#just....him climbing on the slayer with no fear

[omies-odd-writing-spot]

Warmth: gift 2

<_< >_>

@gullivertravelstowonderland Have a thing, I love your MoD story and just.... GET LOVED ON! Also have a young Vito before the bad happened.

Also a part of the GT july, warmth prompt, just...out of order.

Warmth: Flynn and Vito

It was one of those strange, and rare moments of knowing he was dreaming of a memory. Not too early of one that it was hazy, maybe some odd years old, but he was also realizing it was not fully a ‘bad’ memory. Looking around, Flynn could recognize that he was in one of the better healing chambers of the arena. Not so deep in the pits, he was sitting in a chair with the back removed. It had been to let his back be treated better, and this had been the first day someone used a healer’s wraith gift on him while Flynn was awake. 

He wanted that healer to come back, the cool, almost numbing energy felt nice on his exposed back. More so after the time he had spent in hell.

Not the arena, now that he was awake and aware, the fighting arena was almost fun. The fighting part, not so much the treatment up until this point. He shifted in the dream, looking around from where he had been put in the corner. With two half walls it gave the impression of Flynn having his own space to himself for once.

Even if it was an illusion, and a healer could walk over to check on him at anytime, or offer another cup of water. It was nice to have some semblance of space and not have another prisoner pressed up against him. The healers seemed confused at him though, but not in a hostile. Though not weak as he saw a woman about his height bodily lift and drop a fighter in armor onto a bed and strap him down.

Strong woman!

Flynn was actually smart enough to just… sit. And watch. He could stand and stretch now and then, but the chains on his legs kept him in a set area. The one time he did go to a half wall was to get attention and get some water by offering the empty cup and slowly saying the native word for water he had learned. 

After that he found if he sat quiet during that day, the healers would bring him water, then some of their tea. Then… food.

Snacks?

It was a roll of soft bread, what seemed like a cross of a cookie and cornbread. Then a fruit. He let them fuss with his back, and got a honey flavored brownie. Let the two younger healers, a girl and boy that could not be even as tall as him, that noticed and watch the accelerated healing… he was allowed to walk unchained to the local equivalent of a bathroom. Even with an armored guard escorting, the silver colored guard was different then some of the others. Oddly quiet and just calmly standing guard for the healers more than seemingly to guard him.

That had been much better then what was in his prison cell before!

At least the corner was dimmer so Flynn could dose when it got boring. He was picking up some of the native words of this world, but not so much to fully understand why he was here (there?) and not being pushed to fight.

Then, an almost impossible thing happened around midday. More strangers had come to talk to the healers in the bigger part of the room but a sound had Flynn looking up to see a small frame peering around the half wall at him. Wide black-gray eyes looking up at him from a child’s face.

Bigger than a human child likely of the same age, the boy looked like he would be around ten, but was just taller like the locals all seemed to be. The boy was in one of those awkward stages of growth, starting to lose the baby fat but the boy's face was round and soft still. Flynn felt something in his chest soften, no matter the annoyances and insults from some of these strange people, kids were just… kids. This little black haired boy looked as confused as he was excited by the wall.

The man gave a soft chuff like sound, something he had heard done lowly to the big wolves.

“Hi?” The boy offered the simple greeting, watching Flynn back in that intense way of kids trying to sort something out in their heads.

Flynn hesitated a moment, before daring to speak in a low voice. Not wanting to draw attention, but also the return greeting was likely still very accented, “Hi.”

“I saw you fight with father! From above, he only spars and trains with the Sentinels now.” The boy chirped, hesitated as if not sure what to do but then in that senseless, fearless way of the young came closer. Dressed in a simple style of clothes, but it seemed pretty good quality to hold up against the chaos kids could get into. Not ‘fancy’ but durable, and had pockets to hold all the boy's random things. “Father liked you, he said you fight with… heart? Not mean though.”

What an odd compliment.

“...thank?” Flynn hesitated, not sure what the rest of the phrase was here. Or what a good chunk of that ramble was, yet grasp just enough to understand the boy saw Flynn's last fight…. The day before?

The boy was clutching a few idems as he looked up at the still taller outlander. The expression of innocence wonder, not judgemental greed or calculation of what to throw him into a fight with next. It had the man relaxing a bit, taking in a partly eaten yellow-green fruit and a little book.

“What that?” Flynn asked slowly, trying to make sure he was speaking the new words right while he motioned to the book and saw the little boy brighten up. The man was surprised and pleased as the boy came over to show him.

Holding up the book to show it was a plain cover, small for Flynn's hands but he picked it up and opened it. Almost expecting to see a story book but instead…

Doodles.

A little sketch book for the boy with a type of pencil in the spine of the book. The book was not grabbed back, so Flynn skimmed the pages. Finding shaky lines of the young learning to draw more things. The boy was drawing what was around him, including plants, animals that Flynn was not sure were real or made up. Something that looked like a dragon with a person on the back with a fuzzy cap? Another page had an egg with purple and blue colors added. There were a few pages of someone far more experienced drawing in the book too. Landscapes, a waterfall, and another, detailed egg in a nest. 

Then there were doodles of the child of some of the architecture around the arena building in the later pictures and… some of the fights? It was a rough picture of him, he recognized some parts of an opponent's armor.

“Like?” The boy asked, trying to repress a wiggle and failing at it.

“Nice,” the man smiled, finding the pencil again and pulling it out, pausing to see if it would upset the boy. The kiddo looked far too interested though and bounced in place to see what the strange outlander would draw.

“What is it?” The boy asked, watching as an animal he had never seen formed on the page.

“...rabbit.” Flynn said in English, smiling as the boy tried to copy what he said. It sounded so strange with the kiddo’s own accent. “Close.”

“What are… rab-bi-ets? Are they big like bears?” The boy asked, taking the book back once offered. The looked up at movement and gasped in delight at the small distance Flynn measured between his hands. “Small?”

“Small.” Flynn agreed, “Soft…nice.”

The boy looked back to the new drawing in his little book then froze as a low voice called from the other side of the big room.

“Vito.”

The boy, Vito, had much the same look as a human child. That internal debate if he could get away with not answering, then looked guilty at his own thoughts. It was kinda cute, if not funny to the outlander.

“Yes sir?” Vito turned to look back at a man not much taller then Flynn. Someone with short white hair, one eyes clouded and likely blind, the other almost the same black as Vito's own eyes. Planly dressed like some of the non active Sentinels, though being half blind the older man might be retired despite the fit build.

“Do not bother the fighter,” the father spoke clearly, “Let him heal in peace son.”

Vito turned back, looking worried as he peered up at Flynn… hesitated before he offered his fruit, there was just two small bites taken out from one side. “Sorry! I didn't know you were healing!” 

“It… okay,” Flynn spoke slowly, carefully using the native words still. Then hummed in surprise at the odd fruit put in his hands, watching the boy run out of his area and back to the father.

Flynn took a careful bite, looking down surprised at the cool, if not mold flavor. Something…nice. 

He remembered the taste of the odd fruit, it was one of the first real nice, natural flavors…

Something he wanted more of.

A clatter of sound jarred the altered man out of his sleep. The following sound of someone jumping up from their spot against his shoulder. Reflexes kicked in for Flynn those few seconds before his companion. Reaching up and wrapping his hand around the injured Sentinel in half armor. Fingers curled to hold the smaller man firmly, yet he managed not to press on the wounds. 

Both froze into the stillness to match the winter storm outside. The giant scanned around, waiting to see where the demons were flooding from-

A single, hell mutated gargoyle was plastered against one of the few windows. It's tattered, twitching wings were freezing in position as the snow bank rose around the very… ice solid demon freezie.  Arm half lifted to catch the smaller Sentinel.

Flynn snorted deeply, glancing to his side at the young Sentinel.

Dark, shiny black eyes stared back with an unimpressed expression that mirrored his far more scary mother. Mirrored, not an exact copy of the look, but enough that the giant grinned. “Can you let me go?”

There was a notable pause as Flynn slowly smiled wide enough to flash teeth.

“What are doing!? Ack!” Vito started to ask and then let a started yelp

The much larger demigod lifted his left arm that was holding his only companion at the moment. Stomach flexing as he sat up, eyed the still frozen demon. Making sure there was no glow of energy in it. Looking back down, Flynn grinned one more at the now upsidedown Vito. Shifting into a better position he lifted his other hand to help support the now limp young man. Vito letting the giant turn him carefully to squint at his left side where his broken under suit was mostly on but had a good section cut off for the wound to be treated earlier. 

“Must you?” Vito demanded, tolerating being moved and inspect only because of the trust he had. 

“Mmhm..” Flynn hummed, then carefully helped Vito right side up, watching as the young Sentinel still leaned back on his right hand for support. The jolt of adrenaline must have drained out, Vito’s carefully selected position to get the best heat was now gone. His smaller form was remembering that there was a winter storm still and started to twitch as he fought the shivers. 

Flynn gave a low rumbling sound of worry.

“I'm…. I'm fine.” Vito shivered a bit more. “Gods I was kinda warm th…there.”

He felt the giant shift, not resisting being lifted up into the right hand. Watching as Flynn shifted to reach behind to grab and pull the bear-like pelt. Having been laying on it, it was also a mix of bed and warmth, like Flynn’s shoulder had been. Vito could only watch in curiosity as he was moved as the giant sat up. The young man basically tucked under the heavy fur and used the massive left arm to wedge against the living warmth. Vito made a relieved sound as the body heat and insulating fur was thawing him out. Not resisting his giant commander as Flynn inspected the building they were stuck in. Then found a slightly better spot to sit and learn back into a reclining seat. 

The giantanic man peered down, checking on Vito and smiled a bit at finding him dozing off again. He tucked the fur cloak around his smaller friend. 

Flynn blinked, pulled the rest of the cloak around and checked the inside. For the first time realizing he did not see more than one seam in the middle. What… what animal was big enough to make this? He puzzled over that while settling down and held one of the few completely unafraid persons of his altered self. A low rumble excepted the massive chest, Vito leaning against Flynn like he would settle in a wintherin nest. 

They still had at least the rest of the night to doze off while the storm raged before there was anyone able to look for them. Sentinels or Hell’s beasts. Or one angry wintherin rider commander, Vito's mother. She still scared him more than Valen.

Flynn grunted as he realized he had a sudden craving for the odd yellow-green fruit like in the dream-memory. 

Well, that was not fair.

[riveroftales]

◈◈◈◈◈◈◈ 𝐏𝐎𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐇 ◈◈◈◈◈◈◈

𝖢𝖢'𝗌 𝖭𝗈𝗍𝖾: A lil’ drabble because I have tests soon and I wanna make sure I stay as active as possible♡ I promise I’ll be more active when all my tests are done! (*´ -`) Not my best work tho, so be warned ( ´•̥ •` )♡

「𝐌𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐀 𝐒𝐏𝐎𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐑𝐒」

“Stupid thing…” Sanemi muttered under his breath. “Always getting messy without even being used…”

He rubbed the dark part of the cloth stained with polish against the blade, blowing on it slightly before cleaning off some of the excess. He held it up against the sunlight, watching the way it shined.

The skin on his fingers were thick, thus providing him a little extra protection as he carefully felt the sharpness of the blade against his thumb.

He wiped off a bit of the sweat which had formed on his forehead as he smirked to himself, proud of his work.

He carefully placed the blade down in a box before picking up a double barrelled gun and polishing that.

The sun was glaring at Sanemi as he climbed a small mountain, walking in the shade to keep cool despite the humidity.

He held a box with the gun and wakizashi he polished. Taking a few more big steps, he reached the area. A graveyard.

Sanemi huffed for a bit before taking a shaky breath, slowly starting to walk through the graves.

There were a lot of graves. It was a graveyard only for demon slayers, and there were still so many.

Sanemi was used to slayers bowing at his feet instantly when his presence was known, since he was a hashira. Being one of the strongest slayers in the entire corps while also being the most feared one came with the price of him unable to tell if people were bowing with fear or respect.

But he didn’t need to worry about it anymore.

Muzan’s defeat meant that the corps could officially disband and he could live his life normally.

He always imagined the souls of the lower ranked slayers still bowing to him or any other hashira whenever they walked through the graveyard. Of course, they almost never did. Only Uzui frequently visited his deceased family, and they had their own.

But even if the souls did bow at his feet, he just wished there was one who he could’ve told that he never needed to grovel at the feet of his own brother.

Sanemi kneeled down onto one knee and placed the box in front of Genya’s grave.

Tears stung his eyes. It was partially because Genya was gone, but mainly because he didn’t have anything left of his little brother to bury.

He could remember it too well. When they were kids, and he had killed their mother to protect Genya.

His poor baby brother was crying his heart out, helplessly holding their mother as she perished in the sunlight. Sanemi was wondering how worthless Genya felt to himself in that moment.

But he never needed to worry ever again, after holding the disintegrating body of his only family member in his arms. He felt it all.

Genya had a casket. A casket with his spare uniform and yukata neatly folded, a desperately sad attempt to replace his body.

All Sanemi could do was break down that moment. Genya was just 16. He had so much potential.

If Sanemi had been a better brother, things maybe could have been different.

[solradguy]

Guilty Gear hugs tier list. These listings can be debated if you want, but I'm going to post this, sign out, and go for a walk before it rains.

Reasoning:

BEST ==

Dizzy: Come on, look at her. Hugs like a best friend you haven't seen in years.

Elphelt: Might be kinda awkward if there's a snowball's chance in hell she thinks she could marry you but otherwise it's a damn good hug.

Jack-O': I'm biased. Hugs like it's the last time she'll ever see you.

Goldlewis: Like being hugged by a grizzly bear. Pats your back. 10/10

Sin: Kid puts his whole heart into everything he does. No way he hugs bad.

Axl: Good at hugging because it really just might be the last time he ever sees you.

Sol: He won't hug you. However, consider: warm, big arms, big chest. If Sol hugs you then the Earth is about to explode and he doesn't want to go out feeling alone.

GREAT ==

May: She's kinda bubbly (pun) and bubbly girls hug good.

Ky: Has rehearsed hugging. Knows the precise amount of time to hug for and how hard to hug but it still feels genuine.

Bridget: Don't have an explanation for this, just think she'd be good at hugs.

Izuna: Hugs like the cool uncle that let you take a sip of his bourbon when you were a teen. Pats your back.

Kliff: Dad hugs. Almost crushes your ribs but there's love in it.

Potemkin: Man's heart's full of love. He's careful not to kill you.

Chipp: Don't think Chipp hugs very frequently because he's a president and he's got an image to maintain, but I think he'd hug like everyone was his friend even if he just met them.

GOOD ==

Jam: Maybe a little too friendly for a hug with a stranger, like she hugs for just a bit too long and it starts getting kinda weird. She didn't mean anything weird by it though.

Zappa: It all depends on how involved S'Ko gets. There might be insects. Decent despite all that.

Slayer: I just don't think he'd hug anyone better than he hugs Sharon. A formal hug.

Leo: Tries too hard to hug well and doesn't quite make it.

Nagoriyuki: Could be killer at hugging if he had more opportunities to. A little out of practice from how long he was sealed in that thing.

Answer: Extremely formal and quick. He's got things to do.

Testament: Out of practice like with Nago. They're getting better though and at least whatever they put in their hair smells nice.

OKAY ==

Anji: If he hugs you, he's probably hitting on you. Depends entirely on how you'd feel about that. If he hugs you and he doesn't like you, I think it'd be a just barely acceptable hug.

Johnny: Saves his best hugs for hot women and his adopted daughters. It's a little awkward, like he doesn't really want to be hugging someone.

Faust: The image here is Strive Faust and I think Strive Faust would hug not great because he's really going through it in Strive and he just needs a moment. Xrd Faust would be up in GOOD or GREAT tier though.

Paradigm: Either you gotta squat down awkwardly to hug him or he's gotta climb up onto a table. Hugs in a professional manner, but the logistics of it make it difficult.

Bedman: Is asleep. Is strapped to a giant bed.

Ram: She's still learning. It's a cold hug because she's not sure how you're supposed to do it yet.

Giovanna: Doesn't want to hug and would rather be doing anything else.

Asuka: He was alright at hugging in 2015 but now it's 2187 and he's forgotten. The experience is uncomfortable for both parties.

Venom: Unless you're Zato, it's a quick and distant hug.

Raven: Would probably hug decently if he was in a serious mood, but odds are he's gonna make it bad weird.

BAD!! ==

Millia: She's had a rough life and also does not want to hug. A hug that makes you fear for your life and be grateful when the hug's over.

Justice: She's dead. Before that she wanted to destroy humanity. You can hug Justice but only once, and you better be fast.

Baiken: You might get stabbed. I can't imagine a scenario where she'd willingly hug anyone that wasn't Delilah.

I-No: Will just straight up kill you. Has never had a reason to hug someone before and might make it horny-weird if she's in a good mood and doesn't kill you first.

Robo-Ky: Assuming Crow programmed him to hug like Flesh Ky, it would still be like hugging a pile of sharp metal. If you're a woman he's going to say something uncomfortable.

Baldhead: Man's really going through it!! Going through it like no man's gone before!! Odds are looking like you'll get murdered.

ABA: Doesn't know what a hug is. Smells like rotting blood and flesh.

Order Sol: Sol at possibly his lowest point. Reeks like hair grease, body odor, and rotting blood. 48% chance you'll get Savage Fang'd, 48% chance you'll get Tyrant Rave'd, 4% chance he rips your heart out with his bare hand.

Valentine: She just stands there and doesn't hug back. Asks questions about hugs, hugging techniques, the meaning of hugs, the history of hugs, and what purpose they serve for as long as you're willing to bullshit answers.

Haehyun: The little human inside the robot is alright at hugging, but the robot itself will probably crush your bones.

Happy Chaos: He's going to do something really friggin weird for shits n giggles and you're going to regret it.

Zato: He's just shit at hugging. Dude died and came back wrong.

[yandereaffections]

Demon Slayer Masterlist

Muzan

S/o who like to climb on him

Demon slayer S/o hunting him down

Falling for a member of Tanjiros family

Random HC

Hunted down

Zenitsu

Cheerleader like S/o

S/o who loves affection

S/o see him as weak and cowardly

Tanjiro

S/o who wants to settle down in a domestic life

S/o whos planning on getting him to trust them and run away

S/o whos cold until they get plants

Petnames

Kidnapped S/o going on a hunger strike

Singing/ playing a instrument around him

Helping S/o recover from a food allergy incident 

Sneaking out of the house to get him a present

S/o who always try to excuse themselves out of dates w/ him

Cold and cruel S/o whos actually just incredibly cautious

S/o who has a hard time apologizing for what theyve done

Kidnapped S/o making compromises

Cold S/o willing to defend him as their sign of affection

Jealousy HC

S/o who thinks they arent pretty enough for him

Demon therapist s/o

S/o hates and constantly fights against him

S/o has the power to put him in a trance with words

Kidnapped S/o bakes as a form of stress relieve 

s/o deciding they want to go out and adventure alone

S/os rival having feeling for them

s/o who works as a family lawyer/advocate

s/o who starts behaving well convince him to let them go to a friends wedding

Darling avoiding introducing him to their unkind family

Real haunted house

Drider au

s/o found out they were a supernatural being and then ran in fear

Werewolf s/o is from a rival pack who is ready for a terf war

Demon tanjiro w/ a demon slayer S/o who wants to coexist 

Saving him from torture

S/os friend beat him to asking to celebrate halloween with them

Accidently falling asleep before their valentines plans 

Kidnapped S/o running back into a house fire to find him

S/o whos too kind/giving

S/o tends to wander off constantly

Oblivious reader using dating apps 

S/o breaking a bone while out with their friends

Yandere Alphabet N,D,F,H,Y

Villain prompt 

Werewolf reader challenges him to be leader of the pack

Shinobu Kocho

So incorporates drawing/painting into their swordsmanship 

Giyuu

Running away to lead him to a surprise party

S/o wanting to repay for how aggressive they were in the past

S/o who always wants to help others

S/o breaking someone else out of a curse with true loves kiss

Plant lover S/o avoiding him in their greenhouse

 “Don’t you dare fucking try it. You know you can’t outrun me.”

“What, you thought you were just gonna get away with that?”

Socially awkward S/o saying “my husband says I’m not allowed to date!”

s/o found out they were a supernatural being and then ran in fear

Newly turned vampire S/o is terrified of blood and gets sick at the sight

Incubus with a s/o who says “yeah you gotta eat, but I need a ring before I can even consider being a meal”

S/o “borrowing “ the car for a joy ride

Enmu

Headcannons

Muzan

Most taboo kink/ Exhibitionism & Dubcon NS FW TW

Tanjiro

Imprisonment & Bondage NS FW TW

[inosukenumberonefan]

How to catch Kokushibo's eye

Unlike upper rank 2 and 3 I belive he would go for a demon because they're isn't any circumstances where a human would cross his path and live.

You'd have to upper rank 2 or 3 because I feel the only way to get to really talk to him would be challenging him to a blood battle or being assigned a mission with him (Or you could harm one of the demons that are above you but he prolly would dislike you for that)

In these two scenarios you'd have to be about the strength of upper 2 or 3 because

In a mission you have to be as close as you could be to be able to keep up with him and not hold him back.

In a blood battle if you were upper 4 5 or 6 he' wipe the floor with you and absorb you for being so naive and stupid and if you somehow managed to beat him and leave him alive bro would never recover and never talk to you again. (Inferioty complex gonna hit hard)

In both of these scenarios you'd have to be have a specific personality for him not to despise you.

His ideal personality:

Queit: Hes not much of a talker but that does not mean he's a listener after about 30 seconds of you raving or talking about someone not "work" related he gets annoyed. (I headcanon him as not liking loud noises either)

Most of your time spent with him will be in comfortable silence and small talk so you need to be down for that

Loyal: This has been established in the manga that he very highly believes in the hierarchy of the demons so he would not like someone who frequently does not listen to Muzan or complains (I belive the reason he let Akaza live was because of his loyalty to Muzan)

Serious: This is pretty self explanatory. Bro does not like goofing around and he takes getting stronger and being a demon VERY serious so someone who doesn't he'll label them as a distraction and annoyance

Calm: He prefers queit and tranquility so someone who doesn't freak out and get hyper or whatever is VERY MUCH preferred. He needs someone who will address him calmly instead of freezing up in fear (still gotta treat him with respect)

Extra points!

Sharing the same ideals as him which is doing anything to get stronger and training very hard.

Being a training buddy (will elaborate more on this later)

Using a katana as a weapon.

Being turned into a demon by Kokushibo

For age you can either be a super old demon 300-500 years (like him) were you've slowly climbed the ranks maybe going up a rank every 50 or so years until finally you challenge him.

Or....

You can be a baby demon 0-50 years. (The younger you are the more impressed he is) it takes a demon roughly 55-100 to devour enough humans to become an upper rank so being able to climb the ranks faster then most, to him that condems respect.

NOW I HAVE A VISION!

Imagine you're a baby demon just recently turned, you were a previous demon slayer a Hashira or Kinoe. Your skills and powers were already great but now they're out of this world. You've climbed the ranks fast and managed to secure a position in the upper ranks.

Now stick with me... Your BDA is related to your swordsmanship (like Kokushibo's 😽) so you seek him out here's the scene.

"Am I right to assume you used to be a demon slayer Kokushibo-sama?" He stands there contemplating his response or whether or not he should respond.

"As were you." You nod.

"Your blood demon art and sword skill truly are something to behold." You compliment and he tenses up at the praise. "Mines actually quite similar-."

"I have important matters to attend to. Please don't waste my time with formalities." He interrupts.

"I was hoping to find a sparring partner." He wasn't very expressive but you could tell he did not want to do that AT ALL. "I understand your reservations but I do belive its been some time since you've gotta a proper fight and not that I don't find you immensely strong but the Hashira's of this era are out of the world especially with them unlocking the mark, it would be a terrible for any of us to die because we haven't gotten proper practice."

It takes him a while but he agrees because you're also fighting with a katana like a demon slayer and you're matching the power of a hashira so it's a good agreement!

[beyond-mortal-limits]

FFXIVWrite2024 - Day 12: Quarry

You killed them. Well done. Can we go now?

The giants’ gore still drips off your axe. You struggle to hear the scout’s words over the pounding in your head.

“Certain... allegations have been made. It would seem that you were seen conversing with - with a corpse in the Brume.

He held out his hands placatingly. Condescendingly.

“Not that anyone would ever believe such slander, of course...”

The soldier swallowed hard. He’s afraid of you.

“I should warn you, madam, that some of these allegations were made by Temple Knights. You, um - you may be asked to surrender your weapon...”

He trailed off, turning pale. 

Surrender your weapon? After what happened in Ul’Dah?

“L-look, I’m just the messenger, I-I don’t-”

He turned, and started quickly wading through the snow.

No. No more. Enough. They’ll put you down like just another heretic. Like an animal. You know what these things are like. Nothing for it, then. JOURNEY TO WHITEBRIM FRONT AND KILL THEM ALL.

The soldier was looking over his shoulder every now and again as he struggled up the slope. He’s going to raise the alarm if you don’t stop him.

When he realises you’re chasing him, the fear becomes fully apparent. His breathing becomes ragged, panicked, and he lurches as he begins to try and sprint. The snow drags at your feet, a hellish freezing burden on your legs that threatens to trip you every other step. Everything about this world acts against you. It is long past due a reckoning. The little soldier’s stride is smaller, but familiarity with the frozen countryside makes up for it. 

On and on the two of you go, scrambling and running through snowdrifts and up the hill, both becoming exhausted by the effort. He drops his bow and quiver to lighten the load, and you rip your helmet off to clear your vision. It’s not like any of these things can actually harm you, anyway.

He’s screaming, yelling, making a ruckus, but the mist eats his words. Even as he bowls through the gates, there’s some hesitation as to what is actually happening. One of the more switched-on guards actually manages to get his pike under your arms and into your chest, but you snap it with your axe and tear the point free. I told you, they’re nothing. You are more than them in every way.

He’s climbed one of the flagpoles, finally trapped with nowhere to run. There is shouting the noise of things who think they understand the world all around but your next step is simple. All you have to do is go up there and drag the soldier down and then we will do the rest of them. You grip the pole and - something is wrong. Keep going. You can see his face, looking down, full of the fear of prey and you can see the spots on it, and there’s spots on his face because he’s nothing still a boy. You can see the tears, too. You remember, now. This isn’t right.

You should stop.

And then what? You’ll put your collar back on? You’ll lie down and let others trample you, because it’s so much fucking easier than having a spine? If you won’t crush the vermin in your way, then they will eat you alive. You deserve better. You deserve more.

I can’t.

You can. You are the Eikon-Slayer, the conquering hero, the divinely-appointed warrior of the star, and you can kill every single worm here without stopping. You don’t even need a weapon to do it.

No.

Yes.

No. We shouldn't be doing this.

Either you start standing up for yourself, or we go back to cowering in misery and letting insignificant nothings make our decisions for us. What’s it going to be, Petra? Are you going to have a fucking spine or not? Are you going to speak up and make yourself heard for once?

I will - I will - I WILL NOT KILL BECAUSE YOU TELL ME TO.

[doumadono]

Emergency request

I had to leave a toxic environment, which was difficult as it had people i called friends. Then a few minutes passed and I got informed by someone via screenshot that immediately after I left, I was being talked about and only a few people stuck up for me.

The entire thing made me spiral into my depression just after I managed to almost climb out of the pit but now I feel like I'm at the bottom again. I feel like I should just stop trying to be friendly and caring and stick to myself

Sorry for the pity party and rant

Could I have something with Aizetsu comforting his s/o?

Aizetsu & gn!Reader who left a toxic environment - headcanons

A/N: leaving a toxic environment is already a brave step, and it's disheartening to learn about the hurtful conversations that followed. Remember, your worth is not determined by the actions of others. It's okay to feel overwhelmed, and your emotions are valid. Take the time you need for self-care, and if you ever need someone to talk to, I'm here for you

DEMON SLAYER EMERGENCY REQS MASTERLIST

Aizetsu's voice, deep and resonant, cut through the silence like a mournful melody, "I sense your distress, my beloved. Speak your troubles to me, for I am here to share your burdens."

His partner, still shrouded in the aftermath of their recent departure from a toxic environment, hesitated before finally succumbing to the urge to unburden their heart. "Aizetsu, I... I had to leave. It was toxic, and I thought it would be better for my well-being, but..."

Aizetsu's hand, adorned with claws that could rend the fabric of reality itself, delicately cradled the cheek of his parnter. His touch was surprisingly gentle, a stark contrast to the fearsome exterior he often presented. "Continue, my love. I am here to listen, to try to understand."

Aizetsu's demeanor remained steadfast, his eyes mirroring the pain etched across his partner's face. He listened, absorbing each word with an empathy that transcended his demonic nature.

"I found out," his partner confessed, their voice tinged with a fragile vulnerability, "that even after I left that toxic environment, I became the subject of discussions. I thought they were my friends, but they spoke ill of me. It shattered me, Aizetsu. I feel like I can't trust anyone."

Aizetsu's response was a solemn nod, his blue eyes reflecting a depth of understanding that surpassed mortal comprehension. "Betrayal is a bitter pill to swallow, my love. I am here, and I shall stand by your side, unwavering in my support."

In the moments that followed, Aizetsu guided his partner through the labyrinth of their emotions, unraveling the layers of pain and self-doubt that had taken residence within their heart. His words, both comforting and profound, wove a tapestry of reassurance.

"The shadows of deceit may linger for long, but you are not defined by the whispers of the misguided. You are strong, resilient, and deserving of genuine connections."

Aizetsu's demonic presence, typically a harbinger of fear, transformed into a sanctuary of solace for his partner. As they spoke, the weight on their shoulders lessened, and the darkness began to recede.

The demon's parting words held a promise, "Your pain is mine to share, and in our unity, we shall forge a haven where trust and love reign supreme, love. It saddens me that you faced such an awful situation though."

Aizetsu's significant other gazed at him, gently wiping away the tears streaming down their cheeks. "Can you hold me, please?" they softly requested.

The demon nodded solemnly. Gradually, he embraced them, enfolding his strong arms around his partner, as though weaving a cocoon of unwavering support. The tightness of his hold conveyed not only physical warmth but also a sense of security, as if he sought to shield them from the lingering shadows of pain.

"In but a single utterance, and I shall unleash suffering upon them. Witnessing you burdened with sorrow rends my heart, my love."

His words elicited a subdued chuckle from them. "No need to expend your time and energy on them, Aizetsu. I merely wish to conclude this chapter and erase it from memory. Can you tell me, will I ever succeed?"

Aizetsu's clawed hand traced slow, deliberate patterns along their back. "Regrettably, my dear, I must bring you somber tidings. The indelible nature of negative emotions leaves an enduring mark, etching itself into the very fabric of the soul."

A heavy sigh escaped their lips. "Wonderful..."

"However," the azure-eyed demon gently cradled their face in his hands, his gaze penetrating, "you possess the capacity to learn the art of letting go. It demands effort, but it is indeed attainable. And in this undertaking, know that I am here, always ready to support your every decision."

They leaned up to gently kiss Aizetsu's cheek. "Thank you, Aizetsu. It's still surprising to me that a demon can be so thoughtful."

Aizetsu grinned slightly. "It saddens me that you doubt my abilities, but I understand your perspective. Regardless, I love you, and I'll support whatever decisions you make."

[splendentmoon]

Demon Slayer Au ! 

In the dangerous battle against the upper moon demon, Bai He finds herself overpowered the boy who once was her brother. For the first time in what feels like ages, she is terrified. She fears for her life. The only thing that is keeping her from the fate this monster wishes to bestow in her, is the sword in her brothers brother's mouth that keeps him from biting off her neck. She was losing the fight and she knows that. In a final desperate attempt to save herself, she releases a heart-wrenching scream, "Xiaotian, please!"

Suddenly the demon stilled. All movements ceased abruptly. It was, as  if he was remembering something, Long forgotten and buried deep down within, now trying to resurface. A little girls voice was ringing in his ear. 

Who was that? 

"Xiaotian, please~ save from this horrible monster," By monsters the girl meant the homework from Tang Sanzang. Xiaotian plays along with a warming smile, "Oh no, foul demon! Unhand my sister at once!" Bai He laughs at her brother's silliness.

"But now you really have to get back to your studies, sister." She tries to shift the focus, and going off topic, saying, "Aw man, but it’s so boring. Can’t we play monster vs hero? You can save me from these terrible Demons of the boring-homework-village." This gets a laugh out of her brother, who teases, "Ah! The demons of the boring-homework-village are very dangerous. What if I am not strong enough to defeat them?" with a joking smile.

"Of course you would, big brother!" Bai He climbs onto the table and stands on her unfinished paperwork. "You are the strongest there is! Besides, who would protect me from those demons if not you?" Xiaotian lifts his sister into the air, saying, "Oh, in that case, I cannot fail! I will just…ah...aha tickle the monsters to death." Bai He sees the indication and laughs, saying, "Wait hahahaha I - I am not a monster hahahaha. Stop, I surrender hahaha!"

The laughter fades, and Bai He looks uncertain. "Brother?" "Yes, my little snowflake?" She fumbles with her dress, uncertain if her question is too silly. "If a real monster showed up, like those baba tells us about, you'd protect me, right?" His smile fades, and he looks serious before putting on a calming smile and reassuring her, "Of course I would! No demon will ever hurt you as long as I am around." Bai He smiles back, asking quietly, "Promise?" "I promise! Now, let’s get back to your studies."

They were back in the present. He did not understand what this memory meant or where it came from. All he know was that it touched him at a place in his heart he didn’t know existed. His heart was aching and there was a sudden wetness on his face. Tears streaming down his face, slowly dropping on the shocked slayer underneath him. 

"Bai He?

I read this many times and loved it!

Sometimes I wish I was a fan and not a creator, to make fanfics of my own work.

You gave me the inspiration to make this drawing.

When Bai sees her brother turned into a demon, it will be a hard blow to her and her family.

[moon-sang]

hewo, I saw ur masterlist and it said you take requests for Inosuke so hehe 😏

Could I request maybe a demon reader (to make it interesting) and maybe Inosuke is ordered to take her down whilst Tanjiro and Zenitsu kill another demon, but Inosuke actually grows a bond with the demon (maybe she’s a bit mischievous in a non-sexual way) and he finds out she has never eaten anyone before much like Nezuko.

BONUS: Tanjiro and Zenitsu confused as hell when they see Inosuke holding hands with the demon walking back to them 😂

you don’t have to do this, it’s just been something on my mind ❤️

Friend Or Foe?

Inosuke x Fem!Reader

A/N: This is my first time writing for kny characters so pls be kind with feedback if you have any ❤️

SUMMARY: Inosuke finds an unlikely friend.  OR

The request.

WARNINGS: fluff, mild angst, Fem!reader, demon!reader, mature language, maybe a tiny bit of tension, mischievous!reader, I think that’s about it, please tell me if I miss anything!

—

The cave is covered in fog as Tanjiro, Zenitsu, and Inosuke make their way further in. An ethereal glow illuminates the crescent shaped moon as rays of white moonshine emanates the top of the mountain’s head.

“G-g-guys, this is getting really creepy!” Zenitsu whimpers, body ragged and trembling in fear. “Stop being such a baby, Monitsu!” Yells Inosuke, triggering the blonde even more. “STOP SCREAMING SO LOUD!! YOU’RE GONNA KILL US, YOU MORON” Tanjiro audibly sighs, turning to face both his teammates who were in a fist fight by then. “This isn’t going to work” He whispers, loud enough for Zenitsu and Inosuke to hear. “W-what isn’t going to work, Tanjiro?” Zenitsu asks in confusion. “I can smell two different scents … I think there are two demons here.” He exclaims. “wHaT!!! THIS IS BAD, THIS IS REALLY, REALLY B-” 

“I think we should split up.” Tanjiro explains 

“YEAH!”  “WE CAN’T SPLIT UP, THAT DEMON WILL KILL US ALL, AAAAAH!”  “it’s ok Zenitsu, you can come with me. Will you be alright on your own Inosuke?”  Tanjiro questions.

“I’ll be fine, Gonpachiro!”

Tanjiro doesn’t even get a chance to respond when Inosuke is already dashing past him, headed straight for the entrance of the cave AKA the wrong way. It takes a few seconds before the green eyed man comes running back, realising his mistake, and finding the right track to the demon he was to fight.

~~~

A forest of blood red crystals formed a small trail for Inosuke to follow. His boar mask was reflected through the many diamonds that sprung from the ground, like small crops. As the demon slayer strode through the diamond garden the more he began to feel like he was being followed. 

With a swift turn of his heels he spins around and almost bumps into the demon. 

Dangerous e/c eyes stared back at him, yet there was a sprinkle of innocence in them. Her skin was a clear s/c, but slightly paled, most likely from being a demon. She bared her fangs at him in a toothy grin, eyes glimmering in mischief. 

Inosuke cackles and reaches for his swords….Only, they’re not there-

“Huh?”

“Looking for something?” Sneers the demon girl, holding his swords in a reverse grip. 

“HEY!! THOSE ARE MINE!” Inosuke yells, pointing an accusing finger at her. “Can I have them?” She asks with a knowing sly smirk. 

“ABSOLUTELY NOT” He grunts. 

Her smile widens and she bolts past him, taking his swords with her.

Damn, she was a fast demon…

“HEY! GET BACK HERE!”  It didn’t take long for Inosuke to catch up to her, after all he was used to chasing Monitsu all the time.  He chased the demon to a dead-end, with only an unclimbable mountain above her. 

“HA! I WIN!” He yells as she stops running, realising her situation.  “Do you?” She asks with a quirk.  Without warning, the demon girl jumps in midair, but instead of landing on the ground again, a small rounded crystal path forms under her feet. 

“HEY, THAT’S CHEATING!”  As Inosuke starts to charge at her, she takes another step, and as if she were climbing a set of crystal stairs, another path formed under feet, as the previous one faded. She continued the same pattern until she was on top of the mountain that once towered over her. 

“NO FAIR!” 

With a mockingly sympathetic smile, she chucks two diamond daggers down. Surprisingly, when they hit the ground, they do not break. 

Inosuke picks them up in question, but quickly realises what he needed to do. 

With an all too familiar laugh he jabs one of the diamond dagger's into the mountain rock. Once again, it does not break. Must have some weird demon spell on it. Thought the demon slayer. He does the same with the other dagger, and slowly climbs up the mountain that way. 

He’s surprised to see the demon hadn’t moved from her place, when he finally reaches the top. 

“Took you long enough.” She blurts.  Inosuke clenches his fists. 

Finally, some challenge. He pondered. 

As much as the boar masked man hated to admit it, he was actually having a little fun…with a..demon.. 

she must have put him under a spell to like her, yeah! That’s what it is! 

“I don’t know what game you’re playing, but I will slay you!” He exclaims. 

“Then hurry up and do it..” She giggles, throwing both his swords at him

He catches them with expert precision and readies them in his stance. 

She lifts her arm slightly and a diamond sword constructs itself in her hand.

She swings the sword so it’s in a reverse grip, and positions her self in a defensive stance. 

He charges at her, without wasting a second. 

Their swords clash and ring through the crystal cave. 

Inosuke lifts his swords off of hers and went for her head, a little hesitantly…after all.. he kinda liked her.  She ducks the swing of his sword and kicks him in the stomach, sending him crashing down to the floor. 

She menacingly walks over to him and offers her hand, encouraging him to take it. 

Instead, Inosuke sweeps her legs and she falls to the ground as well. From there, the demon slayer climbed on top of her and readies his sword at her neck. 

“Go on.” She says, when Inosuke hesitates.

“Slay me, demon slayer.” She chuckles.  “SHUT UP!”  Why was he having such a hard time decapitating her?

He stays hovering over her for a while longer, battling with his own mind on what he should do.

The demon yawns from underneath him, admittedly getting a little bored. 

“I’m hungry..” she groans.  actually..now that he thought about it, Inosuke was getting pretty hungry as well..

His stomach lets out a low growl at the mention of food and she chuckles. 

“Lets go get something to eat.”  “What the damn hell do you mean?! Aren’t I your meal?!” 

“Naaa, I don’t like fur in my food.” She snarks.  “Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?!” He barks.  she snickers in response, enjoying every moment of this. 

It had been a while since she was treated like she was normal. 

“How about.. some tempura?” She asks.  Inosuke’s ears go up at the mention of his favourite food and he immediately gets off of her. 

“You like tempura?” He asks, completely intrigued with her now. 

“Of course.” She says with a smirk.  He’s silent for a moment, before-

“LET’S GET TEMPURA!”  ~~

BONUS: 

“So you have two friends named Gonpachiro and Monichi?”  “Yup, my turn now.” 

“Do you eat humans?” He asks.  “No, I’ve never eaten human before, I can resist the urge to by consuming human food.” She says with a faint smile.  “oh” he says as they walked through the cave.  “Hey! Is that your friends over there?!” She asks as two figures appear at the entrance.  Inosuke squints and widens his eyes when he realises it’s his teammates. 

“Yeah! It is!” He replies, grabbing her hand and running towards them.  “ITADAKI TONTARO!”  Tanjiro turns his head in absolute confusion. 

“ITS TANJI-” He cuts himself off when he sees Inosuke running with what smells like a demon.

“Inosuke…who’s this?” He asks wearily.  “OH, THIS IS Y/L/N Y/N.” He blurts out.  “She’s a….-”

“Demon, I know.” He finishes for him.  “We’re gonna get some tempura!” He yells before bolting off, finding the closest restaurant that sells what he wants.  Tanjiro and Zenitsu exchange looks of absolute confusion and horror (in Zenitsu’s case). 

What had their friend gotten into this time? 

~~~

Requests open.

[cosmo112]

JURRASSIC SLAYERS AU

I know Megladon y/n won but also… cutie little dinosaur boys being nervous :( ofc the amazing headers made by @cafekitsune thank you for supporting my come back without even realizing it! Also check out everyone in the taglist! They have amazing works themselves!

Taglist: @vrystalius , @mintx , @junobutterflyden / @juno-of-wonderland ,

OBANAI - Titana Boa

Complete ass to his handlers he finds useless. He does also pick fights with smaller hybrids. When you were assigned to handle the Hashira Sector, he was a bit nervous, before finding he certainly preferred you over the other idiots who wanted to help him shed or messing up his carefully procured nest.

He finds he prefers you over most of the others in the Sector, trilling happily when he sees you and is a bit more polite to you. When you take on the intern Tanjiro Kamado, he has a BIG problem, he pushes Tanjiro into sinkholes since he knows if he kills your intern you’d be mad. Obanai puts Tanjiro in trees to keep him away. Just because he’s pissy that Tanjiro ate lunch with you.

10/10 kinda silly snake man! (Think Nagas when imagining this big boy! I’d say his human half is a bit petite since he doesn’t need to eat as much, but his snake half this thick, with white scales and some heft. Used for climbing. His scales do get easily stained :( clean him! (He rubbed dirt on his scales)

Tengen - Quetzalcoatlo

Tengen has of course his three original female mates! (Can’t find anything on how they mated so let’s say Tengen is a special case) he steals watches and even scares people to drop their phones to bring to his mates and nests. Laughing the entire time.

Then he meets his new handler for the Hashira Sector, Y/n. He then realizes he probably shouldn’t just have THREE mates when there was a perfectly cute human right there. Four mates sound better! He drags you to the nest of flying dinosaurs and you get stuff tied in your hair and Tengen starts growling at other people.

When you take in Tanjiro as an intern, he gets along pretty well, even teaching Tanjiro the skills of courting humans! (Kidnap then give them shiny rocks ✨) and sees Tanjiro as a hatchling, even encouraging his mates to drag Tanjiro back to the nest with the other eggs.

Goofy ahh bird man. He has skin flaps under his arms, think of humanoid bats with human hands and bat wings under their arms, and sharp nails. Very good for back scratches and very polite!

Giyu - Espinossauro - Spinosaur

He tends to be quiet, his handlers can’t find him half the time, I’d like to say he paints his spinal fin to match his fallen friend, and floats in the lazy river in his enclosure.

Meeting you, it made him a bit nervous as you cleaned him up and did his hair.. he got embarrassed, so he decided to snuggle up and gets very possessive, growling at other handlers, which he makes him think that they’re gonna take his handler..

He meets Tanjiro and is confused, why would you intern him? Then when you get sick and Tanjiro works for you, he understands, when you get back he starts ushering you both to his nest and refuses to let you leave in fear of either of you getting hurt. Tanjiro is his new little brother / hatchling. And your Tanjiro’s other parent.

10/10 big baby. You have to sleep in his enclosure then deal with Obanai getting mad at Giyuu for taking up your time. Don’t mention to either of them that the rocks in their enclosures don’t make good beds.

[omies-odd-writing-spot]

B.F.D.G. 08: BLEEAHK- that was a bad idea

[Ao3] [ffnet] Full chapter in links!

.

The Slayer did not go too far from where he left his new human. He could not as the Demigod realized that she was not equipped at all to survive alone. Just far enough away to get a good reading of the scents and a basic layout before looping back. Finding that the main halls were just big enough for him to walk through as he paced a bit. Investigating a bit as the Slayer just caught a glimpse of the other humans retreating around a corner again and then behind what seemed like airlock doors. He was finding quite a few of those really!

That… made some sense actually, to have several fail safes for breathable air.

He heard the scrambling in the hall that he used before, head snapping around and away from where he sensed the living souls. The near giant launched back the way he came. Following the sound and down a now familiar hall with the big windows that showed the Martian landscape and the colony.

The little human was just starting to move, sitting up and looking around. Only to yell as one of the black slicked possessed creatures was climbing up on the machines she had been left on. The fear drew the creature up on the colorful machine and another one latched onto a machine at her feet.

The Slayer lunged to get over there faster, a snarling growl slipping out. The lower gravity was still throwing him off as he cleared the distance faster than he was expecting. So he crashed into those colorful machines while just able to grab the first altered thing. Shoulder hitting them and rocking the things, and fronts of two of the three crumpled and seemed to just pop open. Sending a few things scattering across the ground with a clatter and thumb of plastic, metal and glass.

The human scream that resulted had an instant reaction. A few moments of chaos that seemed much longer than it really was. He grabbed that first creature and was trying to break it when the second one climbed on top of the machines. Having to grab at that, the Slayer gave a confused but insulted sound as the second hell altered possessed slipped out of his hand as the black oily substance on it let the thing wiggle free. It reached for the human's leg as she was trying to curl up.

The human cried as the Slayer grabbed the second creature with both hands. It made a squelching sound and twisted as if inside its own skin to try to bite his fingers. He grunted in surprise as she fell off the hiding place, half behind the machines. The Slayer gave a frustrated sound as a third black shape was scrambling over his back and was jumping for the living mortal as the broken but still living first possessed rolled over.

He needed both hands to grab the two things, as well as hold onto the slippery one-

The Slayer did not think, he just acted and reacted. Feeling something squished and popped wetly as the same altered teeth that helped him tear into the restraints in his sarcophagus now sliced through demonically altered flesh. Hard enough char was starting to form in his mouth as he caught the third creature and the first in his hands.

Like what happened in the sarcophagus it took more effort to kill the things then it should have. Caving the first creature's chest in and throwing it back. Then had to hold tighter to the last and flexed to start ripping it apart. Annoyed at the strange vine like growths in it-

"Hurrp-ak!"

…and then the taste of the oil that was on the creature he bit finally sank in, a few seconds after the fact. Not even that strange metallic sweet of proper, healthy blood. It was almost rancid and fatty. Engine grease would, and did taste better he knew from experience.

Do not ask what the experience was.

Were?

Technically it was two experiences, but he also knew that Human made engine grease and Argenta made were alike but different.

"...blaaaahh-aahk…" The Slayer spat, gagged and tried to get the fluid out of his mouth as the possessed were charring around him. That one that he bit was tossed down the hall as it seemed to be moving. It was weird and tasted bad and it was like there was a thick layer of that rancid oil under the skin-

The Slayer made a face not unlike someone might do when they suddenly had unexpected acid reflux. That moment between realizing it was a horrible taste and then betrayed that it happened in the first place. The near giant of a man started to lift a hand to try and clear the taste, then realized that the same black oily substance was all over them and coughed. Gagged and then… the demigod dry heaved there in the hall.

The little human was just barely peeking from around the farthest machine that was broken. Mostly seeing the giant's shadow at first and then just the Slayer's top half. He heaved again hard enough some of the traces of liquid energy he had been, well, fed, while trapped in hell came up. Not that that was much better, but not rancid like the oily stuff.

He shifted to start pushing himself up, debating on at least trying to rub the oil off on his shoulder or something-

The Slayer's left hand landed on one of the things that fell from the machines, he started to wince, feeling it crunch. Then jerked away as it… imploded? Exploded? His right shoulder hit the one machine that he did not damage before. Though now its small locks broke and there was a flood of some sort of packets against his shoulders. There was a rather ungraceful moment of him trying to get away from the stuff, triggering some more pop and splashing hisses of fluid.

He was sitting near the human when he finally started to place what the things were. Sitting there out of range of popping anymore…cans. Bottle. Both.

He started to recognize these things. Or at least he recognized that he used to know what these things were. The Slayer sat for a good minute, frowning at what he was seeing. He leaned forward and plunked up one of the undamaged cans, scowling at it as if offended it's kin did that to him.

It was as the big guy was slowly turning the can, squinting at the text on it, that the nearby human, still mostly hiding, wondered if he could read.

In reality, the Slayer could and did read and write quite well. Both human and Argenta languages, several of the latter in fact.

At least…he thought he could still read the old human language. The spoken language was recognizable to the Demigod. Even if it was accented to him. These things had text that were… semi familiar in how the letters were but at the same time like those letters were… wrong. Backwards maybe?

Almost like backwards or spelled so odd it was almost something else.

"It's…" a very small voice spoke, drawing the glowing gaze to his left. The human swallowed almost audibly, as she tucked her face down against her knees. Oddly, it helped her speak again without being able to see anything. "It's a Drizzle Sprint drink. Soda?"

The Slayer blinked slowly at the tiny human, looking at the can again. Soda?

Why was that… familiar?

[rotm-channel]

RotM:Interlude I - Jamies Giant

The wind was taking Jack back home to Burgess. At this time of year there was no snow or ice,but it was still home to him regardless.He wondered what Jamie was up to and so he came to his house.

Jamie was reading the newspaper with intrigue. He was interested in what was going on in California first a meteor than alleged giants.While he was an older boy his childhood never left him and never will.He was still fascinated by the mysterious and supernatural world.He had fulfilled his goal of having yeti/bigfoot photos,autographed at that.And while these were his long term goals he did have several other ones…one of these was a giant.

“What you're doing Jamie” Jack asked

“I'm researching the Giant,Jack!”Jamie swiftly replied.”By any chance did you meet him or her?”

“Sorry,but no kiddo.And I'm unsure if it's real or not,which I rarely am…”he added

“Some general Monger said on behalf of the government that those reports had no evidence to prove it and dismissed it.But do you also think it can be real?”

“Well I'm real and people don't think I am so why not?”Jack said in a playful tone.

Jack also shared some of Jamie's interests,he even read his book “Mysterious Times" and found it fascinating.

“Where's the rest of the gang?”Jack asked.

“Oh?Well Pippa will be here any minute.She is also interested in it and I should call the others too!”Jamie said.

“Sure why not?”Jack replied

"Oh and Im Home alone Jack"Jamie added before going to the phone

A few minutes later

“So you actually think that giant is real Jamie?”Claude said it to Jamie in kinda an ironic, nearly sarcastic tone.While he and his twin Caleb both were firm believers of the Guardians and several other such creatures,they still were often in doubt of what they didn't see at least once.

“Like really if it is real where would it hide?And where would it go?Something that big can't just appear out of nowhere and then disappear just like that.”Caleb added he and Claude had also heard the official reports and took them as if it were all.And the fact that even Jack himself was unsure cemented it in their heads for them.

“Well then how do you explain it,many saw it and it's not like that one man saw bigfoot many saw it and it's hard to mistake a giant isn't it?”Jamie counterarguments in a serious yet also wondrous tone.

“Well believe it,when we see it” Claude and Caleb said in unison,but Jamie's argument did sow a seed of belief in them and while it was still small it was a little self-doubt to themself.

“Maybe it's one of those friendly giants like the BFG”Sophie said she remembered really liking the book after all the main character's name was Sophie too…she would often dream she was in her place.

“Or maybe it's one of those evil giants,”Monty added when he also read the BFG and was scared of the man-eating giants, the thought could just come out of the shadows, from under a tree or even just gobble him up while he was havin a dream, it made him shudder and gave him nightmares. It didnt help that recently he saw with the gang attack of the 50-foot women which really made his fear for giants grow…

Suddenly an Idea flew into Pippas head.

“Jack?”Pippa asked the frost spirit.

“Yes”Jack replied

“Did you see the giant after you climbed the beanstalk”She said

And almost as if by magic everyone commenced to laughing including Jack.

“Good One,but no I am not that Jack that climbed the beanstalk”Jack said still smiling.

“Did you jump over a candlestick by any chance?”Claude said in a comical tone.

“Or if youre Jack, where is Jill?”Caleb added.

“Did you slay Giants?Then if the Giant attacked you could fight back!”Monty said, referring to Jack the giant slayer.

Jack couldn't help but smile…

“It seems as though there are a lot of Jacks which were in fairy tale.I guess it was so cool they wanted more Jack”Jack said in a humorous tone.

JUST THEN THE DOOR OPENED AND OUT IT CAME!!!!!!!!

“HI JACK!!!”

Cupcake!

Everyone was surprised and relieved.

"What were you doing?"She asked

“We were talking about that giant,if he's real or not and about other Jacks”

"He?Why can't she be a woman?"Cupcake said she had heard some of the reports and while some did not specify some called her the collosoal woman,bridezilla or mega-maid and so she thought that was it.That she saw with the gang attack of the 50-foot women which she really liked despite being so obviously fake.She also found it silly that Monty could have nightmares of it despite the effects being so poor.

“You have a point there!”Jamie said contemplating the thought through his head.

“Hey,now that we're here…..” Claude said

“We can watch a movie!” Caleb said

“Right what are we gonna watch?” Jack said

"Why not something not so scary?"Monty said

“I want to watch the classic horror movie The Son!Of the Bride!Of the Ghost!Of Young!FRANKENSTEIN!!!!!!”Pippa said excitedly.

The BFG?Sophie said

Why not Earth vs the Flying Saucers?Jack said

“What about…”Monty said

Gulliver's Travels?Caleb said

“The Amazing Colossal Man”Claude said as a bit of a remark at Cupcakes ideas.

"The Chronicles of Narnia"Jamie said

“THE POTATO GROWING SHOW!”It was Monty's favorite program and wasn't scary and didn't give him nightmares…It was soothing to him like a nice lullaby to listen to when you're about to sleep and he also was a little interested in growing plants a few years back he did get for his birthday his own lawn and supplies and all those tips and tricks he learned helped it grow and become fertile full of life.Biology was his favorite subject in school and he loved it!

While the kids did find it funny and some snikered,they didn't find it funny anymore when they found out that today was Monty's turn to choose…

1/2 hour of boredom later.

While watching the show Jack was having no fun,he figured only mother nature would find this fun but he saw Monty enjoy it too which gave him second thoughts.He wanted something exciting not some long drawn out show about people growing spuds he wondered how anyone could.Suddenly a commercial break came.

Suddenly Jack took control and was looking through the channels.And hopped right through them as if he was bunnymund on a busy day!

“Oh I liked that one…”Pippa said

“Say how about this-”Monty said

“I've always been fond of-”Cupcake added.

“Nah,wait i saw this one before,about 3 seconds ago”Jack said

Meanwhile Jack had accidentally put way too many kernels of corn and left the microwave unnatended with the popcorn popping more and more it would soon show its disastrous results when a MIGHTY BANG OCCURED!!!!!

House Shuddered and the microwave relaease its contents out.

Everybody Jumped in shock and saw the corn poor into the room.............

"Wow that was so cool,this reminds me of snow"Jack said

"Oh Boy!"Jamie said

"Lets do that again" Jack said happily,this was just so enjoyable.

The Fun has only begun!

This was gonna be a long movie night…

JACK FROST IN:ATTACK OF THE MOVIE NIGHT!!!

(And also note this actually take place between Chapter 2 https://www.tumblr.com/rotm-channel/755724934649610240/rotmmeet-the-monsters-chapter-ii

and Chapter 3(Coming Soon!) )

This story takes place one month after the first prologue and two days before the third prologue.The kids are in their teens though unspecified this story takes place a few fears after the nightmare war or the events of the movie.

Im trying to make this like a little breather before the threat arrives kinda a last stop before the long road....

The kids are in their early teens or so.

Do you think the giant is real?While the Guardians are real even they are unsure and they know practically all but on the other hand just because you dont see it doesnt have to mean it doesnt exist!

[cheshireegray]

Dark obsession

• I do not in any shape or form own the vampire diaries or the originals. This is strictly for fun, don’t sue me for using the characters.

°＊☆

Dark Obsession

We all knew that the allure of darkness would happen to the most innocent people.

Loud Music rang through The Streets Of The Quarter as two stunning women walk into the Party that was being thrown. Knowing very well that the salvawhore brothers and their doppelganger pet were following them closely.

Blood covering them from head to toe, they may have had a little fun with Tyler and his wolf pack of mutts. The Heretic blonde adored the screams that erupted from Tyler as she made his inside bubble out of him, right before she ripped his head off his miserable shoulders.

Bonnie ripped off head after head of the mutts, listening to their other family members scream and yell for her to stop. Enjoying the blood as it splattered on their faces the warm feeling of the blood running down her melanin skin before she licked the dribble that made its way to the corner of her lip.

Taking Tyler's head and putting it in a duffle back before leaving all of the massacred wolves to rot in the woods. Caroline wanted to send a message to the she-wolf hayley, she could smell the whore all over Tyler for the last two weeks.

Turn out they had been sleeping with each other ever since she had come to visit the wolves. So she dealt with the situation the best that she could, which in this case meant ripping Tyler to shreds. Bonnie had joined the fun after she was turned to cut her line off.

Turns out that you can’t cut off the last living Bennett witch so she turned into a heretic. They both realized they have sacrificed everything just to save little innocent Elena. Becoming a heretic made them become closer than ever as they learned new things about themselves together.

Caroline dressed as a little red riding hood -Slayer of wolves- she looked hot, and her hair was cut into a butterfly cut with bleach and tone. Bonnie dressed as Cat woman -Halle berry’s version- the real diamond claws, the whip, and skin-tight leather.

Both girls became attached at the hip when they both accidentally massacred a whole entire bar out of pure hunger, at first they were ashamed but then they realized that to live their amazingly fabulous lives they need to kill people to survive.

Now as they get to the bar of the party they both drink from the bartender, The salvawhore brothers and their pet came up behind them. Damon cleared his throat to get their attention, but both girls just scoffed and kept drinking until the man's heart stopped beating.

Dropping the body on the ground not bothering to clean the blood from their mouths they both look at the three shocked faces. “Oh I'm sorry..did you want some?” caroline said coyly as she made her and bonnie shots.

Bonnie laughs at their faces as she takes back her shots with caroline, Damon being his normal idiot self speaks up “alright blondie and bonbon funs over, time to go” they both looked at him and scoffed before turning back to a woman that just walked over to the bar.

Bonnie flashes to her as she dilated her eyes “scream for bonnie” the girl nods as bonnie sinks her fangs into her neck draining her of her life. The random girl screams at the top of her lungs making everyone look in bonnie and carolines direction.

Caroline sees everyone looking at them so she stands on the bar taking off her hood “I want you all to witness perfection as my bestie drains the life from a pathetic little human girl” she claps as everyone else mimics her while bonnie drains the girl dry.

The girl stops screaming from the lack of blood in her veins, she takes the girl's life before dropping her on the ground. Bonnie climbs onto the bar with her black YSL heels as she stands beside caroline. “Now which one of you will be my bestie's meal?” saying with a smile as people cower in fear.

One voice sticks out to her the most as his dark silhouette come from the shadows “ill do it love!” caroline beams as she snaps her finger and the people move out of his way. Four men help bonnie and caroline off of the bar towards the sexy British man.

Klaus walks out of the crowd followed by all of the originals behind him, caroline walks up to him “Neck or wrist?” pointing to both arteries that were pumping with his delicious hybrid blood. Caroline could practically taste it already.

Klaus takes off his Grey Jakcet as he moves his shirt from his shoulder“have at it sweetheart” caroline claps before snatching his face down to hers, she kisses him on his raspberry-colored lips, moving down his lips to his jaw then to his neck.

He wraps his arms around her waist as she starts kissing his pulse, sinking her fangs into his neck ever so gently. Tasting his hybrid blood just like their time in the woods and her graduation night. Using her other hand to rub the other side of his neck.

Taking only about half of a pint before pulling away from his neck, licking the skin as it turns a bright red color. His grip on her waist tightens when her bite marks start to burn, as her venom rushes through his body making him growl.

Everyone watched in pure shock some people were turned on by some blonde girl getting to drink from the Original Hybrid Klaus Mikaelson. Caroline pulls away from him as she sees visible sweat leaking down his forehead.

Whispering a spell before biting her lip so it would bleed, she slams her lips into his as he sucks on her bottom lip. Gripping her tighter while drinking vigorously trying to get more of her amazing strawberry blood.

Caroline pulls away when she thinks he's had enough, looking at the side of his neck and seeing the bite healed she looks back at him “all better, big guy” pushing his arms away from her waist as she walks back over to bonnie who had just fed and healed kol.

Grabbing bonnie hand as they intertwined their fingers, looking at the crowd, the originals, and the scooby shack idiots. They smile at them before flashing out of the party leaving everyone shocked and horny.

-At the Mikaelson Home-

Damon, stefan, and Elena had gone with the mikaelson’s back to their home to discuss what went down at the party, to say the least, they were all amazed and shocked. Kol always knew that one day bonnie would come out of her shell and become who she was meant to be.

Klaus always knew that caroline had a dark side that she hid from people well before she was turned into a vampire. Back then she was just an innocent witch who was always putting her life on the line for her “friends” now she was a badass heretic who didn’t care about what people think.

“Well, it sounds to me like they stopped saving or caring about you lot” Rebekah pointed out, not caring about the glares she got from the three mystic freaks. Kol chuckled at his sister's comment, he couldn’t help but notice the look on Elena’s face. It looked like jealousy from his view.

Stefan was just trying to make sure that they didn’t get hurt, he and Elena had broken up months ago because she loved Damon. All he wanted was to have at least one friend that wouldn’t betray him, and those friends were Caroline and Bonnie. Everyone is pulled out of their thoughts when three people bust into the front door.

“Klaus!” Marcel flashed into the living room heaving trying to calm down, klaus looked annoyed at his past protégés sudden invitation. “What can I do for you Marcellus?” He groaned while taking a sip of the bourbon that he was nursing. “I just got word that 12-night walkers and the wolves in the bayou were slaughtered”

Now everyone was staring at the three new people in the room, who would slaughter a whole pack of werewolves and 12 vampires? But then Rebekah and kol burst into laughter making everyone stare at them. “Oh how much I love the new heretics!” Rebekah exclaimed in pure joy at how the girls were so ruthless now.

“What do you mean by that?” Davina was so confused as to why the two youngest originals were laughing at something so serious. “You’ll meet them soon, I just texted them to come here” Rebekah smiled looking at her phone ignoring the gasps from the mystic freaks.

Hayley had just come into the room with baby Hope in her arms “can you keep it down I’m trying to put Hope to sleep” she bounced Hope gently as she was fussing at Hayley. A giant gust of wind blew into the room as a blonde and brunette came into the room with blood on their arms and torsos.

Caroline saw Hope and wanted to grab her but her hands were covered in blood, Klaus noticed her not-so-clean hands and flashed her a wet paper towel. She blushed at him being all soft around her, she kissed his cheek before wiping her hands off.

Walking towards Hayley she reaches her arms out to the fussy toddler, Hope looks at her and leans over in her arms. She gently rocked Hope while humming a song softly, Hope started to doze off before fully falling asleep on Caroline’s shoulder. Everyone but hayley watched in awe as Caroline put the fussy baby in the bassinet that was in the corner of the room.

Before Putting her game face back on she whispered a spell so that Hope couldn’t hear anything that would happen in the living room. Turning back around she stalks towards Hayley with a deadly look in her eyes “Jackson said that he loved you” with a sinister smirk on her face as Hayley’s eyes grew wide.

“Oh and before I forget!” She flashed out of the house to her car before bringing in a bloody duffle bag plopping it at Hayley’s feet. “Next time think twice before you cross me!” She flipped her hair and walked over to Bonnie who had a smirk on her face. Hayley bent down and slowly unzipped the bag, gasping as tears ran down her cheeks.

Everyone was wondering what was in the duffle bag, kol decided to see for himself what it was that made her cry. He walked over to the bag and looked down at the head of Tyler Lockwood, he tried hard to not laugh but couldn’t hold it in much longer. Bursting into laughter while looking at Caroline.

“What did he do?” He gasped in between breaths from laughing so hard, Caroline smirked ignoring the sobbing coming from the she-wolf. “Little miss she-wolf and Tyler were sleeping together, so not only did we kill his pack but also Hayley’s,” Bonnie said nonchalantly as she walked over to the couch to sit down.

Klaus wanted to see the head for himself so he got up and opened the bag to see it was truly Tyler’s head in the bag. Elena was shocked and pissed at both Bonnie and Caroline “what's gotten into you two?” She shouted while standing up along with Damon, Caroline and Bonnie looked pissed off.

“Elena if you speak again and nobody addresses you…” caroline paused as she flashed in front of Elena, she leaned into her ear before whispering “ I will tear out your spine and make Damon wear it as a necklace!” it was so sinister that i sent chills down the blonde in the corner of the room's spine.

Caroline turned away to a kol who had his hand up to high fived. Caroline gave a fake smile and went to sit beside Bonnie who was getting tired of being there. Kol put his hand down before flashing beside bonnie, he pulled her close to him as she tried to get away but his hold was definite.

Bonnie giggled when tried to tickle her, she was ticklish near her side and kol was using that against her. Davina was staring at the smiling couple with envy, she had gotten closer to kol but every time she asked him on a date he rejected her. Always saying that he values his life and that his feisty witch would kill him.

Caroline had secretly sent a message to her favorite doppelganger about elijah and hayley being together. Letting a smirk fall upon her sweet evil face, hearing a certain set of stilettos on the concrete she gave bonnie a smirk before smiling wickedly. Davina is about to say something to bonnie about her and kol, but the doorbell rang.

Hayley got up to answer the door, just as planned she opens the door slowly. Katherine has her head down before smelling the she-wolf, hayley looks at her with a raised brow. Before she could say anything Katherine's hand was plunged into her chest.

Hayley gasped as she gripped Katherine's hand trying to get her to release her grip on her heart. Katherine smirks before pulling her closer towards her ear “Trick or Treat doggy!” she yanks Hayley's heart out of her chest.

Letting her body fall to the ground with a loud thud, walking over her body and into the house with Hayley's heart still in her hand. Coming into the living room looking at everyone, some had wide eyes, some with opened mouths, but two looks that made her smile.

“Kitty kat nice of you to join us!” bonnie was being cheeky towards her new favorite doppelganger as caroline smiled brightly at the heart still resting in her perfectly manicured hands. “Well you know I couldn’t resist a good Halloween prank!” she threw the heart towards the ground.

Walking towards the bar she grabbed herself a drink before sitting in the corner of the room silently observing. Camille went to sit beside klaus, basically sitting on his lap, trying to show the other blonde that he was hers.

Caroline and bonnie rolled their eyes, caroline knew if she wanted to have him all she had to say was that she was ready to stand by his side. Davina was watching kol as he was fittling with bonnies fingers while she wasn’t paying attention to him.

Getting irritated she walks over towards bonnie “who do you think you are?You can’t just come in here like you own him!” jealousy filled her vocals as she was staring at the pair sitting on the couch. Bonnie laughed as did kol, looking at her like she was crazy.

Bonnie stood up as kol was still holding her hand “I don’t have to own him, Davina! I just have to be better than you, which i already am!” smirking at her facial expression before sitting back down and spelling her mouth to stay shut.

Klaus was uncomfortable as camille was rubbing his head and shoulders, while she nearly grinded on him. He was looking at anyone for help, that is until his eyes landed on caroline who flashed towards camille. “If your trying to make him hard for you, your failing! Now move he’s clearly uncomfortable!”

Caroline pulled her up by her arms before pushing her away from a now relieved klaus, camille scoffed as she looked between caroline and bonnie. “You two are pathetic, using the mikaelsons men as pawns! Your both just greedy for attention, especially you Bonnie!”

Caroline was now clenching her fist as the lights started to flicker “ What mommy and daddy never loved you enough so you go after kol for attention?” bonnie had tears in her eyes as she looked at kol before scooting away from him.

Kol growled at camille before pulling her back towards him, she fought but in the end he won, sinking his head in the side of her neck inhaling her sweet maple glaze scent. Camiile scoffed again “look at you so needy!” she laughed at bonnie as she looked at the others to see if they would join in on the laugh.

Nobody else laughed because before they could blink camilles head was ripped off of her shoulders as he body hit the ground. Looking at her body then the person standing over her they watched as caroline was seething angrily through her teeth looking at the now dead blonde.

A series of gasps filled the room, elena was staring at caroline as her shoulders were moving up and down heavily while still holding the blondes head in her grip. Caroline finally dropped her head as klaus got up and came behind her “come on love, lets get you cleaned up”

Caroline looked at bonnie who gave her a nod saying that she was safe with kol, looking back at klaus who had both of her wrists in his hand she nods. They both walk out of the room and flash up towards his bedroom.

Klaus let her shower in his bathroom before giving her one of his shirts and some of rebekahs leggings, “welp looks like your gonna have to find a new blonde!” she joked while they walked down the stairs, he looked at her with a raised brow before stopping at the middle of the steps.

“ you know that ive only always wanted you sweetheart.” he moved some hair out of her face as she blushed “well i guess you can show me New Orleans now!” she smirked before heading down the stairs. Klaus chuckled before following her.

Looking at the living room a lot of people were missing, but klaus, kol, bonnie, caroline, rebekah, stefan, katherine, and elijah. “We should watch a scary movie” caroline said cheerly at rebekah who beamed and flashed off to get the movies.

Katherine sat beside elijah who didn’t scoot or move but wrapped his arms around her waist pulling her closer, stefan and rebekah sat together as she leaned her head on his shoulder, klaus and caroline leaned onto each other, and kol and bonnie snuggled up as they watched jason.

It was a Great Heretic Halloween Of Course.

[gamergirl-06]

Wedding in the apocalypse

Bruno x Gender Neutral Reader (I also have more stories of the slayers drafted as well) Also should I do a Bruno one where he proposes (almost like a prequel)?

Tags: @hyunjinbiased-blog

The air crackled with anticipation, a symphony of nervous laughter and excited chatter. It was a strange scene, a wedding amidst the chaos of a zombie apocalypse.

But then again, everything about Bruno was a little strange, a little..beautiful.

He looked dashing in his tailored suit, a stark contrast to the blood splattered walls of the makeshift chapel. The sun streamed trough the boarded up windows, casting a golden glow on the makeshift altar fashioned from and overturned table.

Your heart hammered in your chest, a mixture of terror and excitement.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. You were supposed to be saying ‘I do’ on a sun drenched beach, surrounded by family and friends.

But the world had gone to hell, and your ‘happily ever after’ had been rewritten in blood and gore.

Bruno had found you in the ruins of what used to be Los Angeles, a beacon of light in the darkness. He was a warrior, a slayer of monsters, but beneath that tough exterior, he was kind, gentle, and utterly devoted.

He held you through your worst nightmares, calmed your fears, and taught you how to fight for survival.

He’d Become your Safe haven in a world gone mad. And now, here you were, about to seal your fate, Your love a defiant act against the apocalypse.

The officiant, your friend Jacob, smiled kindly at you.

“Are you ready (Y/N)?”.

You took a deep breath and met Bruno’s gaze. His brown eyes sparkled with love and a touch of vulnerability.

“I’m ready,” you whispered, your voice trembling slightly.

The ceremony was short and sweet, a poignant testament to your resilience and love. You exchanged vows to stand by each other, to fight for each other, and to find a way to build a new life in the ashes of the old.

As you slipped the handmade ring onto his finger, a wave of emotions washed over you. Fear, excitement, joy, and above all, a deep-seated gratitude that in this world gone mad, you had found your soulmate.

The first kiss was a tangle of limbs and emotion, a fierce declaration of your love amidst the chaos. As you pulled back, Bruno’s smile radiated warmth and hope.

“We did it?” He said, his voice rough with emotion. “We made it.”

You returned his smile, tears welling in your eyes “We did ,”you agreed, pulling him close. “And we’ll face anything together, just like we always have.”

The party, if you couple call it that, was a boisterous affair. You celebrated with drinks salvaged from a looted bar ( I don’t see Bruno as a drinker but he is here), shared stories of survival, and laughed, truely laugh for the first time in what felt like forever.

The night ended with a bonfire, the flames dancing and flickering against the darkness. You sat side by side, your hands intertwined,watching the embers glow.

“I never thought I’d find love in the middle of the apocalypse,” Bruno confessed, his voice low and husky.

You squeezed his hand. “Me neither,” you admitted. “But I’m glad I did.”

As the embers died down and the moon climbed high in the sky, you looked at each other, eyes full of love and hope, two souls bound together by a love strong enough to survive even the end of the world

[nightmaretist]

TIMING: Recent, late march PARTIES: Emilio @mortemoppetere & Inge @nightmaretist LOCATION: Near/in a tree in Worm Row SUMMARY: Perro sniffs Inge and chases her into a tree. She's stuck there and so a conversation between Emilio and her follows. It soon spirals. CONTENT WARNINGS: Parental death, sibling death, child death (all mentions), physical torture (threats, mentions of past events), alcoholism (implied), animal abuse (implied vaguely)

Despite living in a much nicer neighborhood now, courtesy of Teddy, Emilio still tended to feel more comfortable in the seedier parts of town. He felt much more at home in Worm Row than he did in Teddy’s neighborhood, even now. He got less odd looks, less people who seemed intent on letting him know just how little he belonged. So, when walking Perro, he tended to gravitate back to Worm Row. He checked up on his apartment, made sure Jeff was alive, kept an eye out for any threats that might need taking care of. Perro seemed to enjoy it, at least; Emilio got the feeling that the dog felt more at home in Worm Row, too.

So it was a little bit of a surprise when the little bundle of fur puffed up as they walked down the street. Perro’s sudden defensiveness was accompanied by a familiar shiver down Emilio’s spine, and he grit his teeth. Something undead. Perro usually preferred nonhuman companions, so it probably wasn’t a vampire or a zombie. Could have been a nonsentient variety of undead, or…

The answer occurred to him about the same time he spotted it. The mare. The one from the factory, the one who’d known his mother, the one who’d tortured his brother for days, the one he was bound not to kill. Emilio grit his teeth, grip tightening on the leash. But Perro, for his part, wasn’t any more a fan of backing down than his owner was. He was scared; Emilio knew that. Mares had that effect on animals. And Perro didn’t cower when he was scared anymore. 

With surprising strength, the terrier dragged his owner towards the mare, barking and snapping his teeth and doing all he could to look vicious instead of small. 

—

She didn’t stretch her legs a whole lot these days. With the muscles the slayer had ruptured on the mend, most movements ached mercilessly, constantly reminding her of her failure, of those dark days in the factory. Inge despised it. She despised herself. She despised the hunters and Siobhan and felt herself grow rotted with hatred, embracing it with glowering eyes.

Today she was on the move. She’d driven up to the casino but was taking a walk from Dis’ underbelly domain towards one of the shadier pawn shops. She had some things to sell, an itch to buy something silly and obscure, an endless craving for a small materialistic win. But of course something as simple as that could not be done without a complication. Perhaps she should have waited until after sundown before braving the streets (ironic, as the darkness was so often considered dangerous in places like this), but alas. It was too late.

Her attention was pulled by the initial bark of a small dog. Not this, not again. Inge wondered what it was about her that made dogs in particular so angry at her existence — why couldn’t it be an animal with less sharp teeth and no instinct to kill? As her head whipped towards the sound and took in the depth of the situation an expression of anger and what she’d refuse to call fear washed over her. Cortez.

Of course that fucker had a stupid little dog.

Inge increased her pace, starting to run to the best of her ability as pain shot from her back and gut to her legs with every beat of her feet against the pavement. She wasn’t going to be able to outrun them. Not with her injuries. Not in general. 

But the sky wasn’t dark yet though it was early in the evening, so there was nowhere to go. Inside a store? God knew that this Cortez might back her into a corner there. She did what she’d done before: she laid her eyes on a place the dog couldn’t reach and climbed. Lucky her, that she was somehow in one of the few streets in Worm Row that had a fucking tree. Letting out a groan of pain, she pulled herself onto a branch, watching as the dog continued to pull on his leash.

“Control your beast!”

—

Perro pulled against the leash in a way he usually didn’t, desperately barking and growling. Emilio wondered if the dog was reminded of the mare that had broken into his apartment months ago, the one he’d stuck a knife in and sent on his way. Was what the dog felt now similar to what Emilio had felt when being fed on by that mare, or the one before it? That icy fear, that stutter step of his desperate heartbeat? Or was it something closer to what the detective felt in that factory, with his brother’s blood coating the floor and a different kind of terror clawing at his throat?

Either way, Emilio couldn’t fault Perro for his reaction, couldn’t deny him the release of venting his frustrations through his tiny, vicious squeals. His leg ached as he picked up the pace to follow, to let Perro take chase, but the pain was worth it. Inge seemed uncomfortable, he thought; she was running, was moving as quickly as she could, and he liked that the same way he’d liked seeing her pinned to the wall with a sword in her gut. It didn’t undo anything that had been done, didn’t sew Rhett’s leg back to his body or stop the long-dead corpses from swimming into view in the corner of Emilio’s eye, but there was something satisfying about seeing one of the people responsible suffer, even if she wasn’t suffering much. 

He watched her retreat, wondering absently where she’d go. Would she run into a store, breathlessly accepting the humiliation of being chased by a dog that didn’t even come up to her knees? Would she climb a fence in an alley, knowing that Emilio likely wouldn’t be able to follow? He noted the hunched way she ran, thought with some quiet vindication that she must still be feeling the effects of that blade he’d put through her gut. He wished he’d put it through her throat instead, but if he’d done that, he might not have gotten Rhett out of that factory at all.

(Would it have mattered much? Emilio and his brother would likely both be dead at the hand of the banshee’s scream if he’d killed the mare then, but what would it matter?) 

The mare scrambled up a tree, and Emilio let out a sharp laugh. Like an animal, he thought absently. He thought it felt right, then thought he should feel bad for thinking that. The guilt might come later, when he thought of Ariadne and Wynne and how they loved her, but it was absent now. Instead, there was only a dull satisfaction as the mare pulled herself onto a branch in a way that sounded painful. 

Emilio eyed her for a moment, leaning down without breaking eye contact. He put a hand on Perro’s head, scratched him behind the ear even as he continued to bark and growl and place his lone front paw against the base of the trunk. “Good dog,” he said slowly, deliberately. Reaching into his pocket, he retrieved a treat and dropped it into Perro’s mouth. “Bueno.” 

—

She’d been staying inside during the daytime hours ever since the factory. Inge wasn’t the reclusive type — she preferred to take the world by storm. Whenever she was alone, she tended to work on her art or broaden her mind, but those activities had felt short for her as her body proved still as frail as that of a mortal. She’d become something restless, something too paranoid and in too much pain to go out as often as she had before. During the night, she ventured out, as during the night she was free. Then, she could access the astral where her body wasn’t this corporeal, weak thing. Then, she could be whatever she wished to be in another person’s dreams.

She should have stayed inside today too, that much was clear. This was a small town. This was bound to happen, them meeting again. She’d hoped it would be somewhere at night or somewhere more public – a grocery store, in line with their products of the evening or, perhaps more in line with their past meetings, in a bar. 

Inge pulled her legs up, her features strained with pain as her body folded up on the branch. She wasn’t sure what it was, this effect she seemed to have on dogs in particular, but she was very much over it. Especially if those dogs had owners with personal vendettas against her. The stupid thing had put his paw against the tree, was still barking and growling despite the praise it received. She wanted to kick it, but knew better than to get down.

“Vete a la mierda,” she cursed, “Y tu perro.” The dog’s stupid ears pricked up at those words, as if it was used to expletives. Inge clutched the trees trunk, considered climbing up higher. If she had a heart that worked, it would be beating faster with adrenaline (not fear) now. She pushed herself a little higher, reaching up. It didn’t seem like the hunter had an axe with him, but she doubted he was unarmed. Her back hurt, her gut hurt — but she was damned if her body became marred once more by a Cortez’s blade.

—

He had a knife in his pocket. Actually, that wasn’t quite true. He had several knives in his pocket, bumping and clanging up against one another in a way that was comforting to him and unnoticeable to anyone else. He could reach for one now, could toss it at her in that tree. He knew how to spin the blade just right so that it would sink into her skin when it got to her, knew how to make sure it hurt. He could put one in the joint of her shoulder. It’d probably knock her down from the tree, send her sprawling onto the ground.

But then what? If he knocked her out of that tree and Perro went in for a bite, odds were she’d lash out. Kick him, hit him, throw him away from her. He was a small dog; it wouldn’t take much to hurt him. And if she did, Emilio knew what his instinct would be. He couldn’t kill the mare without breaking the promise, and he couldn’t break the promise without killing himself. And while he might not particularly want to live, he didn’t want to die like that, either. He didn’t want to give the mare or the banshee the goddamn satisfaction.

So, he settled for watching. Perro barked and growled and pretended to be a bigger thing than he was, and Emilio crossed his arms over his chest and tilted his chin up and did the same. Neither one of them could present a real threat here. Neither one of them could do shit for the respective pounding in their chests. But there was some comfort in baring your teeth, even when they’d never find anyone’s throat.

“Your pronunciación is bad,” he said flatly. “I thought you spent time in Mexico. Isn’t that where you met my mother?” He pretended the word didn’t burn on his tongue. Her Spanish was fine, really; better than most people who didn’t speak it as their first language, even if it wasn’t quite perfect. But Emilio needed something to say, and insulting her was the only route that made him feel decent, the only thing that kept his mind from dragging him back to that factory with the stench of blood clinging to his nostrils. “How’s the tree? Maybe you can try jumping over to the next one. Get yourself home like una ardilla. Maybe you won’t fall on your ass.”

—

She would like to think she had cornered the market in making people afraid. It was something she had made into an art, something she’d honed her skills in over the past years. She was the monster under the bed, the scary clown at the circus, the birds that pecked out eyes, the water in which loved ones drowned — she didn’t get scared. But Inge was, at the end of the day, nothing but a survivor. A raging thing, refusing to give into the notion that perhaps she should be dead. 

And Emilio Cortez – just as his mother and all those like him – put that in danger. Even if his dog was small. Even if he’d had the opportunity to kill her thrice now and hadn’t. Even if he was bound to Siobhan to never kill her. Still, she felt unsure of her unlife when across from him and though she refused to call it fear, it came close to it. Like a nasty cousin. Discomfort, anxiety, a thread of unease with what the slayer represented and what, in turn, she was made to be.

Ingeborg could not do anything from where she was in the tree. She could not reach into the astral and to get down was to be in an even less comfortable position than she was in now. The dog might bite and then there’d be glittery blood and people flocking to them and seeing something they shouldn’t. There was the hunter with God knew what weapons. She felt herself simmer with rage and that other feeling too, that unease. She’d felt it in that factory too — the lack of control, of things being turned against her. She no longer in control, the way she was in dreams.

“Yeah,” Inge said, remembering what Mona had said, “That’s where I fucked your mother.” It was said with conviction, lies were an easy enough comfort and she needed something to wield. She dug her fingers into the branch holding her up, nails pressing into the bark. “Nah, I’m going to stay right here, it’s right comfortable. What are you gonna do, just stare? Kind of perverse, you know, to just be staring at women stuck in unfortunate positions.” She readjusted, grimaced. “Your dog is horrid.”

—

Did this make him feel better? Genuinely, he wasn’t sure. It had been a long time since he’d felt the way he had in that factory, where she’d tortured the only family he had left for days on end and thought herself righteous for doing so. The desperation that had clawed at his chest then had been the sort he hadn’t felt in a long time, had taken him back years and miles until he was right back in that living room with the blood on the floor. Wasn’t that what it came back to every goddamn time? Emilio would never leave that fucking room. His corpse was still rotting on those floorboards with his daughter’s. He could pretend he was somewhere else for a while, could haunt Teddy’s house or Xó’s apartment, but people like Ingeborg would send him back to that room time and time again with little more than a word or a look or a leg on the concrete floor.

So what was the point of this, then? Trapping her in a tree for however long it took for the sun to sink low enough in the sky to allow her to access the astral and scamper away wouldn’t put his soul to rest. Her taunts didn’t serve as an exorcism that might free his restless spirit from that living room floor, and the barking dog wasn’t a priest who might speak the last rites over his cooling corpse. A ghost was still a ghost, even when it fought back. Even when its heart still beat.

He didn’t feel much more alive standing at the base of this tree than he had in that factory, where he’d begged to die for his brother’s sins. He didn’t feel in control here, didn’t feel powerful. He hadn’t felt powerful in a long time, since the day the world ended two years prior with a too-small corpse on a bloody floor. Was this what it meant to rage against the dying of the light, then? It was so much quieter than he thought it would be. 

“You must have been very bad in bed,” he said dryly, “if she wanted to cut your head off after. Not sure I’d brag about this.” The idea of his mother sleeping with anyone undead was somewhat laughable. Elena Cortez had always been strong in her convictions; that was why she’d felt killing her son was the best option available to her the moment he stepped out of line, after all. Emilio felt far more discomfort at that thought than he did at any of Inge’s taunting. “I could run to the general store across the street and pick up some salt, if you’re tired of me staring. Nice circle around the base of the tree. Since you’re so comfortable, I’m sure you wouldn’t mind staying the night there.” Did he mean it? He wasn’t entirely sure. It wasn’t as if he could do much against her. At best, he could serve as an irritation. But… Emilio was good at being irritating.

Glancing to Perro, he hummed fondly. “Es un buen perro,” he corrected. Perro looked back to him, tail wagging in spite of his fear at the mention of his name. Emilio offered him an encouraging nod in return, and the little dog went back to barking and growling at the base of the tree.

—

Was she becoming a sentimental woman now, who didn’t know what was good for her? She should have left this town behind that time Rhett had put her in the basement, should have given into the instincts that had done her good all her undead life so far. But in stead she had stayed, giving into the human urge to be around people that made her feel good. In stead she had attempted to exact revenge against that same very hunter and failed miserably. And after that too, she had stayed. She had stayed after what had happened with the ghost tours. 

And now here she was, stuck in a tree, looking down at the offspring of a hunter whom she had run from. Had she been wiser, then? What was it that had muddled her mind that she was in a position like this? Inge did not think herself so weak, that she’d risk herself like this for others. For sentimentality, for affection. 

She called it pride, then. Pride was what had kept her in town. A refusal to be run from a place she enjoyed living in. It was her right to be here. It was strong of her to remain, wasn’t it? Not weakness, but strength. Certainly, her affections for Dīs and others played a role in that refusal to leave, but it was a sign of character. That was how it was. (But how strong could that character be, if she ended up stuck in a tree? If she was glaring down at a dog that was barely as big as her torso, tense at the sight of a Cortez cornering her.)

She checked the time. Sundown couldn’t come fast enough, but it wasn’t there yet. Damned spring. If it was winter, it’d be dark already and there would be no problem. No inner turmoil, no unraveling, no need to keep listening to that grating voice and the even more grating barking.

“I was excellent. I’d tell you to ask her, but …” She lifted one hand, gesturing vaguely. “I guess she’s dead.” She hoped the words could be like a knife between the ribs, but she doubted it. Her lie was paper thin. She was cornered — and if Cortez was serious about what he’d said next, she might even become stuck. “And leave your dog with me? I doubt you’d be so stupid.” Inge had no intention to hurt the dog, but she didn’t mind making it seem like she was that brand of cruel. “You’ve seen my handiwork, haven’t you? How’s Rhett doing, anyway? Sleeping well?” 

She was a fool, staying in the same town as the both of them. But perhaps so was Emilio, or at least, perhaps she could make it seem that way. “Es un perro muy apestoso.” She could barely smell the thing. “Igual que tú.”

—

Exhaustion clung to every inch of him, though not the kind that could be resolved with a nap or a cup of coffee. Sure, his body was tired — he couldn’t remember the last time he’d even attempted to sleep through the night — but that wasn’t what made his bones ache. There was a different kind of exhaustion, one far harder to combat, and it had been hanging over Emilio’s head like a cloud for years now. He tried to find ways to ease it. He killed people who were a part of the group that brought on that apocalypse in Mexico that only he had noticed, and he did it slowly. He made them hurt for hours or days and he pretended it could be compared to the way he’d been hurting for years now. And it used to come with a jolt of energy, like the kick of caffeine in the early mornings, but it was so muted now. Everything was. 

He could make the mare miserable, if he tried. He could take a page out of Rhett’s book, could trap her someplace with bright lights and no access to food and see what happened. The thought of it made his stomach churn, made him think of Wynne’s face outside that van or the way Ariadne had been so sure that he was there to finish the damn job. Had Rhett felt good about it after, he wondered? Had he felt anything at all? Was it Emilio who was broken, Emilio who was wrong? His mother had thought so. Rhett had, too, sometimes. And maybe they were right, but they were no longer here to say it. Did that count for something?

“Yeah,” he replied to Inge’s statement, though he felt a sensation as if he was watching the conversation from the outside. His mother was dead. It ached the same way it always had, and he wondered if that was normal. Should he feel differently about her now? Should he grieve less with the knowledge that, had she survived, it would be Emilio rotting in the ground somewhere now? How did you mourn someone who you’d loved when they hadn’t loved you back? How did you wrap your head around a grief that was only ever going to be one-sided? “You’re dead, too,” he said flatly, because it was easier to antagonize than it was to unpack the questions that haunted him now. “So I guess you don’t get any bragging rights.” 

She made a good point, though Emilio wouldn’t admit it. To walk to the store would mean either bringing Perro along and allowing the mare a chance to escape or to leave him alone with her, and neither option got him what he wanted. The very idea of leaving his dog with the woman who’d spent days torturing his brother, who had removed his leg from his body and found it a funny game to play, made his breath catch in his throat. She wouldn’t hesitate to hurt the dog, would she? She wouldn’t think anything of it at all. And Emilio couldn’t stand the thought of failing something else that relied on him, couldn’t live with it. 

So he shrugged, shifting to sit down on the sidewalk with his bad leg stretched in front of him. “Guess we wait, then.” When the sun went down, she’d be gone. He couldn’t do much to stop that. But he could inconvenience her until then, could piss her off and ruin her day and pretend it made any kind of a difference. 

The mention of Rhett brought the acidic taste of acid to his tongue, though he showed no external sign of this discomfort. He’d made sure Rhett was safe from her, had begged a promise out of Siobhan in a way that had made no difference in the end. Perhaps he should have found some way to include more in that, should have tested his luck to see if he could protect everyone he cared about from the pair of monsters with blades and nightmares to spare. If Inge wanted any sort of vengeance now, he hoped she’d just take it out on him. At least he’d earned it. “Maybe I’ll pick up where he left off before, hm? Bright lights, salt. How many swords do you think I could put through you before you passed out? Got plenty more of them. Could pin you to the wall like a poster again, see how long it takes for you to get free just so I can do it again.” 

He couldn’t kill her. He had to remind himself of it, had to force himself to remember the promise he’d made. But Siobhan never said he couldn’t make her wish she was dead. That was enough to keep him going, at least.

She insulted the dog, insulted him, and Emilio huffed and rolled his eyes. Maybe if he were more present, he would have taken more offense to it all, but it felt like a scene from a movie. He was watching it happen from that living room floor he’d never get away from, seeing it all play out against the backdrop of a bloodstained wall. “Maybe you’re smelling yourself. You’re the rotting corpse here.”

—

For a moment she wondered, why the slayer wasn’t dead. The rumors had spread about the eradication of that clan of slayers (clan, because referring to them with vampiric terms was a mental powerplay) and yet here he stood. Alive and kicking, with an annoying dog and a reluctance to kill her that he’d had to pay for. Inge wondered how it could be, that he still lived, how his mother had died, how many people he’d lost. She felt no pity, just a numb kind of interest to press her thumb on the sore spot until it bruised even darker.

She hoped whoever killed his mother had made her suffer. Her fingers trailed over the jagged skin of her neck. Would she be proud of her son, for having marred her gut as he had? For having pinned her to a wall and leaving her there? Or would she just be disappointed that he hadn’t stuck the sword in her neck and cleaved until her head had rolled off and she’d become dust? It was an ugly train of thought, one that served to justify Inge and not do much else. To think of such things was to forget her own transgressions, to paint the others as villains and vindicate her. Not that she felt particularly victorious, up in this tree.

As Cortez pointed out that she was dead she let out a sound of frustration, though it could also be one of boredom. She didn’t think of herself as dead. If she was dead, her body wouldn’t hurt as it did. If she was dead, she would not be feeling that anxiety crawl through her body, wouldn’t have known euphoria and love and rage. She’d seen death, the permanent and definitive state of it. She was between. No, better: she was above. Above mortality, above finality. “That’s just your wrong opinion,” she quipped back, pressing a hand in her side. There was no blood underneath that skin, perhaps not even functioning organs — but she was here. She was vulnerable – and didn’t that in and of itself make her alive? “Did she suffer? Did they hack her head off? Stab her with a stake in the heart?” 

She wouldn’t penetrate his nightmares, she wouldn’t meet him on the ground, but she’d do this. Turn words into daggers and hope some of them would land. If he’d trap her here, she’d make it a miserable time, that was what she vowed to herself as she watched him sit down. 

But it seemed it was a two way street of miserability and as the slayer talked of ways to make her life worse Inge found her muscles growing tight with that thing she refused to call fear. Even now. She was lucky, wasn’t she? That he didn’t have the salt to trap her. That he didn’t have that van his brother had used to lock Ariadne away. That his dog was part of the equation, a weakness that she could hypothetically exploit. That he had no family to call to come assist him in trapping a mare and doing to her what had been done to his brother.

Even with all those things in her favor, she felt unsafe. The threat hung in the air, unanswered, and she had no reply for a moment. She remembered the bright lights, Rhett’s gruff voice, his hand in her neck as she was immobilized. She remembered Italy and starving. She remembered being stuck on the wall. She remembered Hendrik.

Perhaps that stirred her most, the way her mind went to her ex-husband. Not Sanne and her head chopped off, but that marital rage that had loomed over her days as a woman bound to the home. Inge stared darkly at the slayer, gritting her teeth. There was a quick remark hiding behind those, she knew it — something clever and unaffected, something that told Cortez she still had the upper hand, even if he held the proverbial knives. Literal too, probably. “Empty threats,” she said, “You could have killed me months ago. Look at you.” She felt her hand dig for her own switchblade. “Sitting there. Waiting me out. You pose no threat if all you do is speak.” Why did it sound like she was egging him on? She grit her teeth again, hating the words that came out. They hardly rationalized the situation.

She carved a star in the tree’s bark. She didn’t care about the insult, saw no use in attempting to dissuade the others opinion on undead. His mind had been made before he was born. She stared at her watch and wondered what time the sun would go down and if he’d stay where he was until it did. She still refused to call what she felt fear.

—

She let out a sound he couldn’t pinpoint, a noise he didn’t have the social aptitude to unpack. Had he hit a sore spot, reminding her of her own demise? The undead didn’t sleep, he knew that. But if they did, would she have been plagued with nightmares like the ones that had led to her death? Did she still think of it, the way she’d suffered and died? Victor had confided in him once that he felt pity for the things they killed. They were people once, weren’t they? He’d asked in a conspiratorial whisper, terrified by the prospect of being overheard. They were people, and they died. It’s not their fault they came back. It must be scary. I think we’re doing them a favor, Milio. I think that’s why we do it. 

There were certainly other slayers who thought that way, though Emilio knew Elena would have disapproved. To their mother, the undead were little more than threats to be eradicated. Protection of humanity, she said, was the duty their name carried. They had no obligation towards the dead, no responsibility to free souls that were already lost. 

(Emilio wondered, sometimes, if that was why his mother had been able to move on so easily from Victor’s demise. If they had no obligation towards the dead, was she freed of her motherly duties the moment Victor’s heart stopped? Why, then, did Emilio cling so tightly to his?)

Of course, any pity he might have felt towards the mare in the tree had died in that factory. She was a person once, but she wasn’t one now. And if he was being honest, it had little to do with her unbeating heart or the way she’d barely bled when he’d stuck a sword through her gut. He liked Metzli, thought of them as a person even when they struggled to apply the word to themself. He thought of Zane as a good man, even though he was a dead one. Ariadne loved Wynne the way only a person could. 

No, if Inge had forfeited her humanity, it hadn’t happened with her death. It had happened, at least in Emilio’s mind, on that factory floor. It had happened with his brother, who had perhaps forfeited his own humanity with the locked door of a van, left in a heap with pieces removed. Wasn’t it a person’s actions, after all, that made them something else? A monster wasn’t a monster because it had sharp teeth. A monster was only a monster when it used them.

Inge was a cornered animal now, too far away to bite but not prevented from bearing those teeth in his direction. She asked about his mother, and Emilio remembered the brightness of her blood, how strange it had seemed. When he’d wandered the streets during that massacre, every color had been dulled except the red. 

He didn’t answer the question, though he suspected Inge would have reveled in knowing the truth. Had she been there, would she have celebrated? Emilio thought of his mother’s corpse, the way it was in pieces by the time he found it, spread across the street like celebratory confetti. He thought of Rhett in that factory, his leg in one place and the rest of him somewhere else. Had he come in later, would he have found his brother in the same state he’d found his mother in in the midst of that massacre? Would the red have been just as bright, just as terrible?

“I don’t have to kill you,” he said, and he pretended that he couldn’t didn’t burn. Should he have killed her the first time he met her, in that bar? Should he have followed her out and sawed through the scar his mother left on her throat, finished the job Elena had started? If he had, would Rhett be whole now instead of broken? Or would that cycle of vengeance have found Emilio rather than his brother? He imagined a world where it was him on that factory floor, where pieces were removed from him one by one. Would anyone have come for him the way he’d come for Rhett? Who would have stood where he stood if he were in his brother’s place, who would have offered their life for his? No one who deserved such a fate the way he had, he knew. No one who should have. 

Even so, he couldn’t help but think that that world might have been a better one. Given the choice, Emilio would always prefer to be the one in pain rather than the one left to stand by and watch. He’d have given his own leg to sew Rhett’s back onto his body, would have given his life to get his brother from that factory with his heart still beating. But things like that weren’t options awarded to him. Emilio had never been able to save anyone he loved. All he could ever do was avenge them after he failed.

And what an empty vengeance it was, standing at the foot of this tree. How meaningless it felt. “I’d rather do to you what you did to him,” he said darkly. “Cut you apart piece by piece. Legs, arms, ears. Maybe I carve into your chest, see what state your heart is in. I don’t think you use it much, anyway. Shouldn’t matter if I take it out. You curious what it looks like? If it started rotting when you died?”

It was probably an empty threat. He could hardly pretend he was able to climb the tree and grab her, after all, not when his leg ached just sitting here. He could try to knock her down, but not without risking Perro getting caught in the crossfire. He could track her down later, find out where she lived and turn her living room into a nightmare the same way his had been in Mexico, make it so she never left her bloodstained carpet even when she was a whole damn country away from it. But he was so fucking tired. Just talking to her made him feel heavy, made his stomach churn. If he tortured her until she begged him to stop, would it make him feel better? Would anything?

So maybe the threat was empty, but so was he. That was just the way things went.

—

What she had one to Rhett – or had attempted to do – she had never done before. It wasn’t like Inge didn’t bite back, it was just that she didn’t tend to do it after the fact. Not like this, not under the guise of revenge. There had been a hunter she’d killed once with the bang of a gun and a body dropping to the floor, but that been in a moment of self-defense, in the heat of the moment. 

To track down a man, to take him down and then bring him someplace else to elongate his suffering before snuffing out the life within — that had been new. But there was plenty else that was new, wasn’t there? There was this cursed town that had dug its claws into her, keeping her from turning around and running. There was something within her that cared about a young, naive mare, a part in her that had been filled with a rage at the notion that she should have to leave once more because of one warden. There was Dis. 

There had been Siobhan, willing to help a hand because of her sadistic nature (one she never should have trusted, that much was clear now) and there was that rare touch or bravery. There was not much left of it now.

And maybe it had been a little too late. She had never struck back at any of the people who had slighted her before, had she? Not in a way like this, not this violently and bloody and coldly. Sure, she had left Hendrik and disappeared on him, but never had she hurt him the way he’d hurt her. Never had she been brave enough to do such a thing. And then there was Sanne, who had given her so much – this new life, these powers, this endless source of creativity – but who had taken so much at the same time. What had Inge done, besides watch as she was murdered? Was that the retribution she had claimed for herself? Watching the woman who had killed her die at the hands of others? She had thought about it, at times. She had thought of ways to scare a woman who fed off fear and had not succeeded, had never let herself get her pay back until that day. Sanne had screamed for her and she’d abandoned her maker so she could live.

There were things stolen from hunters, messes created in their houses or other significant places. Little jabs or payback for her having to run. But there had never been something like this. She had placed herself above proper revenge, valuing her own life more than exchanging eyes for eyes and she had thought herself wise. She had wanted to kill Rhett. She had thought herself more entitled than hunters did when it came to killing her kin. She had thought it just. Her time. She had thought it would have felt good.

And she still thought now that it would have felt good if she had succeeded. If all that carnage had ended with a dead body and a chapter closed. But in stead everything had gone to shit. In stead Elena Cortez’ son had come in and had done something, somehow to convince the banshee to take the hunter with him. 

So the point — it was lost on her. Even if now she still imagined slamming a knife in Rhett’s throat. Even now, she thought of that factory with its stained floor and thought of an alternate reality where Siobhan had undone both the men’s lives in one fell swoop, as she was certain the other was capable of. But these would remain fantasies, as her thoughts of revenge had often done. 

In Emilio Cortez’ head, there were also fantasies. He spoke of them now, weaving an image of a long process of pain, searching how far he damage her body without killing her. Inge was all tight muscles in the tree, staring down at him and wondering when he’d get up, when he’d blind her with some kind of light or pin her to the wood she was clinging to. When he’d start. If he ever would, or if he would just let the threat exist between them, like the promise he’d made Siobhan. I may not be able to kill you but I can make you wish I could.

Fine, she admitted it to herself. She was afraid. She had been afraid in the factory. She had been stirred by the sight of the blood and the toes and the leg. She had looked at herself in the mirror in the days after, wondering what kind of woman she even was any more. Someone who created horrors in dreams but winced when presented with them in front of her? She turned her fear into art, paintings of red and gore that jumped off the canvas. She was afraid now, like she had been afraid in the bunker, like she had been afraid sleeping as a human.

She climbed a branch higher, her face scrunched up with pain. She stared at him and knew that one day, a scene like this would plague one of her sleepers. But that was to be then, and this was now.

“I didn’t do it,” she bit. “I gave him dreams. If you want to return the favor of that stolen limb, you’ll have to find the fae who bound you. She took him, nail by nail, toe by toe, then the foot and then the leg. She.” Inge knew there was no use in it. She’d watched. She’d taken away Rhett’s ability to flee into slumber, turning all the furniture in his already rattled brain upside down, endlessly taking and given the way someone once had with her. “You could never recreate the things I made him dream, though I suppose I could give you a taste. Your mother wasn’t immune to my touch, so I reckon you won’t be either. Do you dream, Cortez? Do you want to see my dreams?” 

The goading was pointless, as it all was. Rhett was still not dead and it was not yet time to beg, to make the fear wash over her face and make it apparent. The slayer remained on the ground, after all, even if his threats now sat in the tree with her.

—

When he thought of Rhett in that factory in the days before Emilio arrived too late to save most of him, he’d never spent much time wondering who had done what. He’d never bothered trying to imagine whether the blade fit better in Siobhan’s hand or in Inge’s, never stopped to think about who’d tied him up or who’d gripped his hair or who’d sawed away at the bones in his leg. What did it matter, in the end? What difference did it make? His brother had started one way and ended another, and two people had forced him on the journey that made it so. Did Inge think herself blameless for not dirtying her hands with the blade? Did she think there was no blood staining her fingers because of it? 

He thought of Lucio, on the day of the massacre. He thought of the apology in his eyes, the way he’d choked on it as it rose from his throat. It wasn’t his uncle’s teeth that tore through Juliana’s throat. It wasn’t Lucio’s hands that snapped Flora’s neck. It wasn’t Lucio who left those corpses to rot in the floor of a house where they should have been safe. It wasn’t even Lucio who’d killed Elena, though her death had been the goal that started the whole ordeal. But when he’d apologized, when he’d pleaded with Emilio to forgive him, what had it mattered where his hands had been? His daughter’s blood was on Lucio’s hands just as much as it was on the vampire’s who’d killed her. Rhett’s blood was on Inge’s hands just as much as it was on Siobhan’s.

And both, he thought, stained his own hands, too. Rhett’s blood was still caked beneath his fingernails, Flora’s was still seeping into his skin. Juliana, Rosa, Edgar, his mother, even Victor… Emilio carried at least some responsibility for what had happened to all of them. He loved the people he loved, and every last one of them bled for it. He could point a finger at Inge and it was deserved, but there was always a second pointing inwards as well. Siobhan held the knife, but Inge was still to blame. And so was Emilio. So, always, was Emilio.

“You think this means anything to me?” It was the same thing he’d said to his uncle once, when Lucio’s apologies formed a noose meant to strangle them both. This quiet street in Maine, lined with shops and trees, flickered into that chaotic scene in Mexico now, with bodies on the concrete and blood in the air. Emilio’s nostrils flared and he swore he could smell it, swore he was choking on it. Inge was Lucio was Emilio was everyone who’d ever sported the blood of someone he loved on their hands like a pair of bright red gloves that went up to the elbow. “You think it matters? You were there. You made it happen. I’ll do what I like to you, to her. I’ll make sure you feel it.”

He wished it were truer than it was. He wished there was some way to take this feeling in his gut and remove it, to pluck it from its home within his ribcage and shove it down her throat instead. If she felt what he felt, if she knew a fraction of it, would it change the look on her face? Would it change anything at all? 

He let out a sour laugh at her threat. Did she think nightmares scared him now, when he’d walked in on a waking one in that factory? Did she think there was anything she could show him while he slept that would ever compare to a factory floor coated with his brother’s blood, to a living room slaughterhouse where his daughter’s corpse had already begun to stiffen? What could she show him in his dreams that was worse than what reality had given him? She’d made a mistake, he thought, in that factory. She’d played her cards too early. She should have known better.

“Do it, then,” he goaded, calling her on the bluff. “Come into my bedroom, climb inside my head. Try to make yourself into something worth being afraid of. I sleep with a knife under my pillow. All you’ll be doing is saving me the trouble of tracking you down later, making it easier for me to do to you what was done to him. You watched, didn’t you? You sat there, you enjoyed the show. You can do the same this time, too. I’ll set up mirrors so you can watch me cut into you, yeah? Let you see while I pull your guts out. One at a time, I think. Lungs, liver, kidneys. You think they grow back? Probably not, huh?” 

Despite the content of the threats, his voice remained flat. He got no joy out of it, no reprieve. Would following through make any difference? He thought of all the vampires he’d killed, the ones he’d tracked all the way from Mexico. He’d done it slow, more often than not. He’d killed them in pieces, done far worse than what Inge had watched Siobhan do to his brother. Had any of it ever filled that bottomless chasm in the pit of his stomach? Had any of it ever made him feel like a person again? Had any of it served to peel him off the living room floor, to wash the blood from his hands? He doubted taking Inge apart piece by piece would make him feel any different than he felt now. Saying it certainly had little effect, but what more was there for him? What else did he have? This was all he was now. This was all he’d ever be. He knew that. 

The sun was sinking now, and he knew it was a matter of time before it was low enough for her to hop away into the astral where he couldn’t follow. He couldn’t tell if the thought was a disappointment or a relief. He wanted this to be over, but he didn’t know how he wanted it to end. At the foot of the tree, Perro barked and growled. Emilio watched him, wondered if the display made him feel any better or if he, too, was just putting on a show.

—

She had known guilt before. When she was younger and she was human or when she’d been newly transformed. She’d be bogged down by shame and remorse about things, because that was how she was taught. On Sundays the pastor would go on and on about the inherent sin of all the people in his congregation. Shame and guilt were taught and Inge had been an excellent student. Hendrik, of course, had always known how to make these feelings grow tenfold. And then she had died and come back as a creature of consumption. If humans were born in sin, then mares were most certainly sinful creatures in nature — and with every meal she’d take, she’d feel her guilt grow.

But four decades had passed since then. She had divorced the man who’d humiliated and shamed her. She had grown distant from the church, even if she had not severed herself. She had learned to enjoy feeding, to find a purpose and a passion in it. She had lost Sanne. She had lost Vera.

She understood that guilt was a wasted emotion, like a bitter aftertaste. It was best not felt but when it was, let it be for the situations that actually demanded it. Like those losses — the gruesome axe to Sanne’s neck and the slow death of her daughter. Those were situations where guilt was warranted and perhaps served some kind of cruel purpose. Those were situations where she couldn’t not feel the guilt, even if she could try to suppress it or maneuvre around it.

When it came to Rhett and that factory? The only regret she had was that she hadn’t slit his throat sooner. She didn’t feel any guilt for the severed leg, even if she had been put off by it initially. She didn’t feel any guilt for the repeated nightmares, the constant intrusion and mental anguish she’d delivered so effortlessly. She didn’t feel any guilt towards Emilio, who had found his brother chopped up and disoriented. She didn’t feel any guilt for the vitriol spilling from her lips.

And maybe there was a part of her that struggled with what Siobhan had done. How she hadn’t discussed it, this mutilation, how Inge had come back to the earthly plane and had seen blood gushing. How strange it was to see such suffering in reality, rather than in her handcrafted nightmares. She grappled with it, sure. She had been afraid of the sight, shocked and disturbed in a way she wasn’t often — but she didn’t feel guilty. It would be a wasted emotion, especially on a man still alive.

A man who’d intended to slowly starve one of her ilk, who would have kept her in that bunker until she’d started convulsing or something of the sort. Guilt was wasted on people like. And Emilio, who went into detail of how he’d dissect her? He didn’t deserve her guilt either. Her guilt wouldn’t undo what had been done, would not make the slayer below her forgive her and would only serve to make her feel worse. 

Inge stared down at him. He was right. It didn’t matter, what she had or hadn’t done, “I watched. I let it happen. And whenever he reached unconsciousness I made sure he would have no peace, either. I watched him as he watched me, as he watched all the others he must have harmed and killed in his lifetime.” She clung to one of the branches. “You’re not doing anything now, Cortez, besides saying a whole lot of nothing.” As was she. But she was only a predator when the sun was down.

She didn’t doubt it, though, the reality that one day Emilio Cortez would come for her and make her suffer like Rhett had. An endless tango of vengeance, suffering for suffering, eyes for eyes and legs for legs. There was another regret she had, actually: she regretted having debased herself to a creature of revenge. For having squandered her position in this town with nothing to actually show for it but a bad taste in her mouth. 

She should have just brought down the knife in Rhett’s chest the first night she met him, that time she’d fed on him in his van. She should have put him to sleep and murdered him before she could even know more intimately what things he was capable of. She should have vanished and left no trace. What eye was Emilio going to take then? Would he know to hunt and threaten her, if she’d been more subtle and more decisive, if she had just delivered a defensive but fatal blow and had disappeared?

Perhaps. If she felt guilt, she felt it for herself. 

“You assume I’d be so foolish to give you the luxury of waking up aware enough to come for me,” she bit back in return, “I do appreciate the inspiration you’re giving me. Maybe I’ll have you dream of that factory and have you watch as Siobhan and I continue our work on your brother. I can immobilize you in your sleep, you know? Make you more powerless than you are now. Make you a spectator.” Inge spoke and spoke, clinging to her bravado as if it was the one thing keeping her upright. She shivered at the thought of his threats — knew that whatever damage he’d do would be more permanent than her nightmares. “I’d make you hold the bone saw. Make you lick the blood of your fingers. How about that?”

—

There had been a period once, when he was young and stupid and so much softer than he should have been, where Emilio was uncertain about the things his mother expected of him. Killing spawn and wights wa sa simple thing, a thing that made sense; they were monsters who looked like monsters, and there was a mindlessness to the way they attacked that was undeniable. But the first time he’d seen a higher vampire, he’d hesitated. It hadn’t looked like a monster, hadn’t looked scary. It looked like his mother, like his uncle, like his siblings and his cousins. It looked like someone instead of something, and it threw him off.

It had been a moment of doubt that he was ashamed of later, and it hadn’t gone unnoticed. Not by his mother, and not by the vampire, either. It was one she’d captured for training purposes, locked in the shed to show him, and it had begged. It had called him mijo, had pleaded for its life, and Emilio’s hand shook in a way it never had before. Nothing he was expected to kill had ever spoken to him before that moment.

His mother had been unable to let it slide, of course. Killing spawn and wights and mindless things was a part of a slayer’s job, but it wasn’t all of it. You had to kill the others, too. The ones that talked, spinning lies to better catch their prey off guard. The ones that would drain someone dry and go home to sleep in a soft bed after, the ones who were dangerous in ways that had nothing to do with their fangs or dietary habits. Emilio needed to learn that lesson, and his mother had been more than willing to teach it to him. Monsters didn’t always look like monsters; it was a hard thing for little boys to understand.

So, she’d taught him. She’d locked him in that shed with that vampire, still chained. And it had begged for the first day and pleaded for the second but on the third, when it was starving, it had snapped like a wild dog. It had thrashed against the chains, it had strained against them in hopes of reaching his neck. By the time those chains snapped, by the time the weight landed on his chest and the teeth found the arm he’d thrown up to protect his throat, he understood what his mother wanted him to learn. The stake went in, and the hand holding it didn’t tremble. A day later, when the bleeding stopped and the door opened, she held her hands behind her back and looked down at him with an unreadable expression on her face. Things like this can pretend to feel, she’d told him, but they can’t really experience it. They’re good liars. You need to remember that. 

He wasn’t sure how right she’d been. It seemed blasphemous to say, but Emilio had seen more evidence of the undead feeling than his mother had ever meant for him to. He’d seen it in Metzli, in Zane, in Ariadne. He saw their grief, their guilt, their love.

He saw nothing of it in Inge.

When his mother spoke of monsters, he thought, this was what she had been referring to. This thing that would lock his brother in a factory, would torture him in his own mind while her companion tortured him in the physical realm. There was something particularly sinister about that, about taking away even the limited escape that existed in the unconscious mind. Siobhan was a monster, but Inge was one, too. Worse still, she was a monster like the one in that shed; the kind that pretended to be something else at first.

Was she proud of it? Did she tell the story with a smile, brag about the damage she’d done? Even in hunters, Emilio often found such behavior distasteful. It was why he didn’t spend much time at the hunter bars, why he preferred drinking among humans. He didn’t care for war stories. His nostrils flared as she recounted hers, shameless in the way she spoke of what she’d done. “If you weren’t a coward in a tree, I’d show you what I can do.” But she didn’t care to be called a coward; he knew that. It didn’t bother her the way it would have bothered others. Monsters didn’t mind being insulted; they cared about what they could sink their teeth into when the talking was finished.

Was he worried, then, that she would sink her teeth into him? That she’d make good on her threats and find him in his dreams, make him relive that day in the factory from a different position? He felt a little sick at the thought, though he was careful not to let it show on his face. He’d had nightmares before, without help. He’d continue having them just the same, whether she invaded his sleep or not. “What would you do, then?” He sneered, baring his teeth like an animal. “Keep me asleep and in dreams until my body gives out? Not unless you want me to wake up like you. No hiding in the astral then.” The thought made his stomach churn, but he knew enough to know that Inge would hate it more. “You’d have to let me wake up sooner or later. And when I did, then what? I’m very good at finding people. I found you in that factory. I’d find you again. You can be in control while I sleep, when it doesn’t matter. But here, I think I have you beat.”

It was a bluff, though it was a good one. Any loss of control made Emilio feel a little too much like that kid in that shed, with a locked door sitting between himself and the night sky and so little room to move. But he was good at hiding his anxiety, good at swallowing it. It was one of the first lessons that shed had taught him. 

The sun sank lower, and it was almost a relief, though he never would have admitted it aloud. He wanted this to be over, one way or another; if Inge departed, he could tell himself he’d won, could pretend he’d come out on top. He could go home and drink until he couldn’t see straight, could put a salt circle around the couch he planned to pass out on, could subject himself to nightmares that were his and his alone. And it wouldn’t be good, but it would be better than this. Anything had to be, didn’t it?

—

It was not hard to imagine the kind of dreams she could make Emilio Cortez dream. Inge’s imagination was a dark and endless well, inspiration gathered from the nightmares she’d endured decades ago and all the horrors that had followed since. She was an artist and fear was her dearest muse and there was so much of it in these corners, in these conversations. 

There was her own fear for what Cortez might do to her, should he actually get his hands on her. How long her suffering at his hands would stretch out before she’d either get away or die. There was fear for even the stupid little dog, though that was instinct and less rational than her fear of the slayer. She could imagine making art based off his threats, a sculpture of organs picked apart and served, of mirrors showing distorted reflections of a mutilated self.

She had made dreams based off the way his mother had chased her, that feeling of imminent death nipping at your heels. An axe head slamming against your windpipe and neck, slowly attempting to undo your head from your shoulders. Coming down and down again and never severing it fully, always coming back to crush those tendons again. Blood gushing but life continuing, the glint of the silver in the air before it reaches down and then, perhaps, getting away and being chased again.

She made dreams of angry husbands and hospital rooms, of mental institutions that had once been and would hopefully never be. She could make Emilio Cortez dream horrible things. She could make him saw through the bone of his brother and have that stupid dog of his devour the flesh, have him coat himself in the blood of his kin. She could prod and poke in his subconscious, try and figure out a way to exploit the massacre that had undone his family and twist that into the dreams. She could make him get chased how she was chased by his mother, stick him to a wall, put him in a van, tie him to a chair, starve him and make him fall endlessly as around him horrors unfolded.

She could, but she wouldn’t. Inge didn’t give people nightmares to exact revenge. She didn’t pick her sleepers for reasons like that. She picked them at random, she picked them because she liked their bedrooms or how they slept, because she had encountered them once in public. She broadened their minds, stretching them by making them fear something that was only and purely in their head — the way her mind had been stretched ones. She inspired. She fed. She didn’t do it out of maliciousness.

Her talents would be wasted on this slayer.

“Would you? If you really wanted to, you’d come up here,” she retorted. They were at an impasse. Neither of them was going to close the distance between them, neither of them was going to bring out a knife or a drowsy touch tonight. Maybe later, he’d find her. Maybe then, he’d pin her down again and do what he had been threatening her with. But tonight it seemed neither was making the first move and in stead their weapons were carefully crafted words, shaped like daggers made of threats. And they burrowed, didn’t they? At least, Emilio’s words were nagging her, itching under her skin, making her grow tense and afraid in that stupid tree. 

“I’d have you wake but be gone whenever you were truly awake,” she said, “As I always do.” Save for that one time with Rhett. And time time a slayer had been in the room with her as she disconnected from her sleeper. And… there was probably another time. Inge narrowed her eyes at him, which were growing more red as the sun grew closer to being gone. “Would you? Find me again? Your mother never did. You forget how easily I can move. I could be in Mexico like that. In Canada in the same time. You could track me down, but could you keep up? No.” 

That was, if she left town. If she put miles and miles between herself and Cortez, but also between herself and all the things she’d grown to love and care for in this town. Inge hoped, selfishly and cowardly, that they could remain at this impasse, though she felt it was wishful thinking.

At least there was something she’d been hoping for that she could count on. The sundown. It always grew dark and it was a comfort whenever it did, especially these days. There was no doubt about what she would do once it was dark. Sure, she could hop into the astral and appear in front of Emilio, put him to sleep and drag him into some kind of horror show — but that wasn’t her intent and most likely never would be.

No, Inge wanted to leave. To go home and sit with herself and the conversation. With what had happened at the factory, what had happened with Elena, with the healing wound in her stomach. She wanted a bottle of wine and perhaps even a second and to then float around her astral until the sun rose.

And so when the sun was fully gone, so was she, not wasting a moment before leaving the earthly plane where she was a humanoid creature that could be picked apart, verbally and hypothetically physically. She left, gone from the yapping dog and the angry slayer, the threats of mutual destruction that might never come to be. But it would be in the uncertainty of what if that she’d have to sit with — not just for the night, but perhaps for all of Emilio Cortez’ hopefully short rest of his life.

[phantombeesting]

He wasn't expecting anything in all honesty. I mean it's just another day to everyone else.

March 29th.

The sun rises, birds chirp, people kiss their loved ones and Billy Hargrove turns 18. The world just keeps on spinning.

The morning passes as expected. No fanfare, no cards, no presents, no well wishes; just Neil reminding him that now he's an adult he will be held fully accountable for all his 'misdeeds' with no leeway, just real consequences. Billy had to fight the joyless almost manic laugh that bubbles up inside him at that, leeway? That's what Neil's been giving him? Holy Shit that's funny. Thankfully if he shows any signs of this perceived hilarity on his face no one notices and he makes it away from the house without Neil showing him what this new version of accountability looks like.

——

The ride to school with Max passes in comfortable silence, the sound of the engine the only thing breaching it. Since she so generously offered to nail his balls to the floor with the hell bat that still haunts his dreams, their relationship has gotten better. Not on the level of siblings but it had only been a few months. They’d even talked about it, actual words, tried to see each other's sides in it all. A conversation made easier by Max seeing the reality that was waiting for Billy at the house, see the pound of flesh Neil took from him for failing to keep her safe. She’d understood his fear a little better then, and promised not to put him in that position again, as long as he (in her words) stopped being an emotionally constipated asshole, which yeah fair.

Billy had even started helping out with the babysitters club runs. The boys were still wary of him and tended to climb in with Harrington or Wheeler if she was about, but that weird girl El seemed to like him. And he would be lying if he said he hadn’t discovered a soft spot for her in return. He’d even started keeping a couple of the cassettes she liked in the car to make her smile.

As they pull up outside the middle school Max jumps out of the car, grabbing her bag slamming the door behind her. Before he had a chance to pull away Max leaned back through the window.

“Remember you’re picking me up from El’s tonight at 6 pm sharp”

“Curfew isn’t till 11 Max can’t you stay longer? I was hop…”

She cuts him off “6 pm sharp Asshole”

With that she runs off towards her boyfriend, Billy fixes the boy with a harsh stare, he can see him fight the urge to shrink under his gaze and Billy’s lip curls up slightly at that. He doesn’t dislike the kid and if he’s going to be dating Max then he'll need that backbone.

A little annoyed at the marching orders Max had given him, Billy peels the Camaro out of the school lot, turning his music up and heads toward Hawkins High.

—

It's the last day of school before the start of Spring Break so there's a sense of excitement spreading across campus. Talk of parties, date nights and mall meetups; Billy just doesn't have it in him to pay actual attention to any of it.

"Hargrove, are you even fucking listening ?"

Fingers snap right in front of his eyes bringing his focus to the annoyed-looking Tommy across the table.

"No. You talk shit so often Hagan I've learnt to tune most of it out" Billy bites back. That earns him an unimpressed look from the other boy and a barking laugh from Carol. Tommy wasn’t too bad if he was being honest, but he only really cared about sitting next to whoever the current kind was. Power by association.

"As I was saying asshole, party tonight at Britneys. Are. You. Coming?" Tommy drags the last few words out like he's talking to a child. “I’ve heard she’s hoping a certain King slayer will show up and let her polish his sword.”

“Fucking Jesus” Billy wipes his hand down his face “Really wish you wouldn’t call me that”

“I kind of like it, ‘King Slayer’ sounds sexy” Carol lets the words roll off her tongue like she’s trying to taste them, looking right at Billy playing up the pout on her lips for effect.

Her words rile her intended target as Tommy’s ears go bright red, it’s clear which of them has the most control in their relationship. It’s fun to watch the games they play with each other sometimes.

“Well sorry to disappoint a loyal subject but I have better things to do.”

“Like what? Don’t tell me you're turning bitch too now Hargrove” Tommy practically spits the words out. It’s something Tommy’s been joking about since they got back from Christmas break, implying he's disappointing him the same way Steve did; it’s slowly starting to feel less like a joke the longer it goes on.

Billy can feel that familiar anger pulling his skin tight. “Since when have I fucking answered to you?” He doesn’t give Tommy a chance to answer standing up from the table and storming out. He needs a smoke.

———

The rest of the day passes easily enough, most teachers have checked out and either show movies or let people read their own books. The tension that started to work its way under Billy’s skin at lunch still sits there, it finds a home in the muscles of his jaw and the hunch of his shoulders and by the time the bell rings to signal the end of the day it’s infected his whole being. He doesn’t even have practice to help him burn it off.

———

He can’t go back to the house like this, he’d just be asking for trouble. And despite what he told Tommy, apart from picking up Max later he doesn’t have anywhere to go, doesn’t have anyone he can talk to. That's the bit that hurts the most; after everything that’s happened in the past year, the beatings, the fight, the interdimensional monsters, it’s the loneliness that eats at him alive.

If he were less of a coward he’d reach out to Harrington; they’re on decent terms now but he couldn’t exactly call them friends as much as he likes to think it’s heading that way. He’s the only person that comes to mind when Billy thinks of opening up and sharing that dark, raw, ugly space inside him, the only person he thinks will understand. It’s times like this that he misses his Mom she’d know what to do.

With a lack of a better destination, Billy ends up at the quarry. He skips stones until his arms are sore, plays songs that remind him of the warmth of his Mom’s smile and feels the tick in his jaw loosen a little. Before he knows it it’s almost time to pick up Max.

———

“What do you mean she’s not here?” He can hear the crack in his voice and sees the confusion starting to pull at Hopper's brow.

“She said she’d be here, she can’t not be here.” He tries to take a handle on the mess of rage and fear ripping through him, rising up his throat like bile threatening to choke him. Real consequences, he’d threatened real consequences, he’s dead, he’ll kill him, Max promised, he’d trusted her, she promised, she promised, she promised. He can’t breathe, visions of the bat, his dad, and Harringtons’ bloodied face flood him and he can’t breathe, he’s choking.

“Woah kid take a breath, I can tell you where she is but first just take a moment ok?” Hopper takes big deliberate breaths inviting Billy to mimic him, moving slowly forward like he thinks he’ll spook, reaching out to place a hand in the centre of Billy’s chest “Come on, In and out, you can do this, In and out.”

Billy tries to focus on the slight pressure of the chief's hand, he manages a shaky breath. It’s still early, he still has time to find her, Hopper knows where she is, he said he’d tell him where she is. He can still fix this.

“Come on big guy In and out” the name actually pulls him slightly from his panic if he had more air in his lungs he might have laughed.

It takes what feels like hours but in reality must just be no more than a few minutes but Billy can finally breathe on his own, it’s still shaky but he can control it. Hoppers gone from big theatrical breaths to just watching and waiting for Billy to finish pulling himself together.

“So I’m going to tell you where she is in a moment, on the understanding that at some point when you’re ready you are going to come here and fully explain what just happened.”

Billy opens his mouth to lie to reassure him but gets cut off.

“And I’m not going to buy that it’s nothing, because Kid that wasn’t nothing. You don’t need to tell me now, just need you to agree that you’ll tell me eventually. OK?” Billy can tell from the tone that it’s not really a question so he just nods.

“Ok so I dropped El and Max off at Steve’s earlier” And that hits him like a tonne of bricks.

Barely above a whisper “She’s with Harrington?” Of course she’s with Harrington, a bubble of laughter leaves his throat there’s no happiness in it, just a sad resignation.

“Look, she told me you knew. That he was letting them use his pool for something” Hopper takes a moment, like he’s mulling something over. “Ok so here's what we’re going to do, You’re going to get in my truck and were going to drive over there, together and me you and those girls are going to have a little conversation about honesty” As Hopper moves away Billy can hear him mutter “Friends don’t lie my ass.”

———

The ride over to the Harrington house is long enough that all traces of anger have left Billy’s body, he’s left with a sick hollow feeling sitting heavy in his gut.

“I erm called ahead, spoke to Steve let him know we were coming. Seems the brats weren't fully honest with him either.” Hopper wipes his hand over his face as they pull into the driveway.

Steve must have been looking out for them because he slips out the front door just as the chief cuts the engine.

“He said he wants to speak to you before you go in. Take as long as you need, I’m going to head in and find those two” Billy doesn’t think he could speak right now if he tried, just tilts his chin down to show he heard.

Hopper clears his throat as he leaves the vehicle, clapping his hand on Steve's shoulder as he reaches him, they exchange a few words Billy can’t hear and he sees Steve gesture to the house before the Chief heads inside.

Steve looks as apprehensive as he feels, and that actually makes him feel a little better. Ok he can do this. Billy takes a deep breath and steps out of the truck.

“Well this feels familiar, you standing in front of a house, hiding my sist… hiding Max” Billy wishes there were more bite to the words but he’s just so tired.

“If it makes you feel better I’m not going to tell you she’s not in there this time” It’s an attempt at a joke that doesn’t really land. He hasn’t been able to look at Steve fully until that moment, focusing instead on the ground in front of him. But now he sees the apologetic half smile, the pleading look in his eyes, it’s open and honest. And Billy, fuck Billy wants to trust him.

“I told her she needed to tell you, that erm even if she didn’t tell you everything that she should maybe give you some sort of heads up” Steve's hand has moved to the back of his neck, he’s nervous. And Billy is so fucking confused.

“Can you just go in and get her? Please? I’m not really in the mood Harrington”

“I think you should come in with me” He catches Billy off guard with that.

“Harrington…” Steves already stepping backwards towards the house

“Come on, might as well right you’re already here” His eyebrow is raised almost in a challenge now, a smile starting to play at the corner of his mouth. Billy starts slowly putting one foot in front of the other moving towards him.

“Steve …. Please” He hates how needy that sounded

“Plus if you’re wanting to feel really nostalgic i’m sure we can find you a plate or something for you to smash over my head” Steve is full on grinning now, it’s not sharp or cruel like Billy would expect. It’s warm and lights a new kind of fire in him “Come on Hargrove, don't you trust me ?” And wants to say ‘no’ but somewhere inside he knows that’s not true.

Billy huffs out a laugh “Lead the way Princess”

Steve turns to the side bowing slightly and moving his arm as if to show Billy the way “After you Birthday Boy” That stops Billy in his tracks.

“How the fuck did you know it’s my birthday?”

“A little shit-bird told me” Steve turns around walking through the house “Come on they’re through the back”

————-

“SURPRISE!!”

And surprise is fucking right.

He was expecting an apologetic pool damp Max.

He wasn’t expecting this. This being Harringtons pool area covered in handmade decorations, paper cutouts of stars, hearts, flowers in a rainbow of colours over every surface he can see, a painted (and still slightly wet looking) Happy Birthday banner and a table covered in pizza boxes, a big pink cake and are those waffles?

It seems like Hopper has already had a word with Max and El as they are both standing sheepishly under the banner.

“Sorry Billy, I just wanted it to be a surprise. I didn’t think'' Max is kicking the toes of her shoes against the floor, to anyone else she’d look disinterested, Billy knows otherwise can tell she's close to tears.

“I like it” Billy has to clear his throat, he can feel words getting stuck in his throat. “Plus it’s still a few hours till curfew so now harm done right?” He reaches out and pushes her head slightly knocking her a little off balance.

“Actually Mom said I could stay at El’s tonight, said to tell you Happy Birthday and feel free to stay out and have fun”

Billy just raises his eyebrow at that.

“Don’t worry I can confirm she’s actually telling the truth, I spoke to Susan before she knows where Max is staying” Hopper helpfully adds.

“Shall this party started then?” Steve presses play on the stereo he’s set up outside and the sounds of Girls just want to have fun fill the space.

The girls crowd the food table, piling plates with pizza slices and syrup covered waffeles. The mood lifts and they are laughing and pushing each other around.

Billy turns towards Steve “Never took you for a Lauper fan Harrington”

“Oh big fan, massive, huge” The smile on his face is infectious “It’s a mixtape El made for you, all the songs that make her happy”

Billy can’t stop smiling, they’ve all done this for him. Theres a fucking cake, he really hopes thats strawberry frosting,

“Wanna grab some pizza? I hope you appreciate that Max talked me into getting that Pineapple monstrosity, I don’t get it myself but she said you liked it” Steve passes him an empty plate and gestures at the table. The girls have left the boxes open all over it.

“I like the contrast; sweet and salty, don’t knock it till you try it, Pretty Boy” Billy lifts a slice to his mouth taking a bite. Steves pulls a face as he watches his chew “What don’t you trust me Harrington?”

Steves not one to back down from a challenge “Yeah ok got nothing to lose right? but if I hate it I’m blaming you” he lifts his pizza up in a toast “Here’s to new experiences” and was that a wink? Billy is 90% sure that was a wink is Harrington flirting with him? Today is giving Billy fucking whiplash.

Once they’ve had their fill of pizza (Steve denied liking the hawaiian pizza but still ate two more slices), and the sun has set Steve lights the candles on his cake and Bill makes his wish; he’s very happy to find out the frosting is indeed Strawberry.

“Ok come on girls we’re going” Hopper comes to stand next to Billy “Come on I’ll take you back to your car”

“Yeah sure, I’ll just be a moment” Billy moves to help move the plates.

“I can drop you off later if you wanted to stay for a while” Steve offers.

“Wait you sure?”

“Yeah I mean pools heated, we still have pizza and waffles…”

“I’m taking the waffles” El’s standing there gripping the edge of the waffle filled plate, it’s not a question. Her expression makes both Billy and Steve laugh.

“Ok well we still have Pizza and the cake” Steve corrects himself. “Plus I have a few beers in the fridge”

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that” Hopper grumbles “So you staying or coming with?”

“I’ll stay thanks Chief” Billy half salutes him laughing when Hopper narrows his eyes at him.

“Suit yourself, and remember our deal ok kid? Whenever you’re ready just come find me” and with that Hopper rounds up Max and El, gets them to say their goodbyes and takes them back to the cabin. Watching El try to hug Billy goodbye holding armfulls of waffles is a sight to behold.

————-

That's how Billy ends up on the night of his 18th birthday sat on the edge of Steve’s pools feet dipped into the water slowly sipping a beer. El’s mixtape has been swapped out for something more Billy’s speed (Or at least as close as he can get from Steve's collection).

Billy breaks the comfortable silence “Thank you by the way, for letting them do this here”

“Happy to do it, which reminds me” Steve slowly pushes himself to standing and makes his way over to the kitchen door, he steps inside for a brief second before making his way back towards the pool holding something small in his hands. He lowers himself down next to Billy again closer than before “Have to give it to you before midnight or it’s not a Birthday gift anymore”.

He holds out a palm sized black box to Billy, it’s wrapped in red ribbon with a big bow tied on the front. He hesitantly takes it running his fingers over the smooth bow. "You really didn't have to"

"I know but I saw it the day after the girls asked me to host tonight and I just couldn't not get it for you" Steve takes a sip of his beer, watching Billy’s fingers work the ribbon off the box.

Billy held the box unopened in his hands, he can feel a thrum of energy skittering through the air.

“The gifts inside the box” Steve snarks from beside him.

Billy tries to glare at him but just can’t keep up the blank face for long before cracking into a smile. He turns his attention back to the box lifting the lid, nestled inside is a brand new zippo brand lighter the exact same colour as his camaro. His nose scrunches up and he sniffs away the tears that are trying to form. “Thanks Steve really it means alot” He brings the back of his hand up to wipe at his face. He can see Steve still watching him, a soft smile on his face. He notices that they’re started leaning into each other's personal space.

“Can I tell you what my wish was?”

Steves takes a moment to answer his eyes firmly fixed on Billy’s face now, When he does answer it’s barely above a whisper “Yes erm yeah go ahead”

Billy takes a deep breath fuck it he’s come this far. He turn himself further into Steve space, eyes flicking down to his lips “That you wouldn’t punch me when I try this” He starts slowly moving towards Steve giving him time to move away, when he sees Steve leaning in as well he brings his hand to rest against his cheek pausing right before their lips meet and Steve mutters “To new experiences right?”.

He’s not sure who moves first after that because as soon as their lips meet Billy is lost, all he knows is the taste of Steve's lips and that the hum that lives under his skin is now a full blown flame. The kiss starts off slow, tender, almost innocent but quickly becomes something desperate all teeth and tongue and desire.

It’s Steve that pulls back first smiling when Billy tries to follow him “I like that alot more than the fucking pizza” he leans back in claiming Billy’s lips when he huffs out a laugh in response. Once the initial desperation has dimmed slightly, they are left looking at each other, bodies pressed together.

“Do you want to stay the night? We can go out for breakfast tomorrow before I drop you off at your car. You can come in with me or I can set you up in a spare room. No pressure”

“Why? two new experiences a day your limit Pretty Boy?” He raises his eyebrow at Steve.

“Technically I’m at three for today, maybe four if you count the baking and icing the cake as seperate things”

By the end of the night Steve had lost count of the new things he could tick off.