A/N: This fic was written during the february ExoWrimo and it was supposed to be a short one shot. It isn't, but luckily, it is all finished and will be posted regularly. I want to thank Herbeloved for her help with some of the religious parts:) and of course my trusty beta reader Starrylizard. Any and all mistakes left behind are my own. I hope you'll enjoy this ride and please, let me know your thoughts.
Deliver me, O Lord
The cold water on his hands felt just about heavenly and Tomas closed his eyes, letting the faucet run much longer than he would have otherwise. He was physically tired, so tired of it all, yet there was no visible reprieve in their near future. Tomas knew he shouldn't be selfish and ask Marcus for just a few days off, to get a chance to get his head straight, but he really wanted to. A few days without chasing after demons, or running away from the Vatican, which nowadays seemed like a daily occurrence. He wished for a day when danger didn't lurk behind every corner, when they could sit down, grab a beer and talk like they used to. With a sigh, he dismissed the thought as wistful thinking.
Tomas leaned against the sink, taking a good look in the mirror. He looked about as bad as he felt and it was just a matter of time until Marcus noticed, if he hadn't already. Tomas knew he was on the receiving end of some covert glances, but Marcus didn't comment. Ever since their reunion, the older man was different, in a way that Tomas couldn't quite put his finger on. Marcus heard God again, felt him in his hands. It was God who led him back to Tomas after all, and he couldn't be more grateful for it. Marcus appeared in the nick of time, saving his sister Olivia from a gruesome death, while neither Tomas nor Mouse were in a position to help. Tomas would be eternally indebted to Marcus for that. Hell, it seemed like the whole Ortega family owed a life debt to one Marcus Keane. At this rate, Tomas wouldn't be surprised if, some fifty years in the future as he lies on a deathbed, the skeleton of Marcus crawls out of the grave with a rosary in one hand and a gun in the other, pointing it at the Angel of Death itself and warning it off of taking one Tomas Ortega.
Tomas snorted at the image then shook his head, mirth quickly leaving his face. He was clearly delirious if he was thinking about such things, and in no fit state to do an exorcism. Maybe that was why they were stuck in this house for three days straight now, trying to save the poor woman. The six months spent with Mouse taught Tomas how to do a quick exorcism, how to rip the demon out of the possessed mind. If they encountered a possessed person that wasn't yet integrated, Tomas usually managed to get rid of the demon within a day. Gone were several weeks long exorcisms... ritual and repetition had no place in Mouse's book, not after she figured out a way to use him. Tomas didn't protest. The training was rough, the exorcisms always took a lot out of him, but the results were worth it. They travelled across the country, saving people, hunting demons and trying to uncover the conspiracy in all of its gruesome size.
Until one of the demons showed him a vision of his sister and nephew, skewered and left at the altar of Tomas' old church. What happened then was still a bit hazy in Tomas' mind and he didn't want to remember it. All that mattered was that Olivia and Luis were saved and currently settling down in an undisclosed, but safe, location. Mouse was there with them, making sure they were truly out of danger.
Tomas wished to know where they were but knew it was a risk he couldn't take, not when he let demons inside his head. So, when Mouse offered to take care of things, he agreed, feeling relieved. He could trust Mouse, he learned that much during their time together. When they parted, she gave him a hug and a light peck on the cheek.
'You two need to figure things out,' she said, looking at Marcus who was playing some sort of a silly string game with Luis, making the boy laugh and cheer. Tomas gritted his teeth.
'I don't know if we can. Things have changed.'
'Yes, you have changed... and so did he. I can see it.'
Tomas shrugged.
'Don't be a stranger for too long. We... make a good team,' he said with a slight grin and Mouse bumped him on the shoulder, a familiar glint in her eyes.
'Yes, I've trained you well. Don't let that old fool undo all my hard work, will you?'
Tomas laughed at that, feeling sad and grateful at the same time.
'Take care of Olivia and Luis, please. Just... make sure they are safe?' he pleaded, touching her cheek gently. Mouse nodded into his hand.
'I won't let them come to harm, I promise.'
Tomas hoped she could keep that promise. Last he heard from Mouse they were settling in nicely and she was ready to leave, though she decided to take a detour before joining them again.
'I got in touch with some old friends and they might help find new allies. I will just be unreachable for a few weeks.'
Tomas wasn't happy about it, but there was really nothing he could do. Marcus took it at face value, shrugging.
'Mouse knows what she's doing,' he said with ease, then bit down on an apple and smirked. 'She'll be just fine,' he said, and Tomas wasn't sure if he wanted to hug Marcus for that absolute confidence in Mouse's fate or shout at him for his lack of concern. Tomas did neither because he knew Marcus was right.
It was strange how quickly they became used to each other's presence again. Marcus still grumbled at Tomas when he woke up at dawn and went out for his obligatory run, and Tomas still found Marcus' socks and things in the strangest places, most often stuffed between his own clothes. However, some things were different and caused annoyance on both sides. The most important was the way Tomas was exorcising demons. After a rocky start with Mouse, they figured that the best approach to casting a demon out was from both inside and outside. So, Tomas plunged into the mind of the possessed, while Mouse was doing her best at the rite of exorcism from the outside. If there was even a chance of Tomas getting lost, well... Mouse took care of that.
Since Marcus was back, they had performed only two exorcisms. The first one almost ended in a fistfight, as Tomas didn't heed the older man's warning and plunged in, just like he used to do with Mouse. He managed to cast the demon out easily enough, which left Marcus looking at him warily, as if seeing him for the first time. He looked almost impressed, and Tomas soaked in that feeling of accomplishment, even while ignoring the lecture Marcus half-heartedly gave him. When later that night Tomas paid the price with a headache from hell, Marcus' awe and appreciation for his skills was gone.
'You can't keep doing it this way, Tomas. It will kill you long before we get anywhere close to Rome.' Marcus told him while Tomas was trying hard not to puke from the pain. Frankly, at that moment, he would've welcomed death, if only to spare him the pain and the lecture.
'If that's what God intends, then so be it,' Tomas said through clenched teeth and winced as Marcus slammed his palm on the door, anger and frustration battling with worry.
'Damn it, Tomas! If God intended you to die, he wouldn't have shown me the way to you!'
'I didn't kill a man just so you could destroy yourself a few months later,' was really what Marcus' words implied and just the thought of Andy stopped their anger.
Their second exorcism didn't go according to plan either. Trying to find a compromise, Tomas let Marcus take the lead on that one and they spent most of a week in a basement with a thirty-year-old guy living with his parents. In the end, they managed to cast the demon out, without Tomas having to connect with the possessed mind, though it was a long and tiring battle. All that time, Tomas could feel the darkness pressing against the base of his skull, trying to crawl in, to play tricks on him. He pushed it back, but the effort of constantly warding it off left him even more tired than an actual exorcism would. When they left the house, the man alive but in a condition that was sure to bring in some police enquiry, Tomas spent the whole ten hour drive out of the state sleeping. Marcus didn't say a word.
When Mouse called them three days ago with an address and a request to help this woman, because she was a friend of a friend, Marcus and Tomas didn't discuss their approach. Marcus was stubbornly set on performing the exorcism like they always did, going as far as asking Tomas if he didn't want to sit this one out. At which point Tomas shot him a glare Mouse tended to use when he said something really idiotic.
'This woman tried to kill her own infant son. She's alone, her husband deployed overseas. Do you really think this is the moment to go solo?'
Tomas had to admit he was impressed that Marcus didn't take offense with his comment. The older man just shrugged.
'Thought I would ask. You look like you need a break. And I... I can hear the words again, I can feel His presence. I can do an exorcism.'
Tomas blinked. So, maybe he wasn't the only one who needed some validation. Tomas knew he was trying to show off his new skills, to make an impression; it never occurred to him that the other exorcist was doing the same. Marcus looked so alive during that last exorcism, so exhilarated when they finished it, Tomas almost said okay, yes, sitting this one out sounds good actually, because I can barely keep my eyes open. But then he remembered the worry in Mouse's voice when she called and an image of Olivia and Luis popped into his mind.
'This is for Mouse. We need to give it our best shot. That's the least I can do for her.'
Marcus looked at him, then gave a nod, his eyes filled with understanding and Tomas was glad that for once they didn't have to fight about it.
Erica was a thirty-year-old woman with her first child, a one-year-old boy. Her husband was a marine deployed somewhere in the Middle East and she wasn't handling it well. When the first signs of trouble appeared, Erica was diagnosed with post-partum depression and her mother Bethany moved in to help with the child while she was taking medication. It didn't help and when Bethany heard the boy's cry in the middle of the night and came to check, she found Erica leaning over her son with a pair of scissors, talking in a voice that wasn't hers. That's when she threw a vase at Erica's head, grabbed her grandson and fled.
Tomas still wasn't sure why Erica stayed in the house afterwards and tried to pretend like everything was normal. Her mother, who was a regular churchgoer and knew someone who knew Mouse reached out, and a day later, Tomas and Marcus were knocking on the door of a small suburban house.
It was pretty clear from the start that Erica wasn't suffering from depression, or if she was, it wasn't her main problem. No, the main problem was the demon that took over her body and mind, that caused her to try and kill her own child and laugh wildly at the sight of the two exorcists standing over her form tied to the bed.
That was three days earlier. Days they spent reciting the rite of exorcism, Marcus throwing covert glances at Tomas, asking him to wait, to give him a chance and not to engage with the demon. Tomas held out, if for nothing else then because he didn't feel strong enough to fight. All his energy seemed to be focused on keeping up the appearance, to keep that damn scratching at the back of his mind in place and not let anything inside, while he stood alongside Marcus and recited the verses of the bible to the body squirming and spitting wild words at them.
The demon didn't seem to be bothered by any of it, not loosening its hold over the poor woman. Marcus stubbornly thought they still had time, that any day now the demon would give up.
'I can feel it is losing power,' Marcus told him just a few hours ago, while Tomas heard laughter inside his head and the scratching intensified. The demon might've been losing its hold on Erica, but only because it was trying hard to get its paws on Tomas.
For some stupid reason Tomas didn't tell this to Marcus. He knew the older man would try to keep him away and finish this by himself. And maybe that would have been the right thing to do, but then they got a call from Bethany informing them that Erica's husband was on his way back home. They had maybe 24 hours before they would have to face an angry and well trained armed soldier. It was time to stop playing, Marcus' feelings or reproach be damned.
When they ended the call, the two men exchanged a look and Tomas excused himself to the bathroom. Where he obviously spent too much time thinking, because there was a knock on the door and Tomas looked up from the still running faucet, startled.
"You okay in there? I'd rather like to use the facilities myself, if you don't mind," Marcus asked and Tomas grimaced.
"Just a minute. I'll be right out," he said, as he took one last look at himself in the mirror. His cheeks were still red and there were beads of sweat on his forehead. That wouldn't do at all. He splashed the cold water over his head and rubbed it with a towel, then left the bathroom.
"Sorry," he said a bit sheepishly, trying to fake a smile. Marcus gave him an assessing look.
"You picked a strange time to do your hair, luv," he said. He leaned against the wall, arms crossed.
Tomas rolled his eyes.
"I was hoping my dashing look might draw out the demon better than your snarky mug," Tomas said and pushed past Marcus into the narrow hall, then paused.
"Didn't you need to use the bathroom?" He raised an eyebrow when he saw Marcus was following him towards the bedroom.
"I changed my mind. You spent so much time in there, I think I'll give it some time to air out."
"I wasn't-" Tomas started to protest, then just threw his hands in the air. "Suit yourself."
As they entered the room, any trace of amusement left their faces. Erica was lying on the bed, her face pale and speckled with sores and blood as she bit into her tongue earlier in the day. The room smelled of bodily fluids and Tomas swallowed hard, fighting the sudden urge to be sick. While he was sweating just a minute ago, the temperature in the room seemed to drop significantly and he couldn't stop the shiver running over his body. Erica's eyes, dark and wide focused on him like a laser and she gave a guttural chuckle.
"Oh, the little cub is feeling sick today? Let me in boy and I will make you feel so much better!" The voice wasn't hers, it was much deeper and held a slickness that just made your skin crawl. Tomas grit his teeth, grabbed his bible and rosary and without comment started the rite of exorcism, more feeling than seeing Marcus standing next to him.
"Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen."
The demon squirmed on the bed, but kept chuckling, as if they were saying something funny.
"Most glorious Prince of the Heavenly Armies, Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in our battle against principalities and powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places-" Marcus spoke along with Tomas, their voices joining smoothly in prayer.
"Ah come on, weren't we doing this for the last three days? It feels like eternity," the demon whined, spitting blood on the pillow and grinning at Tomas, giving him an assessing look. "I'm getting bored. And quite frankly, padre, I don't think you will be able to keep standing much longer. I can just smell the sweat of sickness on you-" The demon took in a demonstrative whiff and its smile widened.
"So close to failing again... so close. Will he leave you to me when you fail I wonder?" the demon taunted and finally got a reaction.
"Enough!" Tomas shouted, his panic at hearing those words, at seeing the look of worry on Marcus' face, it was just too much. The nails digging inside his skull seemed to pause, waiting. Tomas took a breath and crossed the distance to the bed in a blink of an eye. He found himself on his knees, the hand with the rosary pushed against the flesh of the now writhing demon.
"I command you, unclean spirit, whoever you are, along with all your minions now attacking this servant of God, by the mysteries of the incarnation, passion, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ-" the demon writhed but was still chuckling, still spitting words out of its borrowed mouth.
"You are weak, priest! You will fail and he will see just like everyone else did and then, then you will be ours!"
"Shut up!" Tomas had had about enough; he couldn't allow this to continue, mostly because he felt the words were true. He was scared and the demon knew it, saw it in his eyes and it laughed. Tomas ignored Marcus' hand on his arm trying to pull him away, ignored the sound of his name. All that mattered was to stop this, to cast out the demon and they were running out of time, he just knew.
"Shut up!" Tomas hissed, his mind reeling and all sense of the ritual gone as if it was never there. Only words that weren't making any sense. The demon inclined its head and waggled its eyebrows provocatively.
"Make me, padre," it said, and Tomas saw red.
"As you wish." He grabbed Erica's face in both hands, and there was a second he felt a bruising grip on his shoulder and Marcus' panicked voice somewhere in the distance, before he let the barrier fall and opened his mind to the sickness of the world. His eyes turned milky white and blind to the image of his partner's face filled with fear and rage.
tbc