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A self-imposed challenge of my own creation, running from February 1, 2016 to February 29, 2016. I only plan to start these stories (producing around a thousand words for each), not to finish them within the month.

 
1.[100moods] 92. Surprised | Sparrow x Frost, last-name basis2.[15pairings] look who's on top | top!Simon x Frost not during groupsex3.[50harlequins] Spoiled Rich Girl and Poor Boy | Circle!Sparrow x Victor!Frost4.Alduin x F!DB x M!DB, corruption & Shout!Sex5.[15pairings] indecent exposure | Galen x Frost, seduction
6.Avery x Rylan x Jackson, dubcon & sex pollen7.Caderyn catches Charon x Adrasteia8.[15pairings] men | Simon x Sam, first time9.[citrus-taste | Kinkier Table] 44. masturbation | Sparrow x Frost10.[alphabetasoup] Hades | Sparrow x Frost
11.Dark!Hera x everyone AU12.demon!Rylan x Avery x Ion, dubcon (Susanne & Myles Die AU)13.Dom!M!Dragonborn x slave!Ancano x slave!Ondolemar, mindbreak14.Domme!Esmeralda x slave!Scorpius x slave!Octavius, noncon & mindbreak15.Dom!Sigurd x slave!Charon x slave!Caderyn x slave!Zephyrus (+ Adrasteia)
16.[citrus-taste] K-2. table | Sparrow x Simon x Nadia17.[citrus-taste] 26. harems | Harem/Parabellum Crossover18.[paranormal25] 23. writer's choice, tentacles19.Malene x Ancano, fantasy AU & arranged marriage20.[Maze of Fiends] Mate or Die AU
21.M!DB x M!Werewolf, hentai physiology & urethral penetration22.[over-look] play dead | Izzy x Octavian, necrophilia roleplay23.[smut-69] oil | Sparrow x Frost24.[smut-69] orgy | Sparrow x Frost x Simon x Nadia x Loretta x Izzy25.[lover100] S-61. secret | Sparrow x Frost
26.[lover-100] S-27. threesome | Sparrow x Frost x Galen27.[citrus-taste] K-47. in public | Sparrow x Frost x Galen28.Zevran x Lyna x King!Alistair, roleplay/raceplay #129.Zevran x Lyna x King!Alistair, roleplay/raceplay #2
 









 
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Title: Evermore
Pairing/Rating: Rylan/Avery, Rylan/Ion, Avery/Rylan/Ion
Challenges: 2. dark path [50-darkfics (http://norienchronicle.livejournal.com/9751.html)]
Summary: When Myles and Susanne are mysteriously killed, Avery is convinced that Ion was behind their slaughter.
Warnings: protagonist journey to darkness
Edited Date: 2016-02-10 08:15 am (UTC)

Evermore [1/?]

Date: 2016-02-13 06:01 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Note: The original draft of this section was written quite a while ago. It has been expanded and edited for 29 Days of Smut 2016.

When he had first heard the news, Avery's rage had burned white-hot through his grief, and his mind had been set in an instant. Myles and Susanne were dead, not six months after Rylan's resurrection, and there was no pretending that he didn't know why. For all he had hoped--had just short of prayed--that the game had ended with her loss, that he could even begin to dream of moving on from the deaths of the two women for whom he'd ever cared, Ion would never let that happen. In his anguish, Avery had strayed from the path Ion intended for him, and now his only other friends were dead.

He could only hope that Rylan hadn't been the one to do it.




The journey to the Pine Barrens took two days, and Avery made his way across the country fueled by only caffeine and fury. Once and for all, he was going to kill that fucking bastard, and if Rylan or any of the rest of those monsters killed him for it afterward, so be it. He probably deserved it at this point. Heaven knew he'd already let everyone down.

The forest took no pity on him, and it was another two days of water, drugstore sandwiches, and wandering before he managed to replicate the path he'd seen Rylan take so many times. Too many times.

But finally, even as a man who couldn't hear the Call, Avery made it to the Otherworld, and whatever qualms he may have had about his plan disappeared as he passed through the barrier into what might as well have been Hell. Ion was going to die, no matter what any of these people had to say about it. No one was going to be able to stop him.

And yet, as Avery marched toward the cottage where he'd last seen the two of them, he could feel his own resolve fading away. There were countless eyes on him, innumerable demons watching him pass through their midst, but they let him go on unimpeded. No doubt they recognized him by now, even if they hadn't expected to see him again.

Much to his surprise, Avery found Ion within minutes--or rather, Ion found him.

"Avery," he said in greeting, acting for all the world at of they were just estranged friends. As if what had happened with Rohan had somehow changed things between them. "What a surprise. I honestly didn't expect to ever see you again. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Try as he might to harness the burning hatred and wrath that he'd been steeped in for days, it failed him now, drained away by the Otherworld. Perhaps, he thought, he had best leave before it took any more than that; perhaps he could lure Ion out of the Other Realm somehow, so it would at least be slightly fairer fight.

"Myles and Susanne are dead," he heard himself say, succumbing more to the disassociation as each minute passed. "The last two people in the world I cared about were just murdered. You know exactly why I'm here."

Ion just looked at him with laughter in his eyes, as utterly dismissive as be could be. "We didn't kill your friends, Avery. In fact, the reason we're here, Rylan and I; she wants me kept very far away from anyone she might still happen to love." His lips curved into a small smirk. "She isn't going to be happy to see you like this."

Avery hesitated. The urge to see Rylan... the Other Realm was drawing it out of him, and he was having a hard time suppressing it. Dear God did he hate this place. "Will she try to kill me?"

Ion had the audacity to roll his eyes. "Please. She wants you alive--you specifically and your little friends to boot. She won't be happy to hear your news... And as a matter of fact, unless you are inclined to break it to her yourself, I fear I may decide to simply... forget it. A century from now, it'll hardly matter anyway."

Avery was about five seconds away from deciding he'd had enough and fleeing this Eldritch nightmare while he still had a chance. But he couldn't do that to Rylan, not even after what she'd become. She had to know about Susanne. If anything could get through to her, it was the thought that Ion had broken his promise. And the monster undoubtedly had, even if he seemed surprisingly reluctant to confess.

"I won't let you do that."
Edited Date: 2016-02-27 04:39 am (UTC)

Evermore [2/?]

Date: 2016-02-27 04:44 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Ion shrugged. "Fine. But I suggest you think about what you're doing. As I said, I am only here because Rylan wishes to ensure I don't harm the three of you. But if you're really the only one left, if the three of us are really the only ones left... well, Rylan might begin to consider things other than your safety."

A chill crept up Avery's spine. He had come here, perhaps foolishly, with a head full of accusations and half-formed notions of drawing Ion out of the protection of this nest of vipers, but somehow it occurred to him only now how foolish an idea this entire excursion really was. The world had changed significantly over the last year, and he had all but forgotten the gravity of it until now.

If Ion returned to the mortal realm... if he were tempted into starting back up his deadly game, Rylan would rejoin it, too. Only this time, she wouldn't be on Avery's side.

"She has to know."

For a moment, Avery waited, wondering if Ion would try to stop him--and wondering, more importantly, if he wanted to be stopped. But the monster did nothing, and so Avery set his jaw in newfound determination; if Ion didn't plan to put up any resistance, Avery certainly wasn't about to abandon his noble intentions. All he could hope was that they didn't backfire on him as badly as--

As he carefully suppressed his own self-wrought wince, Avery tried not to think of all the other things that had gone wrong in his life since Ion first begun to ruin it. Avery just needed to tell Rylan what had happened, just needed to see enough of her reaction to convince himself beyond a shadow of a doubt that she'd had nothing at all to do with their friends' murder, and then he could go. Then he could put these people behind him once and for all, severe the last remaining tie to the life he'd hoped--

Christ, this wasn't helping. "Where is she?" he demanded, voice gruff and tense and far too emotional, and Ion's easy smile was all the confirmation Avery needed to be sure that the fucking beast heard it, too. Avery was weak right now, inevitably so now that the last people in the world who he loved were dead and there was still the sneaking suspicion in the back of his mind that Rylan might have been the one to kill them. And so he had to be sure, and if that meant letting Ion see through the cracks, so be it.

"Come with me," Ion said, and he turned his back on Avery so carelessly that for a moment, the hunter was half-convinced it was some kind of trick. Ion knew better than that, knew better than to give him such an easy opportunity to take him out once and for all, and yet Avery was so shocked by it that he didn't even move; perhaps that was what Ion had been counting on, he thought, or perhaps the demon was just testing him once again. Either way, Ion glanced back a few seconds later, a single brow raised in challenge. "Unless you think you're safer here with them?" He nodded vaguely in the direction behind Avery, obviously meaning the various fey that Avery knew were still watching them in idle curiosity--and perhaps waiting for the first sign that this opportunity might not be Ion's but theirs.

Bristling at the suggestion--Avery wasn't stupid, knew he wasn't safe here or anywhere else, not now that Rylan and Susanne and Myles of all people had been taken out so thoroughly--Avery obliged to follow him, and as Ion led him down a narrow path between two seemingly dilapidated but disconcertingly hard-to-focus-upon buildings, Avery was surprised by how easily Ion continued to put his back to the man who he must realize still intended to kill him if he ever got another good chance.

Perhaps it was merely that Ion realized Avery wouldn't dare attack here in the Otherworld. If so, he was certainly right; Avery wasn't nearly that stupid.

Evermore [3/?]

Date: 2016-03-05 04:45 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Ion led him deeper into the village, taking him down a twisting, turning path that Avery quickly realized he wouldn't be able to replicate and reverse if his life depended on it (and he certainly hoped it wouldn't), until finally they stopped in front of another dark, nondescript, shadowy building Avery knew he was staring directly at the bulk of--and yet couldn't seem to wrap his mind around anyway. But when a figure appeared in the doorway--which he had been all but sure had been securely closed by a large wooden door a moment ago that seemed utterly gone now instead of merely open--he knew in an instant that Ion hadn't led him astray.

Rylan stared at him a moment, a look of utter shock on her face--

--and then she turned her gaze on Ion, fury burning in her eyes.

"What the fuck did you do?" came a low, threatening rumble in a voice he hardly recognized as her own, and Avery was rather impressed with himself for stopping his involuntary step back. "I told you to--"

"I haven't touched him," Ion protested, as at ease as ever even in the face of her rage. "He came looking for you."

Eyes narrowing slightly, Rylan glanced between. "I don't believe you," she said, voice dismissive as she glared at Ion, and then she turned to Avery. "What happened? Are you okay?"

There was a single, sharp moment of focus when Avery became painfully aware of all the emotions he'd been suppressing over the past few months. Christ, he'd missed her, more than he was ever going to be willing to admit, and even if seeing her here like this made his heart ache in its despair--this wasn't the Rylan he knew--he still wanted nothing more than to take her back with him, to pull her into his arms and drag her back to reality if that's what it took to get here there. He would've given anything, he feared, if it meant he could fix what Ion had done.

"I'm... fine," he said stiffly. It was so strange to be talking to her again, something downright disturbing in the way they were talking as if they were just estranged friends instead of... instead of whatever the hell they were.

"Then why are you here?"

He shooed away the thought that there was something almost hopeful about the way she was looking at him; either he was imagining it, or it didn't mean anything good. And he certainly didn't plan to find out which. "I... I had to tell you. Myles and Susanne, they're... they're dead."

Avery didn't miss the way she turned her fierce glare back on Ion once again, and perhaps that sight alone made this whole trip worth it. She suspected him, even now, and that more than anything proved that some part of her, at least, was still Rylan.

"Don't look at me," Ion preempted her accusation. "I already got it from him, and that's enough, thank you. You know exactly where I have and haven't been for the past six months."

Rylan was still for a moment, then gave the slightest hint of a nod before she turned back to Avery. "Do you know who did it, then?"

"I... don't. I was hoping that--well..."

One dark brow lifted. "Were you hoping that we did it, then?" she asked, a hint of pained offense in her voice. "Or that we didn't?"

All he could do was give her the truth. "I don't know."

"Then what do you want, Avery?"

He could feel their eyes fixed upon him--Ion's and Rylan's and who knows how many others'--and everything seemed to come together in that one crystallizing moment. "I want whoever did it to pay."

Rylan's eyes widened, just slightly, and Avery watched her glance again at Ion. The demon laughed. "Are you sure that's what you want, A?" Ion asked, an almost mocking smile on his lips.

Avery stared at Rylan, a small part of him convinced that she was doing this on purpose, that she was drawing something out of him that he hadn't even realized was there before he'd arrived and that he wasn't going to be able to suppress now that she'd beckoned it to light. "Not you," he said quietly, his gaze flickering to Ion. "I don't want anything from you. But Rylan--"

Evermore [4/?]

Date: 2016-04-06 10:34 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Her smile was more charming than he'd ever seen it, all white teeth and delight, and for a second he was sure she planned to pull him into a hug. "Of course," she assured him. "Of course I'll help you. I wouldn't miss this for the world."

Avery could feel his own excitement bubbling--this was his chance--and he practically snarled as Ion spoke again. "You're not leaving here without me," he said, eyes flickering between them both.

Rylan hesitated a moment, apparently reluctant to simply tell Ion to go fuck himself like the situation demanded, and Avery frowned at the words that finally made it past her lips.

"He can help, you know," she told him, and there was something detached about the way she spoke. Either she didn't believe it, it she didn't Avery could be convinced--possibly both--and she wasn't far from the truth.

"I will never trust him," Avery snapped at her, hating that there was a part of him that was actually considering it. For once in his life, Ion might actually be an asset; when they tracked down whoever had killed Myles and Susanne, Avery couldn't think if a worse punishment than giving that man, woman, or beast over to Ion.

But Avery wanted to kill this one himself.

"You trusted me enough to help me before," Ion reminded him, that same grin on his face that had haunted Avery's nightmares for so many years.

"I wasn't helping you," Avery all but spat at the man. "I was helping Rylan."

"You both were," Rylan urged, and from her time, she seemed to earnestly want them to get along. It was an absurd thought, but perhaps he'd brought it on himself; coming here, after all, had been mad. "And now you need help. So we will both help you, okay? Please, Avery."

Ion laughed, a dark, rumbling sound that never bode well for anyone. "Let me make the choice simple. Rylan and I are leaving here, Avery; going back into the world now that our main reason to stay here is gone--and now that you've given us a very good reason to go. So, you can either leave without us and hope you find whoever you're looking for before we do, or you can come with us while we hunt down whoever murdered your friends, and we'll let you have your revenge before they die. Hell, you might even earn yourself a say in what we do after we're done taking down your enemies for you, and I know you'd prefer that to having to chase us down.

"So," Ion finished, grinning that wolflike grin, "what will it be? Together, or alone?"

Avery felt himself floundering, startled and perhaps a bit overwhelmed by what was bring offered to him. He turned to Rylan, helpless and hesitant, and the cautious hope in her eyes felt like a weight in his heart.

"Fine," he said, his voice reluctance turned to sound. "Help me, if that's what you want. But if either of you tries to hurt me--anyone--or I find anything that suggests you were behind this, I swear I'll kill you both."

Avery meant the threat, but as Ion gave him a skeptical look (and Rylan seemed wholly unaffected), even he feared that it might be empty after all. He didn't know of he could bring himself to kill Rylan, and he doubted he'd stand a chance against them both.

Going up against even one of them could a death sentence, and that was assuming they actually wanted him dead. Even that wasn't something he could take for granted, not after what Ion had done to Rylan herself.

"Alright, A," Rylan said softly. "I'm ready to go if you are." She glanced at Ion. "Are you?"

Ion nodded, the excitement obvious now on his face, and Avery had the terrible suspicion that this entire trip was the worst mistake he'd ever made. "Let's go."

"Come on," Rylan said, those too-warm, too-friendly eyes turning to Avery again, and he stiffened as she reached toward him, her arm encircling his. "I've had more than enough if this place."

Ion scoffed as he fell into step behind them, and Avery let Rylan lead him back along the untraceable path Ion had taken him down before. People--demons--were still watching them with cold, impassive eyes as they walked, and Avery couldn't have been out of there soon enough.

And he hoped more than anything that he hasn't just made everything worse.

Evermore [5/?]

Date: 2016-04-10 10:38 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Even with Ion and Rylan at his heels, Avery couldn't have been happier to be free of the Otherrealm. He hated that place, hated its oppressive atmosphere and its incomprehensible nature, and, even more than the rest of it, he hated that it was teeming with more demons than he could possibly hope to count--and that there wasn't anything he could do about it.

But that, of course, was a problem for another day. For now, he found himself struggling with quite a different task. Now that he was free of the mind-numbing fog of the Otherrealm, Avery could only wonder what the hell he had been thinking. Not only had he failed to kill Ion, as he'd wished to do from the start, but he'd also managed to coax the monster out of hiding. He was now walking through the pine barrens with two literal demons at his back, one of whom killed his sister and destroyed his best friend--and the other of whom was had been his best friend until that destruction fell upon her. He didn't trust either of them--wasn't even sure if he would be able to match them if it came down at a real fight--and now they were back among the living, roaming free and set to the task of tracking down their next victim. He feared he'd made a horrible mistake.

"Are you alright, Avery?" came Rylan's voice, breaking through his silent worries in that same gentle tone she'd adopted after her... after her conversion. She seemed so different now, nothing at all like herself, and there was a part of him that even now wanted to believe that it was a lie equal and opposite to what he had believed about his sister. He had been convinced that because it had been Jaslyn's body, it had been Jaslyn's spirit wreaking havoc at Ion's side when in fact he really couldn't have been more wrong; now, he was begrudgingly willing to admit that this was in fact Rylan, in spite of what had happened to his sister... and yet wouldn't it better, he asked himself again, if it weren't? He could kill someone else in Rylan's skin, just as she had killed Jaslyn.

But he couldn't kill Rylan herself, not in her own skin or anyone else's, not even with this strange, sedated personality she had manifested since her change.

"I'm fine," he answered gruffly, though he was far from it. The worries were just piling on now that his mind was back to normal. He was going to be stuck with them, he realized, stuck playing babysitter to two bloodthirsty maniacs, and he had no delusions about having any ability to keep them in line. If they wanted to abandon him, kill him, or do anything else more suited to their natures than helping, he didn't think he was going to be able to do anything about it. He had been an idiot, he decided, and he was going to have to come up with some way to deter the inevitable for as long as he could. Assuming such a thing was even possible.

"No," Rylan countered, a hint of something a bit more obstinate flooding back into her voice, "you're not. You regret this already, then?"

Avery pretended he didn't hear Ion laugh. "No."

"Good," she said, sounding far from convinced. "Then what do we do next?"

"We get the fuck out of this forest," he answered coldly, his eyes on the horizon. He shouldn't leave his back to them, he knew--shouldn't take his eyes off them for a second... but what did it matter now?

"And then?"

"Then we find a hotel, get ourselves a room--rooms," he corrected quickly, "and start trying to figure out who the hell murdered our friends. Unless someone wants to make a confession, of course. Then I'm all ears."

He glanced back at Ion, only to find the man giving him an easy grin that did nothing at all to ease his frustration. "We told you, Avery," Ion reminded him with an almost sing-song cadence. "We didn't do anything. Neither Rylan nor I have set foot in this realm since the last time you saw us. So let's focus on finding the real culprits, shall we?" His wide grin couldn't have made it more obvious that he wasn't taking this seriously, and that only made Avery more sure that this was going to be an enormous waste of his time. "I haven't played solve a mystery in a long time. This should be fun."

Evermore [6/?]

Date: 2016-04-24 03:27 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Avery couldn't help himself. Now that he was starting to think clearly again, all the anger that had abandoned him during his foray into the Otherworld seemed almost inescapable now--and so it had an easy time escaping him. "This isn't going to be fun," he hissed at the other man--demon. "This is a job. We are going to figure out who the fuck did this, and we are going to put them down. And you two fucking psychopaths--" He didn't fail to catch Rylan's wince at that, though Ion's ever-worsening smirk seemed somehow more pressing at the moment. "--are not going to touch a single hair on anyone else's head. Do you fucking understand me?"

"How many times are we going to have to say we do, exactly?" Ion asked lightly, as if he couldn't even be bothered to care that Avery had just been trying to threaten him. "I'd like to get an estimate, because so far it seems that's going to be the least fun part of this trip. Though, knowing you, you'll find something else to make us all miserable. You've a special skill for that, don't you?"

Avery's jaw clenched. "I'd say you're the expert at making other people miserable, actually."

From the wickedly delighted look on Ion's face, the demon had all but taken that as a invitation to play. "Am I?" he asked, keeping pace with him even as Avery turned to storm away, eager to be as far from this forest as the job would allow him to go. "I thought you said I wasn't a person?"

"You're not," Avery hissed. Christ, he hoped it wasn't going to take as long to get out of the forest as it had taken to get through it in the first place. He checked his phone as he listened to Ion go on, hoping the GPS, at least, hadn't suffered any lasting damage from being taken into another realm.

"So when you say 'other people', you mean people besides you, not people besides me?"

It didn't appear to be broken, thank goodness, so Avery actually had an accurate idea of where he was going for the first time in days. That, at least, was a relief. "Would you shut the fuck up, damn it? I didn't let you come along just you could talk me to death, thank you."

"What should I be doing to you, then, Avery?"

He chose to ignore that, as well as the blatantly suggestive tone Ion had just dropped into. It wasn't at all something he wanted to dwell on. "My truck's that way. Assumin there's not an Otherrealm parking lot around here somewhere, I take it you're both going to need a ride?"

"Yeah," Rylan said softly, and Avery glanced back at her again. She sounded so different still; he didn't get it at all. How, he wanted to ask her, had having her soul warped into a demon made her, of all things, more demure? She talked like... she talked like a mediator, he decided, like she was trying very desperately to sound innocent and unassuming and, above all else, nonthreatening, and if she thought for a second that she was fooling him, she had another thing coming. After years at this job, he was far from that easily tricked--even when it came to Rylan--and pretending to be a sheep when she was clearly a wolf wasn't doing anything past insulting his intelligence. He had half a mind to order her to stop.

Unfortunately, though, he didn't think arguing with Rylan was a good idea. Arguing with Ion was one thing--a given thing, at that--but arguing with her had its potential dangers. He didn't want to run her off, after all, or to give her any reason to want to leave. Because if Rylan wanted to leave him, he didn't doubt that she wouldn't have much of a hard time convincing Ion to go, and that would leave Avery in a very precarious position, indeed.

It had been his interference in their secluded lives that had lead to their return to the mortal realm. If they ran off on him now, no doubt intending to wreak all manor of havoc around the continental US and perhaps the world, he would have to decided quickly whether to go after them in hopes of preventing as much of the damage as he could... or to stick to his current job of finding Myles and Susanne's killers, and to save Rylan and Ion's fates for some other day.

And that was assuming, of course, that they wouldn't just kill him and be done with it, whether he chose to go after them or not.

Evermore [7/?]

Date: 2016-04-30 02:02 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
There must have been more of his worry on his face than he realized as he dwelled in those dire thoughts and tromped through the forest, because Rylan's eerily gentle voice interrupted them, full of audible concern. "You're still worrying," she said softly, and when her fingers touched his arm, he jumped so hard anyone watching would've thought he'd just stuck his finger in an electrical socket.

He had jumped so hard, in fact, that the three of them had come to a dead stop, both of the other two staring at Avery. Rylan's eyes were wide, and while his back was to Ion, he could just imagine the amused expression on the stolen body's face. Avery's own heart was pounding in his chest, his thoughts racing as he himself tried to figure out why he'd just reacted that strongly--and if the look on Rylan's face was anything to go by, she was as bewildered by his reaction as he was. "Sorry," he muttered. "Just--just don't do that."

And then he turned away from her and started walking again, faster than before. God damn did he want to be out of these woods.

The rest of the hike back, thankfully, passed uneventfully. None of them spoke again, which was frankly stunning considering who his companions were, but perhaps there was something to the notion that they might be as thrown by this whole thing as he was. It was a long shot, of course (he'd only ever seen Ion off his game once, and this situation was certainly nothing in magnitude when compared to that one), but an alternate explanation didn't come immediately to mind, so Avery decided to settle for it. It wasn't as if they were simply respecting his own discomfort, after all. Ion and respect didn't exactly go hand-in-hand, a fact to which Rylan herself could attest.

But the spell of silence broke once they were back in the parking lot, and while Avery was endlessly relieved to be free of the eerie, oppressive nature of the Pine Barrens, his spirits weren't exactly lifted when his eyes fell upon his truck and he realized what exactly was going to happen now.

There was a reason that in the few cases when the three of them--himself, Rylan, and Myles--four if Susanne tagged along--were working together, they took Myles' car instead of Avery's truck. Avery's truck was not a vehicle built for three adults, and things were about to get very awkward, very fast.

Everything about this was a nightmare.

If either of the others had noticed the inevitable problem yet, they gave no sign (and since he didn't think Ion would've been able to resist taunting him about it the moment he noticed it, Ion must not have noticed it yet). Instead, Rylan simply started toward his truck without even waiting for him to point it out; but of course she didn't, he realized with a dull shock. Why would she? She'd ridden in that truck so many times in the past, buckled in beside him and teasing him for his musical choices and his utter lack of style and his gruff attitude and--

The problem was, he realized, that even after all this time, he still couldn't seem to reconcile this thing at his side with Rylan. It was her, and he had all the evidence in the world to prove it to himself. He never would've let it live if he hadn't, after all. But even with the undeniable proof that this demon wearing Rylan's body was Rylan herself, albeit corrupted almost beyond recognition, he still couldn't seem to wrap his mind around the idea that it was her. His brain kept telling him that it was someone else, as if Rylan had been replaced by an identical twin who was no less a stranger to him than anyone else in the world. Like the body was familiar to him while the mind and the soul were not--even though they were--and so he simply couldn't recognize her unless he actually thought about it.

It was fucking maddening, and there was a part of him that was actually inclined to blame it on Jaslyn. His brain kept telling him that Rylan wasn't Rylan because Jaslyn hadn't been Jaslyn, and perhaps that was a trauma he was never truly going to get over.

Dwelling in thoughts he didn't want to be having at all, Avery unlocked the truck, and though she was already ahead of him and standing at the door, Rylan hesitated. "Um..."

Evermore [8/?]

Date: 2016-05-18 02:25 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] norienchronicle.livejournal.com
Written 5/16/2016; forgot to post.

Avery ignored her. Let the two of them figure it out, he decided. It wasn't like he didn't already know what they were going to do to solve the problem.

As Avery slid into the driver's seat and slammed his own door shut behind him, starting the truck up while Ion paused behind his... girlfriend had to be the wrong word. But whatever she was to him--victim, girlfriend, he didn't even care at this point--or so he told himself--the two of them paused for only a moment before Ion gave her a little grin. "Tight fit. How much do you think it's going to upset him if you sit in my lap?"

Avery had to admit, he had some genuine appreciation for the uncertain expression on Rylan's face as she glanced back at him following those words. They all knew he wasn't going to be pleased with the inevitable way they were going to solve this particular issue, and it wasn't simply because they would risk getting pulled over by any cop that happened to catch a glimpse of their seat arrangement.

No. Unfortunately, each of the three of them knew that Avery was going to be jealous. No matter how long he had spent away from her, no matter how suppressed his feelings had been back when they might have actually mattered, no matter what Rylan was now, he couldn't pretend that it didn't give him a distinct and unshakeable sense of horrible envy to see them together like this. Ion, of all people, should not be the one who had her in his arms.

If only he could pretend he didn't care.

Without any more words on the subject--just a self-conscious look on Rylan's face and a smug, self-satisfied smirk on Ion's own--Ion reached past her, opened the door, and then skirted around her body to slide onto the seat beside Avery.

Oddly, that was what got him. He hardly even paid attention to it when Rylan climbed into the car and let herself be pulled down into Ion's grasp. Her ass hit Ion's lap, their skin only separated by two thing layers of jean, and yet all Avery could think about was how damnably close Ion was to him right now.

It was disconcerting, really, something that set him into a kind of subdued panic. He didn't want--never wanted--Ion anywhere near him, and to let the monster into his space like this--not just into his figurative bubble of personal space but also the semi-private territory of the inside of his car--was disconcerting to say the least. It felt eerily akin to the moment in a vampire movie when the genre-blind victim invited the beast into their home, dismantling the one barrier between them and sure, inescapable death in one horrible moment of mistake.

It felt, to put it simply, like he was making a mistake.

But then, he told himself as he started up the truck and tried to ignore whatever they were doing beside him, that was the thing, wasn't it? This was a mistake, and there was absolutely no getting around that. Avery shouldn't under any circumstances be letting Ion--or Rylan, for that matter--this close to him. He shouldn't have contacted them at all, shouldn't have given them a reason to leave the Otherrealm behind, and absolutely shouldn't be helping them now. Bringing them into contact with humans at all was dangerous and stupid, and what in the fuck had prompted him to make sure a completely idiotic decision, he couldn't even begin to guess.

(He just missed Rylan, a nasty little voiced whispered from the back of his mind, and perhaps he was even willing to put up with Ion so long as he could have her. It was a voice he was determined to ignore.)

They drove, thankfully, in silence. A few minutes down the rode from the parking lot where they'd disembarked, Avery saw Rylan's twitch toward the dashboard. She was going for the stereo, he knew, meaning to turn on the radio like she'd done so many times in the past. Had things been normal, she would've done it; she would've turned it on and listened for a few seconds to whatever he'd left it on, and then she would've given him a bit of gentle teasing before asking if he minded whether she changed the station. He never had before, even if there had been a few occasions when he'd had her wait until a song was over before she turned the dial.
Edited Date: 2016-05-18 02:26 pm (UTC)

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Amara Tanith

January 2021

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