More protective Roman coming up in this one or maybe that should be adorably protective/panicky Roman?
Skovko, Look at you getting in there first and being top of the list! Haha glad you liked it, I do love me some snarky Dean, plus I felt like I needed a little light moment for them. They probably deserved it!
Squeegee Beckinhime, Aww, thank you *blushes* glad you like the boys' dynamic. I just love writing them together, especially Dean and Roman (even though I'm missing Seth a bit in this one!)
Cheryl24, Oh yeah Bray is upping the crazy because that's what he does best. I honestly think horror movies took their cue from Bray rather than the other way around. He's going to get worse too!
Mandy, Protective Roman is the best and he's so naturally touchy feely with it too. More than happy to keep writing him being a big old teddy bear. Bray is certainly sniffing around and he's keen!
LHisawesome4ever, WWE creative not making more of The Shield vs. the Wyatt boys will always be such a bitter regret because it could have been so much longer/juicier. Least I can make up for it here!
Wolfgirl2013, Thank you, got a little more Bray coming up for you here!
Ohana1337, Aww, so glad you love the bromance. I'm such a sucker for these two as best friends who will do anything for each other and I'm missing that soooo bad on TV right now *cries*
Minnie1015, Back to work missy! Plenty of protective Roman (and a soupçon of protective Dean) still to come so best stock up on your horrible salty popcorn (sweet rules) as we go!
Stingerette1975, Bray sees Dean as a sort of kindred spirit, someone else who sees the world a little bit differently. In his head Dean is basically a Wyatt except Dean and Roman don't really see it like that!
Hayley1001, Thank you! Writing beaten up Dean and worried Roman will never grow old and hopefully it will keep us all going until we get the real thing back again (crosses fingers, toes and everything between!)
KiaraKitty08, Indeed, things are going to start moving from here on in. Expect drama and angst!
SkittlezLvr79, Bray is going to start a slow, steady campaign of winding the boys up in the hopes they explode! But luckily Dean has his number (sort of) in this chapter. Lots more twists and turns!
Cherry619, I loved the Dean/Bray feud but will forever regret Roman being out injured because him hovering and being worried in the background would have been perfection! Hence this story!
Daisysakura, Awww, sorry you've been having a bad week *offers hug* but protective Roman is always the best medicine. If I could bottle him and sell him in capsule form then trust me I totally would!
Who wants more creepy Bray...
Village Of The Damned
They manage to make it right the way through to the morning without having to see Bray and his ugly beard again. Mainly because the guy is absent at dinner and in the main cell block for the rest of the evening after that.
Not that they mind it, well –
Dean doesn't mind anyway although his bigger frownier cellmate is less easily impressed and so instead spends the entire time glaring at the threshold and clearly expecting the guy to stroll straight back in, which maybe the copper blonde would also envisage were it not for the fact that he is mostly busy throwing up.
No pruno again for the rest of his existence.
Possibly even longer than that.
Fortunately by the time the grey light of morning swings back round to peek in through the frosted glass, the bulk of the nausea seems to have lifted and it leaves him feeling fresh and a whole hell of a lot more bright. Roman is slumbering like the dead as he always does and so accordingly Dean decides to let him sleep it in and therefore clambers quietly into his gaudy orange prison threads before stretching out his muscles and heading kitchenwards for the breakfast shift. In hindsight maybe it isn't the smartest of his limited brainwaves given that his nemesis is back wandering the halls, but then Dean isn't really the sort of person to change his habits based on what are still light and idle little threats, besides which he's been told on more than one occasion that he carries a healthy stubborn streak a mile wide and so chooses to simply keep forging on like always and is rewarded by making it into the chow hall unharmed. In fact it even makes him chuckle momentarily in a wry type of smugness and then snort in contempt.
Nothing to worry about here so why was he worried?
But beneath his usual eleven layers of bravado lies a much more real and pervading sort of fear because whatever the hell Bray Wyatt has in store for him it is eerie and unnatural.
He has known that all along.
Bullyings and beatings in the traditional definition of the variety that happen with fists and feet are fine, because he knows what they're like and on the streets of his childhood had been hauled off and bloodied up plenty of times. Including the week before his arrest for possession – with the crucial legal addition of intent to supply – that had landed him his twenty four month sentence in the big house but which had all been set rolling by a knuckle duster to the ribs and the bag of white powder that had been shoved into his fingers with the instructions to sell the damn stuff or else.
Yeah –
Brutal beatings are nothing new for Dean Ambrose but then that isn't what Bray Wyatt is doing to him and instead there is some weird ass affection like the swamp beast is somehow hurting him for his own good or like the copper blonde is some poor bewildered puppy dog being booted and then wagging its stumpy tail back. Even worse is the fact that the bayou hillbilly is mesmeric with the same magnetism that lures bugs towards zapper lights or lemmings to the edge of towering cliff tops or turkeys right into a rifle's waiting path.
Bray is like some fucking shaman.
In other words therefore, he just straight up isn't right.
Retrospectively speaking it's probably the reason that the copper blonde holds his breath when the hall doors open up and when the first flood of rumbling stomachs pad in heavily in a visual assault of tattoos, orange and beard growth.
Bray isn't there though.
Dean assumes that's a good thing but on the other hand his absence is troubling as well, because instead of cooling off the swirling burst of tension it actually manages to ramp it straight up since it isn't a case of Bray popping up again so much as it is a matter of when. The guy is like a bad fucking penny or perhaps an outbreak of the bubonic plague and the thought of his ugly and ever bearded moon face being carried across the country is still consuming Dean's head ten minutes later when Roman busts in worriedly and then blows out a breath of sheer relief on seeing him there.
Hell of a way to play it cool big guy.
Roman grabs a tray and then wanders across, trying to act like he isn't still sleep fogged and hasn't literally fucking fallen out of his bed and which would probably be pretty easy to pull off with conviction were it not for the fact that every button is done up wrong.
Dean grins at him as he draws in closer,
"You look like crap brother, an' I thought I was the hungover one."
Roman huffs a breath out,
"What the hell happened man? I thought we talked about this."
"Yeah, but you were there snorin' an' lookin' all cosy – 'sides – I'm a big boy an' everythin' y' know?"
Roman stares back,
"Uce."
Evidently he isn't buying it and his copper blonde cellmate knows instantly why that is and then remembers too late that he had promised the night earlier that he wouldn't move around without his burly minder in tow, because Roman at least is taking the swamp man threat seriously and far too seriously as it maybe turns out.
Dean rolls his eyes,
"Alright man, m' sorry, tomorrow I'll wake you up and we can walk down here hand in hand."
He smirks a little as he offers the apology like the totally smug asshole he usually is and in response Roman sighs but at the same time fights a smile back and slowly the big broad shoulders drop down.
"Idiot."
"Y' know it dude, now are you havin' some oatmeal or are we gonna stand here an' let it go cold?"
Roman puts his tray out and is about to give into it since he has started to grow oddly fond of the thick prison slop, but it stopped from having his usual breakfast when the chow halls doors bang loudly as they are both flung open wide and a round and bearded figure flanked by two tall associates traipses in through like he owns the damn joint and in response the splotch of oatmeal being passed across the sneeze guard falls aimlessly from the ladle and hits the countertop.
"Damn."
Bray.
He is standing on the threshold in his full paunchy glory with his arms outstretched and his head tipped right back and although his stance should draw anger and aggression, the chow hall around them has fallen oddly quiet and it makes the hairs on Dean's arms sort of prickle in a way that not even under torture would he admit as he scrubs them hard to make them lie flat again and then tries to pretend like his nemesis isn't thirty feet away.
"It's good to be back in the village of the damned."
Hell of a greeting.
Bray saunters through the doors and then stops and drags his finger across the tabletop before raising them up and then sucking on them.
Gross.
He pauses for a second and then pops them back out again, before licking his lips like he's savouring the tang, which must be a mixture of last night's chilli and then a following layer of anti-bacterial spray and scurf.
"Mmmm, tastes like home."
Dean actually shudders because god damn it all if it isn't fucking weird and the following silence across the busy and packed out chow hall is evidence enough that everyone else there feels the same. Maybe possibly with the exception of Roman, who is standing clenching his fists and glowering hard. Bray seems to notice or perhaps he infers it or else is clued into it by the voices in his head, because for whatever reason his narrow gaze snaps right round at them and is followed by a grin that is fucked up enough to burn. The asshole is beaming like a kid in a toy shop and nobody seems to want to break his nutso train of thought.
He tips his bearded head back further,
"I'm home boys."
His guttural bellow bounces clean around the room but finally appears to release the dazed prison guards who begin to shuffle forwards with their hands around their gun belts in a way which Dean hopes is the warning precursor to the jackass being dragged off to the solitary cells but instead turns out to be merely a reminder and in return the swamp demon holds up his meaty hands,
"I'll simmer down, you don't got to worry."
Dean snorts beneath his breath,
"Yeah, because you're totally sane."
Roman unclenches his fists in response to it as the gradual buzz of the chow hall strikes up again, but then shakes his head and blows a long breath out because the whole thing has been a step too far on the crazy train and if he keeps on glaring across the space any longer he is liable to launch over and give the swamp beast a right hook. Dean knows that without the big man telling him because at some point they have simply become pretty well attuned and it makes him grin a very little in the chaos since it's nice to have a guy in his corner for once.
Not that the smirk lasts all that long however –
Bray looking across pretty much kills it flat and seeing it slide from the copper blonde's feature makes the Hills Have Eyes reject bark to himself in a happy noise which sounds a lot like he's coughing up a hairball and which is technically possible but is actually a laugh.
Roman growls,
"That son of a – ,"
"Hey c'mon uce, you gotta stay calm."
For once it is the younger man who provides the voice of reason as he murmurs above the rising levels of noise, leaning himself over the hot steam of oatmeal and then gesturing roughly like he's looking for the right words. Behind them Bray has lumbered over to a table and dispatched his lackeys to bring him back food, whereupon he hooks his big ass feet on the seat opposite and then leans himself back like he's having a cut and blow dry.
Dean shakes his head then keeps on going,
"He wants you to lose your shit an' go haulin' over there but you gettin' your ass thrown into solitary won't help us."
Roman blows a breath out and then tries not to grumble because reluctantly deep down he knows Dean is right and even more than that has also probably hit on precisely what the bearded cult leader is placing his bets on, since it seems pretty obvious even to a novice that Dean will be far easier to get to on his own. Roman blowing his lid and steaming on over is therefore a great way to get that part done. He cannot afford to leave his cellmate unprotected and so sighs a second time and then throws his hands up,
"Alright uce, you win, I won't go on over there and wipe the smirk off his face with my knuckles."
"Probably best."
But in spite of the tension and their ever grinning nemesis there is a new sort of playfulness hung in the air and it extends to the bigger man rolling his eyes wearily and the copper blonde reaching out to pat him fondly on the chest, in much the same way that a coach might tap his fighter or a animal trainer might rub a grizzly bear and is done with lashings of awkward male fondness and an offhand little shrug of appreciation,
"Thanks though man – like – for havin' my back an' whatever."
He trails off with a cough and then a quick scratch of his head, which is achieved through the too flimsy plastic of his work gloves and possibly leaves a smear of oatmeal in his hair but which still makes Roman smile back at him vaguely and then raise a laconic looking brow,
"Sure thing babe."
He takes his tray and then bags himself a table as close as he can possibly get to the snaking breakfast line, picking a position where he know Dean can see him and where he can also keep tabs on the man trying to rile them up and which helps since the whole thing is beyond damn confusing and the proximity to the swamp brothers doesn't much help. Harper is in the queue like some lady in waiting and edging along the counter grabbing food for his boss while Rowan has evidently been placed on coffee duty as the pair of them flit about like a couple of overgrown slaves for hire. Dean wonders absently if either of them have missed it or if they resent being shoved around by Wyatt once more, which is then firmly answered as a tray of toast and jelly being carried by the tall Luke Harper lumbers right past accompanied by an unmistakable curled lip of warning as he bounds like a pooch towards its master's chosen chair.
Fortunately though none of them seem to want oatmeal and just slope back to their little table and leave everyone else alone, which is clearly not a status that is destined to last long but is a nice reprieve in the meantime from the glowering and means that when his breakfast shift whittles down, Dean goes to join his still hovering cellmate and feels comfortable enough to drop down into a seat because fuck what the swamp monster and his brethren are doing –
Dean isn't going to let them get to him.
He's not.
Roman sniffs in a note of displeasure then turns towards him impatiently,
"You ready to get out of here?"
"Sure. You mean prison, right? Because if that's the plan brother then you should probably know that I'm a pretty good lock pick."
Fond brown eyes flicker wryly back upwards but the bigger man snorts in amusement all the same, then slaps the table with his wide palm broadly which seems to act as a reminder to shift himself. Dean follows lazily, tugging the apron over his hairline and then flinging it in over the sneeze guard as they pass, not bothering to aim or pay any attention to where it flutters because the dawn shift is done and so he couldn't give a crap. Bray is still staring which he knows since he can feel it, but with Roman beside him it doesn't burn all that much and actually fuels him with enough cocky arrogance to throw a little self-assured swagger into his step and which lasts well beyond pushing their way out of the chow hall and back into the main and newly busy cell wing. He is grinning but it stops at a sight up ahead of him and he stops so suddenly that Roman walks right into his spine, before moving around to see what is happening and then issuing the question with the usual word.
"Uce?"
Dean points into the distance,
"Isn't that Truth's cell?"
Roman looks up in the direction of the jab and towards a nervy looking obvious newcomer who is being hustled with his belongings into an empty looking room. Dean blinks mildly and then looks back towards the bigger man with an expression of sheer resignation,
"Damn, that sucks."
"What sucks uce?"
Dean sighs roughly and then shrugs in world weariness.
"Truth must 'a been moved on too."
For him it is simply another prison departure of the type he has come to know only too well, but if had taken the time to look across at his cellmate then he would have seen a far different reaction slotting in and one that would likely have both confused and mildly troubled him, because Roman's thoughts are different.
Exactly how has he moved on?
Questions, questions, always more questions but in the next chapter Roman finds out a few answers for the first time...not that they are good answers though!
