Tags: M/M, Guide/Original Character, Character Study, Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Obsession, Possesiveness, Mutual Pining, Blood, Death, Angst, Horror
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chapter 7: the hero and the enemy
The goblin army was a stout lesson in quality versus quantity.
It takes no effort at all to mow down their numbers with the combined efforts of his flail and aerial advantage, Khalid's ranged and deadly ammunition, and the ghastly, flamed skulls that Raziel conjured from within themselves. Fighting the goblins is no problem at all, it's stopping them from completely wreaking the place he built with his own hands that seems almost impossible.
An hour was all it took for Nasrin and Callahan's homes to be reduced to splintered wood, cobblestone and glass. That wasn't even including the damage that had been done to other homes. Every minute that passes is another home ruined, another adored piece of this place dragged into the muck. There is a vicious catharsis he feels as he slams the ball of sun fury into the hundredth goblin; the sheer speed of the flail splitting it's head in a gory burst that stains the front of his armor. The surge of vitality with each drop of blood splattering onto his armor feels nearly smothering.
Hours dredge on, feeling more like years as his body continues to be bolstered by too many potions and stolen vitality. Still, there could only be so many enemies left by now, he thinks to himself as he begrudgingly takes to flight to scan the village. He's proven right as the only goblins left seem to be from the very bottom of the chain, wielding nothing but crude weaponry and barely any armor.
Khalid is the one currently handling them and while he's confident they've got it handled, he still swoops down at top speed to knock all the goblins off their feet and get them winded. By the time he's looping back around for another go, he hears Khalid laughing raucously as they put a bullet into each and every one of them.
Their olive trench coat was absolutely drenched in blood and some of the gore even stained their ashen hair.
"Any of that blood yours?" He asks while landing on the grass.
"Pfft. As if. Where's the old man?"
"Not sure. Didn't see him out in the open when I was flying." Before he can set out into flight again the two of them hear nearing footsteps.
"I'm admittedly harder to spot without my cloak." Raziel slips from behind the rubble of the fountain that formerly sat in the middle of the village. "Are there any left?"
Instead of separating to check the entirety of the village, while it would save more time, the three of them deign to walk side by side instead, sipping healing potions as they walked. It is taking definite effort from both of his companions not to remark on just how angry he surely looks as he scans all of the damage. In total, three homes had been completely demolished while several needed major patch jobs.
While upsetting, he still manages to turn towards Raziel and Khalid and offer them a smile.
"Figuring out sleeping arrangements is going to be a nightmare. Well, not for us three I guess." And while he gets a snort out of Khalid, Raziel only shakes their head before walking ahead of him.
As much as he wants to just fly or run over to the bunker, he's more exhausted than he'd care to admit. The best he can muster is an uneven shuffle. It's the relief that no one had died that carries him where his stubbornness can't.
Back at the bunker, he knocks loudly at the door.
"It's safe!" He says loudly and then backs away from the door. It takes a full minute for the heavy concrete and metal door to be wrenched open but the slight wait makes seeing a dozen of uninjured, relieved faces all the more worth it.
The only thing he's found to be faster than a bullet is the run of an excited child.
As soon as Will has their eyes on him the boy is pushing and shoving everyone and everything out of their way, dragging Kieran with them by the hand. Despite the chunks of gore and the mud embedded into the nooks and crannies of his armor, Will still attempts to hug him, albeit carefully. His new armor wasn't really designed in mind to be huggable.
The gesture still felt nice, even if he couldn't really feel it.
"So you three beat them, right?" Will peeks up at him to ask.
"We did." He nods. "I'm afraid it doesn't look like a victory out there, though. There's a lot of damage. Give me a few minutes to catch my breath and I'll get started on clearing up the debris."
A cold wind slips inside of the open bunker. It'd be refreshing if it didn't unnerve him. Looking away from Will, he sees that Kieran has a dark look on their face.
"...What?" He asks, blinking, and even looks over at the others to gauge their expressions. Maggie in particular is looking at him like he's the world's biggest idiot, which usually doesn't bode well for him.
"You've done more than enough for today." Kieran tells him and by the tone alone he knows that there is no arguing on the matter. He still tries anyways, opening his mouth to argue that he wouldn't be able to rest with so much work to be done, but he gets interrupted by Callahan.
"Aye, he's right. You three did the fighting and so it's only fair that us lot get started on cleaning up." The demolitionist explains.
"Wouldn't want you to die on the spot from exhaustion, would we?" Elandrian chimes in, effectively silencing everyone else with their voice.
Seeing as how no one would defend him in this regard, he sighs and makes peace with the fact that he'll be locked in his home; this time for something as innocent as needing rest.
"Alright, alright. I'll go take a nap. But if anything happens-"
"We'll grab you." Nasrin huffs.
It's all he can ask for, really.
--
For the second time that day, Zach awakes far earlier that he'd expected to.
Morning's light had been dimmed by the intrusion of a goblin army and now, alone in bed and still wearing his filthy armor that he'd passed out in, he comes to the waking world with fried nerves and bloodshot eyes as screams, an entire chorus of them, echo throughout the village just outside his front door.
Panic and adrenaline course fresh and electric through his too tired body, but more than that is the burning, seething anger that broils just below his skin. He manages to grab his weapons and throw his helmet back on before he's practically ripping his front door off the hinges to get out.
Outside, the first thing he notices is the heady scent of blood in the air. The second, hanging in the night sky like an omen, is the rusted visage of the blood moon, not just smirking down below at them all or nearly to fullness, but entirely full. This wasn't just a bad streak of luck, no, this felt as if the entire world had suddenly decided that whatever good he'd and anyone had else experienced was now going to be trivialized by what he can only assume will be the worst thing any of them has seen. He runs past his home, past the various rubble and heads to the center of the village. He arrives just in time to find Nasrin, fully transformed, in the middle of attempting to eat Raziel alive. By the looks of it, she had only just begun, her claws still attempting to rake down the elderly man's front to get at their viscera while also snarling and snapping her jaw when desperate hands attempted to push her off.
"Get off him! Fight me instead." He snarls at the she-wolf, sun fury's chain already twirling at high enough velocity to break any human's skull, let alone an animals. He lets it soar towards her, his aim just right that the ball of the flail hits her directly.
The sound of impact is wet and followed by a foreboding crunch and while Nasrin flails and howls, reeling back in pain, he watches with impatience as Raziel does nothing.
"Hide, you idiot!" He shouts, flying over to the she-wolf and stopping just behind her so he can wrap the chain of his flail around her neck. The second the fire imbued chain touches her skin Nasrin lets out a deafening howl and begins to buck and claw in every direction. He's almost thrown off her twice, but the spikes in his armor dig into her skin and give him purchase enough that he can secure the chain even tighter.
Concussed and quickly losing oxygen, Nasrin will be dealt with in a matter of seconds. Or, he had hoped so, that is until he notices that instead of dragging their half mangled body towards somewhere safe, Raziel instead shuffles to their feet and fixes him with a look of hate so intense that it actually stops him for a second.
"What are you doing?" He asks, irritable, and realizes rather quickly what Raziel intends to do when they raise both of their arms and their torn sleeves begin to ripple with magic being cast. "I'm trying to save you! You idiot, you'll get us both killed!"
"That's a fitting end for us all, don't you think? A heap of blood and gore." Raziel scoffs in return and black, ephemeral clouds begin to form from their palms before a steady stream of shadow flame skulls are released towards him.
In his distraction Nasrin bucks against him once again and manages to knock him off. Flat on his back, he sucks in a hiss of pain before sitting up and taking in just what he's going to be dealing with. If he were rational he'd make it his entire focus to end this fight as quickly as possible and try to find the others; what little of them might be left.
But he isn't rational- no one was currently.
"Fine. Two of you against me might actually be a fair fight. Try to last longer than a minute, will you?" He grins and readies his weapon.
A fight is the last thing he would call whatever it is the three of them were doing now.
Nasrin stalks him in a great circle, her movements sloppy and her saliva frothing at the corner of her jowls. A shame the initial hit hadn't caved her skull in entirely and killed her. Now he had to deal with not just a raving beast, but a nearly brain dead one as well. All might but no brains, he thinks with a wicked smirk.
To piss of the she-beast, he takes turns flying just out of her reach and takes great amusement in how she swipes and claws at him desperately. When one of her claws nearly manages to catch his leg he feels an unbridled spike of anger and pulls out a dagger, which is thrown with precision at her face. The blade sinks right in the middle of her forehead and the she-beast's maw opens to howl in pain but the action is aborted by the blade in their brain.
Nasrin sinks to the grass limply and her form slowly fizzles out into nothingness.
He watches until nothing is left. Then, he turns towards Raziel and fastens his hold on sun fury. Raziel opens their mouth to say something, probably to curse him, but he walks steadfastly towards them, ignoring the burn of the shadow flame skulls being sent his way and simply stops their conjuring with a mere headbutt. Unconscious, Raziel slips to the floor; their chest rising and lowering laboriously.
He slips into a crouch, balancing on the balls of his feet and slips another dagger out of his inventory. He grips the handle of it and hovers the blade just over where Raziel's heart lay. For a long, terrible minute he thinks about just killing them anyways, but it's the wet, squelching sound of monsters finally reaching the village that stops him.
Why focus on a feeble old man when there was an endless hoard to rip apart?
He straightens and watches with excitement as dozens of fleshy monsters slip into the village, some by air, most by foot. However it is these monsters arrive, it matters very little seeing as how they would all be leaving the same; by his hand. In the back of his mind, where there is a voice screaming at him to go and check on what survivors there might be, there is also a voice now warning him that the several potions he's chugging at the moment will lead to nothing good. Just how many potions had he drunk that day, he can't recall. What does it matter, anyways?
Beside the usual weird feeling of consuming so many buffs, there is also a terrible nausea that now settles into his stomach. Worse than that, however, is the clench around his heart- as if someone had their fingers just around it and was slowly squeezing. The sensation leaves him a little breathless.
Feeling less and less like himself as the seconds tick by, Zach tosses the now emptied potion bottles onto the grass, the twinkling sound of glass breaking music to his ears. He flaps his wings hard twice and takes to the air to scout for the densest group of monsters, finding a particularly packed group swarming Pasqual's home.
The painter themselves was nowhere to be found.
He arches his back and brings his legs together as he dives down towards the home, gathering momentum like an oncoming storm and it's with that momentum that he crash lands into the already assaulted cabin. He effectively splatters a handful of the many-eyed, floating mounds of flesh, and what his crash hadn't killed he effectively wipes out with the help of sun fury.
Hoard after hoard is reduced to bloodied piles on the ground and the more blood he spills the more his own health is restored- it's beautiful, really. He has never felt this free, felt this accomplished. Truly, this is what he was meant to do.
Yet he is on the verge of tears.
Someone else seems to be as well, as he's broken out of his blood lust fueled revelry by the shrill, heart breaking scream of a woman. A familiar woman. He was positive that had been Maggie just now. He should go and find her. Help her. But he doesn't.
He stays right where he is and continues to kill.
--
Morning arrives and with it: agonizing clarity.
The sun rises over the canopy of the forest of his home and casts the once red hazed night into soft blues and oranges. Everything feels quiet.
Still.
Air unsullied by blood or sweat catches him off guard but once he's got a taste of it, Zach finds that he drinks it down like fine wine. From where he sits on the grass, kneeled, he sucks in breaths greedily, each breath clearing out the fog from his mind. Sunfury, abandoned at his side, is quickly put into his inventory. He's done enough with it.
Standing to his feet proves impossible.
Gritting his teeth, he pulls out a sword and demotes it to being nothing more than a walking stick. He grips the hilt with both hands before sinking the blade into the dirt and then pushing himself to slowly rise. He can't stand at full height no matter how much he tries so he accepts hunching over the blade instead.
Back on his feet, he looks all around the wreckage of the village.
The wreckage was just as upsetting as it had been yesterday, but that feeling had been soothed by the fact that no one had been lost. There was no denying that many had been lost this time around. He himself was directly responsible for two deaths, and although he hadn't finished off Raziel, he had left the man unconscious in the middle of the village with monsters quickly approaching.
He brings a shaky hand to his throat and palms at the scar encircling it and hopes very much that Raziel's death had at least been quick.
Even in the haze of last night he had felt other lives blipping out of existence, although who's, he was yet to discover. He takes a few more deep breaths, if only to lessen the painful palpitations in his chest, before thrusting the sword out of the dirt and beginning the slow hobble towards Will's tree house.
He doesn't even make it halfway before one of his knees are giving out and he falls back onto the grass, one hand still gripping the sword and the other gripping his chest plate to feebly quell his heart to stop stuttering. Sweat beads on his forehead and slips down his brows and into his eyes, stinging, and in frustration he tears off his helmet and tosses it aside.
He needs to find the others, but his body refuses to listen to him.
"Just work with me for another couple of minutes. Come on. Just move, for fuck's sake. Please." He snaps at himself and tries to push up. It takes several tries, but he does end up standing to a degree again.
Doing so only rewards him with the sudden turn of his stomach and the upheaval of its contents. It's as he's hunched over his sword and hacking up his innards onto the grass that someone calls out to him.
"Zach? Holy shit you look terrible, man. You need a hand there?" Khalid asks while running up to him and coming to stop to stand by his side. One of their hands comes to rest carefully on his pauldron, mindful of the spikes.
He blinks some sweat out of his eyes and shakes his head, sweat soaked hair flopping limply into his face.
"Where are the others?" He asks.
Khalid, good man that he was, slips an arm around him and tugs one of his arms around their shoulders. Leaning his weight on them was far better than the sword. The smell of gunpowder always wafted off the arms dealer, no surprise there, but the smell is particularly acute after such long night of fighting.
"Most of us booked it to the bunker as soon as the blood moon started. It wasn't the best idea, given everyone's such an asshole on blood moons and locking ourselves together led to....some altercations, but it kept us safe from Nasrin. We figured us ripping each other apart was better than getting torn apart by her." Khalid explains to him with a wince.
"Poor girl. We know she would've stopped it if she could. With the goblins attacking earlier, the cycle of the moon was the last thing on anyone's minds. I doubt anyone blames her for forgetting to take her potion. Judging by the fur stuck all over your armor, you took care of her I'm guessing?"
He swallows down a myriad of things.
"I did." He relinquishes, "I found her mauling Raziel. Tried to get her off of him but he started fighting me. I had to take care of both of them."
"You did what you had to. Just sorry it had to be you." Khalid tells him easily and when he peeks at their face he sees that there isn't a single trace of scorn. Just tired understanding.
"I heard Maggie scream last night. Did she-" He starts.
"She's good. Don't worry about her."
It's said far too quickly to make him stop worrying.
At his pressing look, Khalid sighs in frustration. "Just let me get you to the others, alright? We can all talk about what happened last night then. Besides, you really need Mags to take a look at you. You're one good hit away from dying."
Death felt a lot closer than that, but he keeps that to himself.
Khalid drags him along as best as they can over to the bunker, the trek silent for the most part aside from each of their labored breaths. Passing through the ruined stone wall of the village and slipping into the forest, it's only a few more minutes until the bunker comes into view. A small group consisting of Maggie, Pasqual, Edmund, Callahan and Elan stand just outside of the structure. The group is speaking quiet, hushed tones and when Khalid and himself near the conversation stops entirely.
Ten sets of eyes are drawn to him immediately.
"Where's Will?" He asks first, looking just behind Maggie and Elan to scour the inside of the bunker for the boy. "And Kieran and Iris."
"Iris is fine. She was with us all until just a moment ago. She might already be looking for Kieran." Maggie crosses her arms to tell him. She avoids his eyes completely. So do Elan and the others when he dares to glance at them.
He understands why it is Iris would prioritize looking for Kieran over Will.
There was no point in looking for someone that was dead.
Blinking rapidly, he ducks his face down and tries to squeeze out the words that are stuck in his throat.
"How?" He asks.
"He-" Maggie starts and then just as quickly stops. She clears her throat and tries again. "He left the bunker. Earlier. We couldn't stop him. You know how everyone is during...that. When the blood moon started Kieran just up and left before it really started. Didn't say why, not even to Will and I'm sure that bugged Will and then once the blood moon really set in I guess that's all the kid could think about." She explains.
"How?" He repeats, voice shaky. "I mean, how do you think he died? Was... it quick?" He lifts his face to look at Maggie, gauging for her reaction and then looking at the others as well. Their faces are as grim as he'd feared.
He opens his mouth to say something, but nothing really comes out.
The quiet morning remains as it is; quiet, save for low, miserable sounds that now spilled from him despite his best efforts. He feels Khalid pull him a little closer, trying their best to keep him upright while also offering a shoulder to cry on. He denies the kind gesture, forcing himself to stand on his own despite all of his muscles threatening to give out at any time. Sniffing wetly, he walks past them all towards the trees.
"Zach." Maggie calls to him firmly. "You need medical attention."
His feet continue on in their awkward, shambled gait.
"Zachariah." Maggie tries again, pleading, and while he doesn't stop he does answer her this time.
"I need to find Kieran." Is all he says.
No one follows him into the forest, thankfully, and that spares them from seeing the two other times he succumbs to his potion sickness and upends his guts on bushes and grass alike. He can feel his death just on the horizon, but he doesn't mean to escape it. He merely hopes to out pace it until he can see just where Kieran has ended up.
More dead than alive, he searches the forest. There's no sign of Kieran anywhere he looks, but there are traces of a fight. The further he gets in the forest, the more flesh and gore he sees slopped against the scenery. Kieran must have been fighting against the creatures of the blood moon and gotten separated from the others.
There's more to the viscera then just proof of battle, however. There's a foulness in the air, like brimstone and rot, and it wafts from the mess littered everywhere. Red, flesh colored muck paints the bark of trees and the grass.
None of the creatures of the blood moon leave a mess such as this.
As he circles the small lake that he and Will sometimes fished at, he spots Iris at last standing near the water, both of her hands raised as she blessed away the corruption all around her. She notices him before he can even say anything.
"You're not long for this world." Iris remarks as she takes in his haggard appearance. She doesn't look at him for long, her brown eyes flickering back over to the work at hand. "You're looking for him, aren't you?"
He nods.
Judging by the wrinkle of her nose and the way her jaw clenches, there is something else entirely she would like to say to him, but all she tells him is, "He's that way. Past the berry bushes."
"Thank you." He tells her and starts walking the direction she'd pointed.
The walk from the lake onward feels worse, although he cannot pinpoint why. He cannot shake the feeling that he's walking towards certain doom and even as the dread threatens to stop his heart itself, he pushes on. His efforts lead him past berry bushes and towards one of the oldest trees in the entire forest; its trunk as wide as three men and the foot of it's roots looking like fat, coiling serpents. It's by the foot of the tree that he spots Kieran.
In a macabre halo around Kieran is the fleshy, curse riddled mounds that made up the entirety of the lands south of the village where the corruption was it's most dense. He can hardly recognize Kieran as they are now; dressed in clothes nearly torn to ribbons, the skin exposed underneath flushed and practically steaming with heat.
Kieran is tucked tightly within themselves, legs folded and brought to their chest. Their arms wrap around themselves. Their face is hidden in the depths of their ragged sleeves. What sticks out amidst the greens, browns and reds was the vibrant blue pouch seated by Kieran, the contents spilling out onto the dirt from being either placed or dropped without care. He knows that pouch very well- he's bought at least a dozen of them. The purification powder that spills onto the corrupted soil makes a feint sizzling sound that he can only catch the closer her draws in.
Closer now, close enough to cast a shadow over Kieran, he can see that their entire body is trembling terribly. Worse, is the observation that both of their hands are now red and angry with bubbling burns, the cause most likely the purification powder.
He sinks to his knees with a clatter. The noise doesn't at all disturb Kieran from the quiet, fervent whispering they've been doing presumably since before he or Iris had found them. It's not in a language he can understand, but it isn't any of the languages he's heard Kieran speak either.
There are a weight to those words, whatever they might be. It was a mistake to call it mere whispering. The more he listens to it the more it sounds like a desperate prayer.
One by one he slips off his gauntlets and sets them down to the side.
With as much care as he can muster, he reaches out and delicately pulls Kieran's face from their arms.
"Oh." He says, breath succinctly caught in his throat.
The face he's greeted with can hardly be called Kieran's. It can hardly be called human either, but it was human enough that Kieran's eyes, malformed and discolored, were brimming with an onslaught of tears that refused to stop.
What was it about this blood moon that was causing such an effect on them?
He'd been inside of their place the morning after a blood moon and Kieran had never looked like this, nor had their home. There had to be something he was missing- something right there in his face.
It occurs to him then what it is.
"The doll doesn't just effect others, does it?" He asks them, his amber eyes softening with remorse. "It's been effecting you as well."
Recognition sparks in their eyes, but other than that Kieran's unfocused gaze still flickers all over his face; aimless.
"I'll always be grateful that you look out for me and I can't fault you for wanting to protect me, but," And he brushes his thumb against where their cheek would be, if it weren't a maculate expanse of raw flesh. "-I think enough is enough, don't you think?"
All at once lucidity floods Kieran's eyes and a diminutive amount of humanity is returned to their face. "You intend to take the doll back."
"I intend to destroy it." He clarifies.
Kieran wrenches his hands from their face and shoots to their feet, eyes wide and mouth parted with panic.
Although it's gotten him nothing twice now, he still asks: "What happens when the doll is destroyed?"
"I have no idea!" Kieran half shouts, half cries at him, fresh tears spilling down their slowly returning physical features. In their upset they pace back and forth at the foot of the tree, their hands clawing through their brown hair. "I always knew this day would come. It was never a matter of if, merely of when. You've been ready for this awhile now. The problem, as always, lays within me. I've been prolonging things longer than they should've been. I never intended to!" Kieran confesses this miserably to him, the forest, and the thing that always seems to be listening.
"I have endless knowledge to guide others, but what lies in wait for me if you should proceed is...unknowable to me." They continue, stopping their pace to stare at where he remains on the grass. "I don't want to disappear."
It's whispered in a frightened cadence, nearly a plead.
"You won't." He tells them.
"You can't know that. None of us can."
"I don't need to." Is gritted out as he hefts himself back to his feet. "I'm telling you, Kieran, that no matter what happens I won't let you disappear and I won't let it have you."
He stands at full height, shoulders squared and and back straight and offers out his hand to Kieran. There is hesitation, but not much and soon Kieran walks over to him, face uncertain, and slips one of their burned hands into his hold.
"I won't let it have you." He tells them defiantly.
"Zach-"
"I won't." He interrupts. "I don't care if it's listening. Or watching. I hope that it is. I want it to witness this." He let's Kieran's hand free for the time being to pull a dagger from his inventory. With his right hand he grips the dagger and brings it to his left hand and drags the edge of the blade across his palm.
"I swear to you in blood that I will put an end to this. That I will protect you and the others until the end of my endless days. That you will never be alone. That you have nothing to be frightened of."
He offers the bloodied dagger to them.
Kieran breathes heavily from where they stand across from him, their chest rising and falling unevenly and their face wet with tears, sweat and blood. Swallowing hard, they shakily reach out with their left hand to accept the dagger. The shaking only worsens with the dagger now in hand, Kieran's entire arm shaking as if an invisible force were attempting to wrestle over control.
It does nothing to stop Kieran from slashing their palm. The subsequent darkening of the skies above, followed by the whispered words carried by the gale that rolls into the forest fails to stop the two of them from joining bloodied hands.
Hand in hand, a blood oath has been struck.
It's as he's leaning in to kiss Kieran that his heart finally gives out to the potion induced heart attack that had been steadily building over the many hours. His limp body is caught easily in their arms and he's settled to lean his weight against their front.
"I'll see you soon." He gurgles over their shoulder, mouth teeming with blood.
He doesn't just mean Kieran.
--
Wakefulness comes to him slowly upon respawning the next day.
Groaning, he pushes up in bed to sit up. His wings feels crumpled and sore from sleeping on his back for so long but the uncomfortable sensation is forgotten immediately when he realizes there's weight on his chest. Looking down, he finds Will fast asleep on his front; some of their hair falling over their eyes.
"Will?" He says in disbelief.
Seeing as how his movement hasn't woken them up just yet, he gently lays back down and settles his hand on the crown of their head. What a stupid thing to worry about- waking them up with his movement when surely the crying he was holding back and the way it racked his whole chest would do it instead.
He's proven right moments later when he feels Will's body stiffen as they awaken. Briefly, he wonders if they'll continue to feign sleep in an attempt to spare him embarrassment but he should know by now that Will never bothers with things like that.
"I'm awake, you know." Will huffs against his chest where their face was still smushed against it. They don't swat his hand off their head and seeing as how they were awake now, he stops fighting the urge to sink his fingers into their hair.
He stares up at the ceiling and rids himself of the remnant tears that still lingered while actively puzzling just how he can breach the topic of the previous night. Will beats him to it and he knows that they're going to when he hears them sigh magnanimously before rolling off of him to sit up on their folded knees on his bed.
"I'm sick of seeing everyone crying, for star's sake." Will grumbles.
"Everyone?" He sits up and crosses his legs, elbows resting crooked on either knee. At his question, Will's round face bursts with color and they dart their blue eyes away from him.
"Well, practically everyone! I woke up a few hours ago. Kieran was waiting for me all morning, I think. He was there as soon as I woke up, seated by the bed. He wasn't even reading or anything. Just watching me sleep. It'd be creepy if he didn't look so miserable. I mean, it was still really, really creepy, but...I'm also glad I didn't wake up alone."
"Me too."
"...He asked me about last night." Will continues. "So I told him what I could remember. First, I remember panicking that the blood moon was rising. I think the first thing I went to do was run to your place and wake you up but Nasrin started transforming before any of us even knew what to do."
Will feebly picks at a loose string in the fabric of their pants, face downcast.
"It was awful. Everyone was panicking. I don't think I've ever seen Kieran scared like that before. He managed to get all of us except Nasrin and Raziel into the bunker. After that, when Elan was getting ready to close the bunker, Kieran started to leave. I asked him if he was going to get you, but he didn't answer me.
"At some point I think that Callahan and Khalid were trying to throw one another out of the bunker. The door did get opened eventually, but I think only for a few seconds before someone was able to shut it again. I managed to sneak past them all and out the bunker. I remember wanting to find Kieran. It's all I could think about. I'm not sure how Nasrin didn't spot me. Maybe she was too preoccupied with Raziel? Either way, I walked around in the forest for a while. I don't know how I thought I 'd be able to find Kieran. I just ran in any direction that felt right."
He refrains from saying anything as Will parses through the still fresh memories. The boy could take all the time they needed.
"I'm not quite sure about what happened next." Will admits. "I vaguely remember the monsters finding me. There were too many to run from, but...I know they didn't get me. They never got a chance to. I ran deeper and deeper into the forest, past the lake, and then....It's blank. I remember my chest hurting and my blood running cold. I remember not recalling how to even breathe."
Lifting their face, now ashen with fear, Will tells him: "I think I saw something in the forest. Whatever it was, I don't think that it liked me looking at it very much."
"No." He agrees somberly. "No, it wouldn't have."
"...What was it I saw? Do you know?"
"It was Kieran."
"Oh." Will says, strangely calm. "That explains a lot."
"It's okay if you're upset-"
"No, really, I'm not. I'm sort of relieved actually. I mean, as far as dying goes, I'd rather it be quick like it was." Will explains.
"I died of a heart attack last night, too." He tells them.
Will perks up at that. "So we both found Kieran last night?"
"Yeah, but in my case I died because I drank too many potions..."
There's a pause as Will regards him and processes what he's just said before the boy bursts into unbridled laughter. Their amusement is so much that he watches them fall onto their side on his bed, arms clutching their gut as they openly snort and guffaw.
"It's not that funny." He sighs.
"You're right- it's hilarious."
He rolls his eyes and leans over to scoop the boy up, their laughter turning into offended squawks as he hugs them tightly.
"I'm sorry." He speaks the words into their hair.
Will stills in his hold.
"Shut up, would you? There isn't anything to apologize for." Will tells him harshly. Despite the edge to their words, he feels their small arms slip around him and eagerly return the hug. For now he acquiesces, choosing to remain silent despite the lingering guilt.
"I don't know if I ever said it, but....I'm happy here. With you all. I wouldn't change a thing."
"Not a thing?" He presses, astonished.
"Nope." Is said with a resounding pop and Will pushes away from him to slip off the bed and stand near the foot of it. Their small hands are settled onto either hip to give him a disapproving look. "Now quit your blubbering and let's go and help the others clean up."
What other choice does he have but to listen?
The two of them exit his home and set out into the village. As expected, everywhere he looks there's people at work. Pasqual and Edmund are by the ruined fountain in the center of the village, both working slow but steadily to remove the chunks of cobblestone out of the way. A few yards off he spots Nasrin and Raziel picking through the debris of the former's home for any salvageable belongings.
Nasrin's ears twitch at the sound of him and Will passing by and she turns around just in time for their eyes to lock. In the middle of her forehead now laid the vertical scar of where his dagger had been thrown. Any trace of guilt he felt is assuaged by the tired, yet affectionate smile she offers him. Relief washes over him immediately and he offers his own tired smile to her as well before heading onward.
Will leads him over to the greenhouse. Or, more accurately, the boy leads him over to what remains of it. What remains is the copper skeleton that once held all the glass panels together but not much else of anything. All of the plants have been destroyed, as well as their pots.
Standing in front of the debris, alone, is Kieran.
They don't turn on heel to regard either of them as he and Will approach. That's fine. He, nor Will, have no problem with moving to stand on either side of them. He breathes in the air of the afternoon deeply, the sweet smell of apples wafting from the forest. He shakes out his wings and spreads them out fully to slip one behind Kieran and Will in a pseudo one armed embrace.
Wordlessly, he slips his hand into Kieran's left. Looking at them from his peripheral vision gifts him the sight of their lips curling minutely at the corners in the beginnings of a smile.
Things would be alright. He knows this from the bottom of his heart.
--
"All vessels are destined to one day break." Is what Kieran tells him from their seat on the floor of their home; knees folded and back hunched over a particular spot in the wood flooring just near the fireplace. The wood paneling is pried open with the blunt side of a knife and with one hand Kieran grabs hold of the doll they've keep trapped within it. The doll is gripped firmly, Kieran's knuckles white with the force they're exerting.
Standing to their feet, Kieran offers him a tight lipped smile along with the doll. The doll itself is littered with cobwebs and dirt, the gray button eyes scuffed. He accepts it easily and tucks it away into his inventory.
"You're much more than just a vessel." He says.
"You certainly make me feel as such." Kieran agrees with a hum, eyes sparkling. "Will as well. Speaking of, is he...?"
"He's with Raziel and Nasrin." He assures them. "Iris should be here any second now, too."
"I see." Kieran says quietly.
All that was left to do now was wait for the dryad to arrive.
"What did you tell Will?" Kieran steps forward to ask. They gently card some of his messy hair from his face and tuck it behind an ear.
"I told him that you and I had something important to take care of. That it was dangerous." He explains. The talk that morning with Will had been awkward to say the least. Very, very carefully, as he was dressed almost fully in his armor sans his helmet, he sets his hands on either side of Kieran's slim waist and pulls them closer.
"He's not stupid. He's going to be extremely upset with both of us." They remind him.
"I know, I know. But if I explained fully what was going to happen, do you really think he'd agree to stay put with the others? The last thing either of us needs is him following me down to that place."
"Or coming here." Kieran agrees. "For the time being, I can say safely that I am wholly myself. However, once you leave with the doll and of course as you near closer and closer to that place...."
He nods, but ultimately adds nothing further to the conversation. It is, after all, the first time in a very long time that it had felt like this; like the world was solely Kieran and himself, so close together they practically melded at the seams. In a burst of nostalgia, he finds himself suddenly grinning at Kieran.
"Hey," He starts, a little loud in his excitement, "do you remember our first night together?"
The mild confusion melts from Kieran's face and is replaced with unyielding warmth.
"I remember every moment of ours. But, in this case do you mean our initial meeting? Or the first night we....?"
"When we first met!" He clarifies quickly and tries to ignore the heat rising to his face.
Kieran chuckles darkly, and their attention turns to the scar around his neck. "Of course I remember. We were scrambling to find somewhere safe for the night. You were insistent on finishing the shack."
He still winces at that.
"Yeah and I got us both killed because of it. I'm still sorry, by the way."
Kieran shakes their head. "You died protecting me."
"You wouldn't have needed protecting if I wasn't stubborn."
"You're missing something important." Kieran says and holds his face in a delicate, but firm grasp. "You could have abandoned me and left me to the hoard. I even suggested for you to do just that, but you refused. You stayed with me and fought until the bitter end. Your first death and it was for me. Yes, I followed you into oblivion right after, but..."
"But...?"
"I think that's how I would prefer things go anyways. I wouldn't ever want to be out of your orbit. Being within arm's reach of each other, in this plane of existence or the next- it brings me a comfort I don't think I've ever experienced before."
"I'm the same." He agrees vehemently and surges forward to capture their lips with his own. Kieran, long since desensitized to his sudden bouts of affection, doesn't at all shirk away from the dozens of kisses he showers them with. He forgets himself, his duties, even the village itself in that moment. Kieran steals his attention with the same fortitude that they used to steal his very breaths.
If given the choice, he'd stretch out this moment for centuries. He gets away with a minute or two before incessant knocking on Kieran's front door spurs the two of them to split apart. Clearing his throat, he speaks for Iris to come inside.
"The time has come." Iris tells them both as she steps into Kieran's home. "Are you two ready?"
"Of course." He answers at once and moves to grab his helmet off the table. Kieran beats him to the punch, walking over and grabbing his helmet with both hands before returning in front of him. Smiling, he slaps away any loose curls in his face before nudging his head forward. His helmet is settled gently on his head.
Fully geared, he turns his attention to Iris. "What about you? Is there anything you need?"
"I have everything I need within me." She says. The purification powder and her own magical affinity would be more than enough to ward off any of Kieran's worst tendencies when the fight was at last started.
The rest was now up to him.
--
Upon first awakening in the clearing, Zach had been unsure of who he might be. Worse yet, he'd been unsure of what he was capable of. Now, as he stands atop one of the dark structures in this infernal biome, doll clutched in hand, he finds peace in knowing himself completely. If he wasn't born for this moment, he'd surely been molded for it by his own two stubborn hands.
The usual devils and scorching bats are nowhere to be found. In this seemingly endless expanse of lava, brimstone and unhallowed earth, he finds himself alone. Slowly, he extends one arm over the edge of the building. The doll dangles limply in his gauntlet, it's gray eyes shiny with excitement.
He spares it a single look before releasing his hold.
His eyes trail after the doll as it descends, time seeming to slow down, if only marginally. By the next blink, the doll's form had submerged into the lava with a small hiss. The alert of Kieran's sudden and undoubtedly fiery death wracks through his entire form like alarm bells singing. Everyone in the village, including Will, must have felt it as well.
A great, wet gurgle of a roar sounds off all around him. So loud is the sound that he feels it reverberate within his skull, the plating of his armor, and even the fabric of his person. The bed of lava directly in front of him ripples and bubbles as if preparing for an eruption and not content to just sit and wait for said lava to be tossed his way, Zach kicks into flight and hovers just above the building. Bursting from the lava's depths is a mound of flesh far larger and vastly more repugnant than anything he could have imagined. His mouth falls open in abject horror as the abomination continues to rise endlessly, the height of it now exceeding the very buildings he'd been using for purchase.
From where he idles in the sweltering air, the monstrosity in front of him nearly felt as if he were looking upon a towering wave about to crash over him. The thing is so big that no matter where he looks, some part of it is in his field of vision. The expanse of the thing is a rusted hue of red, the texture like a scab that had been repeatedly picked at and left to bleed over and over.
Two eyes, bloodshot and bulbous, regard him cravingly; the iris of each a mottled red. Seated between those two eyes was a maw that snapped and grinded it's sword-like teeth at him with carnal delight. Horror threatens to sully his mind, but it is within that horror that he finds familiarity.
This thing, whatever it may be, was apart of Kieran just as Kieran was apart of it and inch by miserable inch, he would claim it for his own. Beneath his ribs where he holds Kieran dearly, he makes a spot for this aberration.
The wall of flesh ahead of him begins to make its move, the monumental weight of it's being shifting causing the bed of lava below to ebb and flow erratically. Several veiny, rope-like masses shoot towards him. It's easily dodged with a timed flap of his wings and while he's relatively safe from falling into the lava below, he isn't at all safe from getting cornered against craggy cliffs and desolate buildings alike.
Half of his brain dedicates itself to keeping him in the air, dodging and weaving cloying tendrils and disembodied mouths and the other half works to ensure that each of his attacks actually lands on the monstrosity. His sunfury extends just far enough to graze the thing's flesh, but if he truly wants to deal damage he'll have to situate himself closer.
It's a risk, one that he's not entirely sure he thinks all the way through, but he does it anyways. Flapping his wings, Zach dives closer to the wall of flesh, the black pupils of its large eyes honed in on his form almost obsessively. Heaps of flesh are slogged off with each subsequent hit of his flail but he takes just as many blows as he gives.
What gives him an advantage is the sheer amount of blood this thing had. Each hit nearly soaks him entirely in blood and his crimtane armor feeds off it greedily; his vitality being topped off in frequent intervals. Even with the healing factor, staying nearly face to face with the wall of flesh wouldn't work for too long. He breaks away from it, dodging a few stray mouths trying to steal chunks from him and focuses on the number of buildings coming up. Even with the knowledge that he needed to find a way around these buildings, he still ends up waiting until the very last second to turn his back on the wall of flesh to make an attempt. Not unlike an animal caught in a snare, he moves in a frenzy to slip through partially ruined doors and long since shattered windows; nearly throwing himself from one building into a small stretch of lava until he manages to kick off the ash bricks and regain a bit of air.
He throws a hundred bee-infused grenades over his shoulder in hopes it gives him time to put a little more space between himself and the wall of flesh, as he needs to take yet another obsidian potion. It's as he's popped the cork and is frantically chugging the contents down that at last one of the tendrils latch onto him. The tendril had slipped into a gap of his armor and now attempted to loop around his arm to cripple him from fighting back.
The opportunity is quickly stolen from it when he uses the heat of sun fury to burn the tendril's connection with the wall of flesh. Removed from it's master, the tendril wilts around his arm lifelessly.
With the lava no longer being a threat, at least for a few minutes, he soars up close to the wall of flesh and fits in as many attacks as he can before he needs to back off again and weave between buildings. He rinses and repeats the maneuver, all the while exhausting his reserve of bee-grenades and molotovs.
"This is a fight you cannot win." He tells the monstrosity with a sharp smile. Even as the wall of flesh quickens it's course to him, desperate to tear him apart and take him for its own, he presses on confidently. The effects of obsidian potion were once again fizzling out but he doesn't move to take another.
"It's almost over." He speaks again, this time gently.
Several tendrils reach out, frantic, to ensnare his legs. He doesn't need to move his legs to stay in the air, so he doesn't bother with freeing himself. Instead, he focuses solely on attacking, each muscle in his body singing with the exertion of each hit. As he brings down sun fury for the umpteenth time, the tendrils on his legs suddenly give out. A terrible wail erupts from the wall of flesh- this time for the last.
In an explosive discharge of flesh and corruption, the enemy at last falls.
The blood from the wall of flesh showers the nearby vicinity and casts the surface of the lava near him into solid obsidian. A few items lay scattered on the obsidian and he barely looks at any of it before quickly shoving it into his inventory. He takes out his magic mirror, closes his eyes and heads home.
A second later, he opens his eyes and finds himself standing in his cabin. The table, the chairs, everything is pushed out of his way as he barrels out his front door. He's only set a singular foot outside his home when he notices the most apparent change to the village; Kieran's home.
The entirety of the home had been reduced to ash, not even the foundations surviving. Standing in front of the wreckage, inconsolable in their grief, was Will, who was actively pushing and shouting at Iris, the latter of which calmly accepting their ire. The entirety of the village stood just nearby, clearly at a loss of what to do.
Upon noticing his arrival, Will tears their attention from Iris and rushes over to him; their face soaked with tears.
"It's alright." He tells the boy. Zach tugs his helmet off and lets it fall to the grass beside him before lowering onto one knee. He opens up his arms, already having forgotten about the gore all over him, and offers Will a tired, but promising smile.
Will collapses into his arms in a heap of tears and hiccupping, half formed questions. He stands to his feet with Will cradled in his arms and looks out towards the crowd.
"It'll be alright." He repeats, this time for each and every one of them. "He'll be back before we know it."
--
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--
"Are you two ready yet or not??" Comes Will's shrill complaint from just outside his front door. It's entirely deserved, given the fact that Kieran and himself were still lazing around in his bed, despite the party for that evening already going full swing.
"Is there anyway I can get a few more minutes of sleep?" Kieran asks hopefully, the words half muffled because they're currently curled up around him; face buried in the smooth expanse between his wings. The arms around his waist are comfortably warm.
"We can sleep when we're dead." He says and brightens when Kieran snorts loudly.
With a soft sigh, he feels Kieran slip their arms off him and move to sit up. He copies their gesture, raising both arms above his head to pop his back before standing to his feet. Sure, his hair was probably a mess and his clothes were wrinkled from rolling around in bed all day, but judging by the sheer pitch of Will's ever going complaints, he figures the boy will be content just to get him outside already- no matter the state.
Kieran, always preferring to have as little skin as possible showing, while once due to nothing other than preference, now dressed the same to conceal the plethora of burns now littering their body. The biggest burn stretched from just over their left pec and trailed towards their hip and lower back.
No clothes could hide the prominent burn that mottled half of their face and partially blinded one eye; the blindness rendering the iris a milky hue. In addition to that, was the patch of hair missing from the left side of their head that had refused to grow back in once initially burned.
His staring doesn't go unnoticed, it never has, and when Kieran finishes rolling a shirt over their head and tugging the sleeves to lay neatly, their mismatch eyes flicker to him and a smirk spreads across their face.
"We won't be leaving anytime soon if you keep looking at me like that." They say.
"I CAN HEAR YOU!" Will squawks, sounding nothing short of disgusted.
Laughing, he walks over to Kieran and slips his hand into theirs before opening the front door finally.
"Sorry, sorry. We're ready now." He tells Will as he steps outside.
"Not quite." Will says and before he knows it their small hands are reaching out for him. His shirt gets tugged stubbornly until he acquiesces and hunches down a bit so the boy can reach him. A yellow and green striped party hat is secured onto the crown of his head with a fairly weak piece of elastic. It matches the one on Will's own head to a t.
The second party had that's pulled from the boy's inventory is a glaring shade of pink and hosts a pompom on the the point. Any reservations Kieran might have about dawning the hat is swallowed down and shoved elsewhere in the face of childish whimsy. Just as he'd done a second ago, Kieran bends at the waist and allows Will to settle the hat onto their head.
Will does it with a gentleness he himself hadn't been awarded, the boy's fingers extra tentative as they looped the elastic around Kieran's chin; mindful of how their knuckles brushed against scarring.
"Alright." Will says with a nod. "Now we're ready. Come on, I think Roxanne is about to cut the cake."
Roxanne, a party-goer of much renown, had been the latest addition to the village. He'd encountered the young woman not at the depths of a cavern or even stranded in a dungeon, but by her unceremoniously waltzing into the village a week prior. It had been odd- Zach was so used to finding people that the idea that someone had sought him out first had surprised him.
Surprise or not, Roxy's bubbly personality was very welcome- as was her baking. At the mention of cake, his stomach growls obnoxiously loud and Kieran and Will both fix him with a look.
"Ugh. You are an absolute animal. I'll go a grab you two some cake. See you in a moment!" Will shoots off into a run before Kieran can even begin to inform them just how little they care for sweets.
"Don't worry, I'll eat your share." He assures them and pulls them along towards the center of the village.
At the center of the village a new fountain had been crafted, this time built from marble. Around it were various mahogany benches, some occupied by those with a drink or plate in hand, but most of them left empty. It was hard to sit still when there was music blasting from the technical wonder that was Roxanne's radio. Where the radio connected to, he wasn't sure, but if he had to guess it probably convened with whatever power that was in charge of the pipe-less toilets being able to flush.
"Look who finally showed up." Khalid mentions to Maggie, who he was currently in the middle of twirling as the two danced. Maggie doesn't interrupt her spin and even lets Khalid dip her before she chooses to speak.
"Late to your own party? You have a lot of nerve." She says while instinctively moving to adjust her nurse's cap, but instead finding the party hat. Rolling her eyes, she leaves the hat be.
"If there was a war going on outside you know he'd be the first to show up." He hears Khalid add.
"Hey!" He starts to protest, but gets as far as that and no further because Kieran starts to laugh quietly at his expense. It's far too charming for him to even fake being upset to any degree.
Khalid and Maggie stop dancing entirely to stare at Kieran, who upon feeling their gaze, stops laughing immediately.
"Is something wrong?" Kieran asks.
"No!" Maggie says quickly. "No, it's just- I think that's the first time I've ever heard you laugh."
"Yeah, man, if you need us to bully Zach more often to get a laugh out of you, it'd be our pleasure." Khalid offers.
"I'll keep that in mind, thank you." Kieran returns.
Not feeling particularly in the mood for a dance, at least not one in public, he leads Kieran over to one of the empty benches and sits beside them. He strikes up a friendly conversation with anyone nearby, so good is his mood that he finds himself unable to stop chattering about any and everything.
In the middle of Elandrian telling him of a tale between a drunken princess and the inane concoctions she brewed, Kieran wordlessly turns to the left. Running as fast as they can with two plates of cake in hand was Will, the boy's face flushed with exertion.
"Dad! There you are- bloody hell, I've been looking all over for you two." Will huffs with annoyance while slowing their run to a loose jog. The sliced cakes teeter precariously in their grip but the loss of cake is the last thing on his mind.
Mouth agape, he stares at Will like the boy had miraculously grown a second head.
"What?" Will asks, coming to skid to a halt now that they can see his expression. The boy looks at all the others nearby, sees the amusement and surprise in each of their faces and visibly becomes upset. "What are you all staring for?"
Before Will can become too upset, Kieran reaches out and places a hand on their shoulder.
"Will, think back on your words." Kieran instructs delicately. One by one they take the plates of cake from the boy and settle them onto the bench.
"What is there to think about?" Will snaps impatiently. "All I said was: dad, there you are-"
The words effectively die in their throat.
"Bollocks!" Will curses, both hands flying to conceal their face just as it flushes scarlet. Before they can abscond, he slips off the bench and kneels in the grass to pull them against him in a hug. Both of his wings flare out and move to wrap around the boy.
"It's alright! More than alright, I-" He tells them, eyes soft, "-I'm happy. I know when we first met you made it clear that you didn't want me trying to treat you like a son, but if I'm honest, I've always seen you as mine. I was kind of waiting for you to tell me off for it one day, but, well, I'm a lot happier it turned out like this instead."
"...Really?" Will says quietly against him.
"Of course."
Slowly, Will steps away from him, their eyes wet with embarrassed tears, but none had been shed as of yet. With a sniff, Will clears their throat.
"So you don't care if I call you dad or not?" They ask.
"It'd make me really happy if you did." He grins.
Nodding, Will turns towards Kieran.
"Don't expect me to call you mom." The boy tells Kieran indignantly, stealing a laugh out of the majority of those around.
"Thank goodness for that." Kieran utters with visible relief.
Although his journey had started off alone, now here at the end of it, Zachariah can say with confidence that he is as far from alone as he could be.