#it's almost gratifying to get little snippets of these characters lives piece by piece... just a few lines here and there

[sparkspropaganda]

This is so cute....!

[spoopybruh]

To Bind.

Fandom: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)

Relationships: Ryan Bergara/Shane Madej

Characters: Ryan Bergara, Shane Madej

Summary: Ryan and Shane have very dissimilar definitions of what love means to each other.

Additional tag: Demon!Shane, Angst, Memory wiping 

Read on Ao3: Here

There’s something simultaneously gratifying yet painful when the very person you swore never to hurt grows afraid of you. Through the passage of time, Shane makes the error of forgetting what heartbreak feels like. He is reminded of the fact as wide watery eyes stared up at him and flinching is his only reward when he runs the pad of his thumb against Ryan’s strong jawline in a slow languid touch.

“Please.” Ryan’s voice tremors when he speaks. He’s quivering in the force of his fear and had he been a stranger, Shane would have found his trepidation absolutely delicious. The heart of a believer has always been considered a delicacy to his species after all. But instead, his own heart ached at the sight. 

“Please, we mean you no harm. We were just-we just wanted to film an episode and talk to the spirits, that’s all.”  “I know.” That draws a heavy sigh out of Shane. He doesn’t stop stroking his companion’s cheek. “That’s what we do. What we always do.” Ryan’s heart hammers violently against the confines of his chest, burning bright underneath fragile skin and bones. His breathing is shallow. Too fast. Given an opportunity, he’d probably start hyperventilating. “I’m not going to hurt you, Ryan. You have to breathe.”

“Please just. Let us go. Let Shane go. I swear- we’ll- we’ll leave and never come back. I promise. Please. If it’s about earlier, I’m sorry we called you a coward. I’m sorry I let him run his mouth, it’s just a shtick. We didn’t mean to imply that you were-”

“Ryan.” All of his whimpering is abruptly cut short the moment Shane hardens his tone. “Would you just calm down and breathe for a second? You’re going to pass out at this rate.” Fingers buried into his hair. He takes advantage of the momentary silence to stroke through them and rest his warm palm against the back of Ryan’s neck, feeling him tense in instinct before forcing himself to relax. “I’m here. I’m Shane. I never left.” But he would never believe that, would he? Shane begins to knead lightly. “I’m not going to hurt you. I would never hurt you.” "I love you. You have to know that.” With a measure of difficulty, he drops his knees onto the hardwood floor so that they would both be kneeling. Shane is aware that there’s a plaintive pleading in his voice, and perhaps he should feel ashamed of it, but he can’t bring himself to care about how pathetic it was at this point in time. “I love you.” His voice cracks. “It hurts me to know that you’re this afraid of me.”

Though he knows it’s probably a bad idea, much like approaching a skittish animal, he tests his luck anyways by leaning in to rest their foreheads together. Predictably, Ryan reacts just as he thought he would. Pain blossoms as the air is abruptly knocked out of him via a fist to the gut and his body reacts quicker than his senses could, releasing Ryan in the process. This essentially allows the other to scramble away from him and dive for the camera bag containing his pistol of holy water.

Except that he would never reach it because said bag is flung against the stair banister with a single wave of Shane’s hand. Leaving Ryan with nothing. That is, until he reaches out to snag the nearest possible item to defend himself with- a paperweight of all things, shaped like an egg. The irony of it all was truly laughable. “Ryan-” He takes a step forward. Ryan recoils as if he himself had been the one who was struck. “Stay back! Stay back, I’m warning you!” Each step Shane takes, Ryan doubles to keep distance between them. Even cornered by an entity strong enough to snap his neck with a finger, Ryan continues to fight. Then again, that resilience has always been one of Shane’s favourite things about him. He’s afraid of the unknown and yet has never turned his back on them. So here he is. Here they are. The faint smile that had been curling on the ends of his lips effectively vanishes. 

He alters the trajectory of the paperweight when it’s flung towards him. Somewhere in the distance, the cracking of glass can be heard when it makes contact. They would carry on in this manner, Ryan flinging things at him and Shane waving it away with a dismissive flick. Until there was nothing left to throw. Ryan’s attempt to rush past him to get to him is thwarted by way of an arm. It’s not hard to change his center of gravity so that he’d slump to the ground, struggling for mobility.  Shane’s knees creaked when he shifts to sit atop him, pinning him in place even when his will is sturdy enough to keep him trapped. He wouldn’t understand. He would never be able to understand or fully believe anything this version of Shane says. Even when he’s always been like this right from the start. And if, by some odd twisting of luck, he does come to accept him as he is, the weight of his own guilt would crush him.

Ryan is a good person. He firmly stands by his promise of never falsifying evidence. He cries during sad animal adoption commercials. He’d sit through hours and hours of Hot Daga editing even though he thinks it’s ridiculous. It’d eat him alive, knowing Shane subsists on destruction and chaos. Fearing for the lives of their co-workers, of everyone they’d meet, of everyone Shane looks at. 

He doesn’t want that. Not for him. “I can’t keep doing this to you, Ryan.” Rusted red drips from the inner corners of his eyes onto the other’s face when he leans in closer. “But you just can’t stay away from all this, can you? No matter what I do, you’ll still go to places like this. Knock on the doors of all the ghouls and tell them to come play. Because you just want to know. You want to help. One day. One day you’ll wander into something bigger than you are. One day you’ll take on a spook too many. You’ll go someplace I can’t follow and-” Shane shakes his head. Watches him twitch, the tears that escaped clear unlike his own. “And it breaks my heart thinking about how I wouldn’t be there to keep you safe. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Ryan. But this is for your own good.” 

Shaking fingers pressed themselves over his companion’s face. Shane ignores the muffled screams as best as he can, concentrates and pushes. He searches for the silvery wisps- snippets of moments culminating in a full reel, drags the necessary ones to the surface and releases them into the air around them. A single flick and the memory dissipates, doomed to wander without a home to return to. 

He finds his breath again when Ryan stirs after hours of lying in the dark, dragged back to the base of the stairs as everything shifts back into it’s original place. Shane’s relief is almost palpable as recognition settles.  “Shane?” His own name had never sounded better when uttered. “What...ugh...what happened? My head...feels like it’s been run over by a fucking truck, jeez.” “You fell.” He helps him sit up. Supports him as he finds his balance, a hand cradling his head. “You fell and I couldn’t wake you.” If he sounded a little choked up, no one would fault him for that. “I couldn’t wake you. I thought you were never gonna wake up.”  “Hey. Hey.” Shane couldn’t resist a full body shudder when he finds himself in encased in a warm embrace, strong arms anchoring him to an even stronger human. “Hey, it’s okay, big guy. I’m awake now, aren’t I? I’m good.”  His only response is to clutch him tighter.  “I’m sorry, Ryan.”  He really is.

Even if he could change the colours of his eyes, even if he could squeeze himself behind human skin to the point of claustrophobia, even if he could remove his claws and grind his fangs into blunt harmless teeth, a demon will still be a demon after all. Selfish enough, cruel enough, to keep removing bits and pieces of someone’s reality just so he could stay. Just so he could covet. 

“I’m really sorry.”