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#wickedswriting
stainedglasstruth · 1 month
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TIMING: Current LOCATION: Worm Row SUMMARY: Arden reflects on the past several months while getting some work done. CONTENT WARNINGS: Mentions of parental death & alcohol.
Arden wasn't quite sure how to feel these days.
Leah's news had been both relieving and devastating. Leaving meant her friend would be safe. Or at least safer than she'd ever be in Wicked's Rest. Leah was strong and feisty and capable, of course, and being a phoenix gave her advantages, gave her powers. But it also made her a bit more fragile, more so than even Arden herself. Leaving meant the likelihood of her having to watch her best friend be killed and reborn had lessened significantly.
It also meant she was gone, though. Funny how that worked.
Oh, how the tables had turned.
Well, no. It wasn't at all fair to compare Leah's departure from Wicked's Rest to her own all those years ago. For one, they had sworn up and down that they would stay in contact this time. Leah wasn't her, the situations were entirely different. But that didn't make it hurt any less.
Her living anchor to Wicked’s Rest, the person who had been there for her since her return, had sailed off to calmer shores. And it felt like a loss. One more name to add to this list. Leah, Zack, Jo, her father. She’d been sick with worry when Emilio disappeared for a few days, she'd grieved Teagan for weeks, been close to losing Metzli, had barely avoided watching Wynne's demise. She'd been hurt, been homeless, and just generally been through far too much in the past year. And what did she have to show for it?
Arden wasn't closer to finding any answers, not about Erebus and the mine or anything else going on in town, for that matter. And she certainly wasn't any closer to finding answers about Jo.
It felt futile, honestly. Too much time had passed, any clues there had been to find were long gone. She was a decade too late, and she didn't know what to do with that. How was she supposed to just drop it, just live the rest of her life never knowing???
...a decade. God.
What the fuck was she doing? What was the plan? She was turning thirty years old this year, and as much as it didn't feel like a big deal, it still felt big. Because she still felt like a clueless teenager far more often than she'd ever be willing to admit to another living soul— lost, fumbling, and in way over her head. 
At least she knew how to swim now, she supposed. She had support, she wasn't entirely alone the way she'd been in Boston. But, her list was steadily growing, as were the near misses, and the chaos in town only seemed to be getting worse as time went on. As much as she hated to admit it, she couldn’t help but feel like there was only more loss on the horizon. There always was in Wicked’s Rest. 
Would more of the people she cared about die, like her dad and Jo? Would they leave like she had all those years ago, or like Zack or Leah? Or maybe they’d finally see her for the fraud she was, see her the way her mother saw her: a pathetic child. A disappointment.
...whatever. 
For now, she was here to stay. And that meant there was work to do.
Taking a swig of whiskey, Arden plucked the freshly printed page from her printer and rolled her chair back over to the other side of her desk. She set down the bottle, trading it for a thumbtack before turning to the corkboard beside her. Standing a little unsteadily, she eyed the map of Wicked's Rest, eyes flickering over the messy evidence board before pinning another missing poster to the line-up.
Lips pursed, she gave it another once over, gaze landing on the photos of that symbol.
She was going to find some damn answers, of that she was determined.
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vanoincidence · 2 days
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Power Creep || Van, Wynne & Emilio
TIMING: current. LOCATION: deersprings. PARTIES: @ohwynne @mortemoppetere & @vanoincidence SUMMARY: wynne and van are on a walk to the store when they get interrupted. luckily, emilio shows up. CONTENT WARNINGS: none!
Van kicked at a loose rock, watching as it skipped over the edge of the sidewalk and into the road. “I miss winter.” She hated slipping on ice and not being able to ride her board, but hated allergy season even more. She looked over at Wynne with a frown, pulling her hat down over her ears. It was a little too small for her, and every time she talked, the fabric wiggled upwards. “We should have a beach day once it’s warmer though… even if we don’t go swimming.” She kicked another rock, squinting into the darkness as it hit the tire of a car. 
“Maybe we can collect seashells.” Van wanted things to be normal so desperately. It was easier to pretend they were if she didn’t think about the magic coursing through her, or the fact that Regan was leaving. Though, she guessed one of those things was normal. People always managed to leave, especially in this town. “Do you really think Dr. Kavanagh is going to stay there? In Ireland, I mean…” Would she be back, or would she love Ireland so much that she stayed put? “I heard they have free healthcare. I think. But she’s a doctor… doesn’t she already have health care?” 
—- 
“I don’t,”  Wynne said, and though the idea of disagreeing with someone didn’t sit well with them, it was the truth. They did prefer summer over winter, thought spring the best season of all. Especially when the days got warmer. Winter made the clouds in their mind seem heavier. “I would really like that, to swim as well. And maybe we can do something fun with the shells we collect. Do you think we could take a surfing class? Or … well do you already know how to do that?” Their eyes followed the rock too and they smiled at the small collision. “If you want, we can also celebrate the spring equinox together. That’s what we used to do at home too, but I do it my own way now. It’s later this month.”
It was nice to walk though. Even if the skin was so cold that it was harsh against their cheeks. Besides, the two of them had a goal — to get a snack! Wynne was glad to have Van’s expertise when it came to treats. They looked sideways at her as she mentioned Dr Kavanagh. “I don’t know.” They looked ahead again, at the way the streetlights were reflected in the icy streets. “Maybe. I hope not, but maybe that’s selfish.” But if Regan’s family was really like their own, they hoped she’d be back. “I don’t know a lot about healthcare, Irish or otherwise.” They were pretty sure they got it through their current job, though. At home, they’d not gone to hospitals. They now understood people had died when maybe they hadn’t had to. “She is a good doctor to have in town.”
—- 
“Surfing?” She shook her head, “no, I’ve never tried that… but I’m sure we could find somewhere around here to do it.” Van was sure that somewhere in Wicked’s Rest, somebody was offering surfing lessons in the summer– she just hadn’t ever looked. “We could try snowboarding, too, if you wanted.” She’d only been a few times, mostly on school class trips, but she always became overwhelmed with the ski lifts and opted to stay closer to the bunny slopes. She wondered silently if things would be different now. “Oh, that’s what–” your cult did – it contains itself before it slips, and Van nods instead, “I think I saw a documentary about that the other day! I think um, that’s what it was.” Nice save, idiot. “It’s too bad I wasn’t born on the equinox… I think that would’ve been cool.” 
“What’s selfish about it?” A part of Van felt relieved that she was leaving, but only because it meant she wouldn’t be thrown out onto the street. Then again, she guessed she could go back to her house, even if she didn’t necessarily want to anymore. Dr. Kavanagh’s apartment was sterile in a way that felt right– it was void of any memories, good, bad– any of it. Though, Thea brought in… different feelings– seeing her every day. She cleared her throat and tightened her arms around her, kicking another rock. They weren’t too far from the corner store now and her stomach grumbled at the promise of hot funyuns. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen her be like, a doctor. Only talk about it.” Dead people needed doctors too, she knew. They needed to be respected, and it really seemed like Dr. Kavanagh did that. “But I hope she likes Ireland, but comes back…” For her sake, for Jade’s– it seemed like Wynne cared about her too with the way that they had shown up at Regan’s apartment, expecting her. “Have you ever been to Ireland? I’ve never been to anywhere abroad except for Toronto, but we like, drove there, and it was super quick.” 
“Yes, right? Because there’s beach. We sometimes did some watersports at home, but that was a lake. Mostly a lot of swimming.” Wynne missed the lake, the way the fog formed in the mornings. The squeals that erupted when you dove in in the summer. “Snowboarding? That sounds … cool, but also a bit scary. I’d like to go on the mountains, though. I’d love to do that. Is it still cold enough for this? I bet, right?” They nodded. “It would have been. But your birthday is also special!”
They were quiet for a moment, processing that question as well as why they thought that selfish. Wynne shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I should just be happy for her that she’s going to her family. And not be thinking about my own feelings or something. That feels selfish.” It had always been branded selfish to take their own emotions into consideration. They had been more than just a person, at home — they had been sanctified, a future savior, a beacon of hope. Prioritizing that was key. But maybe not wanting Dr Kavanagh to leave just meant they cared about her. “I have been to her office. She has a lot of skeletons there. I never saw the corpses, though. I don’t want to.” They grimaced, kicked the same stone after it had rolled their way. “I hope she does too.” They shook their head. “No. I’ve only been here, in Maine. And New Hampshire, a little. I have never been in another country. The world is so big, am I right? How was Toronto?” 
Van silently tried to imagine the life that Wynne had before finding themself in Wicked’s Rest. She’d heard enough to picture it in bits and pieces, but it wasn’t entirely clear. She tried to imagine people who looked like Wynne– siblings, maybe, or cousins, who dove beneath the water to grab at rocks beneath the lake’s surface. “It’s definitely still cold enough for it.” Van offered a smile, brushing past the memories she was re-creating in Wynne’s stead. “I want to, for sure… we should definitely do it.” She was a little nervous at the prospect of falling flat on her face, but she was great at skateboarding! The mechanics were there! “The 21… I’ll remember that, I think.” She nodded, committing the date to memory. It was clear that it was important to them, because this hadn’t been the first time they’d mentioned something about an equinox. 
“I think it’s okay to be…” Van gestured vaguely, “upset..?” She thought for a moment before shaking her head, “maybe that’s not the right word, but..” Van shrugged, mimicking the way that Wynne kicked a rock, sending her own flying to the side, off into somebody’s yard. “I don’t think it’s selfish to feel things. You can be selfish, but I don’t think feeling things has anything to do with it.” She offered Wynne a small smile before shrugging, pulling the sleeves of her coat down so that she was cupping them against her palm. “It was okay. It was for a convention.” She couldn’t remember too much about it. Her anxiety had spiraled tenfold, and now that she looked back at it, she was sure that the melted convention tables had been her fault. 
As they continued to walk, Van saw movement out of the corner of her eye. “Oh, the cemetery is over there… I wonder if Nora is home.” It felt weird, calling the cemetery Nora’s home, but it felt right, too. “Should we go check?” She offered Wynne a smile, before it faltered. “Wait, this isn’t hers, never–” The sound of something scraping against the floor, a body being dragged through mud– there was dirt, too. The sound of gagging. Van’s eyes widened as she grabbed onto Wynne’s arm, dragging them backwards from the fence where the creature stood, taller than either of them. “What is that?” Van asked, breathless, skin now itchy by merely looking at it. As if in some kind of response, the creature dropped the individual by the leg it held onto and leapt over the fence, now standing a foot or so away from either herself or Wynne. “Wynne–” 
“Let’s do it! I love trying new things,” Wynne said, glad that there was another possible prospect to look forward to. They had learned that it were those kinds of things they needed to continue to feel like life was valuable, to keep them from sinking into the dark and depressed mood they were always teetering on the edge of. “Especially with friends. And if all goes wrong we’ll at least laugh about it, right?” They smiled at Van. “Sweet. I will let you know where to be when it’s time! I think on the beach near where I live now.”
They were silent as Van spoke, focusing on the pavement. She didn’t think it was selfish to feel things — and it sounded right coming from her mouth, even if the concept in and of itself was wrong. It was selfish to be overrun by emotions, to feel so deeply that it might upset others. Wynne wished there was another stone to kick. “Oh,” they said, as if Van was saying something completely new. In a way, she was. “I think I find it hard to be upset. I was taught it was bad and selfish. But I think you’re right. I wouldn’t think it selfish if you were sad.” And Wynne was no longer someone special or chosen, so why shouldn’t those standards apply to them? They were here now, in this world. “What did you convene about?” They weren’t sure if that was what people did at conventions, but it sounded right. 
They looked at the cemetery, nodding at the suggestion. They hadn’t really been at Nora’s cemetery home a lot, as they’d always met in public or wherever Emilio was living at that time. Wynne was ready to go in, though. Seeing Nora would be nice — but she didn’t live there, Van realized. And there was something else. Their eyes were wide, pushing deep into the darkness to try and see what it was the pair of them were hearing. They too felt an itch running down their skin. “I don’t know.” Wynne took a step backward, felt themself holding onto Van’s hand where she’d grabbed their arm and took them further back with them. It looked monstrous. Their free hand reached inside their jumper, pulling out the necklace Emilio had given them. It seemed to cause some kind of response, the silver cross and Wynne held it out as they kept stumbling back, a moan escaping from their throat. Something fearful, something pathetic, something that wasn’t equipped at all to handle the winged beast closing in on them with a fist full of dirt.
If she and Wynne lived anywhere else, they could have continued their conversation. Van would have convinced them that they deserved to feel anger, if they wanted to— that it was alright to exist for themselves now that they were out of their cult. Though, she still wasn’t sure that was the appropriate word to use. Probably not. It didn’t matter that much, though, because the beastly figure that stood in front of them now took over practicality on Van’s behalf. 
It advanced on them, and Van noticed out of the corner of her eye that Wynne was digging into their sweater, pulling something out— the hand that was closed around theirs tightened, and she half expected something to happen at the reveal of whatever Wynne had closed in their hand, but nothing did. There was no magical light that poured from the necklace, but it did, however, deter the monster for a moment. That moment was all Van needed for her magic to push forward. The ground at the monster’s feet began to melt, cement running grey around the creature’s feet. It caused it to slip, almost too comically, and Van was stumbling backwards, pulling Wynne with her. 
“I did that, and we have to go— what is that!” She was shrieking now, admittance for what she’d done ringing through the air. She thought about all of the times she had denied such a thing, and how it felt almost freeing to finally say that yes, she had been on the other end of the magic that temporarily rendered the beast unable to advance on them. “Wynne, what do we do!” The melted asphalt wasn’t enough to keep it at bay for long, and it was trudging towards them, steps too careful for something entirely beast like— this had smarts to it, Van realized. The dirt that it held in its hand spilled from the corners of its large hands, and Van shrunk away as it got closer. Panic rose in her chest and Van outstretched a hand, willing something to happen, but nothing did. 
Wynne knew that strange things existed. There were demons and vampires, fae and mares. There was such a thing as magic as well, but they didn’t fully understand it — but when the ground started melting they figured that might be it. The thing slipped, ugly and made clumsy and they stared with wide eyes. Disbelief still washed over them, an emotion so familiar to them that they might as well no longer register it. The world was full of strange things, but they weren’t used to it yet.
And then Van was shouting that she’d done that and Wynne wanted to ask her what she was going on about, but in stead ran after her. They too were letting out a shriek, “I don’t know! It — maybe — vampire!” It had responded to their cross, hadn’t it? Did Van know about vampires? She had made the ground melt, so maybe she did. They continued to move backwards, fear continuing to strike in their heart and striking twice as heard when their bodies hit what seemed to be a car. “I don’t know! Do that thing again!” Whatever it had been, it had seemed to slow the creature down.
But nothing was happening and the creature was upon them now, taking hold of Van and ripping her from Wynne’s grip. It stuffed a hand of dirt in her mouth and they didn’t even know what to do for a moment, so stunned by this action. “Stop that!” They kicked at the creature, which seemed very intent on finishing his task of making Van eat dirt. 
“A VAMPIRE?! Wynne, that looks nothing like Edward Cullen!” She wasn’t exactly upset by the lack of Edward Cullen-ness, especially because to her, he was the least attractive in the family. If the vampire looked like Alice, on the other hand… Van’s thoughts jumped from one medium to the next, trying to dilute the idea of vampires into one single image. If both magic and bugbears existed, then who was to say something like vampires didn’t?
While she really wanted to have a breakdown about it, she knew that now was not the time. “I can’t just do it, it just happens!” She was panicked enough, but that brought on another fear– that the ground might come up to swallow both herself and Wynne. 
As hard as she tried to concentrate– to follow Wynne’s instructions, she was interrupted by the beast ripping her forward. Had her shoulder just popped out of place? The pain was blinding. She let out a scream, but it was soon muted by the way dirt poured into her mouth. She choked on it, kicking against the creature. Her fingers dug into the arm, but it was no use– he was far too strong for her. The dirt in her mouth was rancid, and she couldn’t breathe. She was going to die here, all because her stupid magic only worked when it wanted to. 
There was always something to do in a graveyard. Emilio longed for a busy mind these days, needed the constant distraction that came with pumping adrenaline and hands covered in dust. He was no good on his own, with his thoughts and his feelings, and he couldn’t expect to always be surrounded when the people he cared for had worlds all their own inside their heads. So he fell back on old habits. He stalked graveyards with stakes and blades gripped in his hands so tightly his knuckles hurt, he made himself useful. There was relief to be found in destruction, in the sound of commotion that he knew he could resolve.
There was less relief when the voices causing that commotion were familiar ones.
He recognized Wynne’s voice first, of course. It was the one he heard more often, the one he’d had many a late night conversation with in the hallway of their old apartment building or the quiet living room of Teddy’s house. It took him a second to pinpoint that other voice. Not Nora, not Ariadne. Someone else. He was almost on top of them before it hit him, though given the way he spotted the ground half-melted, he wasn’t sure the revelation meant much. Van was the only person he knew with a habit of melting the ground they stood on as a mechanism of defense.
And defense was a necessary thing here. He spotted the vampire instantly, recognized it as a blutsauger with a quiet string of curses. He didn’t have any garlic on him, and he felt stupid for that. These things were rarer than most other types of vampires — it wasn’t the kind of thing you went out expecting to find. But of course, Wynne and Van had found one anyway. And of course, it was doing its goddamn damndest to turn Van with dirt going for her mouth. “Hey!” He called out, unsure if he was trying to get the kids’ attention or the vampire’s or both. “Get over to me. Okay? Get over here.”
Van didn’t know about vampires and Wynne wasn’t sure who Edward Cullen was and it was all a little bit too much to comprehend and explain, so they just tried to focus their energy on what needed doing. The whole vampire and supernatural things exist conversation could come after they’d survived this. Besides, they had questions about what Van had just created! They hoped one day they’d have to stop learning about things that made their head hurt.
For now, they continued to kick at the creature, their anger and fear both growing louder with the sound of Van’s voice. Wynne watched with horror how the dirt got stuck in Van’s throat and they dug for their knife, the one that Emilio had gifted them but that they hadn’t had to use yet, that just sat in their pocket in case of. The knife they hoped to never have to use.
They kicked the creature again, screamed at it to, “Let her GO,” and then tried to hit it with the knife. It wasn’t wood and the skin barely broke, the knife sliding down and leaving a cut that seemed to barely bother the thing. They roared, trying to take Van’s hand to pull her away but Wynne wasn’t strong like that. They didn’t know what to do and they hoped that someone else was here, that —
And that’s when fate seemed to be on their side for once, Emilio’s protective voice calling out and ringing through their body with a feeling of recognition. “I don’t know how!” Their voice was shrill as they called back. How could they just run towards the slayer if their friend was in such trouble? If she might die? The fear struck through their heart and they looked at Emilio. “Van — I can’t — we need to stop it, I don’t know what it’s doing but it needs to stop.” Wynne pushed with their hands at the vampiric monster again, their knife cutting into some of its skin but it was futile in the grand scheme of things. “Van, Van, can you — pull free? We need to run.”
There was another voice– although grating, Van felt a wave of relief. She’d recalled the last time she’d gotten into trouble with Emilio, how he’d taken care of it pretty swiftly. Would this be like the last time, or would she die here? Her mouth was full of dirt and she was coughing it up as the monster was shoving it in. She could see Wynne out of the corner of her eye kicking at the creature, but it didn’t seem to care all that much. She tried to, too, but she was growing tired– exhaustion set into her bones the more dirt that filled her mouth. 
Van spluttered, nails digging into the wrist of the creature as she tried desperately to break the hold it had on her. Tears streamed down her face, both from the suffocation and the fear. She was starting to lose feeling in her toes, she thought– was that what that was? Suddenly, one moment she was being held upright, and the next she was being half-tossed, half-thrown to the side. The ground beneath the monster began to disintegrate, liquid asphalt pouring over the creature’s feet. At least her magic was working now. Was she about to die? Was that what this was? 
She hit the ground hard, stars scattering across her vision as she coughed up the dirt, hooking a finger into her mouth to scoop it out. Tears made her face sticky and wet, and she could only imagine what she might have looked like to those around her. But that didn’t matter– not right now. When she looked back towards the beast, it was stuck in the goo she’d created. The divet into the earth looked like a large pothole, and then suddenly– a giant hand, grotesque and feathery grabbed onto the creature’s shoulder, pulling it down beneath the level at which Van could see it. 
There wasn’t time for this. The blutsauger had a hold of Van, was already stuffing dirt into her mouth, and it wouldn’t be long before it killed her. Maybe Emilio couldn’t keep it down permanently, but he had to do something, had to find some way to at least save the kid’s life. He yanked his holy water from his pocket, pushing himself as best he could to cross the distance between himself and the kids quickly in spite of the pain in his bad leg, but he could already tell it wasn’t going to be enough. Van was sputtering and coughing and running out of time, and Emilio could push himself as hard as he wanted to but he couldn’t force his useless leg to work. He couldn’t close the distance quickly enough, couldn’t stop what was about to happen. He’d walk away from this with another dead kid on his conscience — or two, if he was too slow to save Wynne, too. The thought was enough to push him a little more, make him move faster but still too slow. He was going to be too late, he was going to fail here the same way he had a thousand times before, he was going to —
The Earth opened up beneath the blutsauger’s wretched feet, close enough that Emilio stumbled back to avoid the gaping canyon that had appeared in the world. It looked like what Van had done back the last time he’d run into her, but… different. Bigger, more intense. Something came out of the hole — a hand? None of it made a whole lot of sense, but it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter, because Emilio was close enough now to dart around that hole, to close the distance between himself and the kids.
He came in as quickly as he could, still clutching that holy water. It had seemed small in comparison to the blutsauger, but it seemed utterly miniscule when held up against the size of the hole that had opened in the ground. Emilio held it anyway, unscrewed the cap with his teeth as he crouched next to Van, between her and the crevice that had swallowed the blutsauger. “You okay? You — Can you breathe? Wynne.” He gestured wildly at them, ushering for them to get behind him, to let him put himself between them and the hole, too. “Here.” He pulled the cross from around his throat, shoving it towards Van. Wynne had the one he’d given them, still; it would be better if Van weren’t entirely unarmed. Although… looking to the hole, Emilio had a feeling Van never quite had that problem.
Wynne was moved by pure instinct only, driven by the fear of losing Van, of this ugly creature killing her on a random evening. They had just been on their way to get some snacks — surely that couldn’t be how death went? Death came for old people or happened in grotesque ways, like a sacrifice on an altar or a vampire’s head being torn off. It didn’t just happen like this, did it? Sure, there were stories of things just happening like this, but Van couldn’t just die, right here, on a random evening when they had been going to get some candy. And so they were trying whatever they could, attempting to pull and hit and kick and shriek – but none of it gave.
And then the ground started to move, something strange happening and Wynne jumped back a beat after Van was tossed away. They watched her cough up the dirt and started to pull at the bandana tied around their neck. Their intention to hand it over for Van to wipe the dirt off of was discarded when they looked at what was happening. The ground was transforming, sinking, becoming some kind of hole — and then there was a hand, a tug and it was gone. The feathery hand and the vampiric thing itself. They stared, tasted the salt of tears leaking into their mouth and let out a whimper.
Soon enough they rushed over, pulling off their bandana fully and holding it out to to Van. Their eyes danced viciously from the hole to Emilio to Van, not sure what to focus on. “Is it — is it gone?” They were crouching, hand placed on the ground and an exhale passing from their lips. “Van —” They didn’t know what to say. Should they address it, how afraid they had been? How she’d almost died? No, probably not – it would probably not be sensible, even if it was the thought circling their mind viciously. “Are you okay? What can we do?”
Between colliding with asphalt and the dirt in her throat, Van was gasping for air. Chest heaving, she held onto her shirt, pulling it slightly as if it’d allow her more room to breathe. She wasn’t dead, and neither was Wynne. Emilio was still talking, and now Wynne was talking to her, too. She blinked rapidly, tears blurring her vision making it hard to take in her surroundings. Something dropped into her lap and her hand splayed wildly around until she felt the weight of the cross. She held onto it as if some sort of lifeline, reaching up to rub away the dirt on her face.
“I think I’m okay,” Van managed to choke out, wheezing slightly as she tilted her head back, blinking away the now dirty smeared tears. Her mind raced from Diana in the parking lot to recently with Regan’s apartment, and now–? Once her vision became slightly more clear, she found the space where the creature had been, where the ground had swallowed it whole. It was left with an indent just as it had been when Diana disappeared, and as when the man in the ice cream shop had. She felt less guilt, less fear about this one, though. 
“I did that,” Van whispered, confirming what she was sure both her companions were trying to figure out. “I did that.” She had saved her own life, and possibly Wynne’s by proxy, but it’d been too close– what if the creature had dragged either herself or Wynne with it? What if Emilio had been trying to fight it off? “I’m sorry– I–” She choked on the remaining dirt in her throat and shook her head. “It was going to kill me, and maybe you, Wynne, I couldn’t– I had to do it, I had to kill it.” Even if she hadn’t exactly instructed her magic to do such a thing, the fear had pulled up over her like a second skin, leading the way to the creature’s destruction. She wasn’t sure what had come up to take down the vampiric beast, but she was grateful for it. How many more times would she feed her demons (literally)? “I don’t know how it– I– I was scared, and then– this happens when I’m really scared.” She looked at Emilio, “I didn’t want to hurt Wynne, I swear.” Because Emilio hurt things that hurt other people, right? Van had hurt people, plenty of them. Would Emilio retaliate? She stared at him, eyes glossed over with fear and regret. 
It all happened pretty quickly. There was a threat, there was a hole, there was a hand, there was nothing. Emilio’s adrenaline was pumping, but there was nowhere for it to go now. Nothing to fight off, nowhere to put the energy buzzing beneath his skin. The paranoia that had taken up a permanent residence in the back of his mind worked overtime as a result, insisting that something else was going to happen, that he’d missed something. Was that tingle on the back of his neck anxiety, or his senses warning him of another approaching undead? He whirled around, glancing off to the side with wild eyes. But the only chaos here was inside his head now; everything else was still.
“It’s gone,” he said, half in answer to Wynne’s question and half in an attempt to reassure himself of as much. There was nothing left to fight. He repeated it to himself a time or two, tried to calm the wild beating of his heart. It was gone. Van was alive and coughing, working on getting that dirt out of her lungs. Wynne was at her side, offering her their handkerchief and making sure she was okay. Emilio was scanning the perimeter like a damn crazy person, half-convinced something else was going to pop out of the woodwork and drag Wynne away next, or Van, or him. Was that something he needed to worry about? It must have been Van who’d caused the hand to appear, just like it had been Van who’d melted the asphalt during the goo shit, but how much control did she have over it? He’d wager that the answer was not much. 
Van’s voice managed to force its way through the haze of paranoia in his head only after she’d admitted to the ordeal, and he tuned in about halfway through. She was apologizing, she was scared. Of him, maybe? Guilt churned alongside the adrenaline in his gut. He felt a little nauseous. “Hey, it’s okay.” It didn’t come out quite as comforting as he’d meant for it to. It wasn’t gentle, wasn’t paternal. It was hoarse and uncertain instead, like a man out of practice with kindness. He grimaced at the sound of his own voice, shaking his head. “Look, you — You did what you had to. That thing was going to kill you. Then Wynne, then more people. You did good, kid. Okay? You did good.”
They wiped at their eyes, where tears of their own had fallen in the blind panic that was slowly ebbing from their body. Wynne didn’t know how to cope with these surges of emotions, but it didn’t much matter — there was no time to stress about emotional incapacity when there was something to take care of. And that, at the very least, was someone they had learned at home. Besides, Emilio was there now, and with Emilio they felt safe. Even if the earth had opened up and strange claw had snatched their assailant away, even if Van was still shaking.
And Van was apologizing for killing the thing and they wondered what it said about them that they were taken aback by it. Maybe it was because they hadn’t known a lot of people who apologized for their murders and sacrifices. Blood stuck to all the hands of the protherians, even Wynne. In this case it wasn’t even a matter of sacrifice, this had been self defense. This had been one of the monsters that should be killed, like the vampires in the barn or the demon their people had worshiped. They looked at Van with wide eyes, “It’s okay,” they said. “You did what you had to do. I’m glad you did. Okay? I — but … I don’t know what it was you did. But I’m glad.” If the world was filled with death – which it quite clearly was – Wynne wanted it to be monsters like the one who’d been swallowed whole to die, and not the people like Van. 
Emilio was also saying that Van had done good and they were glad for it. They remembered the vampire falling on their stake and turning into dust. Emilio turning more of them into nothingness, because maybe that was what best. They remembered Padrig, guts spilling. Jac, neck slit. The creature that had just died didn’t tug at their gut the way those last two did. Wynne nodded. “Do you want to go back home?” 
You did good. 
Van choked on the apologies as they swarmed her mind. She would need to explain this in further detail to Wynne, would need to figure out how to make them understand that she wasn’t dangerous in the same way that the creature had been. In a different way, sure, but different. Van didn’t want to hurt anyone, much less Wynne. Van blinked back the tears, both from the fear and agony of not having been able to breathe. She reached up to wipe away the few strays that managed to fight their way through with the back of her hand. 
She grabbed onto Wynne’s hand, holding it tightly as if willing them to be an anchor of some kind. If Van could feel something real in this moment, it would make it easier. She could feel Emilio’s gaze on her, too, and so she pushed herself up, exhaustion evident in her movements as she struggled to get to her feet. Her hands and knees were scraped and she could feel the sting with her movements, but that wasn’t important right now. 
Home was an option, but Van didn’t want to be alone. Regan’s apartment, though put back together after what had happened that night, felt a little… wrong. 
“Can I come over?” Van asked, stare blank as she looked down at the asphalt from where the creature had disappeared. “Is that okay?” She tightened her grip on Wynne’s hand, looking between them and Emilio. “I don’t–” She thought it was obvious, but she forced herself to say it, to bend at will to the idea that maybe they didn’t want her to be alone, either. “I don’t think I want to be alone.” 
There were tears, though none were from Emilio. He wondered, somewhat absently, if Van had done this before. Not the melting — that was familiar enough that he knew it had happened before — or even the hole that opened up and the hand that thrust its way out of it. Instead, he wondered about the creature he presumed to be dead now, wondered if Van had killed anything before it. How much of the fear on her face or the tears in her eyes were for the suffocation she’d nearly suffered, and how much were for the sensation of taking a ‘life,’ however ugly it had been? He tried to remember the first time he’d killed something, tried to remember what it felt like. But it was hard. It was hard to remember his hands before they were bloodied. Maybe it was better that way. Maybe that was the way things were supposed to be.
Wynne assured Van that she’d done what she’d had to, and it was strange that Emilio had thought that went without saying. He rarely considered things like this to be something a person needed comfort for. No one had comforted him, had they? His mother had praised him if he’d killed something exceptionally well but, beyond that, it had only ever been expected. Van killed the blutsauger, and of course she had to. But Wynne said it like the reassurance was necessary, so Emilio nodded as if he believed it, too. It was hard, teaching an old dog new tricks. None of them ever felt natural.
He glanced to Wynne at Van’s question, though he wasn’t sure if it was for them or himself. Wynne’s house was their own; Teddy had made sure of it. But Emilio nodded, anyway. “You can both come to Teddy’s,” he offered, because he thought Wynne might feel safe there and he thought he might feel better if he could keep an eye on them, on both of them. “You can have… Uh, how old are you again?” Wasn’t the drinking age different in America? In the twenties instead of eighteen. Emilio had been far younger when he’d had his first drink, though, and he’d never cared much for laws, anyway. So he shrugged. “Eh, doesn’t matter. You can have a drink. Helps calm you down. Or… There’s probably food. Uh, whatever you want. Yeah? You can do whatever you want.”
Van’s hand was in theirs and Wynne held on tight on her too, her thumb running small circles over the back of her hand. They weren’t sure what to say just yet, but maybe that was okay. There could be conversation about what exactly it was that Van had done and what it meant later, just like they could converse later about the existence of vampires. (And demons, maybe those too, if they were ripping off bandaids anyway.)
For now, though, there was a hand to hold and tears to let dry. As Van quietly asked if she could come over, they were ready to offer their home. Going to Teddy’s (and Emilio’s – even if he didn’t quite see it that way yet) home seemed like a good idea, though. More space, there, and the slayer could remain to linger in their periphery and make sure no other vampires somehow ended up on their trail and attacking them. They wanted to ask if there was a chance that there was more, as there always had been in their previous encounters with vampires. One look at Van made Wynne think twice about bringing up that potential reality, though.
“Sounds good,” they said, nodding. They squeezed Van’s hand. “Are you … did you drive?” They looked up at Emilio, who seemed to be suggesting a favored solution. Liquor. They wouldn’t mind some at this point. “There’s a bunch of stuff there. We’ll just go there and get you cleaned up and relax, okay? Teddy also always has treats. No need for the shop.” They looked at Van, catching her eyes. “We’ll be okay there.”
She wasn’t sure why, but she half expected Emilio to tell her no. She felt a little guilty for that– thinking so badly of him when all he was trying to do was help. Van leaned into Wynne as they ventured away from the scene of the crime. At Emilio’s question, her brows furrowed. It occurred to her that Emilio hadn’t even said happy birthday to her. Actually, that seemed normal. “I just turned twenty-one, and I like pink drinks.” Her voice shook slightly as she explained herself. It didn’t really matter what she liked or not, she didn’t think. 
Van attempted a smile, but she could still feel the dirt on her teeth. “Do you think Teddy has an extra toothbrush?” Would they be upset with her for what happened? Especially after getting her the ring that was supposed to help? She wasn’t sure. She bit the inside of her cheek as she stared off into the distance, She had to believe both Wynne and Emilio that it would be alright– that the beast she’d sent off to… wherever, wouldn’t come back to finish the job. 
“Oh. Happy birthday.” It was flat, and a little uncertain, but it was genuine, too. Emilio was sure Teddy had the ingredients to make pink drinks (were those just drinks that were pink?) back home, though he had no idea how to go about making one. He’d figure it out, he guessed. Fuck only knew the kid could probably use one, after everything.
He turned to Wynne, shaking his head a little. He hadn’t driven — and if he had, he’d have been on his bike, which he wasn’t sure would comfortably carry three people — but they should be fine to walk. And… stop by a store on the way home to buy a toothbrush. “I’ll get you one. Call it a late birthday gift or something. And Wynne’s right, okay? You’ll be all right.”
Emilio would make sure of it.
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asirenscream · 5 days
Text
a shrimptastic picnic | wren & felix
TIMING: current
LOCATION: the common.
PARTIES: @asirenscream & @recoveringdreamer
SUMMARY: wren's bad attempt at potato salad leads her to the lions & lambs picnic and felix is kind enough to taste test, until they're interrupted by a man insisting they learn more about the well respected shrimp. a totally normal picnic, right? right!
CONTENT: mentions of the potential of food poisoning.
The Lions and Lambs picnic seemed pretty daunting to Wren. Well, not just because she had to subtly find out that there weren’t actually going to be any lions or lambs, but because of how many people would be there. Standing in the grass of The Common, Wren tried not to sweat too much. Her fingers were gripping the tupperware container she had put her potato salad in. She hadn’t ever made potato salad before, but someone had mentioned how that was a common picnic food. She had taken hours attempting to boil the cubed, unevenly sized potatoes and mixing them into the mayo mustard mixture. The website on The Google she had found said that anyone could put what they wanted in potato salad! The comments were very helpful so Wren threw onions, celery, raisins, and walnuts in it. Hopefully people liked it.
Shifting on her feet, Wren tried to coax up the nerve to approach the crowd of people in The Common there for the picnic. This would be a good way to step over her anxiety and fear of humans—of people in general. Should she have brought forks or spoons? She didn’t own many of them… Or plates. Or bowls. Should she have brought those, too? Oh, she was definitely spiraling now. Brown eyes squeezed shut as Wren tried to take a steady breath and ignore the racing of her heart. Maybe if she pretended people weren’t there for a minute then it’d be okay. It’d be fine. Right? Right!
Wren slowly opened her eyes and tentatively started walking across the grass, the slightest tremor in her form. She accidentally bumped into someone and squeaked, looking up with wide eyes. “Sorry! I’m—wait. I know you, right?” She got out in a rush. She felt like she remembered him from online. “You have the cat? Um, right? I’m not misremembering.” Cats didn’t tend to be birds' biggest fans. Wren hadn’t met a cat before so she wasn’t sure how they’d in turn take to her. “I’m Wren! I think we talked before, hi!”
For years, Felix had felt fairly isolated. First, they’d had their father as their well-meaning warden in that house in the woods. Then, there’d been Leo and his less-than-good intentions in the apartment they’d shared for years, where Felix made themself smaller and smaller by the day in order to allow Leo space to be big. Felix had never really had the chance to branch out and meet new people until after their breakup with Leo and, by that point, they’d been so nervous that it seemed a herculean task just to start a conversation. But they were working on that. They were doing better now. They were reaching out to people, they were making friends.
They were going to picnics.
It had seemed like a good idea, in theory. They’d even managed to talk themself out of the tempting idea of dragging Mona or Natalia along for the ride, reminding themself that they needed to be able to meet people without the security blanket of someone they were already close to being there to help. They could do this on their own. Just Felix, the muffins they’d brought, and… a whole lot of people. Like a lot of people. Were there always this many people at things like this?
Someone bumped into them in the crowd, and Felix stiffened a little. “Sorry,” he said, at the same time that they apologized. Then, blinking down, they realized they recognized the girl. “Oh! Hi! You’re, um, the bird girl. I mean, the girl who likes birds. I mean, person. Bird person. Person who likes birds.” All right, Fe, reel it in. “I’m Felix! Um, what did you…” The trailed off, looking down at the tupperware in her hand and what they could see of the… substance inside. “...make?”
Bird girl. Well, they weren’t wrong. It caused Wren to let out a high-pitched, nervous laugh. That felt a little too on the nose, even if they didn’t realize it. “Yup! Yeah, bird girl seems… fitting.” Her laugh strained just a tad bit more before she reeled it in. “Big fan of birds! That’s me, yes. Um, anyways!” She rocked onto the balls of her feet as she tried to ignore her own anxious, awkward tendencies. “Hi Felix! I’m happy to see a friendly face.” He really did seem friendly from their brief conversation. It did little to ebb her already overwhelming anxiety, but it was something at least. 
Looking down at the container, Wren had to take a moment to remember the name. “Uh, potato salad!” She looked back up and smiled. “The recipe said to just add whatever I wanted! So I did that. I’ve never made potato salad. I didn’t even know what it was! I had to search what picnic foods were, because I don’t think people would like my go to foods.” Raw meat, raw fish may be more accepted, but she didn’t know how well either of those would hold for human consumption. 
There was plenty of activity around Wren and Felix. It was overwhelming, so Wren did her best to ignore the push, push, push of it all. “Um, did you bring anything? Or just come for the fun? Would you want some potato salad? I didn’t bring forks! Should I have brought forks? I don’t know how picnics work, I’ve never been to one. What do you think?” She blabbered on. Wren could tell when she was spiraling and it was definitely happening. “Oh god, sorry. When I start I just kind of can’t stop! Ha.” She winced.
She seemed nervous, and Felix wondered if they’d said something wrong. They had a habit of that, they knew, of speaking out of turn and generally making a mess of things. They were trying to do better, trying to improve, trying to… be the sort of person that people wanted to talk to, but it was an uphill battle. Spending most of your teen years living off the land in a murder cabin tended to make social interaction a little more difficult. Trying to save the interaction, Felix nodded. “Uh, yeah! Birds are great. I like birds, too.” They didn’t. Not more than the average person, at least. In fact, some birds freaked them out a little. But, hey! They could pretend, in the interest of friendly conversation. “Yeah! Yeah, it’s nice to, uh, know somebody.” 
Glancing back down to the container again, Felix tried not to let their… surprise show on their face. That was not potato salad. Felix had seen potato salad. Felix had made potato salad. Felix had even enjoyed potato salad. That was not potato salad. But it was her first time making it, and she’d found a recipe that apparently wasn’t very helpful, and wouldn’t it be unnecessarily mean to point that out? “It looks great!” Felix lied, flashing her a bright smile. “I can’t wait to try it!” They hoped they had remembered to put anti-nausea meds in their jean pockets.
“I brought muffins,” Felix replied quickly, holding up the muffins and offering one to Wren. They liked to think they were some quality muffins, but they might have been a little biased. They glanced back to the ‘potato salad’ Wren was holding with a forced smile. “Oh, yeah. I’d love some potato salad. I think, uh — I think there’s forks where the other food is. So we can go over there and get some forks. And then. Eat this potato salad!” They felt a little like they were tying a noose for their executioner here, but it was fine. “No, hey, it’s okay! I kind of do the same thing. It’s cool. Come on, let’s… go find a fork.”
Wren’s smile was shaky at best, but it was getting easier to breathe through the anxiety when she just focused on Felix in front of her instead. They seemed really nice and dealing with one person in comparison to several was always going to be preferable to Wren. Especially when they seemed to be as kind as Felix was. “I don’t do this kind of stuff often,” a pause as Wren tried to figure out how to word it, “go out, I guess. Being around a lot of people kind of freaks me out.” An understatement, but she could lighten it a tiny bit. There was no harm, right?
“Thanks! I tried really hard, so I hope it’s good.” Wren smiled, holding up the container briefly to observe the potato mixture in there that had taken her way too long. Humans were really strange in what they could eat and couldn’t. She didn’t want to make something she’d enjoy, but would make humans sick. That was the quickest way to give away the fact that she was very clearly something else entirely. The constant fear and itch to not be found out was persistent enough. 
Baking! That was another thing that Wren was eager to try. “Oh wow, these look amazing! Thank you!” Wren took the muffin excitedly. “Do you bake a lot? Or cook in general? Baking seems really hard, but so fun. Do you have a favorite thing you like to cook or bake?” She practically bounded alongside Felix to go near the other food. Someone was going to eat her food! She was way too excited. “Fork adventure! Hah,” Wren giggled almost nervously and could feel the heat from her embarrassed blush travel all the way up to the tips of her ears. 
There was a table full of other dishes and cutlery, plates, anything you could think of. Wren made work of setting down the tupperware container and popping off the lid. It didn’t look awful, at least. Or to her, anyway. It looked like vegetables and sauce? That was normal, for sure. “If you hate it, it’s okay! Don’t worry.” Wren added quickly, resisting the urge to grimace. “Rome wasn’t painted in a day or whatever the saying is. I heard that one on TV.” 
Given her overall demeanor her words — that this wasn’t a thing she did often — felt unnecessary to really say. It was clear that she was uncomfortable, out of her element. But that was okay. Felix was a little out of theirs, too. So they smiled back at her, they shrugged their shoulders. “I don’t really do this often, either,” they admitted, wondering if they were this obvious. Being around a lot of people was pretty scary, but they’d found it was a lot better when you were around one you trusted. They could be that one for Wren, they thought. Or… try to, anyway.
Even if it meant eating her potato salad. They spared it another look, careful not to let the uncertainty shine through in their expression. They weren’t sure she would have picked up on it, but they didn’t want to take any chances. “I’m sure it’s great. I think, um, the first step to cooking and being good at it is to try your hardest. Right?” Wrong. Very, very wrong. The first step to cooking and being good at it was not making anything like what she had in her hands. Felix’s stomach was not going to be happy with them after this.
But Wren was happy, or seemed to be. That made it feel kind of worth it. She took a muffin, and Felix offered her an encouraging smile. “I love baking. It’s something I do a lot. Um, I do more of it when I’m stressed. I like to think I’m pretty good at it, because of all the practice.” They paused. “Baking, I mean, Not being stressed.” Though they got plenty of practice at that, too. “Yeah! Yeah, let’s go on a fork adventure.”
It didn’t feel like much of an adventure. They walked to the table and grabbed a fork, trying not to sigh as Wren popped open her tupperware. It smelled… interesting. Like a lot of things at once. Felix, unsure where to start, stuck his fork in. “Yeah. That’s — That’s totally how it goes. Um, I think.” They tried to remember that meal at the Raven, the one that looked terrible but tasted fine. They did their best to convince themself that Wren’s potato salad would be the same as they brought the fork to their mouth.
Wren swallowed hard around the small lump that formed in her throat. Ever since all but crash landing at Wicked’s Rest she had been endlessly surprised by the kindness people showed her. She hadn’t ever really considered before that this may be the norm for humans and their society. Felix was offering her kindness simply because they wanted to. She couldn’t say it made her any less perpetually terrified of those around her, but at least it was comforting to know that kindness was the go to for a lot of people she had, thankfully, already met. 
“Oh, yes! I think so, too. Something about being bad before you can be good at it,” Wren agreed cheerfully. She peeled carefully at the wrapper around the base of the muffin before taking a bite. One of the things that Wren had also come to love was all the various foods humans had to offer. The muffin was sweet and the sugar went right to her head with how ready she felt to bounce all around. “Wow! This is amazing, Felix!” Maybe baking was something people were just good at off the bat. Felix seemed to be at least. 
Nodding along, Wren took Felix’s words into consideration. So they weren’t good at it off the bat then. Practice was the key. She’d have to keep that in mind for herself. All wasn’t lost. “I get that, though. I’m always stressed—especially about things I can’t control, which I’ve been told isn’t great for me, but it’s hard not to and all. Do you make cookies or anything? Or cupcakes? Those are baked goods, right?” Okay, reign it in, Wren. That wasn’t a normal thing to ask someone—a fellow human. It took her best efforts sometimes to not look like a fish out of water. 
Wren clapped her hands together and smiled expectantly. She hoped that they didn’t feel too pressured right now, but this was a big step for her. Cooking and trying to offer it to people without having an anxiety filled meltdown. She thought she was doing pretty well so far. “So? Thoughts? Concerns? Comments? Questions?” She asked, trying to do her best to not look over eager, but failing. 
She was right about that, at least; the first step to being really good at something was being really bad at it. Felix’s mother had been particularly fond of that saying, smiling each time one of her children came to her to admit to some mistake. That’s how you learn, she’d tell them. So… maybe Wren’s potato salad was effectively poison. Maybe Felix would regret eating it. But this was how she was going to learn, wasn’t it? Their mother had helped them with that, so maybe it was their duty to pay it forward and help Wren.
They smiled as she took a bite of the muffin, pleased that she seemed to enjoy it. “I’ll give you the recipe, if you want. Um, baking is — It’s about being precise, but knowing when to improvise. My mom used to say it was like jazz music. There’s notes, but some of it is you making it up as you go.” 
It was easy to see themself in Wren. In her stress, her anxiety. Felix had a pretty good idea how she was feeling right now, and they wanted to help. If that meant eating bad potato salad, they’d eat it. “Yeah,” they confirmed with a nod. “I make cookies a lot. Cupcakes sometimes, too, but I’d rather just make a normal cake. I don’t know why, but I like normal cakes better than cupcakes. Those are baked goods, yeah.” Man, Wren wasn’t kidding when she said she was new to cooking. Maybe she was a sheltered kid, someone who’d just moved to town for college or something. She was about the right age, and Felix had heard that some college kids didn’t even know how to do laundry when they first got to their dorms.
The potato salad sat on their tongue, and it was… wrong. All of it was wrong. The texture, the taste. It was hard not to make a face as it settled, and when Felix swallowed, it was… a little too hard of a gulp to pass for neutrality. They opened their mouth, now blessedly free of “potato salad” and tried to think of something to say.
Luckily, they were rescued by an approaching person. The man wore a red shirt and red shirts, with a red had sporting claws on either side. He came to stand beside Wren, the smile on his face a little too wide. “Shrimptastic day we’re having!” He greeted, and Felix, eyes wide, nodded.
“Um. Yeah?”
“Have you seen our booth? We’re just over there. We have pamphlets. Would you like a pamphlet?”
Jazz music. Wren wasn’t quite sure what that was, but she could figure it out. The website Google had been her best friend since stumbling right into the thick of human culture. “Sure! That would be really nice.” She nodded, “improvise… kind of like how I did in the potato salad!” She supplied, looking proud of herself. The website did say that you could throw whatever you wanted into it and it’d more than likely work. 
“A normal cake! Like the big ones with a bunch of layers? I saw that on a TV show.” Wren gasped, trying to refrain from getting more muffin crumbs all over her sweater. She wasn’t entirely successful, but that was fine. “Do you have a favorite flavor or anything? I’ve heard that you can’t go wrong with chocolate. I like chocolate loads.” She informed them. Taking another bite of her muffin had her head bobbing along happily as if there was music she was dancing to. 
Mouth full of muffin, Wren didn’t get to hear what Felix thought of her potato salad when someone came up beside her. She did her best not to choke on the baked goods in her startled state. Thankfully with that came not shrieking out loud like the impulse had been. Wren quickly chewed and swallowed, wiping at the crumbs on her face. ‘Shrimptastic day’... what did that mean? Shrimp were delicious, she’d allow that.
“Um, yes?” Wren wasn’t sure if that was the right answer. “What is your booth about? Shrimp?” Someone did say that they had been given a bunch of shrimp they didn’t want. Her brown eyes flickered over to Felix to see if they had any earthly idea what could be going on with this shrimp enthusiastic person. “I didn’t realize so many people here liked shrimp that much.”
Felix didn’t want to encourage more potato salads like this one. They really didn’t. But saying, no, nothing like what you did with the potato salad, do the opposite of whatever you did with the potato salad would probably hurt Wren’s feelings, and that wasn’t at all what Felix wanted. So they grit their teeth together in a forced grin and nodded their head. “Yeah! Like that!” Surely not every attempt would be as bad as this one, right?
“Yeah, like that. I like chocolate a lot, but I have to be careful how I make it. I’m lactose intolerant — uh, which means I don’t process cow’s milk well — so I have to, you know, use other ingredients instead. But you can make it work! And if you don’t have allergies to worry about, they make a lot of boxed good cake mixes. Pretty much all you have to do is add the wet ingredients!” Maybe that should be Wren’s first stepping stone if she wanted to be a baker. It was hard to mess up a boxed cake mix, wasn’t it?
It was strange, feeling grateful for a stranger approaching to talk about shrimp. After their experience at the theatre with Mona, Felix had little desire to talk about shrimp at all. But talking about shrimp would give them time to think of something nice to say about Wren’s potato salad, wouldn’t it? It was… was sticky a compliment? No, right? She probably hadn’t been going for sticky.
The man smiled at Wren, something strange behind his eyes. “Isn’t everything about shrimp? If it isn’t, it should be.” His eyes flickered down to the potato salad. “I spotted you from across the way. Your food looks very good. I think we might have similar ideologies.” He reached out, putting a hand on Wren’s arm in a way that was strange; like he wasn’t quite used to having hands. Felix blinked.
“Um, actually —”
The man continued as if they hadn’t spoken. “Of course people like shrimp. Who would deny shrimp? You wouldn’t, would you? Would you deny shrimp the respect they deserve? The fear? The awe? Be honest.”
“My friend Van is like that! She offered me medicine once when I cried at her work then got raw meat.” Wren informed Felix. You’re supposed to share stories with friends or people who would become friends, right? She was totally nailing this. Boxed mix sounded a lot easier than trying to bake from scratch. Maybe she’d have to give that a try. She could make something for her friends and hopefully they’d like it! “Oh, that sounds like a nice idea, thank you! I’ll give that a try. I can follow instructions, for the most part. Sometimes I like to do whatever I want since that’s more fun, but I’ll do my best to try to follow it all without too much change.” Jazz, jazz music. Had to follow it to make it work best, but with some changes is what Felix said.
The man had a certain look in his eye that was making the hair on the back of Wren’s neck stand up. She didn’t have a good gut feeling, but when did she ever? This could just be her anxiety talking, knowing her. Poppy always poked at her mercilessly for her fear over the smallest things that she wouldn’t be able to sense real danger if it smacked her in the face. Was this one of those situations? She wasn’t equipped to be able to handle this, she was sure. 
“Oh, ha! Um, thanks!” Wren laughed nervously, the brief grimace on her face quickly being hidden by an equally as uncomfortable looking smile. “I didn’t think everything should be about shrimp, to be honest. Isn’t there other things to enjoy like… I don’t know? Nature? Um, stuff that isn’t shrimp? Right, Felix?” She quickly looked at them with a wild look in her eyes. She didn’t want to do this alone.
Shaking the man’s hand off as casually as Wren could manage, she looked at a loss for words. “Aren’t shrimp usually just eaten instead? Is that what your pamphlet is about? A shrimp eating contest sounds like fun!” 
“Oh, hey, I know Van!” And… they also knew that humans weren’t supposed to eat raw meat. Felix could handle it — the jaguar was built for digesting raw meat, and they did share a body — but it made human sick. Maybe Van didn’t know that, or Wren didn’t, or both; either way, Felix felt it was their responsibility, as an adult in the equation, to say something. “You cooked the meat, though, didn’t you? You really need to cook meat before you eat it. I mean, um, there are some kinds you can eat raw, I think — like sushi and stuff — but for the most part, you’re really supposed to cook it.”
At least she seemed willing to accept boxed cake mix. Felix thought it would be a big step for Wren, the kind of thing that could really push her in the right direction. Boxed cake mix would be so much better than this potato salad, because anything would be better than this potato salad. Not that Felix was going to say that. They were not breaking kids’ spirits. “They usually put the instructions on the box with the cake mix. But, um, you know, you can still add stuff to it! Like… chocolate chips.” And not onions, they wanted to add. Definitely not onions.
They wondered what had drawn this shrimp-loving man their way. Surely he didn’t really want Wren’s potato salad, did he? He kept looking at it, something like hunger in his eyes. Felix moved to grab him a fork when Wren spoke, drawing their attention away. “Um, yeah. Shrimp is cool, but it’s not everything. Haha.”
It was like a flip had been switched. The more Wren spoke about shrimp, the less friendly the man seemed. His hand dropped from her shoulder, his eyes narrowed. “Eaten? You would eat them? Shrimp are to be adored! Worshiped! Eaten, perhaps, but only after a natural death. Only to keep them close, to make them a part of you.” He reached into his pocket, retrieving a pamphlet which he shoved into Wren’s face. “You will educate yourself. You must.” 
“Hey,” Felix took an uncertain step forward. “Look, you’re being a little —”
The man turned to them, reaching out and shoving them. It wasn’t a particularly hard shove, but it caught them off guard enough to send them stumbling backwards and make them drop the tray of muffins they were holding. “You cannot possibly understand,” the man mumbled, seeming to grow more and more frantic. “You could never. But you!” He turned back to Wren, gesturing again to the potato salad. “You must! Come with me. Come with us.” As he said it, he reached into his pocket again, this time producing… a shrimp.
“Oh, wow! She’s great, huh?” Wren smiled happily. Oh. Right. Humans didn’t eat raw meat. Sometimes she forgot how far away from human she was the longer she was in her human form. Though, then stuff like this would happen and she’d be very much reminded how human she wasn’t. “Um, sure! Yes. I definitely cooked the sausage. Don’t worry. I am very much a food safety expert. I watched two videos on the site YouTube about it. Especially since I didn’t want anyone getting sick from my potato salad!” She looked it up after realizing that human stomachs couldn’t handle what a siren’s stomach could. 
Wren really wished that they were still talking about boxed cake mix instead of shrimp. Which, that was something she never thought she’d think. She loved eating shrimp. This whole shrimp loving man seemed to take it to another level than her casual enjoyment. Casual enjoyment of shrimp was also another thing that Wren didn’t think she would ever think to herself before. The longer Wren is in Wicked’s Rest, the more she is convinced it’s an odd place to live. It worked out, though, she was pretty sure she also was considered odd to most people.
Blinking owlishly, Wren merely stared at the man with wide eyes. This… was so bizarre. She flinched back with the pamphlet being shoved in her face. At least this wasn’t as distressing as Regan taking her to see a dead bird. Wren had almost transformed in front of the woman with how upset she was, so she would take the building anxiety over that any day. Especially when it was with some man insisting that she educate herself on the worship of shrimp.
“Hey!” Wren said sharply the moment that he shoved Felix. “That was mean! Don’t touch my friend!” She shook her head rapidly as he seemed to get more frantic and set his sights on her instead. Snatching the shrimp out of the man’s hand, Wren bit off the shrimp leaving only the tail. She chewed thoroughly and shook the tail around, “that’s what I think of your shrimp! Go away! You touch my friend again and I’ll claw a chunk of you and your shrimp! Again!” Wren scowled at the man, shoving his shoulder hard to get him away from the pair. “Get out of here, weirdo!” 
“Yeah! Van is great. And, um, so is cooking sausage. Before you eat it. Which you should do!” Did watching two YouTube videos make you an expert on something? It was hard to judge without knowing the length of the videos, Felix supposed. They’d seen videos on YouTube that were up to eight hours long, though they’d never ventured to watch any of them. There was every possibility that Wren was an expert on food safety, even if the content of her potato salad made them doubt that she was an expert at food anything. 
In any case, she was probably better with food than… this guy. This guy who was so angry at the prospect of them eating shrimp, a popular food item! Felix didn’t mind the shove, really — they’d suffered far, far worse, after all — but it was nice that Wren was so upset about it. They offered her a small, grateful smile. “I’m okay, Wren,” they assured her, glancing down at the muffins. At least they’d managed to let one person eat one before they were ruined. And Wren had said they were good!
They glanced back up, away from the muffins and back to the situation at hand. The situation which saw Wren… eating the man’s pocket shrimp. That couldn’t be healthy, could it? It had been in his pocket! Shrimp needed to be stored at certain temperatures, probably! Felix took an uncertain step forward, faltering when the shrimp man’s wail cut through the air.
“You would dare? What makes you think you’re worthy? What makes you think you’ve earned this?” He pointed a finger in Wren’s face, wagging it around. His own face was red with fury, growing impossibly redder as he was shoved away. He looked from Wren to Felix and back again, eyes narrowing. “We won’t forget this,” he said lowly. “You’ve made our list now. You!” He pointed to Wren. “Are an enemy of the shrimp.” 
And with that, he turned on his heel, stomping away and tossing the pamphlet behind him. 
Felix knelt, picking it up and flipping through it. “Um, that was… weird,” they admitted, shoving the pamphlet into their pocket. They’d find a garbage can to dump it in later. “It was nice of you to stand up for me, though. I really appreciate that. Are you okay?”
Felix insisted they were okay, but Wren felt so angry. How dare this man think he could just shove people around because they don’t like shrimp? All Felix’s hard work was on the grass. It made Wren’s heart hurt and that only increased her anger. She let out a shaky breath and managed a small smile in Felix’s direction. “I’m glad you’re okay, Felix. That wasn’t okay what he did! I’m very sorry for your muffins. That’s so mean of him. Mean people don’t deserve good things!” She turned her sharp glare to the man in question. 
“I would dare? No, you dare!” Wren threw back in return. Though it wasn’t the best comeback, but she was too mad to think of anything better. “Get your dumb finger out of my face, weirdo! I hope you stub your toe every morning when you wake up and every night when you go to bed! It hurts really bad and you deserve it!” Wren shrieked back at the man. “That shrimp wasn’t even that good so I’m not that worried about being on your list! List of bad shrimp recipes and storing, I bet!” She huffed. “Watch some long YouTube videos and maybe you’ll be a better person after!”
Enemy of the shrimp. Wren would eat shrimp for breakfast if it meant telling that man what’s what again. She huffed and knelt down to carefully pick up the now ruined muffins. “That was really weird. I don’t think normal people keep shrimp in their pockets.” Her head shook as she held the muffins with a sad sigh. “I’m sorry about your muffins, Felix. They were very yummy and he ruined them.” The younger girl sniffled, feeling the tears start to well in her big, brown eyes. “I’m fine! Sorry, I cry at everything.” Wren hiccuped weakly. “I’m just so sad that he was so mean to you! Maybe we could make muffins some other time? Ones that won’t end up on the grass.” 
The anger on her face was a familiar thing. Felix didn’t get mad often, didn’t tend to rage against any machine or whatever it was that people did when they were upset with the world at large, but the jaguar did. They felt his anger in their chest sometimes, burning and directionless, upset at a situation he had no control over but was stuck in all the same. Did Wren’s feel similar? Felix wondered, sometimes, how things felt when your body was only yours. Was it preferable? Or was it good to have that ‘out,’ that thing inside of you that you could point the finger at if things went too far? 
The shrimp man stormed off, not bothering to respond to Wren’s words. He’d said his piece, it seemed, put them both on some… list that Felix hoped wasn’t a literal thing. (He didn’t know their names, did he? Felix had called Wren by hers, but only her first name! You couldn’t do anything with just a first name. Could you? Anxiety ebbed in their chest.) Felix watched him go, unable to relax even after he’d disappeared into the crowd.
Turning to Wren, they tried to offer a comforting smile. They wanted to be a force of good, a steady thing to lean upon. It was hard; Felix hadn’t felt steady in years now. But Wren was clearly upset, even if she said she was fine. “I can make new muffins,” they assured her. “And, um, yeah. You could help. If you wanted to. Um… I don’t know about you, but I’m not really… feeling the picnic anymore. If you want, we could go back to my apartment, and I could show you how to make muffins? Maybe we can come back tomorrow and bring them. Does that sound okay?”
Using her free hand, Wren wiped beneath her eye where a tear had escaped. She felt like a tsunami inside right now. Everything was a swirling mix of chaotic emotions that she was having a hard time tampering down. She couldn’t remember a time she felt so angry and so upset in one breath. That man was just mean and he was mean to her friend. That wasn’t okay. She didn’t want her friends to be upset or hurt because other people didn’t know how to be kind. Part of her contemplated actually going flying for the first time in… well, ages, but immediately decided against it. She wouldn’t be any good flying like this, even if she already wasn’t the best flier there was. 
Wren managed a small smile in return. “That would be fun.” She agreed after a moment and a small sniffle. “I don’t think this picnic sounds very fun right now, either. That sounds like a lot more fun.” She sighed shakily, standing to her feet to reluctantly throw away the newly ruined muffins. Wren wiped her hands on her jeans and contemplated whether or not she wanted to take the potato salad with her to Felix’s apartment. Maybe people would enjoy it and she could come back for the tupperware container tomorrow when they brought the new muffins.
“Okay! Okay, muffin mission time. We got this.” Wren did her best to be optimistic after the torrent of emotions that had been swirling throughout her. “I’m thinking we make sure to taste two of them, one each, that way more than just one person gets to have them.” She reasoned, practically skipping beside Felix as they headed away from the picnic. The picnic definitely hadn’t gone like Wren envisioned, but she got something out of it regardless. More time with a new friend and apparently on the list of the shrimp… Whatever that may mean she could only hope for the best and be optimistic for what could come. Not everything had to be scary, right? Right.
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kodiacast · 8 days
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Timing: Within the last week or so Location: Whichever cemetery is closest to the harbor probably Feat: @recoveringdreamer & @kodiacast Warnings: None! Summary: Just two confused folks lookin at a lobster
Felix had never really understood the appeal of cemeteries. It had always seemed a little morbid, the idea of standing on top of your buried dead and speaking to them as if they were there. Maybe it was the balam’s ability to see ghosts that made the concept a strange one, or maybe it was more tied to the fact that the dead person they’d loved the most hadn’t been buried in a graveyard. (Cremation had made more sense, their father said; the idea of someone digging up his mother for her pelt had been more than enough to convince Felix to agree.)
So they didn’t spend a lot of time in places like this, tended to avoid them altogether when they could. But… cutting through this particular cemetery was the quickest way home tonight, and Felix was tired enough to put aside their discomfort in favor of the shortcut. They had their hands in their pockets as they trudged past the tombstones, trying not to look at the names carved into the granite. Some were familiar; that was a side effect of growing up in Wicked’s Rest for the fourteen years they’d lived here before their father whisked them away.
A scuffling nearby caught their attention, and their head turned towards it instinctively. They were expecting to see a mourner or another passerby. They were not expecting to see a giant lobster. Maybe that was their first mistake.
Blinking, Felix stopped in their tracks to stare, eyes wide. They heard someone else approaching and quickly put their hands up. “Careful!” They warned, turning towards the stranger. Whoa, was he dressed like a fireman? Was it Halloween? Felix stared at him, too, for a moment before snapping out of it. “Um, careful. There’s a lobster.”
On the ranch, the weirdest thing Otis ever saw was a cow born with two heads. Only strange as a quirk of nature, rather than something truly bizarre. Wicked’s Rest however, had a panoply of oddities around every corner. The distinction between the stories in the writer’s head and the sights he’d spy on the streets had never been thinner. Never been so unclear. 
He’d always seen things. Ones that shouldn’t have been possible, shouldn’t have existed. But hell, he could turn into a bear. Often would, if lacking in the esoteric eating habit he couldn’t seem to shake. Who was he to judge? Even so, he was hard pressed to find much else supernatural on the ranch. He was just an anomaly. Alone in kind but not in heart. His mother’s both saw to that. They didn’t care whatever he was, so he didn’t really put much stock into it either. Still, every so often, they’d be out in town and pass by someone who neither Brenda or Patti noticed a difference in yet Otis saw them for something distinctly un-human. 
Maybe he just had a big imagination. Always had, actually. Maybe this was just a part of it. So why couldn’t he just be seeing things as that expansive mind thought they might be, rather than what they were. Otis never minded. Never brought it up even when talking to someone who looked much more like a bush than a barista, more like a shadow than a sales clerk. Wicked’s Rest was full of these strange visions. Otis assumed it was just because he was somewhere new. Somewhere more populated. Maybe the cold and dealing with northern attitudes had made him seek comfort in the strange. That made sense. He was content to leave it at that until, well, right up until– 
“A lobster?” The firefighter’s path home had taken him through the cemetery. It wasn’t a great place to be at night (Otis’ relief had been late again, but the bear didn’t mind much) but it was much faster to get back to the shitty little apartment by going through, then circling the length of the whole field. He expected he might see some oddities. Always a daydream of a goth kid or two, some people pretending to be vampires, or an imagining of a zombie or something. He did not expect someone else to see the very same chitinous creature the bear assumed he’d conjured from his thoughts. 
“You– you mean the big guy?” 
The stranger — the firefighter? Were there firefighters in Wicked’s Rest? There must have been, since there were fires and all, but some part of Felix found it strange, somehow, like firefighters were too normal to exist in a town full of giant lobsters. — didn’t seem entirely put off by the lobster, and there was a moment where the balam wondered if they’d somehow imagined it. Had their mind invented a lobster where there wasn’t one? They had been under a pretty great amount of stress lately. Stressed minds saw things that weren’t there, and that probably included giant lobsters. But… no. That was ridiculous. This was Wicked’s Rest. If you thought you saw a giant lobster, there was probably a giant lobster.
This was confirmed when the probably-a-firefighter spoke again, asking about the big guy. Felix blinked, looking back to the lobster and holding up his hands. Palms out, thumbs together, carefully placing the lobster between his fingers as if to measure it before turning back to the stranger with a satisfied nod. “He’s pretty big, yeah,” they agreed, feeling fairly confident in the response. “I, uh… I don’t know if he’s friendly or not, but a lot of things aren’t, and he’s in the graveyard, and maybe he wants to eat someone, so I’d, um… Make a wide path.”
The scene was something out of a sunday comic strip. Two tall figures at the edge of a winding path, both staring out in disbelief and confusion at a sight that shouldn’t have been possible, but somehow they could both perceive. The monstrous lobster was scuttling to and fro. It paid little mind to the living, fancying itself with the fresh lump of earth it appeared to be quite fascinated by. Otis couldn’t help but be taken by musings. Observations. 
Descriptions blossomed in his mind, the way he’d describe such a thing if it were to appear in Tales from Beyond. A mass of bright red bone-like structure, entirely too still until it began to twitch this way and that. Not unlike a spider, but much more bulbous, spiky. Its body swayed with a groaning grind of carapace against carapace as it dug at the freshly turned earth. Long spindly limbs akimbo. Too far to properly get a glimpse of its maw, though that particular fact was more of a blessing than any kind of problem. 
Otis tore his eyes away for a moment, realizing how wrapped up he’d been, and how it had made him forget his manners. “...’preciate it.” He nodded, offering the stranger what he believed to be a smile, but in reality was no more than a twitch where his lips met his cheek. “...The heads up, I mean.” 
It wasn’t as if Felix had never seen strange things in Wicked’s Rest. Felix was a strange thing in Wicked’s Rest. But you never really expected to see a giant lobster scuttering through a cemetery, did you? It wasn’t really something you put on your list of possible activities for the day. And yet, there it was. Undeniably present, unless the stranger at Felix’s side was messing with them. (But he probably wouldn’t do that, right? Firefighters were upstanding citizens. They had to be. They fought fires.) 
Glancing over as the man spoke, Felix offered him a small smile. “Yeah,” he acknowledged. “Um, of course. I wouldn’t want you to get… Do lobsters pinch people? Is that — Is that something we should be worried about here? I wouldn’t want you to get pinched. He’s got really big claws, right? It’d probably hurt. My, uh, my brother used to say that normal-sized lobsters could pinch your fingers off. I don’t know if that’s true, but if it is, I bet a lobster that big could take off your whole arm. And you probably need your arms, for the firefighter thing. I mean, assuming you’re a firefighter. And not just dressed as one. I know other people dress as firefighters sometimes. I went as one for Halloween when I was a kid. Not that it’s Halloween now! It’s winter. Or spring. And Halloween is in fall. So…”
Trailing off, Felix looked sheepishly back to the lobster. They’d never been much good at this — at the talking. They always wound up saying too much, rambling on and on about things that didn’t make sense. Leo used to cut them off in the middle, remind them that no one really cared what they were saying. In some ways, Felix had come to rely on that. Without it… They’d go on forever, wouldn’t they? Rambling about things no one cared about to strangers while giant lobsters dug at the dirt. Embarrassing. 
“...yeah.” While Otis wanted to wax poetic about the size of lobsters, and how he’d heard that up north they got big, and yet he wasn’t prepared to see something quite like the creature a few yards away. Instead, he nodded along. Soaking up the stranger’s words. Considering their position. The firefighter blinked a few times, tried to collect his thoughts into a coherent sentence. “Makes sense with the… big claws.” He nodded knowingly, despite how much he didn’t. “Bigger pinchers, bigger… appendages…right? Like it could take an arm maybe.” 
A curiosity spread into inspiration, and the bear took out his sketchbook. Pulling it from the side pocket of the duffle bag he had slung around his back. Otis figured it wasn’t often that he’d get another up close encounter with the local wildlife. Certainly not on his way home. “...You dressed up as a firefighter?” Conversation, people liked that sorta thing, right? The other seemed better at it than he was. Not that that was a hard act to follow. “That’s… sweet.” 
—   
“Right! Right, yeah.” There was some relief in the way the firefighter seemed to understand the rambling stream of consciousness that tumbled from Felix’s mouth. Most people didn’t. The nice ones would just let him talk, while the less polite would snap at him to shut up. No one had ever agreed with them before, though. They weren’t really sure how to feel about it. It was nice, but it kind of felt wrong. There was something almost sad about the thought.
Craning their head a little as the man pulled out his sketchbook, Felix nodded absently. “Uh, one year, yeah. Another year I was Superman. I went as something different every year. I didn’t really dig repeats, you know? My brother went as Peter Pan every year for five years in a row, but I didn’t like that. I wanted to be different. And — And his Peter Pan costume wasn’t even really a Peter Pan costume, anyway. It was Robin Hood, and our mom just made adjustments, so it wasn’t…” Not important. “Um, are you drawing? In the sketchbook. Are you drawing the lobster?”
“... Superman? Fan of…comics then?” Otis liked comics. His moms kept a variety in their ‘library’. Everything from old anthologies to whatever came out recently, if they had a chance to run into the closest town with a geeky store anyway. “...Repetitive could get old, I see what ya mean. But if he liked it… s’pose that's well and good for him. Ta each their own pancakes, er somethin’ like that.” 
The firefighter didn't look over at the other, might have felt a little bad about it but it seemed they were fairly interested in whatever he was doing anyway, and it required a lot of his attention. The pencil floated over the page, slowly shading in the details that he could see. Multiple angles, gestures and studies. 
“Ah, yeah. Y’know. Never seen somethin’ like that before. Are…they common ‘round here?” Otis finally peeled his gaze away, fairly satisfied with the sketches for the moment, back to his manners and his new acquaintance. “I mean, if yer also from ‘round here. Guess there's lots a–” he paused, searching for the word transplants, but failing to find it. “–folks who moved from yonder.” He nodded. Nice. “Me– me too. I'm one of them. Guess you could pick that like a prize pie at a state fair, what with the accent…” 
“Not really. I just kind of thought his costume was cool. I liked the cape.” And the spandex, though that felt a stranger thing to admit to. “Yeah, he liked it a lot, so that’s his, uh, pancakes, I guess.” They’d never heard it phrased like that before, but the firefighter seemed smart, so Felix figured he knew what he was talking about. If he said pancake metaphors were the way to go, Felix would support him.
It was fascinating, watching the man draw. Felix had never been much of an artist themself — they could manage stick figures, but anything more complex was out of their wheelhouse — so it was interesting to see someone work through a process like this. The firefighter made the pencil look like an extension of his own hand, and Felix didn’t think they could do that with anything. Not a pencil or a paintbrush or a knife or a sculpting tool. They didn’t even know what it was to have full control of their own body, given the jaguar of it all.
Humming, Felix shrugged at the question. “I’ve never seen one before, but I don’t know. That doesn’t mean they’re not common, right?” A lot of things like this had ways of avoiding detection. That was why so many humans lived in Wicked’s Rest without knowing that there was anything odd about the town, wasn’t it? “I grew up here. I mean, kind of. I moved away when I was a kid. But then I came back! So…” They trailed off with a vague gesture. “Yeah, um, it’s a cool accent. Like Bones in Star Trek. Or the cowboy in Night at the Museum. Where are you from?”
He could appreciate that. The taller figure nodded along. Thinking it through, remembering the sheet of crimson flowing behind the blue suit. Picturing it and rolling the idea around in his mind. Each thought bubble meandering through a syrup thick stream of consciousness, they met and multiplied, carrying off the bear’s attention through the roster of all things Kal El related. He was a nice boy. That memory stuck out amongst the rest. Otis’ mum had made sure to stress the importance of that to the young bear as he grew up. Superman was strong, but people liked him because Clark Kent was kind. 
When the fog lifted, Felix had added more questions to the roster. Ones the man had missed. Lost to the night like the many, many, many limbs lost to the large crustacean by the small pile of corpses it was amassing behind its spiny legs. Otis’ brows lowered, coming to a halt in a straight line over his eyes. His lips responded in kind, curling into his cheeks making him look like an exceptionally confused and confounded chipmunk.
The very last question was the only one to sink past the fortress of frolicking thoughts. Otis shook the concern from his face, chalking down the lobster’s display as just ‘one of those weird WR things’. One he might have to talk to someone about. Probably. Whenever he had a moment.  “Uh– yeah, I’m from Georgia. Just a bit outside Savannah, my mamas own a big ranch.” 
Felix had never really been much of a superhero person. The outfits were cool — they’d always like the idea of wearing a cape — but the concept was a little too much for them. The idea of helping people by hurting them wasn’t one Felix could really get behind, even when the people being hurt were the bad guys. It was something their father had used as an excuse for decades, after all, a thing he’d spouted while Felix was stuck burying bodies. Felix didn’t want to be like that. Having freeze breath or laser vision or whatever superpowers comic books boasted seemed just as stressful as having a jaguar spirit living inside you who’d really like it if you started eating people more often.
The firefighter shot Felix a confused look, and Felix blinked, wondering if they’d said something wrong. They knew they talked a lot, in situations like this one; it was a nervous habit. They liked to fill the silence, liked to make sure there was always something to listen to even if it was only their own voice.
Still, the man didn’t seem annoyed with them, and Felix decided to take that at face value. If someone was mad at you, they thought, it was that person’s job to tell you they were rather than leave you guessing about it, right? They offered him a smile, nodding. “Georgia! I bet Georgia’s cool. There’s a lot of songs about Georgia, right? Um, did you like it? The ranch. Hey, do you know why they call ranch dressing ranch?”
“I mean– It’s actually pretty warm. Even in winter.” Otis misunderstood. It wasn’t that he’d never heard the phrase. One of the ranch hands used it pretty liberally, it was just never in the context of a chilly night in Maine where his mind was fairly preoccupied with the large creature going about its business, oblivious to the two chatting away at the edge of the cemetery. “S’pose there is songs, yeah.” 
The other question was a lot more to consider. His moms hated the smell of ranch dressing, but Tawny, yet another ranch hand, loved the stuff. Put it on everything. Fries, burgers, peaches. It was a bit much. The sauce had a nasty acerbic stank that wafted out and around. Hurt the bear’s nose, made it itch and twitch and feel like he couldn’t orient himself. Fair to say he avoided the stuff as often as possible. So again, he was quiet for a bit. Stirring the thoughts inside like a big old pot of risotto, until it came together, finally. “Has milk in it.” Otis nodded. 
“But- uh– You?” He realized, a moment later, that he’d been rude. When people asked questions, they liked to be asked them in return, right? “Where you from?” 
— 
“Oh,” Felix let out an uncertain laugh, not sure if the firefighter was joking but not wanting to be impolite either way. Was it worse to not laugh at a person’s joke, or to laugh at something they meant genuinely? Sometimes, it was difficult for Felix to pick up on little things like that. After all, they’d spent most of their life only interacting with their own family. Social interactions weren’t something they were great at. It was difficult to understand tone, sometimes, when the person speaking wasn’t someone you’d known since you were a baby. “Do you, uh… like the songs?” It seemed odd to make small talk in front of a giant lobster, but Felix wasn’t sure what else to do.
Milk? Of all the things Felix might have expected ranch dressing to contain, milk wasn’t one of them. Maybe it should have been, though — why else would it be white? Felix had never cared for the taste and, given their lactose intolerance, that was probably a good thing. Maybe their distaste for ranch had saved them an upset stomach more than once. “Do you eat a lot of it? On a ranch, I mean. Is that why it’s called ranch?” They were half curious, half filling the silence, but they really did hope that the guy might have an answer for them.
“Uh, I’m from here. Wicked’s Rest. I moved away for a while with my family, but I moved back a few years ago on my own. What brought you here? I know it’s kind of got, um, a reputation.”
It only ever dawned on Otis that the quip was quop in the presence of a laugh. Half-hearted as it may have been, the great bear was glad to have brought forth any amount of joy. Of course he always sought to add more, but fell short on any additional puns in the present moment. Instead, he nodded along. Thinking briefly on the second question before coming to a response. 
“Some of ‘em.” Eloquence. Practically a monologue. Champion of conversation. He almost wished he could blame it on the lobster but, sadly, this was just kind of how the bear acted. Blundering along, all of his thoughts and all of his words so carefully kept and organized behind that thick skull. Never really making it out until he had a chance to put pen to paper or fingers to keys. 
“Can't stand it, really.” Ranch dressing. Eugh. Put a bad name to what was a wonderful place in Otis’ mind. The most wonderful, probably. “Maybe… other ranches though.” He affirmed, not wanting to shut down the other’s idea. “We have more of a… peach thing.” A pause. “Orchard. Make all sorts of peach wines and mead. Got goats…. Honey too. For the– use it for the mead.” The words themselves seemed to mozy about with the same languid tempo his accent danced upon. Many pauses and noises that sounded an awful lot like a bear trying to root its way through a pile of rubbish. “Lots of stuff but not– no dressin’ or nothing. Though my mama did try and make a sauce, what with the peaches and the honey. Tasted mighty delicious on some fried chicken, I'll tell you what.” Something about being given space to complain a little was enough to open him up juuuust enough for a few more words to escape. A little more introspection to his introduction. Maybe more than he'd shared with most of the people he interacted with.
In the same respect, the big old lobster seemed to be satisfied with its haul and began to skuttle off,  dragging the dirt laden bodies behind it. Heading in the direction Otis had to guess was towards the sea. He watched, half fascinated, half repulsed. “From here? You must be a whole lot more used to the…” A hand shuffled out in front of the tall man. Gesturing vaguely towards the creature. “Not so much of this back–” Half sentences were all he could muster each time before hearing another bone snap, or smelling the putrid essence of death. 
“Came here for uhh– inspiration. Writing.” He admitted, though if Otis had been asked, he didn't know if he would answer truthfully to what he was writing. Couldn't risk losing the anonymity of his podcast. So maybe it was a novel. And hey, scary writers loved Maine. Look at Stephen King! Very plausible. “Bit too quiet back home. Strangely enough, it sorta… made it so I couldn’t hear my own thoughts. It's…. Nice to be busy up here. Tryin’ sum’n new.” Otis sighed and tugged at the bottom of his shirt absentmindedly. The fire department was a very different ball game to the ranch. Whole new team too. At first it was…. A bit too much. But it came to be one of the things he relied on now. The routine interlaced with just enough spontaneity to keep his mind flexible. To keep stories coming so he didn't have to… well. Use the strange stone that sat in the back of his closet and whispered in the deepest reaches of his mind. 
“What brought you back?” 
“Oh, yeah, that makes sense.” After all, weren’t there a variety of genres of songs starring Georgia? Country western seemed to be the most popular — for reasons Felix figured were pretty obvious — but there was no hard and fast rule saying a song about the state of Georgia had to be sung with a southern twang. And nobody liked every genre of music, did they? Even Felix, as flexible as they tried to be, had their preferences.
And clearly, the firefighter did, too. Felix wasn’t sure why they laughed at his response to the question of ranch dressing, but the noise slipped out followed by a quiet murmur of, “sorry.” Peaches, they thought, sounded a lot more appealing, anyway. “Oh, I like peach wine. It’s sweet. You know? I like sweet things more than the bitter stuff.” They couldn’t stand most alcohol because of the taste. More often than not, they found themself practically choking it down just to fit in with whoever they might be with at the moment. Leo had been fond of beer; he’d often chastised Felix for not enjoying the taste, tried to ‘sweet talk’ them into drinking more. Peach wine would have been better, they thought. “Does she make it often? I bet it’s great on chicken.” They smiled a little at the way he spoke about his mother, the look in his eyes, even if there was a distant pang in their gut at the thought of their own mother. 
They’d almost forgotten about the giant lobster, what with the conversation and all. They only remembered it when it made a noise as it prepared for its departure, scuttling off towards home. Felix felt a strange sense of envy towards it, in a way; it must have been something wonderful, they thought, to be so sure of where you belonged. “Yeah,” they confirmed, wrinkling their nose at the stench. They were glad their abilities awarded them a way not to always have access to the jaguar’s enhanced sense of smell; they had a feeling this was the kind of thing that was bad enough with human senses. “This kind of thing happens sometimes. You learn to roll with the punches.”
They looked back to the firefighter as he spoke again, offering a small smile. “That’s cool. I always thought a writer looked like a fun job to have.” They’d wanted to try it once, had expressed some interest to Leo, who’d laughed and told them that writers were meant to be smart and Felix wasn’t. Like most other inclinations Felix had, this one had died in infancy, strangled before its first breath. Maybe it was better that way, in some sense. Better to never have a thing than to have it and lose it, right? “What kind of books do you write? Have you, um, published any?” It would be cool to read a book written by someone he knew, wouldn’t it? 
The question sent Felix’s gaze back to their feet, and they shrugged. “I, um… I was dating someone who lived here. I moved back to move in with him, but…” They trailed off with another shrug, allowing a heavy, uncomfortable silence to settle. After a moment, they cleared their throat and looked back to the disturbed grave. “I, uh… I think I’m gonna fill it back in. I know the lobster made off with the body, but… It’s not really about the body, is it? And someone might come by in the morning. With flowers or something. So I’m gonna…” They took a step towards the grave.
Otis paused, eyes lifted up to the sky as if the stars peering out behind the partial cloud cover would act as some sort of cosmic shazam feature, letting him know all the Georgian songs he hadn’t heard of. When they didn’t, and he still didn’t know, he simply nodded again. A purse to his lips that still held deep consideration. “You got a mighty fine head on you, kin. Thinkin’ a things I ain’t ever pondered.” 
This too, was something to sit on. They liked sweet things, and despite not even knowing their name, Otis filed that info away. After all, he’d have to find a way to thank the kind stranger for stopping him before becoming… lobster chow. “Sort of a special occasions thing. We had plenty of peaches, bein’ a peach farm n’ all. But Mama always had a mind about her that if we ate ‘em always, we’d grow tired right quick.” Otis didn’t think he’d ever get tired of them, but that was okay. It wasn’t like he couldn’t go out and sneak a stone fruit on the slightest of whims. What was more intriguing though, was the honey. More than once he’d gone and given himself a quick lick when the hives were calm enough. “Could try and get the recipe if ya like, though I ain’t much of a cook. Always… take it out… too early… More hungry than scared a’ raw stuff I guess.” 
His gaze drifted again, on the wind, towards the beastie. Almost invisible beyond the treeline. Well enough out of their path that both of them could probably make their way forward, but ah– His new acquaintance had a better idea. A kinder one for sure. Otis followed, continuing the conversation as they moved to start filling in the emptied grave. “Couple of short stories, but not like… widely published.” His shoulders were built for hard labor. Nothing about this was too different from mucking out the horses' stables, or digging in the fields. Except maybe, the lack of shovel. But whatever. “S’pose if you see fit to give me a number or somethin’ I could send ‘em your way. Along with the chicken recipe.” 
It wasn’t a compliment Felix got often, and they couldn’t help but smile at the words. They liked the firefighter, were glad that the two of them happened to be in the graveyard at the same time, glad that this strange experience had brought them together for a chat. It wasn’t the strangest way Felix had met a new person in this town, but it was one of the nicer ones. No harm done, no danger. Just two people who could find decent company in one another.
The promise of a recipe only made Felix’s smile widen, and they nodded their head. “Oh, I love to cook. Hey, maybe if I crack it I could make it for you! Then you can eat it without having to worry about being the one cooking it. Right?” After all, it was probably more than Felix would be able to eat on their own. They could share with Luci and Milo, too, of course, but… maybe the firefighter walking through the graveyard at night could use more friends to fall back on. Felix knew they could, at least. “And I promise, I won’t make it raw.” 
Humming, they nodded again. Widely published or no, short or long, the stranger had finished something. That, to Felix, was a thing to be admired. Pulling out their phone, Felix offered it over for the man to add his number. Once he had, the balam sent him a quick text so he’d have theirs, too. “I’d love to read them sometime. And make the chicken, of course. Whenever you want…” They looked down at the contact that had been added with a smile. “Otis. It was great talking to you!”
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muertarte · 9 days
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TIMING: Right after this
PARTIES: @animotoph0bia @muertarte
SUMMARY: Metzli runs into an injured Finn and decides to help.
WARNINGS: None
Stupid pride. Or had it mostly been fear. For some reason, that stupid skit about never letting anyone take you to a secondary location was on repeat in his head, forcing out pained and involuntary chuckles interrupted by hissing with every other step. Finn couldn’t properly steady his limp and useless arm with the hand that felt like it was on fire, having at some point settled for somewhat leaning against the nearest wall for support. 
It wasn’t really working. 
Everything felt fuzzy, both his mind and his face, adrenaline starting to drain from his body and leaving only so much exhaustion and pain. Finn was sort of sure that he was heading in the direction of the hospital but honestly, maybe instinct was just leading him home - it was hard to tell. As long as he could get somewhere to lie down, far away from where he’d been in case the man with the knife decided to change his mind. Or unchange it, he supposed. 
Like so many times before, Finn didn’t have cash on him and honestly, he wasn’t even sure if a taxi would stop for a guy in his state. His messed up hand was covered in someone else’s blood for fuck��s sake. He rarely put a lot of faith in humanity and tonight was not the time it would change. The sound of a car rolling to a stop had him freezing instead of filling with relief, muscles tensing and pulling at his shoulder as he turned his head, expecting to meet the sinister, blue eyed gaze once again. 
Wicked’s Rest was filled with many things. Creatures, beasts, and ghosts that stalked the darkness. Being one of them, Metzli could always spot the others, but more importantly, they could find the victims of their siblings shrouded in night. This was a talent they’d had since their experience in the clan. Even without using their nose, just in sight alone, Metzli was an expert hunter, but that wasn’t the case that evening. Instead, as morality had wrapped itself around their heart the moment their sire died, the vampire offered kindness. 
They chose to ignore the way their fangs ached at the smell of blood on the stranger’s hands. 
“Excuse me,” Metzli swallowed, gripping their steering wheel tightly as a means to steel themself. The blood smelled so good. “What is wrong with you?” Though the question was blunt and likely to be taken badly, the vampire meant nothing by it. There was no confusion or even a judgmental tone. Just an even and dry question looking for a blatant answer. But maybe Metzli should’ve known better than to continue speaking. 
“You look very bad.”
So, not the creepy guy back to finish the job. Was this person creepy? Finn wasn’t sure if his radar for it was correct at the moment, set on high alert. They didn’t feel like much but to be fair, Finn wasn’t sure he had the capacity to feel anything other than his own pain and exhaustion at the moment. Point for the ME, he noted begrudgingly. Tired eyes took in the stranger, their furrowed eyebrows, and tried to detect any hint of hostility. It wasn’t glaringly obvious but then, as this evening had made clear, he was dumb as bricks. 
The question made him huff out a laugh because fucking valid, and not just because he looked like shit. “Besides the broken bones? So fucking much,” Finn answered honestly, cocking his head at the follow up statement. “And yes, I’m aware. Which is why I’m heading to the hospital. Or I think I’m heading to the hospital. Maybe home, whichever I find first.” Heaving in a breath, Finn turned from the car to continue the slow shuffle down the street, making it a total of five steps before a fresh wave of pain made his vision go black. 
“Fuck,” Finn sighed, slowly but surely sliding down against the wall until he was fully sitting on the ground, cradling the useless appendage. Just a short break, then he’d get right back on track. 
Clenching their jaw tightly, the vampire shut their eyes and imagined the roadmap they had memorized of the town. The direction the stranger was heading was the wrong way, and in his bloody and haggard state, Metzli wasn’t sure he was even going to make it to his home if he was wandering aimlessly. Opening their eyes, they swallowed the urge to take a greedy breath of air to calm themself, completely avoiding the scent of blood. They watched the young man’s gait turn into a hobble, his body relinquishing itself to exhaustion. There was no other choice but to help, and maintain control over their hunger while doing so.
“Boy.” They called out to the stranger, trying to get his mind to focus and stay awake as they bolted from their car. When they knelt next to him, that’s when Metzli saw just how serious the injuries were. And thanks to Regan’s many lessons on anatomy and decay, they knew how to label each one. 
Lacerations, contusions, a dislocation, and…they narrowed their eyes at his hand, a bit disconcerted at the way it had swelled and appeared wrong. Someone had hurt him, the intention in such an attack plain to see by someone as experienced in fighting and injuring as Metzli was. The story could change though, couldn’t it? They could be a good person, could choose the kindness they’d always wanted to give. They didn’t have to be a monster. 
They breathed deeply, “My name is Metzli and I will not hurt you.” It sounded like a promise, red eyes impossible to suppress, but genuine and kind as they softened to accompany Metzli’s statement. “Hospital is other way and I will take you, but I can,” English began to fail them, but after a short pause, Metzli managed to find their way. “Make pain less.” They gestured to the stranger’s shoulder. “Will hurt much at the beginning, but it will be less when it is in right position. Does this have sense to you?”
From somewhere, Finn found the energy to get annoyed at being called a boy, especially by someone who looked maybe a few years older than him. Annoyance was good, though - it cleared his mind just the tiniest bit. Although he was kinda hoping that the glaring red eyes were part of a pain-induced hallucination and not real. Not that it mattered, he wasn’t exactly in a state to run off. 
Metzli introduced themselves and it made the blood colored irises a little less spooky. The words did imply that they could hurt him if they felt so inclined but then again, Finn felt like a kitten could end his life at this point so whatever. “Hey, Metzli. I’m Finn. You have red eyes,” he commented tiredly and yeah, maybe he was a tiny bit delirious, shut up. Assistance to the hospital did sound promising, hospitals had medication. His odds of getting there himself without perishing definitely seemed worse than letting this one armed stranger help him. “Nothing makes much sense at this point but as long as the plan isn’t chopping off my arm, go nuts,” Finn resigned, too tired to care. Not like it could hurt more than it currently did, right?
Wrong. Very wrong, and dumb - the unofficial theme of this evening. Finn wasn’t sure if what had left his mouth had even been English, some amalgamation of curses and general noises. He couldn’t even appreciate the strength of Metzli’s single arm, or the fact that they seemed to have done this before. Probably more than once. The part about it hurting a bit less hadn’t been a lie, thank fuck, but as soon as pain gave way, it only left room for more exhaustion. “Ow,” Finn groaned pitifully once black spots cleared from his vision, legs fully the consistency of jello at this point. 
Finn was blunt, and it made Metzli smile, though they were sure Finn would think their face was unchanged. “You are bleeding. Blood makes my eyes turn red and fangs appear.” It was a statement they made dryly, unaware if it made the young man uncomfortable. Metzli didn’t think anything could be more uncomfortable than being covered in injuries, or microfiber, but they’ve been known to be wrong about how people feel. It came with their very unique territory. 
Or so they’ve been told.
“What is wrong with having only one arm?” Furrowing their brows as they pondered, Metzli raised their half limb and waved it for a few moments. “It was torn off by someone else for punishment.” Another bland statement, but they didn’t give Finn much of an opportunity to react or respond before they moved in to adjust his shoulder. It was better that way. People didn’t flinch or lock up as badly when they were distracted, and Metzli hoped that Finn didn’t begin to leak once he was done with his outburst. 
They’d never heard so many obscenities in one breath before. It was actually a bit impressive until Finn topped it off with a bland ‘ow’ and his body nearly going completely limp. “I am going to carry you now.” Metzli droned like a humanoid robot, slipping their arm around Finn and lifting him up without much struggle on their part. The problem with lifting someone nearly limp, with one arm was the lack of control either party had. But to Metzli’s surprise and relief, they managed to tumble both of them to their car, with only a few bumps into the door as they tried to open it. Thankfully, no one was around to see the struggle. Or so they hoped. 
Focus. 
“Can you put seatbelt on by yourself or do you need more help?”
Ah, fangs. Cool. At least this wasn’t a new kind of strange thing, just another vampire. Finn had dealt with that before, very unsuccessfully but still. And this one did really seem intent on helping. Tired eyes had managed to track the movement of Metzli’s arm - stump? Half-arm? - as they asked a question with a seemingly obvious answer. “It’s… well, then you don’t have two arms?” Finn answered dumbly, feeling like that should have explained it. He already felt physically useless most of the time with all appendages intact, there was no need to further his problems. After this evening, it almost sounded reasonable that someone had simply torn off Metzli’s arm. Witnessing what seemed like freaking organ harvesting and then a man impaling his own hand as an intimidation technique, it just sounded on par. 
Metzli gave him warning but everything still spun as he was raised up from the ground. Finn did his best to be slightly more than just dead weight, although that just seemed to throw the vampire more off balance, but it was a short walk. He didn’t even mind his head knocking into the open door as he was discarded like a sack of potatoes into the back seat, breathing heavily from the exertion of doing basically nothing. “I got it, I got it,” he mumbled, feeling very childlike for a moment as he struggled to make the clasp stick. When it finally did, Finn sighed victoriously. 
Even with the knowledge that a vampire, one that was clearly aware of the blood coating his hand, was driving the car, Finn did feel safe as they took off. “You didn’t have to do that,” he finally spoke, gaze settled on the blurry lights outside as they passed. “Probably shouldn’t have. Trying to help a stranger is what got me fucked up in the first place. Although you’re not a vulnerable bag of blood so maybe you got that going for you.”
“Yes, that is a factual statement.” Once again, they wiggled what was left of their arm with a curious tilt of their head. Finn was strange, and Metzli had a feeling it had nothing to do with any head injury or blood loss that he’d experienced. They couldn’t imagine what he was like on a typical day, but they were sure he wouldn’t be all that terrible to be around. Hopefully their judge of character wouldn’t suddenly steer them wrong. 
Although, watching the way Finn struggled to put on his seatbelt and sighing like a tired little kid made the vampire feel more secure in their assessment.
Shrugging, Metzli circled around the car and took their seat, setting the car into drive to head toward the hospital. The smell of blood continued to entice them, but the conversation Finn attempted to start was enough of a distraction. Even with the mention of blood. Bags Metzli no longer felt comfortable stealing, but they were sure that wasn’t exactly Finn was referring to. Regardless, they shook their head and looked at the young man in their rear view mirror, a weight pulling their shoulders down. They’d done horrible things in the past, allowed people to die by acting on orders and standing idle when required. That Metzli was no more. Freedom allowed kindness to shine through, and the child of night would accept that warmth, and pass it on.
“I like being kind,” They finally said, seeing the hospital sign in the distance. In a matter of minutes, they’d arrive, and their job would be over. “I still bleed a little and it still hurts, but this does not matter to me.” Flashes of Teocaltiche and the neighboring states of Mexico made Metzli subtly wince, the pain they had once inflicted sending a spiky ball of guilt down their throat. Pain was inevitable and necessary, but tragedy set in motion was not, and they’d be damned if they ever began doing that again. Little by little, Metzli would redeem the monster they once were, giving as much of themself as they could for people that needed a little more help than others. And if Finn’s heroic behavior was an indicator, they were positive they’d see him again. 
They’d offer help then, too. 
“We are almost there.”
Metzli was interesting, in a good way. It helped that they didn’t seem too off-put by… well, anything, including the chaotic rambling from Finn, taking it in stride. He had a feeling he’d be hard pressed to spout anything that would insult them, accidental or not, which was nice for a change. Sure, the circumstances of this meeting preferably could have been less traumatic and bone crushing but bright side and fucking whatnot. 
His line of questioning had caused an uncharacteristic lack of response, the silence turning his gaze to the back of Metzli’s head and then catching their gaze in the rearview mirror. Even in his current state, Finn could feel the empty space where there should have been a swirl of emotions, evidenced by the look in those eyes. Maybe a good thing he couldn’t feel it - this night had him feeling like a wrung out towel. The answer finally came and he smiled softly, leaning his head back. “Pretty solid answer,” he concluded. “The weirdo from the alley definitely could have used some pointers from you.” 
Perking up at the update on their trip, Finn did indeed see the hospital looming in the distance, a sight he never thought he’d be happy to see. “I… I feel like I owe you. Like, it feels weird to not even pay you for the gas, not to mention there’s definitely some blood in your car now but I don’t know, maybe you don’t mind that… I don’t even have cash on me. Promise you’ll let me pay you back somehow?”
Whatever Finn was saying was drowned out. Showings of gratitude were unnecessary and futile, to say the least. With the wealth Metzli had accumulated from the criminals they’d killed and the genuine business side of their gallery, they didn’t need for much at all. If anything, they wanted to extend the kindness further, and they would. Metzli had paid hospital bills before, without batting an eye, and in Finn’s condition, they weren’t sure if his wallet had fallen out during his bloody scuffle. Not that it mattered. Having money or not, being attacked was enough trouble. Bills didn’t need to be added on top of that. 
“We are here.” 
They turned into the emergency room parking lot, quickly unbuckling themself and getting Finn out of the car. He could hardly walk, but his legs seemed to oblige as much as they could. As they led him to the sliding doors, which activated for a group of people shuffling indoors, Metzli swept him up and threw him over their shoulder, not considering how strange they’d appear walking in with an injured and bleeding individual. But was that really out of the ordinary for a hospital? Let alone one in Wicked’s Rest? It didn’t matter. They were at the front desk in the blink of an eye and Finn was quickly swept away on a wheelchair to be tended to, leaving Metzli to stare blankly and wave him goodbye. 
Which was interrupted by a clipboard being shoved into their face for them to fill out. With a simple, “No.” The vampire slid their business card over to the nurse and uttered the word, “Bill,” before turning away and leaving. 
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recoveringdreamer · 9 days
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TIMING: current LOCATION: wicked's rest community theatre PARTIES: @thunderstroked & @recoveringdreamer SUMMARY: felix and mona see a play! CONTENT: none!
Mona sat beside Felix, hands folded in her lap. The musical was at intermission already– an hour and a half having flown by in the blink of an eye. As others began to get up from their seats, she turned to her friend. “What in the hell are we watching?” She’d won the tickets and had done hardly any research prior to arriving at the theater. Felix had graciously agreed to go with her, and while she felt Inge might’ve gotten a kick out of tonight, she figured that with everything going on, it might be better for the mare to stay settled. “I didn’t realize that one shrimp would explode.” 
Felix had never been to a musical before. Halfway through the shrimp musical Mona had somehow acquired tickets for, Felix still wasn’t sure they’d ever been to a musical before. The whole thing was… bizarre. Even for Felix. They couldn’t figure out the plot and, quite frankly, they weren’t even sure they knew which of the shrimps was the lead. What was more, the shrimps in question didn’t seem to be people in shrimp costumes; they seemed, as far as Felix could tell, to be actual real life shrimp. Which was weird! “You’re the one who got the tickets,” they said in a hushed tone, glancing nervously around the surprisingly crowded theater. “Are the blue shrimp and the red shrimp a couple?”
“Yes, I got the tickets, but I didn’t go seeking them out. They gave them to me as a prize for my mirror sweater.” It’d taken her awhile to finally find the energy to go and use them, but the moment she’d been given them, Mona knew that it would be Felix who’d accompany her. She stared at the stage as the red curtains closed them from watching the stagehands rearrange. “I don’t know, maybe? There is also a purple shrimp, so if they are following color theory…” Mona trailed off as she watched the people around them disperse into the lobby. She wondered how many would come back. “Why did they have to use real life smells? You can smell the brine from here too, can’t you?” She wrinkled her nose in distaste as she shifted in her seat, crossing her legs. “I cannot believe somebody brought their baby. What was that about a sacrifice?” 
“You’re the one who decided to use them, though!” As if Felix had hesitated at all when Mona asked them to accompany her. This was hardly their idea of fun, but hanging out with Mona was always worlds better than hanging out at home alone, even if it did come with a shrimp play. “You mean… You don’t think…” Felix squinted at the stage, trying to determine whether or not they liked the implication that the purple shrimp was some lovechild of the two main characters. (Or, he thought they were the main characters. It was a little hard to tell. The play’s dialogue was in a language Felix didn’t recognize.) “I don’t know. The smells are… a lot.” Felix was glad they weren’t shifted at all; they could only imagine how bad the smells would have been to the jaguar’s nose. “The sounds are weird, too. Why do their feet squelch so much? How are they so wet when they’ve been on stage in the open air for this long? They shouldn’t still be dripping.” Felix glanced down a few rows to where someone was holding an infant up to see the stage. “Do you think there’s supposed to be… audience participation?” They felt a little concerned for the baby now.
“Yes, and?” Mona piqued a brow before turning her attention back to the velvet red curtains, as if willing them to open on command to continue the play. At Felix’s comment, she nodded. “It smells like something washed up on shore, yes.” It smelled like when she’d fallen off the dock, thus creating the second time that Felix had saved her from herself. She looked over at him, shaking her head. “Maybe they are wearing special shoes to create the sound?” She didn’t think that was it, but it never hurt to throw a guess out into the open. “I hope not. I’m not interested in watching a shrimp kill a child. Maybe the other way around. Shrimp are delicious.” Probably not these shrimp, but still. Mona clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth as she considered what they’d seen on stage so far. “Do you think the shrimp with the beret will come back out? It sounded like they said its name was Liz, but I’m not sure.” 
“Okay, fair.” If Felix got free tickets to a show, they’d probably use them, too. Even if the show was… shrimp. Felix flipped through the playbill again, as if willing it to contain more information than it previously had. No new words magically appeared on the page; in fact, the only thing on the page at all was a series of photos of shrimp, increasingly close up until the final page, where the shrimp was evidently so close to the camera that red was the only thing you could see. On the back of the playbill, there was an advertisement that was no less confusing than the playbill itself. Felix was beginning to wonder about the validity of this theatre. “You don’t think — I mean, they wouldn’t serve shrimp to the audience after this. Right?” Their stomach rumbled a little in anticipation. A woman in the row ahead of them turned, shooting them a dirty look. Felix ducked his head. “I don’t know. It, uh… was kind of weird to see it in the striped shirt, wasn’t it?” Shrimp wearing hats were strange enough, but shirts? There had to be lines. “Do you think that other one is going to… keep eating eggs? I’m not really sure what the, um, point of that is. I think it was looking right at me when it slurped up the sixth egg. It was kind of weird.”
“I really hope not.” Mona’s expression twisted at the thought. She didn’t particularly feel like being fed the shrimp that were on stage. She kept an ear out for any screaming from backstage, but there wasn’t anything wrong that she could tell. “Were they trying to make us think it was a mime? It was talking, or whatever it was doing. Was that talking?” She couldn’t be too sure– it sounded like a series of squeaks and words strewn together. Come to think of it, maybe that was just the way that they sang. She noticed the way Felix ducked into their seat and she turned to look at the woman that was giving them the eye. She raised a brow and shooed her away before turning her attention back to her friend. “Maybe he knew you were hungry. I’m not sure why they’d choose eggs. Eggs aren’t even that good.” Mona frowned as she leaned into her chair. “I really hope that the second half isn’t as long as the first… I don’t know how many more times I can see them impersonating a wet cat.” 
“I think it was supposed to be talking,” Felix agreed though, in truth, they weren’t sure. They hadn’t understood a single aspect of the play so far. What made even less sense was the audience’s reaction. No one else seemed nearly as confused as Felix and Mona were. In fact, at one point, they’d heard several sniffles throughout the seats around them despite the fact that they couldn’t figure out what was happening on the stage at all, much less the emotions that should have been associated with it. “I am pretty hungry.” Not so hungry that their appetite increased at the sight of a shrimp in a wig slurping eggs on stage, though. Mona was right — eggs really weren’t all that. “Wait, was that what it was supposed to be? A cat? I thought it was a dog. I’m — I think I’m offended.” Shrimp, Felix thought adamantly, shouldn’t pretend to be cats. There was something not right about it. “What about the one in the cowboy hat? How’d they find a cowboy hat that fits the shape of a shrimp’s head? Do you think they had it custom made?”
“Was it? Seriously?” Mona wasn’t sure if Felix was right, or if they were grasping at their own straws. Probably the latter. She fiddled with the edge of her arm rest, pulling at the loose velvet-y fabric. “We can get something after this. I’m unsure about shellfish, though.” She may not be eating it for a while, anyway. The smell was abhorrent. “It was most definitely feline in nature.” She wasn’t only saying that because she wasn’t of that family. “Maybe it’s something about reversing the food chain…?” She eyed Felix, twisting fully towards them now. “How many shrimp have you eaten in your lifetime, Felix?” Would they remember? Probably not. Mona considered their question before nodding. “That, as well as the assless chaps… I didn’t realize shrimp had asses. I’ve never thought of it before.” She made a face before pulling on Felix’s sleeve. “Is that–” She pointed up towards the ceiling where it looked like one of the shrimp performers was gearing up for some kind of aerial performance. “Don’t tell me it’s going to go over our heads?” She looked around for something to cover her head with, “I do not want shrimp juice in my hair.” 
Felix only shrugged. They couldn’t be certain if the sounds coming from the shrimp on stage were intended to be dialogue or not, but that was the only thing that made sense, wasn’t it? Plays had dialogue and this was, allegedly, a play. Maybe Felix and Mona just… weren’t the intended audience. After all, presumably everyone else in the crowd had purchased their tickets while Mona had been given hers without much of a clue as to what the play was about. “Yeah, I think… no shellfish. Or any kind of seafood, really. I might be a vegetarian now.” Was that a thing they were allowed to be? The jaguar was still going to eat meat, no matter how much Felix might try to stop him. Did being a vegetarian count if you shared your body with an apex predator? How did that work? Uncomfortably, Felix squirmed in their seat. “I’m not sure I like that,” they admitted. They tried to think about how many shrimp they’d eaten, but they only knew that the answer was a lot. “You don’t think they brought us here to…” They lowered their voice, “eat us, do you? I don’t want to be eaten by a shrimp, Mona.” They followed her gaze up into the ceiling, blinking before looking back to stage. One of the performers peeked out from behind the curtain, and Felix caught a glimpse of wings retrofitted to their back. “Uh…” They were definitely gearing up for an aerial performance. “Maybe they won’t drip?”
“Don’t go that far. Spare ribs are too good to pass up. Though, I guess they are on land.” She didn’t think there were any rib-like creatures in the sea, but she could be wrong. She didn’t want to think about it for that long, mostly because the squelching sounds were making her stomach churn. Mona folded her hands in her lap, thumbs pressed into her knees as she observed their surroundings. “To eat us? How would they eat us? We’d be able to eat them. We have sharp teeth when we need to.” The idea of shifting to defend themselves was feasible, but would Felix be able to keep themself from hurting others? She wasn’t so sure. “Or maybe I should do the eating…” She reached over to pat their shoulder with a sour expression. “Listen, if they do drip, I think I might ask for some kind of compensation. Forget the fact these were given to me.” Mona sighed, watching as the curtains began to peel open. “What do you think they’re going to do first?” It hadn’t occurred to Mona, but most of the people who’d left at intermission hadn’t come back. There were only a handful of people still in their seats. “Felix.. maybe we should have left.” 
Okay, so they hadn’t considered spare ribs in the equation when pledging themself to vegetarianism. Mona, as always, made a very good point. “We can still eat ribs,” they said, unsure if the ‘we’ in the sentence was themself and Mona or themself and the jaguar. If it was the latter, it was probably unnecessary. Felix knew the jaguar would do what the jaguar wanted to do, despite Felix’s protests. “I don’t know! They’re really big shrimp. They might have really sharp teeth, too.” The last thing Felix wanted was to shift in a theatre full of people, though they’d do it if it meant keeping themself and Mona from being eaten by giant shrimp. “Could you eat that many on your own? That’s a lot of shrimp.” And she’d just said she never wanted to eat shrimp again. “I think… I might already want compensation. That green shrimp has human feet, Mona. Human feet! I don’t want to see that.” They really didn’t want to see any of this. A saner person might have just left the play, but it felt rude. Felix didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings; not even a giant shrimp with human feet. It seemed most of the rest of the audience had other ideas, though. The theatre wasn’t exactly filling back up. “I mean… I’m sure they worked hard on this. The shrimp, I mean. It’s probably not easy to put on a whole play, especially when you’re… you know… a shrimp. We should stick it through to the end, right?”
“We can,” Mona echoed, nodding her head in agreement, unaware of Felix’s inner deliberation. “Do shrimp have teeth? If that’s the case, I absolutely want nothing to do with them.” A shiver ran down her spine as her gaze wandered around the venue. She was half-expecting a bucket of krill to fall over their heads, or maybe something worse– what did shrimp eat? Algae? Would algae fall over them? Mona wasn’t keen on being covered in algae. “I could do whatever I wanted, but if they have teeth, then those are all on you.” Mona grimaced at the thought before shaking her head as if to physically dislodge the thoughts from her mind. “Okay, I do not think we’ll need to eat our way out of this. I think we should be okay. Our mind–” Cut off by Felix’s outburst, Mona’s brows shot up before she was leaning forward, hands pressed firmly against the seat in front of her to get a better look at the aforementioned foot having shrimp. “Are these costumes? They don’t seem like costumes. Should I push you into one of them and you can try and rip it off?” No, that wouldn’t work, not with how they were seated and the shrimp were far away from them. Mona flexed her fingers against the seat, digits digging into velvet. “I’m not sure… if they have human feet, then really…” She gave him a look that said do we owe them anything? “But if they are this… shrimp-human hybrid, as shifters, I believe we have a duty to support them.” The grimace stayed intact as she settled back into her seat. 
“I mean, they must, right? Everything has teeth. Geese have teeth.” Was a shrimp like a goose? Felix supposed they had some similarities, if you really thought about it. They didn’t know what shrimp ate — or what geese ate, for that matter. Were teeth necessary for their mealtimes? They hummed as Mona continued, sounding a little uncertain. “I don’t want to eat them if they have teeth, either. What if they bite back? I don’t know how sharp their teeth are. Maybe we should just, you know, make a break for it. Like with the snowperson.” Though that had seemed an easy situation in comparison to the hypothetical they were dancing with now. Snow was easily defeated — you just had to melt it. A giant shrimp with teeth was a far harder foe to best. Especially the one with human feet. Felix wrinkled their nose as Mona leaned forward for a better look, closing their eyes. They’d seen enough, really. They didn’t want to look any more. “I don’t know. They look wet. Costumes can’t look wet like that, can they?” If they were costumes, they were realistic ones. Not made of fabric or rubber; even from a distance, Felix was sure of that. “I don’t want to rip it off. If they are costumes, people might be naked under them. Right? And they might taste bad. And if they’re not costumes…” Felix didn’t want to touch them. Mona brought up a good point, of course; there was a chance that these were shifters of some kind. And if that was the case… “We should have solidarity.” They sounded mournful at the thought, shaking their head. “We have to stay.”
Mona shuddered at the thought, sinking further into her seat. Maybe leaving wasn’t such a bad idea, even if they didn’t necessarily have confirmation that they’d be forced to eat the shrimp. It seemed a little odd that the theater company would treat their cast as expendable, but it wouldn’t be the first time, would it? “I do not think this is like the snow person at all.” These could probably fight back in a way that the snow person couldn’t, and there were no hot tubs to boil the shrimp alive. What if they were already boiled, and that was how they came to be? Did they need to be frozen? Mona watched the curtains carefully, looking for any sign that they might open soon. “Stage makeup is an incredible thing, Felix.” She actually had no clue, but she figured it was. Felix did have a point, Mona didn’t feel like seeing any naked people tonight. She didn’t think shrimp shifters were a thing that existed– the closest that she’d gotten was a krill nymph years ago, but even then… 
Her gaze lingered on the curtains, and she noticed a shrimp head pop out from the other end, telling somebody in the orchestra something in its native language. Mona leaned forward to try and listen in, but it was a series of vowels she didn’t understand. The lights began to dim again and Mona looked back to Felix. Then, the shrimp that’d been buckling into the harness above them swung from their perch, shrimpy arms extended as they belted out a song. The curtains opened with ferocity and the shrimps that’d been onstage beforehand were now dressed in suits and tophats, kicking their shrimp legs forward as they linked arms. The theming of the musical seemed to have drastically changed, and Mona was a little grateful– it was better than whatever was happening before… until it wasn’t. 
The shrimp began to huddle together, arms raised, objects that Mona could not identify falling from the ceiling overtop of them. Screams filled the room and the smell of cooked shrimp reached Mona’s nose. “What– Felix, what is–” hot water poured down onto the shrimp as they ceremoniously chanted. 
“No, I guess it’s pretty different.” The shrimp, at least, seemed less… angry than the snowperson had been. They weren’t actively trying to kill anyone, nor were they chasing anyone across the stage. They were just… putting on a play. And it wasn’t a particularly good play, in Felix’s opinion, but it wasn’t dangerous, either. “I don’t know. I mean, I saw a production of Cats once, and the makeup was kind of bad. The whiskers looked really fake. It was almost offensive. This would be — I mean, this is pretty intense for stage makeup.” Wasn’t this a community theater? Felix wondered absently what the play’s budget was. The set decoration was pretty extensive, and it all looked a lot more expensive than what one might expect from a community theater production. Maybe Mona was right — maybe there was just some really impressive stage makeup going on here.
The lights began to dim and Felix, never one to be disruptive, straightened in their seat, jaw tightening as they snapped their mouth shut. They hadn’t been enjoying the play, but that didn’t mean they’d talk during the performance. It was clear that the actors — the shrimp — the shractors? had put a lot of work into this, and that ought to be appreciated. Even if it was… very odd. Felix blinked as the line of dancing shrimp came out on stage, all kicking along to whatever the one in the harness flying above them was meant to be singing. The beat was nice, even if Felix couldn’t understand the words. They found themself nodding along absently. 
But then… the mood shifted. Something fell from the ceiling, the audience screamed, the theatre smelled — delicious. Something smacked Felix on the head, and they blinked as they picked it out of their hair. It was a piece of cooked shrimp, but it was… moving. There was a strange sound coming from it. Felix brought it to his ear hesitantly, shifting just enough to make out the sound and regretting it shortly after. The shrimp was singing. Singing along to the music still coming from the stage. Felix tossed it, making a face and grabbing Mona by the arm. “I think we need to get out of here now. I think — Mona, this is some weird shrimp thing that I’m not comfortable with anymore.”
Mona leaned forward, picking up a piece of shrimp from the floor. Just like Felix’s piece, it was singing. She stared down at it, then looked back over to her friend. The distraught expression that peeled over their features told Mona it was time to go, even if he was also verbalizing it. She nodded and grabbed his arm, pulling him up with her. There were a few other people who had the same idea– namely the woman who had been staring at Felix earlier. 
As she directed him towards the back doors that’d open up to the lobby, a large– shrimp man–? Stepped forward, a bat in his hand. He slapped it against his hand menacingly, making some kind of sound. Mona took it as an authoritative one, mostly due to the expression on his face. She looked back over at Felix before turning back to face the man– shrimp, thing. 
“My friend is allergic to shellfish, they are having an allergic reaction. Aren’t you?” She turned back to face Felix, nodding at him to start a coughing fit, or to maybe start wheezing. Hopefully he wouldn’t feel bad about lying here, especially since he’d been the one to want to go. 
The shrimp bouncer stared at them, bat slapping in his hand– squelching, more like, Mona realized. She winced, tugging Felix to the side so that they could maybe climb over the one row of seats preventing them from leaving the theater. 
There was a rushing relief when Mona seemed to agree that they ought to leave the theatre, and Felix wasted no time in allowing her to drag them along. They practically tripped over their own two feet in their haste to get to the top of the stairs, trying to avoid being trampled by the rest of the crowd who had, evidently, also decided it was time to go. Freedom was in sight in the form of the door at the top of the stairs, and Felix rushed towards it along with Mona, faltering when it opened to reveal a security guard. A shrimp security guard. A shrimpurity guard? 
Whatever the correct term for the creature was didn’t seem to matter much. It was there, it was big, it was holding a — was that a giant stick of butter molded into the shape of a baton? Felix let out a small sound of distress, tugging at Mona’s arm desperately. It seemed she had a plan, and it seemed that plan involved… Felix feigning a shellfish allergy.
Okay. They could do this.
Bringing a hand up to their mouth, they forced out a fake cough which, in their stress, didn’t sound particularly realistic. The shrimpurity guard’s expression didn’t change; Felix wasn’t sure it was capable of changing its expression. But it did stare at him, slowly outstretching its hand until the butter baton was inches from Felix’s nose. There was something expectant in the way it stared, and Felix didn’t know what do do beyond stare back.
There was a beat. Felix looked to Mona, and then to the butter. Slowly, they stepped to the side. “I, um… I’m also lactose intolerant,” they said.
The shrimpurity guard swung the butter baton at their head.
The butter baton was extended towards them and Mona tilted her head away, stomach grumbling as both the smells of now cooked shrimp and butter filled the air. Maybe they hadn’t planned on paying those who performed in the play– maybe they counted on the audience to eat them that way they wouldn’t have to dish out expenses? Whatever it was, it was messed up, and Mona could not wait to get the hell out of here. 
Felix was a terrible actor and that didn’t surprise Mona, but the words that came out of their mouth and the action that followed had her dragging him to the side, the butter baton smacking her across the shoulder. The shirt she was wearing (in her opinion) was already ruined, so it didn’t matter that now there was a smear of butter across it. 
“That hurt! What the hell is wrong with you!” It didn’t actually hurt, not in the way one would expect being hit with a baton would feel like, but the words left her anyway. She lifted her hand, an orb of blue fire shooting from it towards the baton, immediately beginning to melt the butter stick in his hand. The expression on the shrimp guard’s face went unchanged, but it was obvious he was displeased by the development. 
“Felix, get OUT!” She shoved her friend towards the seats to their right, urging them to climb over them. The guard was trying to pick up the melted butter baton off of the ground now as it slipped from his hands, only his shrim-like-human fingers slid through the butter. The singing ensued, even as Mona managed to spill into the lobby after Felix. 
She could still hear the screaming from the shrimp musical even after the doors were closed, but there was nobody else in the lobby with them. At least, until she heard the quiet squeaking of a voice at the till. She turned around, gaze narrowing in on the small shrimp that held up a knife. The knife was bigger than it was, but– really, Mona wasn’t sure what she was seeing anymore. “Let’s go,” she groaned, leading the way to the door, pushing it open. 
The rush of fresh air was welcomed, and she turned to face Felix. “I’m never taking you to a musical again.” 
Felix let out a loud yelp as the butter baton came towards them, half surprise and half anticipatory. But there was no butter smacking across their shirt; instead, Mona took the blow for them. She said it hurt, and Felix stared at her with wide eyes. The baton was half-melted and didn’t seem like much of a threat, but had they miscalculated? Were they going to suffer a very literal death by butter here?
Not if Mona had anything to say about it, it seemed. She held up a hand, melting the baton with her foxfire and earning them what, in Felix’s opinion, was meant to be a stern look from the shrimpurity guard. Mona shoved Felix towards the seats and, without really knowing why, Felix shouted a quick, “I’m sorry!” at the guard before following her direction, climbing over the backs of the seats to get around the guard.
The pair scrambled out towards the door, the guard no longer showing any interest in them. It was still trying to revive its butter baton, pressing buttery fingers together with an air of what Felix could only describe as intense concentration on its strange, expressionless face. The face didn’t change, but the vibes did. The posture, the stance. The guard was clearly distraught about the butter baton, and Felix, in spite of everything, felt a little bad.
Just… not quite bad enough to stop. 
Out in the lobby, Felix glanced around. None of the crowd that had been following them had made it out yet, and Felix wondered if they ought to be concerned about that. Were those people going to be okay? There was little time to worry about it in earnest, given the whole… shrimp knife situation. Felix let out another squeak, allowing Mona to shove them through the door and out into the streets.
Outside, it didn’t smell like melted butter or shrimp. It smelled the way Wicked’s Rest usually smelled — ever so faintly off. Usually, Felix wasn’t a fan, but right now? It was the best thing they’d ever smelled in their life. They turned towards Mona, blinking owlishly. “Yeah,” they agreed, “I don’t think I’m a musical person. Even Cats was better than that.” They paused, taking a few steps away from the theatre door and tugging Mona along with them, but whatever shrimp monsters had wanted to keep them within the walls of the theatre seemed to have no interest in pursuing them outside of it. There was a beat of quiet, the calmness outside the building providing a stark contrast to the chaos within. 
When they’d finally caught their breath, Felix sighed. They paused a moment, chewing their lip. Then, in a tone that was almost apologetic… “Do you want to get some lunch?”
Mona cast a glance over her shoulder back into the venue, squinting past the tempered glass to see if anybody was following them outside. Instead, a giant CLOSED sign slapped itself against the window. That wasn’t great! But what did it matter? Both she and Felix were outside now, free to exist from the confines of shrimp… hell? 
“I think your jaguar would be upset if you complimented Cats like that.” She shot him a glance, expression seemingly playful considering what they’d just witnessed. Mona followed after Felix easily, glad to put the theater behind them. She didn’t think she’d ever go to another musical again, especially not here. To say she was scarred was an understatement. 
As they walked, Mona’s stomach grumbled, but before she could approach the subject of maybe getting something to eat, Felix was beating her to it. She considered his question, wondering if they shouldn’t feel hungry after what they had just witnessed, but that didn’t make sense– it was normal, what with the smells that had filled the air. 
“I could go for some fish and chips. If there are any seagulls, we roast them, too.” She motioned forward, allowing Felix to lead the way. 
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eldritchaccident · 11 days
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Timing: Current Location: Darkling Lake Feat: @closingwaters & @eldritchaccident Warnings: Nothing in Particular from the list, but there is descriptions of a panic attack Summary: Lets go for a swim!
New England weather never ceased to amuse Theodore Jones. They didn’t know if they’d ever quite get used to it, but that was half the fun. On Tuesday it’d be snowing. Blustery bitter cold, enough to make a witch’s tit shivver. By Thursday it’d practically be tropical. All warm, sunny, and wonderful. The ex-demon was incredible grateful for the latter, and how the fates had seen fit to alleviate the gloom of early spring with the golden glow peeking through the bare branches above. 
They were walking in the woods. Not something they did too often, but a task that was about as enjoyable as anything else. Teds liked nature. Maybe not as much as the nix they sought, but who besides the lovely fae and maybe a few really crunchy hippies could love it that much? Not many, Teddy thought. Still, seeing the woods like this was a welcome change to the fairly constant self imposed house arrest they’d been under. Too much shit going on, the least of which was the goo that had separated them from…
Teagan. 
Such a sweet and lovely lass, ripped out of their life mere moments after being added to it. Teddy was tearing themself apart with guilt even after the nix was freed. Arden said she wasn’t dead, and they hardly believed it. She said the nix hadn’t suffered too much, that it was like a blink, and she was back. Tired, but back. Void below Teddy hoped that was the truth. Just about nothing in this world sounded more horrific than being in a stasis, unable to move, to speak, but still conscious of your surroundings the whole time.    
In an attempt to chase away the wibbles and wobbles of anxiety and guilt, the ex-demon had brought snacks. A tin full of cookies and treats, a thermos full of hot cocoa. Extra marshmallows. Extra love. All homemade. Maybe it’d make up for the fact that they hadn’t been able to save her. Not when it happened, and not during the month she was trapped. 
“Vala! Wait!” The kelpie brayed excitedly, continuing the fast swimming pace that the weak nix could not keep up with. It was a kind of training that Teagan hoped would help, but it seemed only set on frustrating her and damaging her already poor self-esteem. “Argh!” She halted frustratingly in her path, watching Vala continue without looking back, which was just as well. She was having fun, and that was what mattered to Teagan. It brought a smile to her face, albeit a weak one, but it was a smile all the same. 
With a disheartened sigh, she made her way to the surface and took a peek. There was no one around as she scanned the area, taking a few extra moments to ensure no one was well-hidden in the brush. Teagan blinked once, twice, and then finally felt safe enough to find purchase on the silted ground of the shallow portion near shore. She stood there lamely, trying to gain her footing while her legs trembled with exhaustion. 
Teagan tried to hold the tears back, truly, she did, but the stinging in her nose overwhelmed her and eyes leaked while a breath hitched in her throat. She slashed at the water, immediately apologizing to it just before making her way to a nearby boulder. The coolness of the stone helped calm her a little, but only for a breath. 
When she caught sight of her tail, the pain of being too weak and useless caused the wave of frustration to mount over. She wanted to punch something, anything, even knowing it wasn’t the best idea with nothing soft around. Eventually, after rubbing her face and splashing her face with water, Teagan calmed, finding a spot to lay in where half her body rested in the lake and the other half remained on land. 
Sleep grew heavy on her lids, head bopping to the side, but her determination to stay awake was still somehow winning. Catrin did always say she was the most stubborn one of all her babes, and the thought brought a sleepy smile to her face, but only for a second. The soft thump of a nearby footstep took Teagan’s attention, and she rolled to her feet as quickly as she could. Her bagged and tired eyes met with a familiar face. A smile grew into a bright grin, and she giggled as her energy was renewed.
“Teddy!” Her voice was hoarse, body swaying just slightly, but nonetheless, she made it to them and gave them a wet hug. “Oh, I’m so happy you’re visiting!”
Their heart swelled by the sight of the lake, and even more so when the nix rushed toward them. Teddy laughed, taking the sopping arms and scooping the fae up in a quick spin before nearly falling in the moss beside the lake, carefully placing the treats down so they could properly squeeze back. Almost like they were confirming that, yes, Teagan was still here. They were real, and safe. Despite everything. 
“Hey there cuddle-fish, didn’t know I needed a second shower today.” Any sarcasm in their voice was fond, and the brightness of their smile only served to emphasize that fact. Ted, of course, probably would have done the same thing, rolls reversed. Still the warmer weather was once again, very appreciated. 
“Do you like hot chocolate?” Eager, of course, to bring out the gifts. Always. Never visit without something to give, Teddy wasn’t sure where they picked that one up. Certainly wasn’t from Leviathan, whose presence was a present enough. Obviously. “What are your opinions on cookies, truffles, and macarons?” 
Teagan couldn’t help but snort at the remark and nickname, only just then realizing she’d been far too wet to hug someone fully clothed. With a bashful smile and a scrunch of her nose, she backed away and clasped her hands behind her back, moving her weight front to back repeatedly. “Oh, please forgive me. I get overly excited at times. Turn into a bit of a scamp.” She bit her lip and winked, shaking her head and flicking water onto Teddy. They’d likely be a bit chilly considering the weather, but Teagan had a feeling they wouldn’t mind. Their playful nature matched one another’s. 
“‘Course I like hot chocolate. It’s chocolate and it has sugar. Why? Do ya got some?” Her interest was piqued and she took a look behind Teddy to see they had brought some gifts. “Oh, my dear, you’re speaking sweet music to me. Love sweets, and you’ve chosen the kind full of luxury. Hm…” Teagan tapped on her chin and considered what the next option should be. The two of them were the same in nature based on their first interaction. It would only make sense to partake in the lake and then some treats. 
“What do ya say we go for a swim and then warm ourselves with some of that hot choccy after?”
“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” Teddy beamed, taking the spritz with pride. “Cheeky little shit.” A rumble of laughter rolled through their chest. It was strange, with Teagan, there was this strange sense of closeness. Like they’d been best friends since childhood, they just somehow hadn’t figured it out yet. Teddy loved meeting people like that. Who didn’t seem to care if you spent a month apart, or a year. You could just pick right back up where you left off. Perhaps even more admirably in the fae, knowing all the trouble she’d been through in the meantime. 
“Well good to know you have taste then, I was beginning to get a little worried.” They were not. But gently and lovingly messing around was a language Teddy was perhaps more fluid in than any other. And they knew quite a lot of fucking languages. “Well, the tin looks extra fancy. They’re all from scratch. Ain’t saying that’s not fancy, but y’know. Packaging helps.” 
Teddy shifted uncomfortably, somehow they hadn’t the topic of swimming to come up. Hoping the cooler weather might quell some of the drive for that, but– It never had for them before. The ex-demon had gone diving off a damn iceberg before. Been swimming down in the depths where the waters were only ever warmed by thick columns of mineral smoke and thermal seeps. Their breath caught up in their throat. 
“Ah y’know maybe not today. Been a bit– tired lately.” 
Of course it was easy to fall into step in the dance of friendship with Teddy. They were kindred spirits, made evident on what ended up being the worst kind of day. But that didn’t matter right then, did it? Teddy was in front of her, and Teagan was free to live. None of it had been Teddy’s fault and there was no way she would place any blame on that sweet lad. After all, it was Teddy that had made sure to keep her as hydrated as they could. 
It was Teddy that stepped up to the responsibility and let Arden know the news. And it was still Teddy that had made the trek to visit someone they had met only briefly and yet treated her like they were just catching up. “Oh come now, Teddy. None of that! We’ve got to get you in! And there’s nothing like a swim to get the energy going, eh? Come!” Teagan pulled Teddy with her as she burst toward the lake. She didn’t give them enough time to protest again, and in an instant, the two were surrounded by water. 
Before words could be shared or explanations given, the cold waters of the lake rose to greet Teddy. Welcoming them into their depths, covering and cradling the one who once called the ocean their only true home. Instincts warred between two sides of the ex-demon. Drowner and drowned, a rush of air broke through the human’s resolve, blustering upward as they scrambled to catch the bubbles as if they could somehow shove them back in. A gasp for air was only met with icy water. Teddy’s vision swam while they sank. Their eyes weren’t built for this anymore. The surface became a dimly lit blob as the pressure built. 
Teagan was still holding onto them, of course she was, it had barely been a second. Might have felt like an eternity to the one struggling to stay alive, but the pair had only just submerged. Teddy struggled against her grip, panic rising like the tide, an aggressive gnarling gnashing thing. Long limbs flailed in every direction, one hand broke the surface. They tried to remember what could bring them closer to it but found themselves floundering instead. 
Luckily (perhaps not for her) their other hand found Teagan. The mop of wet hair tangled Teddy’s fingers and accidentally they gave a yank. They weren’t controlling their own actions, fear was. Certainly not behavior fitting one who’d been in the water all their life, but ones born of a war tearing up the inside of a creature newly formed. Not quite human enough, no longer demon at all. Lost. 
Panic. Nothing but panic overtook Teddy, and it was unlike a water-dweller to do so. They never said they had certain requirements for what water they dove in, and they’d been so excited at the prospect of a swim together. It was confusing, to say the least, and painfully alarming, to say the most. Thankfully, Teagan didn’t need to breathe, and so the yank to her hair and the thrashing against the water didn’t phase her, besides the pain. But that hardly impeded her ability to keep them both afloat. 
“Teddy, my dear, Ted—ah!” They gave Teagan’s hair hard enough tug to strain her neck. “Breathe.” Could they? She wondered for a split second before another tug tore her from her thoughts and pushed her to launch them both out of the water in a frenzy. The two landed on the cold shore with an unceremonious thud, silt running along their feet as the waves continued to run along the shore. “Okay, now breathe!” Urging Teddy with a few pats to their chest, Teagan paid close attention to her friend, careful to not cut them with her claws. 
“Talk to me, dear. What’s doin’ ya a panic? What was that?” There was no frustration in her tone, nor was there anger. Only genuine concern and confusion. After all, Teagan saw the panic and fear consuming Teddy’s body, and considering they’d spoken of true forms and their love of water, she could only guess that something had changed or something very bad had happened to them. Either way, she wanted to help calm Teddy down and let them know that she was willing to help any way she could. 
“What can I do? Do you want to go inside?”
Teddy and their mind sputtered. One dribbling the dregs of water out of their lungs, the other reeling through visions of what it still believed was happening. They were drowning. They drowned. They were dying, they were dead. Pain erupted from Ted’s chest. In reality from of strain from thick ragged heaves and coughs, but in their head it was the waves, the pressure. No longer the comparably safe and shallow lake, it was the ocean, the depths, the darkness. Even on land, Teddy thrashed. A series of screams finally able to escape between the hoary breaths they didn't realize they were taking. 
A voice broke through, hazy and muffled at first, but persistent. It sounded like their past. It was their father's growing tone, repeating the chant that stripped them of their powers. It was every shitty kid in every shitty schoolyard or park, hurtling alienating insults like daggers. Then it was the one and only phrase Teddy ever remembered in their mother’s voice, the words she tried to command the Leviathan with. The ones she used to give Teddy up, condemning her baby to death so she could live forever. The voices shifted through a clip show of the ex-demon’s greatest failures. Until it began to open to a clearer tone. Until it was obvious that the real voice was a helpful one. That it was close. Warm. It was Teagan. 
Their eyes had been open, but they finally blinked back to sight. To the surroundings of the clearing, to the worried axolotl, standing over them. On land. On land. On land. Teddy felt their body crumple, felt hot tears fill their eyes again. “I'm–sorry–” They croaked, they crushed themself against her lap, they sobbed. “I can't– I'm not– I'm sor– I'm sorry—” 
“Teddy! Teddy.” The first call for their name was a little too harsh, wasn’t it? For someone so panicked and apologetic, the treatment needed to be a little gentler. Teagan watched their eyes open, and she saw the way horror and sorrow swam in them like the worst tidal wave imaginable. “No, no, lovely. Shh…” Carefully, she brought Teddy into her and let them do what they needed to feel any sort of relief. She let them do that for a while, their sobs catching Vala’s attention enough to bring her to the surface. She peeked around curiously, snorting loud enough for Teagan to hear. 
The nix arched a brow and waved the kelpie over. She circled around and planted herself behind them, as if to both cover them from the elements and wrap them with a sense of safety. “Don’t mind Vala.” Teagan ran her clawed hand carefully through Teddy’s hair, trying to ease them into the realization that they weren’t alone. “She’s just a curious and concerned kelpie, and a mighty good friend.” In response, Vala placed her muzzle in Teagan’s lap, bringing a soft smile to her face. She looked around then, making sure their surroundings remained safe, but her attention quickly went back to Teddy, who was likely incredibly cold. 
“Why don’t we get you inside? You’ll catch your death out here.”
Sensation seeped back in, prickles of pain in their fingertips spread outward and illuminated Teddy’s arms and legs. Each limb felt like an icicle, sharp and jagged, and far too brittle. There was warmth, but coming from the other. It felt like they were hollow. A vessel fit only to feel the stings of thousand mistakes that had led them wherever they were now. Still, they soaked it in. Teagan’s arms around them, the strange fae horse. The comfort. Lost and found. 
Teddy wasn’t alone. Wasn’t lost to the waters without their father’s guidance, its power. It wasn’t the familiarity they were used to, the reliance. But she was there, she was holding them. Picking them up. Only just aware enough to parse the changes, Teddy realized they were being led off. Between the nix’s arms and the kelpie, they were steadied. She was pulling them toward a house not too far off the shores of the lake. There wasn’t much they could do to resist. Wasn’t much of a reason to try. 
Any residual ache unfortunately passed along to the nix, but thankfully the majority of Teddy’s pain was mental. Spiritual. A deeper, more undefinable thing. One that had them only really coming to once they’d been sat down, wrapped tightly in a blanket. Their eyes finally met with Teagan’s. Their heart felt like an anchor.
“I’m—” Tears stained Teddy’s cheeks again. Fresh, hot, stinging. “–I’m just a… human now. I’m nothing– I don’t– I can’t go in the water Teagan. I can’t even go in the water without– I’m sorry. I can’t do it–I’m not– I can’t… ” 
 “Hey.”
Panic and fear were two fiends that could hardly be fended off alone. They wanted to latch and consume, digging and digging until their victim was a husk or their former self. It was a wretched experience that Teagan had had far too many times, and seeing Teddy become undone by those same demons made her legs wobble and her nose sting. She sniffled, biding herself a little time before her own tears mixed with her friend’s. Now wasn’t the time for that. Teddy needed someone to be strong, whether they’d admit it or not. 
“Hey,” She said again, patting Vala to pause the trek indoors. “Human is enough. You’ll learn to swim again in time, learn to…to let the water consume you once more.” With a bit of hesitance, Teagan shuffled a bit closer to Teddy, mindful of her depleted strength. Vala obliged without request, huffing and nuzzling at Teagan. They were both in a safe place. “Taught Arden how to swim. She even plays with Vala sometimes.” She chuckled at the memory, eyes softening as she continued. “Kept the lake safe while I was gone. If she can do it, you can too. Because you will be okay again, and you are not lesser because you are changed.” Pressing her forehead to Teddy’s, Teagan raked a clawed hand through their curls once more, appreciating their existence. 
“You’re not ready now, and that’s okay, too. Took me weeks to even step outside after my tail was taken. I can only imagine how difficult it is when everything is gone.” With a swallow, Teagan stepped back to get a good look at Teddy. Their stubble, their deep eyes, the wrinkles at each corner of their lips from the smiles and laughter they’d had, and then, finally, the scar on their face. Beautiful, to say the least. But appearances hardly mattered when it came to the content of one’s heart. Handsome or not, Teddy was still themself. They were still Teagan’s friend, and she was going to get them inside to a change of clothes, a warm blanket, and hot tea. That, she promised herself.
“Now, come.” She kissed their cheek, giving them a good and slow blink as she would with Alffi or Hobbes. “I’ll put the kettle on, and you can sift through my laundry to find something to change into.” Taking Teddy’s hand, Teagan let out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding, allowing it to become a shaky chuckle. 
“You’re sopping.”
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escudofracturado · 1 month
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Always Gold || Milo & Luci
TIMING: Late September LOCATION: UMWR PARTIES: Milo (@escudofracturado) & Luci (@luci-in-the-stars) SUMMARY: After a failed attempt at dorm living, Luci enlists Milo's help in moving out. CONTENT WARNINGS: Sibling death tw
Luci had -admittedly - lasted longer in the dorm than Tia thought she would. She was pretty sure if Ingrid hadn’t absolutely hated her. Since she moved in she seemed to think Luci was a freak of nature and someone that should be removed from the school. It was probably all of the notebooks -or how Luci talked. Maybe she hadn’t liked Snow?  It wasn’t something that was wholly new to her, a lot of people off the bat didn’t like her in school for some reason or whatever, but she had hoped it would be different here. So while the administration had been willing to work with her - even offering to move her in a few weeks- Luci was fairly sure that just getting the waiver to move off campus would keep her from walking on eggshells. She needed space for alchemy and honestly, dorms made her sad. 
Besides, while she liked school and went to all of her classes she didn’t spend much of her time on campus now anyway and she didn’t think it would change. So, she had hopped on to the apartment listing and had been excited to get the okay to move. Luckily Ingrid had spent the last few days just ignoring Luci instead of wanting to get her expelled or something. Still, it hadn’t stopped Luci from purposefully moving her bed frame an inch to the left hopefully causing her to trip. 
Still, as she waited for her brother she sighed at how quickly she had to pack up her things again. Poking her figures through Snow’s carrying case to pet her white fur as she waited. “It’s okay Snow. Wynne is super nice and you’ll have more space there. Milo will be here soon,” Luci said reassuring her familiar who seemed more nervous than she was. She should have gotten a carrot for her. 
______
It had only been a matter of time before something happened. Milo loved his sister, and he would do anything for her, but between her curiosity and her difficulties with reading people, she did tend to find herself in some chaotic situations. Granted, it usually wasn't a huge deal, and she almost always managed to get away with it, too. Couldn’t be him. But still, he worried. Especially here.
He knew he needed to chill out, though, that he was making things weird between them, but how could he? Milo was the one who ruined everything and landed them here, and he knew he really shouldn't be around anyone like this— he was dangerous. However, Luci had come to find him anyway. And it wasn’t like he wanted to be alone, either. He wanted to protect everyone from himself, but he was too much of a coward, too selfish. He wasn’t able to just be alone with his thoughts, with himself, so he had managed to make some friends here. And he wanted to have a relationship with his sister. Aside from their aunt, they were all each other had now…
These days all he wanted was to lie face down on the floor of his room and never get up. But his sister needed help moving, so floor time would have to wait til later.
By the time he arrived at UMWR, Luci was already there waiting for him, of course. “Too cool for school dorms?” he asked in place of a proper greeting. Bending over, he looked into the carrier with a smile. ”Hi, Snow.“
______
Luci was still a little surprised seeing her brother now even when she tried to hide it looking over her shoulder as he approached. It was a bit odd - something that she couldn’t quite describe other than feeling off. Normally she might have asked Milo if he knew what she was feeling, but that seemed a little - rude at the moment. 
Instead she snorted, rolling her eyes at the notion and said, “I’ve never been too cool for anything, Milo. Ingrid though - um yeah she didn’t like me much.” She shrugged slightly, not at all bothered by the dislike even if it meant she had to move out of the dorms. It wasn’t the first time that someone hated her instantly and while she ought to feel sad about it she couldn’t. It was inevitable, and Luz just didn’t feel the need to keep energy on it. “I didn’t cause any fires this time at least right? Just me being a freak this time, I guess.” 
She let him see Snow, the little Jackalope’s eyes looking curiously at the other spellcaster and moving to get a pet instantly calm with two de la Vega’s around. It didn’t surprise Luci, and instead made her smile slightly. “I think that’s a hi from Snow. For the record, she didn’t like Ingrid much either. First night she tried to get Snow kicked out - but luckily I had some paperwork.” She had forged the paperwork months ago and the University had sided with her on that one. “I managed to get it all down here while she was out. - Um, we should probably leave quickly though. I don’t think she’s smart enough to realize what I did, but still. ” It was mostly because she had threatened Snow. Familiars shouldn’t be apart from their person. 
______
He could feel the awkward tension in the air, hanging over the interaction. His lips curled up into a smile as he managed to pull a laugh out of her, but there was still that feeling of uneasiness churning in his stomach. There were so many things that they had been purposely ignoring, leaving unsaid, and they hung heavily between the two siblings, creating a distance that had never been there. Not to this extent, at least. Never to this extent. But he tried his best to ignore it, to be the person— the brother— he had once been. 
He frowned as his Luci mentioned her ex-roommate. “Well, fuck Ingrid, then.” 
It was good to hear that she hadn’t started any fires, but his brows furrowed as she called herself a freak. “You’re not a freak, Luz. Did she say that?” Had his sister been getting bullied by her roommate? She didn’t seem bothered, but still the idea worried and saddened him. Milo had dealt with enough shitty kids back in school to know how vicious people could be, how painful it could be to hear the same hurtful words thrown at you over and over. 
It was nice to see Snow again, and to see that she was still comfortable enough with him to demand pets. Despite his worries, it brought a small smile to his face. He, of course, obliged to her demands, though he looked up with a scoff when his sister continued to tell him about Ingrid.
“For real, though, fuck her,” he repeated, shaking his head. Giving the jackalope a last pet for sensing the girl’s bad vibes and watching out for Luz, he finally stood. They probably should start moving, but she shouldn’t have to rush just because her roommate was an asshole. “But, like, what’s she gonna do? You’re already leaving. Also, I can go up if you missed anything,” he offered. 
______
Luci sighed a little at his response, shrugging and responding, “ I don’t - language, Milo. You don’t have to curse even if she wasn’t really nice.” It was partially to hide that she was annoyed by her former roommate. She had hoped to find a friend in her, but that had been pretty clearly not something the other had wanted. She hadn’t realized he would pick up the language either. 
At the question she shrugged, going to pick up the backpack that she had put between her feet. “Does it matter? I don’t have to talk to her again,” Luci said finally knowing that it was fair enough. She’d never really been considered particularly normal, and she didn’t really care much about it before. Sure, she wanted friends here in Wicked’s Rest, but she would survive without them if she had too.
While repeating the words she tried to not laugh, thinking that it was a little silly. “Oh I don’t think she can do anything to me, to be fair. I just don’t want to be here when she realizes I moved everything just slightly off kilter - or maybe the fact that she shouldn’t have been copying my old chemistry notes if she wasn’t going to be particularly nice - I think the midterm was a week ago? She should get the results now-” She said it matter of factly, knowing that she probably did tank her grade. 
At the offer of getting anything she missed she shook her head and said, “No, I was careful and I have everything packed and labeled even.” Luz didn’t have much - it hadn’t been easy to get to Wicked’s Rest, and she hadn’t been interested in bringing everything she owned, figuring that she could gather things as she lived here in the next four years. So everything had pretty much fit in the couple of suitcases she’d arrived with, plus a few ikea bags she’d managed to borrow last minute. She had already sent a few boxes to the apartment thinking it would be easier than lugging them there, and had a few things waiting for her anyway. 
______
“Sorry, sorry,” he said, raising his hands in surrender. Milo’s filter was not the best. He didn’t like insulting people with curses, but he was terrible at keeping his language ‘clean.’ At work, he could mostly keep it in check, but anywhere else? All bets were off. Especially with people he felt comfortable around. And despite the weirdness, Luci was still someone he felt comfortable with— she was his sister, after all. He tried to respect her non-cursing, but he also just really wanted to hear her curse? Also, like, for real though, fuck Ingrid. 
He watched her reach for her bag, frowning at the response (or the lack of a response, he supposed. But that felt like an answer itself.) He had fixed his face by the time she looked his way again, but the feeling of frustration and worry continued to swirl around in his gut. “Yeah, that’s fair, I guess,” Milo replied, dropping the subject. He didn’t want to push it– he couldn’t, not with the way things were between them.
It startled a laugh out of him, Luci’s admission. “F– reaking amazing,” he laughed, catching himself. Man, he’d missed her. Shoving down the sudden guilt and sadness, Milo tried his best to focus on the amusement and fondness in that present moment. Luci was brilliant, and she should not be messed with. 
And of course she had thought to label and pack everything, he wasn’t surprised. Still, he had moved a few times now, and he always managed to miss Something. “Figured. But, you know, if you need it, offer stands,” he shrugged. 
But it was time to do the actual moving, so Milo grabbed some Ikea bags, letting out a small ‘oof’’ as he stood up. They were heavier than expected, weighed down by her books, probably. “How many books do you have in here?”
Luci snorted not believing for a second he’d actually be able to keep himself from cursing. She loved her brother, and knew him well enough that it would only take a few minutes before it happened again. It was something she had oddly missed, although she wasn’t going to encourage it either. Snow was there after all, and her little ears shouldn’t have to hear curses. 
He didn’t used to let her get away with non answers, but she supposed now most of their relationship seemed to be dancing around answers. If she was braver about it she might have called him out on it, instead she just secured her backpack on herself and grabbed one of the suitcases to push Snow safely under her arm. 
Luci couldn’t help the grin hearing Milo laughing and stuttering out a fake curse. It was nice to hear, and while she wouldn’t say she was especially funny it was something that always made her feel better. Mostly, Milo had a habit of laughing with her, not at her, and it was something that after she noticed had made her want to say more and more outrageous things. 
Luz nodded, starting to move the suitcase with a nudge. Hearing him picking up the bag she gave a chagrined look at being caught. “Uh - well define what a book is. If it’s a finished volume, only five, if you mean journals too - twenty between the two bags. Sorry I can trade you for Snow if you want for one of them.” 
This felt good. Even if it didn’t feel totally right, even if they were ignoring both of the very large elephants in the room. He wanted things to be okay so badly. Nothing was, but for a moment it felt like it could be. Luci was smiling and laughing, and the tension? It didn’t feel Quite so heavy. It certainly wasn’t as heavy as the twenty whole ass journals that Luci had packed away.
…okay, he was being a little dramatic, they weren’t that heavy, but it was heavier than he had been expecting. Milo shook his head, grinning at her reply. “And how many did you have when you got here?” he asked, wondering just how many she had managed to finish in the span of a month. It always astounded him how quickly she could go through notebooks, how she managed to write so much, how she always managed to find so much to write about. It was like how she processed the world, made sense of it, being an observer. And it was interesting to him, to see how his sister’s mind worked, how she looked at things. 
He supposed it wasn’t Totally different to how his mind worked, especially these days when he didn’t really feel like he was in his body most of the time. His emotions were trapped, muted, behind a glass wall most of the time, and there were times he literally felt like his being was a few inches to the right, clipping through his body. Didn’t that sorta make him an observer too?
Still, he’d always worried the habit could keep her from fully being present, keep her from fully enjoying or experiencing things. Not to mention people being dicks about anyone doing stuff that was outside the norm. But he wasn’t being very present at that moment. 
“Nah, you’ve got her,” he said, waving her off. But he continued with the bit because he had to. “I’ll just suffer.” 
It was very extra.  
At the question Luci raised one of her eyebrows in fake thought as she said, “Well I brought six that were half finished, and five that weren’t started yet. There was a sale. I got the rest here. Mostly because everything here is pretty fascinating. Did you know there’s statues that people say can see you too? I don’t know if I believe that, but wouldn’t that be interesting.” She had one she hadn’t touched - the one that Gen had given her last Christmas that for some reason she couldn’t seem to write in. She hadn’t quite figured out why, but that one wasn’t in the bags anyway. 
She kept that in her backpack, if only to keep it out of any official counts. Stretching her arm slightly she said, “A few of them are from my job actually. Vera has a lot of instructions so I’m making sure to write them all down. It’s actually pretty helpful.” 
Writing had always been easier for her to gather her thoughts, and while she was pretty comfortable typing there was something to physically writing things down that had always helped her. That and she had a habit of mixing little technical diagrams next to things. It felt like something an Alchemist should be good at. After all, her magic was pretty much a form of writing at the end of the day. It was also her way of making sure not to miss little things about people, to understand why they were doing what they were. What if she didn’t notice something and it turned out to be important? 
At the comment of suffering Luci chuckled and said, “Your sacrifice has been noted. I appreciate the help, and for the record so does Snow.” 
It was so many notebooks, he could never. And he definitely couldn’t manage six at once. If anything, there would be one, and it would be So Messy. 
The town was definitely fascinating. However, that wasn’t the first word he would use to describe it. And at the mention of the statues, Milo froze for a moment. “Yeah, I– Watcher’s Way, right?” he asked. But he already knew exactly what she was talking about. “They’re creepy as fuu–dge,” he finished, nodding. “Creepy as fudge.” Censoring himself only made it sound silly, but that was probably for the best. Also for the best? Changing the topic. 
“Oh, yeah?” he asked, grateful to talk about literally anything else. “How’s that been going, by the way? What’s Vera got you doing over there?” While he’d been to the magic shop before, he wasn’t sure how much Actual Magic they had going on over there. 
…he’d really been doing a piss poor job at what he’d come to this stupid town to do. But he had to work and that often sapped up all of his energy. Sometimes he wasn’t sure how he worked up the energy to drag his ass out of bed. However, being around other people helped him get out of his head for a few hours, which was something. His head wasn’t a super fun place to be, after all. 
In response, he gave her a two finger salute before reaching for the other suitcase. “Of course,” he shrugged. “You know I’d do anything for you, kid.” It didn’t matter if things were weird between them, Milo would always be willing to help his sister. 
“Hm, I think so. I’d have to check,” Luci said as he asked where the statues were. She had written it down somewhere, but she didn’t want to get it wrong. At his attempt to not curse an eyebrow went up, a part of her wanting to make fun of him but nevertheless holding her tongue. After all, she had to give him something. 
“My job? It’s okay. Mostly it’s just working in the front and helping customers. Vera gives me little projects to do though so that’s nice.” She didn’t add the fact that most of the little projects ended in failure, of her getting something wrong. Vera was still pretty nice about all of it though. Chalking it up to Luci’s age and not something being wrong. Alchemist had to start somewhere after all, and well even when her magic wasn’t fighting her it wasn’t as if Luci’s experiments always went well anyway. “How’s your work going? Still have birds around?” 
Luci nodded at the sentiment, even if it felt a bit heavy in the air. She believed him, that he would help her through most everything. It was the bits on the outskirts that made her pause most though. That maybe he would try and help, but he couldn’t do everything. It was like when people say the day they saw their parents as humans with flaws and not superheroes - she couldn’t quite picture it with their parents but she did with Milo and Gen. 
“I know,” Luci still ended up saying out loud, as if maybe the both of them needed to hear it. “That’s why I called. Well that and I really didn’t want to do it alone. Also so you could meet Arden and maybe Wynne if they're off work.” 
“Well, either way, Watcher’s Way? Zero out of ten, do not recommend. It’s giving weeping angels,” Milo offered in lieu of any actual explanation. Just thinking about the odd experience with the then googly eyed statues felt unsettling. 
“Ah, customer service,” he sighed with a smile. It was probably difficult for Luci— hell, it was difficult for him, and he was usually good with people. There were just some incredibly rude and unpleasant people in the world, unfortunately. “But it sounds pretty cool aside from that– you love a good project.” 
At the mention of birds, he shook his head, “Always with the birds. They’ve been getting kinda rowdy recently, I dunno what’s up with that.” 
“But, aside from those little narcs, it’s chill,” he shrugged. He liked his job well enough. “My manager’s a bit too serious, but my coworkers are mostly okay. And customers aren’t usually a problem— see a lot of the same art students and the seniors from the knitting circle at the community center.” They always asked about his projects and gushed about whatever they were currently working on or planning, and it was very sweet. 
“Plus, always some cool local art,” he added with another shrug. He’d been thinking about his job more recently, about what he wanted to be doing, if he should just go work at the Sugar Pot with Alistair. It would be a good environment, and he got along quite well with the older spellcaster, but that was part of his reservations. As much as he said otherwise, Milo was sure he’d bother the man if he was around him constantly. Always too much, but simultaneously not enough. He’d ruin it somehow because he ruined things…
But he tried to shove that aside for now. 
Luci had called him because she didn’t want to have to move all by herself. She knew he would help, would be there for her, would want to meet her new roommates and make sure she was safe in her new apartment. That was good. That made him feel good. Despite it all, she still trusted him, and that made his chest ache something awful. 
They would be okay …could be okay. He could do his best to pick up the pieces and try to be a good brother for her. 
For as long as she would let him, at least. 
“Oh, I know Wynne a little!” He said, perking up. “But it’d be good to meet ‘Arden,’ and just see the place, yeah.” He had to look out for her, after all.  
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mortemoppetere · 19 days
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TIMING: early february. LOCATION: caroline's apartment PARTIES: @raisareigns & @mortemoppetere SUMMARY: emilio and raisa investigate the disappearance of caroline, raisa's missing coworker. CONTENT: none!
Raisa tried not to feel like they were doing something wrong. 
Her goal was to find Caroline, though, and they couldn’t do that without figuring out where she’d been. When Emilio had suggested retracing her steps as best they could, Raisa agreed that it seemed like the best thing to do. She just hadn’t realized that would be prying their way through Caroline’s life and forcing their way into her home.
But it was for the best. Raisa took a deep breath. “Would you hurry up?” she hissed as she leaned over to see how Emilio was doing at getting the door open. “I keep waiting for someone to notice us.”
Most of the time when someone hired him, they sat back and waited for answers. Most of the time. People didn’t call a private investigator to hang out with him, after all, and Emilio could count on one hand the number of people who took active involvement in their cases after handing them over to him. He wasn’t sure if it was a good thing or a bad one that Raisa was now included in that number.
Right now, it was a bit of an annoying thing. Nobody liked someone hovering over their shoulder as they worked, and Emilio would insist that picking the lock would go a lot faster without the audience. He cursed under his breath as Raisa hissed at him to hurry, shooting a glare over his shoulder. “Do you want to pick the lock?” He snapped, looking back to the lockpick in his hand. “If you think you could do a better job, you’re free to…” The lock clicked, and the door creaked on its hinges as he pushed it open. “...take the next one. Come on.” 
Raisa took a step back at his question, opening her mouth to argue, even if she didn’t yet know what she was about to say. Then it opened, so the point was irrelevant. “Perhaps I will,” Raisa said with a sniff as she stepped past him into the open space.
As soon as she did, though, Raisa slowed, her eyes locked on the kitchen table. A lone coffee mug sat all alone. She stepped toward it to peer over the rim. A dried out crust that had probably once been the last dregs of a cup lingered along the bottom, clearly days old. Almost without meaning to, Raisa said, “I don’t think she realized she wasn’t coming back.”
She lifted her head to take in more of the space. It didn’t seem like anyone had left in a hurry necessarily, but things sat scattered in the same fashion as the cup–a normal kind of messy and lived in that had clearly been intended to be cleaned up later.
“Sure. I’d like to see you do better.” In all honesty, Emilio had no idea if she was the sort of person who could pick locks. She didn’t strike him as such, but maybe he was wrong about that. After all, in a town like this one, no one was quite what they appeared. Emilio included. 
He trailed behind her into the apartment, carefully shutting the door behind them. Raisa’s deduction was a good one; there was a coffee mug on the table, still half full of liquid. Two pieces of bread stuck out of the toaster, an open jar of peanut butter and a butter knife beside it. The television was still on, playing reruns of some show on cable, laugh track filling the quiet of the apartment.
There were no signs of a struggle; that was the next thing he noted. “Nobody took her from here,” he mused, walking over to switch off the TV. It was a little eerie, the sound of it. “If I had to guess… she stepped out for something quick. To get the mail, to take the trash out, to run to the store for something she was missing for breakfast. Must have been morning.” That ruled out a few things, too. Vampire attacks usually happened at night, for obvious reasons. Werewolves were more prone to losing control when the sun went down and the full moon came up. “We should walk to the mailbox first. Then the dumpster. Finding out where she disappeared from will tell us more.” 
Or… finding out where she was killed. Emilio was more prone to believe they were looking for a corpse than a person, but he wouldn’t say that to Raisa. No one hired a private investigator to find someone they didn’t care about, and telling someone that someone they cared about was dead without knowing for a fact that it was the truth was a dick move. “Come on.”
Such simple words, and yet they made a chill run across Raisa’s skin. She knew it was naive to hope Caroline could be fine with the way she’d disappeared. Some people could blink out of existence for months and come back like it was nothing, but that had never been Caroline’s way. She was dependable. She didn’t make commitments she didn’t plan to keep, and she didn’t blow them off like they were nothing. 
“Morning makes sense,” Raisa said. She reached for the coffee cup, then hesitated. Probably best not to touch. She shoved her hands back into her coat pockets, then watched Emilio move around.
She nodded and followed him toward the door. At the last second, Raisa paused to ruffle through the basket by the door. “No key,” she said. “Your mailbox theory might hold a little weight. Unless she carries it with her. I suppose that’s always possible too.” Personally Raisa didn’t like to carry more than she could help, but one up and down of owning her own house: no lock on the mailbox.
Raisa followed Emilio outside at that point. She closed the door gingerly (though didn’t lock it) behind them. She found herself falling back as they approached the mailboxes for the apartment. She glanced around. “Won’t people get upset if we look like we’re breaking into the mail?” she asked.
Contrary to what hyperbole might want people to believe, no one ever disappeared ‘without a trace.’ There was always something left behind, always some kind of evidence to be found so long as you knew where to look for it. Emilio had gotten pretty good at knowing exactly where to look for it.
More often than not, the things he found weren’t what his clients were hoping for. He found corpses, found broken watches or bloodied wedding rings or undeniable proof that the person he was looking for was being digested somewhere by something ravenous. Optimism wasn’t the kind of thing he clung to anymore, hadn’t been a thing that interested him at all in years now. As he led Raisa towards the mailboxes, he prepared himself to stumble upon some such proof of tragedy, got ready to tell her that the story they were writing wasn’t one with a happy ending. It was an inevitable thing, after all. Most stories didn’t end in ‘happily ever after.’ Most stories ended in blood.
He slowed as they got close to the mailboxes. Still no outward sign of a struggle. But… something gleamed from the concrete, and Emilio leaned over to pick it up, ignoring the protest from his bad knee. The key was small and silver, and he held it for Raisa to see. “We don’t have to break into the mail,” he said. Finding the box with Raisa’s friend’s apartment number on it, he slipped the key inside and, confirming his theory, found that it fit. He turned it and pulled open the box, finding several days’ worth of mail inside.
Turning back to Raisa, he nodded towards the box. “Gone before she opened it,” he confirmed. Hesitating, he glanced around. No one nearby, but there was a camera on the wall across from the mailboxes. He nodded towards it. “We’ll get that footage,” he said. “But… Look, before we go any further, we need to make sure we’ve got all our facts straight. Wouldn’t normally ask this, but you and me took down a damn snowman together, so I figure you know more than most people. Is your friend human?”
Raisa stepped back as Emilio bent over, though she couldn’t exactly say why. Something about the idea of clues perhaps. She knew the odds here, or at least she thought she did. Whatever they were, they wouldn’t be good. Raisa knew that much. When he lifted a key, Raisa breathed a sigh of relief. Nothing bad yet. Well, she stiffened as she considered the implications. People could drop something like a key without anything being wrong. That seemed unlikely. Caroline was too detail-oriented to misplace something like that. 
She peered over Emilio’s shoulder as best she could, but when Raisa stepped back, she tried to see the way he did. As he glanced around, she did the same, eyes lighting on a camera. She glanced toward him, pleased with herself to see he’d also considered it important enough to focus on. She hadn’t missed some obvious clue.
His question, though, took her by surprise. “That’s not–” Raisa stopped to take a deep breath through her nose. He hadn’t asked about her. He could make any assumptions he wanted there, but Raisa knew she couldn’t be offended by a question like that. It probably would help solve this if he knew the truth.
“Zombie,” she said. Generally Raisa didn’t like to acknowledge such things out loud. Even Caroline had only ever mentioned it in passing, something to allude to. Raisa did the same. They both had needs that set them apart from their coworkers, even if they blended in quite well. “Do you think this could be related to that? I know such things happen, but I thought there was usually more of a mess left behind.” She was about to make a smart remark about the recklessness of hunters but best not. From everything she had guessed of him so far, Emilio was of that sort, even if she didn’t officially know that for a fact.
As she spoke, Raisa started walking toward the management office on site. Perhaps they could charm or distract their way into a little information.
Zombie. He tensed a little at the revelation, though he knew it was unfounded. Raisa’s coworker was the victim here, the person who they were looking to help. There were no signs pointing towards her having disappeared to go on some rampage, no evidence that she’d hurt anyone. If anything, this new information only increased the odds that he was looking for someone like him. The thought made him uncomfortable. 
Even now, he disliked going against other hunters. He’d done it more than once, at this point — there was a body buried in the woods of a hunter Andy had killed, and Emilio had dug the grave. He’d sprung Ariadne from Rhett’s van, would do it again a thousand times over. He’d severed Parker’s finger from his hand, regretted only the fact that he hadn’t taken his head off instead. Emilio was more than willing to go up against other hunters when it was necessary, but it always left a sour taste in his mouth. It always made him feel like he was doing something wrong, like maybe his mother had been right to want him out of the picture. But this was who he was now, he supposed. He did what was necessary.
It fucking sucked. 
“Could be,” he acknowledged. “I think whoever got her must have at least known. Otherwise, it’d be difficult to take her out.” Whether ‘taking her out’ meant knocking her unconscious or something else remained to be seen. “Someone could have cleaned up their tracks after. Or taken her someplace less public to finish things off. Just because there’s no mess here doesn’t mean nothing messy happened.” It was important to keep Raisa’s expectations in check. Emilio knew that.
He nodded, trailing along behind her to the management office. “You should probably do the talking,” he said as he pulled the door open for her. “People don’t like me much.”
Raisa caught his momentary reaction, but she tried to let that roll off without responding. Normally zombies weren’t her favorite companions either. She couldn’t hold it against him.
She swallowed hard as he vaguely described what could have happened. “You’re probably right,” she admitted. “Caroline was always on top of things. She spent too long around humans to let herself get sloppy about something like… cravings.” The last word left a strong distaste in her mouth, but Raisa tried to brush that off too. It was the reality that came with zombies. If they were investigating this, they needed to stay neutral, perhaps even pragmatic. 
At his final comment, Raisa snorted. “Can’t imagine why,” she said lightly, careful to toe the line between joke and too-truthful insult. 
She shifted her purse on her shoulder as she quickly scanned the office, letting a smile spread across her face as she caught sight of a balding man reading a comic book behind the counter. Almost too easy when he was presenting his interests so readily. “Hi,” Raisa said. “Are you a big Spiderman fan? What did you think of his last movie? Personally I thought it was a little controversial, and–” She pretended to catch Emilio’s eye and let herself flush. “Sorry, I mean…” She sighed and leaned against the counter. 
Raisa offered the man another, more apologetic smile. “So my boyfriend here swears someone must have broken into our mailbox, but I’m pretty sure someone managed to leave the key in it because we can’t find that either.” She rolled her eyes and leaned forward a little closer. “Is there any way we could get a look at the security footage for the mailboxes to find out for sure? We’re just trying to figure out if we need to order a new key or if it’s somewhere in the apartment.”
As a child, Emilio had been taught that all supernatural beings were just looking for some excuse to hurt someone. His mother had been adamant that any humanity the undead may have had died when their heart stopped beating, insisting that higher vampires and zombies and everything else with an unbeating heart resting in their chest was just as monstrous as the ghouls and spawn that slayers culled in graveyards to keep people safe. For the longest time, he’d accepted this truth. After all, why would his mother lie to him? Back then, he would have seen this case and assumed, without question, that Raisa’s friend was the perpetrator and not the victim. 
But things were different now.
He’d seen plenty of undead people who felt more human than he did, seen plenty of ‘monsters’ less monstrous than the people he loved. If Raisa said that her friend had control, Emilio had to believe her. He had to open his mind to the possibility that they were looking for something else here — and that uncovering it might open a decently-sized can of worms. If someone had grabbed a zombie without winding up dead on the concrete, there must have been a reason for it.
Rolling his eyes at Raisa’s comment, he followed her into the office. He let Raisa strike up conversation, tilting his head slightly when, instead of bringing up what they were here for, she started talking about… spiders? His brow furrowed a little, and she seemed to notice his expression and decide to move on. 
The man’s eyes flickered over to Emilio as Raisa spoke, and he offered a curt nod. It was easy enough to play the part of the silent, slightly embarrassed boyfriend who was disgruntled to admit that someone had broken into his mailbox, and the man seemed to buy it well enough. He met Raisa’s eye with a smile. “You sure your boyfriend’s not pulling your leg?” There was a teasing lilt to his tone, and Emilio let out a huff, rolling his eyes as he propped his elbows on the desk.
“We’re sure,” he replied flatly, allowing himself to sound as annoyed as anyone might be in this situation. The man glanced to him again, then shrugged.
“I guess I can let you take a look. Just don’t tell anyone, okay? I’m not really supposed to.”
Raisa hadn’t given Emilio a terribly difficult part to play, and thankfully he played it well enough. She glanced toward him here or there when it felt appropriate, but her attention stayed primarily focused on the guy at the desk. When he gave them the yes, she smiled at him, wide and full of sunshine. “That’s amazing! Thank you so much. And absolutely! We won’t tell a soul.”
Without asking, Raisa moved around the counter as he clicked in a few keys on the keyboard to pull up the camera they needed. This would be easier too without him there, but she hadn’t figured out a solution for that yet. After a few seconds, she spied his comic book. If the bit wasn’t broken…
“Here you go,” he said at the same time Raisa asked, “So is that the newest issue?”
He looked at her, surprised. “Do you read it?”
“I try to,” she lied, hoping he wouldn’t push her too hard on facts. She needed to move quickly if they were to avoid that. “I missed the last one and need to catch up. You don’t happen to have it, do you?” Raisa glanced at Emilio in an effort to get him to understand what she was doing. “Maybe I could take a look while my boyfriend looks at the footage?”
The man lit up. “I have it in my car! It’s around back, but give me like five minutes and I’ll have it for you.”
“That’s so great!” Raisa gushed as he was already getting up out of his seat. She waited long enough for him to get out the door before whirling around to face Emilio. “I don’t know how much time I actually bought you, but I hope you’re fast at this stuff. I don’t actually want to pretend to care about the comic.”
Emilio followed Raisa around the desk, watching as the security guy pulled up the footage. He was just beginning to wonder how they could view this footage without potentially having the security guard insisting they involve the police — if the footage showed the abduction, it would be a hard sell — when Raisa launched into a distraction.
It was kind of impressive, the way she slipped so seamlessly into the role. Emilio was a little impressed. His own undercover work wasn’t exactly stellar, even on his best days. He managed when he had to, but Raisa was a far better actress than he could hope to achieve. Given her profession, that probably made sense. Still, he couldn’t help but offer her an impressed nod when the security guy rushed out to fetch his comic from the car.
“Nice,” he commented, quickly navigating around the footage. “Shouldn’t take too long. Just need to find the right… Here.” 
It was early morning in the footage. Not quite light yet, but not dark enough to be night, either. A woman with dark, curly hair opened her mailbox, pulling out a few envelopes and shuffling through them. A figure came onto the monitor. There was no sound, but Emilio could imagine the commotion as the man grabbed her. He watched closely, pausing the footage when the man turned to face the camera. Pulling out his phone, he snapped a photo of the grainy image. “There’s our guy,” he mumbled.
He pressed play again to watch it play out. Towards the end, the man turned to someone offscreen, saying something impossible to make out. “He had a partner,” Emilio mused. But when the man disappeared off screen and the shadow of the vehicle he’d arrived in sped off, the partner still hadn’t appeared. “First step, find out who this pendejo is,” he said, turning his phone towards Raisa. “Then, we find his partner. Sound good?”
Raisa leaned in close as she watched Emilio work through the footage with impressive speed. She couldn’t help her gasp as Caroline appeared at her mailbox, just going about her daily routine. A sense of dread settled low in her stomach as she waited for something horrifying to happen. She almost held back a small squeak as a man appeared. Raisa wanted to look away, but if these were Caroline’s final moments, her friend deserved for it to be seen. They wouldn’t be able to bring her back, but they could find the details and figure out how to get her justice.
Thankfully, though, while Carolien was obviously under duress, she seemed to be very much still alive as the man dragged her off. Raisa felt her hope return. Surely they wouldn’t take her away just to kill her, would they?
“Sounds good,” Raisa replied, almost as an afterthought. She glanced toward the door. “Is it better to fake our way through this interaction or try to get out of here before he’s back?” If she could help it, Raisa really didn’t want to fake flirt more than she had to.
They had someone to identify, someone Raisa didn’t think she’d ever seen before in her life. Hopefully it wouldn’t be as challenging as those parameters felt.
It was hard to know what the abduction really was. Emilio had known hunters who preferred to work slowly with their prey, liked to take them somewhere where they could spend days finishing them off. He thought, painfully, of Rhett, of the van, of Ariadne, and he shook the thought away. If Raisa’s friend had been taken by someone who intended to kill her slowly, it just meant they had a more serious time limit on what they were doing here. It didn’t change much.
Raisa spoke, and Emilio turned towards her with a shrug. “Never gonna see him again,” he replied, looking briefly back to the computer. He wasn’t much of a tech guy, but he knew a delete button when he saw one. He quickly deleted the footage of the abduction, knowing that if the security guard got curious and went back to look at it, it could mean trouble. 
With that done, he pushed away from the desk and started for the door. It was far easier to slip out before the security guard came back than it was to make up some excuse for leaving. The man would jump to his own conclusions — that the ‘couple’ had realized they’d made a mistake and left, that Emilio had been irritated by Raisa’s flirting, that they’d gotten some important phone call. The best cover, sometimes, was no cover at all. People’s minds would go a long way to rationalize things, he’d learned. You could use it to your advantage if you knew how.
“Come on,” he said, ushering for Raisa to follow him. “We’ve got work to do.”
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thunderstroked · 7 hours
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Shifting Tides || Mona & Isa
TIMING: current. LOCATION: the woods! PARTIES: @poisonousdelights & @thunderstroked SUMMARY: mona runs into isa while trying to find her way out of the woods that seem to be never ending. together, they run into a hunter who knows exactly what mona is. CONTENT: none.
How many entrances to the woods were there in this godforsaken town? How come every turn she took, the woods seemed ready to swallow her up? It was devastating, especially given how many traps were lingering, either seen or unseen. Unlike the last time she’d managed to find her way through the underbrush, she was more careful this time. At least these woods were unfamiliar– she was far from where she’d started. The fox wandered forward, and she was starting to get hungry, and really she just wanted to go home. But as if in some film about comedic timing, everything seemed to thwart her advances to doing just that. 
The fox stayed still as the sound of leaves crunching beneath feet echoed. She was barely into the trail, just on the outside of it– she could still see the parking lot, the number of houses that lined the trail entrance. And then she saw her, an unrecognizable face. It was too late to hide, she realized. The other girl had already caught a glimpse of her. She stared at the girl, hackles rising slightly, challenging her to step closer. If she were to be called Regina again, or shoved into some small twisted metal thing, she was going to be pissed. 
______
She hated being cooped up in her apartment most days. It was, for the lack of a better word, a dump but it was all she could afford by herself so Isa always found herself looking for things to do outside. It was a good thing she loved the outdoors so much or else she would be screwed. That day she’d felt like going for a run but halfway through she’d decided that a trip through the woods might be beneficial. If she could find a cryptid and take it to Maggie, her best friend would be over the moon. It was something she did often, always keeping an eye out for one of the coveted creatures, especially when she was in her other form. 
A two tailed and discolored fox was not on Maggie’s list of cryptids though, at least not as far as Isa’s memory was concerned. As soon as she’d spotted the animal, she slowed her movements until she’d come to a stop, eyes roaming over the tails with curiosity. Not a cryptid but still so interesting to her. It was clearly scared though and the snake really didn’t want to deal with a mad fox trying to bite her but she wanted so badly for it to calm down and trust her. She’d always been that person willing to make friends with a wild animal if she could regardless of that fear of an attack.
So, she slowly crouched down to get as close to its eye line as she could, trying to emanate a very calm energy. “Hi beautiful…it’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you.” Her voice had dropped to a lower tone as Isa held out a hand, palm up and open, in hopes that it wouldn’t sink its teeth into her. She started to click her tongue, not knowing if that would help or aggravate it more but feeling the instinct to keep it up until she spoke again. “I just want to be friends, that’s all.”
______
It was interesting to her that every single time somebody came across a fox of her stature, their immediate reaction was to coo at her as if she were some baby. It was better than the alternative, though, and she knew it. The fox could be running instead, could be fending for her life. Instead, she was dealing with the majority of those who just seemed to be confused by her visuals. It didn’t seem like this person recognized her to be anything other than a minutely deformed fox. 
The fox watched the girl carefully, gaze slipping past her to see if anyone might be behind her, but there was nothing. It was just the two of them, and whatever else lived near. She thought back to the woman who called her Regina, how she’d been stupid enough to get scooped up, and while she didn’t want that to happen again, she figured she had a better chance of escaping than before– though she had managed it. 
The fox took a small step forward, paw digging into the dirt, tails straight up behind her. She had her abilities still, at least, and so if she needed to use them, she would. She took a careful step forward, nose twitching in response to the noise that the girl made. Maybe she could get a free ride back to where she needed– she could possibly possess this girl, guide her to where she needed to go. But it’d been so long since she had tried, and she wasn’t keen on getting stuck both in body, or in her fox form, so she opted for approaching the human in a friendly manner, still carefully watching her. 
______
To Isa’s amazement, it seemed the fox was ready to check her out. She stayed still as it stepped forward, understandably cautious, and her hand stayed in place so it could sniff her if it wanted. That was how it worked with dogs so this should work for a fox too…right? Her smile broadened when it got closer, the snake slowly turning her hand so that she could run gentle fingers through its fur. 
She was petting a fox. Nobody was going to believe that a two tailed fox was allowing her to pet it, giving her the trust that she had asked for, and not immediately attacking her hand. Isa could barely believe it herself. A breath of disbelief rang out around the quiet forest but she stayed as still as she could, her fingers still gently running over the animal while it continued to check her out. She didn’t want to push it too far.
She had been planning to let the fox sniff at her for a minute or two, let it familiarize itself with her, until her ears pricked up the sound of an unamused chuckle. Isa’s head snapped up to find a man staring at the two of them, his head tilted while he took them both in. Something was off about him, and the snake instinctively straightened up, tension filling her entire body. “Sweet, almost gave me a toothache. Lucky girl stumbling upon such a creature.” 
Her nose wrinkled at his words, immediately deciding she didn’t like this man and whatever he was saying didn’t matter to her. She kept a protective hand on the fox, not yet grabbing it because the lamia feared it would run off and this man would go after it with the way he was eyeing the animal. There was a gleam, a desire that she’d never seen before, and she could tell that he had bad intentions. “Maybe I was meant to…” Meant to keep it away from him and whatever plans were forming in his mind. She gently pulled the fox a little closer, naively hoping he would just pass them by and leave them be. 
______
For a moment, the fox thought that maybe she could get this girl to help her– communicate with her in a way she had tried with the animal control officer. But instead, there was another sound, another scent. Must, dirt, petrichor. The fox’s head swiveled, golden eyes narrowing in on the newcomer. The way he spoke about her instantly set off red flags, and her hackles rose in response. 
She was careful not to create electricity, as the girl still had one hand on her. A couple of years ago and the fox might think the two were working together, but she felt as though she was getting better at discerning these types of things. She hoped she was right, at least. The girl didn’t seem amused by the onlooker, and she felt herself being cooed forward, the feeling of a hand on her side. 
The fox watched the man intently, watching for any signs that he might advance. “You really have no clue what you’ve found, do you? I can show you.” He extended a hand and the fox had half a mind to send an orb flashing against it, but she waited, attempting to muster up some patience. “Let me show you what it really is.” The man took another step forward, unsheathing a blade from his belt. “Do you know how much a tail is worth? We can split it.” 
______
Of course he wouldn’t move along. If that were his intention he would have already done that. The dream of being left in peace with her new friend was shattered as he went on about what she’d found, her eyes locked on his every movement. ‘Oh, hell no’. The thought was abrupt as the man started to advance and unsheath a blade. It made Isa nervous, not only for herself, but for the poor creature next to her. She didn’t care what it was or how much it was worth, there was no excuse for cutting its tail off. “I don’t care what it is, you’re not touching it.” 
Her voice held more resolve than she felt, the snake glad that she sounded so confident as opposed to allowing the nerves twisting inside of her stomach to be voiced. She stood to her full height of five foot two, wishing so badly that it was night time and she could easily handle this man by looking into his eyes. But Isa stood her ground, moving in front of the fox to create a barrier between him and the beautiful animal. 
He wasn’t intimidated, another bark of laughter being her first clue, and he took another step towards the two of them. ‘You gotta be kidding me, girly.’ Her skin crawled at the nickname but Isa took another step forward, half hoping the fox would run off so neither of them could get their hands on it again. ‘Look, if you don’t want a piece of it, then that’s fine. But I do, so I’m gonna need you to step aside so I can do my job. Don’t make me tell you again.’
Isa felt herself bristle, the short fuse that her snake held starting to infiltrate her own mind and the girl actually hissed in the man’s direction causing him to stop in his tracks. That surprised him enough to keep his attention off the fox but now his sights were set on her. “Get away from us…don’t make me tell you again.”
______
The blade had the fox’s heart pounding– small, fragile, she felt uneasy. She stared up at the man, gold eyes narrowed in response to the audacity that the man put forward. The girl had other plans in mind– she was stepping forward, and the fox felt a little astonished by her bravery. If the roles were reversed, she wasn’t so sure she’d be so keen on putting herself between the endangered and the dangerous. That was the difference between them, though. 
This girl was nothing but a girl– quickly proven wrong by the noise that vibrated from her frame. It even caused the fox to stir, taking a step back in anticipation for what might erupt from the girl’s frame. There was nothing, though, but the man continued to stare at them, gaze now lingering on the girl. 
“You’re not what you seem, are you?” His words reverberated in the fox’s skull. She had had enough– what if he tried to hurt her savior now? Lack of desire to die be damned– the fox sprang forward, an orb of hot light shooting from her tail as it hit the man square in the chest. Another shot forward, this one aimed at the hand that held the knife. It fell to the floor as the man yowled in pain, his hand now pressed to his chest. Electricity crackled over the fox’s frame as she stomped her feet into the ground, baring her teeth. Her heart hammered in her chest, and in the back of her mind she knew that she might come to regret these actions, but she couldn’t just let the girl get hurt on her behalf. 
______
She was prepared for a fight, the man’s words clearly showing Isa that he wasn’t backing down either. Now he wanted her as well as the fox but in her mind he wouldn’t be able to take two more steps before she allowed her inner animal to take over. Cute clothes be damned. Maybe it was time to start taking her mentor's advice. Humans were nothing but trouble that could be handled with one bite of her unhinged jaw if she really wanted and he was the perfect specimen to try this out on. Never had she considered the teachings before, never had she wanted to sink her teeth into human flesh, but her anger was being fueled by the viper inside. It was a good thing she hadn’t eaten in a little while.
But before she’d fully made the decision to take this man’s life, eyes now the slits of the viper’s, something unexpected drew her attention. Heat hit the man square in the chest, the flash of light causing her to close her eyes as she turned her head away. She changed them back to normal before they blinked open, dots flashing in front of her vision until they cleared and showed Isa the fox now surrounded by what looked like little bolts of electricity. “Woah…” So she wasn't the only one with special abilities here, huh? If only Maggie could see this now.
She looked back to the vile man as he grunted, noticing that his weapon was on the ground while he tried to shake off the pain. It wouldn’t be long before he was ready to go after them again when the split second decision was made. Isa ran forward, sliding through the leaves to grab the knife (thank you soccer) before springing back to her feet, narrowly avoiding the man grabbing her by her shirt's collar. ‘You don’t know what you’re doing, little girl. Why don’t you give that back to me and we can talk this out.’ Her eyes rolled, Isa holding out the knife as a warning. “Looks to me like you’re the one who was bested by a little fox.” She could have sworn he growled at her but she didn’t care. They had the upper hand right now. 
“If you uh…you know, get rid of that lighting I can get you out of here.” The words were meant for the fox but she was still staring at the guy who seemed ready to charge them both. His face was purple with anger, or pain, which Isa couldn’t tell nor did she care. “But you’ll have to be okay with me carrying you.”
______
The fox watched as the girl sprang forward, leaves scattering in her wake as she grabbed the knife from the ground. She was ready to send another blast towards the man if he so much as reached for her, but she slipped through his grip easily. He spoke, and the fox’s ears flattened as she exposed more teeth, a warning sign to shut his mouth. It was especially clear to her now that he knew she could understand him, because something shifted in his expression. Maybe he was just some idiot who didn’t know what he was getting himself into– had seen her photo on a board and thought to himself that he’d get money, or maybe he really was a ranger. She wasn’t sure, but her attention shifted from him to the girl as she spoke. 
She wanted to carry her? The fox was surprised by that, especially considering she’d just shot fire at the man– coiled and blue. She didn’t necessarily need this girl’s help any longer, but something told her not to leave her here– what if the man had other means? Another weapon? The fox relaxed, the electricity quickly dissipating, as if being turned off with a switch. She took a careful step back, committing the man’s face to memory. She’d find him again, make Inge haunt him. If he weren’t a hunter, then he’d have no idea what was happening. If he were, then at least they’d be able to be wary of him. The fox considered letting it just remain as that– the man on the ground without his knife, but she sent another ball of fox fire at his ankle, burning it through the cuff of his jeans. He wouldn’t be able to follow them anytime soon. As he screamed in pain, the fox trotted over to where the girl was, standing as some kind of protective barrier. 
______
Eyes flitting back and forth between the bastard and the fox, Isa had to stifle a giggle when the fox sent another blast the man's way. It was clear as to why the animal did it, it wanted to make sure he couldn’t come after them, but the extra blow was still amusing to her. This was a smart creature, it thought like a person more than an animal, and for a brief moment Isa wondered if maybe a human was in there somewhere. Apparently there were different types of shifters after all, could this possibly be another? If so, how fucking cool it must be to be able to shoot lighting from your tail. She was a little jealous since all she could do was bite people and make them rot…not even mentioning the stone thing.
When the fox was in front of her, some sort of protective wave coming from her, Isa smiled and squatted down to be as level with it as she could be. It was tiny after all. ‘’I think me and you could be good friends. Thank you for helping me out, little one.” How weird would it have been if she reached out and scratched under its chin. If it was human the lamia imagined it wouldn’t be too pleased with the action. Isa would have bitten someone for it if it were her. So, she kept her hands to herself for the moment. “We have to take care of each other, you know? People like this…I don’t understand them.” 
As she finished her sentence there was another crack of a branch making her head snap up. Was there somebody else coming? Did this man have friends with him? “Okay, we should probably get out of here. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not take down another asshole today. One is usually my limit.”
______
The girl was talking and the fox forced her attention back towards her, knowing well enough that the man was in pain and focused on the burning flesh of his ankle now. She wished she could communicate with the girl, let her know that if she saw the man again to immediately let her know, but there was little she could actually do. The fox chirped in response at her words, unaware of how true they were. To her, the girl was a girl, and nothing else. 
The fox’s ears rotated slightly at the sound of a newcomer. She tilted her head to the wind, inhaling the scent of something new– cyprus and cigarette smoke. Not unlike the man that laid before them, now mixed with singed flesh. Her hackles rose as she bared her teeth, but the girl was already on it, giving them a course of action. 
As the fox went to lead the way in the opposite direction of the noise, shouting ensued. The individual who was fast approaching was looking for the man, and so the fox looked up at the girl, fear palpable. They needed to separate– staying together would only bring more harm than good. The footsteps were closer now, and the fox shot off in the direction furthest from where they were arriving, and she hoped the girl would do the same. 
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disengagedspirit · 1 month
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PARTIES: @dirtwatchman, @disengagedspirit TIMING: Later the same day after this solo. SUMMARY: Mercy finds her way into a nearby cemetery, Caleb's cemetery, where he finds her lost and confused after waking from a nearly 400 year slumber. CONTENT WARNINGS: unsanitary tw (brief mentions in regards to her clothing)
Though it had been morning, when Mercy had been revived from her slumber of almost 400 years, the man she had fed from had given her enough strength to find shelter in a nearby tomb located in the cemetery she had found herself wandering into out of desperation earlier in the day. But now, with the night sky hanging overhead, the woman who only appeared to be 33 had found herself conversing with a spirit who donned clothing similar to her own, “Pray tell kind sir, what day is it?”
“Tis’ Wednesday, Madam.” He was an older gentleman who had reminded her of the man who had raised her. At least what glimpses of him she could recall. After spending century after century in the dirt everything she had tried to hang onto had slowly faded, except now, there had been gentle reminders with the fog lifted from the meal she had consumed that morning. 
“And the year of our…” Mercy paused, nearly choking on the word Lord. “What year might it be?” It hurt not being able to speak of such things that she was once so passionate about and had been raised on, but to force it out would have meant an agony she couldn’t quite handle at the moment.
“Tis’ 1724.”  Though he was kind, his answer didn't sit well with her. There had been so much progress with the sun captured in tiny glass containers. Melodic songs that rang out from small bright objects that shook. And numerous other things. If witchcraft hadn’t existed while she was still around previously, it certainly did now.
There’d been an influx of strange happenings going on around town lately which wasn’t all that alarming to Caleb. This had been happening ever since he was a kid. One thing would die down only for another crazy circumstance to take over. It was life in this beautifully weird town. But this circumstance was a little different and even he was being overwhelmed by the noises and the ghosts taking over the place. So many were in the cemetery alone. Where he used to only see a few here and there it seemed like they were multiplying each day. 
As he made his way towards a gravestone that he’d noticed graffiti on earlier he noticed a woman who was talking to one of them. She wasn’t a ghost but she was almost dressed exactly like them save for the larger blood stains covering her clothes. Well…that wasn’t good. 
Cautiously making his way over to the pair, he caught the tail end of their conversation. The ghost didn’t know what year it was? Hadn’t somebody told him yet? “Excuse me, miss? Are you okay?” Caleb’s eyes trailed over the fresh blood, noticing that it wasn’t limited to her clothes. It was splattered over her face as well. His caution grew but he also had ended up in situations like this so he couldn’t really judge her harshly. “It’s 2024, ma’am. He’s a little off on that. But it also looks like he’s been dead since 1724 too….what year did you think it was?”
Mercy let out a soft sigh. If his answer was accurate, she had only been in the ground less than a century, but that realization was soon shattered by the presence of a man approaching her. Pulling her away from the ghost’s attention, Mercy set her sights on someone who appeared to be solid and dressed much differently than she had ever seen, except on one other person who was now laying dead miles away from where she was currently standing. He was rather tall and reminded her of Thomas; at least what little she could remember of her husband. But his vernacular was all wrong, and when she turned back to speak to the ghost, he was gone.
With no other choice, Mercy turned back around to face the man again, “Forgive me, but hast thou proclaimed it to be 2024?” If her heart could beat, it would stop. With her sharp blue eyes widening, it meant that if the math in her head was correct – Thomas had taught her much about the art of mathematics – that she was underground for nearly 400 years.
Stepping backwards somewhat, Mercy reached out for a nearby stone bench and sat down. It had taken her a moment to regain herself and to be able to talk to the man. Though she didn’t want to believe it, it had made a lot more sense, with all of the new discoveries, than what the gentleman earlier had said. And with sad eyes, she looked back upon him, “1694. When thy accusers placed thee underground…”
As soon as she started to speak Caleb knew he was in for a wild ride with this one. This woman had definitely missed out on some time but how in the world had this happened? “Um…yea, thou is 2024…okay, yea, I don’t know how to speak old English properly so I’m not even going to try. I’m sorry.” He watched her take a seat on the memorial bench, trying not to spook her too much. Of course it was a shock, he was shocked just hearing her so he couldn’t imagine what was going on in her mind.
Did she say 1694? Accusers? The paranoia started to grow stronger as Caleb kept his distance from her even if he knew he most likely wasn’t in danger. The woman had to be dead so whatever she ate it wasn’t rotting flesh like him. But what had she done to be placed underground? And who had just become her latest meal? Were they still in the graveyard? “I think I’m going to need a little more context here so that I can try to help you. Could you explain…why you were underground and why you’re here now? Did you wake up here?” 
The questions were fair. He was understandably curious but he also needed to know if there was a body that needed to be taken care of before more police started to crawl around the place. Caleb already had enough of those looking his way. 
Mercy couldn’t help, but gaze up at him with furrowed brows at his attempt. The language spoken now was so different, but yet, still very similar. Thankfully, she had been able to make out what he was saying, and what he was asking wasn’t unfair. Though she was weary in replying. Mercy did not know his motives. Would he try to drag her back to a premature grave or hang her for her crimes? She had seen this happen far too many times, and while she wouldn’t deny being at fault for what she had done, death by the gallows was something that scared her greatly.
“Might I trust thee?” Mercy needed to know, before confessing why she had ended up buried so deeply in the ground. Humans could change and evolve, she had seen that in the short amount of time she had been roaming the Earth. She had witnessed it with Abigail in her jealousy and accusations, and unfortunately, she had only just met this man, “Many a year ago, I was betrayed and don’t trust as I once did.” Mercy looked at the man with sad eyes. 
— 
Her question threw him for a loop, Caleb not really sure how to answer that. Really, he couldn’t could he? Trusting him was all on her. He could tell this woman all night that he wasn’t going to do anything to hurt her but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t in her mind, especially after what she’d been through and he didn’t even know the extent of it all. “I…I mean, I guess that’s up to you. But I will point out that you’re covered in blood talking to a ghost and I haven’t thrown you in the ground yet.” He gave her a sincere look, not sure if that was the right thing to say or not. 
Especially since she’d experienced betrayal before. Anyone who had been through something like that would have a hard time trusting others again but where Caleb stood, she didn’t really have much of a choice, did she? “Tell you what, I’ll introduce myself. Let you know why I’m here and then you can decide whether you want to tell me or not.” The zombie gave her a moment to contemplate that, make any objections if she wanted, before continuing. “My name is Caleb. I work in this cemetery, take care of it, and I see things like this pretty often. Though, I think you’re the first one who’s been buried for…so long.”
Mercy listened intently as Caleb spoke. He had made a fair point. As she glanced down to look at herself, she noticed the blood and dirt soaking her dress. A dress that she could vaguely remember being a different color when she first wore it so many years ago. Not dingy and aged and eaten by the worms and beetles that had slipped into the cracks in the coffin over the years. In fact, it had been the first time that Mercy had seen any part of herself – her eyes only having been focused on the vast changes in the world around her, “You are fair in your observations.”
As he continued, she nodded gently, her bright blue eyes remaining trained on him the entire time. When he finished, she paused thinking if it were safe enough to trust him, and when she realized he was her only option of assistance in such a dire matter, she spoke, “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Caleb.” She wanted to quickly return her name, but as the moment came up, Mercy paused. She had been buried for so long and in the dark for quite some time that she couldn't quite recall her name, at least not immediately. And when she finally did, she returned an answer, “My sincerest apologies. You may call me Mercy. Laying in darkness and rot for many a year has taken its toll on my memories.” It was strange being upright. Strange being out of her dark and dirt ridden prison and back in the land of the living. “I suppose it is only fair for me to explain myself. I have repeated my life’s story over and over again, perchance I was to be freed from my eternal prison in the ground. However, I fear I am unable to remember everything, so please forgive me, if I cannot recall every detail as it was.”
“I was born in the year 1656. I was married and gave birth to a beautiful, little girl – my sweet Sarah.” Mercy felt the girl’s name catch in her throat as she thought of her daughter and husband. “We lived in Salem town. But when the war broke out, people started to flock to Salem for refuge; our town twas no longer peaceful. I was later attacked and left for dead, but when I awoke, I had a very unusual craving for blood. In fear of harming my sweet Thomas and Sarah, I fled; hid in the shadows for as long as I could and consumed that which was offered by poor, innocent animals, until I was caught by a former friend who betrayed me. In desperation, I fled from my home and everything I knew to a town known as Wicked’s Rest. Here I was caught and forced to an eternity of rotting in the ground.”
“You don’t have to tell me everything...” She just kept talking, Caleb, surprised that when she finally decided to trust him the woman decided to tell her whole life story. And what a sad story it was. He could feel his heart going out to her more and more, especially after hearing her throat catch while talking about her daughter. Being turned into a vampire, losing her family, a friend betraying her and her ending up in the ground buried alive because of it…it was heavy. Something occurred to him though. The whole time she was talking, she never once mentioned the word ‘vampire.’
Did she even know what she was?
“And then you woke up in 2024…you’ve missed a lot.” He let out a deep breath that he’d been holding in, probably for longer than he should have. “I’m sorry you had to go through all of that. Do you…know why all of that happened to you? I mean, the reason you woke up craving blood, do you know why that is?” He didn’t want to mansplain vampires to a vampire but Caleb couldn’t get over the fact that she’d avoided the word. “Did you crave it when you woke?”
He knew she did. The blood on her dress was enough to tell him that but he also knew that not eating for so long was enough to throw them into a frenzy. Now he was wondering if there was a trail of bodies he needed to help clean up and maybe some he could harvest for his own needs. Caleb ran a hand over the nape of his neck and looked around them, seeing only the old fashioned ghosts that had taken to walking around the town. At least there was no one alive around to witness this. 
“Sorry. I needed to speak it. To allow it out so that my life and the life of my Thomas and Sarah were still relevant even in…” Mercy still couldn’t process the year, “Two-thousand and twenty-four.” She looked away from him, still trying to understand how she could even still be here. But his questions caught her attention, “Excuse me?”
Mercy still didn’t understand that part of her life. She knew that whatever it was had made her an abomination in the eyes of the Lord. Any holy words spoken had burned her tongue and any time she had tried to lay her hand on a Bible, it sent a searing pain through her body. If any memory from her time previously walking the Earth that she had held onto, that was it. And it had made laying in a wooden box for centuries so much harder. Her faith not being an option to get her through the longest days of her undead life. So she made her husband and her child her faith with the hopes that she would one day see them again, but now that she was once more free and living in a completely different era in the history of the world, even she knew it was impossible.
“All I know is that I am an abomination.” She tugged at her bloodied dress in frustration. “A parasite that can still roam freely needing to take the lives of innocents to survive. Even…God’s…” She paused as pain coursed through her small figure leaving her to ball her fists, “green pastures and warm sunshine burn my skin if I am in them for too long. I assumed it must be some illness of my time, but I never recalled a name given to its description.” Mercy’s chest heaved up and down as the pain from speaking the Lord’s name slowly dissipated. “So no, I do not know the true reason why I crave the blood of a man or animal, but merely for the reason of my survival.”
Everything she was saying only confirmed what she was. If drinking blood to survive after being attacked wasn’t enough to clue him in, not being able to walk in daylight was the seal on what species she was. Watching choke the word ‘God’ out, seeing the pain it caused her, was only the bow on top of the neatly packaged picture she had given him. “Abomination is harsh.” But was it true? It’s what Caleb felt like most days and it’s what a lot of the undead he had met over the years felt like as well. Maybe they were all abominations. It wasn’t like they were meant to walk around this earth after experiencing a death. 
“Mercy…I’m certain that I know what you are. I’ve seen quite a few of them over the years. I don’t know if the name was a common thing during the time you lived but they have one for it.” The zombie paused, hands going to his pockets as he tried to let that sink in a little. He was trying his best to be gentle. “You’re a vampire. The person who attacked you before you woke up and craved blood, they must have been one and they turned you.” 
Caleb didn’t pretend to be an expert on the subject. He’d run into many while working in the cemetery but he’d never really known one personally so he was sure he didn’t know about everything that came with that life. But what he did know, he could try to help her with. “Unfortunately, blood is not an option. You’ll have to keep drinking it to survive. I don’t know if there’s any way around the sunlight thing either. I’m not an expert on vampirism but I can see what I can do to help you through this. The good thing? It’s easier to go undetected in this town. Plenty of them live around here.”
Mercy didn’t know any other way to describe herself. She could no longer be around people without the lingering threat of killing them. She couldn’t walk in the daylight. And worse of all God had shunned her from speaking his name, singing hymns, or saying her prayers. It was an impossible life to live, and the only reason she had been hanging onto it all before had been the existence of her family. Now, she was in a completely different time in the history of the Earth, and they had long been in the grave as she had once been, “Tis my judgment upon thine ownself.”
The small brunette held her head in shame, until Caleb had confessed to knowing what she was. And immediately, though with sorrow in her eyes, raised her head, “Pray tell, Caleb. What have I become?”
As she listened to him explain and finally put a name to what her illness was, Mercy couldn’t help but repeat the word over and over again in her mind, before saying it outloud, “Vampire…I know not of this word, but your description is accurate. I suffer from all of those afflictions; the hunger for blood being the worst of them.” If there had been more of these creatures during her time of living had it meant that the Salem Witch Trials were based on accuracy instead of accusations? It was a question she would ponder for another time. Instead, the realization that she wasn’t alone was more important, as was his offer to help her, “I am indebted to you, sir. Tis your kindness in this moment that means a great deal. The revelation of more…vampires…however, is quite the shock.”
Mercy paused for a moment, “Seeing as though you are willing to help me, how shalt we proceed?”
“I get that. The hunger isn’t easy. Mine’s not exactly the same but I experience it in a different way than you would…different than humans too.” Caleb didn’t exactly know if it was wise to bring up what he was to her but he also wanted her to know that he could understand in a way. He wasn’t just some random guy who didn’t know how to relate to her. Still, telling her that he was a zombie would come at another time as she was still processing what she was. 
“Oh, no, you’re not…indebted to me. I just want to help. You looked very lost and…” He paused, not sure how to explain why he wanted to help her. It was something he did quite often for many different people but there was a pull with Mercy. It might have been because Caleb was also lost when he was turned. It took a long time to realize what he’d become and how to properly live as it so maybe there was a sort of kinship there. “Your story seems familiar, is all. Besides, the town doesn’t need a confused vampire on its hands. We’ll all suffer for it, not just you.” That might have been a little harsh but it was the truth. If she didn’t know how to control herself things could turn messy. 
The zombie was still focused on the messy part, actually. “I think we should start with whatever body you left behind. We can’t leave it.” Especially if it was in his cemetery. Besides, he could harvest from them if they hadn’t started to decompose yet. “And then, I guess you’ll need somewhere to stay. I have extra room but I need you to promise that you won’t go into the basement of my house. It’s kind of off limits.” More than a little off limits. His stash of brains was littered across that entire basement, the supply for most of the zombies in Wicked’s Rest. It would most likely scare the hell out of her. 
Mercy was curious, but she dared not question him. Not when he was offering a helping hand despite knowing what she was. There would be time for that, because, apparently, at this rate, she had all the time in the world, “I trust thee, Caleb. No need to explain thyself.” He was right in his assumption though, she was definitely lost. This world and all its changes had been nearly impossible to understand. And though she hadn’t encountered many people yet, she knew things were going to get a lot harder, especially in the upcoming days, until she could actually adjust and blend in more, “I fear you are correct. I don’t want to take the life of another innocent. Tis not fair nor right.”
Mercy knew that consuming the blood of the man who had freed her had been a sin. She had taken him away from his family, much like she had taken the woman who had been caring for her after being attacked, away from her family. The only right thing to do was to give him a proper burial, and it seemed that Caleb would be the one to help her, “I shall take you there. He deserves peace - the peace in which his family will never have. She hung her head in shame as she slowly climbed back up to her feet.
All the vampire had wanted to do was to pray for forgiveness and to ask for guidance, but in some ways she was at least getting the latter, especially when this man, who could have easily gone about his ways, had offered to help her. What she didn’t expect was for him to allow her a place to stay. Normally, she would have hesitated – what would it have said of her reputation, boarding with a man, whom she barely knew? But Mercy was in no position, and looking up to him with a true innocence, she spoke up, “I promise. It is your home, and I am merely a guest. It may have been many years since I have resided above ground, but I know my place, sir. And I will cause no problems.”
With that, Mercy turned away from him and began to walk in the direction from once she came. She wasn’t entirely sure how Caleb had planned to handle the body of the man she had feasted on, but just like everything else currently happening in her long and barely lived life, she would soon find out. She was just grateful to have someone on her side who, rather than shun her and point fingers, gave her the opportunity to explain herself, and if this was commonplace in the world now, then maybe life in this new time wouldn’t be so horrible after all.
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fearhims3lf · 1 month
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TIMING: Before the Parker Incident
PARTIES: @animotoph0bia @fearhims3lf
SUMMARY: Looking for an escape, Finn takes a walk and stumbles into the Vinyl Countdown, where Mateo shows him the wonders of punk music.
WARNINGS: None
A phone call with his mom always ended in one of two ways - she was almost too busy to be checking in and ended the call once she had confirmed her son was alive or, on days like today, she ranted. Finn got to hear about his sister’s trouble in school, his brother’s anxiety, how hard work was at the moment and how worried she was about her eldest living in another town. It was draining to say the least and the reason why those kinds of calls usually ended with Finn flopped on the bed, surrounded by smog and head spinning a little too fast. 
He’d finally resigned himself to a walk when the options had become that or having a small freak out in the apartment. Time passed in a blur, no real mission ahead except maybe finding something to eat at some point. In his easily distracted state, Finn found himself drawn to the sound of music, decent music even, filtering through an open door and muffling as soon as the door closed. Without hesitation he followed the sound, stepping into a store that thankfully wasn’t crowded. It was, however, filled with gorgeous vinyls, posters lining the wall and making this a feast for the eyes as well as the ears. 
Shuffling inside, his fingers traced over every singer and band name he recognized, heart filling with longing even though he had no actual means of playing these beautiful vinyls back in his shitty apartment. The adoration got halted for a moment as Finn was made aware of the sand-like texture in his mouth, backpack thrown off in a less than fluid motion as he began the search for a water bottle that he maybe probably had in there. 
The shop had been particularly slow, foot-traffic growing slower by the day as the goo around town made it harder for everyone to travel. Mateo groaned to himself, drumming his fingers on his chest as he leaned back in his chair idly. There were two customers, one older man with his son, nothing to really rush to. The older the customer was, the worse, because they knew exactly what they wanted and had no intention of venturing toward something that could actually enlighten them. 
“Hmm…” Mateo rocked the chair back and forth on the tips of the legs, contemplating whether or not to convince the boy to rebel and request some good music. “Eh…” He shrugged, brows rising at the sound of footsteps entering the store. “Welcome to the Vinyl Countdown, ask for my help if you need it, or don’t.” Propping his head on his palm, Mateo blew air through his lips, making a raspberry sound out of boredom. He scanned the newest customer, watching the other two leave without buying a damn thing. There was a roll of his eyes and he got up to walk around, leaning over the shelf to peer over it.
“Thirsty for some good music?”
The water bottle had finally been dug out, held victoriously in hands that were maybe struggling a little bit to work the cap, when a voice from nowhere startled him. It wasn’t from nowhere, of course, just the other side of the shelf but it was enough for Finn to drop it and then dumbly watch it roll away. “Shitfuck - I mean, yes. Or hi. Or yes to water and music,” he blathered, elegantly stretching his arm out for the rogue bottle, tilting some of the contents of his bag out in the process. 
Crouching down, dropping his bag to the ground before the rest of his belongings littered the floor, Finn stared at them as if wondering what to do other than simply pick them up. Getting up and just leaving did feel like a decent option right now. “This might take a while, can you, like, circle around and come back so I can pretend none of this happened?” he asked, finally looking up at the store clerk from his graceful position on the floor, noting that the guy looked… intimidating. Didn’t feel intimidating though but he didn’t feel like anything, which was to be expected since Finn could barely feel his hands at the moment. 
“You look like you’re supposed to be selling something other than music.” See, this is why we don’t go out amongst people in this state.
Okay, so the dude was jumpy and probably needed a good smoke by the looks of it. That wasn’t to say that his state of being was bad. Just a little ruffled and out of place. “I think I’ll stay right here. Make sure you don’t leave anything behind on the floor I cleaned this morning.” Was it rude to do that? Yes. Did the mare care? Not really. It was fun to be a little rude, and it wasn’t like the customer would die of embarrassment. Well, hopefully not. Mateo had learned Wicked’s Rest was capable of anything, and he really didn’t want to soil any good reputation the shop had accumulated.
Laughing at the remark, Mateo rolled his eyes and looked at himself. He wasn’t sure if he was offended by the comment or not. He needed to talk a little longer to really get a read on the guy. “Is it the battle vest? The tattoos? Or my mug?” He tilted his head back, putting on his best macho vibe. If Mateo had really wanted to, he could probably intimidate the guy, especially with how lost he seemed, but sales needed to be made and punks to be recruited.
“Regardless, I’m here to get music in your hands. I can probably throw a little extra in there, but that depends on your music taste.”
Honestly, fair. Finn probably wouldn’t have left himself alone under normal circumstances so the store clerk had the right idea. “Guess I’m thankful I’m not dragging myself along a dirty floor,” he muttered to himself, finishing the job of finally gathering up his belongings with dark eyes boring down on him. Backpack zipped up safely and thrown over his shoulder, Finn finally got to his stupid feet, bottle of water crinkling in his hand as the guy laughed. Angry? Offended? Amused? Fuck, it was hard to tell. 
Shrinking into himself slightly, Finn still took the question very seriously, eyebrows furrowing in deep thought before two syllables finally made their way out, slow and dragged out. “Haircut,” he decided was an appropriate answer for some reason, one finger wagging in the vague direction of the guy’s head. “Also just the whole ‘fuck everything’ vibe which…” He gave a thumbs up, the gesture genuine even though he probably looked like an idiot. 
The temptation to leave was still rearing its head but it seemed the guy had a sale to make and honestly, wasn’t that the least Finn could do after interrupting the poor man’s whole day and maybe offending him? Uncapping his water and downing more than half of it, Finn finally nodded. “Yeah, yes. Music sounds good. Music taste is… fluid. And I most definitely do not have a vinyl player?”
Yeah, the dude needed to relax, and maybe that was a little Mateo’s fault for several reasons. Most of all, he was doing it on purpose. It was funny, and besides selling a single vinyl so far, that was the most fun Mateo had had all day. He continued his mischievous smile and watched and waited, holding back another chuckle as the gentleman in front of him let his anxiety win over. At least he liked the vibe Mateo was giving off, which meant his opportunity at making a big sale full of the music he adored was broadening. 
“Well I most definitely live by ‘fuck everything’ and ‘fuck authority,’ so I’m glad I give off that energy.” Mateo grinned and as he listened to what his anxious customer liked and lacked as far as music went, an idea began to spark. There was money to burn in his pocket, and if he could push something other than Taylor Swift out and get more people listening to something like Public Enemy. ‘The real shit,’ Mateo calls it. 
“Tell ya what,” The mare bounced his brows playfully and gestured for the young man to follow. “Don’t even worry about the record player. I’ll cut you a deal.” Mateo spoke as he walked the pair to his favorite section and plucked out the album, Black Dots by Bad Brains. He placed it adoringly into the system, moving the tonearm over for the music to burst to life on the speakers. First the gentle static, then the playful bass, and then finally, the drums. Mateo bobbed his head along, smiling. “Now, you won’t be getting a system like this, but the sound will be just as quality. And better yet, this album was peak punk back in the day. Not to mention, they’re a black punk band. They did punk the best, and you can hear the history in the sound.”
Lucky for Finn, it seemed people with anarchist vibes quite enjoyed being called out on said vibes, the shopkeeper grinning wide and maybe only a little bit at the empath’s expense. “You are very on brand, then.” Bullet seemingly dodged, Finn nodded dumbly at the mention of a deal and shuffled along behind the smiling man. Already wondering how many extra jobs he would have to scrape together after inevitably spending money he didn’t have here purely because saying no at this point would be way too awkward. Well, not purely, he did like the idea of listening to music on something other than his laptops tinny sounding speakers. 
Eyes trailed the unassuming looking record cover as it was pulled out, the band name not ringing any bells in particular. It was fitting though - ‘bad brains’ sounded like a good description for a soundtrack to Finn’s life. Sound started to filter through the speakers before Finn could voice that very astute thought to the shopkeeper, head tilting further and further with each introduction of a new instrument. It was loud, brazen - the kind of shit sixteen year old Finn would have loved to blast back at the family house to annoy his mom on one of her ‘more controlling than usual’ days. 
The hand not clutching the water bottle tapped distractedly against his thigh to the chaotic beat, mind jumping from the notes to the words, gaze focused on the spin of the record. Snapping back into his environment as the low voice cut through the music, Finn turned his attention back to the shopkeeper. “I’m not even going to pretend to know the different sorts of punk but… yeah. Hell yeah.” He held out a hand for the vinyl cover, flipping it over to look at the back and huffing out a small laugh at the song titles. “They’re great.” He couldn’t have pretended not to like it even if he’d wanted to, head subconsciously bopping along, small smile curled on his lips as the record rolled into the next song. An even more aggressive guitar strum surrounded the pair, filtering through Finn’s entire body, making him excited to blast these guys in his headphones at a volume that would threaten his hearing permanently.
Victory in sales wasn’t an uncommon occurrence, but it always felt like there was a scale, always on the verge of tipping in any one direction. Mateo often found it shifting in his favor, but nevertheless, it was always a relief to not pivot toward failure. “Now, these guys are from back in the day, ‘bout…seventies. Late seventies, I think.” Holding a finger up to ask for a moment, Mateo sifted through more records, chuckling triumphantly as he found the two other records he was looking for. 
“This album is a little old, but a little more recent, and they released a single two years back. Good shit honestly. Look ‘em up on whatever you listen to music with, but you gotta get this album, too.” He presented Hearts of Hoodlums by Whole Wheat Bread, spinning it between opposite corners. There was just one final album Mateo wanted to find, and it was only a section over. With a smile, he reached over and slid it out of the array of other records, planting it on top of Hearts of Hoodlums. “Teen Mortgage just came out with their self-titled album last month, and it’s bomb as hell. Punk revival at its finest.” 
He puffed his chest victoriously just before removing Black Dots from the player and returning it to its sleeve. When it joined the rest of the pile, Mateo placed them all in Finn’s hands and walked away to retrieve a player he’d refurbished from a storage closet. It was an older Crosley turntable he’d found that only had a few frayed wires and needed a needle replacement. After that, it was good as new, and it even still had the original box, which Mateo presented when he returned. “Thirty bucks and all of this is yours. I fixed up that turntable so it’s no big deal to pay what it was worth before. Just pay for those sweet records and spread the good word of punk.”
Finn let the music bleed into him as the clerk rifled through records, actually appreciative of the fact that there were no outside emotions spoiling the experience. Sure, a thought had passed through the semi functioning portion of his brain that so far, no emotions meant vampires but this was public and in broad daylight. Besides, eating your customers was far from a good business model. 
Nodding along as the clerk’s excitement grew with every pulled record, Finn realized this is what people normally meant when they talked about infectious excitement. The passion held for the music being displayed was hard to ignore and it definitely made the empath curious to listen. A change of pace from making a fool out of himself and applying that the guy looked like he should be a thug for hire, but a good change. Returning the genuine smile that somehow softened the man’s harsh edges, Finn couldn’t even be bothered to worry about how much money he was about to lose. “Look, the only music recs I’ve ever gotten are from my younger sister so I am putting my faith in you completely.”
The records felt nice in his hands - maybe shit like this would make the apartment at least semi less depressing. Speaking of stuff that would liven up the apartment… “Oh, dude. That’s so dope. Pretty sure my dad might have had something similar now that I think about it.” And consequently, Finn made sure to not think about it. Running a hand over the slightly frayed edges of the box, his head whipped up as it came to the payment part of the sale. “Wait, seriously? I mean, I can totally pester people about good music like nobody’s business but… are you sure?” 
Sale tactic or not, this definitely felt like a nice gesture. 
When a younger sister was mentioned, Mateo couldn’t help but think of his own back home. How most childhood afternoons were spent picking music and ragging on each other’s tastes. They’d skip songs, yet spend hours dancing or head banging around the room before their parents were home to tell them to turn the “noise” off. Then when it was quiet, they would make mixes, blending the music they were just making fun of because music held value, and the currency changed from person to person. 
To this day, Mateo still held on to a good handful of those old cds, and he softened with a swallow as he thought of those memories, almost thankful for the babbling idiot that was now a bit more composed than before. He chuckled, mostly to himself, but also because it was an appropriate reaction to mask the tenderness he was experiencing. “Ayo, don’t knock her tastes too quickly. Guarantee there’s at least one banger in there.” With a smug but friendly shrug, Mateo patted the records. “But…putting your faith in me is a smart move. C’mere.” He took all the items and led the two to the register, scanning each one as a mixture of reverence and awe washed across the customer’s face. That’s when Mateo knew he’d not only made a sale, but also helped someone truly listen to the message of punk. Passion, freedom, and expression. 
“I’m serious, chico. Like I said, found that thing and fixed it pretty easily. Not losing anything on it, and if it plays these records, that’s all the payment I need.” With a passionate rocker horns gesture, Mateo wrapped the records and placed them on the turntable’s box. “So gimme that thirty bucks and scram to listen to these. Oh, and, uh…” He plucked a logo sticker from the stack and planted it on top of everything. “Don’t forget to come back for another hit.”
It was hard to remember why exactly Finn had been so intimidated by the guy before. Okay, maybe not hard - he was confident and had a buzz cut and maybe looked a tiny bit scary in that way his sister definitely would have fawned over - but definitely silly. Not to say he’d want to pick a fight with the guy but in the setting of discussing music, the clerk was easy to talk to. “If there is, she’s not sharing them with me,” Finn sighed, following obediently to the register and bouncing on the balls of his feet. 
“Right! Yes, payment.” The traitorous bag was pulled off his shoulder, this time with less incident, and the crumpled bills dug out from a zipped pocket. Finn was sure he’d probably been saving that money for something but whatever it was, this literally felt more important. Maybe just a tiny bit because he wanted this guy to like him but mostly because of the music. Bills exchanged for the purchase, Finn scooped the stack into his arms with a smile. “For sure. Next job that doesn’t pay like crap, I’ll swing by straight after. Which, by the way, you ever need a coder for anything, I owe you one.” He raised the new, prized possession in his arms to cement the point before adding, “and also for not kicking me out for being an idiot.”
Starting to backtrack towards the door, careful with the record player because at the very least, he wasn’t going to break it in front of the guy that had literally just fixed it up, Finn gave a tiny wave. “See you, then. And, right, I’m Finn, if you need coding. And I am leaving now. So, uh, punk rock and all that.”
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endlessevenings · 6 days
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Out of Depth || Van & Mahuika
TIMING: Current LOCATION: Like A Charm PARTIES: Van ( @vanoincidence ) and Mahuika ( @endlessevenings ) TRIGGERS: None! SUMMARY: Van ventures into a magic shop out of curiosity and nerves. Mahuika spots her practically like a spider with its prey, and pounces. But in a nice way. Probably.
Van bit down on the inside of her cheek, shooting furtive glances over her shoulder. The woman behind the counter eyed her from behind the book she was reading, eyebrows pulled together in suspicion. This was so stupid. She wasn’t even… what was it, a spellcaster? A magician? A witch? She just had magic. It was an inherent and unfortunate part of her. It was something she didn’t mind the thought of getting rid of, but she didn’t know how. She figured Like a Charm might be the best place to find that information, but for the most part, she wasn’t finding anything that would aid her in her desperation. She thumbed through a couple of different tarot decks, not able to make sense of any of the symbols or images. This wasn’t her. She wasn’t… somebody who would take to this, she was something else entirely. 
A nervous sweat beaded across the back of her neck as she tried to tuck tail and run, but instead of making it through the door, she was slamming into a girl quite a bit taller than herself. Something from the other woman’s hands fell to the ground, and Van dropped into a kneeling position to pick it up. It was a number of herbs, as well as a book that Van couldn’t read the title of. “Sorry– I, sorry.” She gathered the items, straightening up as she shoved them towards the girl, gaze fixed on her own hands and how they shook slightly. 
Like a Charm seemed like an absolutely kitschy sort of place – or maybe that was just Mahuika’s good views manifesting themselves. Though she knew that she was right at least to some degree, because some of the things in the shop were absolute junk. Still, she wasn’t going to say that out loud (at least not while she was in the shop), and maybe there was something of use here.
Correct, there were many somethings of use here, and she was totally shopping local, which made her a totally good person, right? Mahuika knew it did, and being in a place dedicated to the appreciation of magic was always good in her book. A place that showed just how better those with magic were. How much more deserving of… everything. 
She’d collected some herbs and a book, though those items had suddenly found themselves on the ground and someone else was in front of her and apologizing and Mahuika grinned, giving a shake of her head. “No worries, I was in your way. There’s nothing you need to apologize for.” If the girl wasn’t magic, then she’d have a few other things to work through, but she figured that she should just go ahead and try optimism for the heck of it, at least in this particular moment. “Are you okay? I wouldn’t want you to get hurt or anything like that.”
Van wasn’t sure that was right– she had definitely run into the girl. She resituated the items so that they didn’t fall out of the girl’s hands again and she wiped her palms against her sweatshirt. “What? No, I’m totally fine.” She offered a weak smile. She was trying hard not to look at the items that the girl had, mostly because that was rude, but she was never good at minding her own business. Ever. 
Finally, her gaze dragged down and she took note of the herbs, of the book. “You’re really going to buy that stuff?” Was she just some girl, looking to grow a garden, or was this something else? “I mean– sorry, that’s not the right question.” She felt heat rise to the back of her neck again. “I was just wondering. This is my first time here, and I don’t really know what I’m looking at, and honestly I just thought it was a place for tourists.” She kept her voice low as she spoke, as to not offend the clerk who was shelving items across the store. 
“Yeah, I am really going to buy all this.” Mahuika did her best to keep her expression light – curious – neutral. Any number of good things because pissing everyone she met off was simply not it. Even if a part of her wanted that to be it, but she’d learned through enough trial and error that being nice and pleasant got her what she wanted most of the time. That was – whenever she wasn’t getting what she wanted through her more preferred means of such eventualities. 
“I think some of it is for sure for tourists.” Mahuika nodded toward a deck of mass-produced tarot cards by the front. “But some of it’s legit. Because magic is legit.” She couldn’t help but scrunch up her face ever-so-slightly, ready to duck out or duck somewhere if the girl made fun of her. There was still a bitterness about the possibility of that, but Mahuika liked to avoid thinking about that whenever possible. Besides, she could deal with this girl if she did decide that Mahuika was full of it. “Do you want … help … knowing what you’re looking at?”
“You must be like, rich or something.” Van had no clue how much everything cost, there weren’t really any price tags for her to snoop on. “Sorry– or you’re just really good at managing your money? I mean, I’m like, not. At all.” She bit the inside of her cheek, sending an apologetic glance towards the brunette. God, she was terrible at communication. 
Van’s gaze swept over the goods stacked into the shelves, a minor chill running down her spine at the mention of magic, and how it was legit. It was weird, hearing other people discuss it so nonchalantly. She’d been hiding from it her whole life, and now, she was in public discussing– or rather, being talked at about magic. She swallowed thickly, clearing her throat. “Um… I don’t… really know what I’m looking for? This is my first time in a place like this.” She looked at the girl with a pleading expression, as if begging her not to tell her this wasn’t her place. It had to be. Where else was there? 
“I don’t… I’m not familiar with like, any of this stuff.” How dangerous was it to come clean to somebody else who also believed in magic? Probably dangerous. Van forced her gaze to not linger on the brunette for too long. “What do you… recommend? What are your favorites?” Was she even going to be able to afford it? 
“I’m not.” Which was probably something too blunt and personal or whatever, but it was true. She was working at Bearcliff to make money, not because she was some fancy hotshot princess (well, she was one of those things) who wanted to know what normal life was like. Mahuika’s nose threatened to scrunch up into something resembling disgust but she flipped it around and grin. “No, o-m-g. I’m really not. I guess I’m good?” She shrugged. 
“Your first time?” Now Mahuika’s grin was far more real. Which was incredibly rare, but her smile nearly reached her eyes. “Let me help you! If that’s okay, because I’m a stranger?” She’d already decided that she was going to help, but the girl didn’t need to know that. The girl who she very much hoped was not some freakish magic witch-spellcaster murderer. But if she was, the Mahuika would just deal with that. She didn’t go around without physical items for self defense.
“Well, it depends on what you want to do with it. It’s not like you can get one crystal or one paper — and it’s also about laws, and what the person intends to do as their magic.” This girl better not up and try to steal her thunder, Mahuika thought. But she desperately wanted to know someone else magic, and this girl looked like she needed help, so it could be a double win. A new magic-user to know, and a charity case to work on. “Do you have any clue about any of that? Or we could just take a walk around? Just get comfortable vibing with the place?”
Van eyed the girl apprehensively as if willing some kind of mask to fall away from her face, to reveal her true intentions. But there was nothing– she seemed nice, seemed like she wanted to help in the way that Van so obviously needed. She tucked her balled up hands into her sweatshirt pockets and bit the inside of her cheek as she nodded, a little too pathetically for her own good. “I mean, like I’m old enough to know not to talk to strangers, but this is like, super public and you seem to know what you’re doing.” Van wasn’t really afraid of what might happen here, mostly because she could run away if needed. It wasn’t like they were secluded and alone. 
The stranger was discussing laws and about what she intended to do with her magic, and Van had to stop herself from telling the brunette that the only thing she’d done with her magic was kill people and melt tables. “I– no, I don’t know anything about… are there like, magic lawyers and stuff?” Was she being secretly watched by some kind of witch-y unity circle? Did they know everything bad she’d ever done? Was this girl here to make her pay? Van’s mind ran wild with the scenario and a small sweat broke out across the back of her neck as she considered the possibility. 
“To be fair, I think even some eight-year-olds have that sense.” Mahuika offered the girl a small smile. “But I get that – and you’re right. But this is public, and I wouldn’t ever hurt you.” Assuming, of course, that this girl was also a magic-user. Which was a bit of a gamble, but Mahuika liked to think she had a good read on people. Though there was little that she wouldn’t think she was good at. It just meant that she had really super solid self-confidence. Obviously. Some might have seen it as being overly self-important, but she didn’t, and that was clearly what mattered most.
“Also yes, I do know what I’m doing.” She grinned. “Oh, not laws like that. Laws like…” Mahuika paused, trying to think of a way to explain it without scaring her off. “There’s things that balance the world, and magic plays a role in that. I don’t want to overwhelm you. But you’re not like, in trouble. Fuck the law, right? Human law, I mean. Not the magic law. That is actually important.”
I wouldn’t ever hurt you. Van had to keep herself from telling the girl that sure, that’s what somebody who wanted to hurt somebody would say, but because this wasn’t some low budget horror film, Van kept her mouth shut. She gave a small nod, not sure what else to say to that. Was she supposed to tell the brunette that she wouldn’t hurt her either? Was that more menacing than anything? Probably, right? 
Balance. Yeah, that was the word– that made more sense than the idea that there was some kind of witch institute teaching magic users how to be lawyers or something. “Oh… balance. Right, okay.” There was not really any balance within her own realm of experiences, she realized. Everything felt severely out of balance. “Yeah, fuck the law. Not… magic law, I guess.” Van kept her voice low, despite the fact that they were in a like minded shop. For all she knew, these could be fake people with fake things to say about magic. But then why would somebody who said she knew about magic be here? Was she fake, too?
Van’s mind ran away with the limitless possibilities, uncertainty clouding her expression. “So you… you know a lot about like, all of this?” It was so unfair, she thought. To have been taught nothing; to have existed in this without really knowing what was happening to her. Why had other people gotten lucky enough to know what they were? 
“See? We’re already on the same page!” Mahuika resisted wrapping her arm around the girl, because that wasn’t good to do without asking and the last thing she wanted right now was to scare the girl off. That wouldn’t do anybody any sort of good anything. Especially because for all that it was absolutely a terrible idea, she already found herself drawn in by the other (assumed) spellcaster. If she could get her hands on someone who was confused and new to all of this, and help them become what they deserved, then that would be all kinds of absolutely perfect.
“I do know a lot. I grew up knowing.” She forced herself to frown, just slightly. Except that the pity she felt for the girl was so real that it was almost tangible. Which was not great (the pity, the loss of time being with magic that the other girl clearly had), but at the same time, worked out absolutely perfectly, just as she’d intended for it to. Mahuika nodded. “I got lucky, but I can help you, if you want. I’d love to help. Teach you whatever I can. I’ll even buy us snacks or lunch or dinner or whatever – and I can be free pretty much whenever works for you. How does that sound?”
Van should have been jumping with joy at the sight of another magic user. Between this girl and the shopkeeper at the Sugar Pot, Van should’ve been expressing immense gratitude, but all she could feel was… well, she wasn’t sure what she felt, but it wasn’t really anything good. Van stared at the brunette, mouth slightly ajar. 
“I’m– I don’t know what you’re supposed to like, teach me.” She was recoiling from the help being extended to her again. Even when it came to Teddy, all Van had taken was the ring. The ring that sat heavy in her pocket, unused, because maybe she didn’t want– she wasn’t sure what she didn’t want, and she wasn’t sure what she did want. She took a small step back from the girl across from her, clearing her throat. “I’m– um, I don’t… really know what I’m supposed to be learning.” A small, nervous laugh escaped her as she clasped her hands together, eyes darting around the room. “I just sort of like, walked in here, you know?” This was all too real– the idea that somebody could help her– or a few somebody’s.. no, she couldn’t take up their time. “I’m sorry for wasting– um, your  time.” 
“You don’t need to be sorry. You’ll learn what you’re meant to learn, all in time. You walked in here and that means something, and I’ll be here for you, alright?” God, she needed to chill with the altruism. But, Mahuika supposed, it wasn’t so bad to be helpful when you were helping another spellcaster. At least this way this girl wouldn’t end up kidnapped or dead. Hopefully.
“We’ll figure it out. But how about I take you out for tea and coffee, or ice cream, or anything you want, first? Also, I’ll admit,” and now this part might’ve been a bit of a lie, “I’ve really been wanting friends, and you seem like you know what you’re doing. So maybe we can help each other? I’ll help you even if you don’t want to be my friend though. This isn’t conditional.” Mahuika hoped that was abundantly clear. “Let me just go and check out first.” She turned on her heel, before adding, “I’m Mahuika by the way. You seem like you’re going to be a lot of fun.”
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vanoincidence · 9 days
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Breaking & Entering || Van & Mateo
TIMING: current. LOCATION: downtown. PARTIES: @fearhims3lf & @vanoincidence SUMMARY: mateo helps get van the book she needs with a friendly bit of breaking and entering. CONTENT WARNINGS: none!
Van pulled her hood up over her ears, bracing herself against the wind as it tunneled down the alley that she was taking a shortcut through to get to the comic shop. There were a couple of graphic novels she was interested in, and she had enough to even get Nora a gift.
“It is,” Van hummed out, “so cold!” She tried the door once arriving at the shop, devastated to be met with the large CLOSED sign. Pulling out her phone, she checked the hours, and sure enough, she had mistaken the day. “Are you serious?” A low pitched whine left her as she tilted her head back. The urge to stomp her foot won, and Van’s tantrum began. Not so powerful that anything happened, but it clearly caught an onlooker’s attention. Their voice sprung forth and Van was turning around, surprised by the company. In response, an overhead street light fizzled out. She wasn’t sure if that was her, or because this town refused to check its lights. She’d pretend it was the former. “They’re closed.” The sadness in her tone was apparent as she peeled herself away from the door, crossing her arms over her chest. 
Mateo drummed his fingers on the armrest of the bench, talking up a man, a stranger he was hoping to get a meal from. Her daydreaming had a nice taste, but he was looking for something bigger than a snack. The man was picking up what Mateo was putting down, nearly enough to constitute an appropriate touch to the shoulder. Another minute or two, and it would go unnoticed, but the mare wasn’t going to get that chance.
A noise interrupted the conversation, a young woman throwing what seemed to be a tantrum by a store that had all signs of being closed. Mateo chuckled, barking out an amused tease as he hopped over the back of the bench, only to stop in his tracks for a beat when the light sparked and shattered. That was when the man he was flirting with booked it, leaving the mare hungry and irritated enough to offer anything but a helpful hand. 
“There is a lack of lights, and I think the door is locked, so yeah, closed.” He nodded, biting his lip to restrain a laugh at the defeat dripping from the girl’s voice. He wanted to see how good the laugh could really be, because, come on. You don’t just ruin a meal, even if you don’t know someone’s eating.“The shop is always closed this day. Ain’t that what google is for or something? You know, checking the hours before you head out?”
Van’s brows furrowed as she ticked off the days on her right hand. “I forgot what day it was. I know how to use google… among other things.” She tightened her jacket around her frame and peered inside, willing the lights to turn on and for the clerk to open the door, but that didn’t happen, because of course it didn’t. 
“There are a lot of hours that a lot of stores have, and sometimes I forget them all. I’m not like, some filer of store hours or whatever.” Van knew that she could have easily googled to avoid all of this, but it wasn’t that big of a deal– she wouldn’t let it be that big of a deal. The old Van might have a meltdown over her self-imposed stupidity, but this Van with the magical powers and whose best friend was a bear? She wouldn’t do that! She refused! 
She took a deep, steadying breath before fully looking over her company. “Your tattoos are cool.” Van could make out a few of the ones that ran up his neck. “How badly did that hurt?” She touched the spot on her navel where she’d been stabbed by Debbie. “Is it like being stabbed or something? Or just a ton of little stabs?” 
Okay, the girl talked a little too much, and while it wasn’t horrible to be asked questions about himself, Mateo was still a little annoyed about missing out on a meal. Tapping his foot on the concrete, the mare contemplated whether or not to answer. He decided to anyway. “Uh…” He arched a brow and pocketed his hands into his vest. “None of them really hurt. Ever been scratched by a cat?” He shrugged, “Kinda like that, but over and over again.” But the throat tattoo definitely hurt more than the others, and Mateo’s stomach one did too. He’d never shook during a session before, and it was hopefully that last time he did. 
“Wait.” Mateo shook the distracting thoughts away, and refocused on the fact that the store was closed. Could cause a little chaos and break in, he supposed, but it was also a locally owned store, so breaking anything was out of the question for him. If it was a big brand, sure, Mateo loved destroying shit, but small businesses needed to stay around and be taken care of. “Hm…” Tapping his chin, he looked at the perimeter and assessed what they could do. Most businesses had alarms, but Mateo figured if he could jump in without being seen by Ms. Talks Too Much, he could get them both in, leave money, and take whatever the girl wanted. 
“You got cash on you? ‘Cause, uh…we could go in. You just gotta know how to work around a lock or two.”
“I’ve never had a pet, and I’ve only like, picked up one cat, but it didn’t scratch me.” She’d been hurt by other things, but never an animal– not that she could remember, at least. She tried to imagine what that might feel like, but fell short. Van narrowed her eyes at him, getting a better look at the tattoos that extended over the entirety of his upper body. They did look cool. Maybe she should go antagonize a cat to see if she could withstand it, and then finally go get that tattoo with Cass. 
“You want to break in?” Van’s eyes grew wide and she glanced towards the door before shaking her head. “I don’t– I don’t think that’s like, a great idea.” She crossed her arms over her chest, pulling her coat tightly in on herself.
“I think that’s a really bad idea, ‘cause what happens if we get caught? Do I look like I’m built for jail?” It wouldn’t have been the worst thing she’d ever done– she’d killed at least three people, and one of those bodies was rotting not too far from here. “Do you like, break into places a lot?” She didn’t want to assume anything about anyone, but he was offering to help her get inside. “Or do you like, secretly work here and you want to see if I’d do it just so you could get me into trouble?” Van’s imagination was running wild now as she stood across from him. 
“Yeah, I wanna break in.” Mateo shrugged, not seeing what the big deal was. While breaking into places was against the law, it wasn’t as if the two were going to trash the place, or steal. They were just shopping after hours. “Look, you’re just annoying enough to get beat up only two times. You’ll be fine though because I’m not gonna get caught.” Emphasis on him. There was no way he’d go down with someone he hardly knew. Although, the idea of teabagging a cop, even for someone annoying, seemed like a lot of fun. He chuckled, patting his vest pockets until he found what he was looking for. 
“It’s simple—and yes, I break into places a lot, but your prank idea does seem like fun.” Ignoring any further protests, the mare turned to the door and began to work. “I’ll have to try that at my shop.” With a snicker, Mateo took out his lockpicking kit and finagled with it until he found the proper pick, inserting it and jiggling the handle until the lock turned. “See? Simple. Now get your damn cash ready and look for your shit while I check for an alarm. For all we know, it’s silent.” He walked as he spoke, making a beeline for a device on a wall in hopes that it was a security system. It was a bust as soon as he saw it was a thermostat. Ugh. He kept looking. 
“What kinda comics or graphic novels are you looking for anyway?”
“Only two times?!” Van pointed at herself with her thumb, an incredulous expression peeling over her features. “I was bullied like, a lot in school, okay? I’m almost positive it’d be more than just twice.” It was a made up scenario, obviously, and she wasn’t sure why she was putting that much thought into it. It seemed silly, all things considered– if she hadn’t been caught for her crimes up until now, what was the chance of her getting caught breaking into a store? Her anxiety numbed her tongue and she pressed it against the roof of her mouth, surveying their surroundings. 
She wasn’t sure what was fun about lying to somebody. She’d broken into places before, but mostly places that deserved it. Van didn’t think that small businesses really deserved to have their locks picked, or windows smashed. Her eyes grew wide as he began to work on the lock and she shot a glance over her shoulder, rushing to hover over his shoulder as if to block him from view of anybody who might pass by. “Dude–” The door sprang open and Van froze, gaze swiveling over the inventory inside. She saw exactly what she needed– it was a copy of Nimona that she’d wanted to get for Nora, since she reminded her of her friend. “Hey!” Before she could yank him back, he was walking into the building. “What about cameras?!” Van hissed, pausing in the door for a moment before she finally found an ounce of courage to pass the threshold. 
“That.” She pointed towards the graphic novel on the display labeled monsters. She didn’t think Nimona was a monster. It was obvious that the shopkeeper had totally misunderstood the story. “It’s for a friend,” Van mumbled under her breath as she walked up to the display, running her fingers over the cover before grabbing it. “Are you sure there aren’t like, cameras and stuff? The last time I broke in anywhere–” She paused, eyebrows furrowing, “forget I said that.” It wasn’t like he’d judge her– just look at him, he was a pro! “Um, but if like, this ever gets investigated, please don’t rat me out. I don’t really think I have a lot to live for, but like, not being in a jail cell sounds suuu-per cool to me, you know?” She unfurled a few bills to cover the cost of the tip, as well as a wad of apology ones for breaking in. There went her red bull and slim jim fund. 
“Okay, I’ve got it– can we just like, leave?!”
Curiosity arched Mateo’s brows and his interest was piqued when he caught sight of the art style on the cover. “Ni…mona?” There was another copy where Van pulled from, and he quickly snatched it up to read the summary in the back. Nemeses! Dragons! Science! Symbolism! It made Mateo chuckle, and feel something he hadn’t felt in a while. Not since he was a teenager looking at similar graphic novels and comics in a store not unlike the one the two were rummaging through. The part about proving the bad guys are actually portraying themselves to be heroes at the Institute of Law Enforcement wasn’t a bad concept either. Pretty punk if you asked him.
“Huh…?” Right. Cameras. In all the excitement, Mateo forgot to consider those in their tiny heist. He’d get to those momentarily. After he’d found a pen, a piece of paper, and his wallet. “I’ll get to that in a sec. Getting one of these for myself. This book don’t seem bad at all.” Still looking at the cover, Mateo went to the cash register and sifted around the shelves until he found what he was looking for. With a smile, he circled back around to the tidbit Van wanted him to forget as he wrote down what they were taking. 
“So this ain’t your first rodeo, huh? Dope shit, fam. Even if it’s not as funny now. People panicking is hilarious—wait, what?” Mateo halted his scribbling quickly on the paper, and he tutted with a grimace at the idea of being a snitch. “Nah, chica. Even if we did get caught and they tried to turn us on each other, I don’t rat. Not even on strangers.” Finishing the last title on the list, Mateo slapped the pen and some money down onto the counter. “‘Cause fuck cops, man. That’s what this book is about, yeah?” He tapped on the title, Nimona, with a smile, excited to get home and read it. 
All they had to do was snag any video coverage and vamoose, but, of course, there had to be a problem. Before Mateo could open a door to a back room, he heard the all too familiar click of a flashlight and the words, “Put your hands up!”
Well, at least something good could’ve come out of this! Van had gotten another person to read Nimona! She waited impatiently by his side, book pressed against her chest as she looked around them. “What do you mean you’ll get to it?” She was acting fairly distraught for somebody who’d broken into places before and killed somebody inside one of them. Then again, this was different; this was a place she respected, and there were no dangers. At least, not that she could see. 
Suddenly feeling self conscious about the entire situation for reasons that didn’t quite make sense, Van cleared her throat. “Um, thank you. I don’t rat either. Narcs are losers, and like, I might be a loser in other senses of the word, I’m definitely not a narc or whatever.” Her voice softened as she relaxed. This was strange– to break in somewhere with somebody she didn’t know, all for the sake of obtaining graphic novels. She still felt a little bad, but they were leaving money behind, weren’t they? That wasn’t bad! They were paying their dues. It was their fault for closing early, Van rationalized. 
Van’s expression brightened slightly at his words, “yeah! I mean, yeah, it’s about a lot of other things, too– and there’s a show which is also really good! But it’s a little different, but still definitely good.” She gave him a smile that, if he really looked at her, he would notice how nauseous she looked. 
Everything fell apart though, as it always did. The sound of footsteps, a flashlight glaring angrily at her feet, creating distorted silhouettes out of the two of them against the shadow-y backdrop of the room they were moving toward. Van whirled around, Nimona falling to her feet as she raised her hands above her head. She couldn’t see their face due to the bright light, but figured that it was probably a cop, or best case– a mall cop. 
“Um! We left– there is money on the counter!” Van was a leaky faucet of anxiety as she stared wide-eyed at the man behind the flashlight. That anxiety, of course, transformed into something else. The ground beneath his feet melted, sending him falling onto his ass. The flashlight rolled away from him and Van dipped down to grab the book before heading towards her accomplice. “We have to go,” Van hissed. She knew that it was only a matter of time before the man got to his feet, and they needed to be gone before that. “Ah– wait– the cameras!” 
“A show?” He made a mental note to look it up once he was home. Nimona’s story sounded like it followed a punk little guy that Mateo would enjoy reading about, and if they made a whole show about it, it had to be good. For a moment, he wondered if it went live action or animated, his thoughts circling back to Xóchitl and her desire to find new animated things to watch. Something about a friend that enjoyed the colors and such. He shrugged, dropping that train of thought to refocus on the lone cop interrupting their rather victimless heist. They didn’t even break the door! 
Eh…whatever. Mateo wasn’t worried. At least, not at first. “Did his…what the fuck just melted?” What used to be solid ground became a large puddle that sent the cop careening to the ground. Not even the shock from both being caught and seeing what looked to be a puddle appear could keep Mateo from laughing, though. Was she different, too? Had she caused that? Whatever the case, it was amazing and hilarious, and it also meant that he didn’t have to worry about disappearing at the blink of an eye. What an amazing night. Mateo wasn’t so mad at losing out on a meal now.
“This is great shit.” He chortled for a few beats, and the cop grumbled as he continued to fumble around like he was on a slip ‘n slide. Mateo laughed more, almost crying at the entertainment. He was only able to catch what Van said once the urgency of the situation caught up to him again, and even then, he was snickering as he shooed Van away. 
“Go on, get!” He commanded with his most playful southern accent, blipping away to the back room he had his eye before they were interrupted. From there, all that could be heard was a muffled, “I got everything covered!” While Mateo found the computer with coverage of the whole store on the monitor. He hoped Van actually listened and beat it, but there wasn’t much he could do while he was preoccupied pausing the cameras, and deleting the last few minutes from the cloud. 
Her accomplice was amused, not scared by the way things had gone. That was new. This was a little bit like Nora, Van thought. Was he a bugbear, too? She tried to imagine the bear form he might have, but her mind snapped back to the present as she turned back to look at him– only he was gone? How was that possible? He’d been standing right in front of her a moment ago, and now he was… 
The cop was still struggling to get to his feet and Van wasted no time in skirting around the puddle she’d created, craning her neck so that she could turn her face away from him. God forbid he have photographic memory or whatever. 
She wasn’t sure where her company had gone, but something told her to get the hell out of there before this guy’s backup showed up. She could hear his radio crackle as she pushed through the door, taking off down the street, Nimona pressed to her chest. This was one hell of a gift for Nora. 
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kodiacast · 1 month
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Timing: Not too long ago in the far off land of… 2022 Location: The Wormhole Feat: @alteyed & @kodiacast Warnings: Gun use (describing wound on ghost), alcoholism (the hunter) Summary: So a hunter walks into a bar…
Between the fingers tapping along the polished wood and the pen tapping on the journal, the large man at the bar was making a hell of a lot more noise than he usually did. Otis was reserved, to put it mildly. A mountain of stoicism, or at least that’s how he appeared. Generally, the bear was barely used to being around so many people. His moms and the ranch workers were just about the only social interaction he’d gotten before moving up north. He knew there would be a culture shock but this was… distracting. 
Otis came to Wicked’s Rest looking for a new perspective, but found himself a bit too much of a shy violet to properly interact with the locals. But he was trying to get better. Hence the bar. The Journal. And the Writing, but in public. This wasn’t his first time in the Wormhole. It was close to home, and cheap enough that he could afford to keep a tab open long enough to get some work done. Only, it was getting pretty hard to think. So many eyes all around, so many ears. It was a little unnerving. A strange feeling for the apex predator, one he wasn’t too sure he’d come to terms with. 
“Ah– hey–” The bear sighed, attention shifting from the lack of words on the page to the bartender. “Could I– Another?” You’d think with a profession built around talking he’d at least be good at it, but Otis had never been a real conversationalist. Words never seemed to fit in the right order when he had to make them up on the spot. Always mixing up, switching around. Like his mouth was a blender and speech was a smoothie. Well, maybe not a smoothie, everything always came out pretty rough. 
— 
Being back in Wicked’s Rest meant a lot of things, but mostly it meant that with every whisper, she was left to guess whether it was a spirit, or somebody trying to figure out why, under their breath, Rue Kincaid was back in town. She’d gotten used to the voices; had gotten even better at ignoring them– pretending she couldn’t hear their requests. In Seattle, the population of ghosts that swarmed her were typically of the familial variety with a few stragglers here and there, all aware that she could see them even when she tried to pretend she couldn’t. 
Her old hometown was entirely different. With its high death toll, it was bound to be filled to the brim with ghostly entities, all looking for their medium to latch onto. But this was just visiting, and while she had the option of working out of her dad’s ski loft for the summer, she figured there’d be more money to me made in town at the tried and true Wormhole. It wasn’t the cleanest of establishments, but the tips were typically good, and it was hard to say no to easy money, even if she had some funds coming in from her over the phone business. The underwriting job had proven to be boring, and while she didn’t anticipate straying from Seattle for too long, a summer couldn’t hurt. 
Rue finished off the glass that she’d been polishing, putting it down onto the counter when her attention diverted to the customer sitting adjacent from where she sat. He’d been quiet, for the most part– an easy customer, and a face she saw a few times since returning to Wicked’s Rest. Her gaze flickered to the now empty glass and she gave him a curt nod, grabbing the glass before pouring more of the brew in, cutting off the head by pouring some to the side before filling it up the remainder of the way. “This all you want?” It was why people came to bars, wasn’t it? He had a notebook in front of him, and a pen poised between his fingers. She had to wonder what he was writing, and she wasn’t typically the kind of person to beat around the bush. “What’s going down in there? Grocery list? Are you a food critic, here to review the beer? Just know I’m not in charge. I only work here, just for the summer at least.” She gave him a wink before grabbing an additional glass to begin shining. 
You had to get alcohol at a bar, right? It was like the law or something. Truthfully, the bear didn’t care for the stuff. Didn’t really like the way it reminded him of the air outside a dumpster in the thick of summer. But it’s what you were supposed to do, and Otis wanted a place to be social, so. Beer. An IPA, or something. Locally made with so many hops it could put a bunny to shame. The label seemed nice. That’s why he picked it. All scrolls and swirls like an Alphonse Mucha portrait. Got his brain lost in the ways he followed the lines. He found himself staring at it long after the drink was poured. Long after he was asked a question, or was it a series of questions? 
Otis blinked back to the bartender, ideas swirling behind his dark eyes. Something about a label that drew people into a trap, ensnaring them in a trance far deeper than any stupor the alcohol behind it could cause. Something about spiders spinning webs in fanciful patterns. Swirls rather than sharp angles, pleasant faces instead of the gnashing mandibles that so many feared. His first good idea in weeks. 
He smiled. A soft thing, hardly different from his neutral expression at all. “No judgin’ here, ma’am.” Otis’ gaze drifted back to the journal where he made a few notes, and half of a sketch. “...got any… bottles of that there brew? Tap’s fine but–” But he wanted to take it home. Wanted to keep the inspiration nearby. “S’nice is all.” 
— 
With a raised brow, she presses her hand to her chest with the rag in it, aghast by the manners he provides. “Ma’am? You know, I’m only twenty-five.” She’d heard it before, plenty of times here and there, but never while she was tending bar. Maybe it was because The Wormhole’s clientele fell all over the place. Rue looked from his glass, then to the tap that she had poured it from. 
“Mm, I’ll see what I can dig up for you, sir.” With a begrudging smile, Rue retreated to the back fridge where she began to look and see if they had any bottles of the brew, the rabbit staring up at her from its label, tucked just behind a box of oranges. She grabbed the bottle and returned to him, setting it down just next to the freshly poured glass. “Might taste different, coming from the bottle.” She leaned against the wooden bartop, ducking her head low to grab another glass that was tucked away in the corner beneath the overhang. “You a beer connoisseur?” She avoided looking at the notebook he wrote into, not wanting to invade his privacy. 
— 
“Ah sorry, meant no disrespect.” Sheepishly, Otis shuffled in his seat. A thin blush reddening his cheeks. The last thing he wanted to do was offend someone, but the north was so much different than his hometown. Either of his moms would have whupped him upside the head for not calling someone in service by their due titles. But Ah– northern attitudes, right? “Just didn’t know yer name is all.” He added, before realizing that might also sound wrong. Shoot. “Not that you gotta give it or nothin’ I just–”
Before any other misunderstandings escaped his traitor of a mouth, Otis hung his head. Hunched himself into his shoulders and went back to writing, but not before paying for the drink, with a little extra tip for the confusion. But she came back, and she was asking things again. Small talk. The kind he never knew what to do with. Felt too heavy in his hands, too small to shape into something worthwhile. “Truly don’t know much about beer.” He responded, candid, shy. “Sorta just like the branding…” 
— 
“If I’m being honest, I don’t know much about beer either.” Not necessarily the truth– her dad had tried his hand at running his own brewery before failing miserably, and instead bought IPAs from the only other active brewery in town to cycle through the small bar within the lodge. Rue looked over the wrapper and gave a short nod. “The art is good, yeah. I can see why you like it.” She gave him a small smile before returning to shining the glass. 
“You can call me Rue, by the way.” She didn’t look up from the glass she was shining as she spoke, “or Prudence, but Rue is better.” Rue set the glass down, planting both hands firmly on the bar top as she looked up, leaning slightly forward. “Should I call you man who likes bunny, or do you have a name? You don’t need to tell me it, if you want. We can go by codenames.” She paused, a short laugh pulling from her chest. “Or, I guess, you can have the codename. I already told you mine.” It was easier to focus on conversations like these– to ignore the woman behind him, the way her throat was slit– an accident, she thought– something about a linen wire. She’d heard the story before, could hear it now as the woman droned on and on, but she focused on the clientele, leaning backwards to tick up the volume of the song by a few notches. “Love this song.” She grinned at him. 
— 
A notch twitched at Otis’ brow. For sure, he thought, he’d ruined the conversation before it ever really started. A messy mix of misunderstanding and miscommunication. More monstrous than the words he wove through the old microphone at home. This was what he should write his next episode about. The horrors of trying to get to know people. 
Rue came back, Well she sort of had to, it was her job. But it wasn’t necessarily part of the description to entertain surly bears that sulked around the edges of the bar. There was a warmth to her, a brightness. Made him wanna open up more. “Rue is...nice. It’s a nice name.” Otis repeated, accent heavy on his tongue. Committed to memory. She’d already painted a picture in his mind, now it had a proper title. “Fittin’.” Cause she was nice too. Nice enough to keep up with his… lack of expertise in this area. 
“Otis.” The bear took a second to reply as the warbling torrent of his mind tried to come up with something better, something about codenames, something clever. Nothing came, just a whisper of half formed ideas clogging up his thoughts. “That’s– That’s me. You can– I’m Otis.” He raised his glass, tilted his head and nodded. “It’s good, yeah. Good song. Don’t think I’ve– heard it before.” 
— 
“Thanks, I sorta picked it myself.” Not untrue, since her dad had tried calling her Prue as a nickname instead. She went by it sometimes, but only for him, due to his insistence.
“Well, I’m Otis, I think you have good taste in beer and music.” It was an old man's name, or at least she thought it might be. But Otis didn’t look old, not in the slightest. Maybe slightly older than her, but not by decades or anything. The woman behind him finally had enough, disappearing through a wall. At least that was over with. Lucky enough for her, most of her family knew not to bother her when at the bar, but there were a few– her great uncle in the chair by the door, being one of them, that never got the memo. 
“It’s by Imminence, it’s called Paralyzed.” She leaned over and grabbed her phone, showing him the screen. “We get to plug our own playlists, so guess I’m sorta… biased?” Rue offered with a laugh. “Might be… a bit sad for a bar, though.” Whatever, she thought. It was just the two of them, anyway. It was uncharacteristic of the bar, but… 
Her thoughts flew out the moment the door slammed open. A man with a woman behind him– translucent, eyes wide with terror, a bullet between the eyes, followed after him. He’s going to kill more, he’s going to kill more. The woman repeated this continuously, rising in pitch as the man spoke, “drink, want a–” His focus shifted as his gaze leveled on Otis, or Rue thought. The drunken expression he wore moments before transformed into something else– determination, maybe. 
— 
Otis’ brow quirked again, before settling into a confused smile. A joke, that was a joke. That meant this was going… well? The bear couldn’t get out of their mind to just talk, everything had to be predated with a mini meditation on the right choice of words. Only to lose them all in translation between thought and speech. He nodded, thankful for the compliment and then again for the song title. Even wrote it down so he could find it on the youtube later on. 
“Somethin’ nice about sad songs though. Feels… more like a comfort when you’re down too. Happy feels broken when you ain’t. Commiseration, like a hand to hold, is better, y’know?” Probably more words in a row than he’d said face to face with someone since he moved to this town. Another sign things were improving. Good, very good. 
He didn’t pay much mind to the sudden slam. Didn’t even turn to look at the stranger who waltzed in already half cocked and clearly looking to add even more to his blood alcohol content. Otis was far and away too preoccupied with Rue, and with the brewing story inspired by the bunny brew. Far more content with sharing his attention to what deserved it, rather than what was demanded. “To be truthful with you–” He started, musing aloud as he wrote a few things down, fully ignoring the newcomer. “Rather have somethin’ sweeter. Like… What's that one soda drink, real red, with the cherries? Summ’n real nice about it. Smooth-like. Perfect for sippin’.” There was no attention given to the rowdy customer, no notice to the way he slinked in close, far too close. 
His breath bounced off the back of Otis’ arm, and the bear barely budged. Didn’t like that much. “Oi. Shitheel. Look at me when I’m–” A hiccup. “–when I’m lookin’ at you.” The man was giving a masterclass in articulation, clearly Otis should have been taking notes. “What’s a beast like you doin’ in a place like this?”  Slurred and mumbled, half the words weren’t really audible. But the man tried to twirl the bear around in his seat. Giving a full attentive audience to his belligerence. 
“...Can I…. help you?” 
— 
Rue would have much rather spoken to Otis about songs and what they meant– maybe not so much how they made her feel, because nobody needed to know that, but this asshole had other plans. He was piss drunk and she could smell alcohol on him as he neared– bourbon, she thought. She wrinkled her nose, gaze passing over his shoulder to the woman who was still repeating the same thing over and over. The blood that dribbled down her forehead, though translucent, was a stark reminder that she had been killed, and it was apparent that the man ahead of her had done it. 
But Otis was still speaking, seemingly unperturbed by the addition to their company. Maybe he couldn’t see him? Was the man dead, too? Spirits could force doors open, could do a whole lot more than just that, but he didn’t look dead, not in the way the woman behind him did. Was this something else? 
She tried to level her focus on Otis, to respond to him. Shirley Temple, she wanted to shout at him, it’s called a shirley temple. Maraschino. Syrup. Sweet. Seedless. 
The man was antagonizing Otis now, and it still didn’t seem as though he noticed him. Rue’s hand tucked beneath the bartop, grabbing the baseball bat that was clipped to the underside. There was another one just behind her, but this would be less inconspicuous. 
“Hey, fuck off– what the fuck do you think you’re doing?” She raised the bat above her head, swatting it towards the man’s head, easily missing Otis in her aim. “Get the fuck out, NOW.” The man looked surprised by her sudden outburst, but his hand was still firmly planted on Otis’s chair. 
“Youa–h gonna make me?” Before he could get the rest of the words out, Rue was climbing over the bar top, kicking over a glass in her attempt to make it towards him. “I said get the fuck out!” The man’s eyes widened slightly as he stumbled back, and the spirits behind him– both the woman and her great uncle, stared at her with equal parts amusement and disbelief. “Get-the-fuck OUT!” Rue swung the bat at his head as she slipped off of the counter, kicking the chair next to Otis forward so that it caught the man’s legs. “I said now!” She swung again, and it whistled through the air just above the man’s head as he sloppily ducked, stumbling back towards the door. 
Otis was lost to her now, all she could see was the way the man had put his hands on him, on the way he commanded attention. Rue hated it– hated the way that he looked at Otis, the way he looked at her. She didn’t like the way that the spirit looked at him either, mouth hanging in a perpetual scream that never came, blood dried to her forehead. 
A sudden shift had the bear stepping back. The stranger insisted, getting a little more handsy, and Rue came in like a bat outta hell. Something about the scene sent Otis right back to the ranch. To the ways his moms would run a coyote out of the chicken coop, or how Lila or one of the other ranch hands would scare off a bobcat getting too close to the cattle. A fierce protective bolt of lightning. Snapped at the second the air got too excited. Sensed something, maybe. The intent Otis had missed behind the stranger’s wild expression and drunken slurs. A heat that had somehow been insulated against ever affecting him because the bartender diffused the bomb so quickly. So efficiently. 
The man retreated. The bartender stood there like a guardian. And Otis felt more at home in this town than he ever had since moving there. The bear hadn’t really gone out of his way to make close connections. Hell, wasn’t really anything to say that’s what this was either. Just a hell of a woman protecting the hell out of her bar. Weeding out a wasp before it could sting. 
A low breathy whistle escaped his lips. He pulled the jacket closer around his shoulders. A little stunned, a lot amazed. “...Sent him runnin’ like a rat been caught rummagin’ in the rubbage bin.” Otis’ accent was never thicker than when he felt the need to add a little southern simile to spice up the sentence.
“….You do that often?”  
Rue watched as the man disappeared through the door, her own chest heaving. Her head buzzed with electricity– adrenaline fused together with the hatred she felt. The spirit that had followed him inside followed him out, and Rue was left to witness it, the lack of accountability. 
For a moment, she forgot where she was, and she turned to look a Otis. “Only when some piece of shit comes in trying to act all tough.” It wasn’t the first time she’d run somebody out of the bar, and she knew it wouldn’t be the last. If she got loud and aggressive, shrieking like some banshee, then people often cut their losses. People didn’t like when things got loud. She couldn’t blame them. Rue tucked the bat to her chest and turned the corner to go back behind the bar. “Are you good?” 
She repositioned the things that’d been knocked by her eagerness to cross the distance to the man, putting the bat back to where it’d come from. “He didn’t bruise you or anything, did he?” Her skin was still warm and her chest still swarmed with a smattering of different anxieties– what if he came back? What had he done to that woman? 
Not knowing the context was a blessing that coupled with the security Otis carried himself with. He hadn’t gone to pieces at the aggressive display. Hadn’t flinched even when the man’s touch spun him around in a way that maybe he shouldn’t have been able to. The bear was of the mind that if he ignored the problem, it would usually sort itself out. Generally, things tended to. A stalwart confidence in his own ability to withstand whatever the world had to throw at him. 
“Yeah, sure ‘m fine.” Otis assured her. An apologetic smile crept in, as if he’d somehow caused the trouble by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. As if the drunk wasn’t going to cause issues no matter who was on either side of the bar. Maybe the man was having a hard time, Otis thought to himself, staring out towards the door where the stranger had made his exit. Maybe he’d been through something and was dealing with the grief it caused him. It never even occurred to the bear that maybe the man was predisposed to hate someone like him, something like him.  
“Wish some fellas wuddin’t make their sorry hearts a problem for other folk.” A huff of air filtered through Otis’ nose, noting how this was something the north and south had in common. People who’d been filled with hurt, hurt other people. Just a fact of life. “My mamas always told me to keep compassion for folks like that. But also to pay them no mind.” Easy for the one who didn’t have to see the specter of a woman with a hole in her head. “How ‘bout you, Miss Rue? How’s the ticker feelin’ after a fright like that?”  
Rue hid her shaking hands on the other side of the bar top, fingers now tangled in a rag. She checked behind Otis, towards the door, but he didn’t come back through. Her great uncle continued to stare at her, his own gaping wound obvious to her from where he stood. She gave him a look that she was half-sure Otis wouldn’t have noticed. 
“As long as you say so.” Rue offered him a small smile, though it didn’t quite reach her eyes. She pressed her hands into the rag, willing the trembling of her fingers to cease. She’d seen a lot– had done a lot, and no matter the anger that coursed through her for the sake of others– the bullet between the woman’s eyes, the dried blood– all of it, it made her feel ill. 
The lack of urgency that Otis showed had upset her in a way she didn’t want to address. It wasn’t her responsibility. Her gaze lifted up to meet his as he spoke and she let out a breath that matched his. “It’d be easy to do that, right? Pretend it doesn’t exist, the hurt that they cause.” It’s said before she can stop it, but she shakes her head as if to dislodge the thoughts that continue on as her words fall into the air. “Oh, I’m fine. I’ve thrown a bat around a time or two.” Another smile, and it still doesn’t reach her eyes. It’s an odd thing, knowing how each family member has died– of being able to trace them back, accident or not. To have this capability, of being stuck with this capability, it’s a responsibility she wouldn’t wish on anyone else, certainly not Otis. “But uh, yeah, I’m good.” Another breath, before Rue is balling the rag up and tossing it to the side. “How about that shirley temple?” 
There was a clear tension tightening between the woman’s chest and the empty door frame. A palpable string, struck out from a chorus of ethereal violins. Her words were comforting, her demeanor less so. Haunted. If Otis had to put a word to it, that’s what it would be. The pools of her irises held depth that her age betrayed. She’d seen things. Seen the could-have-beens maybe. The ending of stories that didn’t stop at the end of a bat, quelled by a thread of threats. 
Otis stared, held his gaze a beat longer than maybe he should have. Trying to convince himself that he was embellishing again. Treating life like it was a story. Like everything was a play that just needed a narrator's touch. Maybe Rue was just tired. It’d been a long shift. He’d been there for a good majority of it. Nursing half-enjoyed beers, and wishing for the sweet little drink he couldn’t recall the name of. 
But she knew. Of course she knew. Otis knew fear, Rue knew drinks. The presence of the stranger hadn’t riled up that undefinable essence that the bear had always needed. He hadn’t gotten sick from accidentally drinking it in. Probably wouldn’t mix too well with whatever made it into his stomach so far. Sort of a relief, honestly. Meant he could stick around for a little while longer. Maybe figure out what kind of life made a person so steely. Meant he could enjoy that fruity little drink. 
“Yeah– sounds–” Otis nodded, wanting to say more but instead he choked up again. Back to square one. Quietly settling into the chair, hunched as he had been. One hand pouring over the notebook, the other playing with the ring he kept around his pointer finger. “Sounds good.” 
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uncannysam · 1 month
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PARTIES: @amonstrousdream @uncannysam TIMING: Mid-December SUMMARY: Leila drops by Sam's place for a snack, but comes to find more than she bargained for. WARNINGS: None!
She hadn’t meant to go so long without feeding on the dreams of some unsuspecting victim within Wicked’s Rest. But with all of the chaos that previous months had brought, whipping up nightmares had been the last thing on Leila’s mind. There were projects to work on, people to take care of, elder vampires to kill, and a death-day anniversary to ignore. With all of it combined, it took the waking and dreaming hours of her life. Meals became few and far between. Finally, it had been too much. She needed a dream, and she needed it immediately. 
And so, the mare disappeared into that in-between space of the astral and fluttered about the town, hunting for sweet dreams to sour. The town, slowly emerging from the gooey hellscape of autumn, was slowly taking on a more saccharine feel again. Naturally darkened dreams of stress and dread were starting to grow brighter. It was overwhelming, to say the least.
After what felt like ages, Leila found a bright spot of dreaming that her hunger would not let her pass up. She slipped through the keyhole, into the darkened room on the soft edges of shadow and moonlight, following the smell of dreams until she found her little dreamer, tucked away in bed. A feather-light hand rested against their arm to ensure they stayed asleep before the mare snuck her way into their dream.
__
Sam couldn’t go any longer without sleeping, but she knew if she slept, her gift of sight would go away. It seemed to do that, when her body was actually well rested. But she couldn’t stay up another minute, especially considering she had almost walked out in front of a car today coming back home from the store. So she reluctantly shut off the lights, crawled in the bed with Scout at her feet, and as soon as her head hit the pillow, drifted off into a deep slumber. One she had at least hoped would be restful, if she had to endure it.
Settling in and shifting through the REM stages of sleep, Sam had finally found herself in a peaceful environment. One that she had felt safe and comfortable in. It was full of familiar faces of friends and family. She was back home in Kahnawake. Everything looked familiar, at least to what her childhood memories were, but this time she was grown. In fact, it was as if she had resided there. Wicked’s Rest was a thing of the past, and she had reopened her comic book shop.
Hearing the bell alert her to the presence of someone, Sam had walked out from the back, “Can I help you? Is there something you’re looking for?” Everything seemed like another day at Escape Your Fate, except Scout seemed to be missing, which had felt off for some reason.
It had taken the nightmare an awful long time to realize what feeding on dreams was akin to. Centuries of floating on the periphery of that one divine moment on the edge of sleep where dreams were all that were and ever had been had shown her that dreams- most dreams, all dreams- were simply life in disguise. Nightmares fed on that. The bit of life and humanity that made all people dream, to replace the life and dreams that had been stolen from them. Had she not been so hungry, Leila might have been disgusted by herself. By interrupting the remembrance of life and happiness in the place in-between. 
But monsters had a desire to live, too. 
Unseen, unknown, the mare stalked about, looking at the sweet dream that seemed to be playing out in the stranger’s mind. A bell jingling merrily. Comic books lined the walls as she flitted down the aisles, a bit of breeze. The tang of uncertainty caught her off guard. The dreamer had noted something. Something missing. A string she could pull, perhaps. Some memory she could unravel? Ah… An idea flickered in Leila’s mind, and the mare willed the sound of footsteps in the back of the store. A voice. A thud. Maybe there was something here she could work with? 
___
Hearing the sound of footsteps, Sam narrowed her eyes and looked back. It wasn’t Scout. He was right next to her and those footsteps were clunky, like boots. Turning her attention back on the person in the store, Sam noticed a stranger she had never seen before. But quickly the voice; an all too familiar voice. One she had heard almost every day of her life since coming to Wicked’s Rest peaked her interest once more. Zach. The part of her heart that had been missing for months now, but he was alive? Of course he was! Sam didn’t know she was dreaming. To her, this was life, but the thud, for whatever reason, had sent a wave of anxiety shooting through her body, and without hesitating, she was to her feet and running towards the back of the store in the blink of an eye.
Breaking the threshold of the doorway, Sam hit the brakes when suddenly, she was no longer in the comic bookstore, but standing in a dark alleyway that appeared empty at first, until she had squinted to take a closer look; her eyesight failing her in the moment. As she inched closer, she couldn’t help but remain cautious. She could have sworn, she was just in the comic book store. And where was Scout? So badly she wanted to shout out his name, but there was a lingering fear sitting inside that told her to remain quiet.
___
Oh… oh, she’d found the thread to pull. 
Whoever the owner of the voice that filled memory after memory in this girl’s mind was, there was an awful lot there. All of it dark. Something in Leila’s chest tugged her forward, wanting to know what it was in this particular thread of memory she’d plucked up and begun to weave back into the story it once was. 
The safety of that shop was easily transformed into something more sinister. Whoever Zach was, nothing good happened to him here, in the damp of a dark alley. She wove the scene together quickly, continuing to pull along at that thread as if it were her personal, unending ball of yarn. She created shadows there, just out of sight of the girl. Enough to draw her forward, enough to pull her along and create the suspense that would satiate her appetite. Sam… Sammy… Leila used that voice again, calling out like a mockingbird. The uncertainty was a start. The strange, tickling warmth that filled her chest with every feeding urged the mare to create terror rather than mere uncomfortableness. The problem was that despite her hunger, despite that instinct, she was curious. She wanted to know what happened. Wanted to see for herself. 
Sammy, where are you… 
___
Sam lingered in her spot in the alley. Fear had engulfed her entire body, and she stood frozen. But Zach was calling for her. Calling her name, looking for her like she had been looking for him. She had to move forward. She had to go find him. She couldn’t leave him. The way the guilt was swelling up in her small form made her heart seem to shatter for unknown reasons thanks to the dream she was currently lost in. Not because she could actually, in that moment, remember the exact events and the way everything went down.
With a quivering breath and her heart pounding so much faster than it had been both in the dream and in her waking life, Sam took one step forward, followed by another and another, letting out a soft whisper, “Z-Zach…” If there was something lurking in the shadows, she didn’t want to awaken it to her presence. Her mind seemed to run stories from her childhood on repeat; tales of warnings from the various creatures that roamed the Earth when her ancestors were still a part of the living world, “Zach, I’m here…where are you?”
Sam continued to step cautiously as her narrowed eyes scanned the area looking for him, but so far nothing. She just seemed to move deeper and deeper into the alley and the darkness and impending certainty of doom that it held hoping she would eventually run into him.
___
There was a rush that came with the fear of a dreamer. It was heady, utterly intoxicating- the first time she’d experienced it, the mare hadn’t known what to make of it. But as existence had stretched on and on, Leila had finally been able to pinpoint it. The racing pulse and sharp intakes of breath were so harsh that they almost replaced what was lacking in the mare. It was horrible, yes. But it was necessary. Without that little act of thievery, she feared she’d dissipate into nothingness. 
It was easy to pull the threads together now. The further into the girl's memories that she played, the more elements Leila could call to light. The boy’s- Zach’s- voice, calling out for her dreamer. Letting it go from whispered calmness to hissed fear as Sam’s fear grew. Shadows… she needed to shape the shadows. With a keen eye for detail, she pulled a form from the recesses of the girl’s mind as one might pluck a pattern from a rack. What Leila wasn’t ready for was how much it startled her to see the form take shape. Feminine. Small. A heap of a boy at their feet. Who was this that she’d created from a memory? And why was this body discarded like abandoned prey, eyes wide and empty…?
The voice morphed from the fearful Zach’s to something other. Some cacophony of terrible voices, all crying out at once from this strange figure’s mouth. sam. Sam. SAM. SAM. 
___
Sam didn’t want to be the coward she feared she’d forever feel like. She wanted to be brave. She wanted to find Zach. To save her friend. To be the hero she knew lived inside her. Like the ones from her comic books. Even the anti-hero like Maya Lopez. She just wanted to be brave. But the closer she went towards him, the more afraid she became. The more she wanted to draw back and retreat, until…
Seeing the figure form of the woman who had taken Zach and made him her meal, along with blurry shadows of those surrounding a clear image of his deceased body laying at their feet had left her frozen in fear. But this time, she had nowhere to hide. All Sam could do was look on helplessly at not being able to save her friend once again. And the voices…her name…shrill and loud. So loud that she tried to cover her ears, but it did no good. Instead, Sam’s heart was beating fiercely. So hard that it hurt. So hard that she felt like she couldn’t breathe anymore.
Gasping for air, she dropped to her knees clawing at her throat, until her eyes shot open and saw nothing but darkness surrounding her as she tried to adjust to the lack of light, except for that peeking in from the sides of her blinds and curtains. But as she scanned the room, she quickly caught sight of a shadowing figure near her, and without any control let out a blood curdling scream, praying Scout would react, but remembering he was staying with her parents tonight.
Scrambling from the sheets, Sam nearly fell out of the bed and rushed over to find the lightswitch on the wall hoping that once the light was on, it would kill whatever shadow monster lurked in her room and probably moreso in her mind.
___
The dream was enough. More than enough, really- there was so much fear welling up within the poor girl who had been unfortunate enough to become her meal for the evening. Usually, there came a point where the guilt seeped in. Usually, the realization of what Leila was doing to the poor person who was simply trying to get some rest was enough to send her back into the astral. That feeling was what made it easier to weave together dreams in the minds of those who, in some way, deserved it. 
But this time, Leila couldn’t leave. She couldn’t bring herself to flutter away to safety, a wisp of smoke and shadow. Instead, she needed to watch. Needed to figure out what had happened, extract as much detail as she possibly could before departing. The girl had suffered, had lost this person whose memory remained like a scar in her mind. She tried to memorize every inch of the figure she’d plucked from the dreamer’s memory. Time, however, was running short. She could feel the poor dreamer’s heartbeat rocketing. 
Mere seconds before Sam’s eyes snapped open, Leila was fleeing through the astral, through the crack in the keyhole of the door. What she had seen in the dream lurked in her mind, an echo reverberating over and over and over… It left her curious. Yes, she’d caused some amount of pain here, forcing the young woman to relive the moment in her dreams, but… Perhaps, she could help her. Somehow. 
Maybe she could help this dreamer fight the things that remained inside her head.
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