#what resemblance could i have to this disgruntled feline?

[sensitivesiren]

just a reminder it's canon that Dean took Castiel to Hot Topic to pick out a grumpy cat plushie for Claire's birthday.

[yourdeepestfathoms]

Rapture Rising

[Evil!Joan AU]

Word count: 2650 (no Read More because I’m away from my computer, but it’s only 2000 words so 🤷‍♀️)

Prompt: “Do you talk to your mother with that mouth?”

——————

The theater rises before her, vast and wrong.

If architecture could hate, this theater hates. It is a frozen snarl, stone (at least Jane thinks it’s stone) forced into confinement. It does not stand quite at right angles to the ground. No, those angles are wrong; it belongs to an unholy geometry. It’s hard to imagine this used to be a place of joy and thrill and entertainment. All that remains is a skeleton infested with twisted pillars and rocks and spires. It is waiting for her to get lost in their bodies if she manages to get out.

Above her, pallid, vicious lights flicker and stab across the ceiling from time to time—almost like lightning, if lightning were regular as a heartbeat. A very powerful force field generator perhaps. Or some unfathomable system of intimidation, brooding over all that lies within.

Beyond the stage, there is nothing. Just bleak, desolate, ebony rocks and needle-sharp stones far as she can see in all directions. There are no seats or an audience left, just a battlefield of lurking obsidian. They were waiting for her to make an escape so they could lance her as she raced for the exit.

Except she couldn’t escape. She’s tried. The jagged, pointy black cage she was huddled in wouldn’t break, no matter how hard she pushed or pulled on the bars.

Jane was stuck.

A scraping sound from behind soon alerted her. She spun around, pressing back against the bars on the opposite side, and watched as her captor emerged from the darkness of the wings.

Joan was a mishmash of scales and feathers and fur. The only area of human skin left on her body was her stomach and face, a pale contrast to the ebony pelt that now plated her form. She elegantly walked on her toes on hock-jointed legs. Talons curved out from monstrous feet—the cause of the scraping noise. Her hands bore the same hooked claws, while her shoulders were clustered with quills resembling thinner versions of the folded spikes running down her back. Wicked ram horns curled out from the sides of her head, pointing upwards, with pointed, feathered ears twitching below them. There, the twisted, barbed black Crown of Thorns sat regally, its wicked points somehow not getting caught in her short, messy, tangled blonde-brown-black hair. The Moonstone was on her chest, glowing a soft blue.

It was hard to think that this creature was once the sweet, hardworking, timid music director that used to help run the show.

“What?” Joan tilted her head at her harmlessly as if she weren’t a walking monolith of sharp points and edges and needles. It was practically impossible to know where one spike ended and another began. Henry somehow wasn’t disturbed by the snarled mess, as he rested peacefully, wound around her neck like a venomous necklace. “Don’t look at me like that. I come in peace.”

She raised her quills up in some kind of truce gesture, as her hands were occupied by some books and a brown paper bag. She doesn’t even need to set these things down to alter Jane’s cage, merely bobbing her head and causing the confinement to shift. The tops bloomed open like flower petals, curving downwards around each other so Joan can set the items down. Then, she stepped back and the rock tendrils closed again, giving Jane no time to try and make her escape. She didn’t think she would get that far, anyway.

“Go on,” Joan said, sitting down in front of the queen. “Eat. I don’t want you to starve.”

“There’s a surprise,” Jane muttered, earning a dangerous glare from Henry and a wounded look from Joan. She quickly shut her mouth.

“I’m not a monster, Jane.” Joan said. “Did I capture you and put you in a cage? Yes. But have I hurt you?” She waited, but her answer was just Jane looking away. “No. I haven’t. And I don’t want to.”

Jane says nothing. She keeps scanning Joan up and down, looking for an ulterior motive. Joan twitched her nose and then flicked her tail towards the items now sitting in front of Jane’s legs.

“There’s food in the bag,” She said. “And some books. To read. Thought you might get bored.”

Jane tentatively opened the brown paper bag to find regular food items- a sandwich, two apples, some treats, a bottle of water. She still didn’t trust them, despite their outwardly inner appearance and pushed them to the side for the time being. Joan must have sensed her hesitance, because she tilted her head at her with a frown.

“What’s wrong?” She said. “Oh! I know! This cage is too dreary, huh? Here, let me help!”

She shot to her feet on her weird, hock-jointed legs. Jane swore she heard the reshaped bones creak, but Joan didn’t falter a bit as she stood on her toes- the only way her body could hold itself up with its new physique.

Joan extended her talons and the Moonstone started to glow brighter, light zipping through the spiral pattern on its surface.

The bars of Jane’s cell began to expand outwards across the stage, gliding effortlessly through the flooring without ruining it at all. Several more petrified tendrils extended upwards to fill the new space so Jane couldn’t wiggle her way out. The ground then began to quake, and Jane watched in terrified awe as a pool-like shape opened up in the wooden floors. Glittering black rocks surrounded the edge and a spiraling pillar stuck out from the very center, spilling water into the trench carved away.

“There!” Joan beamed. “A...pool! And more space. But a pool! Really makes the cage more lively, huh?” She blinked at Jane’s horrified expression. “What?”

“I-I didn’t...I didn’t know you could do...that.” Jane whispered.

“You mean alter things?” Joan sat back down. “The Crown lets me control the rocks, but the Moonstone is what gives me the magic. I can do almost anything!”

A shiver ran down Jane’s spine. She backed up further, wanting to get far away from the creature before her.

“Of course, there are parameters.” Joan said after she’s poked in the furry cheek by Henry’s tail. “If you use the magic too much there are...consequences.”

Jane furrowed her eyebrows. “What do you mean?”

“You can turn to stone, for one.” Joan said, supremely bored at having to say it out loud. She was clearly disgruntled by the side effects to her fun powers. “I also heard the Moonstone could destroy the body or something.”

Jane winced, although she didn’t mind the thought of her captor turning into a statute for the rest of time. Perhaps kids would climb on it and mock it if that were to happen, knowing she would never ever get out. Or maybe it would get destroyed into thousands of tiny, harmless shards that she could dance upon in glee.

“I see.” She said after a moment. Henry was staring at her with blood red eyes. Her shoulders hunched around her neck as she struggled not to squirm under his gaze.

“But enough of that!” Joan waved her talons. “Just know that if you ever need anything, I’ll get it for you. With exceptions, of course.”

“So I can’t ask to be set free?” Jane said bitterly, already knowing the answer.

“Yup,” Joan nodded. “But I don’t want you to feel like a prisoner.”

“You’re doing a great job at that,” Jane rolled her eyes. When she centered her gaze back on Joan, she saw that the girl’s hands were clenched and the quills on her shoulders were bristled up like the fur of a threatened feline.

“I could have killed you.” Joan hissed lowly. “I could have done terrible things to you, but I didn’t. And I don’t want to. But don’t forget that I can.”

Jane swallowed thickly, suddenly feeling sick. Oily, sticky dread was spilling through her like a tidal wave. She tilted sideways and dipped a hand into the pool, and the coolness of the water seemed to soothe her slightly.

“Alright,” She whispered.

Joan settled. The quills on her shoulders flatten.

“Good.” She said. “I’m glad.”

An awkward and tense silence fell over the stage like a thick smog. Jane was frozen where she was huddled against the far side of the cage, one hand still submerged in the pool, while Joan sat crisscross in front of her confinement, staring at her lap. Henry was perfectly peaceful, still woven regally around his ally’s neck.

Then, Joan’s head snapped up. Henry is jostled a bit; his tail slithers up and winds halfway around her neck for extra balance.

“I know!” Joan said. A new light was lit in her eyes, but Jane could see that it was slightly forced. She could read the girl before her like a book, as if the Moonstone has granted her mind reading.

Joan held out her talons and crackles of silver burst between her palms before swirling together in a grand show of sterling. They curve and coil around each strand of magic until twin beautiful milky orbs like translucent moons and a circlet made of silver woven wires with three ebony gemstones caught in the middle formed. She took them and then eagerly shoved her hand through the bars of the cage, giving them to Jane.

“There! Something pretty! I���ll have to make you new clothes soon, too. You’ll be here awhile.” She said.

Jane had been pleasantly endeared by the beauty of the jewelry for just a moment, but that was squashed by the last statement Joan made, replaced with fear that made her feel ill all over again.

Would she ever see the queens again?

Would she ever see her precious daughter again?

Oh, poor Kitty... She was probably losing her mind with worry and anxiety. Not being by her side and there to comfort her most be so daunting. She even found herself lost without the young queen there clinging to her hand or grinning up at her adorably.

“Oh my god, will you STOP?” Joan growled. “I KNOW you are thinking about Howard and it’s SO ANNOYING. Won’t you like my gifts for once?”

Jane tentatively plucked up the earrings and circlet. They felt normal in her hands, no throbbing magical pulse in them aside from their creation, but she didn’t know for sure. They still made her very nervous.

“They’re nice,” She said. “But Kitty is my daughter. I’m going to worry about her. She’s probably so scared...”

“NO SHE’S NOT!!” Joan suddenly roared. Every spike on her body was standing on edge and the tip of her tail was flicking back and forth in a very agitated manner. Even Henry seemed to be startled by her outburst, as he slipped slightly from his position and had to frantically wriggle back to avoid falling off. But when he settled, his eyes slanted into a slyly pleased expression. “She’s not your—your daughter! She’s just some kid you thought was interesting enough to take under your wing as if she doesn’t have everyone else’s pity.”

“She is my daughter and you will not speak of her that way.” Jane snarled, using her queen voice. Usually that would frighten Joan into submission, but Joan was no longer susceptible to such a tone.

“I can do whatever I want.” Joan struck back. Her quills rise again, tail lashing. “I could kill her, you know? I could kill her and throw her body into your cage so you can rot with her. Would you like that? Would you enjoy cuddling your precious daughter as maggots infest her and her flesh falls off?”

Jane can’t take it- she vomits into the pool set into the ground.

Horrid images flash in her mind and she screws her eyes shut to try and block them out, but they keep shoving their way in. Kitty headless, Kitty decaying, Kitty as a skeleton, Kitty bleeding from a slit in her throat, Kitty eviscerated and gasping her last breaths, Kitty covered in blood and weakly reaching for her- they all kept piling on top of each other, one after another after another after another.

“Do you talk to your mother with that mouth?” Jane snarled lowly. She didn’t know where to look- at the monster, at the rocks waiting to gore her, at the chunky green-brown billowing through the pool. She didn’t want to see at all.

“What do you think I’m going right now?” Joan smirked wickedly, fangs flashing in the half light.

Jane vomits again. She can hear the faint sound of Henry’s hissing laugh.

“I’m joking.” Joan chortled. “But no. My mother left me and my brother to fend for myself. But, ohhh, if I knew her now...” The form of a faceless woman coiled up from the ground. The rock she was made out of seemed indestructible up under Joan slashed out the throat and spews of red came shooting out. It looked so real, despite quickly dissolving in the air. Joan stuck two claws into the eye sockets. “I’d make her pay for leaving us. For disappearing with that slimy lowlife I have to call a father. They’re both—“ She punctuates her snarl with a swipe to the woman’s belly and magical entrails came spilling out. “—worthless! And horrible! And cruel! And the worst parents ever!!”

The woman is dismembered violently by the monster until she’s nothing but rock shards and fake, but realistic blood strewn across the ground. Joan stomps on what used to be the skull several times until it cuts into the soft padding under her strange feet.

She looked to Jane and froze when she saw that she was shaking with a horrified expression plastered on her face. And, like that, all her anger is blown away, leaving only fear equal to, if not more than, the queen’s.

“I’m...” She looked down and splayed her claws open, staring at them as if they were drenched in blood. She swallowed thickly. “Enjoy your gifts...”

She turned and disappeared.

Jane didn’t move for half an hour, and then, once she knew Joan wasn’t coming back soon, began to cry.

———

Joan curled up into a small ball in the large nest she had built for herself with her magic. It was situated in the corner and was egg shaped, made of woven needles of black rocks with an opening that she could crawl into. There, she lay tangled in the dozens of soft blankets and colorful quilts and fluffy pillows, crying into the fabric.

“I’m a monster, I’m a monster,” She sobbed, pulling on her horns.

“No, my dear,” Henry said languidly from where he sat on a large, pastel yellow pillow. He slithered over its length and gently nudged Joan’s head with his nose until she looked up. His tongue flicked silkily against her cheek, licking away her tears. “You are not a monster. You had every right to react that way. It’s the expense of being a ruler.”

Joan sniffled pitifully. “I-I just want Jane to love me...” She whimpered.

“Then why not make her?” Henry flicked his tail and smiled slyly.

“Wh...what do you mean?”

Henry tilted forward and poked Joan’s nose with his own. “You have magic, darling. Why not use it?”

Joan blinked at him before clambering out of the nest and walking over to the desk in the room she’s claimed as her den. She sifted through the mess on the top before finding a glistening silver and blue necklace. She turned back to Henry, who was grinning at her from the opening. He nodded at her with a flick of his tail.

Joan clenched the necklace tightly in her hands and held it to her chest.

“I enchant this necklace,” She murmured. “To make the wearer love me like a daughter.”

No matter what.