heat of the fever on his skin and when he tried to stand, his head swam. Still, he willed his feet to remain steady; he needed a proper assessment on what in the Void he was dealing with here. The world tilted as he stood, but at least his legs were relatively injury-free. Despite his swollen shut eye, Daud collected himself, sneered through the gloom, and what he saw nearly sent him reeling again.

He was in a sewer. It was dark as sin; here and there, the light of the upper world managed to gently filter through. Not that it mattered. He didn't need to see in the dark to know the place was full of death; at the edge of his gloomy vision, the humps of discarded bodies festered and bloated. He felt carefully for the wall and shimmied away from the offensive odor of rot and decay, forcing his brain to play catch up, to try and remember why he was even here in the first place.

Only flashes came to the forefront; tiny, disjointed moments that meant nothing to him without any context. Something large and furred had clawed his face, but there was no way a wolfhound could have inflicted this kind of damage. Perhaps he was misremembering; maybe it had grabbed his neck with its teeth. Silently, fingertips brushed three, four long marks, the longest slash dancing from right forehead to throat, right through his eye-- no tooth would have made lines like that. He worked his jaw and immediately regretted the action, his whole head throbbing in protest.

It didn't matter what had attacked him, he decided, just that it had. And if he didn't get the wound cleaned as soon as possible, the infection could still kill him yet.

His whole body shuddered. He didn't stick around to identify any bodies.

As he left his tunnel for another, the smell of death made way for the smell of sewage -- which frankly, wasn't much better. Blood and grime clung to him like a shroud and he tried desperately to recall why. He counted his knives; he was missing two of them, realizing belatedly they were probably back from where he had come. After some deliberation, he decided it would be easier to just replace them than collect them, but it wouldn't come cheap. The bigger hit, though, was his whaler blade. He missed the weight of it at his side, grimacing at ever considering it to be good luck. A blade was a blade, and now that needed replacing too.

Missing knives, missing blade, dead bodies. With this in mind, he could surmise he was on a job and with a job came a contract. Did he have the information on him? He padded down his jacket, the crinkle of paper faint in his ears.

He reached a spot where enough readable daylight filtered down and decided to pause, searching his pockets. He procured sleep darts, three trap mines, and the contract details. Daud's eyes unfolded the pages, smoothing creases as he skimmed the words, digesting them carefully.

Brimsley. Fink. Dog ring hit. A sizable bounty… Rulfio was supposed to have a cut. But where was he? A flash of memory tells him Rulfio backed out, and he breathed a sigh of relief. He'd have hated going back to that blood-torn room just to look for Rulfio's rotting body.

Reading over the details, more and more memories fell into place. Daud had followed the men and their hounds, had watched the dog fight a monster that couldn't die, had fled to kill Fink and collect the bounty, and then…

Blind eyes. An inhuman scream. Claws rending his entire face to ribbons.

He remembered all of that, the holes in his recollection filling like a puzzle. But anything following confronting Fink and getting attacked by a monster was gone. Nothing to pull from.

By all accounts, he should be dead. Very dead. Daud massaged his jaw on instinct, surprised to find it still whole. He was sure it had broken, his jugular bursting, his face shattered. He had been bleeding out. Nothing could've fixed that bad of a wound.

His mind's eye supplied him the vision of a giant monster's throat bubbling, gurgling, then somehow repairing. He felt his scratches, remembering the hot blood that should've been pouring from them, his own blood leaving far too quickly to be replaced… and yet…

And yet.

His heart rate quickened and his head and throat throbbed. He did his best to still the rising panic in his bones and let his mind rationalize. His neck was different from some monster who used magic to come back to life, to heal completely. He didn't use black magic. Maybe he was just damned lucky, not that he was out of the woods yet. Daud was alive, but still in considerable pain. He was wounded. His head spun dangerously with every stray thought. He needed to get looked at, to make sure he didn't die of infection.

But first, he needed to get paid.

He tucked the contract safely away and gathered himself the best he could. He was near the surface now; he could hear the people passing by, the shouts of guards and teachers and sellers alike. He wandered the tunnels, looking for a maintenance shaft, some way out before he was unceremoniously swept away into the Wrenhaven. He was actually near an exit when something caught his eye, glinting in the light by a blocked off drainage pipe.

It was his sword. Nearly washed away, stopped by a grate. The opening wasn't large enough for him to crawl out of, but through it, Dunwall Tower was visible, where the Kaldwins and their servants sat cushy and protected.

Daud grunted, holding no love lost for nobles and their affairs. He pulled the blade free, feeling for the notch. It caught in the thumb of his glove, nearly drawing blood, and Daud smiled.

“Lucky,” he muttered, sheathing the blade. His voice rasped painfully but he paid it no mind, just happy he still had a voice in the first place.

------

The Brimsley estate was huge and conspicuous and easy to infiltrate. Daud had few issues finding it and even fewer issues scaling the wall, even in his injured state. He was a mess; he didn't care. He didn't care that he stank of death, that his clothes were soaked black-red from a stranger's blood. He didn't care that half of his face was ripped open, raw and ragged and showing every swollen edge. A part of him revelled in it, couldn't wait to feed off the look on his contractor's face when Brimsley eventually found the assassin relaxing on the balcony, enjoying the warm, late spring evening.

His blade sat on his leg, the whetstone running cleanly across it. Every pass caused the metal to sing and smile in the dying light of the day. He felt the wind shift and heard a door close; he didn't pause his easy movement. There were two muffled voices chatting amicably, but they paused as Daud's stone ran along steel and interrupted all conversation.

Voices hushed to whispers that seemed to shout in Daud's all-too-sensitive ears. He grinned, adjusted his hood, then looked up as footsteps approached.

Brimsley screamed.

He recoiled from Daud so hard he nearly fell over; actually, he would have, if his assistant hadn't been there, gripping his arm and keeping him upright. A tray of tea spilled across the floor but nobody paid it any heed, not when Daud sat across on the balcony, looking like death warmed over.

His smile was easy, if not pained. Brimsley swiftly pissed himself.

"Brimsley." He pulled the contract from his pocket, and put his blade back into its sheath. His eyes flicked to the assistant and he stood, pulling at the edges of his hood. He walked over to Brimsley and the man, realizing that Daud was real, stammered into speaking.

"D-Daud…" he forced out, and Daud's eyes flashed, watching Brimsley carefully. "What happened? We all thought you died--"

His eyebrow quirked. "We?"

"It's been five days, Daud."

Something in his brain halted. He hadn't seen a calendar, a paper, nothing. He just came here and planned on dealing with all of the other important matters after he had the money to pay for it. But five days? He stiffened, alarms in his head blaring.

"The contract is fulfilled, just like you wanted, Brimsley." He shoved the paper with the man's signature on it into his chest. "My partner and I. The full payment. Now, if you know what's good for you."

"You completed the contract? Then--"

"The Beast is dead. So is Fink. Which means you won't be putting out dangerous contracts trapping assassins into a death ring anymore, now, will you?"

Brimsley blanched. Daud's scowl grew severe, and something in his stare unhinged the noble. He was sweating, breaking eye contact, before waving at his assistant to go get the promised sum. He tried looking at Daud, but could not manage it without retching.

"Y-your face… how did you survive?"

"What's wrong? Disappointed?" Daud growled, his throat burning from the effort. "Sad I didn't turn into dog food, too? How convenient it would have been for me to die like the others. You can be sure I won't forget about this bullshit any time soon, Brimsley."

"You can't kill me... I'm your employer!"

"Maybe today you are," Daud said, eyes tracking the return of the assistant, now carrying a hefty purse. "But tomorrow… a different client, and different contract. You never know if you'll be in the list." He aggressively pulled the purse from the assistant, then silently counted the coin. Everything was there -- everything but Rulfio's cut. Daud snarled.

"My partner is still alive. You'll give me his cut too, if you enjoy your head still existing between your shoulders."

Brimsley nodded, and the assistant was pushed away again. Daud tossed the purse in his hand before pocketing it, his face starting to burn and itch in the most unpleasant of fashions. When he next looked at Brimsley, he caught the man staring at the wounds and he bared his teeth involuntarily.

"Get Sokolov to paint me, if you want the memory to last longer." He sneered, tempted to put a hand over the wound. He doesn't; Daud never showed such weakness in front of a client. It was easier to get what he needed from contractors when he was as intimidating as possible, with or without having to resort to his blade. But something in Brimsley's gaze made him uncomfortable, the hair prickling along his neck, his hand twitching at his side before curling into a fist. He held Brimsley's stare until the man grew too uncomfortable to keep the contact, the noble's shivering frame growing sweaty.

"How did he look?" Brimsley asked, his voice hushed and breathy. "Was he wonderful? The Outsider's beast in that basement?" He then looked back to Daud. "You're one now too, aren't you?"

Daud's whaler sword was at Brimsley's neck in an instant. Brimsley flinched, but there was a smile lingering there that was vile and Daud wanted nothing more than to wipe it from his face permanently. He almost did, but the assistant returned, carrying the purse of coin slated for Rulfio. This time, Daud didn't stay to count the coin; he simply took the pouch, secured it, and left Brimsley's office as silently and stealthily as he came, his anger roaring in his ears.

------

It was late evening by the time Daud neared his current hideout: a small apartment outside of Slaughterhouse Row. The smell of whale oil was never pungent enough to scare him off like it had other residents, but now, as he pushed his way in through the door, closing it heavily with a shoulder, it was so offensive that it burned his nose and caused his head to throb. Not that it wasn't already stabbing him with pain; every movement and exertion pulled at his wounds and he could feel the blood and puss seeping unpleasantly. Nauseous and fevered, he pushed himself to the bathroom, testing to see if the water was running clean today.

It was; he thanked the Void and immediately began stripping down. His clothes were black for a reason; the stains of blood and dirt wouldn't be so noticeable, but the stench was cloying at his nostrils like never before. Since when did he become so sensitive to such things? He grimaced at the rancid smell before filling the sink with water and throwing his shirt in, letting it soak in the lye while he pulled off his remaining articles and started a shower. As the room began to steam, he forgot himself for a moment, reflexively looking towards his movement in the mirror.

And finally, he was face to face with the reality of his injury.

Daud paled, the color draining from his cheeks in real time. He would have vomited if there was anything actually in his stomach besides some nicked bread and an apple. Instead, he swallowed on the bile, taking a careful, shaking step towards the mirror.

His right eye was near swollen shut, black and purple from the bruising all around the socket. The shiner was green on the edges, before getting lost in the infected red surrounding the nasty slices in his skin. And what slices they were; they were actually thinner than he expected them to be, but deep and vicious all the same. The longest and most painful one was the one bifurcating the whole of his right face; he traced it gingerly down from forehead to neck, his pulse fluttering where the scratch fell over his jaw, his jugular…

Daud swallowed again and the wounds visibly protested. He shut his eyes, trying not to let his head swim from the scent and sight of his own skin. He uncoiled his hands, flexing, before rooting through the cabinet behind the mirror. He quickly pulled out some peroxide, some disinfecting ointment, some fancy Sokolov concoction he got after an old contract was paid, and a soft sponge. He carefully poured the peroxide on the sponge first; he hissed and snarled as the sponge hit the wounds, the sound rippling through him dangerously. He slowed; the second growl was more of a suppressed groan as he eased into the pain. He then wrung out the sponge, letting the blood and infection wash away. He then got into the shower, reveling in the scalding water and trying not to pay attention to all of the blood and grime and stink washing away from his weary body.

In the steam and under the pounding drops of water, he finally let his mind relax and wander. It wasn't long before his thoughts became intrusive; five days was a lot of days to be laying half dead in a sewer with nobody to find him. What if he had died? He supposed Rulfio would be the only one to go looking, and who's to say he actually would? Maybe to make a point, win the bet, maybe piss on Daud's corpse. He wouldn't blame him.

No. It wasn't like Rulfio to be that petty, and even if they were just business partners, they were still partners. For the past year or so, they had come to work well together and as it turns out, two assassins are better than one. Not many in their profession were willing to let others in on their trade secrets-- plus, stealth work was traditionally best done alone. But with Rulfio, he and Daud had been able to double their output. He never had such good contracts. Even if they just did business together, it was lucrative; he would still be hiding in abandoned buildings like a homeless rat instead of in an old apartment that was heated and even had hot, running water. Blessings like that were few and far between in Dunwall, with exception given to the military and noble houses.

Nobles. Daud spat in the shower, watching bloody phlegm swim around the drain. They paid well, but Daud hated every single one he's ever met. What good did they bring the world? Hoarded coins like dragons, partied while children starved and died. Commissioned bridges in their name instead of paying their workers fair wages. His face ached from the rage simmering just under his skin. His teeth itched, and he rolled a tongue over them, wondering what other unexpected side effects his gnarly wound was going to give him.

The water ran cold all too soon and Daud shivered as he pulled himself out, hardly toweling off as his tired body stumbled over itself. He had half a mind still to pull the Sokolov elixir out; he downed it in one full swig, then turned to the ointment as some strength returned to him. He dressed the wounds in a half haze, his vision beginning to blur from fever and tiredness. It was a messy job, but he was far too gone to care. As long as he slept on his back, he'd be fine. He was sure of it.

What he wasn't sure of after that was how he even made it to the rickety mattress on the other side of the apartment, throwing himself heavily onto it, swiftly letting the Void take him. ------

He tried to get through the days as normal. He really did. But every day passing was another day that the wound didn't heal right, or at all, until all Daud knew was the searing, itching heat of his wounded skin. It dominated his days, his nights; everything in between was fevered and sensitive. He heard whales crying, but not like the keening from the slaughterhouse he's used to; these cries were screams of torture, of whales falling into the Void where their bodies were destined to be desecrated for the whims of a bottomless city.

He tried to conduct business, but it was no use; his scabs were too much of a deterrent. He couldn't chance bandaging the wounds so he left them exposed, and if anyone saw him, they were terrified into vacating his premise. His self-consciousness, usually non-existent, bubbled up in his chest until finally, in a fevered state, body shaking and his breath ragged, he entered the slaughterhouse and stole a whaler mask. The smell of it was pungent and unforgettable; he resisted the urge to regurgitate (everything smelled ten times worse, everything was too much and he still didn't have the piece of mind to wonder why) and placed the mask cleanly over his face, hiding the worst of his facial offenses. Later that same night he couldn't help but notice how, even in the mirror, the long muzzle of the whaler mask suited him in a way he couldn't place. It satisfied something primal in his chest, unlocking a door that he never knew was closed. His chest swelled. He wrestled with the urge to sing.

He sneered. He never sang.

The mirror suddenly disturbed him, those glass eyes too empty, too all-knowing. He snarled, a sound that now caught in his throat and rumbled through his whole being violently, but he saw it as nothing more than his ruined vocal cords yelling at him for even attempting to make a sound.

It wasn't long after that he started looking for Rulfio. It was slow going-- over a week now and his fever still hadn't broken, he still felt weaker than he ever had-- but Daud also had a heavy purse full of a noble's blood money that he owed another assassin. However, with their last contract so far behind them (and as far as Rulfio knew, Daud was dead), tracking his partner across Dunwall was becoming an annoying chore.

Rulfio didn't have a lot of haunts. He had a few regular places, but even when Daud patrolled them, Rulfio never showed up. It made him itch, his whole body full of agitation. It was unlike the assassin; Rulfio was a man of routine. It's what made him so excellent at his job; he could count down the seconds to a kill, a literal metronome, patient and meditative. Every kill was perfectly timed, perfectly planned. So, to see him being something akin to unpunctual was too much to bear. Daud jumped off to a different roof, trying not to fear the worst for Rulfio's safety.

There was one haunt he had been avoiding; their old meetup spot. Something in Daud had nagged at him to visit sooner, but it felt redundant; Daud was a no-show to a meeting, and if an assassin was a no-show, it's best to assume they're face down in a rat-filled ditch. So what was the point in stalking that particular part of Dunwall? The city was huge -- miles across, even -- and Rulfio could choose to be anywhere. So why would he be on a familiar rooftop, waiting for a ghost to appear?

His boots landed heavy on the old concrete, muscle memory catching him before he stumbled. The potted plant overlooking a blood red sunset looked no better than it had two weeks ago, and unswept leaves scattered about his feet as he walked. Everything was untouched from his last visit-- and yet, the hair of his neck prickled, sensing immediately that he was not alone. A dark figure in the corner shifted and Daud's vision bee-lined on it, his fist clenching in apprehension.

"Come on out, then," he growled out, the words muffled behind the thick respirator the mask offered. Even so, the individual jerked and twisted at the sound of his voice. They stood up, spinning on him with a wild, desperate expression.

"Daud? That better be you, you bastard, and not Jordan playing another prank on me--"

Daud's breath hitched and he relaxed, straightening out of the predatory stance he'd taken. Rulfio scrambled forward, then slowed, eyeing the mask critically. "It is you, isn't it? Daud-- Spirits--..." The man hesitated, then grasped at Daud's arm, as if to make sure he was real, and not some smoke-induced mirage. Daud huffed.

"Of course it's me, Rulfio, I'm the only other person who would even think to look for you here." That seemed to ease all of Rulfio's remaining fears. He looked Daud over and stepped back, his nose curling at the mask.

"Outsider's ass, Daud, you crazy bastard. What the fuck happened? It's been weeks."

Daud turned his head away, not bearing to look Rulfio straight on even through the heavy whaler mask. In response, he pushed the coin purse into Rulfio's hand.

"Contract's done. Fink is dead. And I made sure Brimsley coughed up your respective pay." Rulfio looked at the money in disbelief; mouth agape, he counted through the coin. Daud tilted his head, triumphant. "Told you I'd win our bet."

Rulfio huffed a laugh, the edges of his beard crinkling in a smile. "You really are a son of the Outsider, you know that, Daud? Shit." He then gave the mask a more critical eye, his eyes flicking to Daud's visible sliver of neck. Daud stiffened, and a very strong part of his brain wished to flee as far and fast as his body could take him.

He stayed, fist clenched.

"So, what's up with the mask? Not like you to hide your face."

Daud shifted, and the mask jerked as he looked around. "My face has been bad for business."

"Bad for business?" Rulfio laughed, unbelieving. "Get better lies, Daud. You're always the face of our contracts, as if you wanna be the most famous assassin in Dunwall."

Daud huffed, his breath hot on the leather.

"Just-- look. You'll see what I mean." He unlatched the mask, unraveling the sizing band and pulling the article off his face.

Rulfio's expression dropped. His eyes darted away, then he covered his mouth, muffling a curse. Daud's stomach turned at the reaction.

"Daud? What the fuck? What the fuck?"

"The cheater in the contract had a souped up dog, or something." A monster, an abomination of flesh and fur. "It hit me, but I was able to walk away alive."

"Are you sure?" Rulfio's voice painfully broke on the question. His fists curled, quivering at his sides. "Daud, have you seen yourself?"

Daud sneered, the skin of face pulling and itching unpleasantly. He smothered the urge to claw the wounds open. "You asked why I'm wearing a mask, and then you ask if I've seen my own reflection lately? Are you an idiot, Rulfio? Of course I know how bad this looks!" His hand gestured to his face, his neck, his pulse suddenly throbbing against the wounds. "I'm not dead yet, and besides, I still owed you your cut of the profits!"

"You should have died," Rulfio said softly, his voice barely a whisper but ringing all too loudly in Daud's ears. "That wound… there's no way it hit your neck and didn't sever your jugular. How are you still alive?"

Daud's ears filled with rushing wind. He snarled, showing his teeth. Rulfio stepped back, his eyes on Daud's expression. Daud caught the movement; he exhaled, deflating.

"Lucky, I guess."

Rulfio's face was unconvinced, his eyes dark under heavy brows.

"There's something you're not telling me, Daud."

In his brain, Daud replayed the memory of that giant whale of a wolf, that disgusting, shredded monster and it's neck, sizzling and smoking and knitting itself back together. Instinctively, he brought a hand up to his neck, stopping just short of ripping at his wounds, at giving in to that bone-deep ache and gouging new, fresh lines into his skin. Rulfio watched the movement, his eyes holding too much concern, and Daud hated it. He was an assassin, for fuck's sake. He wasn't some child, and even when he was, he was already killing, shoving sharp bits of metal into his assailant's eyes. He didn't need the pity resting in Rulfio's black eyes.

He growled, anger boiling hot under his skin, but Daud didn't give in to his urges. His hand dropped, his breathing hard and his ears ringing.

"It's nothing you need to worry about Rulf. I dealt with it weeks ago."

Had he? Something told him yes, you did, but he had no memory, nothing to say that the giant dog was actually dead and buried.

Just… an instinct. An unreliable, unnecessary, instinct.

"Yeah, and I'm looking at the blood money result of that, right?" Rulfio huffed, turning from Daud to look at the setting sun. "So, picked up any other contracts since then?"

Sensing the conversation shifting but also feeling his limbs buzzing unpleasantly, Daud pushed the mask back up over his face. There was a comfort in hiding behind it, though Rulfio didn't seem to share his sentiment. He watched the mask slip back on with disdain.

"It doesn't suit you."

"I don't remember asking your opinion," Daud shot back, defensive.

Rulfio shrugged. Daud sighed, the air hissing out the respirator.

"I have not picked up any contracts," Daud supplied, answering Rulfio's earlier question. "I wanted to get you your payment first, that and…" he trailed off, his shrug trying to hide his unease. "These scratches have been a liability for clients. Believe it or not, my face really is bad for business, right now."

"Can't imagine why," Rulfio needled him, and Daud prickled in response. Rulfio seemed to sense his annoyance and just smirked. He walked back over to Daud, pulling a stack of papers out of his pockets. "Got a few that I picked up, seemed like they might be good for--well, for me, at least." He passes the paper to Daud. "Most of these are enough for a singular assassin to accomplish, no problem. If you need work, you could probably take one of these off me."

Daud nodded, looking through each contract. One was for offing a sex offender, another of just stealing a gem from a noble for a noble, another was a hit for killing-- Daud growled and balled that piece of paper up, throwing it over the roof. Rulfio looked at him, protesting, but Daus held up a hand.

"I don't murder kids, you know that," he murmured, dangerously. Rulfio stiffened, then looked at where the crumpled paper had fallen, three stories down. Rulfio murmured out an apology, an 'I must've misread that one in the pile," but Daud shoved him off before finally taking a contract out of the stack.

"It's fine. I got my hit." Rulfio looked at him curiously, but Daud pointed to the fine print.

Seeking a headhunter for con man Eustace Fink, who led my sons to what I can only assume was a drowning under the Hound Pits Pub. Will be willing to part with 200 silver for anyone who can find and apprehend this criminal for me!!

The post mark was two weeks ago. Rulfio wrinkled his nose in clear disgust.

"200 silver? No wonder nobody has taken that job, it's not paying nearly enough."

"That's fine; it's my hit anyway."

"What? Daud, you're worth double that in gold, it's not like you to sell yourself short."

"I'm not-- this is-- do you not recognize the name?" Every syllable dripped with more hatred; Daud could nearly feel his body ripple with the anger. "This is the brother of the man I nearly died killing." And he knows shit I don't, Daud all but growled out. Rulfio raised an eyebrow.

"Revenge, huh? Suits you as much as that mask does," Rulfio murmured. "Are you sure you're gonna be okay, Daud?"

He folded the contract into his jacket, pulling his hood up. His movements were jerky, pained.

"I'll be fine, Rulf. Don't follow me on this one. I'll handle it on my own and see you here when it's finished."

"You can keep the 200 silver, Daud," he laughed, but Daud was already hopping from the rooftop, leaving Rulfio and his words behind.

Eustace Fink would have answers, he reasoned to himself. He knew what his brother had been up to, was complicit in the act. So when Daud found him, he'd be sure wring every dirty little secret out of him before slicing his neck open like a disgraced lover.

[haberdashing]

No Puppet Strings Can Hold Me Down (16/17)

The Magnus Archives fanfic. An AU that diverges from canon between episodes 159 and 160, in which Peter Lukas’ statement that “he got you” takes on a different meaning.

on AO3

Not everything, though, went smoothly after that point, and not just because Jon was still trapped in his own body, unable to act of his own accord. There were incidents that reminded him of the true gravity of the situation, how one wrong move could lead to consequences much graver than his current imprisonment.

The first incident started with Jonah Magnus writing something down, though Jon hadn’t thought much of it at first; he’d peeked at a few words during the writing, as it wasn’t as if he could look away, but upon grasping that it looked to be a missive every bit as pretentious as he would have expected from Jonah, Jon let his mind wander, focused more on how Jonah Magnus’ handwriting both did and did not resemble his own (it was formal-looking handwriting, filled with dramatic loops and whorls, but still slightly different than what he’d seen Elias write before) than the actual contents of what was being written. Whether it was some sort of bragging or a suicide note or somewhere in between, Jon figured that what mattered was the action that accompanied it, not the letter itself.

Jon had barely noticed that said letter was still in his pocket as the day went on, and as his body entered the bathroom, his mind was more preoccupied with Knowing the sort of thing Daisy had used that bathtub to clean up and how inadequate her cleaning efforts really were on a biological level than with how Jonah had preoccupied himself writing something earlier in the day.

Jon only focused again on the scene in front of him when, after locking the door behind them, Jonah took out the letter and thrust it in his face while making no effort to actually attend to business there.

Read this, Jon.

Jon hadn’t planned on doing so any more than he had when the same words had been in front of him before, but his eyes instinctively looked to the top of the page--and, Jon noticed, his field of vision moved with them, his head tilting ever so slightly upwards.

He could move again, then--and yet, though he hadn’t planned to read whatever Jonah had written out loud, his voice rose to do just that, its tone calm and clinical even as Jon’s hands shook.

“Stateme-”

Jon closed his eyes, closed his mouth, gritted his teeth together to stop the words from flowing up, because he recognized the pattern now. He recognized the pattern, but he’d read just enough before to know that what Jonah wanted to share with him wasn’t a statement--not a regular one, at least, not some brief anecdote about the supernatural. It was... bigger than that. It was something more.

It was, at any rate, very much not something Jon wanted to read out loud, especially after being prompted to by his captor.

(The phrase Free will is a funny old thing, isn’t it Jon? floated into Jon’s head, and he felt bile rise in his throat at the thought of it.)

Part of him wanted to read it, though, and not just the part of him that was starting to feel resigned to whatever it was Jonah had planned for his captivity here. Part of him wanted to see what Jonah thought was so important, wanted to learn why he’d requested that Jon read it, wanted to know what this was all about, wanted to Know-

Jon pulled his hands into fists, crinkling the paper in the process.

It wasn’t a statement. That was what mattered here, right? He could feed off statements, but if this wasn’t one--and it didn’t look the part, exactly, scrawled hastily onto paper that wasn’t even official Institute stock--then that didn’t matter. If he could- could justify in his mind it being something else, that would change things, right? Dream logic, and all that?

It wasn’t a statement. It couldn’t be. He wouldn’t let it be.

Jon hadn’t noticed that he was hyperventilating until his vision began to dim.

Do calm down, Jon. Panicking won’t get you anywhere.

“I’m not going to- to calm down!” Now Jon’s voice shook as much as his hands, but there was a strange sort of comfort to that, to knowing that his voice was his own again, panic and all. “If anything, maybe I’ll just panic louder. Martin’s out there, you know, he’ll-”

He’ll what? Think that I’m throwing a hissy fit and do his best to ignore it? Or did you think he would somehow know better?

“I...” Jon reached for the door, but as he went to unlock it he felt his body freeze up on him again, watched Jonah Magnus back away from the door and into the filthy bathtub--Jon noticed, distantly, that he could tell when his body was his own again because the shaking started up as soon as he regained control.

There was a tape recorder on the bathroom sink now, one that definitely had not been there when Jon entered the room.

Jon’s skin was crawling as he planned his next move.

“I’m not reading this.” Jon tried to sound more sure of that than he felt.

Then we’ll see how long you last in here. There’s plenty of fresh water, so it could be weeks before you succumb to hunger. Do you really think your curiosity can stay sated for that long?

“That’s your master plan? Lock me in a bathroom and hope I get bored before I die?” Jon raised his voice as he spoke, hoping that Martin might be able to overhear, might be able to put together the pieces--the mental image of Martin kicking in the door suddenly popped into Jon’s mind, and he did his best to focus on that.

You might get bored. You will get hungry. One way or another.

Jon let out a long sigh, then ran for the bathroom door, willing to fling himself into it if that was easier than unlocking the damn thing, only to have his body forced back again before he could make contact.

Don’t you want to know what’s in there? It really is fascinating work, if I do say so myself.

Jon did want to know, he did, the yearning for knowledge burned within him-

The toilet seat was up, and that gave Jon an idea.

Slowly, carefully, Jon made his way forward again, directing his gaze between the tape recorder on the sink and his own face in the mirror. (It’d been a while since Jon had gotten a good look at himself. He didn’t look well, and not just because of the scars that dotted his body now.)

“...it was always leading up to this, wasn’t it?”

More than you know.

Jon nodded, trying his best to look resigned, crouching down as he looked over at the papers still clutched in his hand... and shoved them into the water of the toilet bowl.

The paper was already starting to break apart, the ink bleeding from the pages, before Jon flushed them down to the sewers below.

Jon wasn’t surprised to find that his body was taken over again as the papers circled the drain. It didn’t matter, not really. What mattered was that whatever Jonah Magnus had written was gone now, never to return, at least not in that same form.

...this isn’t over, you know.

Jon would have laughed, if he could.

I’m pretty sure it is, actually.

The second incident came a couple days later and started as innocuously as the one before, with Martin making two cups of tea.

(Martin insisted on making meals and snacks and tea for both himself and Jonah in Jon’s body, even after showing that he knew of Jonah’s presence, and Jon did his best to determine why.

Was it simply a matter of utility, of it being almost as easy to make food for two as for one? Was Martin thinking of Jon when he did it, knowing that Jon would taste what Martin prepared for him even if he wasn’t actually the one eating it? Did Martin just not trust Jonah Magnus to fend for himself with such things?

Whatever the true reason, Jon appreciated the gesture all the same, though he was in no position to indicate as much.)

The cups were both steaming hot as Martin brought them to the table that afternoon, and Martin didn’t hesitate to take a sip of his own, but Jon’s just sat there, with Jonah making no move to drink any.

After a minute or two of this, Martin finally looked up and asked, “Aren’t you going to have some tea? I made it fresh for you, you know.”

“No, I don’t think I will.” Jonah looked at Martin for a long moment before adding, “Did you know that ingesting methanol can be deadly?”

“What?” Martin’s face, pale and panicked, showed all the confusion that Jon felt but couldn’t express.

“It’s true. Though it looks and smells much like ethanol, ingesting as little as fifteen milliliters of methanol can be fatal.”

“I... wait, are...” Martin was growing paler by the second now. “Are you trying to threaten me?”

Jon’s body shook as Jonah let out a huff of amusement. “Quite the contrary, actually. I just wonder whether you know for certain whether you put more or less than fifteen milliliters of methanol in this cup of tea.”

Martin slouched down a bit in his seat, and as he did, Jon considered the implications of what had been said. Jonah Magnus seemed to be accusing Martin of trying to poison him, potentially fatally, and Martin wasn’t denying the accusation, either... but why?

Jon’s finger circled the brim of the tea cup absentmindedly. “Perhaps you’ve changed your mind about wanting to hurt Jon to get to me. That does make the game more interesting, though I would remind you that while I can find a new body if I need to, whatever you do to Jon would prove a bit more... permanent.”

“No, I- I know how that all works. Making you find a new host isn’t worth the price of losing Jon forever.”

“Well then.” Jon’s finger slid off the top of the tea cup, down its smooth surface and onto the saucer below. “If you aren’t looking to kill Jon, I believe it would be in your best interests to dispose of this cup of tea and prepare another one, one that hasn’t been adulterated in the same way.”

“Right. Of course.”

Martin took Jon’s tea cup and began emptying it out into the sink as Jon’s mind reeled.

To borrow Jonah’s metaphor, what kind of game was Martin playing here? Why would Martin try to- not to kill him, it didn’t sound like, but to poison him to some other effect? Methanol being the poison of choice, apparently, but what was so special about methanol...?

“It’s probably a good idea to use a different cup if you’re going to make a fresh batch.”

“Yes, I got that, thank you, I’m not stupid you know-”

“I am well aware of that much.”

Suddenly the information flowed into Jon’s head, everything he had been wondering and more answered in an instant.

He learned how methanol was called wood alcohol because it was once produced by distilling wood. He learned that it was often used to denature ethanol, but that some would drink the resulting mixture anyway despite its toxic properties, either not understanding the risks or being desperate enough for alcohol that they didn’t care. He learned that drinking contaminated alcohol, through this and other methods, had led to thousands of cases of methanol poisoning over the years, hundreds dying in disgrace and pain, while even the survivors often suffered long-term effects that left their lives in shambles, including-

Oh.

That was it, then, wasn’t it? That was Martin’s plan? For once the Beholding’s bank of infinite knowledge proved actually useful for something...

As Jon put together the pieces, realized why Martin had considered that particular poison to slip into his tea, for the first time in longer than Jon would care to consider, he felt something a little bit like hope.

[edsbev]

Ever since Derry, waking has felt like falling.

Richie sees Eddie in front of him. Almost breathless in his excitement – the cavern is filtered a sickly shade of dark green, but Richie, even in his dazed state, can still see something golden in Eddie’s eyes.

“Rich,” Eddie says. “I did it. I killed it. I – ”

And then Richie sees it. An unfurling shadow at Eddie’s back. And he knows what’s going to happen before it happens. But he can’t move. His body is frozen. He can’t even call out to warn him. And then Eddie is being pierced through the middle, and Richie’s brain is falling until it lands back in his body, and he jolts awake in his bed.

His heart pounds but it feels like he’s dead. Weighed down by some sort of cold, sickly fear, his body numb, his soul somewhere outside his body. Hasn’t returned yet, from the fall.

Until his eyes find the back of Eddie’s head, asleep on the pillow next to him. Until he reaches out and ghosts his finger over Eddie’s arm, his shoulder, just to feel his body heat. And everything begins to click into place. His soul returns. His heart tempers.

Eddie is here. Eddie is here, he’s alive, Richie thinks. In Richie’s dream, he is impaled.

In reality, Richie grabbed Eddie and rolled them over before IT could strike, and the stones of the cavern were impaled instead.

It’s such a fucking nightmare, waking up like this. But it’s only been a week, and they’re not even that far out from Derry. So it’ll get better. That’s what Eddie had said yesterday, when Richie had woken so fiercely that Eddie had jolted awake too.

Hey, Eddie had said softly, a hand to Richie’s jaw. I’m here. I’m always going to be here. Morning light had filtered in through the motel room’s shutters, cast golden stripes over the bad 70’s inspired décor, just as it does now. Eddie looked a bit like an angel, sitting up in bed in one of Richie’s shirts, blankets pooled at his waist, hair a mess atop his head. Then he’d smiled, more like a devil, like himself, and said, you’re not getting rid of me any time soon. 

Richie had kissed him, then. And it had been desperate and needy – which should’ve been embarrassing – but Eddie had kissed him back just as desperately, as needily. Now, Richie shuffles over in bed, loops an arm over Eddie’s waist, and kisses his shoulder. Careful to be gentle, not to wake him, as he slots up against Eddie’s back, as he buries his face in Eddie’s neck.

They’ve done this before. When they were young.

It’s weird, how the memories will either hit Richie all at once, or trickle in one by one. He had remembered those memories the first night he had slept next to Eddie, curled up around him.

One moment, he was in this hotel room, the next, he was in his childhood bedroom, and he was fourteen years old.

“…I swear that shadow looked like a person,” Eddie was saying – who was also in Richie’s childhood bedroom, and also fourteen years old. He was sitting up in bed, not in Richie’s shirt but in his own shirt, blankets pooling around his waist, hair a mess atop his head. And Richie had thought he looked like an angel then too, even though there were dark night shadows cast over his face, and a wild frightened look in his eyes.

Richie was lying next to him, face half smushed into his pillow. “It’s just the tree outside, dude.”

“If it’s a tree then why did it look like a person?” Eddie demanded. His hands were fisted anxiously in the quilt, his gaze pointed sharply at Richie.

“Because sometimes shit looks like other shit. I don’t know. It’s just your eyes playing tricks on you.” Richie yawned. He was exhausted, already half-asleep, and maybe that’s why he reached out and carefully pried Eddie’s hands from where they clutched at the blankets. He didn’t do anything else. Didn’t hold Eddie’s hands, or let his own hands linger. He just unclenched Eddie’s hands, let them rest on Eddie’s lap, and then pulled his hand away. “Go to sleep.”

And then, a few seconds too late, it hit him. What he had just done. And his eyes had shot open, and his stomach had lurched to his throat. Wide awake. And he looked at Eddie, who was looking quietly down at his own hands, and then Eddie looked at him.

“Fine,” Eddie had said, and he sounded irritable but his throat did something strange at the end of the word. Like he was having a hard time swallowing.

He shuffled down, lay back against the bed, then rolled onto his side, facing away from Richie.

It was their usual kind of sleep over, only it wasn’t. It was usual because it was just the two of them, and they were up at a painful hour in the morning because they’d stayed up talking and eating copious amounts of sugar and reading comics. But it wasn’t usual because Eddie had spooked himself before they’d decided to go to sleep, and had ended up in Richie’s bed as a result, rather than where he usually slept on the floor.

It wasn’t usual because they had fought a killer clown only a few months ago, and were still burdened by a lingering sense of fear.

It wasn’t usual because at this point Richie liked Eddie so much that he could hardly stand it.

Richie stared at the back of Eddie’s head for what felt like the whole night. Hand still tingling from touching Eddie’s. But it had only been a handful of minutes, when Eddie said, kind of quiet, “I still can’t sleep.”

Richie watched the back of Eddie’s move as Eddie frustratedly nuzzled his head into his pillow, groaned. Something ticked in his chest. Then he scooted a little closer to Eddie and said, “here.” And he’d looped an arm over Eddie’s waist, and lay his head so close to Eddie’s that Eddie’s hair brushed his nose. And his mouth went dry and his heart screamed at him and he figured that at some point he should learn to use his brain before he used his mouth, before he moved his body, but it was too late now. He asked, “this okay?”

Eddie had gone very still. It felt like the kind of still that Eddie went before he exploded; a deep breath in before he yelled.

But Eddie had said, voice barely there, “okay.”

And, god, that had been a terrible idea. Because Richie couldn’t sleep. Was too keyed up, distracted by the slight rise of fall of Eddie’s torso beneath his arm, by the smell of Eddie’s hair. It was pure, agonizing torture, being so close to Eddie. But then, once Richie had finally fallen asleep, it had been the best sleep Richie ever had.

They’d slept like that a couple times after that, Richie remembers. Maybe only a handful of times. Eddie silently climbing into Richie’s bed during their sleepovers, Richie silently wrapping an arm around him. Sometimes, Eddie would wrap an arm around Richie. Once, they wrapped their arms around each other. But it was always silent.

It was, also, always part torture.

Richie remembers waking up once, when he was maybe fifteen, and finding Eddie lying so close that they were sharing a pillow. They weren’t touching at all, but Richie, even without his glasses, could see every feature of Eddie’s face. Could see, perfectly, the curve of Eddie’s lips, slightly parted in his sleep.

And Richie had wanted to kiss him, of course. To close the gap, press his lips to Eddie’s. To touch Eddie’s face gently with his fingers, to have Eddie touch his face with his own fingers. Had burned so fiercely with that desire it was a wonder the whole bed didn’t go up in flames.

It was torture not being able to kiss him.

Now, Richie opens his eyes – hadn’t even realised they were closed – and he finds Eddie’s face close to his own, like all those years ago. Only Richie has his arm still wrapped around him, and Eddie is awake.

“Hey,” Eddie says, with a soft smile. He says it like he’s been trying to talk to Richie for a while. Probably since Richie had jolted awake and slotted up against Eddie’s back. Richie wonders where his mind had gone. But he knows. It was with Eddie. It had left Eddie to think about Eddie. God.

“Hey,” Richie says.

“You okay?” Eddie asks. Richie reaches up and presses his thumb to Eddie’s jaw, just because he can.

“Yeah. Just…fucked up dreams, y’know,” Richie says. A line appears between Eddie’s brows, concern filtering into his perpetual wide-eyed look. “Sometimes I wish you could crawl inside my head and yell at my brain. Tell it to stop fucking with me.”

Eddie quirks a lip. “I am good at yelling at things.”

“You are,” Richie says. And then he leans in and kisses him, because he hasn’t kissed Eddie since last night, and that’s far too long. Because he had wanted so badly to kiss Eddie when he was young, and he’s trying to make up for every time he wanted to and couldn’t.

Eddie pulls away, a hand at Richie’s chest when Richie tries to follow him with his lips. “You know how I feel about morning breath, asshole.”

“I just want you to know that you could be drenched head to toe in sewer water, with half your teeth fallen out, and I’d still want to kiss you,” Richie says.

“Okay?” Eddie says. “That still doesn’t change the fact that I don’t want your stinky breath in my face.”

Richie laughs. Then he pries Eddie’s hand, where it’s fisted in Richie’s shirt, and he kisses Eddie’s knuckles. Eddie watches him with a kind of reverence, the way he has been watching him whenever Richie does something particularly gentle, particularly loving. It’s like Eddie still can’t quite believe that Richie Tozier has the ability to be tender.

Only with Eddie, Richie thinks. He can’t imagine himself being like this with anyone else.

Not that there would ever be anyone else.

Richie is going to marry him.

Not now, of course. Or any time soon. Eddie is already married. That’s the whole reason they’ve been staying at this motel for the past week. Eddie hadn’t wanted to deal with it, with real life, with their old lives. Not yet. So he’d called Myra to let her know he was okay, that it was over, and that he wouldn’t be back for a week or two. And then he’d booked this room.

And they haven’t really left it.

It’s been seven days of ordering room service for breakfast, and Eddie scolding Richie for trying to eat the food in bed. Of the two of them pulling the little wooden chairs from around the little dining table up to the window to catch some sun as they sit, feet in each other’s laps, and talk about their lives. Of them curled up together, flicking through channels on the tiny, square television up on the wall. Of them kissing and kissing and kissing. Like they’re teenagers who have fallen in love for the first time.

They got out too, of course. They’d both go a little stir crazy if they didn’t. They’ll go for walks in the afternoons, and out for dinner out in the evenings. They’d tried to go see a movie, but Eddie had had an anxiety attack half way through it, and Richie had spent ten minutes calming him down outside the theatre. He couldn’t blame Eddie – the loud noises, bright flashes in the dark, had made Richie’s chest feel tight, too. Like they were back down there, in the sewers.

So mostly they stay in their motel room. And, honestly, Richie thinks he could spend the rest of his life in bed, with his mouth to Eddie’s skin, and be satisfied.

Which is another thing they do a lot of, in this room. Only in the last few days, though, because it had taken Eddie a little while to get used to the idea. It was new to him, Richie got that. Eddie had only ever had sex with his wife, and even then Eddie had said that he and Myra did not have sex often.

So on the first two nights, Eddie had been into it to a point. On his back, hands gripping Richie’s shoulders as Richie kissed his neck, hands in Richie’s hair as he kissed Richie. But then Richie had grinded down against him and Eddie’s breath had hitched and he pulled away, looked at Richie with those wide brown eyes, and said, nervously “I don’t know, Rich.”

“It’s okay,” Richie had said, trying to squash down the fact that he was wildly turned on. Eddie just had an effect on him.

“I’m sorry,” Eddie said, and he looked very sincerely sorry. “I’m sorry, I…”

“It’s okay, Eds,” Richie had assured him. Smiled at him gently, pressed a kiss to Eddie’s hair. “There’s other things we can do. Like sleep. I’m old, I need to sleep forty hours a day now.”

And Eddie had smiled back and they’d held each other and slept.

Richie hadn’t tried anything on the third night. They had time, they had the rest of their lives. Eddie had pounced on him on the fourth.

Which was funny, because that fourth night was also the night they had gone to the cinema, and Richie had spent ten minutes helping Eddie come down from a panic attack. He’d just talked Eddie through the attack, at first, and then he’d started to very carefully touch him. His hand on Eddie’s arm, on his shoulder, rubbing circles into his back, trying to ease the pinched, frustrated look on Eddie’s face. Eddie had still been a little agitated during the drive back to the motel. Richie had held his hand over the centre console. But as soon as they walked through their door, Richie with a sigh, “home sweet home,” he’d said. “Home ugly home, more like, am I right. Who designed this place? Someone’s dead grandma? – ” Eddie had pushed Richie against the door and kissed him.

It had been a surprise, albeit a pleasant one, but the biggest shock was just how hungrily Eddie kissed him. After days of Eddie being careful, almost embarrassed, suddenly his hands were everywhere, and his tongue was in Richie’s mouth, and Richie was breathless and exhilarated and his whole body was thrumming.

“Richie,” Eddie breathed, and his voice was all airy and shaky. He looked up at Richie and there was something there, in his brown eyes, that made Richie’s stomach drop to his knees. “I want you.”

“I want you too,” Richie said a little stupidly. Before realising that Eddie didn’t want him to say something he wanted him to do something. And so he kissed Eddie and they stumbled together toward the bed.

They’d gone slow. Richie didn’t think he’d have the self-control, but once he was presented with a flushed, heavy-eyed, half-naked Eddie Kaspbrak beneath him, all he wanted to do was go slow. To take his time, learning every inch of him. With his hands. With his mouth. Memorise every breath Eddie took, every sharp inhale, the way he swore under his breath when Richie found a particularly sensitive spot. (And, God, Eddie was so sensitive). 

Richie had had sex before. With women. With men, when he was really drunk. But this almost felt like his first time. Maybe it was because he had never wanted to watch someone’s face so closely before – eyes drawn to the slackening of Eddie’s red mouth, fluttering of his eyelids, as Richie rocked into him. He’d never wanted to kiss someone the whole way through it. Sex had always felt so impersonal. A little underwhelming. Eddie breathed out Richie’s name, hand clutching Richie’s shoulder, before trailing his up the back of his neck to curl his fingers in Richie’s hair, and Richie had felt something he’d never felt during sex before. It felt personal, intimate, it felt overwhelming. And he felt a lump in his throat, a compressing of his ribcage, and an all-encompassing urge to say I love you. 

So he leant his forehead to Eddie’s and he said it. And Eddie said it back.

“What are you thinking about?” Eddie asks now, in the stripy morning light, hair all fluffy, falling over his forehead. Richie still has Eddie’s hand pressed to his mouth.

“Fucking you,” Richie replies honestly.

Richie swears he sees Eddie go red. “Jesus, I thought you were gonna say breakfast or something. You had that look on your face you get when you think about food.”

“I was. I was thinking about a snack,” says Richie. His eyebrows jump once, twice. “I’m hungry.” 

Eddie snorts. “Oh my god.” And then he’s sitting up with a roll of his eyes, a smile. “I’m gonna go take a shower.”

Richie stays in bed. Listens to the sound of the Eddie’s feet pad across the motel’s ugly green printed carpet, the bathroom door shut, the shower turn on with a hiss and water hit the tiles. Then he gets up and follows Eddie into the bathroom. Because those thirty seconds without Eddie had felt long enough.

Richie would say that he decided that he could no longer live without Eddie after Eddie was almost impaled. And they’d scrambled to their feet and slid behind some large rocks and Eddie had looked at Richie wide eyed and breathed, “I almost died,” while Richie’s whole body shook. “Holy shit I almost fucking died, Richie…” Richie could see, in his mind’s eye, the image of Eddie in front of him, pierced right through the middle, so clear it was like it had actually happened. “…Jesus, you saved me, Rich…Richie…” Eddie’s voice softened over the second saying of Richie’s name. Richie looked at him. Eddie’s whole expression had widened, as though he had had a revelation. He cupped Richie’s face in his hands and pressed their mouths together.

(“Holy shit,” Richie had blurted, once Eddie pulled away. And then, because he’s an idiot, joked, almost suggestively, “wanna get out of here?

Eddie had actually laughed. “Let’s kill this fucking clown first.”

“Good call.”)

That should have been the moment that Richie decided he couldn’t be separated from Eddie again. Reasonably. But Richie had decided that the moment he walked into that restaurant, and had felt Eddie’s eyes on him for the first time in twenty seven years.

Eddie isn’t in the shower, when Richie opens the bathroom door. He’s brushing his teeth by the sink, the whole room cloudy from the hot water’s steam.

Immediately, Richie crosses the room to wrap his arms around Eddie’s waist, press kisses the back of his neck.

Eddie makes a hrmph sound around his toothbrush and elbows Richie in the chest. “Not while I’m brushing my teeth,” he says, words all muffled, trying to keep toothpaste from dripping from his mouth. “Feels weird. Distracting.”

“You’re so fussy,” Richie says, but he says it with the kind of affection that would be embarrassing if anyone else had heard him say it. He steps back and waits. But Eddie takes a very long time brushing his teeth. Like, a long time. Richie wonders how Eddie manages to get to work on time every day. Then he imagines what mornings will be like once he and Eddie live together, once they’re married. How Richie will have to bump Eddie out of the way with his hip, just to use the bathroom sink, while Eddie goes through his five-step brushing teeth routine. He thinks he’ll probably be late to work every day, because if he’ll have Eddie Kaspbrak showering in his shower each morning, then Richie is definitely also getting in that shower, and if he and Eddie are in the shower together, they’re definitely going to be doing more than just showering.

Richie can’t fucking wait for that.

His hand instinctively reaches for Eddie again, but Eddie is now flossing his teeth, so Richie lifts his hand over Eddie’s shoulder, and, without really thinking, but also while thinking of their close-enough-to-touch, domestic, married future, writes their initials onto the steamed glass of the mirror with his fingertip. R + E. 

It seems silly, but a sort of warmth blooms through him as he lowers his hand and those letters stare back at him. As Eddie looks at the initials curiously, still flossing his teeth. Because the last time Richie wrote that, he’d been alone, anxious, throwing wary glances over his shoulder, all pent up with feeling, thinking Eddie would never like him back. Now he’s with Eddie, who’s wearing Richie’s shirt, who’s slept in Richie’s arms for the past week, and will sleep in Richie’s arms for a thousand other weeks, who wants him back.

“I’ve seen that before,” Eddie says, lowering his hands from his mouth. Richie goes still. Eddie furrows his brow at the steamed mirror, then at Richie, before his eyes widen. “The kissing bridge, back in Derry. R + E. That was carved there.”

“You saw that?” Richie asks. Eddie had never mentioned it when they were kids.

“Yeah,” Eddie says. Richie doesn’t know why he suddenly feels embarrassed. Eddie seems to notice, because now his mouth is widening. “Wait, that was you?” 

Richie shrugs.

“Holy shit,” Eddie says. “I used to wonder…but it seemed so stupid. Because why would you carve that? It wasn’t like we were dating. And it wasn’t like you liked me. And it wasn’t like I wanted those to be our initials… These are all my stupid kid thoughts.” Eddie pauses, blinks owlishly at the letters. “Why did you carve that?”

“Uh, because I was an idiot who had a huge fucking crush on you,” Richie says. He reaches out and grabs Eddie waist, would rather pull him close and kiss him than talk about the weird pining shit he did as a kid. But Eddie doesn’t budge. Richie sighs. “I don’t know. I thought it was a way to get my feelings off my chest without telling anyone.”

“That’s…” Eddie considers it. “Really sweet.”

“Don’t call me sweet,” Richie scoffs.

“Richie Tozier is a sweetie,” Eddie says, grinning. “A sweetheart.” Then he turns and draws over the R + E. on the mirror with his finger, because it had started to fade, and adds a heart around the whole thing.

“Now who’s the sweetheart,” Richie says, but he feels so fucking warm that he swears he’s going to burn from the inside out.

“Still you,” says Eddie. He doesn’t resist, this time, when Richie draws him in by his hip, pulls him close. Tilts his head up to meet Richie. “I can’t believe Richie Tozier had such a big crush on me.”

“Me neither,” Richie says. “I mean you were such a fucking weird kid - ” Eddie laughs, ‘shut up’, “but I thought you were the best thing ever. I mean, you’re still fucking weird and I still think you’re the best thing ever.”

“So we’re just gonna pretend like you aren’t also fucking weird and annoying?” Eddie asks.

“I never said annoying,” Richie points out.

“Yeah but I did.”

Richie laughs, and the kind of laugh that only comes out around Eddie. A kind of I love you without words. Eddie grins, plants a hand on Richie’s shoulder, and reaches up to close the gap between their mouths.

The R + E on the mirror fades, until it’s gone.

The R + E on the bridge is still there, when Richie takes Eddie, later that week, to see it.

Eddie takes Richie’s pocket knife, after Richie re-carves the fading letters. And he draws a heart around that, too.

[billhaderlovebot]

beep beep (3) - richie tozier.

(how fucking babey is this man?? i??? hhhh???)

@ceruleanrainblues @the-star-above-you @a-second-hand-sorrow

ok! so! some like, violence type stuff? some fluff, some angst, richie being babey, bad language, sex references. here we go lesbians.

---

it had taken richie everything in him not to break when he had returned from the arcade. not to just unravel in front of you and let himself go.

but he didn't. he couldn't.

and he couldn't, now, either.

when pennywise, with gnarled, elongated hands and fingers that almost looked barbed, lifted you from the ground.

ripped you from richie's arms and held you struggling in the air.

"always the hardest to scare." It said, and you groaned in discomfort as It's hot breath fanned the back of your neck, its clawed, twisted hand tightening around your waist. "always the fighter."

"you get the fuck off of her, right the fuck now." richie gritted his teeth, clenching and unclenching his fists. yeah, he was probably going to throw up.

--

richie loved you.

obviously.

he had loved you every single day of his life since he was fourteen fucking years old. every single day.

he knew, now, staring at you, your body curled around his protectively even though you were so much smaller, that his wretched heart would continue to love you for every moment of the rest of his life (plus two or three weeks, for good measure.)

often, when you were kids and you'd nap together in his bed because his parents were out (they were always out) and you needed to be near each other, he would fall asleep after you, just so he could lay awake and watch you breathe. watch you exist so serenely and look so fucking soft in his arms that he could have cried. you looked frightfully vulnerable when you were asleep, though, which always bothered him.

now, years later, you were no different. breaths coming slow and warm and ghosting across the crook of his neck where you had buried your face. so small. so vulnerable.

richie subconsciously held you a little tighter.

he would do anything for you, good lord.

even if it killed him.

you'd been asleep for about a half hour, but richie couldn't drift off.

richie hadn't told you about his artefact because the guilt that came with it sat on his chest like a fucking dumbbell. guilt, because he hadn't told you something very, very important.

you were not his first love.

but eddie kaspbrak was.

and he was guilty. guilty because he had moved on and because he had hidden such a huge part of his life from you. you, who wasn't his first love, but would undoubtedly be his last.

you, who was the love of his life.

eddie had been the first person he'd ever felt any sort of love for. when they were young, before you, and eddie would obsessively straighten the collars of his hawaiian shirts and clean his glasses for him and put band-aids on cuts and scrapes and used curse words that rivalled his own. eddie was the only one to care about him when his parents didn't. richie loved him so, so much and it had awakened a part of him he'd been ashamed of ever since.

it had been a sort of relief when he had met you, really, because he could pass himself off to the world as a normal guy with a normal girlfriend and a normal life. normal.

and oh, how he would do anything for you.

the girl who swore like a fucking sailor and held him tight and got so stoned she couldn't walk while listening to the cure on her portable radio. you'd been his distraction, to begin with, but he found himself falling fast and hard for you.

it scared him, how much he loved you. he'd never fallen so hard. he'd never given so much of himself to another person, bearing his soul to you because you were the only person he wanted to see it.

he'd come to you for solace and comfort, and had ended up loving you so much that nothing else mattered to him. and the day he'd kissed you in the clubhouse was perhaps the best decision of his life. the towering tsunami that was his love for you, crashing over him in almost overwhelming waves, kept him going for two fucking decades.

there was a smaller wave, though, too. smaller, but potent, lapping at his ankles and reminding him that he was not, by any stretch of the imagination, as normal as he wanted to be. as normal as he willed himself to be. because... he loved you, but once upon a time, he had loved eddie kaspbrak. so much.

he had carved your initials onto the kissing bridge the same day he had kissed you for the first time, bigger, and far away from eddie's, as if it would erase what had used to be.

it couldn't erase it, of course. erase what was, and always would be, a part of him.

richie tozier was...

he was different.

and he couldn't, for the life of him, figure out why it had happened to him. he had always been told it was wrong.

wrong, wrong, wrong. run, you fucking fairy.

and he had run. so fucking far. even now, when his job was to be controversial, he couldn't fucking say it. he could think of nothing more controversial than being b...

than liking both.

i mean, he could, but after years of being told how fucking weird and perverted and wrong it was by people who didn't even know him, he expected a certain reaction. richie glanced over to his jacket hanging on the back of the door, where the arcade token sat in the pocket. well, fuck.

you stirred a few minutes later, looking up at him with sleepy eyes and a tired smile, and, in that moment, everything was okay.

he kissed you, then. softly. ever so softly and almost like he was afraid you would break.

"what was that for?" you asked after he pulled away, heat rushing to your cheeks.

"i just... love you. that's all." his voice was quiet. "im so fucking in love with you."

you didn't notice anything out of the ordinary until tears welled in his eyes, his lips shaking as he held something back.

"richie? what's-"

"marry me." richie whispered, wiping his eyes and leaning his forehead against yours.

"huh?"

"let's get married, baby."

"yeah. yeah, okay."

----

you had gone absolutely fucking mental when richie had been caught in the deadlights, his eyes clouding and his face devoid of any emotion. beverly had had to hold you back to stop you from going right after him, screaming for him at the top of your lungs because he was floating.

he was floating away and you were going to lose him to the jaws of hell.

"RICHIE!"

"stop!" bev had pleaded. "stop it, you can't do anything! he's too far up!"

you hated her for that. for just a split second, you hated her. and you were kicking and screaming and crying, hot tears sliding down your face faster than you were sure you could make them.

and before you knew what was up:

"BEEP BEEP, MOTHERFUCKER!"

eddie had yelled, launching the monster-killer right down Its fucking throat. and then richie was on the ground, disoriented and spluttering, and, bev, with a sigh of relief, let go of you. out of the corner of your eye, you saw It, struggling and vomiting what might have been actual lava but also looked strangely like blood. your mind cast back to richie and then you were by his side, shaking him awake.

"richie! fuck!" you were aware of just how loud you were sobbing, grabbing him and holding his head to your chest. "you fucking idiot, oh, fuck, i love you." and he was wrapping his shaking arms around you, panicking and probably crying because he had been caught in the deadlights and what the fuck.

"rich!" eddie was ecstatic, kneeling beside the two of you. "i did it, richie. i think i killed it, guys!"

"EDDIE, LOOK OUT!"

you didn't know what was going on, really, until a colossal, razor sharp claw dug itself into the rock where eddie had just fucking been.

and you were sure you'd never been more thankful for ben hanscom and his intuition.

"holy shit, eds." you just about shrieked.

"it's not dead!" richie was suddenly alert, dragging the three of you to your feet as pennywise crawled up from the ground, the spikes it had fallen on making a wet crunching sound as It tore itself off of them.

everything was happening so fucking fast, and you must have zoned out or something, because all of a sudden you were in the fucking air, torn away from a screaming richie. the sharp, jutting bones of it's long fingers dug into your torso as you were lifted, flailing.

"always the hardest to scare. always the fighter." pennywise all but giggled.

"you get the fuck off of her, right the fuck now." you knew what it sounded like when richie was trying to keep his cool, and right now, he was not doing a very good job.

"are you scared now?" It asked you, grinning from ear to ear. "are you scared, richie's girl?"

"FUCK OFF, YOU BIG DUMB ASSHOLE!" any attempt to kick and struggle was cut short by It's tightening fist, and the sharp ridges of It's fingers cutting into you.

oh, and, yeah, ouch, that was a cracked rib. fuck.

"you are." It growled. "i can smell you."

the losers on the ground stared up in frantic horror, flocking around richie and eddie.

"maybe i should take him, instead. your richie."

"YOU STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM HIM!"

"i told you i'd get you, richie's girl."

it flicked a long, black tongue over its razor teeth.

"AND I TOLD YOU THAT IM NOT FUCKING AFRAID OF YOU, YOU STUPID CLOWN."

it's face dropped.

its eyes rolled back into its head.

it fucking smiled.

and then, as if you were a ragdoll it was tired of playing with, it tossed you aside.

richie heard it. the fucking sound. the crunch as your body collided with the jagged rocks at the other end of the sewer. he retched and heaved and his legs didn't seem to be working anymore.

he saw your body crumple, and the scream that erupted from his throat wasn't quite human.

---

"you need to wake up." richie held your hand in his own, the wires protruding from your wrist making him feel sick. "you gotta wake up, baby." the steady beep of your heart monitor was the only thing stopping him from going completely fucking insane. "cmon, we're getting married, so... so you gotta come back to me." richie ignored the bile rising in his throat at the sight of you with tubes and wires spilling from every part of you that wasn't cast in bandages. you looked so fucking broken. "we've already lost so much time... and we need to catch up." richie couldn't find it in himself to crack a joke. this was the first time he'd been really, truly happy since he was seventeen, and now it was all hanging in the balance.

richie had heard from bill the morbid account of your injuries. the doctor wasn't able to tell richie, directly, as he was going on a fucking rampage outside, throwing trash cans and yelling and such.

you'd almost died in the operating theatre twice, he had also heard from bill.

"sh-she had uh, bad in-internal b-b-bl-bleeding. they almost c-couldn't stop it."

but they had stopped it. and now you were here. you were alive. but you'd been out for a good three days, and every hour that passed, richie was less and less sure you'd wake up again.

beverly had had to coax richie into a bathroom to clean himself up, bringing him a clean outfit, because he flat out refused to go back to the inn and shower and change. he wouldn't leave you here. she allowed him to cry on her shoulder, and she knew that he only cried in front of you, which threw her, but she held him and let him cry until he couldn't anymore.

"mr tozier?" the nurse who came in regularly to change your feeding tube and medicine and such was stood by the door, clipboard in hand.

"yeah?" he croaked, not making a move to stand up.

"there's someone here to see you."

richie was sure it could have been the queen of fucking england, or freddie mercury risen from the grave, and he would have told them to fuck off.

"will you, uh, send them in?" richie requested. he hadn't left you for more than ten minutes the whole time you'd been admitted. "i don't wanna-"

"of course, mr tozier." said the nurse, nodding sympathetically and backing out of the room. the door clicked shut behind her.

moments later, richie heard a voice.

"sorry, but, who exactly are you?" said the voice. richie looked up from your hand, which he was still holding, by the way.

a smallish, mousy brown-haired man stood at the door, his hair slicked back with far too much wax that didn't do anything for his terribly receding hairline. "and why are you holding my wife's hand?"

ah. the husband. fuck.

"oh, yeah. right." richie didn't let go of you. "you must be, uhh... umm..."

"timothy. timothy milo." the man said with an air of superiority. richie would lay this guy the fuck out.

"oh, yeah, of course." he nodded, squeezing your fingers gently.

"forgive me," said timothy, pulling up a chair. "forgive me, but, my wife has been missing for almost a week, now, and i get a call saying she's here, in... in derry? is it? battered, and... and comatose."

richie had only known the guy for all of thirty seconds, but he'd knock out those perfect, sickeningly white teeth in a heartbeat. "yeah, there was... an accident-"

"and richie tozier, big-shot comedian from malibu, is holding her hand and looking like... his whole world has been torn down."

timothy was becoming increasingly irate, and richie found it more than a little bit funny. he raised his hands in defense.

"look, man-"

"i ask you again, tozier, who exactly are you? to her, i mean."

and richie had... no idea what to say. for once in his life. no sarcasm, no witty comebacks. nothing.

"well... i fucking love her, man." was all he could think.

and then, with a crunch, timothy milo's manicured fist collided with the side of richie's face.

---

you didn't remember much.

the only thing you could fathom was a faint beeping sound, and a warm, calloused hand on top of yours. you cracked one eye open (with great difficulty) and sighed in relief. it was him.

your richie. disheveled and distraught, but your richie, all the same.

"r-r-r-" your throat was so fucking dry. it hurt to speak. "rich..." was all you managed, your fingers twitching under his hand.

"holy fuck." the smile that lit up his face was the most beautiful thing you'd ever seen. he had a rather large bruise on his left cheekbone, and his eyes were red and puffy, but he grinned so big and so bright that you could have burst into tears. "you're awake."

"and y-you're... beautiful." you croaked.

"woah, how hard did you hit your head?" he joked, sniffling, a tear slipping down his cheek. he kissed your hand, mindful of the tubes.

"that... that looks like... a punch, richie." you noted, eyeing the purple bruise that started on his cheekbone and ended below his eye.

"you should see the other guy." richie sniffed, a sad smile on his face that didn't reach his eyes. it hurt you.

"wh-who?"

"timothy fucking milo." richie scoffed, rolling his eyes in a manner that reminded you of stanley.

"he was... he was here?" your head fucking hurt.

"yeah. gone now. after i told him what was what. fucking asshole."

"wh-"

"another time, babe. you're not up for it."

and you knew he was right. you'd only properly processed about half of the words he'd said.

"i've been outta my fucking mind waiting for you to wake up, yknow. don't do that again." richie said, dragging his hands down his face and rolling his shoulders. his back hurt from sleeping here for just under four days, leaning over the cot and holding your hand.

"it wasn't... my fucking fault... you asshole... it was... oh my god. It."

"we won't dig that up now, huh?" richie interjected. "you rest up a little, i'll chat to you about boring shit, you'll perhaps give me a sympathy hand-job, and when you're a little less drugged up, we can talk about the heavy stuff."

"okay." your attempt at a nod was feeble as fuck. "and... sympathy hand-job?"

"yeah. for making me fight your husband and cry for three days. in no particular order." richie explained, as if it were obvious.

"do you want me to... pull your dick off with my medicine tubes?"

his eyes widened.

"no, ma'am."

"then... shut up." you whined, breathless. your chest burned and your side hurt and you didn't even want to talk about your legs.

"i need more drugs, trash-mouth." you groaned, and he leaned over you to press the red button to alert the nurses.

"believe it or not, you've said that to me before." richie snorted. "no chance of a hand-job, then?"

"beep beep, richie."

[thegoldenreport]

MIND BENT

Pretending to be someone else is easy, especially when you’ve been doing it your whole life. Amber-Eye 098 is an top tier imitation artist from the Southern Moon district, who has almost twelve years of experience under her belt in deceiving the general public for fun.

She recently sat down with Golden Report executives to share one such experience - how she managed to infiltrate Jatty’s Candy Cave and impersonate the titular owner, while remaining undetected for three months.

If the name of “Jatty’s Candy Cave” doesn’t ring a bell for you or stir up a primordial urge to vomit, we highly recommend an appointment with your local re-education services to rectify the issue. But in the mean time, we’ll ask you a very simple question, what’s really in their candy?

Or to put it in a different way...

Are you meant to be seeing the buzzing, glitching, oozing shadow that stands in the corner of your room at all times?

…

AE098: Whenever I approach a new character, I choose to look first at their environment. Their people. You can tell a lot about how a person is supposed to act just by looking at their people.

Jatty’s Candy Cave, for example, is housed in a very elaborate sewer system underneath the inner city of West Logos. Jatty doesn’t voluntarily share this information, but somehow makes sure her customers spread it like the plague. She wants to be known far and wide, yet continues to stay hidden. Chosen isolation perhaps as a method of retaining control? A walking contradiction nonetheless.

Sending several camera flies into the underground system confirmed she didn’t work alone. A personal assistant named Rael followed her every beck and call. Visuals showed him to be a funny little man who changed his aesthetic and vocal inflection on the daily. Though tended to favor anything revolving around a space or astronaut theme. It was a good thing I wasn’t stealing his identity.

Jatty, on the other hand, donned an a-line purple skirt, skin tight black turtle neck, dark green combat boots (which just so happened to be the same shade as her nefarious chemical ingredient, zeroX), and a pair of velvet back gloves that extended her fingers into claws.

Unlike Rael, she wore this suit on the regular and showed no signs of switching it up. Which of course made things ridiculously convenient for my costumes associate. She does such a sublime job at matching garments down to the very fabric and shade. I had nothing but confidence in her work.

I remember spending long evenings in her sewing shop, top floor of the special ops building. Trying on the boots and pacing around the floor. Feeling out the walk of, shall we say...a potential murderer? An ill advised chemistry enthusiast? Mad science extraordinaire? I wouldn’t know for sure until I became her.

Everything is a performance. Everyone has a good side. Everyone loves to act for the camera that isn’t even there. You may be wondering why we even go through the trouble of full body espionage if we already send in a hundred camera flies to wire tap the place. To that I say again, everything is a performance. The name of the game is not just tearing down the curtain, but walking backstage. The one place a camera refuses to go.

Further audiovisual input revealed her voice to be low and musky, like she constantly had to be clearing her throat (of her own toxins, perhaps?). We had vocal modifier pills that could mimic this effect. And her walk was always brisk in comparison to the slower moving factory workers. She was a being in motion, a blur that could not stop for more than a few moments at a time. And it wasn’t just an urgency to it, but a nervousness, a real fear. I was excited to discover more.

In the days leading up to my deployment, special operatives performed what we like to call a body snatch. Methodically extracted in such a way that Jatty would not even think to deny leaving with us. We offered an opportunity, intentionally vague, but sweet enough to seal the deal. Or that’s how it started.

In reality, we slipped a sleeping agent into her water glass, while discussing terms in the late hours of the evening. I’m not entirely sure where they took her, but by that point, I was ready.

MEETINGS

This is the word I would use to describe my first month in character. I remember the night I slipped into her office chair, torn faux leather at a cherry red mahogany desk. I remember the stickiness of said office chair. I remember pouring through her journals, her agenda books, her middle school science books. She was a being on the move, constantly meeting with someone. But for what?

One such meeting that stook out to me was with a blue deer handler, and only in my second week of deployment. I had read about this particular blue deer. And the sweet nectarine like flavor of it’s blood. Our conversation was brief, speaking about his latest harvest for the factory. He had come across a surplus, could give more this month than before. I was immediately suspicious. Could this blood contain the hallucinogenic properties I had heard about?

Unfortunately, the answer was no. Can confirm. I tried it myself.

It was however the main component of almost all their candy’s flavor profile. But I couldn’t have cared less about the flavor.

CHEMICALS

My second month felt the most comfortable. No one had yet raised a suspicious eye towards me, save for a few factory workers who I quickly disposed of, as per my training. I had gotten used to the endless walking. Learning to digest informative material while on the go. Like all those mad scribbles in her middle school science textbook. Keeping all conversations either short or long depending on what the situation called for.

I had internalized every type of candy we made in the Cave. The pipes hissed. The air smelled like swamp water. The work room was a mental prison of blood, sweat, and flickering lights. It was here that I learned the ingredients. That I tasted the fruit for the first time. Although I was pretty good at pretending I had done it many times.

She must have built up a tolerance to the drugs they use if she does this on the regular.

The candy I tried was called Vox. A lime green sucker that slowly turns into goo as it melts in your mouth. The color is deceptive. One might expect it to taste like an apple or even a lime. It tasted like salted butter.

This particular candy among many others contained a key ingredient known as zeroX: an opaque, thick, dark green almost black liquid at room temperature. Meant to be highly addictive. Meant to simulate an adrenaline rush. Meant to make the whole body shiver. The eyes dilate. The palms sweat. You feel like an imposter in your own skin. You believe that the voices on the radio are talking directly to you. The paranoia crawls deep into your brain, filling the space behind your eyes.

But you don’t hallucinate.

Can confirm, as I locked myself in the chief office and rode out it’s side effects on the wave of a panic attack.

SECRETS

In the middle of month 3, we received a mysterious package from a tall man in a black trench coat. My assistant Rael brought it to me at my desk, during one of the few times I had felt comfortable sitting down. He seemed to know exactly what it was. And assumed I also knew.

It was a black box, no seams or openings, no buttons or lights or switches. The only thing of note was a silver etching of an eye marked out with an X. It was a symbol that made me shudder. I had seen it all over the textbook. I had seen it plastered on every police car and above every government building. It’s a symbol you should all know. That was the first secret.

Our own leaders were in on it. Turning a blind eye.

That was the beginning of the crack in my facade. That little pause. That miniscule choke before my answer. I noticed a glimmer of something in Rael’s eyes. Confusion. Doubt. Suspicion. Patrons not trained in this artform might miss a cue like that, but I knew I had to begin my extraction.

A week later, I exposed my taste to zeroC. One of two chemicals they used as zeroX was designated for hard candy and zeroC for soft. Only five percent of their production contained soft candy. They don’t talk about zeroC. They mix it under tables or in dark corners of the room where the light doesn’t touch them. Which leads to the second secret.

The black box was zeroC, ground up like powder to be mixed with the syrup.

I had been reading about this less popular ingredient written upside down between the lines of Jatty’s incredibly weathered textbook. Similar to the effects of LSD or DMT, but extremely more potent and infinitely more long lasting. Made with the same blood of that fantastical blue deer.

I was fearing the inevitable. My weekly tasting of the newest batch. I could not fake it. All the workers lined up to stare at me at I sat before their production table and consumed their poison. There are some things you simply cannot fake before that many eyes.

I felt the sweet juice explode in my mouth as the candy’s skin broke between my teeth. I swallowed with all the confidence of returning to my office to take a shot of my emergency counteractive medicine.

I immediately started to cry. A side effect I was not expecting. The emotion swallowed me as they all stared. Some perplexed. Some, dare I say, satisfied? I stumbled through the hallways. Rael chasing after me with a clipboard. I didn’t turn to look at him. Escaped to my office, shut the door, and locked it. Which brings me to the third and final secret.

I had been fooling no one. They knew.

Sitting behind the cherry stained mahogany desk was the real Jatty, holding the shattered remains of the syringe, which contained my antidote. Ice blue eyes magnified by the chemicals coursing through my body. Her glare pierced through my skull. I don’t know if she escaped, if I was set up, or if my extraction was on short notice. My supervisors have neglected to tell me.

But as I was there with knees buckled and tunnel vision, I saw the black shadow of a hand appear on her shoulder and she whispered.

Don’t forget this. You people have no control.

I blacked out after that. My supervisors came to collect me after some time. I felt their arms wrapped around me as they dragged me out, slipping in and out of consciousness. Unable to process the shocking and also very strange things I was hearing.

Something about not keeping the deal. Something about craving orange juice. Another thing about an early return. And another thing about wombats in space.

I was in recovery for three weeks afterwards while our physicians on hand constructed an antidote. The hallucinations have stopped, but the paranoia is still palpable. They offered me a mind wipe pill, asked me if I wanted to forget.

I told them it was impossible.

[nattikay]

@arcadia-trash @keepin-it-crispy @elizabethemerald yeah idk what the point of this fic even is but it’s got some Jlaire in it so ^^;

It was nice to be back in Arcadia, if only temporarily. New Trollmarket, while still much smaller and less intricate that its centuries-old predecessor, was established and thriving around the New Jersey Heartstone, and to celebrate the success of their quest Jim, Claire, and Blinky had gathered together in the newly-running Gyre station to visit the friends and family they’d left behind in California.

The trio were greeted with a plethora of hugs and shouts for joy as they reunited, Toby in particular talking a mile a minute, excitedly raving about everything they’d missed while on their journey and insisting that they had to come along and properly meet Krel tomorrow. Jim, Claire, and Blinky were already more-or-less familiar of the supernatural goings-on of their hometown over the past few months, of course, thanks to the ever-useful invention of cell phones and texting--but it was special to hear about it face-to-face.

These joyful greetings were short-lived, however, as the time was late--they’d decided to travel at night just to make sure Jim and Blinky would be safe from the sun. And so they all soon found themselves saying goodnight and heading their separate ways--Claire with her family, Jim with his mother, and Blinky with Toby, Aarrrgh, and Dictatious--with promises to come together to hang out for real the next morning with a celebratory breakfast.

“We can do it at my house,”  Jim offered, tusks protruding from his toothy grin. “Food’s on me.”

“Can’t wait!” called Toby, waving over his shoulder as he and Blinky made their way over towards the Domzalski home.

“See you then,” added Claire, pulling Jim down for a quick kiss on the cheek before heading off to her own street.

Jim smiled and waved back, watching a moment as his girlfriend, best friend, and essentially-adopted-father walked off in different directions before turning back into his own house.

“Mom?” he called, not seeing Barbara in the front room where she’d been just minutes before.

“I’m here,” she responded, walking in with a pile of blankets and a pillow, which she promptly handed to Jim with an apologetic look.

“I’m sorry, sweetie, but I’m afraid you’re gonna have to sleep on the couch...see, with Walt and I somehow getting roped into looking after all the changeling familiars, well, we needed space to put them all and well, with you not here--”

“It’s ok, Mom, I understand,” said Jim, mildly disappointed but not surprised. As much as he’d miss his old room, he couldn’t really fault her reasoning given the circumstances. Besides, a couch would still be way more comfortable than the forest floors and hard stone caves he’d slept on during the exodus to New Jersey.

“Thank you,” said Barbara with a hint of relief. “It’s getting pretty late, you go on and get some sleep. I love you,” she added, moving in to hug her son one more time, which he gladly returned. 

“Love you too, Mom. Goodnight.” 

Barbara grinned appreciatively as she headed back up the stairs, leaving Jim to set up the pillows and blankets as comfortably as he could on the couch. He drew the blinds (didn’t want to wake up to a burned stone shoulder or something if the sun rose before he woke up, after all), placed the pillows and set the blankets. That doesn’t look too bad, he thought as he examined his handiwork. Satisfied, he went to brush his teeth, change his clothes, and turn out the lights before crawling under the blankets and closing his eyes.

It was decidedly more comfortable than a cold stone cave, and yet...yet...

“Uuugggh. Why can’t I fall asleep?!” Jim growled to himself as he adjusted his position for what felt like the fiftieth time.

It’s not that he wasn’t tired...well, it wasn’t like the Gyre journey had been particularly long or exhausting or anything, but he was the...normal amount of tired, he supposed. The same that he was every night.

Was it maybe his horns getting in the way? ...nah, he’d gotten used to sleeping around those months ago, there’s no reason it should suddenly start bothering him now.

Perhaps it was the strangeness of sleeping on the couch in his own home, now that his childhood room had been taken over by a bunch of babies? Maybe...but somehow he didn’t feel like that was quite the full story.

So what was it?

Groaning, Jim turned over once more and tried again to drift off into sleep.

.oOo.

The sun was shining through the blinds (though not directly enough to cause any harm) when Jim was roused the next morning by a cheerful voice wafting over from the door.

“--morning, Dr. L!”

“Hi, Toby! Come on in...you’re a bit early, I don’t think Jim’s even up yet, let alone making breakfast.”

“That’s ok!” said Toby, bounding into the front room as Jim sat up, rubbing his bleary eyes. He’d managed to get a little sleep that night, but none of it had been restful, and he was left feeling even more tired than he’d been before.

“Hey, dude!” Toby greeted his best friend excitedly. “Aarrrgh and Blinky’ll be coming through the sewers; while you were gone Aarrrgh connected that old hole Draal made in your basement to one in our house. But Nana and I are here now, so---oh man,” he broke off, noticing the bags under Jim’s eyes. “You alright dude? You look awful. Did you sleep ok?”

“I mean, not really,” said Jim, stifling a yawn. “But it’s ok. Happens to everyone, yeah? Let’s go get that breakfast party started,” He sat up and stretched before heading towards the kitchen, hair and scruff a mess and still in his pajamas.

“What do you think we should do, pancakes or waffles?” he called back over his shoulder.

“Oh, I’m totally feeling waffles!” said Toby.

“Waffles it is,” said Jim, gathering ingredients for the batter.

About five minutes later Blinky and Aarrrgh emerged from the basement, plopping down in the front room to chat amiably with Toby, Nana, Barbara, and Strickler (who, Jim noticed, was holding a babbling infant that he recognized as the changeling’s own former familiar).

In another ten, the food was ready.

“Alright, we got fresh waffles for whoever wants ‘em,” the half-troll called from the kitchen. “Along with whipped cream, syrup, and fruit, or for anyone who wants some more trollish toppings, some old sock bits and tin foil,”

“Alriiiiight!” exclaimed Toby, leaping up and helping himself as the adults followed closely behind.

“Can’t tell you how much I’ve missed the smell of your cooking, kiddo,” said Barbara, to which Jim shrugged, smiling.

Just then another knock sounded at the door. Strickler, being the closest, answered it and let the Nuñezes in.

“Sorry we’re a bit late,” apologized Ophelia, “It was a little hard to drag Claire out of bed this morning...she’s usually so good with mornings, but I guess she’s been busy with that quest...”

“Oh, you’re alright; in fact, you’re right on time,” assured Strickler, ushering them in. “The food has just been put out...”

Upon the invitation, Claire made a beeline for Jim, slipping her arm around her boyfriend in a comfortable side-hug.

“You’re looking professional this morning, Chef Jim,” she teased, eyeing his pajamas and messy mane. 

“Yeah, sorry about that,” shrugged Jim. “Honestly, I wasn’t even really up until Toby came over...didn’t sleep all that well last night,”

“You too, huh?” asked Claire, and sure enough when Jim glanced down she also had a bleary look in her eyes and while she had at least put on day clothes her hair, bound by its many clips, was slightly disheveled. 

You couldn’t sleep either?” he asked, surprised. “Not even in your own bed?”

“Apparently not. It was weird...it was like something wasn’t quite right, for some reason...but anyways,” Claire continued, shaking off the mystery, “Let’s try some of these waffles, they smell amazing!”

.oOo.

Once everyone had eaten, a few began to disperse. Nana Domzalski retreated to her house to check up on her cats; Ophelia and Javier returned to their daily schedule with little Enrique in tow. Stickler went upstairs to feed the familiars and Barbara insisted on washing the dishes (”You made the food for everyone and you did wonderfully, now you sit back and let me clean it up!” she’d told Jim when he offered to help). That left Jim, Claire, Toby, Blinky, and Aarrrgh in the front room while Toby excitedly showed off some of the new magic tricks he and Aarrrgh had perfected to Blinky.

Jim sat on his little couch-corner, the furnishing still covered in the ruffled blankets he’d slept under (or at least, tried to) last night. Claire was leaned into his side, watching Toby’s magic act as she lazily ran her fingers through Jim’s scruff. Jim wasn’t sure he could remember ever feeling so relaxed before. In fact, he felt like he was just about to drift off to--

“Hey, I think that’s what was missing,” said Claire suddenly.

“Huh?”

“Last night, when I had trouble sleeping. That’s what was missing.”

“...what was it?”

Claire snuggled in closer. 

“Your heartbeat,” she said simply. “I guess I’d gotten so used to sleeping to it in New Trollmarket and on the journey that suddenly not having it was just...off,”

Jim took a moment to absorb this statement, eyes slowly widening. Oh. Oh.

“Ooohhhh,” he said out loud. “...man, that makes so much sense now! You were missing my...my heartbeat and I guess I was missing...your scent...oh man,” he shook his head, followed by a yawn. “That explains a lot.”

“I know we have a lot to do today, or a least a lot Toby wants us to do,” droned Claire contentedly, voice growing drowsier by the word, “but now that we have...what was missing...maybe a quick nap first would be best,”

“...yeah,” Jim managed, smiling warmly as his eyes grew heavy. “Yeah, that’s a good idea...”

And the two drifted off into a very contented snooze.