#mateo: stone cold badass

[recoveringdreamer]

TIMING: recent PARTIES:  @fearhims3lf & @recoveringdreamer LOCATION: worm row SUMMARY: when felix runs into trouble on their way home from work, mateo decides to help them out... against his better judgement. CONTENT WARNINGS: gun use

Walking through Worm Row always made Felix nervous, but those nerves had only grown worse since their encounters with the warden in the neighborhood. Even if their second alleyway ‘conversation’ with the man hadn’t been as traumatizing as the first, they weren’t looking to break the tie with a third encounter. But given the fact that they worked in the neighborhood, it was inevitable that they’d have to walk through it to get to and from the Grit Pit.

Lately, they’d been counteracting the anxiety by taking different routes. Some took them a little out of their way, but the peace of mind it offered was worth it. Felix didn’t run into many people on this road in particular; most of the buildings had been completely overtaken by the Abnormality, so most of the residents had moved elsewhere. It was kind of spooky, but peaceful. And there was some cool architecture, too.

Like, for example, the statue sitting atop the staircase of a building that seemed relatively untouched by the Abnormality in comparison to its neighbors. Felix slowed as he approached it, stopping at the bottom of the steps. “Hi there,” they greeted the statue with a faint smile. “How are you this…” It moved. They blinked. Had they imagined that? No — the statue moved. It stretched its wings, it looked down at him with a harsh glare, it — 

It climbed off its pedestal. 

Felix scrambled back, running into a very solid shape. Turning back, they caught sight of a man. He didn’t look like a statue, which made him preferable to the one stepping off the steps now. “It — That statue is alive,” they stammered. Alive and, from the looks of it, pissed off. This was not what Felix had been anticipating on their walk home.

It had been three in the morning when the mare had sauntered his way out of a bar. At that time of night, there wasn’t much to do, but sleep would not overtake Mateo. He’d need to find a way to fill up his time if he wasn’t going to die of boredom. Going to his storage unit and rocking out seemed like a viable option. No one to bother him and the unit was sound-proofed enough that he wouldn’t get a noise complaint. Although…Mateo took out his phone and scrolled through it, sifting through other options, seeing what else he could pound. 

He was just about to click on a contact when someone stammered out something about something being alive? Okay. Crazy guy, Mateo thought. But hey, he wasn’t heartless. They obviously needed help. “Look man, I only have about…” He trailed off, looking through his wallet. “Fifty bucks on me. It’s yours if you—” A noise interrupted Mateo, and he looked around the stranger to see a stone, animal-like creature angrily making his way toward both of them. 

Mateo immediately pocketed his wallet, and took a step back, huffing with annoyance. “You really brought this thing—you motherf–” A roar took precedence then, and Mateo threw his arms up in the air and shrugged as he backed away. There was no sense in him sticking around when the problem wasn’t his to begin with. He had no connection to the complete stranger who made the mess. “Well, sucks to be you, I guess.” His smile was flat as he gestured the rocker horns to the monster’s soon-to-be snack, and in a blink, he disappeared into thin air.

The stranger thought they were nuts. Felix could tell just by the look on the guy’s face — the apprehension, the quiet pity, the desire to get away as quickly as possible. Felix had seen this look plenty of times when they’d been readjusting to the world, and it was one of their least favorite expressions to find on a stranger’s face. (Though it was still better than anger. Anger, on an unknown entity, was always a recipe for disaster.) 

“No, I don’t — I don’t need money,” Felix stammered desperately. They wanted to insist, wanted to wave their hands and shout and do a thousand things that would make them look even crazier than they looked already, but it turned out it wasn’t necessary. The giant rock monster was perfectly capable of proving them right on its own. For a moment, Felix was relieved. If the stranger saw the monster, if he realized it was real, he could help Felix fight it or run away from it or do whatever needed to be done.

Except… Except he didn’t. Instead, he flared with some of that anger Felix had been relieved to find missing before, and then — he vanished. He disappeared into thin air, and Felix was alone with whatever this thing was. And it was gonna kill him, wasn’t it? There was something almost funny about it, because he’d just kind of assumed he’d die in the Pit ever since his first fight there, but here they were instead, prepared to die out on the street against some beast made of rock. But the jaguar, stirring in their chest, made one thing clear — Felix might be prepared to die against this thing… but Felix was not alone in this body. And the jaguar would do what he had to do to win, just as he always did.

He’d been closer to the surface recently, like he was floating just beneath the top of the proverbial lake instead of sleeping at the bottom. Felix wasn’t sure why. A few others had mentioned strange feelings, too — Teagan, some of the other shifters at the Pit — so maybe there was something going on. Either way, it meant the balam’s fingers shifted into claws almost without their permission, swiped at the rock almost without Felix trying to move at all. If the stranger on the street wouldn’t help them, Felix would just have to help themself. Right? They could do that.

Okay, maybe disappearing without a trace wasn’t the nicest option, but Mateo wasn’t a charity, was he? The guy had gotten himself into that mess, and wanted to rope him into it! How was it fair that he had to jump in and lend a hand? Besides, he was squishy and bullets wouldn’t really word on stone, would it? Ugh. Mateo appeared in his apartment with a groan, rubbing his face in frustration. He had to help the stranger, didn’t he? Fuck. Fuck! Kicking a random box on the floor, Mateo grabbed a crowbar from his closet and jumped back into the astral to find his opportunity.

Well, well, well…the mare could see the stranger holding his own a little. Were those claws? Huh…Mateo scratched at his head, pursing his lips in thought. Did this rando even need his help? He tapped his foot, groaning yet again as he came to the annoying conclusion that, yes, he had to help. Why did being nice always have to come at a cost? He juggled his head from side to side, cracking his neck and rolling his shoulders to loosen up. “Here goes nothing.” Mateo whispered to himself, dropping out of nowhere, right on top of the gargoyle-fucker with his crowbar colloding with its head.

The impact was stony and bits of crumbling dust rolled off its body, though it hardly seemed that it was affected at all. “Puta madre…” He hissed as he landed on the ground next to his new annoyance. “Why’d you have to piss off a damn rock, man?!” With a stretch, Mateo hovered his hand over his holster, considering his options. Maybe it was better to just run. “Ain’t no way we’re beating this thing, ya think?”

They definitely weren’t expecting the stranger to come back. Part of Felix wasn’t even sure the guy had ever really been there to begin with, despite the fact that they’d run directly into him. Maybe stress had made some ghost seem more tangible than it was, or maybe he’d finally lost it and was just… imagining things completely. Either way, they’d already accepted that they were well and truly on their own by the time the stone creature got in close.

It was kind of slow, which was good. They were able to duck as it grabbed at them, though their claws did next to nothing against its rocky flesh. How did you beat stone? Probably not with jaguar claws, but Felix didn’t have a whole lot more going for them. They could let the jaguar out fully and get away, but… Well, then they’d be a jaguar. Their spirit companion didn’t always like handing control back over, but maybe this time he’d…

Something dropped out of the sky, landing on top of the stone creature. It took Felix a moment to realize it was the same man from before — decidedly real, and decidedly not a ghost. “I didn’t piss it off!” The balam insisted quickly. “I was just walking by, I don’t — I don’t know why it’s so mad.” They squinted at the dust that had fallen from the creature. It wasn’t regenerating, at least; maybe blunt force was the best way to beat it. “I think we’d have to — crush the rocks. Um, which I don’t — I don’t know if we can do. But it’s slow!” They could probably outrun it.

“Right…right…” The expression on Mateo’s face was one of mocking and disbelief. Maybe a little amusement too. His companion seemed to have their panties in a bunch, and the mare had a hunch that that was their default state. Oof. Just his luck. “Well, I got a gun and bat, and you got…” He gestured vaguely to the stranger’s…paws? “Whatever you got going on there.” Questions could wait for later. A roar snapped Mateo’s attention back to the animated statue. This wasn’t going to be an easy task, and he was already dreading how sore he was going to be.

“Okay, I’m Mateo, and I’m gonna—” Another roar cut through, interrupting the mare. He rolled his eyes and groaned. “¡Oye, guey!” Taking out his gun, Mateo pointed it straight at the creature, bemusement painting over his features. “I’m in the middle of something.” With the safety flipped, he fired. 

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Nothing, not even a wince or sound of pain. Just dust trickling down its still moving body. There wasn’t much to do but slow it down enough for the non-astral-jumping one of the two to escape. Kindness had its upsides, or so Mateo heard. Maybe he could finagle his way into a payment if the two got out alive. For the time being, he’d deal with the downsides, and disappear again to land atop the creature with his bat at the ready. Claws attempted to reach him to no avail, and Mateo’s bat crashed into it repeatedly, completely distracting it.

“I’d run if I were you!”

“I didn’t,” Felix insisted, a little offended that they weren’t being believed even if that was quite literally the least of their worries at the moment. “It’s — Hard to explain,” Felix replied, looking down at their hands and wondering why their first instinct was to hide them behind their back. The guy had already seen them, so it wasn’t like hiding them would do anything. And it was clear that this guy wasn’t human himself, anyway. He’d vanished into thin air and then come back just the same. Felix was pretty sure humans didn’t do that.

Nodding their head, Felix did their best to offer the man — Mateo — a smile. It looked a little more like a grimace, what with the… everything going on, but, hey! Work with what you’ve got, right? “I’m Felix. Uh, I’m not sure if a gun is the best —” But it was too late. Mateo was firing his gun in the direction of the rock creature, and Felix figured they were lucky that the bullets hadn’t ricocheted. That was where the luck ended, of course. The bullets did nothing to stop the creature. If anything, they just seemed to piss it off.

Felix scrambled back as Mateo crashed his bat into the thing and told them to run. “What — Uh, what about you? Don’t really want to leave you to fight that thing by yourself, man!” Not after he’d come back for them, at least. It seemed pretty rude to just… leave him there. Felix had no idea if the whole ‘disappearing into thin air’ thing was something Mateo could do on command or if he had no control over it. Hell, for all they knew, there was a boomerang effect to it, and that was why Mateo had come back. Either way, leaving felt wrong.

“Uh-huh…” It was almost cute how Felix attempted to hide the claws Mateo had already so obviously seen. “Look dude, I can jump into a different plane and come back to any place I want. Explaining is pretty simple if you don’t overthink it.” He winked as he struggled with the creature, trying his best to remain cool. He was way out of his element, as much as Mateo hated to admit.

The statue continued to claw at its back, ferally growling at the anomaly it was trying desperately to get rid of. Mateo chuckled smugly, it quickly interrupted by sudden movement. He lost his balance and quickly fell to the ground with a dull thud. Groaning, he had just a moment to act before a stony fist went barreling toward him. “Oh fuck!” Mateo blipped away, swirling in the astral for a few beats longer to collect himself. There was no beating the monster, he thought, but he’d put in enough sweat already that it felt like defeat to just run. He groaned, landing himself back next to Felix.

“Lemme get a few more wacks in, and then we can both run. It’s slow, man. We can do it.” Nodding his head side to side hastily, Mateo clicked his tongue. “Well, after those wacks, yeah? I bet I can crush it after…long enough.”

“Oh.” Well, that didn’t sound like something Felix had seen before. They liked to think they were well-versed in the supernatural world, given their experience with the Grit Pit, but most of the fighters there were shifters, like Felix. Their father had warned them about mediums and exorcists and rangers, but none of those were capable of… blinking into another plane, as Mateo put it. So that probably made him something else. Uncharted territory, just like the statue they were fighting. Luckily, though, Mateo seemed to be on their side.

Felix watched Mateo fight, wincing as he fell. “Hey, look —” But before they could finish their warning, the man blinked out of existence again, this time popping back up next to Felix after a few stressful seconds of being nowhere. Felix glanced over to him, looking at him carefully to see if he was hurt, but he seemed all right. Bruised, probably, and a little shaken, but not horribly injured. That was good. It was probably Felix’s fault this was happening — they didn’t want someone else to be hurt.

“I’ll help,” they offered. “I, um… I know how to fight.” It was true, even if it probably didn’t look it. If Felix weren’t as good as they were in a fight, they wouldn’t have survived this long in the Grit Pit. Of course, if Felix weren’t as good as they were in a fight, the Grit Pit probably wouldn’t have bound them so tightly, anyway. Still, it would be nice to use those skills to… help, for once. “I think… Yeah. If we go at it long enough, we can take it out. Look, it isn’t — It doesn’t regenerate the rocks after they get knocked off. Right? So that means if we knock off enough of them…” They trailed off, letting it hang.

“You just get cuter, don’t you?” Mateo grinned, happy to hear that Felix was down to fuck…up a statue. He cracked his neck, bouncing lightly on his feet to warm up. “I go high, and you go low. Oh…!” Mateo lifted a finger, gesturing for Felix to give him a moment as he sifted through his pocket. 

He stuck his tongue out as he searched, face lighting up when he found what he was looking for. “Aha! Use this!” A can of spraypaint lay like the Holy Grail, a punk’s favorite tool for leaving a message “Maybe at the eyes? Does it…have eyes?” Didn’t matter. Mateo waved the thoughts away and handed the can of spraypaint over to Felix. “Have fun!” He blipped away, probably for the hundredth time that night, and slammed his bat right into the statue’s shoulder. 

It seemed to roar out of annoyance rather than pain, and Mateo continued his assault by shooting several rounds into the divet he had left behind with his bat. Doing so made several cracks surface, weakening the connection between the arm and the shoulder enough to make it begin to fall away. Perfect. ‘Cause Mateo’s hands were really starting to ache from the force ricocheting back into the handle of the bat with every strike. Not to mention, the weapon was starting to really get dented.

“Uh…” Felix practically squeaked, turning red as they looked down at their feet. It probably said a lot about the damage their relationship with Leo had done to them that their first instinct was to assume that Mateo was insulting them, somehow. They wanted to apologize, though they weren’t sure what for. “Low,” they said instead. “Yeah. I can go low. What…?”

They took the spray paint, brow furrowed as they turned it over in their hands carefully. Mateo had held it as if it were important, so Felix held it the same way. “It… has to be tracking our movements somehow, right? And I didn’t see any ears…” Eyes were the best bet. Mateo’s plan really wasn’t a bad one, and Felix was, frankly, just relieved to have someone else take charge. They could fight, but they were a lot better at taking orders than they were at formulating plans of their own.

Mateo blinked away again, and Felix was quick to follow. They went low, just as they’d told Mateo they would, careful to avoid the bullets the other was firing and the bat he was swinging. As Mateo swung at the beast’s shoulder, Felix aimed the spray paint at its face, spraying a generous amount into its eyes. The creature brought an arm up to swat at them, but it was a blind swing. “Hey, I think the eye thing worked!” They ducked down again, claws digging into the creature’s leg. Though not the ideal weapon, they did leave a pretty impressive slash, and Felix aimed a kick at the new weak spot. The rock began to crack, and the balam grinned. Maybe they had a chance after all. 

Victory was on the horizon, single stony arm flailing in its sad attempts to attack the two strangers taking it apart. Mateo winced as he gave a final wack to the back of the monster’s head. He jumped down, rolling down next to Felix and looking at his trembling hands as he scooted backwards and away. They were sparkling in the moonlight, burning with the pain from the friction of the bat. As he continued to scoot, he felt a lump on the ground, the object digging into his thigh uncomfortably.

“What the fuck…?” He whispered to himself, brows raised with excitement and Mateo licked his lips. He whistled once, raising the ball in the air like it was his trophy to victory. “Start running!” Laughter ensued, and Mateo rose to his feet to run back toward the beast and shove Felix out. “Run away! You don’t want to be here for this part. Trust me.” Removing the pin, he showed Felix exactly what he had: a grenade. One that was about to be active the moment he released the lever. “Once you’re outta sight,” He pulled Felix by the scruff of their shirt while the statue thrashed against the ground, trying to find them. “I’ll throw it to that thing and blink out. So, go!”

The fight was… actually not going terribly. Mateo’s bat was doing a lot of damage, and Felix’s claws were less useless than they had been at the start now that they had cracks to aim for. They could dig the claws into the cracks in the stone and widen them, sending more and more spreading across the creature’s body. It was… almost fun. So different from the fights in the Grit Pit, where they fought for the entertainment of people who cheered when they bled, where they fought alone. 

They lost themself in it a little bit. The punching, the clawing, the almost-joy. It was only when Mateo spoke that they looked up, eyes locking onto the grenade in the other’s hand. “I — That’s probably not a good —” but it was clear that there was no arguing with the other. Shooting him a concerned look and praying that he had some idea what he was doing here, the balam stumbled off, running as fast as they could to get out of the blast zone and hoping that the statue was the only thing that would explode.

Mateo turned to face his opponent one last time, a wicked grin pulling his cheeks up. He waited until he heard Felix’s footsteps recede enough to remove his fingers from the lever, still holding it for a few seconds longer. “Here you go, puto.” Mateo charged forward, shoving the grenade in the beast’s mouth. It growled and snapped, nearly taking a bite out of the mare’s hand, but Mateo was gone in an instant. He jumped next to Felix, beckoning to stop and enjoy the show. “Should go boom right about…now!”

They were a decent way’s away when Mateo popped into existence beside them, and they faltered a little, turning towards him. Hesitantly, the balam turned towards the direction they’d run from just in time for a boom to shake the ground. Fire and rock flew out from every direction, though they were too far for any of it to touch them. “That was a bad idea,” Felix breathed. “That was — That was a terrible plan.” They let out a choked laugh, dissolving quickly into hysteria. 

Mateo cackled, joining Felix in a fit of laughter. He nearly tumbled to the ground, more than amused with how the fight ended. “It was a great plan! Who doesn’t love a good explosion?!” He continued to laugh, the sound beginning wane once the effects of such a charging change of pace. With a sigh, he patted Felix’s shoulder, free hand on his hip and a grin on his face. “Why don’t we end the night with a drink? You got anything at your place? You kinda owe me here.”

“Me! I don’t love a good explosion!��� Felix insisted, but they were laughing still. Their claws had already retreated back into their hands, their eyes fading from the jaguar’s bright yellow to the more human shade of brown. Adrenaline was still thrumming through them, and it felt good. So much better than it did when they were in the ring, when everything was such an intense flavor of do or die that it took all they had to keep themself from the latter. They’d never sleep if they went home now. They knew that. So… a drink wasn’t a bad idea, right? Mateo was right, anyway — they kind of owed him. “Okay,” they agreed. “Yeah. C’mon, man. I’ll buy you a drink. And, um, maybe you can tell me how you did that whole teleporting thing.”