iluvroadrunner6 | get your words out { 2018 } gywo yahtzee

Entry tags:

get your words out { 2018 } gywo yahtzee

Round 1 (8/8) | Round 2 (0/8) | Round 3 (2/8)
Running Score: 320
Word Count: 49,233

Walter and Aaron’s first date wasn’t really a date, and it involved a New York City scavenger hunt, a cranky magical elder with a mean streak, and an invisible duck.

Yes, a duck that’s invisible.

See, the thing about being the crowned prince of all magic, is that eventually you have to start courting the current magical elders and gain their trust and blessing. This is easier with some of them than others. For one, some of them are younger, and are more willing to give a chance to a young, twenty one year old kid from New York City and trust him to make decisions for the new era. Some of them are like Morgan LeFay, who’s been with his family since he was a child and had seen him grow up. Some of them were gods who just didn’t really give a shit so long as the world kept turning and their patrons kept finding them.

And then, in the midst of all of that, there’s Baba Evgenia.

When she strode to the Pentaghasts’ front door, looking like something out of a Grimm’s fairy tale (for all he knows she’s why Grimm’s fairy tales exist), holding a real live duck under one arm, she already seems like she disapproves of whatever Walter’s about to do, but he has to try to be polite anyway.

“Baba Evgenia. Thank you for coming.”

“Bah.” She pushes her way past him, looking around the interior of the apartment, looking around with a disapproving eye. “Too modern.”

“I’m … sorry?”

“When are we leaving for dinner?”

Walter falters again, confused for a moment. Most of these meals have taken place in his own home, giving the elders’ different idiosyncrasies. He hadn’t expected that they would be leaving. “Sorry?”

“I would like to have Shake Shack.”

“Shake Shack. Right, of course. Would you like me to order it?” He’s starts to reach for his cell phone and she reaches forward with her stick and smacks the meat of his hand.

“I do not want no ‘delivery’.” She says the word as though it’s an affront to the human language, and her duck quacks loudly in agreement, forcing Walter to stumble back even further. “By the time the burgers arrive they taste like soggy dog meat. We eat at restaurant.”

“Of course. No problem. Good deal. Would you like to leave your duck here?”

There’s another smack of her walking stick. “Why would I leave Dmitri all alone in unfamiliar apartment? He loves Shake Shack.”

“Well, it’s just that the restaurant might not appreciate it if we have a duck in their restaurant – ”

“That of no matter.” She reaches forward, taps her fingers against the top of the duck’s head and Walter watches as the duck vanishes from view, suddenly invisible to even the magical eye. Walter blinks again, before he nods his agreement in return.

“Great. Well, then. That settles that. I’ll just … instruct the help to eat the large meal of Russian delicacies I painstakingly prepared and we’ll go to Shake Shack.”

“Good. It is what the help deserve. Russian delicacies taste like garbage waste.”

Walter tips his head back as they leave the apartment and offers a quick prayer to the ceiling in his wake. He hopes that this will be the end of things, but he also knows he’s going to be wrong. That’s the way things with magic usually work.

* * * * *

To Walter’s credit, things were fine for a while. He manages to eventually get a conversation going with the old witch woman that manages to go fairly pleasantly for a bit until they start to leave in search of what Baba calls “ice cream big as Dmirtri.” Walter is all for ice cream and is willing to show her to one of his favorite places, this all goes awry when they get to their feet and lets out a forlorn wail.

“DMITRI!”

“What? What is it? What about Dmitri?”

“He’s gone!” And then the fearsome witch turns on him with a steadfast glare. “You lost him!”

“I what?”

“You lost him! You lost my precious beautiful Dmitri.” She then starts moaning forlornly in Russian, and Walter’s eyes widen as he starts to look around as though that’s going to help him find the very invisible duck and he tries to stammer his response.

“Can lift the invisibility? Then we’ll be able to see him?”

That very sensible excuse is only met with more moaning, and Walter is convinced that this is all going to end incredibly badly for him when a familiar voice steps up behind him, and a hand taps him on he shoulder.

“Walter?”

He spins violently in response, arms flailing everywhere, but when he sees who it is, he stops. Officer Aaron Wilkinson, the man who saved his life not all that long ago, is standing there, confused, a pretty redheaded girl at his side. He’s dressed down for the occasion, and it’s possible he looks even better than he did in the bulky, awkward policeman’s uniform that he’s used to encountering him in.

“Aaron. Hi.”

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah, it’s fine, I just happen to have lost an invisible duck.”

“DMITRI,” wails the witch from behind him.

Walter takes a deep breath and gives Aaron a very pleading look. “Help me.”

There’s a small twitch at the corner of Aaron’s mouth, fighting back a smirk at Walter’s predicament, and he glances back at the bemused redhead over his shoulder. “Bess?”

“I got Baba Evgenia. She loves me.” She then steps forward, pats Walter on the shoulder lightly. “You better find that duck.”

Water turns and watches her go, blinking in confusion for a moment, before turning back to Aaron. The other man shakes his head, before gesturing for Walter to follow him. “C’mon. I’ve got a good idea of where to start.”

* * * * *

“So. Baby Evgenia.”

They’ve grid searched their way through several blocks, calling for that stupid duck, and Aaron waits until he finds a nice pocket of silence to exercise judgement. Walter sighs sheepishly as he rubs the back of his neck, before nodding his agreement.

“Yeah. We’ve started the whole ritual courting allies thing. It’s … ”

“Terrifying?”

“Oh, shit yeah.” A laugh bubbles up out of him, unaware how much tension he’s been holding in without being able to talk about things as they are. “It’s just … I want to make a good impression, you know? I don’t want any of them to murder me in my sleep.”

“Want some unsolicited advice? Not that I have much experience but at least from my perspective?” Walter nods and he continues. “Don’t worry about impressing them. You don’t want them to have to see you as a kid. All of these delegates you’re meeting with are old as balls, and they don’t really give a shit about what you’ve done to be impressive. They want to make sure that as an ally, you’ll be worthy of their trust. Best way to do that is to put yourself on their level.”

“How the hell do I do that?”

“Have a little confidence.” Aaron reaches over to take his arm before turning him to face him. “You took out Merlin. You can take out them too, and they know it. Show a little more confidence and they’ll be ready to follow your lead.” He squeezes his arm gently. “Then you’ll be chasing a lot less ducks.”

“Point.” He sighs before turning back to the alleyway at hand. “Speaking of – DMITRI!”

This time, however, instead of silence, they heard a loud quack from the direction of one of the garbage cans. This is then followed by some rustling and some garbage spilling into the alleyway. The two men glance at each other for a moment and raise eyebrows at each other.

“Think that’s our duck?”

“Let’s find out.” Aaron’s hand reaches into his shirt for a moment, before fishing out the silver cross that usually hangs around his neck. He pauses for a moment, focusing his power, and it’s not long before a ring of white magic washes out over the alleyway, eventually fizzling out some spell lingering in the area. Just as the magic fizzles from view, there is an ornate duck lingering in the alleyway.

Walter gives a whoop of victory. Dmitri turns and begins to flee away from them. “Oh shit,” he mutters before flailing and taking off after the duck in question and preparing to catch it. “A little help here!?” he calls back over his shoulder, and he catches a glimpse of Aaron shaking his head and taking off after him.

* * * * *

Eventually they return to the Shake Shack, covered in feathers and dirt but holding Dmitri in hand. Bess and Baba Evgenia are waiting outside the restaurant for them, and the minute the duck comes into view, the old witch lets out a squeal of glee and takes it into her arms, murmuring sweet nothings in Russian. Bess smiles in return, before reaching up and clapping Walter on the shoulder.

“Nice job, Your Majesty.” Then she turns to Aaron and holds out a bag that smells like burgers. “I figured when you got back you’d want a shower and then food in that order, so I got our burgers to go.”

“You are awesome,” Aaron sighs as he takes the bag, popping it open and inhaling a deep breath with a happy sigh. “Thank God for red meat.”

Walter nods a bit as Bess goes to hail a cab, before offering Aaron a small smile. “Thanks, by the way. For the help. You didn’t have to.”

Aaron glances over at him with a small smile in return. “Let’s just say you owe me one.”

“Well, feel free to call in that one any time.” A beat. “Literally, any time, I have zero social life beyond royal appointments.”

Aaron laughs a bit, before eyeing him for a moment and taking another step closer. “That doesn’t sound so much like a favor – more like a date.”

Walter’s eyes widen and he swallows, eyes glancing tentatively over to the redhead. “But –?”

“We’re not dating. We’re just friends.”

“Occasionally with benefits,” Bess adds helpfully, and Aaron shoots her a look, before turning back to Walter.

“Though if this is the kind of fare that you usually save for dates...”

“God, no. There is a hundred percent less chance of ducks for our next date.” A beat. “First date. As we’re establishing that this is clearly not a –”

Walter is cut off by the other man stepping forward, moving one hand to rest against the side of his neck gently and leaning in for a warm kiss. Walter isn’t expecting it, and it takes him a moment to melt into it, but eventually he does, hands moving to rest against Aaron’s waist as he just relaxes and enjoys it. It’s probably the first time all evening that he actually feels like himself, so he’ll take it.

Eventually Aaron pulls back with a smirk, before nodding. “I’ll call you.”

“That sounds great,” Walter nods as the two of them get in the cab and he waves them off. He stands there, watching the cab go, when Baba Evgenia steps up next to him.

“I like him. Strong back. He’ll be a good lover.”

Walter is then shocked back to reality, and he turns to the older woman with a nod. “I will keep that in mind.”

“Come. We still have ice cream to get.”

Walter huffs a laugh, before shaking his head and falling into step next to her. “Of course, Baba Evgenia. Lead the way.”

Thankfully, the rest of the evening went without any greater incident. But all in all, he has to admit – that wasn’t a terrible first date. Though next time, he made sure that there were absolutely no ducks involved in any subsequent dates with Aaron.

Edited 2018-02-27 14:43 (UTC)

The room around her was stuffy and stale and it’s the first thing Jennifer really notices as she starts to come to. She doesn’t really remember what happened, exactly, save for a bright light and blessed unconsciousness. She doesn’t even really want to open her eyes right away, but she needs to check and make sure her partner in crime is okay. Her hand reaches out idly, feeling the scratch of whatever she’s wearing against her arm in contrast to the silk of whatever the person next to her was wearing.

“Deirdre?”

The silk moves, a hand grasps her shoulder, and a disappointed voice meets her. “What the hell are you wearing?”

That is enough to have Jennifer open her eyes and look down. The scratchiness of the material is certainly not what she had been wearing a few minutes earlier, and when she does manage to get her eyes to focus, there are a few problems at hand. One, she’s dressed in menswear – not necessarily a huge problem as she’s never been particularly girly, but she’s definitely never been this masculine. Two, she has no idea where they are – there’s nothing about the room that’s familiar by any stretch of the word, and finally, three:

“Uh, Deirdre? Where did the color go?”

The other woman’s normally vibrant red hair shifts back over her shoulder as she turns to look around, but no matter what, it’s clear that there’s something off here. Everywhere that there should have been color had been reduced to varying degrees of grayscale, almost like they’ve walked into something out of film noir. In fact, there are more than a few clues heading in that direction, including the private eye logo slapped on the door. Jennifer scrambles to her feet and moves towards the nearest mirror, looking herself over as she tries to adjust to this new look.

Upside: while she is clearly the private dick in this scenario, she doesn’t actually have one. Downside: she has no idea how they’re going to get out of this one.

“Oh no. The film festival.”

Jennifer raised an eyebrow as Deirdre rose behind her in the mirror, dusting off her form fitting dress, that seemed to appreciate all her curves perfectly. Jennifer turns to face her slowly, tipping her head to the side.

“What about the film festival?” Then, a second later. “Did we get sucked into the movie?”

“That is entirely possible, yes.”

“Why is that entirely possible?”

“Because sometimes magical backlashes can make things a little … wonky.” Deirdre huffs for a moment, blowing a curl out of her eyes as she turns to lean against the desk in the middle of the room. “I’m just saying it’s not unheard of.”

“How do we get out of the movie?”

“That’s the tricky thing. I mean, in theory, we should just be able to follow the plot to the end?”

“Do you know the plot?”

“No.”

“Deirdre …”

“We can figure it out.” She strides across the room, adjusting Jennifer’s tie with a smirk. “Look, it’s clearly a PI film, and you happen to be a detective. So all we have to do is solve the crime, and we’re free as a bird.”

Jennifer sighs heavily, before shaking her head. “I really hope you’re right.”

“Have a little faith, why don’t you?” Deirdre smirks, giving her a playful kiss on the cheek. “Besides, if I’d known you’d look this hot in menswear, I would have made you get a suit sooner.”

She blushes, then nods. “Okay, let’s do this.”

Hopefully they’ll survive to the end of it.

So one of the Zambezi totems wound up in a place called the Library.

Rip advised not breaking in and coming up with another solution. The Legends didn’t listen. It’s this series of events, and this series of events alone, that ends with Zari, Nate and Mick sitting down along the edge of a ledge in one of the main areas of the Library, facing down a series of people who are less than pleased to see them.

“Who the hell are you?” says the gruff one, who looks like he’s ready to punch all of them in the face – a softer version of Mick, in a lot of ways, Mick doesn’t seem all that impressed. The three of them glance to each other, then back to the “Librarians,” then give a small shrug in unison. Gruff Guy looks like he’s ready to growl at them, before the cute redhead (in Zari’s opinion) makes her way forward holding out a notebook in hand.

“It’s okay. I got this.” She then turns back to the Legends and tosses the notebook in their direction. “Catch.”

Mick and Zari, after seeing what some of the things in the Library can do, veer away from the flying item, but Nate, sweet, blessed, stupid Nate, brings up his hands on instinct, not because the redhead told him to catch, but just because he is that big a nerd.

“Is this one of the missing Jung notebooks?” Nate flips it open almost as soon as it lands in his hands, peering over the worn handwriting with the trained curiosity that comes with being a historian of his caliber. The nerd just loved old books, and that is when Zari starts regretting the choice of bringing him over Ray because now they’re screwed. “This is incredible.”

The Librarians seem surprised but his interest and mostly his competence in recognizing it, and the redhead nods before she continues. “It is. In fact, it is one of the first notebooks and due to some choice interactions with some ley lines has been imbued with the ability to force someone to verbalized their stream of conscious thoughts.”

Zari presses her lips together before clapping him on the back. “Good job, Heywood.”

“Yeah. Nice one, Pretty.” Mick glances up at the Librarians with a grim look. “Any chance we can get a beer before he gets started? We may be here a while.”

“I’m sorry, did you say Heywood?” The taller, older gentleman in the back begins before poking his head around the corner of the group. “As in Nathaniel Heywood, the historian?”

“That’s me.” Nate frowns before looking up at him. “Why? Am I on your list? Do places like this have a list? What did I do to get put on a list?”

“Here we go,” Zari mutters.

“Well, you are. Sort of.” The man steps forward and extends a hand. “My name is Jenkins. I’m the Custodian of the Library. You were one of our potentials.”

Zari frowns and her brow furrows. “Potential whats?”

“Librarians,” Jenkins continues. “The Library tried to send him an invitation, but apparently he was … unavailable.”

“Probably because I was already on the Waverider. It’s hard to send someone their mail when you exist outside the time stream. Though I have to say while this job looks very cool, I think my current job is much cooler.”

“I’m sorry – did you say outside the time stream?”

“If you put your hand over his mouth do you think that would allow him to shut up?” Zari asks Mick behind Nate’s back, and Mick gives a shrug in return.

“Worth a shot.” He starts to move again, and Nate dodges to get away from his hand before he can get there.

“Do not smother me, Mick. I already have enough nightmares about you trying to kill me in my sleep.”

Mick’s eyes narrow at that, and the Librarians are looking even more confused, and Zari just takes a deep breath, opting to put everyone out of their misery while they figure this out. “We’re time travelers. The Waverider is a time machine and we travel in time and space.”

The short Australian one tips his head to the side before he speaks. “If you’re time travelers, what do you want from the Library.”

“The Zambezi totem. Or one of them, anyway.” Nate opts to take a turn to fill in the blanks there. “We have three of the six and we need all of them to stop a demonic force named Mallus. And he’s seriously skeevy, you do not want him to go creeping around people’s minds and destroying time.”

The Librarians look very somber for a moment, before the redhead holds up a finger and gestures for the rest of them to follow her. “Hold please. I think we need to discuss this amongst ourselves.”

“Cool. We’ll be here. Just … hanging out and waiting. Cool.” Nate nods a bit and Zari glances down at the book in his hands and shouts after them as they retreat out of the room.

“Hey! Can you take this book – ” The doors to the main area of the Library close, and Nate looks over at Zari with a grin that could almost be defined as stupid.

“Your hair looks very pretty today.” He then turns to Mick. “And Mick, I just want to say …”

There’s a smack! and the book gets flung to the ground, skittering across the floor. Nate’s jaw drops.

“That’s a primary source for one of the founders of modern psychotherapy. You can’t just throw it around like that!”

“Yeah, well at least now you can keep your thoughts inside your head,” Zari points out as she shifts to lean back against the ledge.

Nate sobers for a moment, before nodding in agreement. “Good point.” Another beat. “I really did I mean it when I said –” And he is promptly silenced with two cold looks from the two Legends sitting next to him. “Right. Keeping it to myself.”

Mick shakes his head as he leans back. “Should have insisted on that beer.”

Edited 2018-03-11 21:51 (UTC)

“Rosalina, come.”

Her father’s voice is sharp but cool, managing to carry the distance between where he was kneeling in the gardens. It’s finally managed to be warm enough where some of the heavy winter snows have melted away and they’ve begun to see the green of the ground underneath. When your patron deity is the god of winter, you get used to the cold, whether you like to or not. Still, today the ground is green beneath their feet and all of Xandria is released from their cages, ready to take advantage of the beginning of their very brief spring.

Rosalina, all of ten years old, has many current plans for this beautiful spring day. As she’s already completed her fencing lessons for the day, she and her younger sister Veronica intend to have a picnic tea party on the lawn and braid each other’s hair while they watched Aster take his own turn with a blade. Veronica isn’t old enough yet, but when she is, she will do the same, but for now she’s content to eat cookies and ramble on about imaginary adventures while Rosalina works her hair into a delicate crown braid.

Sensible sister things, obviously.

But with her father’s sudden attention she is up like a shot, making her way closer to where he’s kneeling next to one of the recently upturned gardens where she knows the winter roses grow. Like blood red dots against the snows of winter, Frostward is famous for their beautiful roses that can survive the crush of winter. She asked about why this was their family’s gift when she was much younger, and he had woven her a beautiful story of a snow king falling in love with a summer queen, and their love creating something that could withstand the crush of both. Now, it seems as though he intends to show her something, and he gestures to the small cushion the edge of the garden, matching the one that he’s kneeling on himself.

“Kneel with me. There’s something I want to show you.”

She wrinkles her nose a bit at first – playing in the dirt has never been one of her preferred activities – but she does it without complaint, knowing that it will be part of her duties as a lady of the manor one day. Once she’s able to fold back on her knees gently, her father leans forward, digging his fingers into the soil firmly.

“I want you to lean forward and knead the soil. Really get it onto your fingers and under your fingernails.”

“But Papa –”

“I know you don’t like to get dirty, darling, but for some things that’s unavoidable. If something is really worth doing, you must do it with your own two hands.”

A broader lesson she wouldn’t understand the context for until she was much older, but Oleand Frostward had always had his eye on a bigger picture, and that includes his children. She nods once, taking a deep breath before plunging her fingers into the dirt and doing as she’s told. Almost immediately, the look of distaste that was resting on her face blossoms into a look of delight as a kind of music fills her that she hadn’t anticipated.

“It’s singing!”

Oleand smiles, before nodding and reaching his hands over hers, using his much larger hands to show her how to really dig her fingers in. The more they work the land, the more joyful the music becomes until it’s like a symphony, all of the pieces coming together to create something beautiful and transcendant.

“Could it always sing? Do all the realms sing? If I went to Asgard, would it sound like a different song?”

Oleand laughs before shaking his head. “Slow down, Rosa. You’re getting ahead of yourself and I can only answer one question at a time.” She falls silent, mollified for a moment, and lets him continue. “All the realms sing, yes, but only we have the special ability to hear it.”

“Does the song always sound the same?”

“Mostly. In the winter, it can be sadder and slower, but the melody is the same.”

“Do we talk to it? Is that how we are able to get it to grow our roses?”

He nods, withdrawing his hands and encouraging her to sit back on the cushion as he dusts off his hands. Without being immersed in the dirt, the song fades from her mind, returning her back to the world of the mundane, but the warmth of the memory still remains as she pulls her dirt covered hands close to her chest. Once his hands are mostly clean, he draws a small blade from his belt.

“The magic of the roses is on our blood, quite literally in fact. In realms with longer springs and summers, plants are able to get more nutrients so they can sustain themselves on their own. Here, they need a little extra help.” Rosalina watches in a kind of rapt fascination as Oleand pricks himself on the finger with the blade, drawing a small drop of blood that he turns and lets it drop into the soil. It takes a moment for the liquid to sink in, the ground drawing it in like it’s desperately thirsty, and her father closes his eyes, murmuring a soft chant under his breath. It’s with that, that the vines of the rosebushes that had been weakening and browning after the effort of blooming all winter begin to regain some of their color, including small red blooms beginning to blossom.

He stops once the first one reaches it’s full potential, before plucking it from the bush very carefully to avoid it’s thorns. “Roses have been the symbol of our house, and they are the good that we try to aspire to. Beautiful and fragrant, no matter what color they may be, they are always signs of different kinds of love, devotion and loyalty.”

She smiles softly, because these are all things she aspires to have at some point, to be known for her love and respect for others, as any good lady should. He then holds up a finger, before tipping the flower to expose the stem.

“But! Never forget that all roses must be handled with care. People can forget that beautiful things can be equally dangerous. Never cross a rose, for you will always find it’s thorns.” He then smiles, before using his blade to shave the thorns off the side of the stem and then sliding it into her bun in order to hold it securely in place. “We will work on this garden together, you and I. What do you think?”

She smiles widely before nodding. “Yes, I would like that.”

“Good.” He grins and rubs his hands together. “Good. Let’s get dirty, shall we?”

Rosalina has been in Valhalla for two years when word reaches her of her father’s death.

It’s news that knocks the wind from her sails, a kind of harsh reality that she knew she would have to face eventually (Valkyries have both longevity and rebirth, they live their lives in cycles of life and death), but she didn’t think it would be this soon. Her brother’s letter notes all the details, the sudden illness, all the healers’ efforts, and none of it is enough.

Rosalina’s never been one to show her emotions in public, too well trained and too conditioned to be anything but the picture of the stoic noblewoman, no matter the loss. Her tears are saved for when she and Mira are alone, the other woman the only one to ever see the way the façade can crack in the face of blows she’s not prepared to take. She ends the evening, after packing and making sure she was prepared for the trip back to, curled up in her lover’s arms and trying to release the weight of most of her grief before she returns to her siblings.

They will expect her to be strong. They will need her to be strong. Therefore all her weakness must be spent before she even leaves her home.

“Let me go with you,” Mira murmurs in her ear as one hand strokes her arm gently. “You don’t have to do this alone.”

“I know,” she says softly, before rolling over to face her with a small smile. “But not this time. I would rather you meet my siblings on a much more joyful occasion.”

“It doesn’t have to be about joy.” Mira’s hand comes up gently, stroking at her hairline with a small smile. “You need someone to lean on, as everyone else is going to be leaning on you.”

“I will be fine.” Rosalina leans in to kiss her softly, a thumb brushing against the apple of the other woman’s cheek. “And I will return to you before you know it. I promise.”

She knows it’s not what Mira is looking for, and that there’s more to this than the excuses that Rosalina is giving, but the death of her father is already enough of a social pot hole to navigate. She’s not sure she can think of anything else.

In the end, Mira lets her go, and the long line of goodbyes begin.

- - - - - -

It’s Aster who is waiting for his sister on the steps of Frostward Manor when she returns from Valhalla. Dwarfed by his father’s armor, he’s doing his best to wear it proudly, and he straightens his shoulders as his sister approaches. He’s young. Far too young to be chosen for this task, and far too young to even really understand the weight of it, but then again, so is she. They’re all far too young to be losing their father in this way, but that doesn’t change the fact that they’re here, and they need to figure out how to begin again.

All she can do, is try to steady things as much as she can before she returns to Valhalla. In the end, it’s all really anyone could do.

Despite the fact that he is now taller and broader than his sister, that doesn’t stop Rosalina from pulling him into a warm hug, closing her eyes and sinking into the hold. It’s only for her that he caves, nestling his face in the crook of her neck a bit.

“I’ve missed you.”

“And I you,” she sighs, before pulling back and greeting him with a smile. “How’s Veronica?”

“I haven’t seen her in days. The cooks say she’s been eating, but I can’t seem to find her.” The question lingers in the air for a moment, that silent if you don’t mind, and Rosalina’s smile widens, already pulling herself in to the tall stature that came less with being a warrior and more with being their older sister, and more of a mother than anyone else they had ever had.

“On it,” she says softly. “But do see if Belinda will whip up some of her delicious baked pheasant. I have missed her cooking terribly.”

“She began marinating last night in anticipation of your return,” he smirks. “Don’t worry. You are quite covered.”

She laughs as she makes her way into the maze of hallways that made up Frostward, her feet taking one step in front of the other as though she already knows where she’s going. It’s been some time since she’s seen her sister, but there’s parts of her that she still knows in her bones, parts that Aster isn’t privy to, and it isn’t long before she finds herself in the doorway of her father’s study. The room smells of dust and leather, just as she remembered it, and she needs a moment before she takes a few steps in.

Part of her still expects to see her father’s broad shoulders silhouetted against the morning light, hunched slightly as he works, but it’s only for a moment before the expectation fades away. She knows she’s never going to see it again, and part of her wishes she had known sooner. But that regret lasts all of a moment, before she pulls herself together again and turns to head into the stacks. Each shelf is passed in silence until she catches the brightly colored hues of her teenage sister’s skirts, and she stops with a small smile.

“I knew I’d find you here.”

Veronica looks up for a moment, her eyes wide with surprise at the familiar voice, before she quickly bursts into tears immediately after. Rosalina is quick to move to her side and let her curl into her arms, allowing her sister to expel her grief until there’s nothing left.

“I miss him so much,” are the first words she manages, and Rosalina nods her agreement, before reaching for the brush that was idling in Veronica’s hands, turning her so that Rosalina could brush her hair and get it into an appropriate style before the funeral services were to begin.

“I miss him as well.”

“Why didn’t you come home to see him?”

“I didn’t know, darling.” Veronica’s hair is easily bushed into soft, shiny plaits in front of her, and eventually she places the brush to the side and lets her fingers go to work. “Aster didn’t send word until Father had already passed.”

“And now he’s in charge of me. Now I’ll almost certainly never see you again.”

“Now, now, don’t be so rash,” Rosalina’s tone is only slightly scolding, still a bit of warmth lingering in the words as she worked. “There’s still Aster’s wedding, and yours.” There’s a pause as a small smile crosses her face. “And mine.”

Veronica’s head almost whips around completely at that, eyes widely comical in the way that most teenagers are when they hear a curious bit of gossip. “You?”

“Close your mouth, Veronica, you look like a fish.”

Her mouth does close, but it purses into a thin line instead. “Don’t change the subject. Are you getting married?”

“Not yet,” Rosalina sighs softly as she continues to braid her sister’s hair, and eventually ties it off at the bottom. “But there is someone I would very much like you to meet.”

“Did you bring her?”

“Not this time. But soon, I promise.”

“Good.” Veronica smiles softly as she leans back into her sister’s hold gently. “I know you will likely live a long life, but we won’t. I don’t want you to be alone.”

Rosalina smiles softly, and gives her a small squeeze. “I won’t be. I promise. And if you need me, all you have to do is send word. You don’t have to wait for Aster to do it for you.”

“So if he picks a dreadful future husband for me, I should call?”

Rosalina laughs before nodding. “But only if he’s legitimately dreadful. He’s just doing his best, alright?”

“Alright.” Veronica sighs softly, turning to stare at the books ahead of her for a moment, before she swallows hard. “I’m not ready to say goodbye to him.”

“You don’t have to. Not yet.” Rosalina swallows as she looks around the room. “For as long as you need him to be, he will be here. You just have to know how to look for him. In his study, in the gardens … he is everywhere where he showed us that he loved us.”

Veronica nods and glances back to her sister with a small smile, then brushing at the track marks of tears on her face. “How do you always manage to stay so strong?”

“Practice,” she says with a nod. “You’ll get there someday yourself. It just takes time.”

Veronica swallows and nods before starting to push to her feet and extending a hand to Rosalina. “Help me learn how to put on a brave face?”

Rosalina nods as she takes that hand up and gets ready to follow her out of the study. “Always.”

When Rosalina first realized that her interests deviated from the norm, she was fifteen years-old.

An older, elegant countess came, seeking to unite her holdings with her father’s and she brought her equally beautiful, equally elegant seventeen year old daughter with her to test the waters of becoming a “sister” to the Frostward siblings. It didn’t really work out well in terms of their potential marriage, but for Rosalina, it was an awakening. She’d toyed with flirting with men at court, never promising more than she was willing to give, but there was no spark in any of it. It was all performative, just because it was expected of her.

When Constance’s fingers brushed hers, it was like a bolt of lightning split through her. The teasing, bantering phrases of friends had an electric pull to them, almost as though Rosalina is forced to hold her breath between responses, worried that at one point that she may have pushed the game too far, and when Constance kissed her, hurriedly while pressing Rosalina against the wall of a blessedly empty hallway, it was almost as though everything made sense again. As stalwart and steadfast as she had been to the idea of the perfect noble and the ideal daughter, always assuming that she would marry a man and have children, as was expected of her, she knew that that moment was something that she could never go back from.

There were a number of other stolen moments, between that hesitant first kiss, and the moment when Constance’s mother yanked Constance out of Rosalina’s bedroom by her hair, but the first was always her favorite – that moment of understanding who she is, for the first time ever. While her father was understanding, tried to offer their daughters as a potential union, tried to give Rosalina a love that would burn bright, the countess refused. She married Constance quickly to a man of her choosing, and not long after that, the girl that Rosalina knew disappeared, shelved behind the countenance of “wife.” “Mother.”

Rosalina was luckier. She was selected for the Valkyries, was taken away from Xandria, was given a life of her choosing. There’s never a day that she takes that for granted, throwing herself into her life in Valhalla with the same vigor that she did becoming a noblewoman. It’s in Valhalla where she finds her purpose and her drive, where she finds a truer kind of love than the fleeting heat of passion she felt in her teens. Mira is the love of her life – she feels it in her bones, feels it in the way that she’s a better version of herself than she was before she met her, and she is convinced that their hearts are guaranteed for forever. They share their duty to the Valkyries, to keep anything, obligation or otherwise, from being able to come between them.

It’s that sense of duty and that sense of duty alone that has her remaining in Valhalla, but that sense of duty isn’t enough to pick her off the cold kitchen floor, blood drenched through her dress and tears running down her cheeks. They had kidded themselves about having forever, let the fact that they’re Valkyries trick her into believing that there was nothing they couldn’t survive.

They couldn’t survive Asgard.

They couldn’t, because Mira is dead, Asgard is lost, and they don’t even have a body to bury. Rosalina tries so many times to force herself up off the stones, but she can’t. It’s like she’s missing the parts of herself that would have allowed her to move. She doesn’t even move when she hears the familiar clatter of armor, and sees a familiar set of legs step in front of her.

“Rosa, love. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

Hecuba was a Trojan woman, once, named for a Trojan queen. One of the last great ones, if Rosalina remembers her stories correctly. Her voice is soft, the way Mira’s would have been once upon a time, but there are too many differences for her to delude herself into thinking that the world had righted itself again. Hecuba’s blond, where Mira’s hair was dark, her features soft and welcoming where Mira was all sharp angles, like painted glass. Hecuba is not the woman she wants, but it’s the woman she’s going to get.

“I should have held on to her body,” Rosalina’s soft reply echoes as she lets her hands be taken, but doesn’t move where she isn’t guided. “I should have made sure she was with me when we were called back. Now she’s going to be reborn in that … in that …”

“She won’t.” One of Hecuba’s hands comes up with a damp cloth in hand, wiping some of the streaks of blood and tears from her sister’s face. “Thor removed his power from the realm. There is no magic there now, and without magic, she won’t awaken.”

There’s a long pause as she feels the long thick braid that lingers behind her loosen, plaits of dark hair falling around her shoulders. Rosalina lifts red eyes to meet Hecuba’s gaze and she gives a soft, bitter laugh. “I can’t decide if that is better or worse.”

Hecuba’s face softens for a moment, before she leans in and presses a kiss to Rosalina’s cheek, arm tight around her as she begins to cry again. “I know you have suffered a great loss. I know this loss myself, all too well.” Rosalina remembers vaguely the stories, of Hecuba’s family that was slaughtered by a monster she eventually slew, leaving her the only survivor. It was shortly after that, that she was chosen for the Valkyries, giving herself a cause to strive for. Rosalina straightens a bit, before turning to look at her.

“How did you survive it? How did you not let them take you with them?”

“By allowing myself to lend my anger to something greater than myself.” Hecuba’s hand comes up again, brushing a hand from her face. “You are a Valkyrie. Lean in to that strength. Let your sisters support you, and count on the fact that we are feeling this loss as much as you are.”

Rosalina nods for a moment, before taking Hecuba’s hand and giving it a small squeeze. “I don’t know if I can do this alone.”

“You’re not. As long as you are a Valkyrie, you never will be.”

There’s a sharp irony to that statement, given everything that Rosalina had put into her duty as a Valkyrie, but she knows she needs to keep moving forward. She nods, before starting to shift to her feet. “I should probably clean up. It wouldn’t do to let Odin see me like this.”

“I’m sure he would understand if you wanted to take more time.”

“No,” she says firmly, before giving a small nod in agreement. “One foot in front of the other, yes? That’s the only way this is going to work.”

Hecuba nods again, a small smile crossing her face that’s more bittersweet than anything else. “Yes,” she nods as they begin to move back towards their rooms. “One foot in front of the other.”

“Oh that is rank.”

Even with the midsummer sun having slipped beneath the horizon, the heat and smell of rot wafting up from the swampy Everglade water around them is enough to make Aaron’s eyes water, and he glances away for a moment, squinting as he blinks the tears away and can refocus on his sister. Kendra was sitting towards the back of the speedboat, directing the rudder as they bounce over the waves. She seems less concerned by the situation.

Then again, Kendra always has a way of seeming less concerned about everything. Chill has always been her middle name.

“Are you sure we’re heading in the right direction?”

“If we’re looking for a minotaur, we need to follow the smell of death, yes,” Kendra replies coolly, only smirking when Aaron makes a bigger face in response. Especially since we don’t know how it got this far into the swamp in the first place.”

“Well, magic always finds a way,” he sighs as he turns his attention back to the stern, keeping his eyes focused on the rapidly approaching horizon. “And if there’s anything that’s a natural labyrinth, it’s the fucking Everglades.”

Magical monsters are always created by magical means, this much is true. But the circumstances of those magical means depends on the magical monster that you get. Manticores have become the most common, in the age of Wall Street investors and other kinds of visceral greed. Minotaurs, on the other hand – they tend to be a little more rare. The circumstances required are so specific that finding one person that checks all the boxes that happens to be in the area of a ley line flare up is difficult. But sometimes they do happen.

This happens to be one of those moments.

“Are we sure it’s this Taylors guy?” He reaches for the file his sister had put together over her time working the case and starts paging through the information again. “I mean, I’m assuming the all the expected signs aren’t literal ones.” No one is expecting his mother to have gotten it on with a bull the way that Pasiphae had, according to the story that started it all.

“Taylors father made some bad bets, got in over his head to a bookie. Set up a payment plan, but decided to prove, stupidly, how much money he could make said bookie by placing more bets, and losing. Bookie, upset with poor tribute, sends his enforcer to stay with him and his new wife to make sure that all payments are made appropriately. Wife decides to screw over her husband by banging said enforcer, and we get Taylors.”

“So I’m going to guess Bookie equals Poseidon, Enforcer equals bull?”

“The guy’s nickname is El Torro. It was not subtle.” Kendra laughs. “Guy happens to be a bit of a sociopath and pretty brutal when beating guys up, so I figure that covers the ‘animalistic’ nature.”

“And poor Taylors happened to be on the wrong ley line at the right time –”

“And he suddenly has a newfound love for labyrinths and scaring people off with the bones of poor boat tourists who happen to wander in too far. Great.” Aaron sighs as he shakes his head. “You know, with manticores and all that shit, usually it’s people getting what they deserve, you know? This is just fucking bad luck.”

“I know,” Kendra sighed as she killed the motor, just letting the boat drift with the current. “But it is what it is. We can’t just let it keep killing people.”

“I know.” Still sucks though is the silent thought that slips through the cracks as they fall into silence and keep listening to the water around them. It doesn’t take much for them to make out the start of the “stay away” signs, human and animal skeletons pinned to trees as a sign of the minotaur’s strength, and Aaron reaches behind him slowly, pulling out his glock and pulling back the safety.

“Stay frosty.”

Kendra nods as she reaches for one of the paddles and starts nudging them closer. They make it about halfway under the arch when there’s an inhuman roar that echoes off the trees and she holds up a hand, urging silence. The boat is still gliding along, but their eyes scan the trees and soft landmasses nearby, looking for any sign of the creature. They almost make it to the most prominent of the islands when Kendra stops moving the oar and frowns.

“What?” What is it?”

“I think it’s …” Before she can finish the sentence, the oar is yanked from her fingers and disappears beneath the water. Her eyes widen and she slams her hands down on the edges of the boat. “Brace yourself!”

He doesn’t have much time to do that before the boat tips violently and he decides that instead of holding on it’s better to dive away. He hits the water hard, gun slipping from his fingers into the dark, murky water. He kicks hard, pushing himself to the surface with a sputter as he scans the surface for his sister.

“Kendra! Ken-!” His voice cuts off as something closes around his ankle and he’s yanked down under the surface again. Part of him wants to panic, to wriggle his way out of this situation and in a way his lizard brain is right. The more he moves, the harder he is to hold on to. But he also needs to be purposeful in it, to make sure that he can be able to put some distance between himself and the minotaur.

He opens his eyes, his paladin night vision compensating some for the lack of light, but the swirling silt and mud doesn’t make it easier. Still, the golden glowing eyes of the minotaur eventually brighten in the clearing water, and the moment he manages to make out the face, he steel himself and slams his foot forward, right into the creature’s face. The first hit doesn’t do much more than make him mad, but with the second kick, his foot is freed and he pushes up to the surface again, giving himself a chance to take another deep breath. The one breath is all he gets, before he rolls onto his stomach and quickly kicks to shore.

He hears the minotaur surface behind him, but by then he’s in the shallows, feet finding purchase on the ground and he quickly scrambles up to the high ground, feeling a bit steadier on his feet. The minotaur moves faster than he does, so it doesn’t take him long to find the same purchase, and Aaron is down to zero weapons and his back up is a question mark. He takes a breath, before sliding down into a fighting stance.

“Look, man. It’s not personal. We just can’t have you killing people.”

The minotaur’s bull face was impassive, unreadable. But there was a definite huff, followed by his foot scuffing against the ground, and Aaron swallows hard before bracing himself for impact. But before the minotaur moves, there’s the sound of splashing behind him followed by his sister’s voice.

“Aaron, duck!”

He doesn’t even think twice. He just drops down and covers his head. The schink! of a blade cutting through skin follows and the minotaur makes one last pained noise before his head separates from his body, spraying both him and Kendra in a cascade of black blood. The body drops to the ground hard, and there is his sister, machete in hand, and she exhales slowly before nodding.

“You good?”

“Yeah. You?”

She nods before she moves to sit on the shore next to him. “We should just push the body back into the water. I’m sure the gators will love it.”

“Yeah,” he sighs, glancing down at the blood on his hands. “I just need a minute.”

“You got it.” She reaches over and places a hand on his shoulder gently. “You did good though.”

“Yeah. You too.”

“If you’re going to be a human, you’re going to have to eat human food, prepared human ways.”

The Leviathan, now newly christened “Ryan Metlars,” makes a face at him as Aaron places the cooked meat down in front of him. The former sea beast had been an omnivore, prepared to eat everything and anything in sight, exactly how it’s delivered to him, but a human digestive system is not nearly so forgiving. Or flexible. He’s easing him into things with a rare steak so its still a little bloody, but still safe for his digestive system.

Metlars leans forward, sniffing at the meat for a moment, before glancing back to Aaron. “What is it?”

“Cow,” Aaron sighs. “It’s just grilled.”

“Did you put anything on it like you did the chicken?”

“No, I learned from that mistake.” He watches as Metlars considers it for a moment before reaching forward with his hand to touch the meat and Aaron catches his wrist before he can get too far. “Eat like a human, remember? Use the knife and fork.”

Metlars grumbles, before doing as he’s told. Aaron can tell just by the way he’s holding them that the metal feels foreign in his hands, but he’s making an effort. That’s all Aaron can really ask for. He then moves to sit across from him to dig into his own steak.

“I know this is a lot, man. But you’ll get the hang of it. And we can prove that we can teach an ancient sea monster new tricks.”

He isn’t aware enough of human culture to get the joke. Instead, there’s simply a curious eyebrow raise before he watches Aaron’s hands, the way he uses the fork to hold the steak and the knife to saw through it. He then looks at the utensils in his hand, studying them for a moment then doing the same. “Why did you place the meat on the fire?”

“Kills the bacteria and other things that the human body can’t handle. And it makes it taste pretty damn good.”

“Do you have to do the same with fish?” Metlars manages to saw off a piece and place it in his mouth, chewing for a moment, before his eyes widen with a pleased expression, before going to dig in for another bite.

Aaron nods. “Most meats need to be cooked before humans can eat them. And humans also can’t live on meat alone – in fact, it’s not always good for you either. You need to supplement your diet with other things.”

Metlars pauses for a moment, before making a less pleased face. “I’m going to have to eat plants, aren’t i?”

Aaron smirks. “Don’t worry. I know ways to make them taste pretty good. We’ll ease you into things.”

Metlars sighs in return, before holding up the knife and fork. “Why these things? Why are they necessary?”

“It makes the food more manageable to eat. And is generally considered more polite.”

“Polite?”

“Nice to do. People don’t generally enjoy looking at other people chewing and tearing into their food like an animal.”

“Oh.” He tries again, sawing off another piece of steak before taking a bite, chewing and swallowing before he speaks. “I suppose it makes up for the lack of claws and fangs.”

“That it does.”

The two men lapse into silence with their food for a moment, Aaron making his way through the meat much more quickly, given that he doesn’t have to learn finesse with the tools in his hands. Eventually he’ll introduce him to sandwiches and things that can be eaten with his hands, but he still needed to learn how to use a knife, fork and spoon. After Metlars makes it half way through his steak, he looks up with a small frown.

“Do you regret it? Binding me, I mean.”

Aaron pauses for a moment, his eyebrows going up curiously. “Why?”

The other man gives a small shrug. While the finer areas of humanity were still escaping him, nonverbal communication seems to be something he’s picked up fairly well. “I have become a … responsibility. That wasn’t my intention. In some ways, it likely would have been simpler to kill me.”

“I didn’t bind you because it was the easiest way to get rid of you,” Aaron points out as he places his knife and fork down over his plate. “And I’m not afraid of responsibility. I did what I did because it was the most humane way to deal with the situation.”

Metlars head tips to the side for a moment, eyes blank with curiosity. “I don’t understand.”

Aaron pauses for a moment, before giving a small shrug. “Sometimes I get tired of killing things being the solution to everything. Even if I understand why it’s necessary, that doesn’t mean I enjoy it. And I would rather put in the work and help you adapt then put unnecessary blood on my hands.”

There’s another small moment of silence as Metlars swallows. “And what if I hadn’t been able to … adapt.”

“Then we would have crossed that bridge when we came to it. But we didn’t. You’re doing well.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

Aaron tips his head to the side, before offering a small smile. “Tell you what. Finish your dinner, and I’ll introduce you to a food you’re probably not ready for, but would enjoy anyway.”

Metlars nods for a moment, before going to finish up the meat in front of him. “What kind of food is that?”

“Ice cream.”

“Bess mentioned ice cream. She also said I would enjoy it.” He places the utensils down on the plate the same way Aaron had, before he nods. “What is so special about it?”

Aaron smirks as he goes to gather the dishes. “Let’s just say we’re going to figure out how well you can handle sugar.”

“That sounds ominous.”

Aaron laughs, before cleaning up and taking them off to the ice cream parlor. He’s fairly certain that Metlars’ first sugar high is going to be an adventure, but it’s an adventure he’s more than ready to have.

Aaron and Jude don’t really get a chance to talk until the mess of it all is almost over. He and Walter are leaving the next day, to head back to Miami where this all began for him and when he and Jude have never been particularly close – Jude has always been Kendra’s call to make, given how they feel about each other and Aaron’s own proximity to the narrative that became Jude’s life – but it’s for those reasons that Aaron always did want to reach out to him, to figure out how his life could be different if fate hadn’t changed it for him.

Now he’s Lazarus instead of Iscariot. The man who was saved instead of the man who betrays.

It’s a lot to take in, to have all the expectations for your life, suddenly rocked to the core and not really sure where to go from here. Jessie’s going to have to begin her ministry soon. He knows that much. But what does that make of his part in it?

Metlars throws Aaron and Walter a “Bon Voyage, Please Don’t Die” party at O’Leary’s the night before they’re due to head back to Miami and by the time Jude arrives things are winding down. Metlars has been commandeering the karaoke machine for the better part of an hour, and Aaron is lounging in one of the back booths, nursing a half empty beer. Things feel so normal that if it weren’t for the fact that the front window was broken and replaced by a piece of plywood, it might be easy to forget that the world almost ended and he died.

He died, and his best friend brought him back to life with the power of her will.

He should be drinking something a lot stronger.

Jude finds him before he can get up and make good on that thought, placing a fresh beer down in front of him and settling into the leather seat. “How long has he been at it?”

“I think he intends to murder the entire discography of Justin Timberlake before the night is through,” Aaron says, lifting his current beer with a thank you nod, before placing it back down again. “I’m not complaining though. It’s a nice distraction.”

“From the fact that you have to go back to saving the world tomorrow?”

“Mostly, yeah.” He glances over to Jude for a moment, before deciding to just spit it out. “Can I ask you something?”

“How many beers have you had?”

“Does it matter?”

“Generally a good indicator of how personal this question is going to get.”

“Mmm. Four?”

“I should have gotten a scotch.” Jude leans back to get comfortable and takes a long pull from his beer. “Alright. Go for it.”

“Why did you do it?”

“That question is very unspecific,” Jude dodges the question with ease. “And I have a very long life to choose from.”

Aaron narrows his eyes for a moment, before leaning in. “You know exactly what I mean. I may have been dead for a bit, but I’m still a cop.”

Jude shakes his head for a moment, before placing the beer down again. “Because I thought it was the right thing to do for my people.”

“You thought the right thing to do was turning over your best friend to people who wanted to kill him.”

He purses his lips together for a moment before pushing up and leaning forward into Aaron’s posture. Most people would probably be intimidated, but Aaron was drunk and newly resurrected. For the moment, he feared nothing. “Be careful in stories with a clear bad guy, Aaron.”

“You really going to paint Jesus as a bad guy in this scenario?”

“No, I’m saying that the gospels were written by mortal men who didn’t understand the power involved, and wanted to make me the bad guy. Men that I once called my friends and didn’t understand why I did what I did, or the politics behind it.”

“Then tell me your side of it.”

“First of all, he was more than just my best friend. He was my brother in arms. Secondly, I didn’t have the information you do now. I didn’t have the opportunity to reflect on my actions based on someone else’s experience.” Jude sighs as he leans back for a moment, rubbing his eyes in response. “All I had was the information in front of me. I saw the way the crowds were flocking to him, causing his power to grow. I saw the way the healing took a toll on him, in a way that was making him unstable. And I saw Mary …”

He pauses for a moment, swallowing hard and for the moment, Aaron almost regrets asking, digging up feelings related to something that happened so long ago. But the door has already been opened, so he keeps pushing.

“Saw Mary?”

“Magdalene. The way she looked at him, and he at her. I was worried that he was going to lose control and do something that would hurt all of us. Not because of her, necessarily, but possibly because something happened to her. Contrary to how much we may love those with magical gifts, particularly divine ones, their power is not easy to manage. Christians may have found purpose in his death, and they may find purpose in Jessie’s one day, but at the end of the day, we are paladins. No matter how much we love them, our job is to protect the world first.”

Aaron swallows hard for a moment, picking idly at the label of his beer bottle before he shakes his head. “I don’t think I could do it. Not to her.”

“Well, you don’t have to. You’ve been spared the burden, Lazarus.” Jude finishes off the rest of his bottle and gets to his feet, clearly intending on leaving the conversation. “You simply get to mourn her. Consider yourself fortunate.”

Aaron doesn’t really think that’s fortunate at all. Sure, he doesn’t betray his best friend, but in the end he’s still going to lose her. He isn’t sure if that makes it better or worse. Before Jude can get too far away, however, he speaks up with one last question.

“Hey, man.”

Jude stops, but he doesn’t turn around. Aaron considers that acknowledgement enough.

“You ever wonder if things would have been different? If you knew what was coming before it happened?”

“No.” The answer is a simple one, with almost no hesitation in his tone. Not that Aaron blames him, he’s had a lot of time to give it a lot of thought. “If I did, it only would have been more frustrating when my choices weren’t my own.”

Jude doesn’t give him much longer to dwell on that answer, stepping away from the table and heading back to Kendra and the bar. And when Aaron turns back to his beer again, he reaches for the fresh one and gives it a hearty sip. Part of him still wants to change it. But before he could do any of that, he and Walter have to save the world, again.

One problem at the time.

“Can I ask you something?”

It’s their second date. Walter would argue that it’s their third, because for some reason he happens to count the night they went scrambling through New York City after Baba Evgenia’s invisible duck. Aaron does not, because a date requires that both parties have fun and there not be a cranky Russian witch involved, never mind the fact that they just happened to be at the same place at the same time and no one asked anyone out, but Walter’s opinion is Walter’s opinion, and he’s learning that it’s hard to change that. It also probably doesn’t help that Walter’s general outlook on the world is a lot less complicated, having been as protected as he has, but Aaron is also learning that that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s unaware.

During their first encounter with each other, Aaron mostly saw a scared kid stuck in an impossible situation. A nerd who cared more about the things he’s accomplished than actually who he was. Slowly, he’s figuring out that there is more there, lurking underneath the surface, and while part of him just wants to pry it out of him, it’s something he’d rather do on his own time.

“You know you can just ask me, right?”

Aaron tips his head back a bit so that he can see Walter’s face. They’re stretched out on a blanket on the roof of the Pentaghast building, staring up at the stars. Head to head, bodies angled away from each other for now, but still close enough that they can hear what the other is saying. This adventure up to the roof had been preceded by the questions “Can I cook you dinner?” and “Can I show you something?” so while he appreciates Walter looking for his verbal and enthusiastic consent on everything, it’s starting to get a little tedious. He shifts a bit before rolling onto his side to face him.

“We are on a date. That implies a bit of getting to know each other, which also implies asking questions.”

Walter glances up at him with a bit of a lopsided smile. “You honestly do not want me to just stream of conscious questions all over you. Because they would never stop, and eventually I’d ask something stupid just because I can, and honestly none of this would end well.”

Aaron laughs. “Maybe I do. Better to know what I’m getting into now, right?”

Walter rolls his eyes a bit as he shifts to match Aaron’s posture for a moment, propping himself up on one elbow. “Also I’m sort of your king? It’s a weird power dynamic that I have no idea how to navigate in interpersonal relationships that I want to be as far away from that as possible. So … for now, while we’re getting to know each other, I don’t want you to feel like you have to answer anything you don’t want to or even entertain the question if you don’t want to.”

“Okay, that’s fair.” It’s something Aaron hadn’t really considered, probably because he doesn’t really see Walter as his king. They met before he even had to assume the role. “Ask away.”

“Do you think I’m going to be good at this? And please don’t tell me that I will just because you think it’s what I want to hear.”

Aaron squints for a moment. “Why are you asking me this?”

“Because I value your opinion,” Walter says with a small nod. “And I think you might be the only person who knows me at least somewhat well who I can trust to give me an honest opinion.”

“Okay, that’s fair, but why are you asking me this now?”

The other man is quiet for a moment, shifting back onto his back again and running a hand through his hair. “I haven’t exactly had the best start? I mean, Merlin manipulated me, right from the get go.”

“And you didn’t let him win.” Aaron swings his body around for a moment, shifting so that they’re both pointing the same direction so he can more directly look him in the eye. “You want me to be honest?”

“Yes. Desperately. Be honest with me.”

“When we first met, I didn’t know what to make of you, at all. You were a little all over the place, and my experience with Pendragons had been only tangentially, through stories that Apollo would tell about that one he used to bang two hundred years ago, so when Deirdre and I found out what you were, it was … not what I thought. At all. Part of me didn’t think that this rambling nerd could actually live up to Arthur’s legacy.”

“Okay.” Walter swallows for a moment. “Okay. Harsh, but I did ask you to be honest, and since you qualified that, I’m assuming that there’s a ‘but’ in there somewhere?”

Aaron smirks a bit before nodding. “But … you stepped up. You took the news that Merlin was fucking with you, and you did what you had to do to protect the world. You trusted your gut and did what you had to do, and that’s what makes a good king, more than anything else.” He reaches one hand up and brushes a hand against Walter’s cheek for a moment. “Look, in my experience first impressions can say a lot, but they’re not everything. You’ve proved that you’ve got good instincts. Just trust yourself and you’ll be okay. And if you’re not sure, I’ll do my best to always be honest with you. Deal?”

Walter pauses for a moment, before nodding his agreement. “Deal.” There’s a beat before he looks up at Aaron and shakes his head a bit. “Sorry. This is only our third date, I should probably be trying to stay cool and aloof.”

“Second date.”

“Third. The duck totally counts.”

“Second, that was not a date.”

“You kissed me at the end of it.”

“We wound up covered in mud and garbage, that is not a date.”

“And yet you still kissed me anyway.”

Aaron rolls his eyes before leaning in a bit, the hand against his cheek moving down towards Walter’s chest. “If this was actually our third date, we would be doing something way more interesting.”

The other man’s throat bobs with a hard swallow, and he stammers for a moment as Aaron’s face hovers a bit closer. “I mean, this is our third date, so we should absolutely be doing those things. In fact, we can go do them right now, if that’s what you really want.”

“Mmm.” Aaron makes a show as though he’s considering that. “Yeah, but I have this rule about waiting until the third date to make sure I really like a person, you know?” He has no such rule but making Walter squirm is more the point at the moment, and he pulls back to get to his feet a bit. “Actually, it’s getting late. I probably should go.”

Walter flops back onto the roof with a groan, one hand coming up to cover his eyes. “God you suck.”

Aaron laughs as he reaches down a hand to help him up, and Walter takes it begrudgingly, pulling to his feet. As they make their way to the door, Walter slides his hands into his pockets with a slow smile.

“Sure you don’t want to stay for dessert?”

“Is dessert you?”

“No, I am not that confident. Dessert is the banana cream pie that I cooked this afternoon.”

“You bake too?” Aaron teases a bit as he waits for Walter to open the roof door. “You’re just full of surprises.”

Walter grins. “So you in or not?”

“Fine,” Aaron replies with a nod. “I think I can stay for one slice.”

If two hours later he happens to be texting his roommate that he’s not going to be coming home tonight, well, that’s a choice for future Aaron to worry about.

The club smells like cologne, sweat and booze. Kendra has never needed whatever they were offering more desperately in her life. For a girl who’s big on control, the way things have unraveled over the past week has been grating at every nerve she has. The evening has already come to a head with her snapping at both of her brothers before she stormed out to get some time on her own, and thankfully they didn’t follow her. Whether it’s because they both knew better or because Aaron did remains to be seen, but her money is currently on the latter.

As much as she tries to be the grown up, Darren’s inability to step up lately has been grating her last nerve which has required Aaron to step in and mediate. He shouldn’t have to do that, being a grand total of fifteen years-old, but this is apparently the world they live in right now. It’s a world that pisses Kendra off, but right now it’s also a world that’s not her problem. She’s not hunting, she’s not looking to live any part of her live right now, beyond wearing something short and tight, having a few drinks, and finding someone hot to dance with for the night.

Maybe a bit more than dancing. The night’s still young.

She’s managed to at least achieve the first two, having brought her best club dress and being five tequila shots in towards her goal of being very drunk. The latter seems to be where she’s having trouble, with most of the guys of interest either being taken or sketchy. Neither is particularly appealing, as she’s neither a homewrecker or an idiot, but this is the situation she’s found herself in. She’s almost starting to think that she may have to look towards some of the women in the crowd, who are far harder to entice for anything more than dancing (and she’s aiming for efficiency, not romance), but before she completely resigns herself to that idea, she catches the eye of a man at the far end of the bar.

He’s tall, or at least taller than her from the way he’s leaning. His features are tan like most of the men in this Miami salsa club, but they’re not Hispanic – more Mediterranean, maybe even Middle Eastern. Long dark hair hangs around his shoulders, with a bit of stubble on his cheeks, and when his dark eyes catch hers, he looks her over once, before raising his beer in her direction. She turns, taking one of the remaining shots and doing the same, then tipping it back down her throat and wincing through the burn. He takes a sip of his beer in return, before making his way around the bar and moving to stand next to her.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you in here before.”

“I don’t come here often. Just wanted to blow off some steam.” She leans back at the bar a bit as she continues to look him over. Broad and well-muscled, he has exactly the kind of stature she usually goes for. Maybe tonight won’t be such a waste after all. “This your usual place?”

“Not exactly.” His accent is something she can’t quite place, and she continues to try and place it as she listens to him talk. “But when you’ve been here every night for the past three weeks, you get to know the regulars.”

Her eyebrows go up a bit at that. “Is there a reason you’ve decided to be that prolific?”

He laughs. “I’m waiting for someone.”

“Is that a cheesy pick up line or something?” She’s really hoping it is, because she’s not sure she’s ready to be disappointed this far in. “Or are you actually waiting for someone?”

His eyebrows go up in return, confused, before he realizes what she’s talking about and backpedals. “Not like that. I don’t know them, but I’m looking to do business.”

“What kind of business?”

“The boring kind, best not spoken of when you’re trying to impress a beautiful woman,” he grins, before shifting his beer to his left hand and extending his right to her. “I’m Jude.”

“Kendra,” she nods as she reaches forward to shake his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“You as well.” He pauses for a moment, before reaching forward slowly to caress the edges of the silver cross around her neck. “I have to say, this is a really beautiful piece.”

“Family heirloom,” she says, before reaching up and taking his hand, pulling it away from the cross. It wasn’t so much the proximity of his touch – the way she moves his hand to her hip says as much – but more what the cross implies. She wants to be as far away from her current life as possible, even if there are parts of her she can’t turn off. “Not that interesting. I think there are much more interesting things you could talk about.”

His eyes are clearly showing interest, looking down at the placement of his hand, and tipping his head to the side. “Not always acceptable ones, for most.”

“Guess I’m the exception,” she teases. “We don’t have to talk though. We could always just dance.”

He smiles in return, letting her turn them and lead him out towards the dance floor. “Who am I to turn down that?”

Dancing starts off fairly innocent at first – or as innocent as you can get in a club setting. But it doesn’t take long before she’s being forced in closer to press against him, and hands are wandering, hers as much as his. Soon dancing’s turned to grinding, grinding has them moving to get off the dance floor and somewhere slightly more private to take advantage of what she assumes they both want. Dance club bathrooms aren’t necessarily the most romantic of locations, but right now she’s beyond caring. She lets Jude pin her to the wall, hiking up one of her legs over his hip as they kiss so that he can push himself closer.

She is all in, had been since she first laid eyes on him. That is, until she feels her knee brush up against something equally hard as what is pressing between her legs, but on the wrong part of his anatomy. She pushes him back for a moment, confused shifting her leg so that she can get a better look at the glock hidden in the shoulder holster under his jacket. She frowns, pushing the jacket back so she can get a better look, and then back at him.

“What the hell?”

“I can explain –”

Before he can get any further than that, the door to the stall that they were using slams open, and standing behind it is the bartender – she recognizes the standard black shirt, black pants combo from when she was ordering her drinks earlier. What’s different about him is his face – his eyes are dilated and blown, his canines extending to form fangs, and the snarl that escapes his throat is decidedly not human. Kendra’s eyes go wide for a moment, because that is definitely some kind of vampire, and here she is, completely unarmed.

“Oh, fuck this.”

[Part 2]

Edited 2018-05-02 00:17 (UTC)

[Part 1]

Jude is starting to rethink this whole plan of his.

It isn’t that it wasn’t a good plan – it clearly worked. The incubus is standing right in front of them, fangs bared, ready to chow down, or in this case be shot in the face. It had been sloppily leaving bodies in the vicinity of the club for months, always couples, always in various states of undress, and Jude had just needed to weed out who it was. The fact that another paladin just happened to be available to provide the bait had been icing on the cake that was this night.

Should he have told said paladin what was happening? Maybe inquired to her training level in all of this? Yes, that might have been a wise course of action to take. But Kendra had drawn him in like a magnet, short circuiting the critical thinking part of his brain and leading to poor decision making like this one.

(Not that she’s a poor decision. In fact, if she doesn’t hate him when this is over, he would very much like to return to their previous activities. But for right now, there’s an incubus to kill.)

He’s about to shift his body to shield her, so that he can shoot it, but before he even realizes what is happening she’s already in motion. As the incubus charges them, she shoves her heeled foot into his chest, shoving it backwards towards the sinks on the other side of the bathroom. Her hand then closes on the handle of his gun, drawing it with practiced ease and firing three shots directly into the incubus’s chest.

She misses the heart, but from her position, the fact that she managed to hit at all is impressive to say the least. The incubus hesitates for a moment, seeing the blood flowing, and starts to take off towards the door. Kendra shoves Jude away from her and follows into the corridor that lead to the door of the restroom, firing one last shot that misses the bartender and buries itself in the doorframe of the restroom.

“Damnit.”

She lowers the weapon and Jude pokes his head out from behind the stall door, looking to see the damage left behind. There’s splotches of blood leading the way to the incubus’ escape route, and he takes a few steps forward towards her. “He can’t get far like that. If we move, we can still –”

Before he can even finish that sentence, she turns on her heel, fast and smooth, an coldcocks him with the butt of the gun. Jude can already feel his body dropping like a sack of bricks, having happened too fast for him to shake his way out of it.

“Should have seen that coming,” he mumbles, before everything goes black.

* * * * *

When he comes to later, he finds himself tied in a very uncomfortable way. His hands are bound behind his back, ankles to the legs, and he groans a bit, before opening his eyes to try and get a gauge on things. Fortunately, he is neither blindfolded, nor gagged, and the room is well lit enough that he can make out the fact that they’re in some kind of warehouse. Movement draws his attention next, and he glances over to find her standing at the trunk of a car, rifling through it with her back to him. She’s still in her club clothes but now she had a glock in her hand and is checking the magazine, and he can’t say he’s ever found anyone more attractive.

It probably says a lot about him, but Jude is old enough at this point that his deviations are just a natural part of who he is. He weighs his options for a moment, before deciding that speaking is likely the best course of action.

“This is all a really big misunderstanding.”

“Oh, is it?” Kendra raises an eyebrow as she sets the glock to the side, then turning to face him and crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Because right now, I’m seeing two options. One, you’re a lure, and you intended to get me all wound up so that the incubus would eat me, or two you’re an idiot, who thought that it would be hot to get a girl in on your superhero fantasy. Or, actually, there’s a third option, where you’re a paladin, but just an asshole who thought it would be a great idea to use me as bait, but not let me in on the fact that you were hunting.”

“Which one out of two or three is less likely for you to kick me in the dick?” he asks tentatively, and she rolls her eyes before turning back to the car again, kicking off her heels as she does.

“So it’s three then.”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“Who the hell are you, anyway? I didn’t know there was another paladin on my family’s turf.”

“I don’t really subscribe to ‘turfs’,” Jude admits, rotating his wrists a bit to see if he can get any traction there. “I just go where I’m needed and that club had been stacking up a lot of bodies.”

“That doesn’t really answer my question.”

“I told you, my name is Jude.”

“Not good enough anymore. It was good enough when I just wanted to turn you into a one night stand, but now things are getting professional. What’s your last name?”

“You don’t actually want to know that.”

“Actually, I really think I do.”

Jude grits his teeth for a moment, watching her as she grabs a pair of pants from the bag, as well as a jacket to throw over her shoulders and a pair of boots. The moment he gives her that answer, their entire dynamic will change, but in a lot of ways, he’s already obscured the truth enough for one evening. So he takes a deep breath, and nods.

“Iscariot.”

The name causes her to still, as it would most people. The dots connect, and when she turns back around to face him again, she almost looks like she doesn’t know what to think. “You’re serious?”

“It’s not something I like to throw around, but yes.”

She swallows hard, before shaking her head. “I guess being an asshole tracks.”

He sighs, before leaning back in the seat. “I did not mean for things to go that far. You were simply the most captivating thing I had ever seen. I got carried away.”

She rolls her eyes, but it doesn’t have any real heat to it. Maybe because he sounded sincere enough that she was willing to buy that he meant it, or maybe it was just because there were bigger things at hand. She picks up the jeans and begins to pull them over her hips.

“Well, lucky for you, I need a partner.” She wriggles into the jeans, letting the short, skin tight dress she was wearing fall over it like an overly long, sparkly shirt, and then grabs her jacket. “The incubus got away and ran back to its nest. I scoped the place while you were taking your nap and it looks like there’s a colony there.”

Jude’s wrists flex again as he watches her sit on the edge of her trunk to tie on the boots. “I should have figured there was more than one. That was far too many bodies for one incubus.”

“Yeah, I talked to the bartender, apparently their friend has like five roommates. One or two I could probably take on my own, but that many I’m asking for an early grave.” She pushes up to her feet and goes to untie him, cutting the ropes on Jude’s wrists before handing him the knife so that he can do his own ankles.

“Fair enough,” he says with a nod, before eyeing her carefully. “Since I gave you my last name, does that mean I get yours?”

“Wilkinson.”

She offers it without hesitation, and that surprises him. Not that she’s a Wilkinson, it makes sense with how capable she is, but that she offers it so freely, given everything that just went down with her father. Still, he’s in no place to judge, so he just cuts the remaining ropes, before holding up the knife to her.

“Well then, Kendra Wilkinson. Let’s get started, shall we?”

[Part 3]

Edited 2018-05-07 23:13 (UTC)

[Part 2]

Kendra is sitting in a car with Judas Iscariot. It’s not how she thought she’d wind up spending her evening.

Scratch that. Earlier in the evening she was making out with Judas Iscariot. The above point still stands.

The story of Judas Iscariot has always been a complicated one. It’s hard being one of the most hated people in history, especially when you’ve been cursed with immortality so that you could continue to suffer for your sins. Judas isn’t a vampire, he doesn’t need to feed on the lives of others in order to be immortal but he can’t die either. Some people say it’s what he deserves, but Kendra isn’t so sure that anyone deserves to have their ability to die ripped from them. Especially if he felt enough regret to kill himself as a result.

Her hands grip the steering wheel as they drive, trying her best to focus on the road and not ask all of the awkward, personal questions that are resting on the tip of her tongue. The silence lasts for almost five full minutes before he shifts in his seat to turn and look at her.

“So. Your father.”

“I am not talking about that with you.”

Jude raises an eyebrow in response, almost teasing, really, before he gives a bit of a shrug. “Well, it’s either one elephant or another. And since I certainly wasn’t going to bring up my own baggage …”

“Actually, I would much rather talk about yours. Thank you for opening that door.” Because anything to avoid talking about her own father and the damage he’s caused. “Because, oddly enough, if people are right about this girl I know, my brother may be in the same spot as you very soon. I want to know what to look out for.”

“Look out for?” Jude’s voice sounds incredulous, like she’s looking for something that doesn’t exist. “You think there’s some kind of neon sign that rests above your head when you’re going to be the next Iscariot?”

“I don’t know. Divine magic isn’t really something we come across a lot.”

“Ahhh, see, magic we can talk about.” She notes the way he deftly side steps the personal and goes into the theoretical, but honestly, the theoretical is all she needs. She wants to know how to save her brother. She doesn’t want Aaron to become another curse that can’t be lifted. “Divine magic is difficult and unstable. You’ve heard what’s happened to most of the old gods, haven’t you?”

“I know Poseidon created a hurricane that killed more than four thousand people in 1928 when he went out. There are rumors that Hera had her own red wedding.”

“The rumors about Hera are not that far off, actually. The groom was caught cheating on the bride the night before the wedding. Apparently it was one heartbreak too far for her to handle.” He pauses before waving a hand. “That isn’t the point. The point is, divine magic is always seeped in tragedy, no matter who happens to wield it.”

“So you’re saying someone with divine magic is destined to die, no matter what.”

He nods. “It’s simply a matter of it’s ten years from now or a thousand. That being said, the divinity in the Christ narrative is even more complicated. The faith they were drawing their power from is a much younger faith than the Hellenistic deities. Which means the power is a lot less stable. Jesus wasn’t going to be able to maintain it on the power of such a limited belief pool. He was already fraying at the edges.”

Kendra’s quiet for a moment, before she nods, understanding where he’s coming from. “So he really did die to save those people. Just not in the way most people think.” There’s another pause before she glances at him curiously. “That’s why he knew what was coming, too. It wasn’t that you betrayed him, it’s that you promised not to let him turn into a monster.”

“I was the only magical member of the apostles. That plus being a paladin meant that I was specially equipped to take care of it.”

“So why crucify him? Why turn him over to the Romans?”

He gives a small chuckle, before shaking his head. “He was still my best friend. The idea that I could pick up a blade and run it through the man I loved like my family?” He shakes his head. “I was a coward. Still am in some respects. In that way, I did betray him. I promised him I would do it myself.”

“Instead you turned him into one of the most powerful symbols of divinity in the modern world.” Kendra gives a bit of a smirk. “I’m not sure if that is better or worse.”

He laughs a bit, before shaking his head. “The end result still would have been the same. I would have wanted to die, and Mary would have still taken that away from me.”

Kendra nods slowly, running her fingers over the steering wheel as they pull into the parking lot of the apartment complex. She knows she could leave the discussion there, they could go in and get rid of the incubus, and that would be the end of it, but there’s something else that she needs to know.

“Has there been another Christ cycle, between then and now?”

He shakes his head as he straightens in his seat a bit. “There hasn’t, no. Most of the others have come before.”

“Then do you think there’s a chance that she could be stronger? That she might be able to survive it?”

He pauses for a moment, and the way he looks at her makes it seem like he wants to be able to give her hope, but at the same time, there may not be any to be found. “The Christ narrative isn’t meant to rely on faith, it’s meant to renew it. It’s meant to be a symbol.” He’s quiet again for a moment, before giving a small shrug. “Maybe we could have done something differently back then, to ensure it wasn’t set in stone, but now that it’s found it’s story …”

“It’s not going to give up until it gets what it wants.” Which means Jessie is still going to die and Aaron may still have to be the one who kills her. That kind of finality is just enough for her to nod, before pushing up open the car door and getting to her feet. “Let’s go get this done, then.”

Jude watches her in return, before nodding and doing the same. “Yes, let’s.”

[Part 4]

Edited 2018-05-08 23:45 (UTC)

[Part 3]

Jude follows Kendra out of the car, but hangs back just enough to give her room to do her thing. He can see the tension set in her shoulders, the kind of determination that he knew didn’t come from nothing, and he’s not inclined to get in her way. She reaches back to hand him back the gun she had used to knock him unconscious earlier, and then rolls her shoulders.

“The warehouse is up ahead.”

The brick face building rises out from behind the trees with a kind of menace to it that probably didn’t show in the daylight. The warehouse in question is really a former warehouse that some rich person had bought up to renovate and sell the apartments inside at a much higher property value than the area around it. Sitting in front of it, equally out of place, is a rundown playground that looked like it was shoved in to make the area look like a “great place for families” but no families actually moved in there. This was probably more the incubi than anything else – they wanted to keep the neighborhood quiet and out of their way while they fed, and they likely had the money to do it.

They certainly live long enough.

As they come up on the end of the slide, the bartender steps out of the shadows, blood no longer leaking from the wound in his shoulder but the stain still remains. He tips his head to the side like a snake, and gives a bit of a snarl over his fangs. “You shouldn’t have come, paladins.”

“We couldn’t let you just keep killing people,” Jude replies, pulling back the slide on his gun to make sure he was loaded and ready to go. He didn’t particularly care about his own life, it’s not as though he could die. He is worried about Kendra’s, though, and he’s prepared to step into the line of fire and make sure she doesn’t. He could stand to lose a little of his life force. It isn’t like he’s not going to get it back.

“Then what do you suggest we do?” The incubus raises his eyebrows as more of his people step out of the shadows, dressed in the same black uniforms. They must have all worked at the bar, taking different shifts. That’s why there were so many bodies. As the pieces begin to fall into place, he waits for the incubus to finish his question. “Starve?”

“There are ways to feed without killing.”

“But those ways are no fun.”

“And here we are, back at the impasse. Believe me, I would love not to kill you. I have enough blood on my hands. She, on the other hand,” he gestures to Kendra, “has been itching for a fight all night since you interrupted her other plans and tried to eat her.”

“So yeah, I really wouldn’t mind killing you,” Kendra nods, drawing her own guns for emphasis. “But I might change my mind if you give me a reason not to.”

The incubus glanced at the other members of the nest, a silent conversation traveling between them, before he smirks and gives a bit of a shrug. “Think we’ll pass. We’d rather eat you instead.”

A smile crosses Kendra’s face, something feral and dangerous and far too attractive for someone who had cold cocked him with his own gun earlier, but in a lot of ways that only really adds to her appeal. She pulled back the slides on her weapons and cracks her neck.

“Fine. Have it your way.”

If Jude were picking somewhere to have this fight, it would not be in the middle of a children’s playground. There are going to be a lot of stains to account for later, but hopefully they’ll have been gone long enough to not have to do the explaining themselves. Instead, he and Kendra slide back to back, shooting at the incubi as they swing around them, trying to get in closer before they get shot themselves.

Here’s the thing about an incubus. They’re fast. Almost as fast as vampires, which makes sense since they’re cousins of a sort. No one really knows where they came from beyond the joke that an empath and a vampire decided to do the nasty and one knocked up the other (which is impossible, given that vampires aren’t allowed to procreate, though he supposes there’s something to be said for a vampire turning an empath). Either way, they’re fast, but they’re also fragile. A few good shots to the chest or one solid shot to the head could put one down for good. It’s simply a matter of shooting the incubi before any of them managed to get their fangs into Jude or Kendra.

Kind of like a game of Plants vs. Zombies.

The first two, young and stupid, go down like sacks of potatoes as Kendra puts a bullet in each of them when they have to stand still to catch their breath. The rest of them begin to realize that standing still means their downfall, so they start spinning around them like a whirlpool, black streaks against the night sky blacking out everything else. It’s that moment when Kendra starts to be a lot more liberal with her bullets, and Jude tries to be a bit more conservative. He only has one gun to her two, after all, and he’s patient enough to know they can’t run forever.

There’s several more thumps as a few more bodies hit the ground, followed by the click click click of one of their guns running out of bullets. Kendra turns from his side for a moment, holding out one of the guns to him. “I’m out. There’s five left in that one.”

He nods as he takes the gun from her, stretching his arms out over her head, so he can cover from both angles while she reloads. Kendra ducks down a bit, giving him room to work, so the thump thump of two more incubi dropping is punctuated by the solid clicks of a fresh magazine sliding into the base of Kendra’s gun. They’re down to the last one by his count, and she’s straightening to return to the fray, when he feels a solid hand grab him around the shoulders, and a pair of needles sink into the base of his neck.

It’s an odd feeling, being drained of life without really showing any physical sign of it. Jude’s been killed by a vampire before, he knows what it feels like to have blood sucked out of you, but this is different. This is more like he’s suddenly becoming very, very tired, and everything is fuzzy and far away. He doesn’t care that he’s being killed, not by any sense of the word. Why would he care about anything, really?

Being killed by an incubus is a bit like clinical depression. He’s sure his therapist will be very pleased to hear this.

His arms drop to his side, guns clattering to the ground, and he hears a sound that’s likely Kendra calling out his name. There’s then a bang! accompanied by a muzzle flash, and he feels himself splattered by something wet, but he’s already too far gone. As he drops to the side and rolls away from the final dead incubus, he can feel a pair of hands reaching for his shoulders and trying to shake him awake.

“Don’t worry,” he murmurs as everything went dark. “I’m just taking a nap.”

[Part 5]

Edited 2018-05-10 00:59 (UTC)

[Part 4]

Judas Iscariot is dead.

Judas Iscariot is dead.

It’s that thought that keeps circling through her mind over and over again, as she stands there with the pile of dead incubi and one dead human, and no idea what to do with all of them. Well, she has an idea. This isn’t her first day at the rodeo. But she doesn’t have the car for it. Kendra glances wildly around the playground for a moment, panic setting in under her skin, but she finally closes her eyes, taking a few deep breaths to try and calm the panic in her chest and actually takes in the scenario. These bodies were not going to fit in her car. But they might fit in the large pick up truck that is parked not far from there.

She quietly begins to move to each of the bodies, fishing around for car keys until she finds ones that work on the truck in question. Eventually the brake lights of the truck flash and she pumps her fist in air and heads out to pull it closer. It’s not long before the incubi are wrapped in plastic and loaded into the truck bed, and she’s left with Jude’s body. She honestly doesn’t know what to do with that one, because on the one hand, he’s dead. On the other, he’s technically not supposed to be able to die.

It’s a bit of a conundrum on whether or not she should deposit his body in the Glades.

She sighs and settles for setting his body in the front seat of the truck, buckling him in so that he doesn’t flop around. She takes a deep breath, before reaching out to pat him on his still dead shoulder. “I have no idea what I’m fucking going to do with you, buddy.”

And with that, she piles into the driver’s seat and heads off to the Everglades. The drive is mostly quiet, with barely anyone on the road at this time of night, but it’s still too quiet. She keeps glancing over to the unmoving body in the passenger’s seat, ready to start a conversation, before she realizes what she’s doing, clamps her mouth closed and turns her attention back to the road again with a determined head shake.

“Nope. Not doing that. Not going there.” There’s a pause and she rolls her eyes. “And now I’m talking to myself. Good job.”

The next hour or so passes in silence, pulling up to the secluded point where she and her brothers usually deposit of the things they want to disappear. The current at this part of the Glades heads out to the ocean thanks to some magical finagling from a local witch, and there are plenty of gators to chow down on them before they get that far. There’s another hour of silence as she starts breaking down the bodies and tossing them into the water, distracted from her other problems and getting into the rhythm of the work, despite the blood spattering everywhere. It’s almost soothing that part of her that she set out to soothe this evening, even if it isn’t the way she intended.

“Do you need a hand?”

The voice startles her after eons of silence and she nearly jumps off the pier as a result, a loud “What the fuck!” exploding from her lips. She spins around, machete raised high on instinct, but when she sees that it’s Jude she stops just shy of slicing his throat open. Then she breathes.

Then she repeats the question. “What the fuck.”

“I did tell you about the part that I was cursed with living, correct?” he says with a bit of a teasing smirk, almost as though she hadn’t just almost tried to kill him. “I wasn’t going to stay dead for long.”

Kendra grits her teeth for a moment, before pointing the knife at him, but this time more to accentuate her point than actually threaten him. “Don’t fucking do that.”

“Wow, that’s mean of you. I just got back from the dead.” She then punches him in the shoulder, hard. He winces, before holding up his hands as a gesture of surrender, before reaching forward very slowly to take the machete from her. “You’ve had a long night. Why don’t you let me take over while you take a break?”

She considers for a moment, though it seems more like she’s considering whether or not she should stab him for good measure, but in the end she lets him take it. “Fine,” she sighs, before going over to sit on the tailgate of the truck to watch him work. She lets the silence settle for a moment, but after having gone for this long without actually talking to someone, she takes the opportunity to have some noise.

“Does it always work like that? You’re dead for a while, then you come back?”

“Depends on how life threatening the injury is. If it’s not going to kill me, then I have to heal it the old fashioned way.”

“Mmm.” She pauses for a moment, before the weight of what he told her earlier gets to be too much, and she feels like she needs to offer up something in return. She takes a deep breath before just speaking and trying not to think about it too much. “My dad went bad. Real bad.”

He looks up at her for a moment, before tossing an incubus torso into the water. “Many paladins do. They are human, and they fail, sometimes. It is not an indictment on you.”

“Isn’t it?” She looks over at him, and she isn’t sure if she’s asking an honest question or being rhetorical. “All of his buddies used to say that I was just like him when I was coming up. And no one saw him coming.”

The last of the incubus chunks disappear into the water, and Jude comes back to the truck, depositing the machete and grabbing a rag to clean off his hands. “I’ve seen a lot of paladins go bad. And the main thread connecting them? Was that it was their choice.” She looks over at him, and he turns to face her more. “Destiny can play a role, yes, but it’s still a choice. You don’t become a part of a narrative until you choose to be.”

She takes a deep breath, before nodding. “Its just hard to believe sometimes.”

“I know the feeling. But from what I saw today, I think you’re on the right track.” He offers her a small smile in return, before tossing the rag in along with the machete. “Come on. I’ll drive you back to your car and get rid of the truck.” She nods in agreement, sliding off the tailgate to stand next to him. He looks her over and smirks. “It’s a shame about the dress.” He pauses to gesture to the sparkly top, not spattered with blood. “It looked lovely on you.”

She glances down for a moment, before glancing up again with a smirk. “I have another one, in blue.” She then steps away and heads towards the passenger’s seat. “If you stick around Miami, maybe I’ll let you see it.”

He laughs behind her, before following to open the door for her. “Now that is an incentive if I ever heard one.”

“Okay. This probably could have gone better.”

Laurel speaks as she plants the map on the front of their RV, trying to figure out where the nearest sign of life is from their current location. She and Sara had taken the van out for supplies, leaving Oliver and Tommy to their own devices.

“Ya think?” Sara comments from the passenger’s side, feet up on the dash as she regards her sister with a critical eye. “Are you ready to call Dad yet?”

“No.”

“Are you ready to call Oliver so he can rent a car to come get us?”

“No. We can figure this out.” Laurel smooths her hands over the map and then looks up at her sister with a glare. “Though it would be easier if we were actually trying to figure this out.”

Sara rolls her eyes at first before she finally climbs out of the van and moves to the side of the road. As she does, she lets her blond hair fall like a cascade around her shoulders, unzips her hoodie so that her bikini top is visible, and sticks out her thumb like she is getting ready to hitchhike.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting us a ride.”

“Are you kidding? We could get murdered.”

“I’ll stop if you give in and call the boys.”

“I’m not going to call the boys.”

“Gee. I really hope there are no serial killers on the road …”

“Fine! Fine. I’ll call Oliver.”

“Thank you,” Sara zips up her hoodie again and moves to stand against the side of the van as Laurel fishes for her cell phone. “Aw, don’t look so sour, sis. You’re the one who wanted me to help.”

Laurel rolls her eyes in response. “You really have a way of making me regret it.”

“Stop the carriage.”

Peter’s eyes come up and blink at his wife in confusion. She isn’t looking at him, focused on something outside the carriage. Before he can question it she leans forward, banging her hand against the wall of the carriage next to his head.

“Stop the carriage!”

The carriage slides to a halt and the driver looks down in confusion. “Milady?”

“I will be right back.” She throws herself out of the carriage, uncaring if her husband decides to follow her, as she does most things. She hears his footfalls behind her as she rounds the corner, revealing the blindingly white monstrosity of a house.

“What the hell is this?”

“I don’t know,” Kate admits, glee slipping into her voice. “Isn’t it glorious?”

“Not the word I would use,” Peter sighs, before reaching for her arm. “We shouldn’t trespass on someone else’s property.”

“Don’t worry, I don’t think there’s anyone home. This is a summer home if nothing else.”

“Still,” Peter’s tone is firmer, and she rolls her eyes as she steps back and nods.

“Fine. We’ll go back to the carriage.”

“Thank you.” She turns with him, slipping her arm in his, but glancing over her shoulder one last time with a grin.

“Would you build me something that dramatic if I asked you to?”

He raises an eyebrow. “And what makes you think it was built for love?”

“Have you seen it? That’s probably the only reason it was built.” She smirks a bit. “You did not answer my question.”

He rolls his eyes a bit, before shaking his head. “No. Not without a great deal of editing.”

She laughs when they finally reach the carriage and opens the door for her. “Good to know I keep you honest.”

He laughs, before nodding his agreement. “Always.”

“I just want to make sure you know what you’re getting yourself into.”

Freya and Stefan are walking arm and arm through the local farmer’s market. Stefan seems determined to teach Freya to cook, and she should have developed this skill a long time ago. Only problem are cheeseburgers are literally the best thing you can eat when you have a hangover.

“The last time I actually cooked something, we were roasting it over a spit.”

“We could do that,” Stefan smirks, veering off occasionally to grab some of the vegetables. He pays the vendors then comes back again. “There’s a fire pit in the backyard.”

Freya raises her eyebrows for a moment. “Would you actually let me do that?”

“Are you kidding? Less work for me.” He flashes her a grin. “Provided it’s properly seasoned.”

“Yeah, that you may have to do yourself. I’m not well versed in ‘seasoning.’” She draws air quotes, around that word, teasing. She appreciates Stefan’s ability to cook for what it is, and she would never want to hinder his process. Also, it gets her out of some work.

“Ah, I think I can dictate that to you just fine,” he laughs. “You’re not getting out of it that easily.”

“Can’t blame a girl for trying.”

“You know, if you want to have a nice long human life, you do need a slightly better diet than tequila and cheeseburgers.”

“I’m aware,” she replies with a small nod. “But old habits are hard to break. And cheeseburgers and tequila are so good.”

He laughs a bit, before nodding. “I’m well aware of that.” He then steers her towards the exit with a nod. “Come on. It won’t be as bad as you think.”

“We’ll see. If the kitchen is on fire later, I’m blaming you.”

Eventually Lance and Maggie’s Grand Tour of DC^TM winds up at a place they will both enjoy: his favorite local comic shop, painstakingly chosen in his first few weeks in DC.

“So? What do you think?”

“I’m definitely into the Spider-Man motif,” she grins as she moves towards one of the tables to start flipping through the merchandise. “Do you come here a lot?”

“Sometimes, when I want a little non-work, face-to-face interaction.” He leans against the table next to her, content to let her browse. “Sometimes I even do a little gaming.”

Maggie glances over with a bit of a smirk. “Are you an elf on an epic quest?”

“Actually, I’m a half-orc barbarian, but thank you for thinking I was elf material.”

She laughs. “Anytime. Do your friends from work play with you sometimes?”

“Sometimes, but they’re not really that kind of nerd. I do think I could get Agent Booth to play, but it would take a lot of persuasion.”

“I think you can do it. Just get Parker into it.”

His eyebrows go up, before a curious look crosses his face. “My main group does play online. I could run a session for them.” A beat. “Would you be interested? You could be a mysterious bard that relies on charisma and is famous for story telling?”

“What if I wanted to be an elven ranger with a tragic past?”

He grins. “You can be whoever you want to be.”

She grins in return. “I will let you know. In the meantime, I think I’m going to buy these, so we can make it to dinner with Hodgins and Angela.”

“Sounds good,” he nods with a smile, before leaning in to kiss her softly. “I’m really glad you came.”

She smiles and nods as well. “Me too.”

“If you’re going to tell me some folksy anecdote about basketball, I’m not looking to hear it.”

The mild irritation in Ressler’s voice gives away more than he wanted about how he feels about this particular “mission” – not because he dislikes it, but because he might enjoy it. It’s hard not to enjoy floor seats to a Wizards game. The fact that he’s here with Raymond Reddington, undercover, is not his idea of a good time.

“Relax, Donald, I’m not here to harsh your fun.” Reddington seems amused by the fact that Ressler is hostile. “Besides, aren’t you supposed to be, as they say, ‘on the clock’?”

The younger man stews as he keeps scanning the crowd for their target. His eyes also stray to the game, getting into it before he catches himself and remembers where he is and who he is with. Reddington just seems amused by all of it.

“You are allowed to enjoy yourself you know. I know this is a business occasion, but this is a very good game. Best I’ve seen since –”

“Okay. That’s turning into one of those anecdotes that I said I didn’t want to hear.” Ressler holds up a finger, before standing and heading towards the stairs. “I’m going to go do a loop around.”

“Suit yourself.”

He leaves, circling up one of the main levels by the concession stands where he can still see the game, and makes like he’s getting on line for popcorn. It doesn’t take long before he’s swept up in the game again, yelling at the players from his place in line. It isn’t long before he turns and there’s Dembe, watching him with the same amused expression Reddington had earlier.

Ressler swallows. “Please don’t tell him.”

Dembe smiles. “Your secret is safe with me.”

The night of the blizzard, Stiles is late coming home from work.

She doesn’t worry too much at first, because Stiles is usually late coming home from work most nights. The Fringe division almost never lets him rest, and while she knows it’s part of the unfortunate nature of being the low man on the totem pole, she still misses him in the evening, when it’s just her and Rocky. Tonight the snow reminds her of the years she’s spent in Scotland, and how much she really does prefer the climate of California, but as the night wears on, those thoughts slip far from her mind. This evening has her worried for two reasons.

One, Stiles has never driven in the snow before, and two, Olivia’s already called to say that Stiles left his cell phone on his desk at the office, and to tell him to not come back for it because the roads are bad. Boston is a winding, confusing mess of roads to begin with, she can only imagine how much more confusing that is when all the world is white and you’re just trying to get home. So that is why Cora is currently perching on the edge of the couch, looking out the window to their brownstone apartment and trying not to worry about the fact that Stiles’ headlights hadn’t turned in the driveway yet.

What if he realized he forgot his phone halfway through and tried to go back?

What if he got into an accident somewhere and is currently dying of hypothermia?

The extremes are wide and far reaching, but she’s concerned about all of them, and even Rocky is starting to pick up on her anxiety, pacing in front of the TV while he also waits for Stiles to return. She’s almost ready to head into the kitchen to pick up her sister’s habit of nervous cooking, when a pair of headlights turn into the driveway, glaring up into the window. Then a tall, black form climbs out of the car, darts awkwardly through the accumulating snow, definitely almost falls on his face at least once, but eventually makes it to the door, throwing it open and stumbling inside before closing it behind him.

“Do not go back out there,” Stiles sighs as he turns to her, holding up a finger. “Those roads are not made for driving.”

“So I heard,” Cora sighs, relief coursing through her as she makes her way closer to help him with his coat. “Want me to make you some coffee to warm up?”

“Please.”

She hangs his coat on the rack near the door and then makes her way into the kitchen, giving him some space to also get out of his shoes and wet clothes. By the time the coffee is percolating, his arms are sliding around her waist from behind, and she jumps when his cold nose slides against the nape of her neck.

“Your nose is freezing.”

“You’re really warm,” he grins, before turning and pressing a soft kiss there. His lips are also cool at first, but warming, the longer he stays inside. “Man, driving out there right now is the worst.”

“I’m surprised Olivia didn’t have plans or something for you guys for when the weather is like this.” Cora reaches forward to pour the cups of coffee for them both, before handing one off to Stiles so he can fix it. “So that you don’t have to drive?”

“She does, but I didn’t want to be stuck in some hotel when I thought I could make it home on my own. And I did, clearly.”

“Yeah, but you left your phone in the lab during your attempt to escape.”

He frowns for a second, before patting down his pockets and winces. “Did she want me to come back and get it?”

“No. She said to definitely not do that.” Cora sighs before leaning back against the counter and taking a sip of her coffee. “She has my number, so she’ll call me if she needs you.”

“At least there’s that.” He glances back to the window again and shakes his head. “Man, I really hope I don’t have to go in tomorrow.”

“It’s Tuesday.”

“Yes, but it’s a Tuesday after I’d worked all weekend.” He turns and flashes her a grin. “The other reason why I wanted to make sure I got home.”

She raises an eyebrow. “So you’re saying you risked your life to get home tonight so that you could be snowed in with me?”

“Being here and nice and warm with you is a way better option than being in a lonely old hotel room all by myself.”

“Oh, I’m sure it is,” she says with a nod. “And trust me, as much as I would rather have you here with me, I’d also rather have you alive.”

“I am alive.”

“You could have not been.”

He sighs dramatically, placing his coffee cup down to the side for a moment, before making his way closer and placing his hands on her waist gently. “Okay, how ‘bout this? Next time there’s a major blizzard, I will do my best to not die, and be a good little agent, and stay where Olivia tells me to stay. Better?”

“For now,” Cora sighs as she winds her arms around his neck. “You still have to follow through with it.”

He laughs a bit at that, before pulling her in closer and leaning in to kiss her. “I’d still rather be here with you. Especially since I know you’ll love warming me up.”

“You say that, now,” she smirks into the kiss, letting her fingers brush against the back of his neck as she does. “But I think you’ll be singing a different tune when Rocky has to go out for his walk tomorrow morning.”

Stiles groans as his head tips forward, burying his face against her shoulder and shaking his head. “I should have known that I would still be punished.”

She laughs, before turning her head to the side and kissing him on the cheek. “Consider it a reinforcement on the earlier lesson. Stay safe in a blizzard.”

“Will you at least warm me up before I have to go out in the cold again?”

She laughs a bit at that before nodding. “Sure. Your wish is my command.”

And with that, he sweeps her up, before carrying her off to the bedroom. Even as much as she wishes that he would be a little bit safer in the snow, she can’t deny that she’s glad that he’s home.

It’s a rare night when Stiles beats Cora home from work.

Probably because Cora doesn’t normally work. Sometimes she heads out to volunteer at the corgi farm where they got Rocky, and sometimes she helps Liv out with a hunt if she’s in need of back up and there’s no one else nearby, but usually she still makes it home in time to have dinner with Stiles – or, alternatively, leave pizza for Stiles in the oven and fall asleep on the couch. Today she’s assisting with the latter, but Stiles actually manages to get out of work on time for once, so when she walks through the door, covered in a viscous, oily substance that she really doesn’t want to put a name to, her fiancé is there in sweats, in front of the TV, chowing down on dinner.

“You’re home!” she blinks in surprise, before glancing over at the clock on the cable box. “Am I that late?”

“Nope. I’m that early,” he grins as he looks over at her, but that grin quickly chances to a serious frown. “And you are gross.”

“Don’t ask.”

“Wasn’t going to.” Then he makes a look that seems like he’s gagging. “But I may throw up a little.”

Cora’s eyes narrow at him, before she starts to walk towards the washer and dryer so she can drop her gross clothes into it. As much as she knows her boyfriend is sensitive to bodily fluids, she keeps hoping that he’ll grow out of it one day and quit freaking out at every little bit of blood, or use of needles or just general mess that comes with their lives. “Liv and I were taking down a demon up near Salem and it got a little messy. And don’t make that face, I know you deal with way worse things in Fringe Division day in and day out.”

“Maybe, but I’m still just as grossed out by them!” He fires after her, resettling into his seat. He looks so relaxed, that she almost can’t stay mad at him. “There’s pizza in the oven.”

“I’m going to shower first.” The last of her clothes gets dropped into the washer, followed by the door slamming as she moves towards the bathroom. “Then maybe we can watch a movie, since you’re home nice and early?”

“Sounds perfect.” Stiles nods. “Especially because I don’t have to move from the couch.”

She laughs a bit at that, before shaking her head and disappearing into the bathroom. A half hour later she is showered, dressed and curling up next to him on the couch with her own slices of pizza, leaning back as Stiles starts cuing up Netflix.

“I didn’t realize Liv was still hunting.”

“You can take the girl out of the bunker, but you can’t take the bunker out of the girl,” Cora replies, taking another bite as she chews. “But it was part of the deal with Hal. She can hunt here, she just can’t be on the road all the time.”

“How’s that working out for them?”

“Pretty well so far,” she says with a small shrug. “Her cooking skills still leave something to be desired, but from what I’m told, the Italian place down the street is very happy with them.”

Stiles laughs as he finally settles on a brainless comedy. “As, I’m sure, is Mrs. Mason.”

“That too,” Cora says with a nod. “She is more than happy to feed them.”

“And is she happy here?”

Cora glances over at him, curious about the question, before she gives a small shrug. “I think she’s happy with him, and everything else is kind of incidental.”

“But her family, though.”

“Her family is on the road all the time. They can be out in Boston whenever she wants. That’s not a dealbreaker.”

“Yeah, but it’s a really long drive.”

“Are you asking about Liv to ask about Liv or are you asking about Liv to indirectly ask about me?”

Stiles pauses for a moment, taking a slow sip of his beer, before he gives a small shrug. “I know that we agreed that this would be temporary, and believe me, I want this to be temporary, and have us go back home eventually. But it’s also taking a long time. I wouldn’t blame you for getting restless, or missing your siblings …”

“There is this thing called Skype. I talk to Derek and Laura all the time.”

“That’s not really the same.”

“No, it’s not,” she concedes, before shifting to lean back against his shoulder and giving a small shrug. “But if it’s a choice between spending all my time with them and missing you or spending all my time with you and missing them, I’d rather be missing them.”

He glances over to her for a moment and nods. “I know. I just want to keep you here. I didn’t like it when you were gone.”

“I didn’t like it when I was gone either,” she admits, leaning forward to place her plate down on the coffee table before turning to face him more. “But we needed that and we’ve figured everything out for the most part, and we’re good now.” There’s a pause, and her face turns a bit uncertain, not entirely sure if they’re still on the same page in that respect if he’s asking these questions now. “We are good, right?”

“We are better than good,” he nods, before leaning in to kiss her softly, one hand coming up to brush against her jawline. “We are great. I just want to keep checking in to make sure we’re great.”

“Good,” Cora says with a small smile, before shifting to curl up into his side so they can watch the movie. “I love you.” She tips her head back a bit, and he smirks and leans in to kiss the top of her head gently.

“I love you too.” A beat. “You still cute, even when you’re covered in slime.”

She rolls her eyes up again, shaking her head as she resettles in her seat. “You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

“I will not, no,” he laughs. “At least not until you find something equally gross to hold over my head in response.”

“Oh yeah?” That sounds like an endearing proposition from her perspective. “And how long is that going to take?”

He smirks a bit at that before shaking his head. “Knowing my job? Give it a day or two and we’ll be square.”

Cora laughs as she settles back against him before nodding. “Got it. I’ll be waiting.”

Normally, Cora doesn’t come on Stiles’ cases with him.

Technically she’s not even supposed to know about them, given that they’re classified, and she respects that line, because she knows that Stiles loves his job and doesn’t want to get him into trouble. But there are certain things that she can’t ignore, can’t let slip to the side, and tonight happens to be one of them. It happens about halfway through the day, a sudden sinking sensation in the part of her that she usually identifies as Stiles, and it’s that bad feeling that has her reaching for her phone, trying to call his phone to get him on the phone. She knows he probably won’t answer right away, but at least he’ll call back soon.

One ring, two rings, three –

“Cora?”

The voice on the other end of the line is not Stiles. The voice on the other end is Olivia Dunham, and her heart sinks even further.

“Where’s Stiles? Something’s wrong.”

“I don’t know.” It’s not the answer that Cora wants to hear. “We were canvasing a scene for one of our cases, and he disappeared. All that we’ve been able to find is his phone.”

She takes a deep breath, doing her best to remain calm and not panic that the person she cares about most is missing, but now that she knows the truth, she’s not going to take no for an answer. She swallows had before opening her eyes again.

“Where are you?”

“Cora, I can’t –”

“I can find him faster than you can. I won’t intrude on your case, but if they’re still in the area where you’re canvasing, I should be able to track them. It’ll be like I was never even there.”

Olivia’s quiet for a moment, weighing the options of breaking the rules with the potential of finding her agent faster, and eventually she sighs her resignation before rambling off the address of the crime scene. “I’ll meet you at the perimeter.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can.” There’s a pause and she swallows. “Thank you.”

“Just get here fast.”

- - - - - -

When she arrives at the scene, Olivia takes her directly to the last place where Stiles was known to be. She’s starting to feel a sense of panic building up in her chest, a panic that isn’t her own, and she tries to shove it down for now, giving herself a chance to focus. She closes her eyes, trying to catch the scent easily, before she opens them again and starts to move in the direction that isn’t the way they came.

“He’s still alive.”

“How do you know?”

“I just … I know.” Cora swallows. “I would know if he was dead. It’s a werewolf thing.”

“Right,” Olivia says slowly. “You know, I don’t actually know much about your kind of lycanthrope.”

“I know. There are a lot of different kinds.” One’s a curse, one’s a disease – they’ve both made it so that it’s easy for Cora’s kind of werewolf to keep a much lower profile. “This way.”

She keeps navigating the maze of buildings easily, like a woman on a mission, and she can feel them getting close, but before she can narrow down exactly which building she’s supposed to go to, she feels a flash of pain, just before the eerie blue light emanating from one of the windows on the third floor flickers, then dies.

“There!”

She takes off for the door to the warehouse, even as Olivia is shouting for her to wait, but she can barely hear her, the blood of needing to get to Stiles pounding in her ears. By the time she gets to the third floor, she’s stumbling into a lab of some kind, full of cadavers featuring different kinds of replacement biotechnology that doesn’t clearly doesn’t work. The smell of death is heavy in the air, but she can hear Stiles’ racing heartbeat in her ears and the smell of his blood, so she follows that first, coming up to where her boyfriend is strapped to some kind of medical table and a hunched scientist is leaning over him.

“You didn’t have to do that,” the man mutters as he paces, trying to fix his equipment that Stiles’ magic had fritzed out. “Why did you do that?”

“Because I told you, you were going to regret this.”

Stiles glances from him, to exactly where Cora is standing in the darkness, seeing the golden glow of her eyes in the blackness of the room, and it’s two seconds later that she pounces, knocking the doctor out to the ground with an angry snarl. She’s about to come down and slash at him with her claws when Stiles’ hand comes up to stop her.

“Cora, don’t. Just get me out of here.”

It stops her and she exhales, hearing Olivia’s feet on the stairs as she and Peter get closer, so she nods as she shifts back, moving over to make sure that Stiles is okay before she frees him from the table and he throws his arms around her.

“How did you know where I was?”

“Olivia brought me in,” she says softly, pulling back to look at him with a small smile. “I did the rest of the heavy lifting.”

“Well, thanks for coming,” he laughs, one hand coming up to brush her hair behind her ear. “Another few minutes and I would have been another one of his ‘experiments.’”

“I do kind of like keeping you around,” she says with a small smile, before she finally pulls back to find his shirt and FBI jacket. “It was in my own best interest.” It probably says something about their lifestyle that she can be so glib after being so panicked earlier, but it feels better to be able to joke with him, than being worried about him.

Stiles smiles in return as he gets his clothes back on before glancing over to Olivia. “Am I good to go?”

“I want to have you evaluated by Walter and take your statement.” The blond woman hauls up the doctor that she’s now handcuffed. “But once that’s done, I say you should be able to go home.”

“Good,” Stiles says with a small smile. “Because there’s nothing like a life or death situation to make you want to sleep for a year.”

Cora laughs, nodding as she turns to help him towards the door. “I’m sure it does. I’m just glad you’re coming home.”

He glances back to her, before kissing her softly. “Me too.”

Being stationed in Boston, it’s not often that they get to see their family from California. Usually they have to go to them, usually for a holiday, but every so often they’ll be graced by the presence of family that happens to come to them for a change. This week happens to be one of those times, with Laura and Parrish bringing their four year-old daughter out for a tour of Boston, one of the last times that Laura will be able to fly for a bit.

Stiles hasn’t been able to see them much, with the nature of his job, but he makes sure to get off for at least one of the evenings so that he can have dinner with them all before they leave town. That day happens to be in the middle of the week, where Amelia and Rocky have had enough time to get comfortable with each other, while not being a goodbye dinner with the a tinge of sadness to it.

Still, he’s trying to win over his niece, and that takes time and bribery, and clearly not stories about how much more awesome Stiles may be than her father. In fact, this assertion happens to be Stiles’ first mistake in the grand scheme of winning over Amelia.

“You know, one time I beat your dad in a fight.”

Amelia is sitting on the floor of their apartment, playing with Rocky when Stiles makes that particular comment, and pauses to glance to Parrish, then back to Stiles, then back to her father again, weighing the validity of this story in her tiny four year-old mind, before she wrinkles her nose. Cora can already tell that this particular adventure is going downhill fast, but she isn’t about to hit the brakes, wanting to see how it all plays out first.

“You didn’t.”

Because clearly Jordan Parrish is the strongest man in the world. He’s her father. There is no way that Stiles is winning this argument.

“I totally did.” Stiles almost seems offended that she doesn’t believe him, one hand coming up to rest over his chest in mock disbelief. It doesn’t take much, really, but Stiles can tell that Amelia has gotten far, far too skeptical in her time without Stiles in her life. “You don’t believe me.”

“Nope. Mommy says you eggs-magerate.”

Cora smirks a bit as she brings the boys a fresh beer. “You mean exaggerate?”

“Yes, that one,” Amelia nods as she pets Rocky’s head gently. “It means you don’t tell the real truth, you make it bigger to be dramatic.”

“Well, your mommy has been lying to you. I don’t exaggerate at all.” Cora gives him a bit of a look at that as she settles next to him, and he waffles for a moment, before relenting. “Okay, so maybe I exaggerate a little, but this really happened.”

Amelia studies Stiles for a moment, before whipping her head around and turning to her father, who is clearly a more trustworthy source. “Daddy, did Uncle Stiles beat you in a fight?”

Parrish pauses for a moment, before smirking around the lip of his beer bottle and he leans back into the seat. “I don’t remember.”

“Oh, you suck right now,” Stiles groans at the same time Amelia pushes up on her knees, vindicated.

“See! I told you!”

“You know, just because your dad –”

“Okay, let’s not convince my child that her parents are liars,” Laura sighs as she makes her way over to sit on the arm of Parrish’s chair. “She’s four. She’ll have plenty of time for that when she’s older.”

Stiles sighs but relents, leaning back into Cora as he resettles to get comfortable. “I think it just sets a bad precedent.”

“I don’t even remember this,” Cora admits with a frown. “When did you and Parrish actually fight?”

“During the Riders,” Stiles says simply, giving her leg a squeeze because he knows how rough that time had been for her. “I cooled him off with a fire extinguisher.”

Cora’s eyes narrow for a moment, before glancing back to Parrish. “I don’t know if that counts as a fight …”

“It totally counts!” Stiles whines, a little hurt that he’s losing having Cora at his back for this, and before Cora can explain her reasoning, Amelia pushes up on her knees and places a hand on Stiles’ leg gently, as though she’s about to break some terrible news to him.

“It’s okay, Uncle Stiles. I’m sure there will be someone less awesome that you can beat in a fight.”

Stiles glances down at her for a moment, face to face with a child so resolved that her dad is the strongest man in the world and no one can stop him, and his mouth gapes for a moment, before he glances back to Cora. “I don’t even know what to say to that.”

“You say thank you to her for having that much faith in you. I’m not sure anyone above the age of four would be quite as generous.” Because Stiles is Stiles, and most people are amazed that the FBI is actually letting him carry a gun day in and day out.

Stiles pauses for a moment, before nodding his agreement. “You’re right. I’ll take it. Thank you, Amelia.”

“You’re welcome,” she replies with a nod, before going back to laying down on the floor with the dog again. Laura and Parrish seem to be lost in their own little world for the moment, and Stiles glances back to Cora with a small smirk.

“You think I’m a total badass, right?”

Cora laughs a bit in return, before nodding in agreement. “You are John McClane.”

“In the first Die Hard or the most recent one?”

“The first one. Your dad is John McClane in the third one, so I guess that’s something you have to grow into.”

He pauses for a moment, before tipping his head to the side curiously. “I’m not sure how to take that either.”

“Just trust me. It’s a compliment.”

“And why wouldn’t I have reason to trust you?” Stiles laughs before turning to kiss her. “Will you still love me when I’ll probably break my hip if I tried to kick someone’s ass, but you’re still young and sexy and people are mistaking you for my daughter?”

She rolls her eyes a bit at that, before nodding her agreement. “Always.”

“Good,” he says as he turns to resettle again. “I’m sure someone will believe me about Parrish one day.”

“Sure, sweetie,” Cora sighs, rubbing his shoulders. “You keep telling yourself that.”

Threaded | Flat

Page 1 of 2

Round 1 (8/8) | Round 2 (0/8) | Round 3 (2/8)Running Score: 320Word Count: 49,233

ROUND 1 (FEBRUARY 10 - MAY 29)

i do the dumbest things for you | original (paladinverse) | 2,000 | round 1, set 1

they're gonna put me in the movies | original (paladinverse) | 600 | round 1, set 2

in the windmills of your mind | dctv/the librarians | 1,021 | round 1, set 3

just a wild mountain rose | original (teleios) | 1,135 | round 1, set 4

those left behind | original (teleios) | 1,513 | round 1, set 4

life goes on, but i'm gone | original (teleios) | 1,195 | round 1, set 4

inside the labyrinth walls | original (paladinverse) | 1,333 | round 1, set 5

too much food on my plate | original (paladinverse) | 1,021 | round 1, set 5

that you only meant well | original (paladinverse) | 1,196 | round 1, set 5

i've got a question | original (paladinverse) | 1,324 | round 1, set 5

panic at the disco, part 1 | paladinverse | 1,201 | round 1, set 6

panic at the disco, part 2 | paladinverse | 1,399 | round 1, set 6

panic at the disco, part 3 | paladinverse | 1,107 | round 1, set 6

panic at the disco, part 4 | paladinverse | 1,257 | round 1, set 6

panic at the disco, part 5 | paladinverse | 1,227 | round 1, set 6

she's got a ticket to ride | dctv | 300 | round 1, set 7

a castle on a cloud | regency au | 300 | round 1, set 7

have it your way | tvdverse | 300 | round 1, set 7

a comic book romance | bones/newsflesh | 300 | round 1, set 7

and welcome to the jam | the blacklist | 300 | round 1, set 7

baby it's cold outside | canon au | 1,100 | round 1, set 8

our love was no joke you know | canon au | 1,100 | round 1, set 8

help me piece it all together | canon au | 1,100 | round 1, set 8

i've listened to preachers, i've listened to fools | canon au | 1,100 | round 1, set 8

Round 1 (8/8) | Round 2 (0/8) | Round 3 (2/8)
Running Score: 320
Word Count: 49,233