Chapter Text
'May August winds blow you in the right direction.'
Part VII.
He felt like fire, but a dying one. He felt like ash and thread-bare desperation. Embers that spit meekly. Smoke that curled, vapors rising into the night air and fraying into the coldest of winds that blew, unforgiving but a little melancholy.
He’s moving slowly, fuzzily, as if under water only he is not, he knows he’s not.
There is a hiss, wet and slippery as something slips just out side his vision.
Something is waiting, and watching.
It feels big, and dark and the warning surge of Wrong Wrong Wrong thunders with every pulse of his heart.
Fire leaps from wide jaws, and familiar claws come down through the air.
The Demon is slender and inhuman, fangs long as his own, dull human fingers and jaw unhinged to reveal the gory mess dripping from it’s jowls. The regal horns jut as the creature rears up, backlit by a heavy, full moon as it’s full wingspan unfurls across the night sky.
He admires the sight, feeling nothing but joy and a fierce thrill that’s intoxicating–but only for a moment.
Then there is nothing to admire, and the Terror returns, rekindling as the creature his mind thinks of as ‘fierce’ and ‘powerful’ but also ‘Safe’, is pounced upon like prey . Like something Weak, only he is not.
Shane–it’s Shane there, the first Demon. He’s not Weak, he’s not prey–
He’s fighting with another that is twice his size, all rageful howls and gnashing teeth as each tries to gain ground on the other. It’s a losing battle for Shane. He fights anyway, stubborn as usual.
Black smoke and fiery blasts puncture, blotting out the stars. It’s like a fire work show gone rouge. It’s like some cataclysmic event that only the dinosaurs had ever seen, like when the meteorites fell. It’s Anger and Glory and Rage and Evil setting upon Evil.
Something pierces into Shane, pinning him up against a wall as the spike juts from his center and he screams, the smell of Death stinking closer and circling.
It’s Horrible.
Its what Ryan dreams of, but it’s not something he’ll remember too well.
Only the bitter taste of ash in the back of his throat, and the warmth he’ll chalk up to sleeping under the wing a Demon.
The next morning dawns and is wholly ignored by both human and demon.
Shane seems most comfortable sleeping on his back, and Ryan supposes that makes sense. If he had two giant webbed fingers on muscled arms jutting from his shoulderblades, he’d prefer his sides or his belly to lay on. And anyway, this position is perfect for Ryan to steal one of those wings, shamelessly curling up under it like it’s a blanket, and grinning when Shane rumbles in his sleep at being manhandled.
Shane never rescues his borrowed wing though. If anything, the few times Ryan rises to get a drink of water or take a leak, he thinks he feels those long red fingers curl briefly when he slips out. Trying to make him stay.
The furnace of heat and power–a core, Ryan has taken to calling it, because Shane had snickered darkly at him when mentioned ‘heart’ so that was clearly a no–kept them warm the whole night and well past the sun’s rise.
So then it’s late afternoon by the time Ryan realizes he either needs to pay for more nights or get the hell out of dodge, and he can’t think of a good reason for staying in this tiny village any longer. Shane’s injuries are entirely gone, and he’s been taken to perching up on the mid century wardrobe that probably has been here since the place was opened in the 70’s. It holds his weight save for a minor creak, and he dozes.
There is however, one slight problem to them walking out the door and climbing into the car. It has to do with the fact Shane looks like a weird cosplayer for a DnD game, and the nearly 11 foot wingspan is only making things worse.
“Just gunna stay up there?” Ryan asks with a tired huff of amusement.
Shane spares him a sideways glance, but doesn’t reply.
“Fine. Keep your secrets.” He waits for the mirth to fill Shane’s eyes at the meme, knows how much Shane enjoys his Lord of the Rings. Hell, with Ryan knowing what he knows now, Shane probably knew Tolkien freakin’ personally. It wouldn’t surprise this Ghost Hunter one iota.
There’s no light of familiarity in his friend’s inhuman, almost pretty gaze. The Demon smirks lazily but doesn’t engage beyond that. He returns to look out the back window into the twilight.
Shane’s silence has become more and more concerning as the days passed.
Ryan initially chalked it up to Shane being exhausted, emotionally and nearly physically.
But last night, when they’d gone to meet the Fairies, Shane still hadn’t uttered much in the way of conversation. Sure, he could get out a passable utterance that resembled English enough for Ryan to understand him–but he was also Shane’s best friend. Their own private sign language was part and parcel to the whole best friend bit, wasn’t it? Shane’s voice was deep and rumbling, like maybe what tectonic plates sound, grinding together. His English comes out short and stilted, catching on his huge mawful of teeth, which are crammed in his mouth and hardly fit.
All that aside, Ryan likes to think he knows Shane almost better than anyone, save the guy’s family of course.
Who he has...never met, come to think of it. Or seen in pictures on Shane’s social media. Which was bare bones as anything. Shane didn’t keep personal items on his desk. Just a very old rubix cube, his coffee mug and his laptop, and an X Files Ryan had given him.
So maybe there was some truth to ‘better than anyone’ concept. Somehow, it made Ryan feel both proud and more than a little sad all at the same time.
Who wanted to be all alone in the world, after all?
Ryan puffs out the last of his thoughts, stooping to collect some of his socks from the floor where he’d tossed them on the few nights he stripped into proper sleep clothes.
“We uh…we gotta head home, Shane.” Ryan punctures the silence with a wince. He’s been meaning to have this conversation for a day or so now. Truthfully, he wants to have it when Shane is human again and able to respond like he would normally. Or at least, what Ryan’s normal was.
Shane’s glittering gaze glances to his, and though the Demon doesn’t look passive, he doesn’t seem terribly interested either. He isn’t rising with a good natured, put upon sigh, and packing his things.
Not that he has anything to pack for once.
Instead, Shane hums and looks thoughtful, almost puzzled with a crease between his brow. Apparently Ryan’s rather clear statement has confused the Demon. Which is weird. Shane is smart and sharp as ever. He just looks a little wild, a little feral.
“Hungry.” He eventually states in response, catching Ryan so off guard the Ghost Hunter chokes on his sip of water and snorts it down to save his wind pipe.
“...you’re hungry? Alright, well that has nothing to do with what I said but, I guess…” His own stomach growls suddenly in reply. Ryan grumbles sheepishly when Shane smiles ebony fangs at him, feral but clearly smug and amused.
‘You’re hungry too.’ Those eyes gleam with pride and eagerness.
“We can grab a bite on the way out of town, Shane.”
Shane growls, making his vote no. Ryan blinks.
“You wanna eat now?”
Shane purrs.
“Okay, anything in mind?” Ryan doesn’t feel picky. He could eat just about anything himself.
“Taco Bell.” Shane states plainly, leading Ryan to believe he could in fact manage several words around those massive daggers he called teeth. And his friend is just cherry picking words or being his typical lazy self.
“Brat.” Ryan bites back, smirking when he hears a cackle and digging his phone from his back pocket. “Check out’s at 4pm. It’s only noon. Lemme see if DoorDash even delivers…well damn, it does…”
Shane gives a slow blink of approval.
“…Okay, what do you want?”
Shane weighs his answers in his head, staring at the ceiling thoughtfully.
“...yes.” He decides to go with, and Ryan chokes again.
$50 in Taco Bell later, of which Ryan ate about a 10th of, and Shane is licking some sauce off his claws with the pleased air of a cat who found a cageful of fat canaries.
“Full finally?” Ryan asks with the air of a dazed man who would like very much never to see a Demon swallow a burrito whole again. Didn’t even chew. Just gulped it like a snake. Ryan tries vainly to ignore what other talents that big jaw and prehensile tongue might have. Shane was so focused on scarfing the food he didn’t even notice Rya’s blush, which the human feels is for the better.
He finishes his Mountain Dew with a sad slurp, eyeing that massacre that is food wrappers and paper bags, and several Baja Blasts, whose cups Shane shoved his python of a tongue down and licked clean.
“Better?” He asks again, chuckling at Shane’s sleepy blink and drooping tail.
“Bettuur.” Shane agrees, stretching lazily and returning to his perch atop the big wardrobe. Ryan frowns, eyeing the ancient clock radio on the nightstand. Shane merely returns to his large claws, clearly focused on their cleanliness.
“We gotta get movin’, big guy. We can’t stay here forever.”
Shane’s confused glance sparks new worry in Ryan’s already churning mind.
“...Go? Where?” Shane looks lost, and Ryan studies his face, more focused on watching the gears in there turn than trying to explain their current situation couldn’t be kept like this.
“...home? Back to California? It’s gunna be like a fourteen hour drive, with traffic. Oh, and, uh, there’s the little matter of you still looking like you walked off the set of Hellboy.”
At that, Shane snorts and goes back to his inspection of his claws.
“I’m serious, Shane. We don’t need anyone to come looking for you. You can’t fit in the car like that. Can you do that smoky thing you did earlier?” Ryan bites his lip, glancing at his bag where the Demon hid the night he saved him from the other Hunters.
“We go, Ry.” Shane finally, finally relents. Ryan’s so relieved he ignores the sigh from his best friend that equals Shane’s exasperation at something he said or did.
“Thank you. Now just, just get in the car in your weird travel form but stay out of sight, I gotta check out.” Ryan glances at the wreckage of their–Shane’s–feast. “And clean up. At least this will look like a few days worth of food.”
Ryan ignores the grumbles as he finishes packing and searches for the actual metal keys to return. (This place really was off the beaten path.)
When Ryan returns to their room, his stuff is inside the car too, and Shane is no where in sight. It puts Ryan on edge, except he’s pretty sure he sees something smoky slithering around under the dash of the passenger’s seat. Plus, Shane packed all his stuff, and he didn’t seem in the mind for wandering like he was last night.
A turn of the engine comes with a rattling noise, and the entire rental coughs uncertainly, shuddering under Ryan’s hand for a beat.
“Jesus christ, now what–”
The radio rolls to life randomly, but the screen is a faint, familiar red, and so are the numbers on the clock. The gearstick wriggles under Ryan’s palm. The radio searches by itself, almost lazily, and finally settles on an ABBA song that Ryan has heard Shane sing under his breath while editing.
He freezes, trying to look normal as he takes in the sudden shift of the vehicle. How it’s…acting. Like it’s alive.
Or fucken possessed.
“....Shane?” He hisses through gritted teeth, awkwardly locking eyes with an elderly couple two parking spaces down that glance at him with vacant faces of mild concern.
The engine purrs.
A few more things make sense for Ryan in this moment.
“Guess that little snack put you in a good mood, eh?” Ryan keeps speaking out of the corner of his mouth, clumsily shoving the car into reverse and backing out.
Shane has no reply, but Ryan thinks he feels an air of smugness glinting off the rearview mirror.
The actual act of driving was at least granted to Ryan, because Shane does nothing more besides flick to find stations with better frequency or fiddle with the heating, amping it up when the sun dips below the mountains ahead of them and casts them in premature evening light. Ryan knows shane doesn’t feel temperature, so the heat is merely for his own benefit and his heart squeezes at his friend’s thoughtfulness.
It’s not even an awkward silence. The situation on paper is awkward, of course. Ryan doesn’t have his co-pilot…only he does. He’s sitting alone in a car on a cross country trip. Only he’s not really alone. He’s tired, but has a feeling that if something happened, Shane’s reflexes would handle the vehicle well before Ryan had to.
He still wishes Shane were in the seat beside him, Demon attributes and all.
“Shane…?”
There’s no verbal response, but the radio does turn down suddenly, like a human might do when they wanted to hear better or make a reply. Shane is listening.
“How come you’re still…all Demon-y?” Ryan ask softly, then waits. He’s more than a little disappointed when there’s zero answer. Even the car is silent.
“Uhm…” Ryan glances from the road to the dash. “It’s okay if you don’t wanna answer…or if you can’t. I don’t mind…I mean, it’s cool with me that you’re a Demon. I just don’t know how the rest of Los Angles will take it.”
Shane doesn’t answer, but Ryan’s mind fills his voice in anyway.
‘They’ll prolly just chalk it up to me being a Cosplayer or sumthin’, Ry.’
There’s a small weight at the bottom of Ryan’s heart, and it’s been growing ever since he woke up and realized Shane wasn’t turning back to Human Shane.
It was starting to unnerve him. Even worse was Shane’s general blithe attitude about it all, like he didn’t care one way or the other.
After about five minutes of silence, the volume on the radio climbs back up. It seems sheepish but determined, and Ryan focuses his own attention wholly back on driving.
But in the back of his mind, he’s worrying and thinking and wondering.
They make it about seven hours before the car suddenly starts driving itself without Ryan’s consent. He doesn’t think he’s got highway hypnosis and has at least another three hours in him. Judging by the way the vehicle slows and ambles off the highway despite his bitching and protests, Shane clearly disagrees.
They pass a leaning, peeled wood sign for a Motel 6 and Ryan huffs.
Ryan gripes, crossing his arms as he pushes stubbornly on the break, yanks on the wheel at an intersection, but he might as well be starring in a movie about Herbie the Love Bug. It’s useless. Shane is being stubborn and Ryan supposes he can’t be surprised.
“Jerk,” Ryan complains, huffing as the rental pulls into a parking lot of the little Motel off the highway. The place is mostly deserted, and any other time Ryan would take one look at the place and grimace, make some jokes about murder-mysteries and Forensic Files and keep driving. Shane usually echoed the sentiments with his usual light hearted tone, but by now it’s evident he was only humoring Ryan and pretending to be wary.
But this is the closest place off the highway, and besides…what could hurt him with Shane nearby?
And Ryan finds that–although the place does look grimy and old and creepy–he complicity trusts Shane on this. He doesn’t even question the choice, merely the timing. But trying to argue with Shane when he was Hellbent on getting them to stop for the night seemed a fool’s errand.
Ryan cannot lie to himself much longer either. Something about sharing the bed with Shane and sleeping against the warmth of his side was a little addictive. He yawns, keeping his hands on the wheel just for appearance’s sake.
Just because Shane had healed in less than a week didn’t mean Ryan’s body was the same. His muscles were cramped from the drive and strained from overuse from the hiking, running and clinging for dear life-ing he had been doing.
Check-in is an altogether new adventure.
Mostly because no sooner has Ryan entered–a bell tinkles overhead–than he realizes this place is Grade A spooky. It’s dimly lit and small, but the vacant areas make the place look bigger than it is. There’s a single chair to sit in, a few potted plants that flourish despite being in near-darkness, and a buzz of a neon sign.
The young woman at the concierge counter (if it could be called that,) glances with polite disinterest, then double takes.
“Hey! No Shades allowed.” She snips, then when Ryan’s face bleeds shock and hesitancy her facade drops. She grins, pops her bubblegum and sets aside her magazine.
“Just kidding. Sorry, it’s just kind of hard to ignore your friend up there.” A long, fake teal nail points at the ceiling, and when Ryan looks he spies the familiar shaggy mass of Darkness just finishing its heave over the threshold. Shane’s shadows thin greatly as he stretches, snaking to coil into the darkest shadows of the dimly lit room. He seems to be showing off, and the young woman eyes him as Shane eyes her back with reptilian fascination.
“I,” says Ryan, and the young woman gives him a sympathetic look. “Uh…”
He hadn’t told Shane to stay put in the car. He’d just assumed the dumbass would know to.
Apparently this place was Different, though.
“Hey, it’s cool. We take all sorts of people here. Usually addicts have the worst things on their backs, but those are personal monsters, more invested in their own misery than looking to cause trouble with strangers.” Her pen taps the desk as she eyes Shane thoughtfully.
“I ain’t ever seen one that big and chill though. Usually the big ones are with the nastiest people. I had this one guy last week I hadta call the cops on, and his was smaller than yours.” She shudders, glancing at Ryan with a new hint of wariness.
“You better not be a murderer, kid.” The clerk warns.
She’s his age, and being called ‘kid’ by another millennial does kinda make him pause. Shane’s silence is even sort of helping to keep him alert and focused. He’s waiting to see what Ryan will do, too.
“You know what Shane is?” That’s the first thing Ryan blurts. The second thing is, “Sorry, it’s just…we’re just looking for a place to spend the night. We don’t wanna cause any trouble.”
“I thought he was a Shade at first but he ain’t, is he?” she settles back in her chair and hums. “You don’t look too typical for the guys that come in here with lions like him on their heels.”
“...what?”
“First time?” She sounds sympathetic but a little teasing. “Sorry, I just meant considering what he is, you don’t match. You look way to friendly and normal.”
Ryan doesn’t know what to say to that. The clerk doesn’t seem bothered by his silence and goes on happily,
“It’s kinda cute, actually. Demons don’t really take humans in, so when you see it it’s like seeing an almost extinct species, yanno? Look, it ain’t my business, just c’mere and sign in. You just wanted a night, right?”
Ryan approaches the desk, spurned on by the way he sees Shane start to mill about, a black mass pawing through a potted plant and then making his way to a Vending Machine that’s buzzing weakly in the far corner.
“What’s…what’s a Shade?” Ryan can’t help the questions. Someone who was at least his own species, and recognized his friend like this? Ryan’s tiredness seems to flee the second he realized she could answer some of his questions.
“Like a shadow, although they typically don’t stick to walls. They’re smaller and more see-through than your buddy. That’s how I realized yours was a Demon. He’s an old one, isn’t he? How long have you had him? Demon Trap? Some guys get tattoos to do it, but you don’t seem like the type.” She has mirth in her gaze, and she snorts when Shane starts wriggling into the Vending Machine.
Ryan feels a little more unmoored.
“Uh…no, he’s not…I mean…” It occurs to him then this woman either was lying or simply didn’t recognize him. He’s glad Buzzfeed Unsolved isn’t that popular, in this instance.
“Shane and I are friends.” The words sound lame even on his tongue, and when he glances for confirmation he deflates as the black fuzzyness is determinedly freeing a KitKat from the door.
“Friends?” And she grins, but Ryan misses it.
“Dude, seriously? Shane! You gotta pay for that–” He tries to scold but the girl waves him off.
“Nah, forget it. Seeing one of these guys up close is worth way more than a freakin’ candy bar. My Uncle is a Demonologist and he’s gunna go nuts when I tell him a met one this high level that’s got a human it likes. Long as you two don’t cause trouble at my ‘fine establishment,’” her smirk suggests she’s aware of how the place actually looks, “He can help himself.”
The overhead light pulse and dim twice, and a pleased rumble filters from somewhere.
“You made it sound like you see, uh, Shades a lot. Why is a Demon any different?” As he asks this, she hands over a key. “Oh, thank you.”
“Room 13, at the end of the block.” She seems able to multitask in a way that makes Ryan envious. “Shades are weaker, for one. They’re like the mice and rabbits of the Supernatural world. My Gramma used to call them Echoes. They’re weird collections of memories, usually more than one person. They kinda drift wherever the wind takes them. Demons are, well, Demons. And when they show up, it never goes this good.”
“Shane’s not normal?” Ryan pauses. “Why am I not surprised?”
“He’s maybe his version of normal. He’s way higher on the food chain than anything else around here. My Grandma wouldn’t have let you guys stay at all, and if she did you would had salt on all your doors and windows to keep him stuck in the room.”
Ryan winces, glad that Grandma doesn’t seem to be around right now.
“Do people come in here that are…normal? Or not…haunted?” He asks as he signs in to the worn, faded book. The paper makes his fingertips tingle.
“We’re all haunted by something.” She winks, eyeing his scrawled in words upside down. “Ricky Goldsworth, huh? Nice name.”
He pointedly ignores the heavy snort of amusement from the corner where Shane’s pilfering candy. It’s pretty easy to mentally beam a ‘Shut up, Shane’ and there’s another cackle as Shane frees a Hershey bar.
The girl checks a second time, something clearly on her mind.
“Did you sign in alone? Good. Don’t ever write your friend’s name down somewhere,” She warns with a sudden seriousness, then tacks on, “Although if that’s his nickname, that’s fine. I guess it must be.”
“What?” Ryan realizes she probably knows he signed with a fake name, but she doesn’t say a word about it. “Why not?”
“Names have power. Especially your ‘friend.’ And if he’s as old and powerful as he looks, I’ll bet he has at least two other names to decoy his real one.” She answers crisply, and Ryan decides he likes her. He notices then that there’s no name tag on her shirt or her desk, and wisely says nothing.
The black mass only wanders over innocently, slithering up the front desk and holding a Butterfinger bar out to him.
Ryan takes it, ignores the heat on his cheeks and the way the girl behind the desk nearly cooes at Shane’s antics and digs for his wallet to pay for the room and the candy, despite the girl’s earlier words.
“Shane brought me here, did he know about this place? I mean, you said you’d never seen him before but…” It seems bad to talk about his friend like he wasn’t in the room, but the darkness coiling lazily around the ceiling fan doesn’t seem bothered.
“We’re pretty well known for other Supers. Like I said, the humans that are brought here with dark shit like your friend are…usually here for different reasons.”
She flips back a few pages, gesturing for Ryan to see the sign ins.
There are very few who sign out, he realizes. Twice on one page of entries, maybe.
Ryan gulps, but steels himself.
Shane trusts him plenty. It is definitely Ryan’s turn to offer the same.
“I think Shane just wants somewhere to sleep where he won’t be bothered. We’ve…had a rough couple of days.” This place is certainly under the radar, it seems. Liminal space levels of under.
The clerk smiles lightly.
“Yeah, you both kind of look it. Have a good stay.” And that seems to be the end of that.
Ryan has more questions–lots more–but Shane is slinking toward the door and the girl is raising her magazine again.
And…jesus, he is exhausted. The cold rush of air on his face when he exits the motel’s main building just makes him shiver.
It’s not nightfall but it’s cloudy and dark, and no one is lingering outside, not even for a smoke or anything. Ryan watches, fascinated, as the darkness that exited the car with him and has been following along, sidles along the cracks of the walkway, and then edge under the door to the room they were given.
“Least we’ll be home tomorrow.” Ryan says as he unlocks the door and enters. After dealing with a Possessed Car and then Smoke-Shane, he almost jumps at the physical presence of his best friend.
Still with horns, and wings and tail. Still with coal black eyes and ruby stars for pupils.
Then Shane yawns, stretching out his shoulders and rubbing at the left one several times. He grunts around his fangs but nods in drowsy agreement.
“Did you know that girl in there?”
“...notta girl, Ry.” And Shane says no more on the subject, but he looks relaxed and at ease like he didn’t at the earlier room.
Ryan studies the lines of the Demon’s body and furrows his brow a bit. He also looks tired again.
“Did uh, possessing the car take a lot out of you, big guy?”
Shane half shrugs, but his smile is familiar and almost soft.
‘Yeah, but it was worth it.’ His look says. Ryan melts a little. The sudden assault on the Vending machine makes a little more sense. Shane was hungry, but thankfully he went for sweets instead of Fear.
“We can get more food tomorrow morning, but like, breakfast for once. How’s that sound? Burger King?” Ryan knows their menu items are Shane’s favorite for breakfast.
The Demon lets out a pleased, sibilant hiss and his lips curl. The blink he gives Ryan is almost delicate and full of warmth. The depth is so strong it catches Ryan off guard, like a string pulling too tight and snapping at just the wrong moment.
He falters, stops, starts again. Then he blushes, shakes it off and mumbles something about a shower and hot water and needing to take a piss. He grabs fresh boxers and his sleep shirt and scoots.
Shane’s chuckles follow him into the tiny bathroom and the memories of the loving sound gets locked in with him when he snaps the door shut.
He doesn’t bother locking the door, just tries to master the shower knobs and strips.
The water is broiling hot and unforgiving, but it’s exactly what Ryan wants and he stays under it a long time. Until his fingers prune, and the mirror fogs thickly, and he can scrub the flush of Shane’s burning gaze from his skin.
Suggestiveness and flirtation–that Ryan could deal with. Either he flirted back or dodged the comments with a playful air that kept him protected and the moment from being weird–though on one occasion a stranger at a bar hadn’t taken the hint to Ryan’s lack of interest, and it had seemed odd at the time the way Shane had just materialized at his side, leaning on the counter and smiling a predator’s smile at the man until he’d left. Ryan had been buzzed, not drunk to forget and he’d always kind of liked the memory. Shane was a chill guy up until the point he wasn’t, and he had this smug smirk he could pull off that made you feel small as a pimple on a flea, especially when he was irked.
Regardless of Shane’s current state, or even before when he was hiding in plain sight, he’d never pushed for anything…sexual. He’d never made it weird, or creepy.
He’d just…Been. Ryan was the social one of the two, the one who Shane warned would be described on The FBI Files as ‘lighting up a room’ and Ryan had always snorted at the joke but he kind of understood now.
This whole time Shane had been looking out for him. How many people or things had Shane seen that Ryan hadn’t?
Despite the warmth of the shower, a chill crawls up his spine.
He’d never brought it up, supernatural or other wise. Never held it over Ryan.
A few times, sure, he bribed Ryan for Pizza Hut or something, but never anything…bad.
Ryan lets out a frustrated sigh, hanging his head to let the water bullet into his sore back.
He’d almost find it easier if Shane did try jumping his bones. The soft gaze and bottomless trust the Demon just seemed content to hand over to him was overwhelming and a little scary.
The fuck he’d done to deserve Shane’s loyalty like this? Drag him onto an web show where he played the skeptic on a subject he was literally the center of once per season? Get trapped in a salt circle on another Demon’s bridge, or have Holy Water squirted at him?
But if the previous incident at the old manor had proved anything, it was that no one could force Shane to do something he didn’t want to do. He’d been held in two Demon Traps and still had broken out to rescue Ryan. He’d been shackled and chained and doused with gallons of Holy Water and still those Demon Hunters couldn’t control him.
Shane had done all that globe trotting, Ghost-Hunting shit because Ryan asked him to. Because he needed him too, to save the show and his career. No wonder Shane seemed so confused about Ryan’s instance at heading back home.
To Shane, home might just be wherever Ryan is.
Ryan squeezes his eyes shut, feeling emotionally exhausted as much as physically.
He peeks out over an hour later, shamefully relieved to find the room dark and see a lump of red on the mattress, the sheets exposed and the sounds of a slumbering Demon that’s he come to find such comfort in lately.
He finishes toweling his hair best he can, but soon abandons the worn terry cloth with a flick of it to the floor beside the bed and crawls onto the mattress. His knees meet wing joint and he scoops it up with both hands.
Shane makes a grumbly old man noise and Ryan can’t stop the grin. It’s all for show, anyway. Those claws are relaxed and Shane’s tail is slithering through the sheets, coiling around his ankle and up his calf to cling.
Ryan slips into the warm cavity between leather and sheets and curls his toes at the cozyness of it all.
“Yeah, yeah, you’re big and scary, Mister.” The distance and shower-thoughts gave him his spine back, reminding him any silly crush on his best friend came after their initial bond.
No matter what, Shane was his and he was Shane’s. What lies between them is unique, priceless and, dare he be cheesy about it, supernatural.
His best friend is a Demon. He is a Ghost Hunter. But they are still Shane and Ryan, Ryan and Shane. Never one without the other.
“We’ll get you back to your human self, big guy.” Ryan whispers between them, wondering Shane’s really even listening. “Even if we don’t…we’ll deal with that when we come to it. Doesn’t change how much I need you.”
The tuckered Demon rumbles in his sleep, and together they rest and recover.
To be continued in Ivory Towers…