#hector's brain short circuits

[excessive-vampires]

Val in the AH Part 5 (FINAL PART): In Which Val's New Life Begins

Setting and all characters except Val and Hector are from oliversrarebooks

Masterlist with CW

When Val awoke the next evening, they were given a simple white dress to wear and a box containing their shoes from before their capture. They were house slippers, but they were better than nothing and Val was glad to get them back. Lily then led Val to her car and put them in the passenger seat. The drive was uneventful and took a little under an hour. Hector’s home was far from modest, but nowhere near as extravagant as the mansion that housed the auction house. After Lily led them to the door and knocked, Val looked over at her. 

“I want to thank you for everything you’ve done for me, sir.”

Lily smiled and put a hand on Val’s shoulder. “You’re very welcome, Val, it was a genuine pleasure to work with you.” 

Hector opened the door. He was dressed more casually, but no less dramatically. His burgundy velvet robe exposed his muscular chest and his black pajama pants were silk. The gold dust had been washed from his hair, which was pulled back into a loose ponytail. He smiled wide and predatorily when his eyes landed on Val, and in response everything in Val went still aside from their pounding heart. 

Hector turned to Lily. “Thank you for delivering them. Nice doing business with you.” 

“Likewise,” Lily replied. 

Hector held out a hand to Val. They reached up and took it a little nervously. He smirked as he suddenly pulled them inside and shut the door behind them. Val gave a squeak of surprise and Hector chuckled in response. He pinned Val to a wall by their shoulders but stayed at arms’ length. “So. You’re officially mine. Does that please you?”

“Yes, sir.” Val said, a little breathily. 

Hector leaned in and inhaled before whispering in Val’s ear. “You smell delectable.”

Val shivered. 

Hector pulled back and ran the tip of his tongue over his fangs. “Tell me, my sweet valentine, what do you want?”

Val didn’t think anything could short-circuit their brain more than the sense of intense desire that the sight of Hector treating them as prey was creating, but that question hit them like a bolt of lightning striking them down through all the conditioning they’d been through and jarring their deepest self. “T-to fulfill your needs and wants.” They stammered out. 

“No. What do you want right now, in this moment?”

“I-I…”

Hector’s eyes narrowed in concern. “What’s wrong?”

“N-nothing, I–”

“Tell me what’s wrong.” Hector commanded, putting power behind his words. 

“I’m embarrassed.” Val admitted against their will. 

“Of what?”

“Of wanting anything. Of saying I want anything. It shouldn’t matter or affect what you or I do so–” Val took a couple fast breaths. “I-I’m sorry.” 

Hector removed one hand from Val’s shoulder and grabbed their chin firmly but not roughly. He sighed. “I figured I’d have to fix your mind a bit.”

Val looked down in shame. 

“No no, eyes here, on mine.” 

Val looked back up quickly. 

“Relax, valentine. Relax and let me deep into your mind.” 

Val took a deep breath and let the tension out of their muscles. They felt their thoughts slipping away until only Hector existed. 

“From now on, you’re not to be embarrassed around me about anything you desire. There is no reason not to tell me if you want or need anything unless I say otherwise.” 

Val nodded. Hector put his hand back on their shoulder. The sense of anticipation and need returned to Val as Hector took a step closer to them. “Now. Tell me what you want.” 

Their entranced mind knew only one desire right now. “I want you to bite me. I want it more than anything.”

Hector grinned wickedly. “Beg me for it.” Val had no idea how Hector was holding himself back this much, The vampiric aura filling the small space between them meant that Val could feel how badly Hector wanted this too, his intense hunger. And, just as strongly, they needed him to bite them, to sate his need with their blood. 

“Please, please, Hector, sir,” Val tipped their head back against the wall, exposing their neck as much as possible. “Please take all you need from me, I want to feel your fangs in my throat.” They were breathing heavily and their heart was racing. 

Hector let out a hungry growl and leaned in even closer. “Well how can I possibly resist that?” he moved to whisper in Val’s ear, they let out a needy whine as the increased proximity intensified their desire to give Hector exactly what he wanted. “Be still but don’t tense up. There will be just a second where it will hurt, then you’re going to feel amazing.”

Val’s breath hitched and their exhale let out another soft “Please.” 

Hector chuckled again and sank his fangs into Val’s throat. Val gasped at the sharp pain, then let out a low moan as the most beautiful sensation suffused through them like ink in water. Hector kept one hand on Val’s shoulder, then moved the other to grip their hair and tilt their head further. Val felt like this was what their entire life had been leading up to, it was so right to be doing this, giving this. It was like Val’s mind was a lost helium balloon, floating away to the stars but also sinking like a stone in a warm sea of soft pleasure and fulfillment of their truest purpose, the intensity of the feeling nearly brought tears to their eyes.

Val felt their legs start to give out and Hector supported them by using his body to pin all of theirs to the wall. Hector was so good, so spectacular. Val couldn’t ask for a better master. As he moved to lick the smears of blood from around the wound Val heard his heavy panting breaths and the sound was intoxicating. They wanted him to want this, to hunger for them so much that only they could fulfill his desire.

He took a step back from Val and held them up by the shoulders again. He licked blood off of his lips and locked eyes with Val. 

“You’re perfect,” he said. 

Any doubts Val may have had about their new life being better than their old one were obliterated. Their mind was still lost in a wonderful haze. They smiled wide and unguarded. “Thank you, sir.” 

With that Hector scooped Val up in his arms and carried them to a room he’d set up as their bedroom. As he tucked them in they noticed that the sheets were incredibly soft, like an old t-shirt that had been through the wash a million times, and the blanket he lay over them was nice fluffy fleece. They wanted to luxuriate in how they were feeling for as long as possible but sleep was pulling them in, and they were inclined to let it. 

“I’m going to bring you a glass of water and a snack for when you awaken,” Hector said. “What would you like?”

Val struggled to think. “Peanut-butter sandwich, sir?” 

“Alright, then. Now you rest up. The sooner you recover, the sooner we can do that again.” 

A joyful laugh fought through Val’s tiredness as they let themself slip into blissful sleep.

#val #Val in the AH

[medranochav]

my brain personified is a thirty something 5'4" raven maven and single mom Yesenia who works OT as a file clerk for a miscellaneous publication house. She's amazing at her job and does archival work for the firm on the side (for free smh)... she loves her babies so much but barely sees them and when she does she's often overwhelmed by the responsibility of being provider and nurturer. she exists between the two, like a tight rope... feeling like because she can do neither 100 percent, she might as well be doing nothing at all. The babies love and miss her all the same. Yesenia is a sonar for safety, something bequeathed to her by her mother and ancestors alike. an heiress of hypervigilance. she's always on guard and often mistakes her knack of categorization for something of a hobby... at her most delulu, she even considers it a talent. Yesenia's ex is Hector, my heart. They're technically married but they don't talk anymore. Hector is a work horse like Yesenia but hasn't her gift of discernment. It's been years since we've heard from Hector but it's assumed that had he a voice, we'd have run amok long ago. It's a good thing he's never met Karen, my spirit. He'd tell her sweet nothings, and her dumb but righteous ass might just belive them and squander what little cash (courage) she has left to her name.

They all exist within me but don't know or communicate with eachother. whenever they do interact. I short circuit

[rockshortage]

Hsgsgxhz I keep forgetting that I've been meaning to give Darryl some more tattoos as well, but once again I've so far failed to come up with any solid ideas

But I was thinking back on when I mentioned her showing Hector some of her scars after he ends up revealing a couple of his own, and thought like....... ok yeah, her showing off some big, gnarly scars is great, but what about her showing off tattoos?

The specific image that came to mind was her removing like a shirt or jacket so she's in a tank top/undershirt and pointing out all the different ones on an arm or her back definitely not flexing a little to an increasingly flustered Hector which may vary depending on how close they are at the time

But there's also a couple other ways it could go. Either way, it seems like smth that would only end with smoke coming out of Hector's ears

asdjfng you've painted such a vivid image of this scene in my brain and now I'm mad my art skill isn't sufficient to illustrate it

But yeah. Hector's just 😳😳😳 the entire time, might not be listening to what she's saying at all because he's distracted by strong and pretty lady...

#darryl: takes off jacket #hector: 😳 #darryl: flexes #hector: 😳😳😳💀💀 #question is. how much does darryl revel in it #is she like. yes. look at my muscles you silly white boy #or. i know you're a repressed little nerd but come on dude chill #darryl murphey #hector messerli #they're outside at night by a campfire and the lighting is just perfect to showcase muscle definition #in her upper arms and back #hector's brain short circuits #like that 'not to be a lesbian' meme #but ohhh myyyfuckinggg goddddd #also that anime gif that's going around of the mechanic/pilot/whatever lady pulling a lever

[keep-calm-ask-the-librarian]

Jacques Snicket prided himself on being a focussed, rule-abiding driver regardless of the situation he found himself in. But on the short drive from the townhouse to the City Station he managed to miss two red lights, drive across a pedestrian crossing without stopping and make three turns without signaling

All in all he considered himself lucky to have arrived at the City Station in one piece. He couldn’t remember ever being so distracted, but the image of Olivia’s luminous white skin kept flashing through his mind, making it impossible to concentrate on anything but his desire to drive back to the house, pluck Sunny out of her arms and declare his undying love for her.

And the morning had started out so well. Having woken up early he had decided to treat the children to chocolate chip pancakes and the surprised look on their faces had been more than worth the trouble. It was the little things that made his new life so incredibly satisfying and seeing the children enjoy a leisured breakfast, joking and laughing with each other, while the morning sun filtered through the windows was definitely one of them.

Then Olivia had wandered in, a long cardigan over yellow pajamas adorned with little books, her chestnut hair still braided and his heart had skipped a beat. Usually she looked so well put together and as much as he enjoyed the dressy blouses, pencil skirts and high heels, there was something incredibly domestic about seeing her in her sleeping attire, lured downstairs by the smell of the pancakes.

When she reached for the teapot, pouring herself a steaming mug of tea that he’d prepared earlier, enjoying the strong taste of it as much as he did, everything had simply be perfect in his world.

After breakfast he’d been cleaning the kitchen when he’d heard Sunny’s shriek.

Without hesitating he had raced upstairs, ready to tackle down whoever was trying to scare his little girl and when he’d stormed into the room, Olivia was already there, clutching Sunny tightly against her, looking equally ready to defend the toddler.

The fearsome intruder turned out to be nothing more vicious than a rather oversized bee and it had been the work of a minute to get rid of the bug.

Olivia had said something to him then, but it hadn’t registered, because he’d finally noticed what exactly she’d been wearing. And immediately his brain had short-circuited, all of the blood in his body locating southwards with such a speed that it left him feeling dizzy.

The ferocity of his reaction shocked even himself. After all, it wasn’t as if he was completely wet behind the ears. In his years as an V.F.D. spy he’d come across women who’d been in a farther state of undress than Olivia had been at that moment, but never in his life had he been so affected by a modest bathing suit.

She was utter perfection, with her tantalizing curves and endless amounts of soft, brilliantly pale skin that begged the be touched. And when she had blushed he had nearly swallowed his tongue, aching with the urge to kiss every inch of that prettily flushed skin.

He knew he must have looked like a prize idiot, gaping at her, completely enthralled, unable to move or speak, even if his life had depended on it, but he had been utterly unable to snap out of it.

Then Violet and Klaus had come in and the situation had become ten times more awkward. He still hadn’t been able to string a single coherent sentence together and the children, observant as always, had picked up on the bizarre atmosphere in the room.

Parking the cab in front of the City Station he leaned back in his seat and slammed the steering wheel with both his hands in vexation with himself. After all of his effort, after weeks of keeping himself in check and bottling up his feelings for her, one green bathing suit with dark blue polkadots had undone all of it.

He had ruined all the progress he’d made in the past couple of weeks. After a strained start he and Olivia had fallen into a comfortable pattern. It still amazed him how seamlessly they worked together where the children where concerned, Olivia’s nurturing personality making it so much easier for him to show his devotion to the children. In their house, surrounded by his family, he didn’t need to pretend and keep up a tough front all the time. That part of him that just wanted to devote his time and energy to his family, making sure they were happy and had everything they needed had been doormat for so long, but since Olivia and the children had come into his life, it had finally emerged, making him feel truly happy and fulfilled for the first time in his life.

When he’d first made the decision to keep Olivia at arm’s length he had been worried about the irrevocable damage this could do to their relationship. His flirtatious  behavior and the kiss they had shared before she’s set off for the Caligari Carnival must have let her believe that there could be a future for them. And even knowing that he was acting in the best interest of her and the children, it had still pained him to hurt her.

But as the weeks had wore on and she’d been able to interact with him calmly, even regaining some of the friendship they’d shared before he’d realized he’d been worried for nothing.

Olivia Caliban might have been attracted to him when they’d first meet, but after his sudden cold treatment of her she’d swiftly moved on like the sensible woman that she was.

It was everything he had hoped for and he should be pleased with this development and content himself with their comfortable, platonic friendship.

And he was content. He truly was.

Taking a deep breath he realized warily though that the carnal impulses induced by  mental image of her clad in nothing but that green bathing suit with the dark blue polkadots were anything but platonic. And so he climbed out of the cab and headed inside the building, towards the gym.

A vigorous, fatiguing workout was just what he needed.

On the last Saturday before school was about to start again, Jacques and Olivia surprised Klaus and Violet with a visit to Duncan and Isadora Quagmire.

They had debated whether or not it would be wise to bring the children together after all of the trauma they had endured, but in the end they had decided to simply suggest their idea to the children and let their reactions guide them.

The look of utter excitement and happiness had quickly erased all of their apprehension and early that morning Jacques drove them all into the city for a meet-up.

After their escape from the village of Fowl Devotees the Quagmires spend several weeks in the self-sustaining hot air mobile home before Hector had managed to safely deliver them to the V.F.D. headquarters in the Mortmain Mountains.

Now that their parents too had perished, the two siblings had been adopted by their aunt, a sister of their father. Veronica Quagmire had been a teacher for over thirty years and was more than happy to take in the Quagmire children.

Jacques was relieved to know that the Quagmire children too were finally safe. Quigley still hadn’t been discovered yet, which was the one matter that still troubled him excessively. Until the Quagmire triplets were reunited, Jacques know he would be able to rest and despite the fact that he was still on authorized leave, he was already discreetly making inquiries after possible leads as to the boys whereabouts.

But that was a worry for another day, today they would focus on bringing the children together.

They started at a small, cosy bakery, the children filling each other in on everything that had happened in their lives since their last encounter while getting their fill of an assortment of cakes and pastries and it was wonderful to see them relaxed and happy. The Quagmires, as it turned out had settled well into living with their aunt, even though they were still shaken by the death of their parents. Both of them loved seeing Olivia again and judging from her brilliant smile and teary eyes the feeling was entirely mutual.  

They spend the day meandering through the city and ended up visiting the Museum of Espionage where they gaped at the various displays of ingenious artifacts of observation and assassination. There were recorders in lighters, cameras in brassieres, decks of cards with hidden maps to every location imaginable and a collection of potions that made the hairs Jacques neck stand up. The children were delighted and he was amused to see Violet scribbling fervently into her notebook.

He had a sneaky suspicion a new set of inventions would soon see the light of day. There was no denying that Violet was incredibly talented and Jacquelyn had already expressed a desire in recruiting her as a new volunteer. After discussing the matter with Olivia, they had both decided it would be better to hold off for just a little while.

Violet was a born for the V.F.D., there was no doubt about that and Jacques knew in his bones that she was destined for great things, but for now he very much wanted her to have a few peaceful years, surrounded by her family.

Smiling to himself he watched Klaus read every single description on every single display, absorbing the knowledge like a sponge.

Klaus too would one day become an tremendous asset to the V.F.D. but his pursuits were very different from Violet’s. Not every volunteer was recruited at a young age and Klaus first had many years of school, university and post-grad programs to look forward to.

Their children had a future again and Jacques could accomplish just that in his life, it would be enough.

When dinnertime rolled around they talked about where to eat.

“Na sal!” Sunny proclaimed firmly.

“She means no Café Salmonella,” Klaus translated and Olivia shuddered.

“I wholeheartedly agree,” she said emphatically and Jacques snickered.

“How about The Veritable French Diner instead?” he suggested.

Twenty minutes later they were all seven of them were seated around a large family table and Jacques ordered the drinks.

“Does Larry work here as well?” Olivia asked, taking a sip of her ginger ale.

“He does occasionally,” Jacques replied, “but then again he waiters wherever intervening waiting needs to be done.”

At his words Violet’s eyes widened and she shared a look with Isadora before the two girls burst into giggles.

Jacques raised an eyebrow at them. “Something funny, girls?”

“I just remember something Duncan and Isadora told us earlier,” Violet answered and at her words, Klaus and Sunny started to grin as well, clearly in on the joke. “About something you did.”

Catching Olivia’s eyes he realized she was just as dumbfounded as he was. But judging from the children’s mirth it couldn’t be too bad. “Well, that could be quite a number of things, so color me curious.”

Violet eventually took pity on him. “It’s something Larry told Duncan and Isadora when they were staying at the V.F.D. headquarters,” she explained. “Apparently Jacques called Carmelita Spats a ‘cake sniffer’ while he was rescuing Larry.”

As if on cue the children burst into laughter again, Sunny squealing delightedly.

Despite himself, Jacques grinned before gravely replying. “I might have done just that. I found her to be an extremely unpleasant girl. And besides… she started it.”

“Really, Jacques Snicket,” Olivia admonished him. “You got into a squabble with a little girl?”

She gave him an arched look, her eyes sparkling and for a second it was as if they were back in the cab, bantering and flirting back and forward as they chased the Quagmire children and his heart squeezed tightly with regret.

Oh, to hell with it. For once he could pay her back in kind and pretend that there was nothing stopping him from trying to win her over.

“I did nothing of the sort,” he answered stately. “I merely told her that I did not care for her mistreating my friend. And then I called her  cake sniffer.”

The children cracked up again and it took some effort to keep his face straight. “It did shut her up however.”

Olivia inclined her head towards him, her face solemn. “That is no small feat, I concede.”

Then the corner of her mouth tugged, dimples appearing in both of her cheeks. “I would have loved to see her get taken down a notch.”

The children hummed heartily in agreement to that statement and then their food was served. As they all tucked in, Olivia remarked quietly: “I never realized you came to Prufrock Prep while I was there.”

Up until she said it, he hadn’t either but it didn’t take long before his mind supplied him with various different scenarios.

He would have met her at Prufrock and fallen as instantly for her as he’d done when he had almost hit her with the cab. He would have taken her, the Baudelaires and the Quagmires away from that dreary, dreadful place and none of the horrendous events of the past four months would have happened.

But it wouldn’t do to dwell on it.

Their story could have gone that way, except that it hadn’t.

On September the first school started and with that a whole new routine was put in motion.

Violet and Klaus especially were thrilled to be back in school, the latter throwing himself into his schoolwork with a zeal that slightly frightened Jacques.

After the first week he discreetly contacted the school’s counsellor, inquiring if the children were dealing with any consequences from their year of absence, but he was assured that both of them were settling in well and that their teachers were very pleased with both their behavior and performance. It was more or less exactly what he had been expecting, but it still took a weight of his shoulders to see them thriving.

On the morning that Olivia had started at her new job at Luminosity he’d seen a side of her he hadn’t previously encountered. Around the children she always seemed so sure of herself, so completely in control, but that morning she’d been a mess of nervous excitement and sick-to-her-stomach anxiety.  It baffled him that anyone as competent and clever as her could ever doubt her own capability and it had taken everything in him not to wrap her up in his arms and tell her that she was brilliant and beautiful and that she would excel at her new post.

By the time she got home that evening her apprehension had given way to utter delight at her new position, her euphoria not diminishing in the slightest in the weeks that followed and it made him realize just how under appreciated she had been at Prufrock. Olivia whole-heartedly loved her new job and the extensive research on V.F.D. matters she had done over the summer with Klaus definitely paid off as she began to implement a new filing system that combined resources that had never been connected before, greatly benefiting volunteers who were working in the field.

He himself hadn’t been cleared for active duty yet, much to his own chagrin, but he had been allowed to return to desk work and he now spend his working hours at the V.F.D. City Station, pouring over every file that mentioned the Quagmires in the hope of finding a trace of Quigley. Another perk of visiting the City Station regularly was the fact that he could use their gym facility. He discovered that in order to let his sanity and self control prevail it helped to workout regularly and he did so with gusto.

Klaus and Violet signed up for after school activities. Violet was elated to discover that there was quite an active inventors club at the school and immediately signed up. Meanwhile, Klaus joined the vocabulary olympiad team and started preparing for a tournament in November.

All in all his family was happy and at peace.

Then it became September the 30th, the one year anniversary of the fire that had destroyed the Baudelaire home and taken the lives of Bertrand and Beatrice.

For days in advance the date hung like Damocles’ sword above their heads and if small mercies were anything to be thankful for, Jacques was grateful for the fact that the 30th fell on a Sunday so that the children at least wouldn’t have to worry about school work.

That morning they visited the cemetery where Bertrand and Beatrice were buried next to each other. It was a miserable, grey, rainy day and as they walked the gravel path, the Baudelaire children close together and him and Olivia each on one side, holding umbrellas over them. Their faces were clouded with sadness and white as sheets and Jacques heart twisted painfully from just looking at them.

Upon arriving at the graves he was startled to find that a small bouquet of red roses had already been placed at the foot of Beatrice’s tombstone.

The children smiled slightly at this display of affection for their parents, pleased that someone else but themselves was remembering them.

“They had a lot of friends,” Violet commented softly. “There was this whole world of people that they knew that we had no idea about.”

“I do wonder about the roses though,” Klaus said plaintively, his analytical mind piquing up even at a moment as this. “Roses are rather traditional as mourning flowers, but the color red isn’t… it’s an indicator of passion…”

At his words the budding suspicion that had been growing inside of him solidified and Jacques could feel his heart rate pick up.

Red roses on Beatrice’s grave… that could only mean that Lemony must be close by.

Taking a deep breath he tried to get his emotions under control. Right now the children needed his support, it wouldn’t do to upset them.

The three of them knelt down at the conjuncted graves and Klaus carefully put down the bouquet of white lilies they had brought.

“Good bye father and mother,” Violet said quietly, her voice barely above a tearful whisper. “We miss you so much.”

Without making a single noise Sunny buried her face into her sisters neck and patted her hair with her tiny, stubby fingers.

“We do,” added Klaus. “So very much. But you should also know… we are going to be all right. We will be now, because we have a home again…”

Jacques risked a glance at Olivia, only to see that there were tears streaming down her face and it wasn’t until he felt wetness against his own lips that he realized he was crying too. At long last the children rose, and as if by a magnetic pull, they both gravitated towards their guardians. Jacques wrapped his arm around Violet and Sunny while Olivia pulled Klaus into an embrace.

Eventually they slowly walked back to the cab and once inside they took a moment to collect themselves.

Turning to look over the front seat of the cab, he inspected the tearful faces of the children while Olivia doled out tissues and soft caresses against cheeks.

“Alright?” he inquired gently.

“Yes… yeah…” Violet nodded. “I’m glad we went… It was good to say goodbye properly… we never really did that.”

“It was,” Klaus agreed. “But now… we just really want to go home if that’s all right.”

Almost too choked up to speak, Jacques nodded and fastened his seatbelt “Of course that’s all right… let’s go home.”

On beforehand he and Olivia had talked with the children about how they would like to spend the day and what each of them needed to get through it. The three siblings had indicated that they would like to remain as close as possible during the day and almost instinctively they holed themselves up in the library, the one single place where they had always managed to find comfort in the past year.

For a moment he had wondered if the children wouldn’t rather prefer to be alone and he shared a worried look with Olivia.

But they hadn’t as much as taken one step towards the door when the children stiffened. “Aren’t you going to stay?” Violet asked in a quiet voice.

“Of course we are,” Olivia reassured her instantly. “We aren’t going anywhere.”

They spend a quiet, gloomy day inside, each of the children barely talking, feeling clearly that every word, no matter how well-meant, would fall like a stone in the fragility of their grief.

Jacques only left the room to fetch tea and light snacks for the children and as the afternoon turned into evening the children slowly started to relax a little, the heavy oppressiveness of sadness and mourning lifting somewhat, although it wasn’t until after dinner that they started to talk again.

“I have been dreading this day so much,” Violet confessed that evening, as she sat curled up on the couch, tucked underneath a blanket, Sunny dozing in her arms.

“Me too,” Klaus complemented. “There something so final about it. It’s been a year now… All of this year I’ve been thinking… ‘but last year father and mother were still here and they did this or that…’

Now I can’t do that anymore.”

“I know,” Violet said quietly. “I feel that too, but on the other hand… I’m also hoping it will be easier from now on. There will be no more firsts… No more first birthdays without them, no more first Christmas… we’ve all made it past that.”

“I hope it will get easier, but sometimes I doubt that it ever will,” Klaus said, his voice hoarse as if every word cost him to be spoken. “Sometimes in the morning, just after I have woken up… I haven’t yet remembered that they’re gone and for a moment everything feels like it used to be before… and then I do remember…”

And Jacques himself remembered only too well. For the first few years after his own parents had died, how often had he woken up feeling the exact same way? But before he could say anything, Olivia’s tearful voice beat him to it.

“I know, honey… and it might take a while for that to go away, but it will eventually, I promise.”

Klaus smiled sadly. “It’s not as bad as it used to be… not since we started living here anyway… but I still feel terrible when it does.”  

“But when the dawn of morning comes he wakes to find once more

That what he thought were sun-kissed hills are rags upon the floor,”

Olivia quoted quietly.

Despite his grief, Klaus’ face lit up briefly in the way a literate mind does when it finds himself being understood by works of fiction. “That’s it… that’s exactly how I feel.. who wrote that?”

“It’s from a poem by Edgar Albert Guest,” Olivia replied. “I’ve always found it to be very comforting.”

For a long moment they were all quiet before Violet spoke again, her voice hesitant. “Olivia… do you still have your parents?”

Jacques watched his wife intently, seeing her startle at the unexpected question, his heart racing. He had wondered about it so often, but he had never quite dared to breech the subject himself.

Olivia took a shuddering breath, before she clenched her hands together in her lap. “I’m an orphan too… my parents passed away when I was five years old.”

There was a world of sadness in her voice, but when she looked at the children there was a look of recognition. Tilting her head she looked inquisitively before asking. “But you knew that already, didn’t you?”

“We suspected it,” Violet answered. “It was something you said to us when we just got to Prufrock.”

“You said: ‘It’s awful, isn’t it, to have people missing from your life. It’s like a question that haunts you day and night and you’ll never know if that question will ever be answered,’” Klaus added.

Jacques shook his head with a smile, marveling at the boy’s memory.

Across from him Olivia was smiling as well, although more tearfully.

“Also,” Violet continued, “when Count Olaf made all the orphans stand up during the pep rally, you stood up as well. We’ve wondered ever since.”

“You children are far too clever,” Olivia answered, her voice rich with affection. “Very well, my parents died from carbon monoxide poisoning. During the investigation later they found a leak in the kitchen… which is where they perished… My father was meticulous about keeping windows closed, he hated draughts.”

“What happened to you after that?” Violet asked, leaning closer.

“First my aunt took me in,” Olivia told. “But she was planning a journey around the world and she couldn’t very well take me with her… she said I would only be weighing her down… so after that another couple took me in. They weren’t related to me… but they thought they wanted a child so they became my guardians. Then it turned out that I wasn’t compatible with their dog, so they send me away again…”

“That’s horrible!” Violet and Klaus exclaimed in unison, disgust written across their faces. Their cry woke Sunny who added a sleepy “Da-bla!” to the conversation.

“My sister means ‘deplorable’,” Klaus translated helpfully.

“Well, I suppose it’s not as bad as some of the guardians that were appointed to you,” Olivia replied with a shrug. “After that I was send to a school. It wasn’t terrible… for all intents an purposes I think it even was a very good school… I learned a lot there… it just wasn’t a home.”

“And you didn’t have any siblings,” Violet supplied, shuddering slightly. “You were all alone.”

For a second Jacques could see a world of hurt and pain on her face, but then she smiled again. “Well, that was then… I’m no longer alone now, am I?”

Barely daring to breath he watched as the Baudelaire children shuffled closer around her, taking her up in a circle.

“You’re not.”

Sitting there, rooted to his spot, the truth hit him with as much painful clarity as a blow with a sledgehammer would have done and he wondered how he had ever missed the signs.

It all made sense now… her determination at saving the Baudelaires and the Quagmires, her surprise at finding herself recruited by the V.F.D, her anxiety at starting a new job and fitting in, the way she glowed whenever she was around the children…

She had been looking for a family as much as the rest of them had.

For months he had had felt faintly guilty about ripping her away from her safe, secure world, even if Prufrock perhaps wasn’t the happiest place to be, but now he understood how short-sighted he had been. He had focussed all of his energy and responsibility on the children, completely ignoring the fact that Olivia needed to be loved as well.

With a pang he remembered his wedding vows, the words he had spoken so earnestly all those weeks ago, despite their unusual circumstances.

That he would love and cherish her until his dying day.

He had done none of those things. Instead of loving her he had kept her at arms length, destroying most of their beautiful friendship in the progress and instead of cherishing her and finding a new way to show her every day what a beautiful and wonderful woman she was and how much he adored her, he had treated her as if she was nothing more than a random associate.

Kit had been right all along.

He was an utter idiot.

#jacques snicket and olivia caliban #jolivia fic #jacques snicket #olivia caliban #asoue #asoue season 2

[redknight3996]

30: Rebecca Vance

You were never the protagonist. If you read the tale of the manor, you would know that already, and expected this result from the start, though maybe not in this place.

Rebecca Vance thought her trip to Sanguine Park would be a simple puff piece. Nothing special, just some time in front of the camera explaining the reopening and maybe throwing some shade at the unpleasant rumors surrounding the park’s owner. Nothing special at all.

She even had a room given to her, up in the hotel at the Gulch, along with her cameraman, Hector. The gothic western decor was cheesy, but it was somewhat cute, and she decided not to mind it as she headed down, planning to get a drink at the bar.

The lobby being full of dead bodies was somewhat unexpected, as was the man in red chatting on a cellphone about a murder game. He paused when he noticed her. She didn’t pause, and a thrown heel caught him in the face. She didn’t strangle him with the phone cord; rather, the two of them struggled quite a bit, grappling and kicking and smashing a lamp into his face and when the gun dropped, she picked it up first and blew his brains out without hesitation. People who hesitate die, after all.

Then the lipless dead with their gnashing teeth started eating people alive while bombs in the parking lot went off and some idiot on the speaker began regaling the parkgoers with the matter of a death game they were all now the forced participants in. Not exactly the nice, fun day she’d expected, and the growing swarms of dead outside quickly made it clear much of a hassle her day would turn into.

Since she had a cure on hand, she used it on herself, before she told Hector about the issues they were facing and told him to lock things down while she handled the business of rescuing other survivors and dealing with the monsters that were attacking said survivors. She had some experience, so out she went, first through the dusty Gulch, then to the locked down plaza, and next to the watery Cove.

Flintlocks were surprisingly handy, once a supply of them could be found, and she was willing to delve deeper than some might be. She certainly met Roger early, and found an unlikely nemesis in the aggravated crab, whose attempts to kill Vance resulted in her ship sinking early.

That didn’t deter Roger though, who pursued Vance through the Cove for quite a while, up until some smart thinking led her to get whacked by the enormous pendulum that is the pirate ship ride, sending her flying off into one pool where some less than clever neptunes attempted to swarm the massive crab. They quickly learned why that was a bad idea, in the time before they were ripped in half and eaten alive, but Vance had moved on by that point, ignoring the itch under her skin as she went north through Future and saw the Breakers for the first time.

The Breakers also saw her, and tried to kill her. So that was another rivalry started, albeit one that was far more of a hassle. Her escape took her through the Circuit and out to the Ancient Lands, where mummies and a minotaur tried to rip her limb from limb. They didn’t succeed, though many came close in the land of the beating sun.

Some time was spent in the pyramids, raiding the casinos for supplies and aiding straggling survivors in getting back to the home base of the hotel. Rebecca tries her best to save those she comes across, so escorting survivors in need of help becomes just another part of the routine, in between surviving, killing, and fixing up the occasional wound she takes. She bandages the cracks in her skin, chalking them up to side effects of the mummies’ grasping hands, nothing too big. She just needed to stay hydrated.

Entering the Quarry isn’t the smartest idea, but Vance sees the corpse and decides anywhere she’s being warned away from is somewhere she should go. A raptor takes a chunk out of her arm, but she takes off the top half of its head with a shotgun, so it evens out. Then she makes things very uneven with the aid of a hatchet and a machete. Maybe she should��ve noticed her teeth getting sharper, but there was a lot of rage pulsing in her head by that point, a lot of indignation at some stupid pack hunters thinking that she, Rebecca Fucking Vance, was a scared rabbit for them to feast on.

Though they were still giant reptiles with very sharp teeth and claws, so when the vengeful remainders of the pack gathered to swarm her all at once, she had to think on her feet. She was definitely smarter than lizards though, hence why she cut the rope bridge over the tar pit while they were all on it. The bite in her shoulder hurt worse as she climbed up the vertical planks, and she was bleeding bad as she lay on the flat rock, listening to the panicked warbles and cries of struggling animals doing their best not to sink.

She didn’t care enough to stick around; just found a medical station, bandaged herself up, and idly watched the giant crocodiles drifting sleepily in the mud pits. It was soothing, somewhat.

Lack of hesitation was perhaps her greatest strength. If someone was in danger, she’d rescue them. If there was a monster in her way, she’d make a way around or through it. If a human being tried to kill her, she’d kill them first.

The Scalpers started up a rumor, one of another monster in the mix. One that looked like a normal woman, but would drive an axe through your skull in a heartbeat. Most brush it off, and meet that exact fate, while others live long enough for the true hunters to put them down.

The Looters avoided her, seeing the woman in the bloodstained suit–her curly black hair first tied back and then cut short, her clothes changing as they were torn and ruined and she needed something better for where she wandered–and deciding that she was far more trouble than she was worth. She, in turn, didn’t bother them unless they tried shit in her presence, and even then, she might just break a hand instead of shoving them face first through a slot machine. One idiot that pushed her did get exactly that treatment though, hence the warranted fear.

The Breakers though, they saw her as a rival. A challenge to be overcome, since that first time she escaped their chase in Future. On their roaring engines, the leather-clad brutes saw themselves as the invincible masters of the park, and a challenger to that title couldn’t be tolerated.

So while she wandered the Avenue–aiding the trapped, ignoring the loot, and tossing some fish to the mermaids–they went to the Gulch, earlier than they would for most troublemakers. Setting the hotel on fire took things too far. Abducting Hector for a hostage took things farther.

It was night by the time she entered the Dome. There was no big shootout, no grand battle with the majority of the gang. She just moved, quietly, and made sure they died.

Her sleeves were stained by the time she entered the center pit of the dome and found Hector hanging from the ceiling. His body was bloody and bruised. The roaring of twin motorcycles was drowned out by the roaring in her ears.

The fight ended with Violet pinned beneath her bike, half crushed and screaming as her own saw tore through her intestines. 

Vance watched Scarlet stumble towards her sister, burning from the inside out all the while, and watched as the last remaining Breaker turned the screams to gurgles in the wet squelch of teeth through flesh. She turned away and cut down her friend’s body, then gave him a proper burial while the chewing and hungry snarls echoed out.

She left taller than before, and wandered past the lit burners eating their fill through the dome.

A new day brought her to the Carnival, where she wanted to find a jacket. Butcher and Baker were still threats, still bigger than her and just as vicious, and a great deal of the Carnival wound up broken through fights and escapes. Butcher had a great deal of glass stuck in her from the hall of mirrors, and Baker lost her flamethrower in the same event that exploded the carousel. The couple was tough though, and multiple encounters weren’t enough to put them down.

Though, on the plus side, the two most definitely targeted Vance over other survivors after her first few wins against them. It was a point of pride in their mangled minds, and her refusal to just die like a proper victim rankled to their professionalism. To Vance in turn, the two brutes were a point of annoyance, particularly since she just wanted to find a fluffy enough coat that going up the snowy mountain wouldn’t freeze her ass off.

Still, her attitude towards them did soften somewhat when she noticed a moment of tender care, so she elected to leave the two of them alone once she made sure no survivors remained in danger in the carnival. And once she stole Baker’s coat.

On the way, she noticed Disco Never Dies. She peeked inside. She decided to leave it be.

The climb up the Peak was chilly, but the coat kept her warm. It was tricky to work with, the sudden cold in the midst of all the heat, but she was willing to think, to work, and to break down a frozen corpse so she could get extra clothes. A nice scarf to cover her face and all that. She made sure to give the body a small burial, just to be respectful, and snarled a warning to the antlered things watching her from the trees.

The skinful were territorial, but cautious, not stupid. They considered shooting the intruder, even raised bows as she trudged through the snow. She didn’t stop in her tracks, just raised a hand and pointed, noting each and every one of them in turn. The skinful wisely sought easier prey, and when she threw an axe straight through the hand of one who attempted to spear a struggling trespasser, they elected to simply not hunt in her presence. 

Not out of cowardice, just practicality in avoiding those violent eyes. Slit pupils tended to mean “predator”.

Getting into the lodge was tricky, and it took her a bit to explain to the survivors inside that, no, she wasn’t a murderous monster or lunatic. Or at least she wasn’t one that was planning to kill any of them. Food was offered, and she even relaxed for a time. Having company was nice.

The lights went out then, and she found she could see better than she used to. So when the monster in the sheep’s mask tried to kill a newfound friend, she tackled the bastard to the ground. The fight was vicious, one of strengthened people aiming to kill as panicked shouts echoed through the room. 

His name was Simon. Rebecca learned that when she ripped off his mask and Jaden shrieked in shock. There was more shouting then, insistence that she let him go, that he was a friend, that he couldn’t be the murderer from people who knew him, and stunned, bewildered silence from those that didn’t. 

He sunk a knife into her side though, so that decided things.

Her gloved fist smashed his teeth to splinter, then his nose to paste, then blackened his eyes, and he started to beg, started to plead that he was sorry, that he didn’t mean to, that it was the mask, that it had voices inside it, and she hesitated.

Vance backed up as Jaden rushed to her fallen friend, apologizing for all the pain, all the terror, and he jammed his second knife through her eye, cursing her out for bringing him to this shitty park to begin with and claiming that with this murder, as he cut straight down and opened her face, that he was even stron–

The barrel of Brent’s shotgun went right into his open mouth, held for the slightest moment for Simon to realize his deep error, and Vance painted the room red before she returned it with a soft apology for letting their friend die.

She left again, though Terry saw her off while the rest mourned. The blonde offered the lodge as a safe place, somewhere Vance could send anyone she rescued. 

Vance nodded, then went back down the mountain. She passed the minotaur climbing up with only a nod of acknowledgement. 

The Swamps were wet, unpleasant, and filled with bloated corpses and fishy folk. Who were somehow even less hospitable than the skinful, though Vance never was good with fishing, so really, this wasn’t unexpected. She wasn’t great with dogs either, so the barghests were a nasty shock, and she wasn’t particularly fond of the nosferats either. Fish, dogs, and now bats were all on her list of animals she didn’t like being mauled by. She hadn’t found anything she did like being mauled by yet, but still.

Because of her tendency to travel, she went deep into the Castle, all the way down into the dungeons, where she saw walls of living flesh, a man spawning rats from his screaming chest, incredibly tacky ventriloquist dummies, and a different man being electrocuted. Also a number of undead, but those really weren’t a surprise at this point. The giant spider was a bit more so, but she’d already met a giant crab by this point, so it wasn’t a complete blindside.

She looked further, where she wasn’t supposed to, and when Mister Flint and Mister Copper came to intervene, she let all the monsters loose on them. Prometheus was at least a decent conversationalist.

She met Ceres first in the castle, where the strange woman gave her the invitation, and she met Cedric Crosswhite soon after. The older man was curious as to the nature of the brutal survivor he’d learned of. Vance, in turn, was good enough at keeping her disgust at him hidden. She waited there as the second phase started, as the bellow echoed, and the new hunters filled the park to start slaughtering the old. She didn’t hide her disgust at them, and Cedric agreed, though for very different reasons. Morals versus dignity, a natural clash.

When Seth blew his head off, she was faced with a choice. When she saw Juno’s grief, she made the choice to side with the monster instead of the man, and she found a sort of friend in the vicious and brutal murders of several violent thugs. Oddly, the two traveled together after that, mostly to continue in their killing of the new hunters. The Sundayers were left for Juno to deal with, while Vance still kept up her attempted rescues whenever she met a survivor.

For some reason, they seemed more uneasy in her presence. Maybe it was her traveling companion? Or maybe it was her increased height? Maybe it was the muscles starting to cord so tightly her skin was twisting? Maybe, maybe, maybe. She kept the coat and started wearing a mask.

Ceres seemed to appreciate it, amid all her eager brutality directed towards the sudden influx of skinless horsehead centaurs. Vance checked with Juno for a moment to make sure those were actually real and not just a hallucination brought on by the drugs in her system. Juno had no answer, so the question was still in the air by the time the mines in the Gulch erupted with locusts and lurkers. 

She thought the mines were just a minecart ride, so she ignored them, apparently to her detriment, though the giant locust weren’t any worse than the usual carnivorous monsters, and the lurkers learned quite quickly where Vance stood on the murder chain.

Juno decided to visit her sister, so Vance followed her back to Disco Never Dies. It was lively, if just because of the sheer amount of parasitic life teeming in the corpses around. At least Vesta was having fun.

A call for survivors over the speakers drew her back west, towards the Peak, though along the way she noticed Butcher and Baker staring straight at the giant tent, which had some rather ominous lighting going on. A nod was given to each of her rivals, who acknowledged her in turn, before she peeked in the tent and saw a weird doctor apparently helping a massive flesh cocoon open up. She elected not to deal with that, so long as it wasn’t a problem to her, and went on her way towards the snowy mountain and back to the Lodge she’d been sending survivors.

When she found corpses in the snow...she didn’t react well.

Angel is probably the creature she hates the most in this park. Maybe not the person she hates the most, but certainly the monster she loathes.

The moth fled from her in a pure panic. Her confidence returned, eventually, but she always flinches at the sight of those slit pupils in those bloody red eyes. The followers flinched back from that same sight, apologized and said they didn’t mean to let this all go this bad, that they couldn’t stand against the Angel.

Vance watched Terry sob on the floor, begging for her savior to return, for the comfort of an easy lie, and Vance leaves again, along with Juno, who walks closer than before. Just to make sure she’s fine on the way back down.

Vance met Pomona on the way back to watch the kaiju fight. Granted, the scorpion and the crab weren’t nearly big enough to properly destroy a city, but it was still interesting to see them going at it as parts of the park started to collapse. She cheered when Billy joined the fray and scowled when Angel entered it too. She entertained the idea of pitching a hatchet into the moth’s wing, then went right ahead and did so, because why not? It didn’t impact the fight overmuch, but it did make her feel a bit better.

Juno didn’t go down into the catacombs with her. 

Vance wandered through the halls, past the walls of grasping hands and screaming faces and the skinless dead to the blood-filled chamber, where she dove right in. It tasted foul on her tongue as she surfaced, and the hatches in her hands got a great deal of work in cutting and chopping at the red dead down there. The blades broke and she shoved the handles into eye sockets. A guttural growl spilled from her splitting lips, a vicious snarl of sharpened teeth.

There were no supplicants to beg as the red mass rose, just chunks of meat in a crimson stew and a woman with cracked skin. A rain of slurry for a baptism, and on she went in a clinging shirt, ignoring the ridges along her spine and the ripples of arteries beneath her skin.

She was still thirsty by the time she met the blue mass. Flecks of skin flicked off into the liquid below. It soaked into her shins as the roof broke open and water rushed down. She watched caresses, seduction, and felt an ache. When the wires fell and the shocks came, she stood and took it. The blue in her veins needed invigorating, and the cracks across her face welcomed in the electric tang as she leaned back and drank deep from the shower.

She was still thirsty by the time she entered the white room. She stared at the mass, and it stared back. Her mouth twitched into a smile, and she asked if it was hungry. She had no chocolate to offer. She drank deep from the milk, let visions enter her mind, and stood again, slick and peeling.

Her jaw split, but that was fine. It could come back together easily enough, and now she had more room for her tongue. 

She was taller, but her hair had fallen away. She didn’t mind. Her skin was falling off too, in favor of the shell beneath.

She chatted with Blackberry. She let it know about her thoughts, her feelings, all that. Because she wanted to, she drank the juice there too. It mixed well. Red, blue, white, black. There was something in that, she was pretty sure, but did it matter? She could see under her skin. Her sides itched, hands inside wanting to push out.

When she met Hélio, he was ecstatic. She was perfect, she was wonderful, he knew he made the right choice in picking her out specifically, in how she inspired him. This was all for her, but it was really for him, so words were dispensed with in favor of one more clash.

Hélio tore open too, bones and spikes ripping free from him, his true form realized as chainsaws of meat and bone formed from his hands. He was that type of person, and Rebecca was the type to beat him to death anyway.

His brains dripped from her foot as she walked up to the top, into the mountain, where a panicked Graman lived. The man was old, rich, and thoughtless, and he begged heavily when he saw the monster coming up the stairs. Her skin was off, so he saw the exoskeleton, the additional eyes, the split jaw with her tongue licking at the air.

He tried to order her at first, when he thought she was one of his, then he devolved to begging. He wasn’t responsible, he wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, he was forced into this, it wasn’t his fault, he didn’t hurt anyone directly, he was pressured, he was threatened, he–

She didn’t listen to a single word. All she could think of, in that moment, was that she…

Was hungry.

#31 day horror park #sanguine park #halloween #horror #my writing