#a/n: smoking isn't cool kids don't do it ... and also some classy perry for lyra bc ily

[derrickperegrine]

@snakepitnet: obscure characters

don’t you need me, your baby boy? ‘cause i’m so happy without your noise

a sequel to take a slice

(click ‘keep reading’ or read on ao3)

A flickering yellow-white light blinked to life in the grainy atmosphere of the night, thin and painful to look at. It lit a red circle in the dark with a gritty hiss, and then in another blink it was gone.

Peregrine slid the lighter back into his jeans’ pockets. He took a lethargic but deep, starved drag of a cigarette; the slowly disintegrating paper and scorched tobacco crackled as a bitter warmth ghosted its way down from the tip of his tongue to the bottom of his lungs. He leant backwards, until the hunched curve of his shoulder blades hit the rattling rails, and opened his mouth. The greedy pull of the cold night air coaxed the frosty-coloured vapour out of him, and it floated before him like the remnant of a bad dream, something that was supposed to be hateful but he was too drained to fucking care about, something that left him hazy and anonymous, uncertain of who he was.

His shoulders slackened and he flattened his back further against the rails. The evacuation of the smoke left his lungs empty, and the acute, cool city air filled him instead, filling his throat and chest, leaving his bones feeling chilly from the sudden invasion. His listless fingers brought the death stick back to his lips, and he closed his eyes to listen to the coarse rale of cinder again.

The empty soda can rattled like the mad laughter of an unfunny man as Peregrine kicked it down the deserted sidewalk. Another cigarette hung from his lips, quickly staling and fouling in taste, but he couldn’t be arsed to pitch it into the dark. Subconsciously his eyes flicker back up to the sky, but he can’t make out anything through the smoggy clouds of the city. He smiles bitterly, ironically, and it suits the dry, ashy taste in his mouth.

Boredom weighed him down like stones in his pockets, even though all he had on him is a packet of fags, a lighter, and keys to his flat. It hit him worst on nights like this, when there’s nothing to do but watch reruns of unrelatable television series on late night telly, and go out for a smoke to try and relieve some of that heaviness he always carried around with him, these days. It never works.

He considered perhaps calling Montague, putting on a lively tone and blathering some trite, furious bullshit into the receiver, but he was too tired to play charades tonight, even if he was bored; moreover, he’d left his mobile phone at his flat, on his IKEA coffee table, next to a half-eaten bag of crisps and his wand.

His aloneness felt particularly pronounced and pervasive that night, as he walked through Muggle streets devoid of Muggles, a strange land that was depressingly familiar to him. He did not like to reach out to any of his peers -- for some reason he thought that they only saw the sardonic, turbulent Perry, filled with spurring outrage and grasping at solutions, aggressively and desperately hopeful. Not the silent, listless one who stalked through an empty London until his next kill, his next taste of fresh blood.

He never minded being alone, unless it was compounded with stifling boredom. Which was more often than not, these days. He felt a tugging yearning within his chest. God, how he wanted to fly again! To feel the Earth turn beneath his shadow, to follow those familiar paths of his favourite stars. But what a laughable thought.

A bird with clipped wings will never fly again.

Truth be told he wasn’t even supposed to mix with this crowd. Both Peregrine and Adrian were just minding their own business; they wanted no business in this War. They didn’t want to fall in line with the rest of the Slytherins, to proclaim loyalty to that slimy old bugger Voldemort; but they didn’t love Potter either, a bloke who always came across as somewhat unreliable, managing to survive only thanks to dumb luck.

Moreover, none of Potter’s folk loved them. In their eyes, Perry and Adrian were still Slytherins, no matter how much Perry kept to himself and Adrian played nice. In the end, they were lumped together with the rest of the lot, Death Eaters’ children and fearful sheep; self-serving cowards and unthinking idiots.

All because they refused to choose.

A choice is not a choice if you are forced to choose.

Naturally, after the War no one wanted any business with them. With the amount of fucking whinging and mass regret pouring forth from the other Slytherins, Peregrine and Adrian’s accounts of neutrality were interpreted as remorseful retconning, and so they were also shuttered off from the new Potter-era of the Wizarding world.

It infuriated Perry in the beginning. After Voldy kicked the bucket, supposedly everyone was granted a ‘glorious future’; but the victors’ aggressive and specific version of the future dissolved the futures of nearly every person Perry had ever known.

Adrian and Terence -- another boy who chose to remain neutral -- lost their shot at the Quidditch industry. No university would dare admit Perry into their Astronomy departments. And when they tried to leave Great Britain, try their luck somewhere new -- they had thought, perhaps, Italy -- the Ministry promptly blocked their exit on account of ‘suspicious activity.’ Perry nearly killed the official who delivered the verdict; it made the situation much worse but it made him feel a little better.

His life became nothing. He found that he loved nothing anymore; for all he had loved had been taken from him. They took his stars away from him by denying him university enrollment despite his qualifications; they confiscated his broom license in case he tried to leave Britain through more illegal measures. It was still possible to purchase a broom through the black market, of course, but Peregrine did not have the money. After all, he was not a Malfoy, or a Zabini, or even a Nott, a Warrington, with a pile of gold sitting coldly in a Gringrott’s vault.

He moved to London where he could no longer see the stars in the sky, so they would no longer pain him. Unable to find a Wizarding job -- fucking typical -- he held several part time jobs in Muggle supermarkets and corner shops. As he worked through his day to pay for his rent in a godforsaken corner of the city, he simmered with a quiet, persistent anger, always fizzing and too hot if you tried to touch it -- like a chippie’s fryer. On the way ‘home’ he usually had to chase down a cigarette with a beer to keep himself from going mad; but on particularly bad days he’d wander his way through some grimy Muggle club, find some nameless individual, usually someone with a saddening lack of self and self-respect, and shag his resentment into that worthless somebody. It didn’t make him feel much better, but at least it made him too tired to care.

What a laughable wreck had become of Peregrine’s life. As a wizard, he’d never felt more powerless; he felt like he had been drained of his magic, and shackled up in a nightmarish cage of an existence. Several times he sat at the roof of his miserable apartment building, letting his feet dangle along the edge, the gravity pulling tantalisingly at his toes. He’d never loved gravity, but sometimes it made an excellent case.

For some reason he never went through with killing himself. Too unsatisfactory of an end, he guessed; plus what would that really change? The world would still be shite, Potter would still be a god, and the real culprits would still be at large. It was only an easy way out for him. But just as he wasn’t a coward in Hogwarts, he was not a coward now, and he would not simply resign to the lot he’s been assigned in life.

One day, his old classmate Cassius called him on his mobile. Peregrine was startled at first by the ringing -- it hardly ever sounded, really. To this day he still had no fucking clue how Warrington got his number. In that same, posh accent he had when they were both schoolboys, Cassius asked if Perry would like to have a drink. Since he had nothing better to do than watch reruns of Lost, Peregrine accepted the invitation and met Cassius in a more well-to-do part of town.

That’s when Cassius invited him to join the Organisation. Perry was incredulous at first -- he could scarcely believe that someone had managed to engineer this sort of league, with a system of operation and mysterious but reliable intelligence sources on everyone. ‘Don’t kid me,’ he said, but Cassius’ face remained as impassive and serious as ever, like it’d always looked when he was focused on making a goal in Quidditch. He wasn’t playing around.

Perry went home excited that night, his head dizzy with revelation, alcohol, and nicotine. He slept fitfully; and when he finally accepted that he was not going to fall asleep, he messaged Adrian and Terence.

Terry quickly rejected the idea, saying that he’d finally managed to work out a decent life between lying low and slowly redeeming his respectability, and that although it was slow work, he was not going to throw all of it away in order to kill some Death Eaters and get revenge. He looked ruefully at Perry, and turned away from his old teammate.

It was true. Terence always had something to lose. He knew the value of stability; he’d learnt his lesson through that shortened Quidditch career of his. Plus, it was an awfully tricky enterprise -- becoming rogue assassins and taking out ex-Death Eaters is hardly a rational preoccupation, and it was not easy either. But at this point Peregrine had nothing left to lose -- save for his sanity. Even if revenge could no longer save this mess that was his life, at least it would make him feel better; and that’s the best he could hope for these days. To just feel better. He told Adrian his decision, and left as well.

Cassius called him and invited him to their next meeting. When he looked through the door, Peregrine saw Adrian there, too.

The rest is history.

Peregrine could not remember how long he had been in the Organisation. It seemed at least longer than four months, but no more than a year. Time didn’t matter if you weren’t in a hurry to live or die; and he was doing neither. He existed in the limbo between the two states of being, watching the third episode of the second season of The X Files, ‘Blood’, whilst consuming basic sustenance in the form of a packet of Walkers.

Tonight was going to be the closest to alive he’s felt in a while. As Scully performed an autopsy on McRoberts, the dim screen of Perry’s phone lit up with a calendar reminder.

With surprisingly fluid movement for someone who had been watching television all day, Perry got up from the couch and dusted his himself off. He walked to his bedroom and pulled the thin, holey black t-shirt over his head and kicked off his grey sweatpants. He left his clothes in a bundle on his floor, and picked something else out of The Chair, on which he usually left his clothes after he did laundry -- why pack it away in a wardrobe when you’re just going to take it out again, anyway?

He threaded himself through a black turtlenecked shirt, and donned a pair of slim black slacks. If he was going to be the last thing someone saw before they died, he wanted to look at least respectable. So they knew it was a Slytherin killing them, not some random sloven. He clicked the lights shut on his way out of the room, and closed the door behind him.

The time on his phone told him that he was still on time. He slid it into his back pocket. And although he didn’t usually rely on wand magic to do the deed, he still brought his wand; it was always a nice fallback, and he derived a small comfort from the presence of the stick of black walnut in his pocket.

Perry turned off the telly, and put out the lamp. He found his way to the door, and slid on his pair of 1461 Docs. No better shoe for kicking in jaws, he asserted. He then reached for the heavy beater’s bat leaning against the umbrella stand -- it was a beautiful thing, shaped by the maths of aerodynamics, fine-tuned to the his touch and style, stained a rich colour by varnish and blood both. He swung the thing upwards, and rested it against his shoulder. The door creaked open in front of him, and Perry grabbed his keys off the hook he hung them on before he walked out his flat.

The door closed behind him, and the lock clicked shut.

Peregrine whistled as he walked down the dying streets. He was in a good mood tonight; he quite liked The X Files. The city was spluttering on the embers of the day -- people were all about to head home, kick back, and do something mundane. There were men dressed in suits walking hurriedly to the tube station he just passed, and one of him bumped into his shoulder -- the one without the bat.

His brain crackled with the electricity of a legilimency link. ‘Falcon, can you hear me?’ Adrian’s voice sounded between his ears.

‘Loud and clear,’ Peregrine affirmed, a cheerful, almost agitated edge forming around his words.

‘Get on the Bakerloo line,’ Adrian instructed. Peregrine was already on his way over.

Peregrine sank into an empty brown seat on the Bakerloo train towards Elephant and Castle. The train rattled soothingly as they sped forwards in the darkness.

His mark tonight was Augustus Rookwood. He’d escaped from Azkaban twice -- the last time during the mass breakout prior to the Battle of Hogwarts. A slippery bastard, this one was, but no one could escape Peregrine’s hunt.

He leapt off the train at Elephant and Castle, and sauntered into the night. He walked down the streets he had memorised in preparation, until he reached a nondescript ugly apartment building. This one knew how to hide -- in the plainest sight.

Peregrine waved a hand before the lock -- the equations and calculations in his magic finding just the right combination -- and it beeped him in. With a little leap, he started on the staircase and wound his way up to the fourth floor.

The room he had been briefed on was labelled as the residence of one Mister Arthur Rook. Yep, this was him alright; seems like he didn’t put much effort into an alias, though, Peregrine snickered to himself. ‘Focus, Falcon,’ Pucey reminded him through the link.

Peregrine extended a hand and motioned at the lock. His fingers moved as if he were playing piano upside down; and the lock clicked to his instruction. Gently, it popped open, and Peregrine mimed a push; it creaked open more, and he walked in as if he owned the place.

Immediately, a barrage of defensive spells launched themselves at him, but he was more than ready. He looped his fingers through the mazes, rearranged the values into new formulas, and gently broke apart the spells. He didn’t even need a wand for the work; the math was always in his favour.

Politely, Peregrine closed the door behind him. He waved a hand through the air, casting a silencing spell on the entire flat. As the last shimmers of the spell faded into the darkness, Peregrine cupped his free hand to his mouth and called out, ‘Oi, you old fucker! Come out and get your due!’

There was a frantic shuffling sound in the back, and Perry snapped his fingers. The locks on the windows all jammed themselves together, grinding themselves together until the metal was deformed and impossible to break apart. Peregrine heard Rookwood curse, and he smiled, pleased.

‘I haven’t got all night, you know,’ he said with a touch of impatience. He had a morning shift the next day. He put out his hand again, and made a drawing motion; and the chicken-hearted Death Eater flew towards him, as if summoned by an accio. Peregrine grinned maliciously, and slammed his fist into the face of the approaching Death Eater.

There was the unmistakable crack of bone straining and the soft, repulsive shift of flesh beneath his knuckles. Rookwood flew backwards and landed on his arse, whimpering from the pain and spitting out broken teeth. Peregrine walked over to him and loomed over the man, his feet wide apart and the bat still resting on his shoulder.

‘You can’t run anymore, you know,’ he told Rookwood coldly. ‘It’s time for you to meet your end.’

‘Who the fuck ... are you ... ?’ Rookwood managed through cracked teeth and a swelling cheek.

Peregrine let out a high laugh and slammed the toe of his shoe into Rookwood’s stomach. The man turned over and began retching dryly.

‘I’m your worst nightmare,’ he introduced himself, his voice growing more and more acute as the adrenaline flooded his system. He squatted down, and grabbed a fistful of Rookwood’s hair with his free hand. He yanked at it so the man’s face would face his; so he could look directly into the terror and desperation and the laughable, stubborn pride in Rookwood’s eyes as he said, ‘I’m the Falcon.’

Rookwood drew his wand from his sleeve and pointed it towards Peregrine, a curse taking shape on his lips -- but Peregrine swung his bat against Rookwood’s hand, and it met with his wrist with a wet sort of crack. The wand clattered onto the floor and Rookwood doubled over again, a terrible scream ringing forth from his throat. Peregrine stood up again, and walked over to the wand. He brought his foot down upon it, and snapped it in two.

Rookwood was still screaming. What a baby. Perry turned his attention back towards him, and made him slide across the floor to him. He couldn’t be arsed to walk back to Rookwood. ‘You’re going to pay for everything,’ Peregrine said as he made a mixing motion with his index finger, and Rookwood’s broken wrist did a nauseating 180-degree twist.

There were pathetic tears streaming down Rookwood’s face, getting caught in the ugly creases of his contorted face. ‘What have I done?’ He asked in a wheezing voice.

Peregrine cracked an unnerving grin. ‘You’re seriously going to ask me that question? You Death Eater dickwad?’ He dropped his bat and picked Rookwood up by the collar and pinned him against the the nearest wall. He made sure that his hand was pressed tightly against Rookwood’s windpipe, so he commanded Rookwood’s full attention. With a fell swoop Peregrine brought his knees to the soft spot under the edge of Rookwood’s ribcage and felt the organs rearrange themselves around him. ‘I’m going to make you pay for more crimes than yours, though,’ he promised, a wild edge to his voice.

‘Please,’ Rookwood began to plead, but Peregrine brought his fist to Rookwood’s face again and dislodged his jaw with a right hook. He’d heard enough of the fucking guy. Rookwood screamed, but Perry wasn’t listening. Everyone keeps saying the same things these days, don’t they?

Peregrine swung Rookwood around, and threw him against the glass coffee table. The weight of the toss shattered the glass and Rookwood fell through, his limp form hanging loosely upon the black metal frame. The floor was quickly darkening underneath his body. Peregrine only had so much time left to have some fun.

Deliberately, he ambled over, the rubber soles of his Docs squeaking against the slick floors. He watched the twitching man, coughing and spluttering and crying like some sort of disgusting, inhuman thing. Finally, the appearance matches the spirit, Peregrine thought as he watched Rookwood impassively, cold rage taking over his previous elated fury.

‘Just finish it so we can go home,’ Adrian said.

‘Shut the fuck up,’ Peregrine said, aloud.

Rookwood looked up at him, bloodshot eye-whites and blue irises stark against the dark blood. He wheezed in a fashion that sounded like a pitiful attempt at ‘please,’ but Peregrine never reserved mercy for anyone.

Why should he be merciful when he was treated with nothing but vicious parsimony and paranoia?

He plunged both hands into the coffee table frame and yanked Rookwood out of it; the tinkling of falling glass accompanied his action, and it would have sounded pretty if it weren’t for the sickly squelch of oozing blood and torn flesh that preceded it. Peregrine threw Rookwood against the floor, and the rag doll of a former Death Eater rolled onto his back, looking at Peregrine helplessly.

Peregrine looked at the dying man seriously, as he always did before he had to kill someone. He hated, hated all of them -- they were war criminals, racists, murderers and betrayers -- but hate was not enough. Nothing was ever enough for him, anymore. He was just so fucking empty, all the fucking time; and not even a fucking sea of hate would come close to filling him up.

He hated himself for being like this. He hated what became of his life; he hated that he was always working the most thankless jobs to get by, he hated that he had nothing left to do in life anymore except watch television because he no longer had the luxury of possessing interests, and above all he hated that the biggest high he could get out of anything was through killing fucking cowards who couldn’t even fight back. Couldn’t even make it feel like what he was doing was legitimate, was significant, was worthy. He hated everything, and most of all he hated that for all his hate and rage and sadness he could do nothing about it.

‘Fuck you,’ he spat at Rookwood as he brought his foot down upon his ribcage. He felt the brittle ribs snap like dry branches beneath his feet, and he ground his foot harder into Rookwood’s chest, until he could see the bones sticking out of his skin, like little altar candles waiting to be lit, an unsung prayer for Peregrine’s dead future. Rookwood’s lungs whistled from being punctured, and his blood splattered onto Perry’s slacks, making the wet fabric stick to his leg.

If Rookwood was screaming Perry wasn’t fucking listening anymore. His ears were roaring and crying and soundless; it was only him and nothingness, forever.

He walked away from Rookwood to where his bat was lying on the floor, and picked it up. The familiar weight grounded him back into the present, but reminded him of better days. Better days for all of them. Better days that had been killed off by the likes of Rookwood. He dragged himself back to the dying Death Eater.

‘Go to fucking Hell,’ he snarled as he raised the bat high above his head; its dark shape obscured the moon shining through the window, behind him. And with a savage swing, he brought it down on Rookwood’s head; blood splattered across his face, chest, and arms, and Rookwood’s skull splintered into another mess that he was uninterested in looking.

Peregrine stood up straight, and dropped his bat on the floor.

He sauntered over to Rookwood’s bathroom, and switched on the light with slippery fingers. He looked at himself in the mirror.

In the stark bathroom he looked hollower than usual, with his skin overexposed in the harsh light and blanched beneath the blood splattered across his face and neck. The light reflected into his irises, bright circles eclipsed by his pupils. For some reason, it made his dark brown eyes look even less lifelike, like the glassy eyes of a doll. He bent down over the sink and turned the faucet on. He washed his hands diligently with soap until the water stopped running pink, and then cleaned the blood from his face. He looked up again, still void with tired dark eyes, still pale against his dark clothes, dark hair, still thin thanks to personal inattentiveness.

Black never suited him; it made him look too sallow, too harsh. But he wouldn’t wear any other colour anymore. He remembered the first time he was paired up with his old teammate Adrian -- the other boy commented that he had never seen Perry wear black ever before, and that Perry looked strange and funny in it. But after he saw Perry kill, he’s never commented on his wardrobe again.

Peregrine dried his hands and his face on one of the towels hanging on the rack, and used it to switch off the lights again; he didn’t want to touch it and get blood on his hands again. He brought it with him back into the entrance of the flat, and wiped down his bat with it.

Picking the bat up, he walked to the nearest window and swung it hard against the glass. It shattered with a pretty tinkling sound, and a crow immediately flew into the flat. Perry handed it the bloody towel, and turned away.

He opened the door of the flat and walked out. The door creaked to a close, and the lock clicked shut behind him.

‘Good work, Falcon,’ Adrian said as soon as they left the flat.

This was why Perry liked Adrian. He knew not to interrupt Perry whilst he was in the middle of a fury. He knew him better than anyone else on the team.

‘How’s Terry?’ Peregrine asked nonchalantly, as if he had not just brutally murdered a man not ten minutes ago. Terence never really talked to him again after he had decided to join the Last Meal, but he was still close with Adrian. Perry wondered if Adrian had ever told Terry that he joined, too.

‘He’s doing okay,’ Adrian said flatly. ‘I’ll see you around.’

‘Catch you later, mate,’ Perry acknowledged, and switched off the link. Adrian’s presence fizzed out like flat soda.

Peregrine dug in his pockets for a cigarette and his lighter. Something nasty to get rid of that more distasteful and unmistakable smell of blood. He put the cigarette between his lips, and hunched over the flickering, tiny flame of his lighter. The cool, sharp taste of menthol coated over every terrible thing he was and wasn’t feeling; and he felt fresh again.

As soon as he got back into his flat, Perry threw all his bloody clothes into the laundry basket and took a scalding shower to scour all the blood off of him. He put on a clean t-shirt and a fresh pair of sweatpants that he picked off of The Chair, and walked back to the living room. He unrolled the half-eaten bag of crisps on his coffee table, and switched the telly on again.

Just another episode in the life of Peregrine Derrick.