#he has some facial wrinkles as well but i think they’re more noticeable in cas

[fizzytoo]

if i speak,,

[agentverbivore]

A FitzSimmons Spooktacular

Happy Halloween! This lil flufflet is an excerpt from my longer Academy era dæmon AU, Side By Side. No context necessary except that dæmons are the animal form of a person’s soul; Jemma’s is a lion named Caedmon, and Fitz’s is a lizard named Sarama.

“I cannot believe you like that stuff.”

“It’s sugar, Caed, what could possibly be wrong with that?” Jemma stared incredulously down at her dæmon, who was regarding the bright pink cloud of spun candy in her hand with distinct disgust.

Around them, the town’s Halloween Fair Spooktacular buzzed excitedly. The dirt walkways were packed with Academy cadets, local children, and exhausted fair workers. With only two days left until Halloween itself, the fair was beginning to look a little bedraggled, but with midterms, regular assignments, and an independent study proposal each, neither Fitz nor Jemma could have spared the time until that final weekend.

“It’s so sweet,” Caedmon insisted, looking up to Fitz as he sidled alongside Jemma, one hand holding the stick of his ginormous caramel apple with Sarama in the other.

“You’re sorta missing the point there, mate,” Fitz mumbled around a large mouthful of apple, caramel, and peanuts.

“Want some?” Jemma held out her cotton candy to him, and he nodded eagerly, leaning forward to take a big bite. Without waiting for him to offer, she primly took the caramel apple from him with her other hand.

“Not sure about the peanuts,” he said, nodding towards the treat she’d stolen after he finished swallowing a large puff of pink.

Jemma chewed her own bite of his apple for a few seconds, handing him back the stick. “I like them, I think. Nice texture.”

“You do like chunky peanut butter,” Sarama added thoughtfully. “We’ve never been able to decide on that one.”

“Cotton candy tastes like chemicals,” Caedmon interjected, getting to his paws as the others began to stroll down the crowded pathway. “And it’s terrible for your teeth. I’d rather have good biscuits.”

Sarama tilted her head towards the ground, claws clutching the cloth of Fitz’s shirt, and Jemma had the impression that if her facial muscles allowed it, the lizard would be grimacing. “Biscuits. Like those horrible gluten-free things you tried to trick us into eating last week?”

“They’re not horrible!” Jemma exclaimed, swiping at a piece of candy fluff that had gotten stuck to her nose.

“They’re horrible,” Fitz said drily, dodging as Jemma made a playful swipe at his arm. “Hey, look, the line for the haunted house has gone down!”

Jemma’s nose wrinkled instinctively; he’d gone on and on about wanting to visit the haunted house when they’d first arrived, but she’d hoped he’d forgotten. “Oh, Fitz, must we?”

“We don’t like haunted houses,” Caedmon mumbled, coming around to nudge his head against Jemma’s hand. She gave his mane an empathetic squeeze.

“Mum made us go to one in the neighborhood when we were kids,” Jemma explained, finishing off the last of her cotton candy and tossing it into a nearby trash can in unison with Fitz’s apple stick. “To make friends. It wasn’t anything like this one, obviously, it was just in their basement, but –”

“We ran out screaming.” Caedmon dropped onto his haunches, giving the haunted house a baleful look. It was the centerpiece of the fair, with the machinery having been brought in from a circus – Fitz was still disappointed he hadn’t been able to figure out the day that they were going to put the ride together so he could watch.

“And then mum’s friend was standing at the top of the stairs in a parrot costume....” Jemma shuddered. “Never looked at birds the same way, to be honest.”

“It’s the beaks.” Caedmon let out a low growl. “Those tiny little beaks.”

“Good thing I didn’t settle as an owl then,” Sarama said with a laugh.

The lion’s expression softened as he glanced up at where she perched on Fitz’s shoulder, but Fitz spoke just as Caedmon opened his mouth.

“I promise,” Fitz said wryly, coming around to face Jemma and planting one hand condescendingly on her shoulder, “I won’t let any birds get to you in the haunted house.”

She wrinkled her nose, searching for any other possible excuse and coming up empty.

Before she could acquiesce, a mischievous smile flitted across Fitz’s face. “I bet that I get scared fewer times than you.”

His attempt to goad her into going was transparent, but it worked anyway. “Well, obviously,” she retorted, striding determinedly past him towards the faux-ramshackle building. “You watch all those horror movies, you’re immune to this sort of thing.”

“Horror movies and haunted houses are nothing alike,” Sarama argued, squirming a bit as Fitz removed her from his shoulder for safekeeping.

“It’s always cheesy, anyway,” he said, trotting happily behind Jemma with Caedmon in tow.

“So why do you like them?”

Fitz seemed stumped by her question for a few seconds, and then he shrugged. “Dunno.”

Jemma rolled her eyes, slowing her pace as they reached the ticket gate. “If you’re forcing us to go, then you can pay the fee.”

“That’s fine, I still have birthday money.” Fitz flashed her a grin, reaching for his wallet and stretching out the hand that held Sarama towards her. As they often did at the Academy, he meant for Jemma to hold his dæmon while he used both hands for something else.

Almost immediately, he froze, glancing up at the ticket seller in the booth only a few feet away from them. The grizzled older woman stared mutely back at him, chewing the world’s loudest piece of gum, and her peahen dæmon peered around the edge of the cloudy pane of glass. Without saying anything, Fitz shifted so that he could balance the lizard on his forearm while flipping open his wallet. Standing in the middle of the Halloween fair of a rather small American town was perhaps not the time for them to be so cavalier about touching each other’s dæmons.

With only a handful of people in line before them, it wasn’t long before the four of them were squeezed into the moving cart – plastic hood and seat decorated to appear as cobwebbed bales of hay – and on their way to haunted fun. Or so the ride operator told them as he locked the safety bar over Fitz and Jemma’s laps, forcing Caedmon to duck to avoid being whacked on the head.

As the cart lurched forward, a loud cackle erupted from a nearby speaker, startling Jemma enough that she screeched and grabbed tightly onto Fitz’s arm. He laughed as the light of the entryway faded behind them, and she elbowed him.

“Shut up,” she muttered, constructing an argument in her head about how loud noises are a cheap shock anyway.

“Scaredy cat.” His voice was smug, and Caedmon made an indignant huff somewhere in the darkness by their feet. Fitz just laughed again as she poked him in the side in retaliation, but that didn’t keep her from holding a little more tightly than necessary onto his arm. Fortunately, he didn’t complain about the way she settled herself into his side, and she thought that perhaps haunted houses had something to be said for them after all.

The ride itself was largely dull, with the occasional soundtrack or flashing light startling Jemma enough that she could prove her hold on Fitz’s arm was warranted, but not truly enough to scare her in any lasting way. A part of her felt rather silly for having been so adamant about avoiding haunted houses for all those years if most of them were like this one. That being said, what she found so enjoyable was allowing herself to be this tactile with her best friend without feeling guilty. Moments like this had become exceedingly rare the more time passed since the summer of 2005; she and Fitz had regressed to rarely doing more than swatting teasingly at each other in odd moments. Even when they sat hip-to-hip on one of their beds to watch a show or a movie, their touch was always brief and perfunctory. The initiation of any other touch was inevitably hers, but even that became more rare as she settled into accepting that this would be the state of her and Fitz’s relationship for the rest of their lives. Caedmon continued to receive pets and scratches from Fitz regularly, and she tried not to feel rather jealous. (Sometimes, a little vein of hurt would settle into her chest on top of the pleasant feeling of having him pet her dæmon, and then she would roll her eyes at herself. As if she, an independent young woman, would enjoy being petted.)

While Jemma was otherwise distracted – by the comforting press of Fitz along her side, by the easy way he let her latch onto him, by the faint, familiar smell of his aftershave – she didn’t notice the next contrived scare until it was upon them. A large, lumbering man in a clown costume, bright makeup melting artfully down his cheeks, appeared from the shadows around a turn and brandished a butcher’s knife in their faces. Fitz screamed bloody murder, his arms wrapping too tightly around her shoulders, his whole body going rigid, and his shoes scraping against the floor as if he was trying to get away. Jemma could feel her daemon flinch against her legs, and she reached over instinctively to make sure that Sarama was still on Fitz’s lap. Once the clown was gone, they sat briefly in silence until Jemma burst into hysterical laughter.

Within seconds, the cart emerged from the cavernous ride and bathed them in light from the lobby, causing Jemma to wince mid-giggle from the brightness.

“It’s not funny,” Fitz muttered, scooping up Sarama and clambering over both Jemma and Caedmon to escape the cart.

Following closely behind, Jemma had to dab at the tears of laughter in the corners of her eyes. “Oh, no, that was hilarious! And you were calling mescaredy cat!”

Fitz shoved his way through the lines crowded around the entrance of the creaking building, not looking back at her. “Startled me, is all.”

“I don’t think I even screamed once,” Jemma giggled, bumping into Fitz as she avoided other people streaming towards the burgeoning haunted house line.

She thought she heart Caedmon mutter a soft “stop” from behind her, and he bumped his head against her calves, but she was having too much fun to pay him any heed.

“I never,” she laughed, barely getting the words out, “ever have heard someone sound so afraid in my life!”

Fitz rounded on her, fingers clenched around his dæmon. “I wasn’t afraid!” The bite to his tone took all the wind out of her sails at once, and she stared up at him, wide-eyed. His shoulders sagged, but she could see his jaw clenching and unclenching as he thought. “I wasn’t afraid,” he repeated, turning and looking anywhere other than her.

“Oh. I – I know,” she said quietly, about to reach out and tug on his shirt as she worked out an apology in her head, but he was already striding away.

“I’m gonna get a drink, be right back.” With that, Fitz and Sarama disappeared into the crowd, leaving Jemma to wonder if she’d just completely ruined their day at the fair.

“I was just teasing,” she muttered, glancing down at Caedmon.

The lion’s brows were creased in thought as he looked in the direction that the other two had just disappeared. “I know,” he said slowly. “But I’m not sure Fitz knew that.”

“I’ll apologize,” Jemma said quickly.

“Maybe...” Caedmon started, pausing to shake his mane in frustration. “Maybe just leave it, when they come back.”

Wrinkling her nose, Jemma let out a small huff. She was torn between wanting to clear the air and wanting to go back to the fun they’d been having before Fitz’s ill-fated desire to visit the haunted house. Well, she thought to herself as she sidestepped a small gaggle of children, perhaps she’d been right after all: Nothing good can come from haunted houses.

The above is from chapter 15. You can find the rest on AO3.