the blow snapped angel's head sideways with a crack that echoed through the alley, the familiar taste of copper filling his mouth. the next was enough to have him dropping to the floor with a laugh, a bright, breathless, ugly little thing.
❛ that all you got? ❜ he drawled, his lower set of arms propping him up off the floor as the top pair spread, an open invitation. ❛ i've had john's hit me with their dicks harder than that. ❜
he barely had the time to close his mouth before the first kick drove into his ribs. then another, and another, steel toed boots finding the flesh of his torso with merciless precision, each impact having his body fold tighter in instinct against himself.
each strike was a cruel little absolution, a language he knew by heart, one his body answered before his mind could as pain blossomed beneath his skin in hot, vivid bursts. somewhere beneath the ache, beneath the bruises already raising beneath pale fur, something ugly unfurled inside him. relief. sweet, poisonous relief. pain he hadn't earned from his own hands.
he couldn't do it himself. every time he'd tried to turn that violence inward, something had stopped him: a voice so quiet he couldn't make it out who it belonged to. sometimes it felt like came wrapped in warmth that had no business existing in hell. a belief so painfully unwavering that, for a heartbeat, he could almost imagine he deserved it. other times it exploded into his thoughts in a burst of loud laughter and the sharp scent of gunpowder. and the other times....it felt like the quiet weight of another soul sitting beside him in comfortable silence. of the steady, grounding presence of someone who didn't try to fix him, didn't pretend the hurt wasn't there, but stayed anyway.
no matter which one, they were always enough to make him pause, from comfort of their voice or from the guilt that settled like barbed wire around his ribs. either way, he'd learnt that picking fights outside of his job, outside of the studio, outside of val was just easier. cleaner. he could pretend he wasn't asking for it, pretend this was just Angel Dust being insufferable.
and whatever happened, he knew he deserved it.
❛ harder daddy ❜ the words came out in a pained gasp, lips spreading into a wide grin as the sinner above him raised their hand in a fist once more.
