#demigodverse

[aimmyarrowshigh]

MLMay 2024: 100 Slash Drabbles

023. Unreal - Percy Jackson/Carter Kane (Demigodverse/Riordanverse)

[a-vampire]

"I look ridiculous."

Mikey is frowning. Caleb pauses, leaving a splotch of unpainted skin on his face.

"You can't even see yourself yet," he tells him after a moment, continuing to gently sponge white paint onto his face. "You look fine."

"No, I can feel it. I look like a... like a costume contest try hard. Going all out. 'Look at me, I'm a priest!'" His tone takes on a resigned air. "They'll figure me out, Caleb."

He finishes the paint and steps back to study his work. They might figure him out, he has to admit. But not because he doesn't look real, but...

He looks almost exactly like his father.

Caleb looks at him and can see Death. Can see years, decades, centuries from now when it's him ushering the souls into the City of Ash. Unchanging. Eternal. Inevitable.

But he doesn't need Knowledge to tell him that this is something Mikey would never want to hear.

"I can wash it off," he says solemnly, "and paint leaves on instead. You can be a nature priest. I'm sure Delilah's kin will welcome--"

He ducks the sponge thrown at his head with a laugh.

[a-vampire]

"We won't have to worry about M anymore."

The finality of the statement gave him pause. He looked up, hands stilled on the buttons of his shirt.

Delilah didn't look at him. She just kept cleaning her shining knife with methodical swipes.

"You didn't," he said, mouth dry. "Del, tell me you didn't."

She stayed silent.

He surged up, ignoring the way his vision whited at the edges. "Del, you--"

"So what if I did?" She looked up at him finally, eyes rimmed with red. "You knew what he meant, Caleb! His very presence was killing you!"

"So you killed him? He was our friend and you just--"

"And I would do it again! A thousand times over!" She was standing now. A breeze stirred the trees. "For the world! For you!"

He looked at her for a few moments, really looked at her as his own hands trembled. He turned. "I'm burying him. He deserves rites. Even if we can't afford the pyre he deserves."

"Caleb, you can't--"

"I'm healed enough. Let me."

He strode off. Delilah did not follow him.

When he arrived in the clearing he knew his friend had bled out in, he found a patch of dead grass and no body to be found.

[a-vampire]

"Oh," he said, blood in his mouth, "it's you."

Maybe there were better things to say when faced with the god of death (and your father). None were coming to mind, though - and it was a very real possibility that he was hallucinating this.

Blood loss is a bitch.

The god in the black shroud said nothing. There was a familiarity in his face, close as it was to the one he looked at in the mirror.

He wasn't sure what it was-- maybe his arrived demise-- but the bitterness of the blood in his mouth was quite suddenly nothing in comparison to his own.

"You know what? Fine. Sure. I go almost two decades without knowing who my father is only for him to show up quite literally on my deathbed." He glared. It was hard to do anything more. "Maybe I would have liked to have met you before this, you know? Maybe I would have liked to hear it from you.

"I didn't believe them when they told me, you know. I thought my real dad was dead. I guess I wasn't far off. But seriously. All these years and you did nothing? Were you hoping I would die earlier than I did? You're a shit ass father."

He laid his head back down, staring at the sky. "So go ahead. Take me off to your realm or whatever. I don't care."

There was a silence. He almost wanted to look again, see how his words were being processed. Hell, maybe he just decided to leave.

There came a voice, quiet as the grave. "You're just like your mother."

And then he could breathe again.

[bea-art-blog]

Meant to do this as a warm-up, ended up spending the whole night on it and do not regret

Some of mine and my friends’ lovely OC couples with this lil’ prompt o;

I had so much fun with this omfg

kiibster, msvendingmachine, jingleriot, 4 u friends

[inspirenjional-blog]

"So if Rangiku's mom is Aphrodite..."

"... Does that make us like step-siblings?"