Author notes: One of those stories that started out as crack, but then took a more serious turn. Written for fanbingo's prompt Magic & Fantasy freeform. Thanks to Tanaqui for betaing.
Goes Around Comes Around
By Scribblesinink
The loud bang of Juice's shotgun going off right next to Tig sounded slightly different, even over the cacophony of gunfire echoing across the garage lot. The next instant, one of the things in the row of gauzy creatures approaching the clubhouse—ghosts, Tig thought with a disbelieving grimace—winked out of existence. Tig blinked. What the…?
"Fuuuuck!" Juice hollered in triumph.
"What the hell d'you do?" Tig shouted over the din around them. He pumped another round into the chamber of his own gun and pulled the trigger. Not that it seemed to do any good, even though he knew he'd scored a hit. No matter how many bullets they got off, the relentless advance of the things below didn't slow.
"Rock salt!" Juice fired again, and another of the ghosts—a short, fat Mayan Tig vaguely recalled putting a cap into back in 2003—disappeared.
"What?" Tig thought he must've heard wrong and, for a long second, he was too puzzled over Juice's reply to go on shooting. Not that it'd have made a lick of difference, of course, but it felt good. Like he was doing something. But even as he gaped at Juice, he noticed from the corner of his eye that, whatever the little shit had done, it appeared to've given the ghosts pause. The ghostly shapes were hesitating, apparently reluctant to continue closing on the clubhouse. "Come again?"
"Rock salt," Juice repeated.
Yeah, so he had heard right after all. "How'd you figure that?"
Juice colored under his lightning bolt tattoos. "Um, there's this TV show…."
"Stop. I don't wanna know." Tig sucked in air through his nose and rolled his eyes in contempt. Then again—. "Got any more of those… salt slugs?"
Juice shook his head. "Only had time to make two. Besides, didn't know it'd work, did I?" He managed to sound cocky and defensive at the same time. Tig resisted the urge to cuff him around the mohawk. The kid had done good, even if he was a doofus.
"Okay. We gotta get more of those."
While Juice shouted down instructions to the two prospects, who, along with Bobby, were defending the clubhouse from below, Tig peered out across the lot toward the garage. In the glow of the security lamps, he spotted Gemma in the office, gapping the blinds so she could see better, her face a pale blur. Piney was the only one over there with her, the rest of them cut off in the clubhouse, but Tig didn't think she was in any danger. None of the ghosts had shown any interest in the garage so far.
"What the hell do they want?" Clay had used the momentary lull in the fighting to scurry over to Tig's position.
"No fuckin' clue." Tig shook his head. But deep down, he did know, didn't he? And it was only a matter of time before Clay and the others figured it out as well. There was one thing all those creatures had in common: every single one of them was a notch on Tig's belt. Tig might not mark his victims on his body the way Hap did, but he remembered.
What they wanted was him. He'd known that ever since that damned cat showed up at the garage, its golden eyes filled with hatred. Even if he still couldn't make himself fully believe yet that what was going on was real. It was just too… fucking weird. Like he'd wake up any second now.
For Chrissakes, it wasn't even his fault! Not this time. For all the bad shit he'd done in his life, he'd never been in the cat-killing business. Damned beast had just shot out across the road from nowhere, invisible in the shadows under the trees until it was too late and Tig had found himself eating asphalt. And hell, tumble like that, he could've as easily broke his own neck as well as the goddamn cat's.
But the old hag who'd come scurrying after the cat, brandishing her walking stick at Tig even as he was still struggling to regain his bearings, hadn't care about that. She'd taken one look at her pet before turning and giving him the evil eye, shrieking curses in some foreign language Tig hadn't recognized.
He'd cursed her back, picked up his bike, and gotten the hell out of there. Wasn't until he was maneuvering the bike into line at the garage and seen the cat again, crouched under a car opposite, that the first shiver had run down his spine. He'd shrugged it off, of course, convincing himself it was another black cat, and gone to find himself a cold beer and a hot woman.
"It's the night of Oidhche Samhna," Chibs announced glumly in reply to Clay's question. "Samhain."
Brought back to the present, Tig shot him a startled look: the Scotsman's brogue was laced with barely suppressed fear. Must be some stupid Scottish superstition, he told himself, not wanting to admit that seeing Chibs scared was unnerving him even more than the idea of ghosts chasing him.
"Halloween?" Clay sounded disbelieving. "You're sayin' this is because it's fuckin' Halloween?"
When Chibs shrugged, Clay snorted, nostrils flaring.
"Here. Got your ammo." Miles came clambering up the ladder to the roof, cutting short the discussion, and started distributing shotgun shells filled with rock salt.
Just in time, too. "They're moving again!" Jax shouted from his place guarding the ladder in the corner of the roof.
Tig loaded up and resumed shooting at the ghosts. Their slow, open approach made hitting them easy, like prize-shooting at the carnival. And now, with Juice's salt slugs, each score made a spirit disappear. Tig laughed, raising a fist. "Take that, bitches!"
But his sense of triumph—relief—didn't last long. Victory was only temporary, a stay of execution. Minutes after they'd winked out, the ghosts would reappear: thin, translucent but apparently just as determined. Tig glowered down at them. Soon, they'd be close enough to touch the clubhouse walls. They'd be completely cut off, then. Last stand at the Alamo.
Can't kill a ghost, a voice whispered in the back of his mind, and the last of his grin slipped. Goosebumps rose on his arms. That had sounded like—.
Even as he was thinking it, Juice pointed. "Hey! Isn't that—?"
Juice's question was cut short when Jax overlaid it with an, "Oh, Jezus!"
Following Juice's finger, Tig realized he was pointing to a newly appeared figure: a woman with long, dark hair. His breath caught. "Donna." The name escaped him before he could bite it back.
Jax turned to Tig, eyes narrowed, and glared at him across the roof. He jerked his head toward the parking lot. "This is you?" Though it was phrased like a question, Jax's tone made it a statement. Tig instantly felt his hackles rise, the way they always did when Jax got his righteousness on.
"So what if it is?" Tig sensed confusion from Juice standing next to him, and reminded himself that the kid didn't know.
Jax opened his mouth and then snapped it shut again. Tig experienced another moment of glee. Don't know what to say, do you? But his euphoria didn't last long. Because, down below, the things kept coming, Donna in front.
Ignoring both Juice's bewilderment and Jax's anger, Tig twisted back toward the edge of the roof. Sighting his shotgun, he tightened his finger on the trigger. But he couldn't shoot. Not her. Not again.
Thank God Ope's not here. The thought flickered across Tig's mind as he went on squinting along the gun at the figure below. Opie had gone home before sunset, well before the ghosts—literally—had come out to play and everything had gone to hell. "Halloween," he'd declared morosely, straddling his bike. "Promised Lyla I'd take the kids trick or treating."
Donna was close enough now that Tig could see her eyes, pale blue and empty. As empty as they'd been that night when he'd rolled up to the truck and realized the horrible mistake he'd made. He'd raced off, burning rubber, with bile filling his mouth, until he was a few blocks away. Then he'd stopped the car and upchucked his dinner in the gutter next to the curb. He swallowed down the memory.
She was the worst. The others had all deserved what he'd delivered: rats, Mayans, enemies of the club. But not her. Donna was his mistake. And now she'd come for him….
And maybe it was right, that he'd suffer at her hands the way she had at his. Poetic justice. But only him. Not his club, his brothers—not his family.
Suddenly, Tig knew what to do.
"Here." He shoved his shotgun at Miles and clambered to his feet. "Take my place." It'd prevent the prospect from making more salt slugs, but if Tig was right, it'd be all over soon, anyway.
"Where're you going?" Clay grabbed for him as Tig squeezed by, but he jerked himself free.
"Do what I need to," Tig growled.
Clay's gaze flicked briefly away from Tig, glancing down at the lot, and something slithered across his features, though Tig wasn't sure what. Guilt? Understanding? Either way, Clay must've picked out Donna among the ghosts as easily as the rest of them. "You don't have to—."
"I fuckin' do." Tig turned away from his Club President and marched on without looking back, not quite trusting his resolve if he did. Clay might've given the order, but he was the one who'd pulled the trigger without making sure who was in the truck. This was on him.
Once he reached the ladder going down, he straightened up fully, looking out across the lot one more time. His gaze fell on his bike, gleaming dully in the rosy glow of the approaching sunrise. He started: had they been at this all night?
"Take care o' her," he asked Jax, when the VP stepped aside unhesitatingly to give him access to the ladder.
"Will do." Jax's expression was serious. "Good luck."
"Yeah." Tig snorted to hide from Jax that he was fuckin' scared. He'd rather face a clubhouse full of armed Mayans than this. But—. Before his fear could overcome him, he grabbed for the ladder and stomped a boot on the top rung. From the east, as the sun crept high enough to clear the buildings, the first ray of sunlight pierced the lot.
"Wait!" Clay was jogging over. Despite everything, the barked order stopped Tig with one foot still on the roof.
"Why—? How—?" Juice stammered from further along the roof. Raising his head, Tig saw his brothers were clustering along the roof toward him, though they were peering past him rather than at him. Juice's eyes had grown round as he stared past Tig.
Tig wasn't sure he wanted to know what they were looking at, but curiosity won in the end, and he twisted so he could glance across his shoulder. The beam of early morning sunlight was creeping in across the lot; whenever it touched one of the ghosts, the damn thing faded. What the fuck—?
He sought out Donna's form, in the front line of what was left of the throng. He thought he could see the concrete of the parking lot shimmer behind her—through her—as she tilted her head back and those empty eyes met his. Tig's mouth went dry.
"I'm sorry," he mumbled, not caring who might hear, even though he thought he heard Clay suck in a breath in wordless warning. "I'm sorry." He wasn't stoned out of his head on mushrooms this time, but he still meant every word of it.
Someone—Chibs, Tig saw when he whipped his head back around—slammed a hand on his shoulder and hauled him back onto the roof with the rest of the club, even as they let out a collective breath. "It's over." Chibs announced. "The night's passed."
Stumbling to find his footing, Tig again looked down over the edge of the roof. The sunlight had at last reached Donna: within the next blink of an eye, she was gone, just like the rest of 'em. Tig thought he could still feel her gaze on him, though.
He scrubbed a hand through his hair. His hands were shaking, he noticed. He stuffed them into his pockets, not wanting anyone to see.
Chibs was wrong. It wasn't over. Not for Tig. For him, it never truly would be.
Disclaimer: this story is a transformative work based on the Fox 21/FX Productions/Linson Entertainment/Sutter Ink television series Sons of Anarchy. It was written for entertainment only; the author does not profit from it nor was any infringement of copyright intended. Please do not redistribute elsewhere without the author's consent.