Your Heart’s Desire
a very late submission to @tmntflashfic‘s valentine’s day prompt thing, since it got insanely long, and has to be broken up into parts. I’ll post the next part within a few days.
Master Post of Chapters.
Summary:
In which Casey makes a lot of bad decisions, buys more groceries than he wants to, deals with his own mistakes, makes a bad drunk decision, almost dies more than once, falls in love, and summons a demon.
Not in that order.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chapter One.
Casey heard his alarm sound, and he rolled over to slap the snooze. However, his had made contact with something… not plastic.
Casey grumbled, refusing to open his eyes yet. Too early, it was way too early… too much hangover, not enough sleep…
He slapped the thing again, trying to find his alarm clock.
“Quit it before I bite your hand off,” Someone growled.
Casey’s eyes snapped open, and he yanked his hand away so fast it smacked the wall behind him. Tangling his legs in his sheets as he did, he scrambled into sitting position.
There was someone in his room. Sitting by his bed. A pair of acidic green eyes glared back at him, standing out against the man’s darker skin.
“Wha- what the hell’re you doing in my house?!” Casey yelped.
The man glared harder, sneering at Casey. “You’re the one who brought me here!”
Casey frantically tried to recall if he’d brought a dude home with him last night, and failed.
“Shit- did I really?” He said, wincing apologetically. “God, I was so smashed last night, I can’t remember anything.”
The man gave him a look of disbelief. “Wha- seriously?! You can’t remember anything?”
Casey shook his head, again wincing, this time from the budding headache there. “Not a thing. It’s all blurry and blacked out. Dude, I’m so sorry, you weren’t waiting too long for me right? You should’ve just woken me up.”
The man stared at Casey, mouth gaping, and hey those were some real sharp incisors right there-
“Oh fuck,” The man said, putting his face in his hands. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Hhhhh…. I should have listened to Leo about accepting summons like that…”
“Summons? Heh, you’re not some kind of ‘call guy’ or something, right? I mean… no way I was that drunk…” Casey trailed off, staring at something lashing across the floor.
Was that…? No not a snake, it had a bunch of fluff on the end, and was attached… to…
Oh.
“TAIL!” Casey shouted, pointing at the thing on the floor. He took a closer look at the man’s head, Casey’s own head finally cleared of all cobwebs, and- “HORNS!”
The man took his hands away from his face, and gave Casey a deeply annoyed look. “What did you expect, idiot? I’m a demon for crying out loud! You knew that.”
To further prove his point- the man’s skin darkened with scales, and his green irises filled his whole sclera. A long forked tongue slithered out of his mouth and the man- the demon, hissed at Casey.
Casey let out a strangled laugh, and then screamed.
Somewhere between flying out of bed, knocking over his sketchbook stack by the door, his baseball bat collection also beside the door, and slipping on a salt pentagram-thingy on his living room floor- where the fuck did his carpet go- Casey managed to calm down a bit.
He tried to assess the situation.
There was a huge ass, old ass book bigger than his chest on the coffee table. That probably explained the salt on the floor, if the candles surrounding the book and the diagrams inside were anything to go by.
The demon-man-person had not disappeared yet. This was still not a dream. He was still looking at Casey like he was an idiot and/or was regretting ever setting foot in Casey’s tiny shithole apartment.
Casey still couldn’t find his carpet. Where the ever living fuck did he put his carpet.
Casey scratched his head a bunch, did ten loops around the whole of his living room/kitchen area, checked ten times if the demon-person-dude was still there, and managed to calm down.
Just enough to sit the guy-demon-whatever down on the couch, and try to sort things out.
“So let me get this straight,” Casey said, standing in front of his couch and guest. “I summoned you, and you’re a demon, aaaaaaand I accidentally made a contract with you?”
“You can’t make contracts on accident, but somehow, I think you managed,” The demon guy drawled, slouching on Casey’s couch. His tail- holy fuck- was still lashing back and forth in annoyance, the fluffy tip of it disturbing the scattered salt on the floor. He glared at Casey, showing a bit of fang as he sneered. “Congrats, you managed to fuck up like no one else ever has.”
Had it been anyone else saying that to him, Casey would have snapped back at them, but the inhuman nature of his house guest gave him pause.
A lot of the guy was very human like, but his less than human bits gave him away. Badly so.
The tail for starters. Longer than the guy’s legs, and fairly thick. It was dark enough that Casey couldn’t see were the fluffy bits started, and the scales ended. And the horns. God damn the horns.
Set on either side of his head, with a spiky dark hair sticking up in between, the two black horns stood out prominently. Tips aimed at the ceiling, and a slight curve against the skull. They sort of looked like goat’s horns, but with smoother ridges. A few inches tall each.
The scales were gone again, receded… wherever they’d gone/come from, but Casey thought he could see a hint of them around the corners of the demon’s eyes.
Wow those were some green eyes.
“You’re staring,” The demon guy growled.
“Can you blame me?” Casey quipped automatically.
The demon sneered again.
Nice teeth too. Sharp.
How far into shock was he, by this point?
Pretty far.
“So like,” Casey coughed awkwardly. “Do you know what happened to my carpet, man? I kind of liked it.”
“You threw it off the balcony,” The demon replied, jerking his thumb at Casey tiny excuse for a balcony. “Right after you summoned me. You had to make some room, so you tossed out ‘the least breakable thing’. Your words not mine.”
Casey opened his mouth, closed it, and ran to open his sliding doors.
He looked over the wrought metal railing of the balcony, and- “-aw FUCK!”
He’d thrown his carpet outside alright. Right onto the communal trash bins area below. It also looked like it’d rained last night, since there were huge puddles all over the place.
Fuck.
Casey put his hands to the sides of his face. “Fuuuuuuuuuuck, man. I’m never gonna get the smell out of it now!”
“If that’d been your desire when you summoned me, I could fix it easy.”
“What?” Casey turned around, looking at his guest. “‘Desire’? What??”
“You summoned me with a desire,” The demon guy said, leaning onto the arm of the couch. “I can’t leave until I fulfill it.”
“Um- what?”
“Desire. It means to want something or someone or whatever. Donnie’s better at the details,” The demon waved his hand dismissively. “Whatever, anyways it means that you had an intention that needed fulfillment when you summoned me, and you wanted me to grant it. You were supposed to tell me what it was when I appeared, but instead, you went off on a rant about how much space I was taking up, tossed your carpet out the window, and then passed out. Not exactly informative.”
“Um.” Casey floundered at the description of ‘desire’. “Yeah. Uh. I don’t remember even summoning you, dude, so I sure as fuck don’t remember why I summoned you.”
“I was starting to get that idea,” The demon said in a deeply annoyed tone.
“Uh- also, why would I toss my carpet outside?” Casey asked, stepping back into the room and shutting the doors behind him. He’d deal with his forsaken floor cover later. “Why would I need extra room? I mean, like, no offense man- but you’re kinda short.”
It was true. When they’d been standing, the demon guy hadn’t even made it to Casey’s nose.
The demon guy bristled- literally, his tail’s end poofed up and everything- and he spat, “Ex-fucking-s’cuse me for being below average demon height! And besides! This isn’t even my real size, asshole. I shrank down for the sake of your stupid mortal ceiling. You’re fucking welcome.”
Casey blinked, vaguely noting he was so far into shock he wasn’t even bothered by the tone of the demon. “Well, how big are you really, then?”
The demon guy smiled for the first time since Casey had woken up. It wasn’t a nice smile.
“Let me to s͠how͡ ̨y͡oư.”͝
Maybe asking had been a bad idea.
The demon on Casey’s couch turned pitched black all over- then into smoke, and the smoke cloud increased in size and swirled through the air like ink, until-
-bad idea bad idea bad idea-
-the smoke solidified into an enormous shape, big enough its back and head brush against Casey’s ceiling, and its tail snaked through his kitchen space.
The demon sort of looks like a dragon, Casey’s hysterical mind supplied, but not quite.
The demon’s horns knocked against the ceiling plaster, and two luminous green eyes stood out against the sheer darkness of his skin.
He smiled, wide and sharp, showing off the rows of long fangs in his mouth.
“̀My͘ r͘eal ̀ńame͘ is̛ ùn̕pron͜o̧u҉nc̡eab̢le in y͝o̷ur̨ l̛an̷guage, ́a͏n͢d͢ ẁoúld͏ ̢pr͡ob̸a͘b͝ly ̴ḿelt yo͜ur mind ̸an̶ywa͝ys,͜ ͠s҉ò-” ̵He grinned wider, vicious and terrifying. “̀-ćall m̷e Ra̵ph͠ąȩl. ̵I̶’̵m the͘ d̨em͏on ̢you̴ ̵sòme͞how͠ mąn̵age̡d͏ to ̵summ̕on̴,͠ ͠a͢nd ̵Ì’m̀ n̶òt ̸góing͡ ̢a̴n͠yw͝h҉er̢e͠ ̛until͢ yo̴u reme͢m̨b҉e̕r wh҉y,̢ ơr-̕” ̨His long tongue snaked out, and he took a step towards Casey. “-̷uńt̴i͘l ýou ̢die.͏ Undeŕs̡t́o͟o͠d?͘”
Casey looked up at the demon’s teeth, then at the huge claws on his hands, and then at the gouges Raphael was leaving in his ceiling.
Hm.
Yup. Such a bad idea.
Casey whirled around, yanked his sliding door back open, and scrambled out of his apartment.
He heard growling behind him, and swore there was hot breath blown on his back as he escaped.
He grabbed the railing of his balcony, got his feet up on it, and jumped over the gap between his and his neighbor’s balcony. Narrowly, he avoided landing on any of the plants there- he did not want to hurt those plants again, not after the scolding he’d gotten last time.
And- oh thank god- she’d left her doors unlocked again.
Casey pulled open the sliding door of his neighbor’s apartment, bursting in and almost tripping over the pile of clothes in the living room. “APRIL! APRIL HELP I HAVE A PROBLEM!”
No answer, so he scrambled through the rest of the apartment- identical to his own excluding the contents- and headed for April’s bedroom.
“APRIL!” He shouted, nearly kicking in her door.
“-jESUS CHRIST- Casey!” April exclaimed, fumbling with the book in her hands and almost dropping it on her face. “What did I say about coming into my apartment without permission?!”
“Yeah hi sorry about that but you have to come with me right now,” Casey said, grabbing April’s arms and trying to pull her out of bed. “I have a problem and it’s kinda huge and wrecking my apartment and I know you hate going anywhere on Sundays but please-”
“Oh for- fine. Just stop yanking on me!” She kicked him lightly in the gut, and untangled the rest of herself from her covers. “I swear- you better not have come in through the balcony again.”
“Uh.”
“Casey.”
A few seconds later, after Casey physically pushed April out of her apartment - “No we don’t have time to get dressed, this is an emergency!”- they ended up in front of his apartment’s shut door.
April, arms crossed in front of her faded sleep shirt, glared up at Casey in all her bushy Sunday morning glory. “If this is some animal you brought home while you were drunk last night-”
“It’s not a dog! I learned my lesson with that one,” Casey defended. “This is- uh, well, I’m not really sure what to call it. It’s a problem, that I know for sure.”
April glared at him, and blew her mussed bangs away from her eyes. “Alright, show me this ‘problem’ of yours. I want to get back to my novel sometime today.”
Casey jerked a nod, and reached out to turn his doorknob.
It was locked.
“It’s, uh, It’s locked,” He said.
“You forgot your keys-”
“I forgot my keys.”
“Casey.”
“I- just give me a moment,” He put his ear to the door, listening for the demon guy. There was a sound that suspiciously sounded like his CD collection being knocked over. Casey rapped on the door. “Hey- hey Raphael? I’m sort of locked out. Could you open the door?”
Did demons even know how to do that?
Wait was he even going to let Casey back inside? He had sort of literally run out on him-
The door’s deadbolt and handle clicked, and the door opened slightly.
“You brought a guy home last night? That’s your big problem?” April asked, giving him a look. “Casey, usually that’s the opposite of a problem.”
“Uh, you’ll understand it if you see it,” Casey gestured at the door. “I can’t really explain it properly in words.”
April rolled her eyes. “And yet, half of your major is in literature, which is literally describing things with words.”
“Just take a look already.”
Casey’s brain caught up with him right then, as April reached out to fully open the door, and he realized there was a chance this was just going to get them both killed.
Uh, whoops-
April opened the door, and the same time as she saw it, Casey also saw-
The whole of Raphael's mass, still crammed into the tight space of Casey’s living room. Raphael’s teeth were still bared, and he was facing the doorway.
The demon let out a rolling snarl at them both, and April slammed the door shut.
“What- what the fuck is that, Casey?!” April hissed, putting her back to the door as though it would keep the huge demon inside it contained. “What the actual. fuck.”
“I might’ve summoned a demon,” Casey said. “Mostly on accident.”
“How- how do you even manage that?!”
“I have no idea. I sort of was too drunk to remember.”
“CASEY.”
Raphael didn’t end up eating them. Or killing them either. He just huffed in their faces when they’d been brave enough to open the door again, blowing hot smelly demon breath and everywhere, and changed back into his mostly human form.
“You’re both terrible hosts,” He’d said tetchily. “The humans a few centuries ago would have been groveling on the ground for my favor. You haven’t even offered me food and drink yet.”
April had turned very pale by that point, and said very quietly, “He has a tail. And horns.”
Raphael had rolled his eyes at them both, and demanded Casey remember what he’d summoned the demon for, so he could “Get the hell back to hell and be done with this shit-show.”
Casey, naturally, had questioned what hell was like.
Raphael had responded, “It’s a figure of speech where I come from. ‘Hell’ isn’t that singular. There’s a lot of them out there. You humans are just too stupid to perceive them.”
April, at that point, had gone inside and helped herself to Casey’s stash of energy drinks. Chugging a full can before she did, she then proceeded to rant at Casey for irresponsible (drunk) decisions, his choice in parties, getting her up on a Sunday of all days, always dragging her into nonsensical misadventures and making it her problems too, and the state of his house.
Also that he’d brought an actual flipping demon onto their plain of existence, but it’d seemed like she was trying to focus on normal things for the sake of her composure.
Raphael had watched, and smirked, the whole time April ranted at Casey. Prick.
After she’d calmed down, April had pushed her hair out of her face, and asked Raphael if he was planning on razing their apartment complex to the ground at all that day.
“I don’t have much interest in that sort of thing,” Raphael had said, studying his longer than safe nails. “That’s more my brother’s area.”
“Good enough for me. Don’t eat him, he still owes me fifty bucks,” April had said, handing the empty drink can to Casey and patting him on the shoulder. “Good luck with this one, Casey. I have no advice to offer, and I promise I’ll check in later to see if you’re still alive. Excuse me though, I have to go rearrange my understanding of mythos and legend and possibly question my whole reality for a bit. Bye.”
And then she’d left, slamming the door behind her, and leaving Casey with an amused demon in his kitchen, eating the last of his already wimpy fruit bowl.
That’d been a few hours ago, and now Casey was sitting on his carpet-less floor with his eyes closed and a throbbing headache.
Hangovers were a real hassle unless you gave them time to ease off. Raphael hadn’t given Casey that time.
Slave driver.
“You’re not thinking about the right things, again,” Raphael chastised.
“Fuck off,” Casey snapped, opening his eyes and glaring at the lounging demon on his couch. “I’ve been at this for hours, man. It ain’t comin’ no matter how many times I try.”
Raphael’s tail lashed out, knocking an empty energy drink can at Casey.
Casey caught it, and chucked it to the side. “Look. Dude. I know you’re some kind of interdimensional terror-thingy-whatever, but I’m hungry as fuck and have grocery shopping to do. Can we give it a rest for at least a few hours?”
Raphael turned another page of the thick book that had summoned him. “I want to go home. Keep at it.”
“Dude.”
Raphael ignored him.
“Bro.”
Raphael turned another page of the huge book.
“Pal. Compadre. Brosif. Duderino. Bruv. Dude-”
“What?” Raphael finally snapped.
“You already ate, like, everything in my kitchen, and I haven’t eaten anything today,” Casey said, gesturing sharply at his dilapidated kitchen, and then at his wounded ceiling and tossed about furniture. “You also made a huge fucking mess of my house, and been a real asshole in general. We’re going shopping for dinner shit, and I’m not gonna do anymore meditating until we do.”
“Big words for a little man,” Raphael growled, curling his lip.
“Look who’s talkin’,” Casey shot back.
He honestly was past caring that Raphael could triple- quadruple?- in size and squash him flat. Casey was hungry and his head hurt like a bitch. He wanted food, rest, and some time to chill.
If he had to risk getting his neck snapped for that, he was willing to. Besides, it’d been pretty fricking awesome to see a real live demon in his living room; even if said demon was an asshole who tromped on peoples’ CD’s without apology. Not a bad way to go out, honestly.
Raphael stared Casey down, and the narrow green eyed glare only made Casey sweat a little bit.
Another drawn out moment, and Raphael shut his book and stood up to stretch. “I could eat, I guess. I’ll let you get away with that insolence for now, but don’t try your luck again. Also, we’re getting meat. I need a steak to sink my teeth into.”
Casey watched Raphael yawn, flashing sharp canines, and figured that was fair.
He was getting the cheap stuff though.
Casey only realized, about halfway to the store, that the person he was walking with didn’t look exactly human.
Oddly enough, no one said anything about the tail, or the horns, or the teeth, or the general aura of vague terror and anger…
“Can’t they see you?” Casey asked as they entered Safeway.
“Hm? Oh. Nah, I’m mostly invisible to them unless someone in the know points me out,” Raphael shrugged. “That human, April? She could only see me because I wanted her to. Plus you sort of told her to look for something, namely me. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have been seen.”
“Huh, nifty trick,” Casey said, grabbing a basket from the stack.
“I know a lot more impressive ones, but I guess so.”
A woman and her five kids, varying between toddler and teen, passed in front of them, forcing Casey and Raphael to pause.
Casey noticed one of the youngest kids looked at Raphael, and smiled as he pointed at the demon’s tail.
“Mom! Look!”
“Don’t point at strangers!” The child’s mother snapped, tugging her child along with the rest.
Casey chuckled softly. Looked like Raphael’s ability to be invisible wasn’t full proof.
Then, the hair on the back of his neck stood up, as a wave of something flowed over him.
The child’s smile crumpled as he was led away, and he started crying loudly.
Casey turned to look at his companion, and found Raphael sneering at the child while emanating some sort of invisible field. It was making the air around them feel unsettling, and caused goosebumps to spread up Casey’s arms.
“Dude,” Casey said shortly, watching the sobbing kid get dragged off. “Not cool.”
Raphael gave him a look, then rolled his eyes and stopped doing whatever he was doing to cause the field. “What? It’s just some human kid. I have to get my kicks somehow. You’re all lucky I don’t just burn this place down…” He trailed off, wandering away as he did. “Come on. I smell meat this way.”
Casey looked after the sobbing kid, and then after Raphael, and wondered for a moment what he’d gotten himself into.
It took a bit of doing, and fighting about what to buy, and fighting to keep Raphael from messing with any other innocent customers, but eventually they made it the checkout area and Casey only had to buy an extra four packages of raw meat for his guest.
Where the hell the guy was putting it all, actual size being huge or not, was a mystery to Casey.
“I’m not fulfilling your whatever-desire, so I’m not getting any energy,” Raphael explained grudgingly, and only after Casey had pushed him to. “I could eat someone, but… eh, it’s not really my thing. And our contract still stands right now, so whenever we finish it, I’ll have plenty.”
“You, uh, you eat people?” Casey asked.
“Not usually. Gets stuck in my teeth.”
“Mmmmkay… then…” Casey replied, inching a smidge more space from Raphael.
He’d probably need to keep his fridge well stocked, however long this lasted. For the sake of his neighbors.
April sent him a text on the way home, asking if he was still alive, and if she needed to call an exorcist yet.
Casey replied that she was a total flake out, and that he was never coming to her for help ever again.
She’d replied with “thems the breaks”, and a shrugging emoji.
“This is so cool,” Casey whispered to himself, watching Raphael devour a whole package of uncooked meat in one go. He was mostly past the fact that Raphael was a demon, and now more stuck on the fact that Raphael was a demon and holy shit was that ever cool.
Even if he was an asshole.
He wondered if he’d get a chance to sketch the guy before he left. Raphael’s full demon form would make a sickass mid-term painting presentation, if Casey could get the colors and anatomy just right…
Wait, maybe that was why he’d summoned Raphael in the first place. For inspiration.
“Hey Raphael,” Casey said, making the demon at his tiny kitchen table pause in his eating. “Maybe I called you up or down or from whatever for inspiration? I’m a little stuck on some projects right now.”
Raphael’s long forked tongue slithered out, and he licked away a drop of meat juice from his lips. “Maybe. Humans do that a lot with my summonings. Get desperate with their work, turn to higher powers for help, and usually lose their soul in the process. Let’s give it a shot.”
Raphael raised his hand, a glowing circle of runes appearing in front of it as he did.
“Hey wait, what was that about losing my soul-?”
Another magic circle appeared in front of Casey, and-
-it made a bunch of sparks, and disappeared.
Raphael sighed, and slouched in his chair. “Nope. Not what you summoned me for. Try again.”
Casey put his hands on his chest, feeling where the circle had been.
“Okay. That was really fucking cool,” Casey said, glancing up at Raphael. “But seriously. The soul thing. What’s that about?”
“What did you think I got out of this?” Raphael said in a bored tone.
Casey opened his mouth, shut it, and said, “-mmmmmmnot that?”
Raphael gave him a look. “I think humans somehow got even more stupid while I was gone.”
“Man, fuck you,” Casey said. He chose to throw one of the eggs he was holding at Raphael, because fuck him. Raphael caught the thing easily, popped it in his mouth, and ate it with a single crunch.
Casey blinked, and then grinned. “So cool.”
“Just hurry up and remember why you summoned me. I want to go home.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ll get right on that…”
Casey didn’t get right on it. He ate dinner, and went to bed. How he got away with that, he wasn’t sure. It probably had to do with Raphael discovering his television set and DVD collection.
Casey woke up again the next day, rolled over to slap his snooze alarm, and came face to face with Raphael again.
Casey stared at his demon guest for a moment, and then groaned. “Oh god. You’re still here.”
“Yep,” Raphael said, equally grumpy about things.
“Fuuuuuuuuck…”
“Get up and start thinking again. I want to go home.”
“I have school, asshat. That’s the only thinking I’ll be doing today.”
“No, you won’t. You’re going to complete the contract, and send me home.”
“Uuuuh… no?”
They glared at each other.
“I could just eat you and be done with this,” Raphael said, flashing his long canines.
“You said you didn’t like eating people,” Casey replied evenly.
“I’d make an exception for you.”
“I’m not doing the contract thingy today. I’ve got real work to do.”
“You’re going to do it, or you’re going to lose some limbs.”
Casey never claimed to have the best self-preservation instincts, so he picked a fight with the interdimensional demonic being invading his home.
There were words exchanged. Strong words.
Then there were fists exchanged.
Someone punched someone first, and pretty soon, they were tussling around Casey’s apartment spitting curses.
Literally on Raphael’s part, since something red glowing and hot flew by Casey’s ear, and set his countertop on fire.
“MY COUNTER!”
“SEND ME HOME DAMMNIT!”
“MY COUNTER!!”
Raphael waved his hand, and the fire vanished. The counter remained blackened though.
“Okay, so, neat trick,” Casey admitted, lowering his voice from yelling. Then he punched Raphael in the nose. “You’re still a prick.”
April strolled into Casey’s apartment right around then, holding her school bag in one hand and a spritzer bottle in the other. She watched Casey and Raphael grapple at each other with a bored expression. “Casey, we’re going to miss the bus.”
“I’m-” Raphael’s fist socked him in the chest, and Casey let out a stunned “oof”. “-kind of busy at the moment!”
She sighed, raised her spritzer bottle, and shot a few squirts of water at them.
Casey reeled from the cold water, while Raphael straight up yowled.
The liquid had hit Raphael’s bare skin, and started smoking.
One second Casey was being held in a lock by two thick arms, the next he was stumbling to find his balance again, and there was the sound of something thudding against his wall.
Casey pushed his shaggy hair out of his face, and realized Raphael had sunk his clawed hands and feet into the wall and ceiling.
Raphael snarled wordlessly, tail lashing and eye flashing dangerously.
In the back of his head, the image of an irate cat came to Casey’s mind. Also the Exorcist movie.
April spritzed the demon again, and Raphael leapt across the room to get away. He left huge holes in the plaster as he did.
“Go get ready, I’ve got this,” April said calmly, eyeing down the furious demon with her spray bottle at the ready.
“Is that holy water?” Casey guessed.
“Yup. Visited the local church this morning. They’re actually very accommodating for this sort of thing. I stocked up.”
“Huh.”
Raphael curled back his lips, crouching on all fours and partially changed into his full demonic form. The patches of skin where the water had hit were red and angry looking, sort of like the demon himself. He snarled again. “I ̨c̀u̢r͡s҉e̡ ̀your̸ ͝chil҉d͡re͞n͜ ͟t͘o ͡ha̶ve̴ ̀p͢ítíf̕ul an̸d p̡àinf͡ul͢ ͘l̴iv̷es,̢ ͢mo̕rt̷a̡l ̀wòm͏an̶.”̢
“Good thing I’m not having any,” April replied plainly.
Raphael hissed, and April sprayed the floor in front of him threateningly.
“Pants. Now.” She instructed Casey.
Casey listened.
“Thanks again,” He said gratefully as they headed for the bus stop. “I was actually sorta wonderin’ if I’d make it to class today.”
“You’re welcome,” April said loftily.
“And you said you weren’t going to help me out with this.”
“You still owe me fifty bucks, and I expect it before this fiasco is over.”
Casey nodded. Yeah, he could do that at least. “You’re taking this whole ‘demon’ thing really well, you know.”
“Don’t under estimate my ability to give no shit, Casey. It won’t do you any good.”
“Fair point.”
“I still want my money.”
“Yeah, yeah…”
The passed the alley behind their apartment complex, and April pointed into it. “Weren’t you going to do something about your carpet?”
“I gave up and admitted defeat,” Casey sighed. “The smell wouldn’t have come out anyways.”
April patted his shoulder sympathetically, while saying unsympathetically, “You do these things to yourself, Jones.”
“Shut uuuuuup…”
“Yo… Casey?”
“‘Yo’ what?” Casey asked, still intent on the piece he was sketching.
“There’s like, a dude in the tree. He’s glaring at you.”
Casey fumbled his pencil, and spun around to face the window.
There was indeed a dude in the tree, glaring daggers at Casey.
Raphael, like some oversized cat, was perched in the branches of the tree outside the studio. Looked like the burns had cleared up, since he was back to normal.
If you could call a demon that.
“He someone you know?” Casey’s classmate asked, leaning around his easel to stare at Raphael.
Raphael’s tail lashed around, exactly like a cats would, and he bared his teeth at Casey. Apparently Casey’s ordinary classmate couldn’t see the actions, since he didn’t start screaming “monster!” or anything.
Small blessings.
“Nope. Ignore him.” Casey said, getting up and going over to the window. He shut the curtains on Raphael’s pissy expression, and felt exactly zero guilt.
“Yeah okay Case’. He an ex or something?”
“He’s an asshole, that’s what he is.”
“Want me to call campus security?”
Casey thought wistfully about calling the renta-cops on the demon, but shook his head. “Nah. Would go badly for everyone. I’ll deal with him later.”
Namely, it would go badly because there’d probably be blood everywhere, and people very much dead on the ground. Cool as that imagery was in a heavy metal music video or an art piece; it was less cool when it involved real actual people.
Casey would have to settle for stealing April’s spritzer bottle- if she’d let him- and telling Raphael off for bothering him at school.
Raphael dropped out of thin air soon as Casey was alone- somewhere between the arts wing and the science wing, headed to meet April for lunch- and scared the bejeezus out of Casey.
Same message as that morning from the guy, “Send me home, I could devour you, I’m such a big bad demon, blah blah blah…”
Casey responded something along the lines of “Fuck you” and that there were strawberry muffins available in the cafeteria that day, and like ‘hell’ was he missing that. The fact that he used that expression during a conversation with a literal demon wasn’t missed on him, and from Raphael’s expression of quiet fury, it wasn’t missed on him either.
He bought the guy off with a few of those muffins- they were probably the best thing around that was affordable to college students- and managed to get Raphael to leave off until he finished his classes.
When Casey got home, dumping his bag and jacket at the door, he was surprised to find his whole apartment restored to how it’d been, prior to Raphael’s appearance.
“Yooooo… what the heck, dude. How’d you do all this?” Casey asked, observing that all the holes and scorch marks were gone. Even his carpet was back.
“You gave me food,” Raphael said in a grumpy tone. He was finishing off a muffin as he perched on the couch arm. “The food yesterday, and the food today. Equal exchange. I had to do something in return, or it would be Wrong.”
“Wrong how?” Casey asked, vaguely wondering if this demon magic thing would work on some of his old sports equipment.
“Wrong with a capital double-u’, and would’ve given me indigestion,” Raphael licked his lips of crumbs, and Casey watched the action with vague awareness. “Can’t have things being unequal, or it gets unpleasant for me. So yeah, if you’re still worried about the whole ‘in exchange for you immortal soul’ thing, whatever you’re getting out of the contract will be equal in worth. Food was enough to get your apartment back to normal, and souls are worth a heck of a lot more. So hurry up with remembering, and you can have your riches and fame or whatever.”
Casey looked around again at the restored, original shittiness of his apartment, and figured he’d have to ask more about the equal exchange stuff later. “Sure. You want to eat and watch the game first though?”
Raphael seemed to consider the offer, narrowed green eyes, and eventually nodded. “Fine. I get first pick of food though.”
“No you don’t.”
“Yes I do.”
“No you don’t.”
“Yes I do.”
They glared at each other.
“No you don’t.” Casey said again.
“Yes I do.” Raphael said again.
They glared harder.
Casey ended up having to give Raphael first pick anyways, but only so the demon would patch the hole he put in the wall with a fire ball. The hole that went clear into April’s apartment, and brought her exhausted wrath down on both of them.
Casey might not have gotten first degree burns from the water gun like Raphael, when April had upgraded he didn’t know, but it sucked anyways because- “Jesus woman, did you fill it with ice water or something?!”
“Yes.”
“Cold, April, real cold. Literally.”
“Fix my damn wall, Jones. I don’t have time for this.”
“You sure you’re not a demon?”
She sprayed him right in the face for that comment.
The third day went basically the same way.
Casey rolled over, tried to hit the snooze of his alarm clock, and almost lost a finger in the process.
April marched in, same as the morning before, and rescued him from the demon holding him in a chokehold. She threatened death to them both if they made her late for her seminar.
They only just caught the bus, and the look April had given him for that told him exactly how lucky Casey was. Though, he felt someone watching him the whole way to school, and all through his morning seminars.
When he glanced out the second story studio’s windows, he got his answer.
“Who’s the dude in the red tank top?” One of his classmates asked, also staring out the window.
“Oh hey, it’s the guy that was bothering Casey yesterday,” The one who already knew Raphael answered. “Man, I didn’t know you could get fire to work like that.”
Raphael, probably with demonic magic of something equally annoying, had burned “Asshole” in perfect calligraphy onto the campus lawn. It was in big enough font that it could have been seen even from the top levels of the school, and maybe even higher.
Casey opened the window, and leaned out to shout, “WHY DO YOU HAVE NO CHILL?!”
Raphael, standing on the edge of his handiwork, flipped Casey off with both hands.
Casey had yelled wordlessly, and flipped him off back.
“Ha ha… I do not envy you, Casey.”
“Hhhhh… fuck off.”
Raphael cornered Casey again, halfway between buildings, and told him if Casey didn’t remember soon, he was going to start getting angry.
“As opposed to what?” Casey asked, zero shits to give about the demon losing his temper.
“I could burn this whole school down, with everyone inside it,” The demon growled, magic runes appearing in his hands.
“If you do that, I’ll never tell you why I summoned you,” Casey said, because that was the one thing he still had over the demon.
Granted, Raphael could just kill him, but oddly enough the demon hadn’t followed through with the threat quite yet. Maybe souls were just worth that much.
Raphael bristled at Casey’s threat- the short hair between his horns standing up straight and spiky- and the demon spat licks of fire at Casey.
Casey’s eyebrows felt a bit toasty afterwards, but Raphael backed off again.
However, he came home to a ruined apartment that looked like a huge cat had shredded it, a smug partially transformed demon in the middle of the chaos, and spent the next few hours fighting with Raphael to fix it again.
He ended up having to text April to bring her water gun.
Casey took pity of the demon though, after Raphael spent a good hour sulking in the corner while his burns healed, and tried to remember why he’d summoned the demon in the first place.
He consulted google, the huge and stupidly useless book, and his good old method of slapping street hockey balls around in the alley.
Nada. He didn’t remember anything. Even with all the new-age mind tricks he looked up, he couldn’t remember a thing. Drinking blackouts were just too strong for them.
Casey called it a night, and resigned himself to having a demon squatting in his apartment for a bit longer.
The semi-murderous look Raphael gave him, as Casey slunk off the bed, told him that time was running down.
Day four came, time ran down, and Raphael snapped.
At least Casey had made it to his one class that day, even if he’d come home to a furious demon. And even after Casey had started trying to remember again, the guy still snapped.
“It. has been. four DAYS. YOU MISERABLE. FLESHBAG.” Raphael yelled, kicking Casey already severely abused coffee table. “Why can’t you just remember already?!”
“I’m trying!” Casey snapped back. He shut the huge book, which had been zero help so far, and stood up from the couch. “And do you think this is any easier for me? You’re a fucking terrible houseguest, and an enormous wad about literally everything!”
“I wouldn’t be, if you just SEND ME HOME ALREADY,” Raphael shouted. “I don’t care if it’s hard for you, use your stupidly tiny brain to remember why you summoned me, and we can be DONE.”
“Why can’t you just leave if you want to so badly?!” Casey yelled, gesturing sharply. “I don’t want you here either, so feel free to fucking go already!”
“BECAUSE IT’S AGAINST THE RULES!” Raphael yelled back.
“WHAT RULES?!”
“THE RULES THAT GOVERN MY VERY FUCKING EXISTENCE!”
“IGNORE THEM!”
“I CAN’T!”
Casey punched Raphael, right in the nose.
The demon reeled, blinking at the sudden attack. Then he snapped back to awareness, and sent a look of pure murder at Casey.
Casey ignored the look and jabbed again, only for his fist to be caught in Raphael’s grip.
“̨T̷ḩat’͡s it,͟”͏ Raphael growled. He shoved Casey back hard enough he stumbled, and then started to grow.
Raphael doubled in size, black creeping over his brown skin and changing it to mostly scales. His shoes disappeared, and long claws extended from his toes. His tail whipped out, and again knocked over Casey’s CD collection. He looked like he was between being bipedal and quadrupedal; caught between his demon form and human form.
Lastly, as he grabbed Casey by the collar and opened his scarily toothy mouth, a pair of wings popped into existence on his back.
Casey was distracted from his anger for a moment. “Dude, you have wings?”
Raphael visibly stuttered, which looked sort of hilarious on such a scary face. “I- ͡of̵ ̴cour̡s̡è I̡ ̸d̨o! I show͞ed ̡y͟ǫu ̀th͝e̷m ͠t͝he ͟f́i̶r̢s͏t̸ d͝a̷y here͝!҉”̴
“Uh, was it when you got big and ruined my apartment? Because like, I couldn’t see jack except for your fat head.”
Raphael growled, low and rolling, and opened his mouth again.
“͏I͠ ̷CO͜U̸LD ̀D̵E͢V̸O͜U̢R ̵Y͝OU̡,̀ MǪRTÀL͜.”͘ ͏He roared, right in Casey’s face.
Naturally, Casey socked him in the nose.
“Fucking try!” Casey spat.
Raphael reeled from the shot, and he gave Casey a confused and offended look.
“͘Wh̀y͡ a̕r͠en’t̡ ̸ýo̷u̷ şcár͞e͜d̵?̀” Raphael asked, sounding actually confused.
Casey didn’t respond, other than attempting to knee the guy in his gut.
Raphael growled again, and he punched Casey. Hurt like a motherfucker, but he’d had worse.
Someone tripped someone, and they ended up wrestling on the floor. Casey managed to sock Raphael in the face again, feeling his knuckle split on a tooth.
Somewhere along the way, Raphael had reverted to his mostly human form, and Casey got a clear look at the rage in his expression.
The demon’s fist met Casey’s chest, and a whoosh of air left his lungs.
Casey was stunned, but he managed to kick the guy off, and send Raphael skidding across the floor.
Raphael rolled right back onto his feet, and maybe just for spite, knocked Casey’s coffee table into the wall with his tail.
Casey met the guy head on as he charged, and narrowly avoided goring himself on Raphael’s horns.
They tussled back and forth for a long while, knocking over everything they came into contact with. Casey thought he heard some of his dishes hit the floor when Raphael threw him into the cabinets. The kitchen table got thrown to the side as he dodged one of Raphael’s kicks. Someone put long claw gashes in the couch cushions and it definitely wasn’t Casey.
His plants from April, his DVD stacks, his sports equipment, some of his art projects- it all got knocked over and mildly trampled. Casey was too busy punching a demon to care though.
End result of the fight, Casey and Raphael sitting against the couch on the floor. Panting and a bit blood splattered.
Casey’s blood, not Raphael’s. He hadn’t managed to even make a dent in the guy.
Casey swiped his hand under his nose, feeling the hot red fluid smear on his skin. His right hand was a mess of already darkening bruises, and his face stung like hell. Probably would have a black eye soon.
Raphael sighed, and leaned his head back against the couch. His horns stabbed the fabric again, and Casey didn’t even care that a ripping sound followed the motion.
“…well that was pointless,” Casey muttered.
“Fuck you,” Raphael muttered back.
Casey wiped his smarting nose again. The blood was already starting to congeal. “You wanna watch the game?”
“…whatever. Sure.”
Casey reached across the floor, and grabbed the remote from where it’d been tossed. He turned on his boxy old TV, and sat against the couch again.
“You put a hole in my wall again,” Casey commented, thinking about the foot sized hole in his kitchen wall. “And broke my table too.”
“I’ll fix it later,” Raphael grumbled. “I’m tired right now though, so shut up and let me watch your pathetic human sports.”
“Fuck you.”
“Fuck you.”
They watched the rest of the game in silence, excluding Casey blowing blood snot into tissues.
Before he went to bed, Casey traded the rest of his meat products in the fridge for some insta-healing, because as much as he wanted to avoid Raph at that moment, he still needed his hands for schoolwork the next day.
The ache was still there, because not even magic could undo everything, but it was bearable with painkillers. Casey had the good type too, prescription even.
He and Raph exchanged no words as they separated for the night.
The next morning, when Casey rolled over to slap his alarm, he actually did without any issue.
He blinked, trying to remember why that was weird.
Oh yeah, demon in his apartment. Where’d Raphael get to?
He found his not-so-friendly neighborhood demon sitting in the early morning sunshine, legs crossed in a lotus position. With the light shining on him, the spiky ends of Raphael’s hair flashed red, and made his thin horn tips nearly glow.
Casey stopped for a moment, staring at the stark difference between the belligerent, snarling demon he’d been dealing with lately, and the peaceful, collected individual in front of his windows.
Casey leaned on the wall beside his bedroom door, examining his houseguest.
Besides the horns and tail and weird blood-red hair tips, Raphael seemed like a normal-ish guy in that moment.
Huh.
Casey’s fingers itched for his sketchbook and pencils. He kind of wanted to capture the scene.
Raphael turned his head right then, glancing over his broad shoulder. He stared at Casey for a moment, and then said, “Hey. Good morning.”
“Uh, yeah. Good morning,” Casey replied, a little surprised by the sudden lack of hostility.
Raphael turned back to the window, and seemed to be done with the conversation already. Casey raised an eyebrow at the sudden one-eighty.
“What, no ‘send me home already’? No, ‘fear me mortal’? No nothing?” Casey questioned.
“Nope,” Raphael said, not turning around.
“What’s with the sudden attitude change?”
“I did some thinking, and figured what we’ve been doing wasn’t working. So. I’m trying something else.”
“Oh yeah? And what’s that?” Casey asked, genuinely curious.
“Patience,” Raphael said, sounding annoyed by the very idea.
Casey’s laughter burst out of him before he could stop it.
“Oh bugger off,” Raphael grumbled, shooting a look over his shoulder. “It’s only because I’m tired of fixing your stupid apartment.”
“Sure, sure,” Casey chuckled, failing to smother his laughter. “Does this mean I can go to school without you hounding me all day?”
“Today? Yes. But don’t think I’m letting you off the hook for our contract. I’m not leaving until we complete it.”
“Like I didn’t hear you the first eighty times you told me…”
Raphael growled, flashing some teeth. “Just go to your pointlessly expensive mortal education already, and fuck off.”
Casey rolled his eyes. There was the Raphael he knew and hated. “Yeah, whatever. I’m going, I’m going…”
Raphael didn’t bother Casey once the whole time he was getting ready. He even had a chance to make breakfast for the first time in days. By the time April strolled in, using the key he’d given her months back, Casey was actually ready to go.
“Oh. No need for this today, huh?” April asked, lowering the huge water gun she’d been carrying.
Raphael turned around to acknowledge her, and raised an eyebrow at the gun. “Overkill much?”
“What can I say,” April shrugged. “I’m having a little fun with this.”
Casey laughed, and grabbed his current favorite sketchbook off the pile. “I’ll be out in a minute, okay?”
“Right on.”
As April started to leave, Casey caught movement in the corner of his eye, and glanced back just in time to see Raphael bring up a spell circle in his hand.
A circle appeared in front of Casey again, and a flash of light around April told him she had one too. Then, before he could react, it shorted out and disappeared, the same time that April left the apartment.
Casey spun around and looked at Raphael in horror. “Dude! Did you just try to magic April?”
“I was just checking if that was what you desired,” Raphael said, no signs of guilt in his expression.
“I- what??”
“You know. Sexually.” Raphael said, gesturing vaguely. “Isn’t that a thing for most humans? Like, especially between men and women?”
“Not with April!” Casey exclaimed. “I mean. She’s not even in to that sort of thing. And I’m- I don’t like her like that. She’s my friend. Best friend. Nothin’ more.”
“You’re oddly offended by this,” Raphael commented.
“Yeah, well, it’s not cool to try forcing people into shit they don’t want,” Casey said, crossing his arms. “I don’t like it, and I know for sure April doesn’t either. Don’t try that again.”
Raphael looked at Casey a moment longer, and then shrugged. “Alright, nothing involving that type of desire. Got it. Now get going, I’m tired of listening to your voice.”
“It’s my apartment…” Casey reminded under his breath, but he let the subject go. He shut the door behind him, leaving the demon in his apartment alone for the day. His undamaged apartment for the first time in a long while.
It wasn’t a bad feeling, but he sort of missed Raphael’s presence stalking him all through the day. It was weird, but he’d already gotten used to the guy hanging around him.
Casey took the peace and quiet, and put it towards his projects.
By the end of the day, he’d somehow finished a bunch of gesture sketches that looked a lot like a certain individual.
His professor questioned the sudden change of model; since until then, Casey had been sketching female figures. Casey didn’t have much of an explanation for the horns or tail in his drawing, other than he’d been having a weird few days.
His professor seemed to accept that, and complimented the way he’d captured the fluid movements on the paper. Especially the tail.
“I’ve been seeing a lot of them lately,” Casey explained, taking his papers back. “I’ve had a cat hanging out in my apartment the last while.”
“Oh? Is your kitty friendly?”
“Nope. He’s kind of awful.”
“O-oh…”
continued.
