Caliban Leandros (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
dichotomos) wrote2011-12-15 05:42 am
dichotomos) wrote2011-12-15 05:42 am
[For Dean] Amnesia Plot
I was a creature of the city. Not a native, not even most of my life spent in them, but the fact remained: There was just something about the endless stretch of buildings and pavement that was comforting, and a guy like me doesn't have many comforts in life.
This city was not my city, though. This one wasn't even close, plucked from the wrong country and the wrong century, but it was filled with the dirt and smog that was like mother's milk to me. I would have been more comfortable in that little piece of London than I'd been my entire time on the island.
Would have been, if the place hadn't been so fucking creepy.
There were these people, see. Like some kind of ghost or wraith, always on my periphery and never quite there when I turned my head. If you needed something, they became tangible, but as I tended to keep my needs to myself and didn't trust anything that impermanent, that part hardly mattered. A guy like me likes having a solid handle on what's going on around him. I'd been jumpy as hell all month.
As a result, I'd leaped into one of my weekly sparring matches with Dean with a bit more enthusiasm than normal. There was no jungle left, but there were empty buildings to spare, and we'd found an abandoned warehouse near the north end of the perimeter. Aside from some empty wooden barrels and a shitload of dust, there was nothing there but us.
I know this because I checked. I always check. Compulsively, as a matter of self-preservation, and yes, probably a healthy does of paranoia, too.
There was no fucking way that spider had been in there when we'd walked in.
Dean was improving. He was a tenacious mother, refused to stay down. Some people would call that foolhardy; I called it smart. If he'd had the benefit of training with Niko, there's no telling how far he could have gone. I was deadly, but I made a shit teacher. That day I must have made a shit fighter, too, because I'd let Dean knock me back a step, my black boots kicking up dust as they slid across the concrete floor.
That was when I saw it.
Crouched in the rafters was one of the ugliest monsters I'd ever seen, and that's really saying something. It looked like a massive spider, but had a face that could only be described as ape-like. Lots of eyes, eight legs, flat skull, a toothless mouth, but the toothless part didn't matter, because beneath it were two sets of sharp manibles, upper and lower. And did I mention that it was big? We're talking run, Frodo, it wants the One Ring kind of big. There was literally an ugly-ass spider the size of a Clydesdale just hanging out in the rafters. Chillin'. Watching us. And I'd left the Eagle (or what used to be the Eagle) halfway across the room.
Fuck.
"Dean," I slowly began, frozen in place with my eyes fixed on the thing on the ceiling. "I think you're about to get a practical test of your skills."
This city was not my city, though. This one wasn't even close, plucked from the wrong country and the wrong century, but it was filled with the dirt and smog that was like mother's milk to me. I would have been more comfortable in that little piece of London than I'd been my entire time on the island.
Would have been, if the place hadn't been so fucking creepy.
There were these people, see. Like some kind of ghost or wraith, always on my periphery and never quite there when I turned my head. If you needed something, they became tangible, but as I tended to keep my needs to myself and didn't trust anything that impermanent, that part hardly mattered. A guy like me likes having a solid handle on what's going on around him. I'd been jumpy as hell all month.
As a result, I'd leaped into one of my weekly sparring matches with Dean with a bit more enthusiasm than normal. There was no jungle left, but there were empty buildings to spare, and we'd found an abandoned warehouse near the north end of the perimeter. Aside from some empty wooden barrels and a shitload of dust, there was nothing there but us.
I know this because I checked. I always check. Compulsively, as a matter of self-preservation, and yes, probably a healthy does of paranoia, too.
There was no fucking way that spider had been in there when we'd walked in.
Dean was improving. He was a tenacious mother, refused to stay down. Some people would call that foolhardy; I called it smart. If he'd had the benefit of training with Niko, there's no telling how far he could have gone. I was deadly, but I made a shit teacher. That day I must have made a shit fighter, too, because I'd let Dean knock me back a step, my black boots kicking up dust as they slid across the concrete floor.
That was when I saw it.
Crouched in the rafters was one of the ugliest monsters I'd ever seen, and that's really saying something. It looked like a massive spider, but had a face that could only be described as ape-like. Lots of eyes, eight legs, flat skull, a toothless mouth, but the toothless part didn't matter, because beneath it were two sets of sharp manibles, upper and lower. And did I mention that it was big? We're talking run, Frodo, it wants the One Ring kind of big. There was literally an ugly-ass spider the size of a Clydesdale just hanging out in the rafters. Chillin'. Watching us. And I'd left the Eagle (or what used to be the Eagle) halfway across the room.
Fuck.
"Dean," I slowly began, frozen in place with my eyes fixed on the thing on the ceiling. "I think you're about to get a practical test of your skills."