11calls | It's where my demons hide, oh it's where my demons hide.

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It's where my demons hide, oh it's where my demons hide.

In the end it had been Simon. Alex had been aware that Simon was…watching her which sounded a hell of a lot better than stalking her since she’d heard their conversation when she’d recorded her sleep note. What Alex hadn’t realized then is just how much Simon had been protecting her or whatever and how often he’d been around. Sure, joking with Nic about Simon watching was one thing—what else is one supposed to do when you’ve got a dark sense of humor and a creepy bilocating kid with an obsession—but finding out that he’d actually been there and overheard those conversations was another thing entirely.

But in an effort to convince Alex to go to Turkey to meet him and the Horn of Tiamat, he’d come clean. Well, it was as clean as Simon had known how to come given all of his cryptic bullshit but she’d gotten the gist of it nonetheless. Alex had gotten the gist of it, and then she’d tried to hide from it, pulling the blankets over her head for a day and calling in sick and wondering if it could possibly be fucking true. That Strand was a demon and had been the entire time and that she had been friends with a demon, that she’d flirted with a demon, that she’d defended a demon and that Alex had bought into the lies and manipulations of a demon who was using her and her entire show for some untoward purpose that probably was the end of the world.

Honestly it was enough to make anyone take to their beds—even Alex Reagan with all of her bravery.

But it was only for one day, even if Alex did call out of work. Nic was more than happy to give her the time off considering it was Alex asking for it, and calls, texts and emails from Strand went entirely unanswered. The most important thing Alex knew from her investigation was that she needed two things in order to figure this out; to prove it: information and evidence. While Alex may not have been very good at collecting evidence of things (though now she can’t help but to wonder how much Strand and to a lesser extent Simon had sabotaged her efforts toward it) one thing that Alex was excellent at was collecting information and getting people to talk to her. Especially people with whom she’d already had a prior connection too.

Alex didn’t know if it was something in her voice or if it was just a case of it being the right moment but this time when she reached out to Charlie Strand, Charlie did agree to talk to her. Off the record, and Alex didn’t record it but it wasn’t about that. This had gone well past a story to the truth and Charlie told her how when they’d been out looking for Coralee, Strand had changed. It was what Charlie had meant by her not having a father anymore because the man who came back from those woods wasn’t her Dad. There had been moments in Charlie’s childhood where the man masquerading as her father had seemed to come out, but Coralee always managed to fix him. Without her stepmother, there was no hope in turning Richard Strand back into who he had been which was why Charlie was working at the Vatican hoping to find something that would work. So far? She hasn’t.

There was no way for Alex to get in touch with Coralee but there was another person who knew him, and Alex called her and begged in a way that she hadn’t when she’d talked to Cheryl before. Richard had moments of weirdness when they were children, but Howard had beaten it out of Richard. That was until Richie had gone looking for the body of Bobby Maimes that he’d seen within his dreams and came back entirely different.

It had taken a week to try and track these things down, and then Alex couldn’t sit on them anymore. She couldn’t keep pacing and waiting and worrying and talking to herself wondering if who she was actually talking to was Simon. In the end, it’s late when Alex drives to Howard’s house in the middle of a rainstorm. Knocking on his door, Alex just holds her breath not sure who—or what—was going to answer the door.

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His fingers squeeze hers because he can see it, and the boy is still alive. Still alive but barely and some part of him wants to make sure he survives so that he can find some sense of peace the same way he had because...

Is this peace? He doesn't know. He relaxes by hairs before opening his black eyes to look at her.

"...So you're suggesting we make them come to us?"

Because he is very confused.

"I'm suggesting you let me go and try and get him out first." A pause and then she just adds softly: "alone." Is Alex bracing for Richard to argue, of course she is but. She also thinks she might be right about it. "They want you way more than they want me, Richard."

Alex just sighs. "I'm not a general, I wasn't supposed to lead any armies, I'm just a pesky reporter who stumbled into all of this. But the one thing I can do is talk. And maybe I can talk whoever this is out of whatever just long enough for Simon to bilocate out."

Every time he thinks about it he wants to say no. To tell her to hang back. Richard wouldn't however. Richard would let Alex at least stand beside him. Hell, she'd be leading him in. And he was Richard.

He was just...redefining himself. Teeth bared (and do they seem a little sharper?) he looks back at the woods.

It's probably her imagination.

He hasn't let go of her hands before he nods mutely, "I'm going to walk with you." He pauses, "Not...physically. But I'll biolocate to where you are if you need help. Or you need me."

A wind rustles through the trees and Richard lowers his head to her shoulder, "I don't want you to get hurt."

"I'll do my best to try not to, Richard. I promise." Which was about the best that Alex could do really, considering who she was. And how reckless she always tended to be especially when it came to things like this. After all, being reckless had lead to him becoming who he was now, and Alex thought that maybe that might have been something that was worthwhile.

But she knows he's worried, and Alex just rests her cheek against his head as she keeps a hold of his hands. "I'll be okay. Really." Alex almost believes it, and she's a little relieved that he's going to be there with her, even if she can't see him. Somehow she thinks that she'd always feel him when he's around though. She doesn't know why, but Alex just does.

Her voice is soft when she asks: "are they still there and waiting?"

"Yes."

He can see them. Simon in the middle of a bloodied circle, beaten and lying on the forest floor. The woman - and it is a woman - has a gun trained on him.

His throat works.

"...I love you."

"I love you, Richard Strand." Alex catches his face and kisses it softly, but it's not a goodbye kiss, because she doesn't believe that this is goodbye. Instead, it's a kiss of seeing him soon, because she's going to get the three of them out of this.

After she kisses him, Alex pulls away and steps out of the car. She tries to straighten everything out, but she'd still not gotten her normal makeup, so the shadows are bright below her eyes, and her clothing wasn't quite herself, even if it was a version of it. But in her ballet flats, Alex steps into another wood. She follows the pull of something that she can't describe and she doesn't even look to her side for him. Nope, no one here but us chickens as Alex steps into the clearing.

"Leave Simon alone." Her voice is authoritative, but because she's Canadian, or just because she's Alex, she adds, "please." At the end of it.

The woman standing over Simon raises a cocky eyebrow, nudging at the body in front of her, "I expected Azazel. Sorry. Richard. You keeping him aside is too funny. Eventually he's going to do something to remind you that he's no longer human and I have to wonder if you'll stand by him then."

She kicks the young man in the circle, "Like this one. He set you up and set...Richard up - all nice and simple. Then Simon fought Crowley."

Her eyes fade to black and her teeth are sharp.

"Alex Alex Alex. Are you going to save him?"

"He already did." Alex said of Richard, and she stepped closer into the circle where the woman kicked Simon. She'd gotten used (well, okay not used to exactly, but it didn't shock her as it would have before) seeing the eyes of someone she was looking at go black, and the sharpness of his teeth reminded her of Richard's in the car.

"Is Simon still in there? My Simon, I mean." Alex asks and doesn't realize that she'd named Simon as hers, but it was just the idea of that it was the one who she knows. "Even if he did set me up, he doesn't deserve this."

When she comes closer, Alex can feel the power radiating off the woman, and how it's a bit different than Richard's felt. "Who are you?"

"Baphomet." She straightened, proud and bright, her hair hanging over her shoulders, "I have shed my human name and I would have served beside my general but it's clear that Tiamat will need a new General. And I will fill the role since ...Richard has forsaken his destiny."

She rolled her eyes and waved it off, "I don't know, Simon? are you in there? Have you killed Crowley?"

Simon groaned, spitting blood across the floor, "You can have him if you'd like. I was hoping to bring Warren and Tiamat your Richard's head on a pike but."

She shrugged, "It's a fifty fifty toss up. He could join us...or he could kill Crowley completely...hmn." she kicked him one more time, "Have you seen what we can do? Have you seen what Richard can do now?"

She laughs than, high and shrill and nasty, "Oh Alex. Oh alex! If you had only seen what we're capable of."

The shadows crawl up the trees, wind picking up to whirl leaves around Simon's body - blowing anything around them back against the trees.

Another archdemon. This was entirely fine. All of it. She's going to be a general in an army of a war that Alex can't possibly win and now she's trying to defend both her Richard and Simon as well. And she's taking the place of one Richard Strand who had given in to the demon so that it didn't hurt her. This was fine.

But Alex Reagan doesn't run from things, or from people. She's not Richard. So she moves towards the woman who is threatening her, and she moves towards the heap that is Simon Reese. "I get it. You're a demon. This is terrible." Alex just kneels down by Simon before the leaves swirl. Bringing one hand up to her face in order to protect her eyes from the wind, Alex is thrown backwards, landing in the dirt and the base of a tree with a soft thud. Just letting out a whimper of pain, Alex scrambles onto her hands and knees looking for Simon.

Simon's eyes are white in his head as he moans. Curling over on his side he pukes and when the wind blows his body is blown back against a tree with a loud crack.

Something seems to change in that. The air shifts around them and Simon shoots a hand out to put it against the dirt trying to stand.

"Alex..."

He gasps out her name, "Alex. Alex help me stand." His throat works, "Please."

Alex's eyes are wide and wild, and she just looks to Simon and then looks back to the woman in the clearing. Baphomet, the demon who apparently the Knights Templar had worshiped. Crowley, another demon and of course Richard himself. This is like something of a nightmare, being surrounded by all of these demons at what's probably the end of the world. This is fine.

Instinct kicks in, propelling Alex forward on shaky legs. It's Simon and he's hurt it's Simon and he probably was to blame for where all of them had ended up at this point. Alex never would have confronted Richard, which never would have led to his confronting Azazel which never would have led to... Well, she knows the rest, it's all still fresh and beating in her mind--a series of two days that also seem unending.

But.

But. Leaving Simon on the ground and running would go against everything who she is as a person, and everything that she stands for. Where Alex hits the tree protests as she slips her arm below his shoulders. His weight is slight, and she can't help but to remember Richard's words about how he was a sick kid who was malnourished. How he probably hadn't been taking care of himself since he'd escaped Three Rivers.

And how he might not even be in there in the first place.

Simon stirs at her touch, tears running down his cheeks as he leans into her touch. The faster she pulls him out the closer she'd see Richard Strand, standing at the edge of the clearing with his shirt rolled up over his forearms and his eyes blackened. His features are pale and he sports his own sets of teeth.

His hands clench.

Get. Behind. Me.

This is basically the last thing that Alex wanted. Worry lines itself into her forehead, swift and sharp and she just tightens her lips together in order to stop the protest that she wants to make. This is a nightmare, all of it, but Alex perhaps for one of the few times, follows what he says without him needing to add the underlying threat against her into it.

The threat against the woman is another thing entirely.

Alex just stares at his sets of teeth before she does move herself and Simon behind Richard. She gently settles Simon down onto the ground before she moves forward to stand only a step behind him. Because Alex Reagan definitely doesn't ever let him deal with things by himself. That's not how she is. Even if the situation is more horrible than they've ever been in before.

Baphomet emerges from the trees, striding forward, mutated, mutilated and smiling that same wide toothy smile. When she speaks it's in an ancient language that makes Richard snarl.

"Speak normally." He drops his hands, "...It'll make everything easier when I rip out your heart and burn it."

There's a hiss of wind and Richard Strand's hands flex, "You tried to kill the boy."

This wasn't good. God, this wasn't good and Alex knows it as she watches this, feeling like an audience member versus someone who has a place in the story. It's hard for her breathe almost, and she just tucks her hair behind her ear as if she was preparing for a fight as well.

If nothing else it made her feel a little better.

"Why did you try to kill Simon?" Her voice is hard but she lends it to what's going on with them, because Alex is here and she's not going to be going anywhere.

"Simon was supposed to facilitate the rise of our general." Baphomet's voice is rough, earthy and wild while Richard's is airy, vast and echoing, "Instead he failed and Richard destroyed Azazel."

Baphomet snarled, looking genuinely hurt, "I have the satisfaction that they killed each other. That this thing is nothing but some new abomination masquerading as your beloved Doctor Strand."

Simon moans and Baphomet raises a hand, "Do you think that Richard won't feel the same sense of disgust at him?"

Richard for his part raises a hand and the wind rises back and shoves at her. The trees visibly bend and Baphomet laughs, "You pathetic guard dog. Can you base your whole identity on her?"

Simon's eyes open and stare sightlessly with Baphomet shaking her head, "Pathetic. You aren't strong enough Simon. You'll never be strong enough. Give in. Give in to Crowley..."

"Simon." Alex says softly, and she kneels by him, reaching out and taking his hand. "Simon." It comes again and she tries to talk over what the demon is saying to him, what the demon is trying to do to him.

"You've been fighting this all your life. You are strong. You can do this. You can beat him." She keeps her voice quiet and sure, letting all of the normal Alex Reagan confidence slide into it. She's not going to let him give into this without a fight. Alex trusts that Richard will keep her safe from this woman, she trust that he loves her enough for that.

And if she didn't love him in return, Alex wouldn't trust this new Richard.

"Sunsets, Simon. You just want sunsets. You're not going to be able to have them if you let him win."

"I'm sorry."

Simon's voice is soft and small as he grasps at Alex, "I'm sorry. He made me. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. He made me do it."

He grips at Alex's hands and arms and there is a roar from behind her as the wind pushes again. Richard and Baphomet are trading blows, wind and electricity before she leaps at him and Richard throws himself back.

Simon grips Alex in a death grim, "Alex. Be careful...around him. He's still. Not human."

His eyes fill with tears.

"I'm sorry I did that to you both."

"No Simon. Don't." Alex's eyes fill with tears, and she just holds him back as he grips her. This doesn't seem possible. Simon was the one who flitted in and out of the story, bringing confusion and unknowing into his wake, but he was also the one who had told her the truth about things even when Richard didn't. Especially when Richard didn't.

And now he was again.

"He's not going to hurt me, Simon." Alex sounds entirely convinced, and she just looks into his face again. "But you can't do this. You can't say goodbye. You've got to make it to the end and sunsets. Please Simon, don't make it goodbye like this." Alex has his blood all over her, the world and the wind behind her is cracking open practically as they fight.

And Alex's heart is breaking for the man who had been a boy and who never had a chance at anything close to a normal life. "Please Simon."

"I...don't-"

There's a scream - a female scream and the sound of branches cracking.

Simon winces, "...Tell my mom." He grimaces, "Tell my mom and dad I love them." He coughs - and blood spurts over his lips and cheeks and chin.

Then he looks upward.

Richard Strand stands over them both covered in blood. His suit shirt is effectively ruined, tie askew, but his eyes are human and his teeth are human and he looks heartbroken.

"...I'm sorry."

Simon spits, "...I really am sorry Doctor St...Strand." Richard kneels on the opposite side of Alex, "...I-"

"Don't say anything Simon." Richard's voice is thick with emotion, "It's not your fault. He takes one of the boy's hands as Simon turns his gaze back to Alex, crying.

"...Please don't leave."

Edited 2020-07-30 18:51 (UTC)

Alex's eyes flash to Richard's, and all of the hurt is easily viewed there, echoing out through her dark eyes as she does so, before her gaze is shifted back to Simon. Him calling out for his parents hurts, because they were the ones who had done this to him in the first place and now here he was dying because he'd lost the battle with the duality of his nature.

Simon was dying.

Simon Reese was dying. And her and Richard were there with him, and Alex's tears dripped down over him as her lower lip trembled.

"Simon. Don't go. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't make it stop. I'm sorry I couldn't save you like you thought I would."

"I'm scared."

The child who never got to be a child sniffs, "I'm so scared. I'm so scared that for all the things I've done I won't know peace." His chest hitches, "Because-"

"Don't say that." Richard's voice cuts in, "Don't say it. I promise you. You'll have sunsets." Impulsively he reaches out to the boy's cheek before pulling away and gritting his teeth.

He pulls away leaving Alex and Simon alone.

Simon squeezes Alex's fingers looking between them before focusing again on Alex and curling towards her.

He coughs once, twice.

His grip weakens.

A third cough.

"...Oh." his grip tightens suddenly. Oh.

Alex just looks to Richard for a moment when he leaves her alone, and she just swallows before she looks back down at Simon. There's no point in trying to stop herself from weeping openly as his hand weakens on hers, and she just leans forward, touching her forehead to his own as she does so.

"Simon. What does that mean?" Alex doesn't know, and it makes her even more concerned for him than she was before. Because she wants there to be a heaven where he can go, considering that this wasn't his fault. That he didn't deserve this.

That no child did.

"God, Simon I'm so sorry."

He gestures. A hand that points and than drops, "...Alex. the sun."

It's starting to go below the horizon and Simon gasps, "...The sun. The..."

His mind is running through itself, through his life, through Crowley, through everything that's happened as he smiles at her, "The sun. It's...ah-!"

His eyes glaze over, his chest stops moving and he lies there, frozen and still, with a hint of a smile on his face.

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