Audio

*[rolling 1d20+-1] [(1)+-1] [=0]* | call me aud. | she/her | writer | dm | perpetually sleepy

[audioaujom]

Writing Masterlist !!

Welcome to my blog ((: Hello~! I’m Aud :D! I’m a psychology major and long-term dungeon master who loves to write in my free time. The stuff I’m willing to post here right now is pretty much all fanfiction, but I’ve got a lot of other projects stored up that may eventually see the light of day if anyone’s interested. My DnD stuff is gonna start appearing on a separate blog!! Hooray! If you're curious or interested you can find all of that fun stuff over at @audndio. I'm in the process of actually setting it up now, so expect good news soon.

I’ll try to keep this masterlist well updated with both the fandoms I’m actively writing for and what fics are on my profile (as well as hints of what’s to come). I love horror, fantasy, sci-fi, and action/adventure, and actually wrote a handful of decently popular r/nosleep stories a few years ago. It's good to finally be posting again ((:

My asks and dms are open for chatting or also requests for any fic that consists of oneshots/writes. I don't really write smut and I tend to stay away from romance in general, but I don’t mind cute romantic fluff or heavy relationship-related angst if it comes down to it. I mostly write whump lmao I’m amenable to most things, so just ask if you’ve got something in mind!

All my posts are tagged with relevant AU information, the characters involved, and angst/fluff/whump/etc, or with asks/updates/scheduling so you can filter for what you're looking for. I do my best to keep things organized, which is why everything is color-coded as well (AUs are purple, oneshots are pink, ao3 is orange, asks are red now, fandoms are green, and the blue is for me). Updated 8/21/25.

If you'd rather read or chat somewhere else, find me on ao3 here.

Full AUs: Life is Strange AU (multichapter fic, YT/Twitch, slow updates) CollegeHumor Powers AU (multichapter fic, CH/Dim20, completed) (You're Not) A Living Thing With Feelings (multichapter fic, sasi, completed) CollegeHumor Tangled AU (multichapter fic, CH/Dim20, updates biweekly Sundays) If I Make It Through Tonight (multichapter fic, sasi, updates irregular Tuesdays) I'm Down, Bleeding Out, Begging For the Bell (multichapter fic, 9-1-1, completed) The Devil's on the Loose (multichapter fic, 9-1-1, updates thursdays) Lone Survivor (multichpater fic, 9-1-1/criminal minds crossover, updates irregular wednesdays) Oneshot/Writes Collections: Corpse Party (YT/Twitch, irregular updates) Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach (ranboo/slimecicle, irregular updates) Stardew Valley Oneshots (sdv, irregular updates) TV Episode AUs (YT/Twitch)

Fandoms I Write For (in no particular order): CollegeHumor (DropoutTV and Dimension20 included) Stardew Valley Supernatural My Babysitter's a Vampire Lab Rats Kickin' It Mighty Med How to Train Your Dragon Criminal Minds Merlin Sanders Sides OTV 9-1-1 Mystic Messenger Doctor Who Boy Meets World MCU (Main Canon movies, Agents of SHIELD, etc.) DC (Batfam mostly, also Teen Titans) Bungou Stray Dogs Resident Evil Corpse Party Hades Austin and Ally Various YouTubers and Twitch Streamers (Ranboo, Slimecicle, Tommyinnit, Markiplier, Jacksepticeye, etc/related) (and more to come!)

[3liza]

do you live in seattle (the american city)?

yes

no

Voting ended onJul 10

please reblog to get this poll out of my bubble, i want reach

[3liza]

so ive been meaning to do this poll for a while because my hypothesis is that seattle is the most Tumblr city, likely in the entire world. tumblr has a huge american majority userbase obviously, but just for comparison going forward, only 0.22% of the american population lives in seattle. as of this reblog, this poll is showing 4% of respondents are seattleites. given, this isnt scientific at all, because my blog just has a lot of seattle connections and seattle followers, but it's still an impressive bias

[ashen-crest]

I can do it. I can write a chapter. I am capable of putting sentences together. I know what a comma is. I am Aware of the Character.

[audioaujom]

helloo i hope you're doing well. i just wanna say i don't usually like rpf fics but i loved your collegehumor AUs! they're so awesome. and while im talking about the AUs, is it alright if i write a fanfic of what happens after the superpower AU fic? like a post-canon fic but a post-fic fic? i was up at 1am thinking about it and i wrote some notes. ✍️

i checked and you did say you had plans for a sequel fic but it was like 3 years ago so im just wondering if i can write it. but if you wanna do a partnership thing, that'd be cool because i have a lot of questions to ask if i do end up writing this fic.

also! im just wondering what happened with the tangled AU? 💭💭 any updates on that? would love to see what happens in the finale but if there's other things going on, that's alright.

Oh my gosh, hello! I'm really glad you liked my CollegeHumor fics enough to say something! I'm not a huge rpf reader myself, so I was hoping to cater to people who read a lot like myself (and my partner) haha

Of course you'd be welcome to write fic with the powers!AU stuff! I've thought on and off about a sequel, but as you can tell a lot of my CH work has unfortunately taken a back burner to my other projects. That doesn't mean that it's off limits, though, and I'd be happy if you wanted to do something inspired by it or if you wanna actually follow me here and chat about it in DMs ^^ I'd be happy to just answer questions and let you have at it.

And yes, the tangled!AU will be finished and hopefully soon! I've had it like... half done for a while now and I feel awful I haven't quite pulled the trigger on being done with it yet T__T! Normally I try to coincide the end of a fic with the start of a new one, but I don't have anything done to replace it since my focus is on other fandoms right now, and that has overlapped with some mental and physical health issues that have stalled all fic work on and off for the last year. However, I should have time this week and since I know folks are looking for it, I'll try to have that up this weekend so it can feel finished!!

I appreciate you taking the time to ask ((: questions and comments are always welcome!

I'm doing okay ((: at least okay enough to be writing, and that's the measure that matters most to me lololol

[audioaujom]

November 5th, 12:06 AM: Athena

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Ta-da! As promised, here’s the next chapter. Your patience with everything that’s been going on for me behind the scenes is super duper duper appreciated, as is your reading of this like, at all. I’ll save the rest of my gratitude for the final chapter when it goes up, so for now, just enjoy!

Word Count: 1266

--

When Athena first entered the cabin with SWAT, she was entirely sure what to expect.

The best case scenario she could come up with wasn’t good, and worst case… well, she didn't want to think about it. If she had to bring bodies back to Bobby, she wasn’t sure either of them would ever recover.

SWAT breached the front door and immediately started to check the place out with Athena a couple steps behind a group of agents. They all spotted the open basement door at the same time, several of them instantly heading that way after declaring the main room and kitchen clear.

“Drop your weapons!” Athena heard someone call out from the steps to the basement, jogging over to follow. That meant that at the very least the Calvert twins had been found, and she had to hope the situation down there wasn’t too bad.

“Make me.” Axel responded calmly, and Athena felt her breath catch in her throat. She had always wanted to kill that bastard, and hearing his voice again only reignited that anger in her. 

Without waiting for permission, Athena joined the SWAT agents on the stairs, her gun at the ready. She ignored the sight of both boys on the floor—both horribly injured and Buck looking unnaturally pale. She could worry about their health when she dealt with the threat in the room, which happened to be Axel holding a knife to Eddie’s throat. “You honestly think you have any chance at escape?” 

Athena didn’t like that Mara was unarmed at the bottom of the steps, but SWAT seemed to be focused entirely on Axel—since he was the only one with not only a weapon, but also leverage.

“No, I've got something better in mind.” Axel said in the same calm tone, and Athena felt something itch in the back of her mind. Something wasn’t right here, and her brain raced to try and figure out what was giving her such a bad feeling.

She noticed Axel shifting his weight to lunge towards Buck at the same time as Eddie, her heart jumping up into her throat. SWAT moved to fire just as Eddie jumped right after Axel, Athena trying to stall the agents with a loud, “Wait!” 

She didn’t actually manage to stop them, shots impacting concrete in the small basement as Eddie wrestled with Axel on the floor right next to Buck. Once everyone caught up to the situation, they all stopped firing, letting Athena break through the crowd to go over to the commotion.

Just as she hit the landing at the bottom of the steps she saw Eddie sway and then fall over, collapsing backwards onto the floor. Axel lay halfway underneath him, entirely unmoving. 

Athena didn’t even have to motion to the agents to have them start moving, a couple of them detaining Mara and taking her upstairs as the others pushed forward behind her. One of them cut Buck loose, who immediately shot over to Eddie—nearly passing out himself from the sudden move. “Eddie!” 

Athena was by Buck’s side in an instant, finally taking everything in now that the threat seemed to be dealt with—SWAT checking Axel’s rapidly bleeding body for a pulse. She didn’t say anything at first, mostly because she was busy checking Eddie for bullet holes.

Luckily he didn’t have any, but that didn’t mean he looked fine. The electrical burns on his chest looked the worst, not to mention the incredible bruising painted across his face. He looked flushed and his breathing was shallow, which was enough to worry Athena greatly—she needed to get the paramedics down here immediately. He was also drenched and missing his shoes, so she could only imagine how bad things had been.

Buck beside her looked better only in the sense that he was still conscious. He was visibly shaking, and combined with the paleness and some flushing in his cheeks even the sergeant could tell he had a fever. Whatever wounds he had had been bandaged, though several of them were now leaking blood even through the wrappings. He was also quite wet, which, while puzzling, was concerning.

“Oh, baby…” She breathed out as she took him in, hands going for his face. She made sure to move slowly, but that didn’t stop Buck from flinching.

“Athena…” He mumbled out incredulously, nodding and letting her touch him after a moment. She then pulled him over to her and into a hug, days of frantic tears built up behind her eyes threatening to spill over the instant she lost control of herself. “You’re… here.”

“I am.” She smiled as best she could at him, trying to keep herself composed. “We’re going to get you two to safety, okay?”

“Axel, is… is he…?”

Athena glanced over at SWAT, who had deemed Axel dead (or close enough) and just left his body on the floor. She saw that he’d gained at least two bullet holes from the agents’ open firing on him, and an open stab wound in his throat. A part of her hated that he’d died so quickly and easily, and the permanent grin etched on his face was bone-chilling. But at least he was now no longer a physical threat.

“Definitely.”

“Eddie, he—!” Buck started again, but Athena shushed him softly.

“Don’t worry about it.” She immediately deduced what he was trying to tell her, and shifted into comfort mode. “Not a jury in the world would convict him for this. Besides, SWAT didn’t miss him, anyway.”

Buck was silent for a long moment, before he finally fully reciprocated the hug Athena had him in. “Good.” 

She held him as long as he wanted, which was just until the paramedics arrived—Hen at the very front.

“Buck!” She called out, seeing him first and giving him a worried look, before seeing Eddie’s unconscious form on the floor and her eyes widened into full blown panic. “Eddie!”

“Oh, man!” Ravi scrambled to keep up, Bobby coming down just behind them.

“Buck…” Bobby immediately had tears welling up and spilling over, him dropping to his knees with a huge sigh of relief.

“You guys are here.” Buck said softly, Hen giving his shoulder a squeeze.

“Yeah, we’re here, Buck.” She was already unpacking equipment, fully in a work headspace. “But we need to get you guys out of here, now.”

“Eddie first.” Buck tried, but everyone shook their heads at him.

“No. Together.” Bobby stood back up, and then helped Buck to his feet so he could hug him, too. He left Eddie to Hen’s care, and so Athena followed the two up and to the nearest ambulance.

Unfamiliar paramedics greeted them and quickly set to checking Buck out, before getting him situated and letting both Bobby and Athena ride along—even if that made the back of the ambulance a tad cramped. 

No one seemed to mind.

“...thank you.” Buck finally broke the silence in the back as they were driving to the hospital, not quite meeting anyone’s eyes.

“What?” Bobby startled first, giving him a confused stare. “For what?”

Buck looked up, an awkward and lopsided smile on his face. It was horribly sad, and Athena felt her heart tear right down the middle.

“You don’t have to thank us for that.” She reached out to grab his nearest hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “We’d do it again.”

Bobby nodded in agreement. “But hopefully we won’t have to.” 

“Third time’s the charm, right?” Buck’s smile cracked with a line of playfulness, the two that followed him into the ambulance instantly unamused by his antics.

“Buck!”

[audioaujom]

November 4th, 11:34 PM: Eddie

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Hiiiii folks, it’s me! Making good on (right now half) of my promise from last week! Didn’t get anything done early enough to be uploaded before today, but the next chapter is almost done so I can have it up later tonight. The second part of this being finished depended very heavily on this one being done (since I needed pieces of this one for the opening and etc), so I kind of just worked on them both at the same time? But that means this one being done means the second one is super close to being finished as well.

Either way, here’s the first of two updates! 19 goes up as soon as it’s done. Enjoy!

Word Count: 1340

--

Normally, sleep was a bit of a chore for Eddie. He knew all of the benefits of a good night’s sleep and did his best to do that, but it wasn’t something he really enjoyed—especially not with the kind of nightmares he was prone to having. However, right now, all he could seem to do was sleep.

He was exhausted. Everything hurt, even thinking. He was hungry, he was thirsty, and he felt a little feverish. Whether that was him having caught something from being soaked and cold or his body giving out from the stress, he wasn’t sure. Whenever his consciousness faded back in he caught himself staring at Buck on the floor, who also hadn’t really moved in a while.

They hadn’t spoken all day, but that was because they didn’t really have anything to say—and they both wanted to conserve what little energy they had left. Eddie may not have felt good, but he could see that Buck looked visibly sick. The worst part was that he couldn’t even do anything about it.

He took a deep breath, and his dislocated shoulder throbbed with a fiery burst of agony. He could sleep through most of the pain, but not that. Now he was going to be awake at least for a little while.

Eddie hated that he flinched at the sound of the door opening and footsteps coming down the stairs, just like he had every other time this had happened over the last… however long this had been. Time was fuzzy, and he wasn't conscious often.

“Alright, playtime’s over.” Axel didn't waste even a second, drawing a knife and approaching Eddie. 

Eddie glanced sideways to see Buck stirring on the floor, and preemptively winced. He exhaled long and slow to try and brace himself. He wasn't… really ready to die, but he was expecting this to be it. His mind flashed with every regret he'd ever had.

However, he didn't feel any pain when Axel suddenly slashed—opening his eyes just in time to see that Axel had aimed for the rope holding him up instead. In an instant everything holding Eddie upright was gone, and he collapsed to the floor like a ragdoll.

That hurt, since most of Eddie’s weight landed on his bad shoulder. His vision instantly blacked out as he landed, hard, body shutting down from the sudden shock.

The first thing he heard when he returned to the present was Buck panickedly calling out, “Eddie!”

Eddie’s vision came back in swirls, him seeing Axel standing above him, knife still brandished. A small part of Eddie wished that Axel had just killed him while he was already unconscious.

“I've waited long enough, and so have you.” Axel said simply, crouching down on the floor next to him. “It was nice knowing you, Eddie.”

“Go to hell.” Is all he could muster to say in response, starting to brace himself a second time. If he felt he wasn't ready to die the first time, this was even worse. But still he took a breath in and held it, waiting.

Before Axel could even so much as twitch in Eddie's direction, however, hurried footfalls came thundering down the steps. They both looked over at Mara at the same time, her panting a little from the sudden run. “Axel! Problem!” 

“Really? Right now?” Axel glared at her, skeptical, and Eddie tried to blink away the spots gathering in front of him.

“The cops found us.” Mara said, honestly sounding a little panicked. Eddie didn't even have the energy to feel hopeful, though. “They're outside, right now.”

“Great, then they can find the bodies.” Axel shrugged, tightening his grip on his knife.

Mara huffed, and then narrowed her eyes back at him. “Is that really best?” 

“You're seriously going to argue with me about this?” 

“Don't say I didn't warn you.” Mara backed off after a tense staring contest, going to lean against the wall at the foot of the stairs. 

Axel breathed out an angry and sarcastic, “Thank you”, before turning his attention back to Eddie—who shut his eyes in an attempt to look like he was prepared for the end. This was now the third time, and he was starting to get a little impatient.

Eddie felt the cold edge of Axel’s blade against his throat, and his heart started racing. Just as the knife started to split the tiniest amount of skin, there was a resounding crash from upstairs that caused Axel to lose his focus. Heavy, booted steps ran around the first floor of the cabin, and Eddie felt a smile start to stretch across his face.

Even if Axel did go ahead and kill him right here, there was no way he was getting out of this. That knowledge finally put his mind at peace, and he felt himself relax even as Axel regained his composure and put the knife back against his throat.

“Drop your weapons!” A SWAT agent called as several of them barreled down the steps, weapons at the ready. They all stopped at the same time as they saw the state of things in the basement, holding steady positions.

“Make me.” Axel didn't even flinch at the sight of SWAT all aiming their guns at him, not bothered in the slightest by their command.

There was a tense moment of silence, before a new set of footsteps came halfway down the stairs, followed by a tight voice demanding, “You honestly think you have any chance at escape?” 

Eddie felt his stomach flip as he recognized Athena’s voice from the stairs. He was too tired to be really hopeful—still expecting Axel to have some sort of trick up his sleeve—but that didn't mean this wasn't affecting him.

God, how desperately he wanted this all to be over, how he just wanted to be home. He wanted to sit on his couch with Buck, to take Chris to school again, to—

“No, I've got something better in mind.” Axel interrupted Eddie's nostalgic train of thought, and Eddie heard the delight hiding in his words. That meant he was right, he did have something hidden up his sleeve for if (or maybe when) this happened.

Despite having every gun in the room aimed right at him, Axel suddenly moved. He lunged sideways, knife held out in front of him, and Eddie realized his new target in an instant—and then moved without thinking to stop Axel before he could reach Buck.

Athena called out a loud, “Wait!” that was barely audible over SWAT firing their guns, but Eddie didn't hear it as he focused hard on the situation in front of him. He barely managed to tackle Axel to the side, them landing on the hard concrete beside Buck instead of on top of him. Eddie easily wrenched the knife from Axel as they landed, his mind flashing with horrible visions of Axel killing Buck and leaving him to bleed out before they could get him into an ambulance. He moved on pure instinct, hands completely steady as he drove the blade right into Axel’s throat—completely missing the wide grin on the other man’s face.

“Eddie?” Buck asked softly, Eddie’s clouded mind instantly clearing. He glanced over and saw fear on Buck’s face, and then down to see blood on the knife held in his still bound hands. SWAT was no longer firing, and the basement was deadly quiet.

Oh. Eddie realized a moment too late what he’d done, everything catching up to him in a blinding rush. He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out, his breath catching.

That… wasn't what he meant to do. Well, he did mean to protect Buck, of course, but he… surely he was dreaming, right? There was no way he’d actually gone to kill Axel, and even if he had there was no way he'd succeeded. 

Now deliriously convinced that nothing around him was real anymore, Eddie let the darkness encroaching on his vision take over—tipping over backwards and passing out on the floor.

[audioaujom]

November 4th, 9:56 PM: Bobby

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Heyyyyyy it’s me again! I know what I said last time probably looks like an empty promise, but it wasn’t empty when I made it? Summer is usually when my mental health is at its best so I was counting on that being able to spur work, but my doctor has decided to try to treat everything that seems to be wrong with me all at the same time! So I’m not only on several new meds, but I’m also now in PT, so for a good while there my days were honestly more of a chore than anything. But now I’m better able to do some of the basic things for myself again, so writing is back on the table!

To actually make things up to you folks, I’ll either upload the next chapter the day I finish it and the one after that on Thursday, or I’ll drop both next week. I’ve got plans and I’m already working on them now, so expect them asap! Enjoy this update!

Word Count: 1155

--

Bobby was fitfully asleep on the couch when his phone started buzzing, him shooting right awake to answer it. His hands shook as he identified the caller ID as his wife’s, picking it up with the calmest, “Athena? What’s up?” that he could manage.

“Good news, for once.” Athena clearly heard the panicked sleepiness in his voice, her tone unendingly soft. Bobby felt his heart leap into his throat. “We have a lead, finally, and it’s not a small one, either.”

“Okay.” He nodded, trying to keep himself focused on what she was about to say. It sounded serious. “What do you need me to do?”

“Get your crew and your engine, and get ready to drive out of town.” Athena said shortly, and Bobby’s heart started pounding from where it was still firmly lodged in his throat.

“So it’s that kind of lead.” He mumbled, trying to ignore the hope that started burning a hole through his sternum. “You think… you know where they are?”

“Mara’s plenty smart and did her best to hide her tracks, but eventually one of our techs found a pattern in stolen credit cards and identities and linked it to her.”

Bobby waited a second, and then when she didn't continue asked again, “So you think you know where they are?”

“The only way to know for sure is to go there.” She let out a soft sigh, and Bobby could hear how heavy this was all weighing on her. He chose not to comment on it.

“And… I’m allowed to be there?” 

“Call it a… special favor.” Athena chuckled a little, and Bobby felt himself smile faintly. “Considering the circumstances, and all.”

His smile fell just a moment later as the situation really started to set in. “The others, do they know?” 

“Not yet.” Athena sighed again, heavier this time. “I figured you deserved the first call.”

“...thanks.”

“I’ll call Hen, you take care of the others.” The phone static crackled a little, and Bobby wasn't sure if she was sighing again or if she was just that tired. He knew he was. “Chimney and Maddie are both still pretty far from California, but they’re on the way. We can update them after this.”

“Got it.” Bobby’s hand around the phone clenched it a little tighter. “See you soon, then.”

“We’re close, Bobby, I can feel it.” He could picture the way she smiled hopefully at him, and his chest ached. “Our boys will be back before we know it.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“Me too.” She let the moment linger, and then swiftly hung up.

In an instant Bobby was up and off the couch, heading to change into something passable enough to get to work so he could get into his uniform there.

He had no idea what they were going to find—or even really where they were going—but he knew doing this would be better than just sitting around at home, waiting on the other shoe to drop.

Bobby called Ravi on his way to the station, explaining the situation as best he could—the young firefighter promising to be there as soon as possible. Since Athena had probably already called Hen, that left Bobby with nothing to do but show up at work, change, and start to pace the firehouse nervously. The other firefighters already on duty either gave him pitying looks or avoided him entirely, but he didn't mind. It let him continue to pace uninterrupted.

At least, uninterrupted until Hen came storming into the building—running for him before even bothering to head to the locker room. “We have a location?” 

Bobby nodded. He didn't bother trying to smile. “That's what Athena said.”

“But we don't… know anything else?” She asked, and he could hear the worry in her words. He felt it too, but now that they were here he needed to be a leader again—be their Captain, a source of stability and authority, even if he didn't feel it.

“All we have is a place to search. The rest is still up in the air.” He said, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. “We can't even promise they'll be there.”

“Hey.” Ravi jogged in just a minute later, duffel slung over one shoulder. “I'm not late, am I?”

“You're right on time.” Bobby let go of Hen so she and Ravi could head to change, straightening his posture and doing his best to sound like he usually did. “Let's get going.”

The other two were ready quickly, them being joined by a couple people from the current shift to fill out a full crew. Bobby, Hen, and Ravi got onto the fire engine together as soon as a few police cars arrived at the station, everyone waiting nervously for instructions. After everything got sorted out and the engine and ambulance knew where they were going, all of the first responders took off into the night—knowing they would meet SWAT on scene.

The engine was silent for the first 20 or so minutes of driving, the heavy air only broken when Hen awkwardly cleared her throat.

“So.” She said into the headset after her small cough. “Identity theft?”

“It really pays, that's for sure.” Ravi answered immediately, Hen cracking a wide smile. “This cabin is a nice but super remote area.”

“I'm just surprised they were able to track this down at all.” Bobby cut in, doing his best to hide his amusement. It was better for them to be acting like this than to continue wallowing in their nerves. “Normally people with stolen anything just get stuck with the loss.”

“So we’ve done several people a favor here, then.” Hen grinned wider, and Bobby rolled his eyes.

“I'm not surprised you see it that way.” 

“Am I wrong?”

Bobby stared at her for a long moment, before breaking eye contact to go back to staring out the window. “I didn't say that.”

“Exactly.” Hen hummed a little, before her confidence seemed to a dim. “Do you think they’ll know we’re coming?”

“Hopefully not.” Bobby replied, reassuring himself just as much as her. “I'm sure they're expecting us to be looking for them, yes, but this doesn't seem like a trap.”

“That's exactly what would make it a good trap.” Ravi cut back in, and the mood suddenly lightened again.

“Ooh, good point.” Hen mused, Bobby shaking his head.

“We just have to hope we’ve actually caught them off guard.” He said, a little more seriously than he intended. “If not, we could get a stand off just like we did last time.”

“Well, SWAT won last time.” Hen pointed out, and Bobby felt something hard settle in the bottom of his gut. 

Whatever kind of bad feeling it was, he chose to ignore it, simply saying, “There's no guarantee that’ll happen again.”

The engine then fell back into silence for the rest of their ride out into the middle of nowhere.

[audioaujom]

November 4th, 6:34 AM: Eddie

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Howdy ho! I’m a bit more behind than planned, but back on it! Had a bad week with some more new meds (physical health stuff this time) last week but I really wanted this up last Thursday. I’ve leveled out, though, so expect me to be actually a little more prompt here soon. Enjoy the update!

Word Count: 1491

--

For most of his life, Eddie’s rather high pain tolerance had been a blessing. Unfortunately, right now, it was most certainly a curse—he would've much preferred to have blacked out into unconsciousness alongside Buck, or better yet, before him.

That didn't mean he hadn't tried, though. His body was still vibrating with the aftershocks of Mara running… however much current that was through him. The tips of his fingers felt numb. But that could also be due to the constantly pulsing dislocated shoulder he now had, which made any twitch of movement—especially the light shaking from the electrocution—horridly painful.

Mara had definitely done that on purpose. And leaving him up like this meant not only could he not relocate his shoulder, but it left all his weight on it and kept him away from Buck.

Oh, Buck.

Eddie had been close to passing out until he saw Mara switch over to handling him, and had unwillingly snapped back awake. That had allowed him to see the exact moment Buck’s eyes glazed over and he drifted back into what had to be one of his worst memories. 

Eddie knew it had been bad. But he wasn't there with him, and so he had no idea exactly how bad. It didn't help that they hadn't been terribly close when it happened or immediately after, or that it was followed so closely in time by Axel disrupting everything the first time. So seeing him fully dissociate and seemingly get thrown head first into a full flashback had Eddie itching to go to him, to hold him. Buck had given him the instructions his therapist had, for these episodes. He couldn't remember the details, but he knew what was happening now wasn't helping.

Buck stirred on the floor with a violent cough, hacking up what was left of the water in his lungs. Eddie felt his breathing hitch.

“Buck?” He tried, not wanting to talk too loudly in case the twins were anywhere nearby. “Can you hear me?” 

“I… don't know where he is.” Buck mumbled, thankfully staying on his side instead of rolling over onto his back. 

Awesome. So Buck definitely couldn't hear Eddie, and had no idea where he was.

“Buck, that…” Eddie took a deep breath, and tried again to remember what he was supposed to do. “I need you to focus. You're not there anymore.”

“I'm sorry, Eddie.” Buck rambled on as if Eddie wasn’t even speaking, starting to hyperventilate. “I'm so so sorry, I—!”

“Buck!” Eddie cut him off, hating this down to his core. When Buck had first started talking about the incident at the pier with such a pained expression on his face—no longer even noticing Mara or Axel—he’d felt so, so awful, but this was even worse. Not even the nights of Buck’s worst nightmares looked like this. “Everything turned out okay, you don’t need to be sorry!”

Buck’s eyes went somehow even more blank as he laid there still for a moment, before mumbling, “I should've just drowned…”

“Evan, please, listen to me!” Eddie tried again, starting to panic a little. If he couldn’t snap Buck out of this, he had no idea what was going to happen. “We found Chris. He was safe. You’re safe.” 

Eddie grimaced. It felt like he was saying the right thing, but it was also pretty much a massive lie. They weren’t safe.

“Kind of.” He corrected, trying to mumble it mostly to himself before raising his voice back again to say, “Come back to me.”

Buck blinked a couple times, his eyes starting to come back into focus. “He’s… safe?”

“Yeah.” Eddie smiled faintly, finally feeling like Buck could hear him. “Don’t you remember? Someone else had found him, she brought him to us. It wasn’t your fault you got separated.”

“Oh, I… I do.” Buck nodded once, and then twice. Eddie could see the haze starting to clear from around him.

“Are you here? In… now?” Eddie cringed at himself, but couldn’t think of any better way to ask. He tried to meet Buck’s eyes, but the latter was still staring at the floor. “With me?”

“Yeah, I…” Buck shook his head, and finally looked up—making only a half second of eye contact with Eddie before exhaling sharply. “Sorry, I— oh, you look like shit.”

“You are back.” Eddie deadpanned, but he was far too relieved to feel any real annoyance.

“Yeah.” Buck started to try to sit up, but coughed again—him curling up on his side with a wince. “I think. Things are still fuzzy.”

“That's okay.” Eddie did his best to keep his voice sounding reassuring. “I know these circumstances are… bad, but they're all we have to ground to right now.”

Buck nodded, but something in his expression worried Eddie. He then watched as Buck very intentionally—and painfully—rolled and flexed his more injured shoulder, crying out a soft, “Ah!”

The lingering fog in his eyes immediately cleared, and Buck pushed himself up to a sitting position in one, careful shove.

“I don't think you're supposed to do it like that.” Eddie said, not liking how familiar he looked with the move.

“Do what like what?” Buck asked, clearly trying to shift the subject. He took a couple deep breaths as he settled, his vision probably blurring from the sudden move. “I'm present again, right?”

How many times had Buck done that without telling anyone? The idea that he had always done this without ever asking for any sort of help made Eddie sick with regret. “Evan…”

“Sorry.” Buck apologized, but it didn’t seem completely sincere—it meant that Buck would do it again, no hesitation, but didn’t want Eddie to feel bad about it. It made Eddie feel worse. “How long’s it been?”

“Not sure.” Sighing, Eddie felt a cold shock from the floor shoot up his legs again. He ground his teeth together as the sudden shake had his shoulder flaring up again, trying to force himself to be still. “An hour or two? It feels like it's been days.”

Buck scoffed. “Time moves a lot slower when you're hurt.”

“You sound familiar with pain.” Eddie said after a moment, earning himself a very unamused glare from Buck. He rolled his eyes back. “I just don't like it, that's all.”

Buck started to say something else, but cut himself off. “You're shaking.”

“I think I'm cold.” 

“You think?”

“I can't tell if it's a real chill or some lingering shock, honestly.” Eddie laughed a little, but it was more sarcastic than anything else. He tried not to shiver. “But it’s more manageable than my shoulder.”

“At least you've stopped posturing.”

Eddie blinked, and turned to stare at Buck dumbly. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“You're not acting like it doesn't hurt.” Buck clarified, smiling. He seemed relieved, for some reason. Eddie ignored it.

“There’s no point.” He started to shrug but stopped himself, recognizing just in time that it would hurt like a bitch to even try. When Buck didn’t say anything else, Eddie swallowed down the heavy knot forming in his throat and blurted out, “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you.”

“What?” Buck suddenly sat up a little straighter, confused. “What are we talking about?”

Eddie took a deep breath. Saying this aloud was harder than he expected. “The tsunami, the pier, I—”

“Oh, that was ages ago.” As soon as Buck caught up to what Eddie was getting at, he shrugged and slumped back down, unconcerned. “It’s no big deal.”

“You were crying out for Chris as soon as Mara put your head in the bucket.” Eddie pointed out, still hearing the way he thrashed in the bucket and cried. It was hard to tell the tears from the water that clung to his face after the second dunk. “And you did that while you were asleep, too.”

Buck shrugged again. “We weren’t really close, then.”

“That’s what I’m sorry about.” Eddie finally got out, Buck’s eyes widening ever-so-slightly at the admission.  “I didn’t realize how much responsibility I’d laid on you, without even offering anything in return.”

“Yeah, well, I’d do it again.” Buck said with complete certainty. Eddie glanced away. “No question.”

“That only makes me more sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Buck’s voice turned soft, but his intentions and tone never wavered. “Unless you want to die full of regret.”

“Well there goes that plan.” Eddie grumbled sarcastically, not liking how finite everything Buck was saying sounded. He glanced back over, seeing that Buck was staring right at him.

“I’m serious.” Buck doubled down, his resolve clear in his eyes. Eddie knew what he was saying, but also knew that neither of them actually planned on letting go of any fault or shame they felt.

“You first.” Is all he said in return, and Buck just smiled back at him. Eddie then let his head drop forward, ignoring the pain it caused, and let himself start to drift off into unconsciousness.

[audioaujom]

Hi folks! Had a violent side effect night from some new meds so the update I had started and planned for today (for The Devil's on the Loose, 9-1-1 fic) may end up delayed. I had every intention of being only a week behind my promise but then I had a rough night and zero sleep 👍

If I can't get it up by tomorrow it'll go up next week in the regularly scheduled slot.

In the meantime, I managed to update Lone Survivor (9-1-1 x Criminal Minds) yesterday before my shit got rocked, so feel free to vibe over there in the meantime!

[audioaujom]

May 19th, 11:15 AM: BAU

LS Hub, < prev, next >

Hey hey hey! I know I’m a little behind what I promised, but I’m not as far behind as I expected to be lol. I’ve finally got all the details for this pressed out in my head, so expect me to really be back on schedule going forward.  Enjoy!

Word Count: 1118

--

“This—” Prentiss pointed a cheap, disposable chopstick down at the takeout noodles in front of her as the rest of the table stared at her, “is amazing.”

“The bigger the city, the better the food.” Rossi agreed, the whole unit thankful to finally be on a lunch break. They’d spent all morning going over Reid’s latest theory from the previous night, everyone feeling extremely tense as they waited for the bad news that they’d failed to prevent another shooting. They’d gotten hungry pretty early, so they’d sent JJ and Prentiss out to find somewhere to get takeout from. Both women were clearly satisfied with their choice, as was everyone else. They’d spent enough time as a group to know roughly what everyone liked.

Their lunch was then interrupted, but not by any of the police officers with bad news—instead by Morgan’s phone going off, and him smiling down at it in relief as he answered, “Garcia.”

“Good morning to my favorite crime fighters!” Garcia’s voice filled the room as Morgan put her on speaker, finishing up the mouthful he’d been chewing on. “I’ve finished compiling all of the lists you’ve asked for, but I’ve gotta warn you, most of them are long.”

“Start with the list of people who had a loved one die in the back of an ambulance.” Reid cut in first, already long since finished eating. Whether it was because he found the food good, he was just that hungry, or he was in a hurry to get back to the investigation was certainly up for debate.

There was some quick typing, then, “That, unfortunately, happens to be the longest.”

“How many of them have a military or law enforcement background?” Hotch asked, the group already having agreed on how to narrow this list down. They just hoped it actually returned results, meaning their theories were correct. Otherwise, they’d be no better off than they were at the beginning of the investigation, already two days ago. They couldn’t afford more victims.

“Uhh… 43.” Garcia winced a little, audible even over the phone. “I need more than that.”

“Any of them on the list of people who would have access to Kenneth Malone’s ammo?” Rossi suggested, a little hopeful. The rest of the table leaned in a little as he asked, sharing in the expectation.

Garcia immediately started typing away, but then sighed. “Nope, not a one.” 

The whole unit grimaced. That wasn’t good.

“Not even someone who would’ve had access in the past?” He tried again, but his little bit of hope had already been extinguished. They were going to need a new angle.

“Still a big fat no.” Garcia said, confirming his suspicions. “Mr. Copeland isn’t on our list of people who’ve lost someone in an ambulance, just for those who were wondering.”

They’d already ruled him out when his background check came back mostly clean, and since the only relevant stressors they could find for him weren’t recent enough to trigger the current killings. But still, it was good to have confirmation that he wasn’t in this pool of suspects. That didn’t mean he was ruled out completely, though—since his access to the department’s ammo couldn’t really be ignored.

“What about just any of them who were or are on a SWAT team?” Prentiss glanced sideways at Morgan, who nodded and gave her a shrug that said, ‘worth a try’. “Try a little broader.”

“To that… I’ve got four.” Their analyst sounded surprised at how fast that narrowed down the list to a reasonable amount, instantly typing more and a little faster to add on, “Three who are currently on vacations but didn’t travel, and one who was recently fired.”

“Send us those names and addresses, Garcia.” Hotch instructed immediately, a tense relief washing over the room.

“You’ll have them before you know it!” Garcia said decisively before she hung up, presumably to focus on sending along the information she’d just found.

Hotch felt his phone buzz a moment later, but before he could assign everyone to a particular suspect, his gaze got caught on something through the conference room window—namely on a group of three familiar faces talking to each other by Field Sergeant Athena Grant-Nash’s desk.

“Is the 118 the only active firehouse in the city of Los Angeles?”

Every member of the BAU paused at the same time, looking over at Hotch's outburst in confusion.

“No, there should be 106 active firehouses in the city.” Reid said after a moment, clearly uncertain as to what the unit chief was implying.

“Then why are they everywhere?” Hotch asked, still staring out the window at where Athena was talking to Bobby and Hen. It looked serious, but so did everything these days.

“The frequency at which we run into these guys is uncanny.” Morgan agreed, but he was smirking. 

Hotch's confusion seemed to amuse him, and also Prentiss beside him—who instead of visibly looking entertained put on a faux shocked face. “Do you think they feel the same way about us?” 

“I would, if I were them.” Rossi chimed in, Hotch finally averting his gaze from the window and back to the team.

“As I was saying, let’s split up. We’ve got four viable suspects and no idea when—or if—our unsub will strike again.” He shook his head to refocus, getting his phone out and narrowing in on the three SWAT members who were currently on vacation from the list. “I’ll send everyone an address. I’ll also contact Detective Denvers to give her the update, and have her send someone to the last address.”

All of the agents then nodded and stood up, quickly pairing off and walking quickly out of the conference room—hoping that at least one of these suspects was the unsub they were looking for.

Hotch, who was with Rossi, detoured to go over to where he’d seen Athena—her stopping mid-sentence to her husband as he approached.

“Agent.”

“Our technical analyst has identified four potential suspects. I was about to call Detective Denvers to let her know.” Hotch said, not missing the look that passed between Hen and Bobby. “My team is splitting up to take three of them, would you like the fourth address?”

“I would.” Athena answered immediately, completely serious and now focused on the task at hand. “If you give it to me, I’ll get ahold of Denvers myself and go check it out.” 

“I’ll leave it to you, then.” Taking his phone back out, Hotch turned and headed with Rossi out towards the front doors of the precinct, sending along the last address to her.

Now all that was left was to hope this narrowed their list of four down to one, instead of zero.

[audioaujom]

November 4th, 5:06 AM: Buck

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Hello hello! It’s me! Back again so soon! I don’t have much to say, so it’s time for the moment you’ve all been waiting for! Enjoy!!

Word Count: 2152

Chapter TWs: Torture, Violence, Electrocution, Drowning

--

The drug induced haze that Buck woke up into made him nauseous. Not just because it reminded him of all the other times it had happened to him, but also because he was still on an empty stomach and it meant that Eddie’s escape plan had failed. Lots of compounding factors. He just hoped he didn't throw up.

Buck tried to blink his eyes open.

“Buck?” Eddie’s voice broke through the strange dizziness, Buck realizing he must've seen him stir on the floor. “You up?”

“Uh… kind of.” Buck answered once he felt the floor beneath him finally stop spinning. “You okay?”

“Seriously?” Eddie huffed, sounding annoyed—but it sounded normal coming from him like that. Buck couldn't help but smile, knowing that he asked a stupid question.

“Sorry. Habit.” Buck sighed, then let his smile fall. “What's going to happen now?”

Eddie scoffed. “Nothing good.”

“What's up with you?” Finally pushing himself up to a sitting position, Buck turned to stare at Eddie. He really sounded… off, even given their rather dire set of circumstances. 

“What's that supposed to mean?” Eddie glared a little as he made eye contact with Buck, clearly still frustrated. It probably didn't help that Eddie had been left standing for god knows how long, and his arms were probably numb from being wrenched up above his head like that. Buck knew how uncomfortable that was. He shuddered a little.

“...something happened.” Buck deduced, and his hunch was only made stronger when Eddie averted his eyes to stare at the floor. “Eddie.”

“It's nothing.”

“It can't be nothing.” Buck shot back, starting to stand but stopping when his vision swam, hard. “What did he say to you?”

Eddie was quiet for a long moment, and then sighed. “It wasn't Axel.” 

“What?”

“It's just…” Eddie sighed again, and Buck could feel the weight behind it. It made his chest ache. “It’s me.”

Buck’s eyes narrowed. “Now what the hell is that supposed to mean?” 

“I could've gotten us out of here.” Eddie said softly, guilt weighing down his voice. “But I failed. And they knew I would.”

“If anyone failed, it was me.” Buck shook his head, the motion making him dizzy all over again. He steadied himself with his hands. “So either we share the blame, or take none of it. Got it?”

Eddie raised his eyebrows. “Since when did you get so wise?”

“It's the only thing either of us would accept, right?” Buck tried to smile again, meaning every word. He had to hope his sincerity would reach him, or they'd really lose all hope.

“...I guess.”

Buck grinned tiredly. “Good enough.”

The cellar fell silent after that, Buck trying to get his brain to stop turning to mush. He needed to focus, to make sure they survived at least a little longer.

They weren’t afforded long, though, the door opening only a few minutes later—followed by Mara dashing down the steps with a smile.

“I'm back!” She cheered, throwing her arms up in the air. “Good, you're both awake.” 

She looked between the two of them a few times, her grin growing sharper.

“Trouble sleeping?”

“Just get it over with.” Eddie turned to glare at her, furious.

“Is that you volunteering?” Mara’s tone was completely teasing, something sadistic in her eyes that made Buck shiver. 

Eddie didn't seem to be bothered, though, holding his glare steady. “And if it is?”

Buck stared between the two of them, confused. Eddie had always been hostile to them (obviously), but this felt like it was something deeper, something more personal. It meant that Buck was definitely right—something had happened while he was unconscious. 

“Then I'll happily oblige.” Mara grinned up at him, taking a seat on the floor by his feet. A moment of confusion passed through the two firefighters, made only worse when Buck realized she was carefully unlacing his shoes. Just as she took his boots off Buck’s attention was quickly pulled over to Axel, who had started to come down with Mara but stopped—sitting about halfway down the stairs. This set off an incredible amount of alarm bells. 

Axel was being quiet? This boded not well at all. 

Panic started to stir in Buck’s stomach. It felt like death was finally approaching.

Mara set up a table across from Eddie but then abandoned it to approach Buck, rope in hand. Already sensing her intention, he gritted his teeth and went back to lying on the floor—face down.

“Aw, you're so well trained.” She cooed, and it took every ounce of restraint Buck had to not say anything back. She wasn't entirely wrong, anyway.

After tying his hands she left him there, going back to skipping around the room to finish getting set up.

Buck took one look at the car battery set up on the table, already with two cables attached, and felt his blood run cold. Mara left it there and went to stand behind Eddie, giggling. She placed one of her hands on Eddie’s left shoulder, gently rubbing at the muscles there.

“You feel that, right there?” Mara was whispering in one of Eddie’s ears, but wasn't so quiet that Buck couldn't hear her. “Wow, your shoulders are so tense!”

Eddie flinched, but couldn't really pull away from her. She snaked her other hand up and placed it on top of her first one, positioned directly on top of his shoulder.

“That will make this worse.” She said seriously, before suddenly shifting her weight to apply as much pressure as she could to the joint. “Annnnd… out!”

Buck heard the crack as Eddie’s shoulder slipped out of place, his body immediately shifting to compensate for the overextension of his arm. He squeezed his eyes shut as Eddie gasped in surprise, yelping awkwardly instead of really screaming.

“Is that all you've got?” Mara teased, and Buck opened his eyes just time to see her starting to reach for Eddie’s other shoulder.

“Mara.” Axel suddenly cut in, her turning to him with a wide pout.

“Fineee, I'll get on with it.” She shrugged, turning her attention to her table. “I was totally getting bored anyway.”

Nobody in the room believed her. 

She then picked up a small knife and turned around, spinning the new weapon in her hands. She made quick and efficient work of cutting Eddie’s shirt away, putting the knife away when she was done. Buck normally loved the sight of Eddie’s body, but this was far from the right context. It also showed off all of the injuries Eddie had already endured at Mara’s hands, from the last time they’d been taken. After they were rescued, Eddie had started to avoid being shirtless, even at night. Buck counted himself lucky that most of his scars were out of sight unless he went looking for them.

Mara tapped the edges of the metal together, a spark shooting out from between them. She then looked back at Eddie, who was struggling to keep his eyes open. “You should’ve killed me when you had the chance.”

That's what he was blaming himself for? Not being able to kill Mara in cold blood?

He almost couldn’t believe that Eddie would take that burden on, but he knew him too well to think it wasn’t true. They’d probably set him up on purpose—and if he had killed Mara, who’s to say that would’ve even helped them escape? It was probably part of whatever sick plan Axel had had in mind before he set the trap with the knife. But it seemed that this was weighing even more heavily on Eddie than anything else.

Buck suddenly looked away, trying to bury his face into the floor, as Mara placed both cables against Eddie’s chest—his body convulsing from the sudden shock.

He heard Eddie sputter and pant for air a moment later, and when he glanced back up he saw that Mara had set the cables down and walked off again. She hefted up two buckets full of water—one in each hand. 

She set one down right beside Eddie, before grinning down at Buck and setting the other near him. “Don’t worry, this one is for you.” 

That obviously brought Buck no comfort, since it spurred in him nothing but nervousness for what was about to come. He was, at the moment, far more concerned with Eddie’s safety than his own.

“Now, how about a shower?” Mara picked up the bucket beside Eddie, shifting to hold it steady against one of her hips. Eddie blinked once before something dawned on him, and he preemptively shut his eyes and flinched—barely a half second before Mara sloshed out all of the water in the bucket to drench him.

Eddie was breathing heavily. Buck wondered how bad the pain of hanging on his dislocated shoulder had to be. Mara picked the cables back up, and sparked them again.

This time, Buck heard Eddie scream when she shocked him again, clearly not able to lock his jaw fast enough as the current pulsed through him. Buck caught a glance of Mara, seeing real joy on her face as she went in for another round.

By the fourth time Mara went in, Eddie had gone completely quiet. Buck really, really didn’t want to look. He just desperately prayed that it would be over.

“Right then.” Mara abruptly set the jumper cables down, dusting her hands off as she then turned her full attention to Buck. "Your turn!”

Buck had no idea what to expect now, but he nervously glanced at Eddie—who seemed barely conscious. It would be best if he was out for this next part, if what Mara planned to do to him was even remotely similar.

“Don't worry, I've got something different in store for you.” She said as if reading his mind, helping him up off the floor just enough for him to be kneeling in front of the bucket she’d placed near him earlier. “It’s no fun to do too much of the same, you know?”

Before he could even think to ask what she was talking about, Mara grabbed the back of his neck and shoved his face down in the water until his head was completely submerged.

It had been a long time since Buck had been anywhere near the water, after what had happened on the pier with Chris. In an instant he was fully underwater, drowning in a tidal wave as his body wouldn’t respond to help him swim to the surface.

Mara suddenly yanked him back out and he started heaving for air, water spraying everywhere as he tried to stop his body from shaking. He was panicking, without a doubt, but not for the reasons Mara probably expected. His chest felt tight.

“Oh, this seems to really bother you!” She jeered, tightening her grip on the back of his neck until his attempts to sputter for air slowed down. “Do you not know how to swim?”

“No, I…” Buck tried to answer her, but he couldn’t seem to focus on his surroundings. All he could see was the flooded pier, and the bodies floating in the water. “I… I can’t find him.”

“Buck?” Eddie’s voice was shredded and weak, barely breaking through the haze of whatever memories Buck was now lost in. “Buck!”

He felt Mara shove him forward again, plunging him back into the cold water until his lungs started seizing up from the lack of air. He saw stars when she pulled him back out, all of the sounds around him turning to a quiet hum overtaken by rushing water. He really had no idea where he was, he just knew he felt cold, and guilty.

Christopher… where was Christopher? He’d lost track of him at some point in his attempts to save people drowning on the flooded streets, and the new waves of the flood didn’t help matters. His head hurt, and his legs were tired from treading water. Suddenly he was back under the water again, and it felt like his life was flashing before his eyes.

He was definitely drowning. Water scorched his air-parched mouth and lungs, and he could barely think. All he could feel was that he’d fucked up, and it was all his fault. His bad leg twinged.

The next time he was able to blink, he was lying on his back on the floor of the cellar, coughing and hacking up pink tinged water onto himself and the floor. His mouth tasted like blood, and his mind swirled with uncertainty.

“I think we’ve lost him.” Mara’s voice floated into his consciousness from above. He could’ve sworn he heard Eddie yelling.

“Just leave him there. We can always come back later.” Axel said, and Buck felt his eyes starting to drift closed. Everything hurt, and he was just so tired. He couldn’t tread any more water, couldn’t save anybody else—let alone himself.

Eventually, he passed out.

[audioaujom]

November 3rd, 9:59 PM: Eddie

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Hello hello! I'm back again after another (over a) month delay!!!  This time it was mostly bad timing on me being busy: I'm a volunteer at my local library and had events I was working at, and last week was my ten year anniversary with my long distance partner and we finally got to spend some IRL time together!!!

Now that all that's over, the sun’s back out sometimes, and my schedule is stabilizing, I'm hoping to get back to my regular updates every 1 or 2 weeks to try to have this fic finished, like, super soon.  The winter is hard for me, but it's over enough! The whump goblin in my brain is finally stirring again, so stuff is going to get fucked up fast, as promised. I promise the next update will be soon and will not disappoint.

Anyway, enjoy the update, and thanks so much for your patience!!

Word Count: 1632

--

Watching Buck slump to the floor, drugged into an unconscious state, had Eddie freezing solid where he crouched. Axel stood over him, bloody machete in hand, and stared levelly at Eddie. The entire basement went silent.

Luckily Eddie had enough sense not to move—since doing so would put him at an immediate disadvantage—but that meant he was locked in a sort of stalemate with Axel. They both had leverage, since he still had his knife on Mara, and if he could hold out long enough, there was a chance the slowly accumulating blood loss could give him the edge he needed on Axel. The only problem with that was the woman beneath him.

“If you kill me, you could take Axel.” Mara suddenly whispered from beneath him, voice strangely normal. Eddie glanced sideways at her, not turning his head. “Why don't you try?”

For just a moment, everything made sense. The plan in his mind solidified—and escape seemed within reach. She was right, if he only had to fight an already injured Axel, he could get him and Buck out of here no problem. He was already perfectly poised to get an angle on her carotid, which would cause her to bleed out faster than anyone could save her—

As soon as Eddie caught up to his train of thought, he gasped, loud, and lost his grip on the knife.

“No…!” The pure panic that welled up at the idea that he was seriously considering murder—and a double murder at that—had him falling over to the floor and scrambling back and away from everyone. Both hands went to his head and raked back through his hair, his breathing shallow and uneven. He’d thought about killing these siblings constantly over the last two years, to be fair, but never this seriously. He rationally knew that not killing Mara and executing his plan was a mistake, but he was running on pure instinct now—and that meant killing was off the table.

Maybe this right here, this conflict, was Axel’s true goal all along. Even as used to the constant nausea as he was, Eddie hated the feeling of his stomach churning as he tried to keep a wave of stomach acid down.

“Perfect.” Mara’s usual smile returned as she sat up, stretching her arms up above her head with a yawn. She stared at Eddie until he looked back at her, grinning. “I'm disappointed in you, though.” 

Some of Eddie’s panic started to disappear into shame. She’d totally used him. He’d been so busy considering what to do about Axel that he had forgotten she was just as formidable, since she’d spent two years on the run not being caught and had helped Axel escape in the first place. He’d been so focused that she managed to perfectly skirt his attention—not to mention that she’d read him so well she knew he wouldn’t actually kill her.

Or maybe she just didn’t care either way. But she was the one who won the gamble, which meant that Eddie—and Buck by extension—had to pay the price.

Again.

“You’re such wasted talent…” Mara mused with a soft shake of her head as she headed for the steps, disappearing upstairs. Eddie for a fleeting moment considered jumping Axel right that second—but the machete in his hands had him reconsidering.

“I didn’t expect him to actually swing.” Axel said after a moment, and Eddie caught sight of a slight shake to his arms. “Honestly, I’m impressed.”

“It’s not a compliment, coming from you.” The insult didn’t quite land as Eddie’s voice wavered when he spoke, and so Axel just kind of chuckled.

Mara then returned, skipping down the steps and dropping a whole pile of stuff to the floor. She then swapped the last item in her hands for the machete in Axel’s. “Here you go!”

“Before we get into the fun stuff, it's time for you to do what you do best.” Axel turned to Eddie on the floor, no longer armed—and revealing that Mara had brought the first aid kit back downstairs and given it to him. “For real this time.” 

Eddie blinked, confused for only a moment, and then grimaced.

“It's not like Buck is waking up any time soon.” Axel shrugged, taking a seat on the floor in front of Eddie. He was starting to look pale.

“And if I don’t?” Eddie started, but he already felt himself reaching for the kit. He stopped himself just short, trying to get ahold of himself. His urge to be helpful and his deep-seated hatred were duking it out in his chest. Axel saw right through him, though.

“You already lost your chance at defiance.” Axel’s grin was infuriating. Behind him, Mara made sure to twirl her returned weapon where Eddie could see her. “Now do it.”

Reluctantly, Eddie took the kit from Axel and set to work. He had to put more than a few stitches into his shoulder, and Eddie couldn’t help but take a little bit of pleasure in the way Axel winced uncomfortably at the pulling of the needle through his torn skin.

Seeing Axel bleed was more weird than anything else, so Eddie was quick to cover him in bandages. The fact he was just a human didn’t feel right, with everything he’d done.

As soon as he finished, Axel carefully made it back to his feet, seeming a little unsteady. Eddie knew he’d need rest and fluids before he could do much—so despite the complete failure of an escape attempt, he thanked Buck’s steeled nerves for buying them a little time.

“You got it?” Axel turned to his sister, and Mara nodded excitedly.

“Mhm! I can do it!”

Axel waved dismissively at her instead of saying anything else, taking a seat about halfway up the stairs—giving him a perfect view of the entire room. The hairs on the back of Eddie’s neck prickled from the feeling of being watched, so he instead tried to direct his attention to Mara, who was picking up the other stuff she’d brought down earlier.

This proved to be the right choice, as Mara immediately chucked a small pack of wet wipes at him, nearly hitting him dead in the face. He barely managed to catch it, and he tilted his head to the side, confused. Before he could ask her, she just smiled and gave him some romantic jazz hands.

Oh.

He knew better than to take the gesture as real kindness, but still appreciated it as he took a few wipes out and cleaned his bloody hands—since he didn’t have any gloves to put on before he gave Axel the stitches. However, this didn’t actually make his hands feel clean. He tossed his trash into a nearby corner, and Mara approached him. He got up to his feet without waiting for her to ask, and delight rippled across her face. At this point, he was starting to feel numb to it all.

Since Eddie didn’t really have it in him to protest, Mara was quick to bind his hands together in front of him. The minor amount of pain from the rope didn’t even register to him, his mind swirling with too much distress to pay it any mind. God, they’d been so close to escape. Buck had warned him repeatedly that it was a trap, that they should’ve been more careful.

Maybe he was too blinded by desperation for the plan to work, or there was never any hope of it working at all. Neither option brought him any comfort.

He snapped out of his thoughts when he felt a tug on his hands, seeing that Mara had tied some extra rope to the cinch between his hands and looped it over what looked like an exposed beam in the ceiling. His stomach dropped as she slowly tugged on it to raise his hands up above his head at an agonizing pace.

“Doesn’t this bring back such good memories?” Mara stepped forward to ask her question right into one of his ears, and Eddie flinched back. It did bring back memories, but not good ones. He started to smell burning flesh, and desperately wished to be unconscious.

Thankfully she left him alone after tying it off, and left enough slack in it he could keep his feet flat on the floor. It wasn’t a comfortable position, but it also wasn’t unbearable.

Well, yet.

Mara then dragged Buck over, and left him untied on the floor just out of Eddie’s reach. She then disappeared upstairs, returning again with more things and an even giddier smile. Axel watched silently, eyes dark.

Mara left her new collection of things in the same pile she’d dropped everything else in, and turned to Axel. Eddie let his eyes wander to what she brought down, tracing shapes until he started to make sense of it in the low light. He felt his gaze get stuck on a large bucket full of water and what looked suspiciously like a car battery, them sitting together on top of a bundle of cables and more rope. It wasn’t hard to guess what was coming, and Eddie hoped the anticipation would be worse than the actual actions this time.

“There'll be no game this time, no way to make this stop.” Axel said from where he was sitting, before then easing himself back up to his feet. He didn't smile, but he reeked of satisfaction. “Endure it as well as you can, and maybe your deaths afterward will be swift.”

Eddie swallowed back his nerves, and shifted uncomfortably. All he could do now was wait for Buck to wake up, and pray for some kind of natural disaster to strike before the impending torture began.

He could no longer see any other way out.

[audioaujom]

May 18th, 5:15 PM: Buck

LS Hub, < prev, next >

Hello hello! I'm back again after another (over a) month delay!!!  This time it was mostly bad timing on me being busy: I'm a volunteer at my local library and had events I was working at, and last week was my ten year anniversary with my long distance partner and we finally got to spend some IRL time together!!!

Now that all that's over, the sun’s back out sometimes, and my schedule is stabilizing, I'm hoping to get back to my regular updates every 2 or 3 weeks to try to have this fic finished by the summer. The winter is a hard time for me, but it's finally over (enough)! Enjoy the update, and thanks so much for your patience!!

Word Count: 1244

--

Shifts without Eddie were the worst, in Buck’s humble opinion. 

That was why, without exception, Buck went right to the hospital every single time he was done with work to check on his friend. Sometimes Bobby or Hen or Chim came with him, but it was usually Buck by himself. To be fair, the others all had other things going on—Athena, Karen, and Maddie respectively—so that left Eddie as his responsibility.

He didn't mind, though. Eddie had been there for him the last time he was in the hospital. He considered this repaying the favor.

Buck yawned a little as he stood in front of the elevator, waiting for it to return to the ground floor so he could head up to Eddie’s room. Just before it dinged, he caught a glimpse of some movement in the corner of his eye and turned to look—spotting a tall blond in a sweater vest that sparked some recognition in his mind.

“Oh, hey.” Buck turned and greeted him, completely missing the elevator doors sliding open. “You're that other FBI agent I ran into last time, with Agent Prentiss, uh… Dr. Reid?”

“Oh, yes, that's me.” Dr. Reid offered him a half-smile and no handshake, same as the previous day. “Prentiss called you Buck.”

“That's my name. Well, nickname. Same difference.” Buck couldn’t help but correct himself repeatedly, chuckling awkwardly. He kicked himself for starting this conversation in the first place, but was far too curious about the progress of the investigation. He just needed to hope that his clumsiness didn’t scare this guy off. “I hate to ask, but what are you doing back here so soon?”

“There's been another victim.” Reid started off, face apologetic. Buck felt a spark of hope in his chest—and it must’ve shown on his face as the agent grimaced and shook his head. “DOA. I'm here to look at the body, just like last time.”

Buck sighed, deflating. Of course all of the other victims had to bleed out before they could be saved. He filed it away and vowed not to tell Eddie even if he asked—his guilt about surviving was already bad enough.

“Not that there is a whole lot we can learn from the bodies at this stage in the investigation, but it's better to be thorough.” Reid continued, and Buck could tell he was trying to be helpful. He appreciated it.

“Have you learned anything from the bodies?”

“Yes! I happened to notice—” Buck blinked as Dr. Reid continued to ramble, a good portion of the fast paced medical jargon flying right over his head. He knew enough from all his first aid training and spending time with Hen and Eddie to at least follow along with most talks, but this guy was on a whole other level. “—which is why all of the victims bled out so quickly.”

Buck may have been profoundly confused by the details, but he understood the gist of what he was saying. “So this guy is a really good shooter.”

“At least professional level.” Reid agreed, not even seeming to notice the blank look in Buck’s eyes during his explanation. “But the really interesting thing is that with his level of proficiency, he could shoot these victims anywhere—including places that would cause them to bleed out faster, like if he fully punctured the aorta. They all bled out incredibly fast, but an injury there can have you bleed out in as little as two minutes.”

“That means the shots to the heart must be symbolic, or something.” Buck mused, before suddenly remembering he was standing in front of a psychological professional and tentatively added on, “Right?”

“That's definitely one theory.” Reid agreed without missing a beat, and Buck felt a huge load lift off of his shoulders. “It also could be about maximizing pain during the time it takes for them to bleed out, since he's choosing not to kill them as quickly as possible.”

“Are they all coding in the ambulance?” Buck blurted out after a moment of silence, mind starting to run a mile a minute. Maybe he should know better than to just start spewing possible theories at the people whose job it is to come in and do exactly this, but he couldn't help it. And the encouraging way Dr. Reid stared at him, head tilted to the side, had him continuing to spill. “Maybe his choice of location could be more about the time it takes to bleed out than the pain thing. If they all bleed out in the ambulance and are DOA at the hospital instead of the scene, couldn't it be the location of their death that’s symbolic?”

Both men stood there in silence for a moment, considering Buck’s theory. To Buck it made perfect sense: shoot them so they wouldn't die immediately, but would still bleed out before reaching the hospital. It was the only conclusion that made sense to him from what the agents had told him so far, during the cognitive interview and now. Maybe it was because he didn't understand all of the specifics of it, but he felt pretty confident. He wanted to be helpful to the FBI, to help them catch this shooter as fast as possible so Eddie—and every single other firefighter in LA—could finally relax.

“That’s… I'd need to check times of death to confirm that.” With a thoughtful hum, Reid started nodding. “If that's the case, it probably means our unsub lost someone who died in a similar way to these firefighters, and that's how he's getting his revenge. Killing them in the same way his loved one died.”

After proclaiming his conclusion aloud, Reid blinked and gave Buck a confused look—as if he finally just realized he wasn't talking to one of his other colleagues and was instead talking to a firefighter he'd only met for the first time maybe 24 hours ago. Buck smiled lopsidedly.

“I watch a lot of documentaries.” He said as if that was any explanation, awkwardly rubbing at the back of his neck. “It's not that I like true crime, it's just… I don't… turn it off… when it comes on.” When Reid didn't immediately have anything to say to his half-assed answer, Buck continued, “And Bobby also told me what you guys said about these victims being representatives from that… profile thing earlier.”

Reid just kind of nodded, the wheels in his head visibly turning. “If the victims bleeding out in the ambulance is what our unsub is going for, it gives us a jump on being able to find his identity.”

Buck reeled back a little, genuinely surprised. “Really?”

“I need to make a call to our technical analyst, have her look for deaths that occurred in the back of ambulances in the last couple years to see if we can get a pool of suspects. But if we’re right… yes.” Pulling his phone out and stepping away towards the morgue, Reid gave Buck one last smile before disappearing as he made his call. “You’ve been very helpful.”

“What an odd way of saying thanks.” Buck commented as he turned to watch Reid walk off, before sighing and going back to what he was doing—only to find himself staring at closed elevator doors. “Oh shit, the elevator!”

More than a little embarrassed, Buck hit the up button to call the elevator, again, and stood there in awkward silence waiting for it to come back down.

[audioaujom]

November 3rd, 9:45 PM: Buck

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Hello hey there folks, guess who’s back!!! As I mentioned in my update yesterday to Lone Survivor, I feel like I’ve finally graduated to real ao3 writer status(!) as my posts here were delayed by the rather serious car crash I got into in mid-January. I'm totally okay—I walked away almost completely unhurt, but my poor car was absolutely totaled ;; that’s what I get for accidentally sliding off the road into a ditch during a snowstorm .-. Between that, my usual depression, and how this has fucked up my job search, life has been crazy. But it's all sorted out for the most part now! Or at least it's sorted out enough for me to be updating again lolol But regardless, here's the next chapter! Enjoy ((:

Word Count: 1127

Chapter TWs: Drugging, Violence

--

“You know, maybe this isn't the best idea.” Buck commented quietly from where he stood behind Eddie, his anxiety really starting to get to him. The two were standing side by side, backs against the edge of the stairs, and waiting for the twins to come back.

“Do you have anything better?” Eddie hissed back, grip on the knife so tight his knuckles had turned white.

Buck’s posture slumped a little. As much as he hated the idea of walking right into the trap Axel had laid out, he didn’t exactly have any other ideas. Except dying, but that was, well, hopefully off the table. “I didn't say that.” 

Eddie glanced back at him, and it was a look full of apology. Buck awkwardly smiled back, but he was far too anxious for it to be completely sincere. He really had a bad feeling about this. It’s not that he didn’t trust Eddie, it’s that this whole thing reeked. They both knew it, but knowing it was a trap and being able to avoid it were two different matters entirely.

He tried not to think too hard about it. He had to stay focused on the plan if they were going to have any chance of success.

When the door at the top of the stairs opened and two sets of footsteps started descending, Buck didn’t feel any relief. However, the sudden spike of adrenaline was finally enough to dull his constantly lingering pain, and allowed him to give his full attention to following Eddie’s instructions.

As expected, Mara hit the landing of the steps first, and Eddie launched himself forward as soon as she did. Buck had to admit he was at least a little entranced by how efficiently Eddie managed to get her to the ground, pinning her down with the stolen knife against her throat.

Now isn't the time to be attracted to him, Buck scolded himself, blinking to clear away the slight fog to his vision.

Eddie looked up at him in a silent signal, so Buck did as he was supposed to do and slid to the floor next to Mara, quickly pulling her machete loose from her sheath. The handle felt odd in his hands—his mind flashing with memories of blood and carnage and fire—but he ignored it and got to his feet as Eddie finished stripping away the rest of her weapons. With him solidly on top of Mara, Buck turned his attention to the steps, where Axel was standing and staring at him with raised eyebrows.

“Don’t… come any closer!” He challenged, machete held out in front of him. Axel was only a few steps away, but the threat didn’t seem to faze him in the slightest.

“Oh good! You do have some fight left.” Axel gave him what looked like his normal careless smile, but there was a delighted, almost manic edge to it. It made Buck’s already overwhelming nerves even worse. “I was worried I'd beaten it all out of you.”

“We’re leaving, Axel.” Eddie said from the floor, voice firm. He left no room for argument, and his grip on the knife got impossibly tighter. “Even if I have to kill both of you to do it.”

“That’s what I wanted to see!” Axel grinned wider, stepping down onto the landing right in front of Buck. “I knew you had it in you!”

“I said don’t come any closer!” Buck tried again, only getting a chuckle in response.

Something was definitely wrong. Buck glanced sideways, not liking how quiet or complacent Mara was being, but quickly tried to refocus on Axel. This man had always acted like he was above everything going on around him, but this felt… different. 

“It was a good plan, truly.” The compliment seemed genuine enough, but that only made it all the more unnerving. Buck refused to break eye contact with Axel, desperate to keep him from ruining their chances of escape. “Not quite what I expected, but pretty close.” 

Buck steeled himself. If he had to use this weapon to protect both himself and Eddie… he had to be ready. His shaking hands started to steady, and he watched Axel as carefully as he could. 

Ready. He was ready. He had to be ready, or—

“Still, I have plenty of contingency plans.” Axel shrugged leisurely, one hand disappearing into one of his pockets. Buck blinked, and in the instant his attention was distracted trying to figure out what his plan was Axel lunged forward with incredible speed.

“Wha— Hey!” Buck’s mental preparation wasn’t for nothing—he still swung the blade in his hands at Axel, but it only sliced open the top of his shoulder and left a small scratch on his neck. Buck braced for intense pain, but only felt something prick against his leg instead of the full frontal assault he was honestly expecting. He glanced down in confusion, watching blood start to run down Axel’s arm—which was holding a small syringe stabbed into his leg, which was clearly the source of his discomfort. 

“Buck!” Eddie nearly jolted to his feet, but had to stay where he was or risk Mara becoming a danger, too. “What did you do?!” 

When Buck tried to look back up at Axel, his head moved a little sluggishly. He blinked, slowly, and noticed that the blood running down Axel's arm wasn’t moving as quickly as it was earlier, either. The feeling instantly registered as familiar, and suddenly he was back in the bar parking lot from two years ago, collapsing to the gravel with Axel standing over him. All hope of escape disappeared in an instant.

Though, in this new second glance he got at Axel, it seemed the wound he’d inflicted was deeper than he thought. He could’ve sworn he saw Axel’s arm shake with the effort of holding it up as more blood spilled out of his split skin, but it could’ve just been the encroaching blurriness from the drugs now pumping through his system.

“You only managed to disarm one of us completely.” Axel said to Eddie nonchalantly, easily taking the machete from Buck even as he struggled to tighten his grip. “And only one of the two of you is capable of murder.”

Buck would've been miffed if that wasn't objectively true, or if his vision wasn't going dark and sliding out of focus. He had other priorities than the slight at his capabilities, like for example feeling completely useless as he felt his consciousness fading.

“Evan!” Eddie called out, but Buck barely heard it as his ears started to fill up with cotton. He hated passing out like this, truly.

Axel’s voice was the last thing Buck heard before he completely blacked out: “See you in the morning.”

[audioaujom]

To the lovely commenter who told me to tag this fic as Buddie to keep it away from "people with taste", I did in fact tag this chapter, the main hub for this fic, and all of the other relevant chapters with "buck x eddie". I'm very careful with my fic tags since not everything I write is Buddie, nor are the fandoms I post for very similar. You removed your comment pretty quickly (or blocked me lmao), but don't worry! I still saw it and will make sure to keep it in mind for the future ((:

If you see something you don't like, don't engage. If you'd like to put your comment back, I'd be happy to block you (probably back) to keep this content far away from your blog. Happy reading!

[audioaujom]

November 3rd, 9:45 PM: Buck

DotL Hub, < prev, next >

Hello hey there folks, guess who’s back!!! As I mentioned in my update yesterday to Lone Survivor, I feel like I’ve finally graduated to real ao3 writer status(!) as my posts here were delayed by the rather serious car crash I got into in mid-January. I'm totally okay—I walked away almost completely unhurt, but my poor car was absolutely totaled ;; that’s what I get for accidentally sliding off the road into a ditch during a snowstorm .-. Between that, my usual depression, and how this has fucked up my job search, life has been crazy. But it's all sorted out for the most part now! Or at least it's sorted out enough for me to be updating again lolol But regardless, here's the next chapter! Enjoy ((:

Word Count: 1127

Chapter TWs: Drugging, Violence

--

“You know, maybe this isn't the best idea.” Buck commented quietly from where he stood behind Eddie, his anxiety really starting to get to him. The two were standing side by side, backs against the edge of the stairs, and waiting for the twins to come back.

“Do you have anything better?” Eddie hissed back, grip on the knife so tight his knuckles had turned white.

Buck’s posture slumped a little. As much as he hated the idea of walking right into the trap Axel had laid out, he didn’t exactly have any other ideas. Except dying, but that was, well, hopefully off the table. “I didn't say that.” 

Eddie glanced back at him, and it was a look full of apology. Buck awkwardly smiled back, but he was far too anxious for it to be completely sincere. He really had a bad feeling about this. It’s not that he didn’t trust Eddie, it’s that this whole thing reeked. They both knew it, but knowing it was a trap and being able to avoid it were two different matters entirely.

He tried not to think too hard about it. He had to stay focused on the plan if they were going to have any chance of success.

When the door at the top of the stairs opened and two sets of footsteps started descending, Buck didn’t feel any relief. However, the sudden spike of adrenaline was finally enough to dull his constantly lingering pain, and allowed him to give his full attention to following Eddie’s instructions.

As expected, Mara hit the landing of the steps first, and Eddie launched himself forward as soon as she did. Buck had to admit he was at least a little entranced by how efficiently Eddie managed to get her to the ground, pinning her down with the stolen knife against her throat.

Now isn't the time to be attracted to him, Buck scolded himself, blinking to clear away the slight fog to his vision.

Eddie looked up at him in a silent signal, so Buck did as he was supposed to do and slid to the floor next to Mara, quickly pulling her machete loose from her sheath. The handle felt odd in his hands—his mind flashing with memories of blood and carnage and fire—but he ignored it and got to his feet as Eddie finished stripping away the rest of her weapons. With him solidly on top of Mara, Buck turned his attention to the steps, where Axel was standing and staring at him with raised eyebrows.

“Don’t… come any closer!” He challenged, machete held out in front of him. Axel was only a few steps away, but the threat didn’t seem to faze him in the slightest.

“Oh good! You do have some fight left.” Axel gave him what looked like his normal careless smile, but there was a delighted, almost manic edge to it. It made Buck’s already overwhelming nerves even worse. “I was worried I'd beaten it all out of you.”

“We’re leaving, Axel.” Eddie said from the floor, voice firm. He left no room for argument, and his grip on the knife got impossibly tighter. “Even if I have to kill both of you to do it.”

“That’s what I wanted to see!” Axel grinned wider, stepping down onto the landing right in front of Buck. “I knew you had it in you!”

“I said don’t come any closer!” Buck tried again, only getting a chuckle in response.

Something was definitely wrong. Buck glanced sideways, not liking how quiet or complacent Mara was being, but quickly tried to refocus on Axel. This man had always acted like he was above everything going on around him, but this felt… different. 

“It was a good plan, truly.” The compliment seemed genuine enough, but that only made it all the more unnerving. Buck refused to break eye contact with Axel, desperate to keep him from ruining their chances of escape. “Not quite what I expected, but pretty close.” 

Buck steeled himself. If he had to use this weapon to protect both himself and Eddie… he had to be ready. His shaking hands started to steady, and he watched Axel as carefully as he could. 

Ready. He was ready. He had to be ready, or—

“Still, I have plenty of contingency plans.” Axel shrugged leisurely, one hand disappearing into one of his pockets. Buck blinked, and in the instant his attention was distracted trying to figure out what his plan was Axel lunged forward with incredible speed.

“Wha— Hey!” Buck’s mental preparation wasn’t for nothing—he still swung the blade in his hands at Axel, but it only sliced open the top of his shoulder and left a small scratch on his neck. Buck braced for intense pain, but only felt something prick against his leg instead of the full frontal assault he was honestly expecting. He glanced down in confusion, watching blood start to run down Axel’s arm—which was holding a small syringe stabbed into his leg, which was clearly the source of his discomfort. 

“Buck!” Eddie nearly jolted to his feet, but had to stay where he was or risk Mara becoming a danger, too. “What did you do?!” 

When Buck tried to look back up at Axel, his head moved a little sluggishly. He blinked, slowly, and noticed that the blood running down Axel's arm wasn’t moving as quickly as it was earlier, either. The feeling instantly registered as familiar, and suddenly he was back in the bar parking lot from two years ago, collapsing to the gravel with Axel standing over him. All hope of escape disappeared in an instant.

Though, in this new second glance he got at Axel, it seemed the wound he’d inflicted was deeper than he thought. He could’ve sworn he saw Axel’s arm shake with the effort of holding it up as more blood spilled out of his split skin, but it could’ve just been the encroaching blurriness from the drugs now pumping through his system.

“You only managed to disarm one of us completely.” Axel said to Eddie nonchalantly, easily taking the machete from Buck even as he struggled to tighten his grip. “And only one of the two of you is capable of murder.”

Buck would've been miffed if that wasn't objectively true, or if his vision wasn't going dark and sliding out of focus. He had other priorities than the slight at his capabilities, like for example feeling completely useless as he felt his consciousness fading.

“Evan!” Eddie called out, but Buck barely heard it as his ears started to fill up with cotton. He hated passing out like this, truly.

Axel’s voice was the last thing Buck heard before he completely blacked out: “See you in the morning.”

[audioaujom]

May 18th, 8:52 AM: BAU

LS Hub, < prev, next >

Hello folks, guess who’s back!!! I feel like I've finally graduated to real ao3 writer status(!) as my updates here were delayed by the rather serious car crash I got into in mid-January. I'm totally okay—I walked away almost completely unhurt, but my poor car was absolutely totaled ;; that’s what I get for accidentally sliding off the road into a ditch during a snowstorm .-. Between that, my usual depression, and how this has fucked up my job search, life has been crazy. But it's all sorted out for the most part now! Or at least it's sorted out enough for me to be updating again lolol But regardless, here's the next chapter!

Word Count: 1224

--

The scene was still in complete chaos when the BAU arrived.

Not that they were expecting anything less—they did show up with the police, after all—but it had been a while since they’d arrived on a scene this quickly.

The 57’s ambulance had already left, but judging by the amount of blood in the street there was a pretty low chance of survival for this victim, same as the rest. The police were running around to try and contain everything, while the remaining firefighters stood around their engine talking. As was usual for LA, the commotion had also attracted quite a crowd of bystanders—most with phones or cameras out to document the carnage. Rossi fought the urge to sneer at them.

“This guy is like a machine.” Morgan commented with a quiet swear as they walked towards the cluster of survivors, all four agents carefully surveying the scene. “There’s no way he currently has a job.”

“Not even flexible hours would give him the ability to be camped out for this many shootings in this many days.” Prentiss agreed, shaking her head. “Maybe he was recently fired, and that was his trigger?”

“Either way, once he finishes his list, he’s going to disappear.” Hotch sighed, not bothering to keep the note of finality out of his voice. “And when he does, we’re never going to be able to find him.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Hotch.” Rossi sarcastically patted him on the shoulder, earning a glare from the unit chief.

It looked like one of the assembled firefighters was injured but not severely, holding her upper arm. Athena had already made her way over to talk to her, the four members of the BAU approaching and catching the tail end of what the two were talking about.

“It’s just a graze.” The firefighter was trying to argue with Athena, despite the blank stare she was getting in return for her attitude. “Barely skimmed me and went right into Jacob’s chest.”

“That’s a lot of blood for just a graze.” Prentiss cut in, Athena gesturing at the agent in a silent but aggressive, “Thank you”.

The firefighter at least had the grace to wince, tightening her grip on the wad of bandages covering her shoulder. “Most of it isn’t mine.” 

“That's not as comforting as you think it is.” Athena shot back, eyes narrowed.

The fighting was interrupted by a new ambulance pulling up, two paramedics jumping out of it and jogging over. Hotch glanced over first, recognizing the number on the side of the vehicle: 118.

“Hen.” Athena greeted the first paramedic, who waved with the hand not holding onto her bag.

“Hey, ‘Thena.” Hen smiled, setting her bag down and starting to pull things out. She turned to the assembled crowd of police and FBI to address them together. “We got her, unless you guys have more questions.”

“Nothing that can't wait until she's been patched up.” Hotch answered, earning a nod from Athena. Hen then directed the other paramedic, who she called Chimney, to start taking care of the injured firefighter. She idly chatted with Athena as the two got started working, them making quick work of stopping her bleeding.

“You guys see stuff like this often?” Chimney suddenly asked, only occasionally glancing at the agents while helping out Hen. “Being with the FBI and all.”

“Sometimes.” Rossi shrugged, mind immediately cycling through all of the worst things he’d ever seen while working with the BAU. This wasn’t by any stretch the worst thing he—or any of the rest of the team—had seen, but it certainly wasn’t a run of the mill case. None of the cases they took ever really were. “But this is an unusually high body count for a short amount of time.”

“This is LA.” Chimney said solemnly, as if that was supposed to answer anything, before helping the firefighter into the back of the 118’s ambulance to rush her off to the nearest hospital.

“What in the world is that supposed to mean?” Morgan asked as soon as the two paramedics were out of earshot, earning shrugs from Rossi and Prentiss.

“He's not wrong.” Hotch commented levelly, silently agreeing with whatever that sentiment was. All three of the other agents stared at him, and then at each other, trying to decipher what was going on.

Letting that hang in the air, Prentiss grabbed Rossi’s attention and started to head out into the street. He caught her drift and moved to stand opposite her, the two placing themselves in approximate positions.

“Where were you all standing?” Prentiss rose her voice to address the remaining firefighters, hoping to start a reconstruction. They needed to figure out where the sniper shot from to see if they could find his nest, which could hopefully tell them something new. And with the injured firefighter having left with the paramedics, the rest of her colleagues were the best place to start.

“Keller was standing a little further to your left, and facing the other way.” One of the firefighters chimed in, directing Prentiss. He then looked over at Rossi and nodded. “Jacob was about where your friend is, there.”

“How much taller is he than me?” Rossi asked, placing one hand above his head and adjusting it as the firefighters all called out to him. Once they seemed certain, he used his other hand to figure out around where the victim’s heart had been, using that to eyeball an angle up into the nearby buildings.

“If Reid were here, he'd tell us the exact angle it was shot from.” Prentiss commented as she tried to follow Rossi’s gaze up, earning a laugh from Morgan.

“Careful.” He warned, voice teasing. “It's starting to sound like you miss him.”

Prentiss glared. “Don’t start with me, Derek.” 

Rossi then led the charge into the most likely building, Hotch dealing with any red tape needed to let them get up into the higher floors. They eventually ended up on the 24th floor, which was under construction, at a window perfectly overlooking the scene. They were sure they were in the right place, though, since they could see two discarded sniper rifle shells, the stand for the gun, some scattered footprints, and an empty bottle of water.

“He left a lot of stuff behind this time.” Prentiss said from her spot in the doorway, none of them wanting to go inside and disrupt the scene before CSU arrived.

“He didn't have time to clean up.” Rossi mused from behind him, the angle good enough they could all see inside. “The police were on scene too quickly.”

“We’ll get some crime scene techs in here to look for prints, but I doubt this guy is amateur enough for that.” Hotch pulled his phone out and made a call, heaving a small sigh. “If he felt safe enough leaving this all behind, even in such a messy state…”

“It's safe to assume he was probably wearing gloves.” Morgan leaned against the far wall across from the doorway, crossing his arms and frowning. “So he prioritized his escape over leaving no evidence behind.”

“Probably figured this wasn't enough to catch him with.” Prentiss agreed, Hotch wandering off to take whatever call he'd made.

Rossi watched Hotch walk away before turning back to the others. “Well, let's hope he was wrong.”

[audioaujom]

November 3rd, 8:00 PM: Athena

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Happy Thursday! I don’t have much to say since I’m on time this week, so just enjoy!

Word Count: 1088

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By the time Athena finished her shift, she was completely exhausted.

She hadn’t slept in almost three days now, and while that wasn’t the most sleep deprived she’d ever been, it was pretty close. The lack of new evidence didn’t help, either, since she spent most of her shift spaced out waiting for news. She planned on working overtime tonight as well, but Elaine had practically thrown her out the door as soon as she was officially off the clock—demanding she go home and get some sleep before she ran herself into the ground.

And honestly, Athena didn’t have the energy to argue.

She hated it, but there wasn't much for her to do. There were already officers running down what few leads they had, and an extra set of hands on that wouldn't be the most helpful. She just had to hope they could find something on Mara’s activities—since the investigation into her had really fallen off after the first year of no leads. If they could find her, they could find Buck and Eddie.

When Athena finally made it home, she found Bobby half-asleep on the couch in their living room. 

As soon as she shut the door he immediately startled awake, rubbing at his eyes as he sat up while badly stifling a yawn. “Oh, hey.” 

“Sorry, didn't mean to wake you.” Athena said softly, feeling bad to see him just as exhausted as she was. This whole situation was really just a bad case of déjà vu.

“I wasn't really sleeping.” Bobby shrugged, giving her a small, half-hearted smile. He then went to grab his phone from the nearby coffee table, checking it and sighing at his lock screen. Athena felt her heart pang.

“Still can't get ahold of Maddie?” She asked as she sat down beside him, comfortingly rubbing his back.

“Nope.” Bobby put his head forward into his hands, heaving a heavy sigh. “Chim answered my call earlier, but I guess Hen had already told him.”

Athena smiled a little. She'd hoped that Hen would get to Chimney first, just so that way Bobby had one less terrible, awful phone call to make. Not that it was good that news had to be delivered at all, of course, but she still counted this as a victory. 

She made sure she wasn't smiling when Bobby turned his head to look at her, giving him a gentle nod. “I assume he didn't take the news well?” 

“He's already got so much going on.” Bobby’s voice started to come out a little watery, so Athena pulled him into a full hug. “I feel like we’re just here piling on.”

“I'm sure they'd both rather know now than just be filled in after the fact.” Athena reasoned, but she knew it was a hard sentiment to feel—she herself wasn’t completely certain of it. But she’d had to deliver plenty of bad news in her time as a cop, so she handled conversations like this much better than he did. “But that doesn't make this news any easier to deliver.”

After a long moment of Bobby sniffing back tears, he pulled away from Athena. He gave her a wobbly smile, and opened his mouth to say something—only for his phone to start buzzing from next to him on the couch.

He quickly fumbled to answer the call, expression seizing with dread. That was all Athena needed to see to know that Maddie had finally called him back.

“Maddie, hey.” Bobby awkwardly coughed to clear his throat, putting the call on speaker and setting it down on the table. “You've got me and Athena.”

“Is everything okay?” Maddie immediately asked. “Your voicemail sounded serious.” 

Even through the crackle of the call she sounded stressed and exhausted, and Athena and Bobby shared a worried look. Her postpartum had been… awful, to say the least. Athena understood much deeper in her soul than she’d ever say aloud, and that caused her to worry about Maddie an insane amount since she up and left LA. She didn’t sound much better than when she’d left, which wasn’t good, either.

“Sorry I… haven't been the most reachable.”

“It's alright, we understand you're going though a lot right now.” Bobby acknowledged tentatively. "Unfortunately, I'm calling with bad news.”

“...it's about Evan, isn't it?” Maddie’s voice was barely audible through the speakers, her tone suggesting she already knew the answer.

“Yeah, it is.”

Maddie was silent for a long moment, before she sniffed loudly and asked, “Is he…?”

“No, well… actually, we don't know.” Bobby started, his voice choking off as the uncertainty of the situation hit him again at full force. Athena pulled him back into the hug.

“What?” Neither Athena nor Bobby could blame Maddie for the way she exploded, barely able to control her voice enough to keep from yelling. “What do you mean you don't know?”

“On Monday, the 118 was responding to a prison riot. The inmates had set some fires that needed to be put out.” Athena took over speaking, letting Bobby just silently sit in her lap. “A couple inmates used this as cover to escape, and they took both your brother and Eddie hostage in the ambulance.”

“On Monday?” Maddie started, clearly unable to decide whether to be more panicked or furious. “Why am I only hearing about this now?”

“You weren’t exactly easy to get ahold of.” Athena didn’t say it to sound judgemental—since she knew the situation, but she winced at how bitter her voice came out. “But one of the two inmates who escaped was Axel Calvert. He disappeared along with Buck and Eddie that evening, and we haven’t been able to find them since.”

“I'll— oh my god, I'll be back in LA as soon as I can!” Maddie finally settled on being frantic, her words coming out in a hurried rush.

“No, Maddie, it's okay.” Bobby said quietly, Athena starting to rub at his back again as he did.

“We’ll keep you updated on the situation.” Athena tried to soothe both of them, though she could feel the tension settling in the air. “You being physically present here won't change anything.”

“I can't just sit around here and do nothing!” Maddie hung up before either of them could say anything else, the call beeping and then going quiet.

Bobby pulled a few inches out of the hug—just enough to make eye contact with his wife. “That went about as well as could be expected.”

Athena just shrugged. “Headstrong runs in the family.”