i want to know more about a camping trip w/ devil bois tht you mentioned in the tags!!
well you’re in luck because there are s e v e r a l. however! in the interest of not stepping on other peoples’ canons—because, after all, i’d love best to hear those stories from the agents who were there themselves—the tale i’m about to tell you features our darling boys and our token exorcist.
seraphim is excellent with demonology, but she is absolutely susceptible to the charms of the fae folk—and creatures like them.
she’d been freshly granted the title of ‘senior’ the first time she went camping with xander and jd. it’d been lilith’s idea. between centralia and enoch, seraphim’s promotion hadn’t been entirely positive—more stressful than anything.
“you two are our best outdoorsmen,” lilith said quietly to jd, one quiet fall afternoon. “i think some time out in the wild will do her some good. xander said you were thinking of going out to one of the lakes this weekend? i know this is probably like asking you to take your little sister with you, but—“
but jd grinned. ever good-natured, ever understanding. “don’t worry about it. we ah, heard about what happened the last time she went camping. probably a good idea that she has someone out with her.” spoiler alert: it was Not Good. but that’s another story.
to their credit, everything actually went well for the first chunk of the trip! seraphim’s a little shy when she meets new people, but xander was the one that eventually had her singing along with him, “i’m so fancy, you already know—!” by the time they’d gotten to their reserved site by the edge of cloud lake, it felt like she’d known them for ages, the chill of pennsylvania forgotten for the moment.
the place where they set up camp (“what do i do with this?” “… morgan when’s the last time you put up a tent?” “… uh.” “here, let me have that—“) was a small clearing that jd had found on a hike, near where the mouth of the beargrass river met the lake. if they followed the river farther into the surrounding woods, they’d eventually find a small waterfall, flowing over the lip of a jagged, rocky outcrop.
jd’d—always thought it was a bit strange. the rest of the forest that he’d seen was either flat, or gently rolling. this was the only part of the land that had such an abrupt rise, and fall.
but landscapes were just landscapes and he knew that nature wasn’t exactly one to give a fuck.
jd had only a vague knowledge of centralia, knew that it aged people. but as he watched his boyfriend and seraphim walk along the river underneath the light of a bright afternoon sun—it was like watching the years fall off of her.
and xander, well—
“did you just check out my ass?”
“…”
“honestly, can’t blame you, let’s be honest here, it is pretty fantastic.”
the love of his life, a new friend, and perfect weather.
this was perfect.
“ohhhh my gosh look at the waterfall!” seraphim squealed as they rounded a bend in the trail, grinning broadly. “does it have a name, jd?”
“not one that i’ve ever heard spoken out loud.”
“cryptic answer, all right, i dig it. oh, have you ever been around to the back of it?”
jd frowned, looking towards the falls. had—had there always been a path of stones along the water’s edge, leading towards the cliff? did he just not notice before?
“uh—no. no i haven’t.”
“cool, i’mma go back there.”
“uh, morgan, wait a second—“ but jd was interrupted by xander’s lips on his, his eyes closing to the taste of his mouth. he didn’t see seraphim stepping carefully over each stone, finally disappearing behind the falling white of the water. his entire world filled with xander’s arms around his waist and the smell of his cologne.
“you can let her explore for one second,” xander murmured. jd could hear the smile curving over his words. “i’m a little surprised that she’d be up to heading right back into the unknown, y’know, considering.”
“she’s a senior agent now, xander.”
“i know that, but still.”
jd kissed him one more time before finally glancing over his shoulder. “… hmm.”
“what?”
“i just—i don’t remember there ever being a path like that to the waterfall.” jd shook his head, “i’ve been up here plenty, you’d think i’d remember coming across something like that. and i mean, i’ve brought you up here, too, do you remember seeing that the last time we were here?”
but xander’s eyes were wider than they were a second ago, his face a bit paler. “… like they just appeared when we brought morgan?”
it dawned on jd slowly. “… hey so let’s go back there.”
“yep, yes, please.”
xander led the way over the stones, his eyes cast downward as he went. they looked normal enough. sort of. how many times had he seen rocks cut like commercial garden stones just out and pressed into the dirt like this? they looked worn, old.
like they’d been here the whole time.
and it did get dark as they walked into the back of the falls, the cliff opening up into a kind of corridor into the side of the hill—but it didn’t stay that way. the rush of the water covered the sounds of their footsteps, but as soon as it dimmed, xander spoke.
“—honey?” he blinked, staring down into what looked like the soft glow of neon. “do you smell that?”
“yeah.” jd crinkled his nose, and their pace quickened, because it definitely didn’t smell like moss, or damp, or petrichor, it smelled like—
a bar.
they’d walked into a bar.
the rock of the cavern gave way to something that gleamed like polished marble. the long countertop itself was all black and chrome, lit by several neon signs bolted into the back wall; they all looked like brands of liquor, but none that either of them had ever heard of, or seen before at any of the bars in the city. there was no sound except for the faint sound of the falls, and it felt alien in a distinctly uncomfortable way.
the change was—jarring.
which meant that they didn’t immediately see seraphim sitting on a stool, facing away from them—or the bartender.
“… oh! well you didn’t tell me you brought friends, sweetheart!”
his hair was the same color as the lake water, piled up in tall, thick curls on top of his head. his skin was too pallid, his eyes were too big, too wide, and he was standing wiping a towel inside of glass over and over and over again. his teeth ended in delicate points, as did his ears.
“oh i think the fuck not,” xander muttered. but then seraphim turned around—“ohhhhh boy.”
her pupils were so wide that he couldn’t see any brown anymore. “oh hi guys!” her words weren’t slurred, not exactly, but she definitely didn’t sound sober. “this is my new friend, uh—i’m sorry what did you say your name was again?” she rested her chin on one hand, leaning forward over the counter, and looking desperately in love with the bartender. she had a tall, narrow glass at her elbow filled almost to the top with something frothy and smoky grey.
jd had already begun walking towards her.
“it’s just el, darling, just el. now,” and he had the audacity to pout, reaching out to push the glass further towards her hand, “you promised you’d try my new recipe. please, please, just take a tiny sip—“
“no, no, no, no, no, no,” that finally broke xander out of his mixture of awe and with every step he took, another “no” echoed through the bar. jd had his hands on seraphim’s shoulders and was trying to tug her away, but it wasn’t until on the sixteenth (seventeenth?) “no” when xander took the glass and sent it sliding all the way down to the opposite end of the counter. (“heeeyyyy that was mine!” seraphim whined, but jd yanked her back as she reached for it.)
el didn’t even have the space to argue, because xander knew exactly what he was doing. “fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, you dick, you absolute dick, no, no, fuck you—“
there were a few rules he’d learned in his time with roanoke. one was that with anything you thought was even a little bit fae, you never even gave them the chance to argue with you. you did not shut up. you were as obnoxious as possible. secondly, you absolutely never drank or ate anything they offered you.
and the third he remembered as he saw jd walking backwards towards the entrance, the exorcist stumbling along with him.
never turn your back on them.
not in situations like this.
el watched them leave, pissed off and very, very insistent on telling him off (although his eyes, jd noticed, lingered on seraphim’s face—or at least, he thought they were, it was hard to tell where exactly he was looking due to the lack of pupils). xander didn’t stop talking until he felt the water of the falls hitting the back of his head. “—fuck you, fuck youuuoohhh my god, okay, that was weird, that was super fucking weird, we have to tell lilith this guy is out here, and… oh.” jd had seraphim gently lowered to the ground at the base of a tree, her head lolling forward. “is she—“
“morgan. morgan. hey.” jd lifted up her face with his hands and the relief he felt when he saw her eyes flutter back open—irises back to their normal size—was acute. “oh, thank god—“
she blinked, looking around. “i—what happened? did i pass out or something? what’s wrong with you two? you look like someone walked over your grace.”
xander’s gaze kept flitting between xander’s back and the waterfall, but nobody—and nothing—came out. seraphim followed his eyes. “oh what a pretty waterfall! oh, hey, there’s a path, have you e—“
“NO.”
“i was just asking a question don’t yell at me!”
