Chapter 38

(All quiet on the western front.)

Chase eyed the old, rundown house for a few more minutes before rising to his feet. The house seemed just as silent and empty as it usually did but he knew better. He brushed the dirt from his knees and rolled his shoulders.

(Show time.)

With a slow grin, Chase turned his eyes black and extended his powers outwards. A cold chill went through his skin and with a pleased sigh; Chase raised his hand and ran his fingers through his recently grown long hair. He checked his hands and was pleased to see his fingers were longer.

(This is going to be too easy.)

--

Pogue's eyes fluttered sleepily under their closed lids but the empath hardly felt the desire to open them. While he had no idea when he had managed to slip off to sleep, he was beyond exhausted and relished the opportunity to rest somewhere comfortable.

Warmth was pressed tightly all around him, a feeling Pogue was more then content to get used to and the teen found himself automatically curling into the sensation. A shadow moved across his closed lids and reluctantly Pogue's eyes fluttered open. The first thing he noticed was the arm lying against his chest lazily and his eyes followed the limb towards a well-muscled shoulder.

He blinked his eyes a few more times, hardly believing the sight that greeted him. Caleb was sleeping peacefully next to him, his breath coming in thin puffs that blew against the side of Pogue's chest, raising goose bumps on the skin. The empath watched the enthralling sight for a few short moments before the events of the past few hours caught up with him.

Remembering the body lying next to him wasn't nothing more then a mindless doll Chase created, Pogue angrily shrugged the arm off his waist. How many times would he fall for that demented fucker's tricks? Ashamed and even more angry, Pogue rolled out of the bed – he still refused to call it his own, nothing in this damn room was his – and rubbed his face with his hands.

Damn Chase, he should've known that prick wouldn't give up Caleb so easily. He should've crushed that damn pendent when he had the chance; maybe then Chase would stop dicking around. The creature behind him sighed softly and Pogue felt the muscles inside his chest tighten painfully. Its appearance, its voice, everything about it was exactly like Caleb. It made his heart feel like it was in an icy grip, the exact same feeling he'd get whenever he was around the real Caleb.

(Christ that feels like years ago.)

While he knew it was impossible for three and a half months to be longer then a year, all of the shit he'd been through sure as hell made it feel like it. Four months ago, his life was simple, he wasn't a hundred percent happy with it, but at least Caleb was around to both ease his pain and increase it to an unbearable level.

With a sigh, Pogue numbly reached for his discarded clothes and started pulling them on. A shadow darkened the floor underneath his feet and feeling like someone was standing in front of him, Pogue slowly raised his head. A dark clothed figure stared down at him and after a few tense moments, the empath was relieved to see it wasn't Chase.

"Good morning." William Danvers smiled darkly before his hand swung forwards and slammed into Pogue's stomach.

The impact knocked the teen off the side of the bed and sent him sprawling across the floor. Pogue's loud yelp turned into a pained growl as he tried to regain his balance.

"What the fuck William?"

The elder's fingers latched around Pogue's neck and with a dark growl, William pulled the empath off the ground until they were face to face.

"You selfish brat, do you have any idea what you've done?"

Pogue tried to speak but the intense pressure around his throat made it difficult. His shock was also interfering with his ability to speak. Since when was William strong enough to touch him, never the less strangle him? He clawed at the powerful fingers at his throat but he wasn't nearly strong enough to force them off.

"William–"

"Was that sorry excuse of a creature entertaining enough for you? Was he better then my son?"

"William, please–"

"You were supposed to help him!"

"I am–"

"You've doomed him!" The elder yelled, the entire room seemed to shake from his anger.

Those three words made Pogue's blood run cold. "What?"

William narrowed his eyes dangerously and threw Pogue back down to the floor with a loud thud. The empath coughed as his chest heaved, trying to force air into his burning lungs now that William's strong fingers were gone from his throat.

"You're unbelievable, is there no intelligence in that damned head of yours? I can't believe Caleb was naive enough to think you could help him."

At that, Pogue turned his head and eyed the elder closely. He tried voicing his confusion, but his attempts died inside his burning throat before they could surface. Apparently, William had a pretty good guess what Pogue's question was because the elder answered him a short while later.

"Yes, Caleb was the one who wanted me to find you because he knew you'd help him. Apparently my son was wrong."

The last few words were said with a growl that made Pogue's insides feel cold once again.

"I am helping him, damn it..." Pogue snarled back and then coughed violently afterwards. "Chase won't have any more use for him when he's in his own body."

William blinked, his body standing completely still and Pogue hoped the elder would believe him. However, his hope was soon shattered as William took another step forwards and his fist crashed across the side of Pogue's mouth.

"And you honestly believe that boy's words?" The elder made his point with another bone-shattering punch. "The ritual will kill him, you moron!"

Pogue jerked his head upwards, ignoring the intense pain running though his body. "What?"

--

"Are you gonna ignore me all fucking day?"

Tyler turned his gaze away from the large window he was sitting near and eyed Reid coldly, giving the blond an obvious answer to his question.

"Jesus Christ, Tyler." Reid groaned and flopped heavily against the couch he was sitting on. "I'm sorry, okay?"

"For what?"

"I don't know, for whatever the hell you're mad at me for."

"Real original, Reid." The younger boy mumbled and turned his head back towards the window.

"Well fuck, Ty, what the hell do you want me to say? I don't know what the fuck you're mad at me for but lately you've been tearing my head off every day it seems for one reason or another. I don't know what the hell to do anymore."

A jolt of regret tugged at Tyler's heart but the younger covenant member refused to show it. He was tired of always being treated like he was nothing more then a child to anyone. He was tired of being left out of the information loop, especially when it concerned him or his well being.

"What you can do, Reid, is stop fucking treating me like I'm some helpless damsel you have to rescue all the time. I'm tired of being completely oblivious to everything."

Reid blinked, confused. "What do you mean?"

"Why didn't you tell me about Chase?"

His question seemed to strike a nerve somewhere inside of the blond because Reid seemed to curl in on himself.

"Because."

"Because, why?"

"Because I didn't want you to worry, alright?"

"You didn't want me to– Reid you hurt Pogue because of me!" Tyler practically shouted, not caring if Gorman heard them arguing or not.

"No. Pogue damn near took my head off because of you..." Reid snapped back, almost immediately regretting his outburst when Tyler's eyes darkened, signaling the boy was clearly hurt by his words. "Fuck, Ty, I didn't mean it like that."

"Then how did you mean it?" The younger boy asked darkly, turning his head away, wounded. "Apparently I'm nothing more then a child to everyone."

He knew his remark would earn an angry outburst from Reid but much to his surprise, the blond remained completely silent and got to his feet a moment later. Tyler watched him out of the corner of his eyes, half expecting him to storm out of the room. However, Reid didn't leave the room; instead, he slowly approached the window Tyler was sitting in front of and crouched down beside the younger boy.

"That's all you think you are to me?"

"You haven't really given me a reason to think otherwise, none of you have." Tyler mumbled softly, more hurt then angry.

"Ty."

Reid's fingers reached out and lightly touched the younger boy's shoulder. Tyler willed himself not to react to the blonde's touch, no matter how much he wanted to just curl in Reid's arms once again.

"I attacked Pogue because Chase ordered me to." The blond whispered ashamedly. "I did it to protect you."

"You're always protecting me, why? I can take care of myself damn it."

"I'd do anything to protect you Tyler, I love you."

There they were again, the three small words that always tugged painfully at Tyler's heartstrings when he heard them.

"Reid–"

The rest of the words dyed inside of the younger boy's throat as a figure entered the room and both boys' turned their heads towards it. Thankfully, it wasn't Gorman and both teens released a small sigh of relief.

Pogue eyed them with a curious expression and shook his head. "Want me to give you two a few minutes?"

"Dude, there you are. Where the hell did you go this morning? Gorman's been tearing the house apart looking for you." Reid asked as he removed his arms from Tyler's shoulders and got to his feet.

Pogue shrugged half-heartedly. "Went to go check on something, nothing serious."

"Yeah, well, tell that to Gorman, he's been going nuts all freakin' day."

"I'm sure he has." Pogue replied darkly and raised his arm in the air.

Tyler saw the movement out of the corner of his eye, immediately noticing that Pogue's eyes were turning black.

"Reid!"

His shout didn't reach the blond in time and before he could blink, Reid was thrown to the floor by a strong wave of Pogue's powers. Tyler bolted to his feet, ready to defend himself but he soon found himself thrown to the wall behind him and pinned to its surface. A cry tore from his lips as he tried to fight against the hold on his body but it was no use, the force was too intense for him to break.

Footsteps soon grabbed his attention and when Tyler glanced upwards, it wasn't Pogue standing in front of him.

"Hello, Tyler." Caleb purred darkly as he stepped closer.

--

(Goddamn it, William.)

Pogue hissed as he lightly ran his fingers across his bruised face, hoping to god that nothing would feel broken. The cause of his injures was sitting a few feet away, his dark eyes boring deeply into Pogue's skull.

"You deserve worse. Be thankful I'm not strong enough to do more."

"And you're lucky I can't fucking touch you." Pogue snapped back. "Although god only knows how the hell you were able to do this."

"I can do a lot in this place boy, don't test my patience."

Pogue rolled his eyes bitterly, but forced his remark to remain silent and asked a more pressing question. "What do you mean the ritual will kill Caleb?"

"It means, boy, that if Chase performs that godforsaken spell my son will die. It substitutes one life for another. Do I need to spell it out for you?"

"Fuck off!" The empath snapped, his temper had already risen way beyond his control.

The elder Danvers eyed him with disdain. "You're just as useless as I feared you'd be."

"Gee thanks, it's not like you're any fucking help either. You could've told me this when you first spoke to me."

"My apologies, I thought I made it perfectly clear you couldn't let that boy go through with this."

"You could've been clearer!"

"Would you have listened? Caleb suffered alone for three months before you tried to help him."

"I didn't know where the hell he was, William, none of us did! Where the hell were you?"

"I was protecting him! Which is more then I can say you have been doing."

With an enraged cry, Pogue lunged forwards and swung as hard as he could at William's face, channeling as much of his powers into the attack as he could. It connected, heavily, and William stumbled for a few short feet before he regained his footing. For a while, the two men seemed frozen, neither of the two daring to move until the elder Danvers raised a hand to the side of his mouth.

His lip wasn't bleeding but Pogue felt for sure it would have been if William was human, hell he knew if the fucker were flesh and blood, he'd be sprawled across the floor. Pogue risked a glance at his hand, which was still frozen in the air and blinked. His knuckles were split open from the impact and a few, dark drips of blood ran down the back of his hand.

"Fine, be Chase's little puppet." William growled darkly, straightening himself up. "But if you let that son of a bitch perform the ritual I won't hold back. I'll tear every goddamn piece of flesh from your bones if you put my only son in danger."

Pogue finally tore his gaze away from his hand and gazed at William fearfully, hardly bring himself to believe what he had just done.

"William–"

The lights in the bedroom dimmed as William vanished from its center, leaving Pogue alone, or as close to alone as the empath could get with the incubus still sleeping undisturbed in the bed behind him.