#yonderland neil | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ailendolin · 2 years

Text

ThemThere Thursday - 01 - Yonderland

Title: Menace [AO3]

Characters: Negatus & Debbie, the demons, the twins, Voltari

Prompt: Negatus adopting his mangey (compliment) little Yorkie. - Prompt sent in by the lovely @tonystarksfabulousass.

A/N: While this is a sequel to my fic Scratchy, it's not really necessary to have read it to understand this one.

Prompts are open, so if you want me to write a story for you just send me an ask with the fandom, characters and your prompt. I’m writing for Ghosts, Yonderland, Horrible Histories and Bill at the moment.

————

Menace

“Don’t you think it’s time to get a little of that feeling Scratchy gave you back?”

Negatus could still hear Debbie’s quiet laugh ringing in his ear when he’d asked her, “Are you telling me to get another dog?”

“No, not quite,” she had said. “But I’ll gladly go with you to the shelter if you’re thinking of adopting one.”

He had told her he would think about it – and he had, every day and every night since her birthday party. Now that the idea had been planted in his head, he couldn’t seem to get rid of it anymore. No matter where he looked or what he did, something always reminded him of it; be it Jeff every time he went a little too feral and nearly shredded the newspaper instead of giving it to him like a good little demon, or Neal who seemed to have adopted a stray flutterbug he’d found half-dead in the Chamber of Evil Misdeeds. It was even worse when he left his Fortress. Just yesterday he had seen that good for nothing Payne give his son some sort of lizard, of all things. The lad had beamed up at his father as if Thanktival had come early, looking like he was about to cry. Negatus gave the poor lizard three days tops before it found its head parted from its body and up on one of Payne’s walls.

He’d always despised the old bugger.

All of this made it incredible hard not to give in to temptation and ask Debbie if she’d really meant what she said. Telling himself that he sort of already had a pet in Jeff or that dogs were too high maintenance with their walks three times a day and special dog food and all the toys they left lying around didn’t help either because he’d inevitably remember how kind and loyal they were too. How they managed to calm you down and make you smile even when you felt like crying just a moment ago by simply looking at you with their big brown eyes and wagging their stupid tails.

Negatus closed his eyes and sighed. He’d never stood a chance, had he? Even though he had lost Scatchy years ago, he’d never forgotten how safe he’d felt with the little guy curled up next to him at night. There had been precious little in his childhood that hadn’t terrified him one way or another but Scratchy had made those fears disappear simply by being there.

Negatus rarely allowed himself to think about him these days but when he did he missed him so fiercely it felt like his heart was missing a piece. A new dog wouldn’t change that, wouldn’t ever replace Scratchy – he knew that. But maybe … maybe it would give his life a new purpose now that being evil had gone out of fashion so spectacularly with Cuddly Dick’s defeat.

“Demons!” he called, decision made. It only took a second for Rita, Jeff and Neil to appear out of nowhere.

“You called, oh not-so-dark Lord?” Rita asked.

“Fetch me my helmet. We need to find the elf. I’m going to get myself a dog.”

Rita and Neill shared a look that didn’t seem as surprised as Negatus had expected it to be. Jeff merely cocked his head to the side. “I thought you were a cat person.”

“Ugh,” Negatus said and shoved him away.

————

“We can’t take the demons with us to the shelter, Negatus,” Debbie said for the third time.

Also for the third time, Negatus frowned at her. “Why not? They’re my minions – that’s almost like pets, innit? No one will notice a few more scraggly beasts running around the shelter. I mean, look at them.”

The demons all gave a little wave. Debbie groaned.

“They,” she said, pointing at the demons, “are your employees. We’ve talked about this, Negatus.”

“Have we?” Negatus asked, glancing at Rita and Neil. They nodded, and so did Ben and Hayley who sat next to them. “Okay, fine. But it won’t be my fault if they won’t get along with the dog.”

Jeff looked up from the drawing he was making. “Dog? I thought we were here to see James McAvoy.”

Before Negatus could do so much as roll his eyes, Debbie marched over to the TV and turned on the film with the magical cupboard the demons and children had been watching the last time Negatus had been in Debbie’s world.

“Not again,” Neil groaned at the same time as Ben and Hayley shouted, “Mr Tumnus!” drowning out Jeff’s equally excited, “Look! That’s him!”

“That’ll keep them busy,” Debbie murmured before she added a little more loudly, “All right, kids, I’m off with Negatus. Daddy’s upstairs fixing the leak in the bathroom so if you need anything, just shout for him.”

She gave both Ben and Hayley a kiss before she took off Negatus’s helmet and gestured for him to say goodbye as well. He waved at the demons. “See you later, losers.”

“Unbelievable,” Debbie muttered as she pulled him out of the room. “Pete! We’re going! Love you!”

“Love you more!” Pete’s voice echoed down the stairwell, followed by a loud thump and a quiet, “Ow,” that Debbie chose to ignore.

“Shall we?”

Negatus hadn’t known what to expect when she told him to get into the car – something similar to a taxi ride in Yonderland, perhaps, where the slow pace allowed one to really appreciate the scenery. It certainly wasn’t Debbie driving them to the shelter at neck-breaking speed and nearly getting them both killed on the way. She even had the audacity to laugh in his face when she saw him desperately clinging to the door upon their arrival. “Bit too fast?”

Negatus merely glowered at her.

The shelter didn’t look like much at first glance, he found, and that impression didn’t change when they stepped inside. He considered the possibility that it was meant to appear a little rundown and uninviting – he had never been in a shelter in Debbie’s world before, after all, so who knew how these places were supposed to look. But he got the distinct impression that lack of funding made it difficult, perhaps even impossible, for the staff to give the animals the love they needed despite obviously pouring their hearts and souls into their work. The took good care of the animals, yes – all of them had food and water bowls, as far as Negatus could tell, and sometimes even the odd little toy – something that couldn’t be said for the hunting dogs his father used to own or the horses Negatus had watched wasting away in the dark stables. But good care alone wasn’t enough. If he had learned anything from Scratchy then that food and water might be needed to survive but were rarely enough to live.

As he went down the corridor and looked at the kennels with Debbie at his side, sad eyes glanced up at him wherever he looked. Some of the dogs came running up to the doors, barking in excitement; others curled up in the corner, whimpering. Some didn’t move at all, already having resigned themselves to their fate.

It tugged at Negatus’s heart, and he found himself stopping and turning to Debbie with a helpless look on his face. “How am I supposed to just … choose one? I mean, look at them.”

He gestured at all the sad faces around them, each and every one of them deserving of a home.

After a moment of silent consideration, Debbie said, “Maybe you’re not supposed to.”

At first, Negatus thought she was telling him to take all of them home. While he certainly would have the space in his Fortress, he didn’t have the time to take care of that many dogs nor the capacity to love them as they deserved.

Debbie gently touched his arm. “Maybe someone else is meant to choose.”

She nodded towards the caretaker who had been showing them around and was currently kneeling in front of a door, trying to coax one of the dogs closer, and Negatus finally understood.

————

Asking to see, “The dog everyone just walks past and no one wants,” ended up with him walking out of the animal shelter with a three-legged and half-blind Yorkshire Terrier – that’s what Debbie and the caretaker had called the pitiful little bundle of matted fur in his arms, anyway. Apparently, she had been found on the streets half a year ago and the caretakers had lovingly called her Princess even though she gnarled and growled at anyone who came too close to her.

Negatus instantly fell in love. Princess as a name, however, wouldn’t do so he had chosen a new, appropriately evil name for her that was similar enough to her old name for her not to get too confused.

“Demons!” he called when Debbie opened the front door. “Meet your new housemate – Menace!”

Rita and Neil gave him looks that clearly said he had lost his mind and carefully kept their distance from the little growling thing in his arms. Jeff, on the other hand, came right up to him and reached up to pet Menace without any hesitation.

“She’s fluffy,” he declared happily even though most of Menace’s fur was awfully matted and in desperate need of both a bath and a cut. She bared her teeth at him but allowed the touch. “Aw look, she’s smiling at me!”

“Right,” Rita muttered and took another step back as Ben and Hayley rushed past her. They were crowding the little dog before Debbie had a chance to stop them.

“She smells,” Hayley said with a mix of disgust and delight. Ben scrunched up his nose and nodded in agreement but didn’t let that stop him from petting the dog.

Menace, it turned out, was – well, not exactly friendly with children and demons but willing to tolerate them. The same couldn’t be said for most adult humans. Debbie wasn’t allowed to pet her and neither were the Elders when Negatus brought her around for the first time, much to Choop’s disappointment. She seemed to like Nick and Elf well enough, though, and loved to play fetch with the Youngers.

There was only one exception to her no-adults rule aside from Negatus: Voltari. Whenever Menace saw him, she would follow him around like a – well, like a lost puppy. Negatus was sure Voltari kept sneaking her treats when he wasn’t looking but so far hadn’t been able to catch him doing it.

“That’s my dog, you know? Get your own if you want one so bad.”

Voltari shared an amused look with Dissectus before he pointedly gave Menace a scratch behind her ears. “Oh no, we’re just fine, aren’t we, sweet girl?”

Menace, the little traitor, closed her eyes in bliss.

He might not have been completely sure about getting a dog at first but now that he had her, Negatus couldn’t imagine life without Menace anymore. She slept next to him at night, licked his face in the morning to wake him up, chased the demons around the kitchen table for fun during breakfast and nearly killed him twice a day by leaving one of her toys lying around in an unfortunate place – though that could have also been Jeff, now that Negatus thought about it. Most importantly, she made him laugh with her goofy antics and silly barks – more than anyone else had in a very long time.

She wasn’t Scratchy – and that was okay because Scratchy would always have a place in his heart that no one else could possible take. There was space there for Menace too, and Negatus liked to think that Scratchy would be happy for him.

“He would have liked you,” he murmured fondly as he lifted Menace up onto his lap. She growled but closed her eyes in bliss when he petted her behind her ears, making him chuckle fondly. “You little menace, you.” It was nice to have a buddy again.

#negatus #debbie maddox #yonderland #my fic #themthere thursday

15 notes · View notes