Troll!Jim gets angry and growls at Claire. He doesn’t mean to and it scares her. After they have a talk about it.
“I’m coming with you.” Claire says, already moving to grab her shadow staff.
“No, it’s okay. Stay here. It’ll just be quick.” Jim says waving a hand dismissively at her.
“No, I want to help.” She says firmly, walking towards the door where Jim was heading.
“It’s fine. Stay here.” He says through gritted teeth.
He watches as Claire walks out the door, ignoring what he’s saying.
He takes deep breathes to try and calm his sudden agitation. This is one thing he hates about being part troll. It makes him quicker to anger. In situations he used to be able to shrug his shoulders at and move on, he finds himself barely able to keep his anger down now.
Jim lets out a groan and follows Claire out the door.
This is supposed to be a simple quick task: get rid of some goblins on the streets and few blocks over.
Claire had been comfortably lounging on the couch as they watched a movie. She didn’t need to come with him. She could have kept watching the movie. Jim appreciates the help but he doesn’t always need assistance. He can do things by himself! He doesn’t need to be babied!
Suddenly Claire’s voice snaps him out of his thoughts.
“Jim! Over there!” Claire points to the left and Jim can see about seven goblins trying to break into some poor person’s van.
“Okay, I’ll get the ones at the front of the-“ Jim says and turns to Claire, only to find that she’s already running off to fight the goblins.
Jim lets out a loud frustrated groan before taking out his sword and running after her.
The goblins eyes widen as he comes up behind them and begins slashing at them with his sword.
Claire’s on the other side of the van using her shadow staff and jabbing it at them.
After a few minutes they both stop fighting and are covered in goblin guts. Jim looks in the windows of the van to make sure no goblins got inside.
Something touches his shoulder.
Jim whips around and swings his sword at whatever tried to touch him, letting out a loud growl from the back of his throat.
His anger rises at the thought of having to fight more. He had already had to fight all night last night and barely got any sleep. This task was supposed to be over by now.
It takes Jim a moment to calm down and realize it was Claire that touched his shoulder.
She’s standing beside him with her hands up in the air, trying to show she means no harm.
When Jim looks at her eyes he feels his heart break.
Claire is looking at him with eyes filled with fear. Her hands are trembling slightly in the air and she looks like she wants nothing more than to run away.
Jim moves his sword down so it’s no longer in her face.
Claire still doesn’t move.
Then it hits Jim. He growled at her. He had gotten so angry that for a minute his new found anger had taken over. He growled at her just like a troll. For a moment he had forgotten he was now a monster, and looks like she had too.
His anger flares for a minute as his thoughts flood with self-hatred.
He growls again at his thoughts, and Claire must think he’s growling at her because suddenly she backs away.
“Wait! No- Claire!” He says copying her and holding his hands up. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to growl at you. I thought it you were a goblin.” He quickly explains.
Claire looks him up and down, probably to see if he’s actually calmed down now, and slowly brings her hands down to her sides.
“Oh, Jim.” She says, coming closer and hugging him. “You scared me. For a minute you didn’t seem to recognize me at all. And when you growled, I thought you were about to attack me.”
She pulls back from the hug to look at Jim’s face.
“For a moment I didn’t recognize you:” she whispers, looking away.
“Claire, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” Jim says pulling her into the hug again. “I don’t know why, but after I turned into a troll my emotions have been all over the place. It’s been getting harder and harder to control my anger.”
Claire looks up at him with caring, worried eyes, as she hears the slight panic in his voice.
“It will be okay.” She says calmly. “We’ll figure this out. We’ll find a way to keep you calmer. Maybe Blinky will be able to help. Have you talked to him about this?”
Jim looks away nervously, “No, I haven’t told him yet. I was kind of hoping if I ignored it, the problem would go away on its own.” Jim sighs heavily, obvious bitterness in his next words. “Instead it’s getting worse.”
Claire feels Jim’s hands clench into fists against her back and she rubs circles on his back to calm him down.
“You should talk to Blinky about this soon. He probably has some way of helping you control your anger, and don’t forget, you can always talk to me or Toby, alright?” Claire says, looking Jim in the eye so he can see she’s being honest. “You can share what’s making you angry and we can listen and try to help the best we can.”
Jim gives her a small smile. “Thank you for being so amazing.” He holds her tighter, careful not to hold her too tight and hurt her.
After a quiet moment Jim says one more thing with tears in his eyes.
“Thank you for being you.”
