Chapter Text
In hindsight, Alex should have intervened, because Druid was simply... gone. He was gone, nowhere to be found, and Alex was... quietly concerned about it. He couldn’t sense him, couldn’t track him, and that was disturbing.
Humans were odd creatures, always so clever, able to change at the drop of a hat. They evolved, and Alex was living proof of that. He was proof that evolution had gone too far, in fact.
Even so, to hide Druid from him... He didn’t like that. None of his superpowers were working to locate him, so Alex had to turn to magic. He didn’t often touch magic. It was too unpredictable, wild and untamed, and he didn’t like it. When it came to his power, he liked things he could control. Magic was not something that could be controlled, only directed, and he knew that. Oh, gods, did he know that. But, he had little choice in the matter, because Morgan was going to be asking him to check up on Druid before long, and if he told him he didn’t know where he was—
Well... Needless to say, Alex didn’t think that would go over well.
So, magic it was, Alex thought as he sank into the depths of astral projection. Billions of lights on the planet, but he was looking for one specific soul. It was twisted, mutated, not quite human, and it was big, to his knowledge. Far larger than the body that held it, and wasn’t that strange? Wasn’t that so, so strange? He didn’t know, but he didn’t like it. He didn’t like it at all.
He shifted through the billions of lives, plodding out through their little mundane existences he was so fascinated with, and there. There it was, in the Appalachian mountains, and there were two other souls just like his, too big for their bodies, twisting, turning, and painfully unstable. He could tell they were at the ends of their ropes, prone to snap at any moment, and that was concerning and a half.
He didn’t like that.
He pressed, sinking further and further down into the ether, and then, he teleported.
He was in a room, with a beeping monitor. Druid was locked down to a gurney, with all sorts of tubes sticking out of him, monitors hooked up to him, and he looked like he was in pain, even as they kept him under.
Alex stared at him, twitching slightly, because he remembered this. Oh, gods, he remembered this. The way they poked and prodded like he was an insect, testing the limits of what he could do, and he didn’t like it. No, he didn’t like it very much at all.
It took the scientists a moment to realize he was in the room with them. A female scientist turned from getting her readings and jumped a mile high in the air with a scream, and Alex gave her a feral smile.
“Hello, Dr. Tiffany Porter,” he said, pulling her name out of a hat. “What do you think you’re doing to this kid?”
He didn’t like this. He didn’t like this at all.
“GET THE ZEROES!” she bellowed, but before she could hit the alarm button, Alex snapped her out of existence. Quick, painless death. Better than she deserved, he thought, and an alarm started to wail.
“ALEX CRENN IS IN THE BUILDING, EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY!” a man hollered into a speaker, and Alex snapped his fingers. He let out a broken groan, more of a gurgle, as he split in two, unfolding to reveal all of his organs, turned inside out, and Alex looked down at Druid. He was still unconscious, and Alex waved away all of the tubes hooked up to him, blinking them out of existence, along with the restraints. Druid stirred lightly, his eyebrows coming together, and Alex swept him up and held him bridal style just as—
Two boys, really, burst into the room as the alarm wailed and lights flashed. Alex stared them down, taking in their appearance. One was about twenty, the one he saw before, with the black hair and red eyes, honeycomb scarring on his throat and hands, that had healed roughly, far more rough than Druid’s smooth scars.
“Put down our little brother,” said the other one, and Alex turned his gaze on him. He was dressed in a Star Wars shirt, cuffed jeans, and red high tops, and he looked pale and terrified. Same honeycomb scars, healed equally roughly, with curly brown hair pulled back in a messy bun. Golden eyes, just like Alex’s, and Alex grinned at him.
“No,” he said, and hefted Druid up higher.
The boys exchanged glances. The other one couldn’t be older than sixteen. They were just kids, and they were about to try to fight him. Ridiculous. Alex teleported Druid away, to the safety of the apartment, and the boys... split.
The one with black hair twisted, his body carving itself open to spill out tentacles and a void appeared before Alex, taking off his leg at the joint, and brief pain flared before he restored it. The tentacle monster continued to grow, forming a creature from nightmares, with an open maw with rows of teeth, and it clicked for Alex.
Oh... Oh, these fools.
They mixed human and eldritch DNA.
Idiots.
The other boy split, forming a creature with far too many eyes, whereas the other had none, with a massive halo, hundreds of heads of different animals, and Alex knew if he was a regular human, his brain would be melting right about now. How tiresome. They couldn’t even control their aura.
What the fuck were these humans thinking? These eldritch creatures were too young, too inexperienced, for Alex to really enjoy the fight. He had fought many eldritch creatures, and even the oldest ones were boring. They didn’t know what to do when it actually came down to combat, because they never had to fight. They just broke people’s brains and moved on.
He considered it for a moment, and then he forced them back into their mortal, human forms. There was a screech of pain as he rewrote their DNA, and the older one collapsed to the floor, panting hard. He was shaking, and the other one, the younger one, was flat on his back, shaking and shivering.
“Yeah, you’re coming with me,” Alex said, and snapped his fingers. Immediately, they went limp, boneless, and he teleported them back to the apartment before he looked around.
Clearly, they were trying to find a way to kill him, or fight the eldritch. Not that the eldritch would ever actually attack. That required effort, and the eldritch were notoriously lazy. Who signed off on this? Some reactionary politician? Probably. Even so...
He considered it for a moment. He could send this place to the ground, kill everyone that had anything to do with it, but that would bring heat on him and Morgan. And he wasn’t sure he wanted to do that. He had already stolen the kids, though, so...
Ah, fuck it, he thought, and snapped his fingers. The world rewound, twisting, turning dangerously, and everyone implicated ceased to exist, as if they had never been there at all. Morgan would approve. He didn’t like it when so called ‘heroic’ institutions experimented on children, and Alex knew he would be fine with it. A couple of politicians vanished, some military leaders, but it was mostly scientists and the like. Then, he snapped his fingers again, and the entire research facility disappeared, replaced by the old growth that they had cut down to make room for it. Creatures in the Appalachian Mountains stirred, and Alex could feel their gratefulness filtering down to him. He caught a memory of the one with black hair cackling maniacally as he absolutely thrashed one of the Old Ones that lived here in a fight when the Old One tried to take him on, and Alex rolled his eyes. He didn’t do it for them, he did it to get brownie points with Morgan.
With that, he reappeared in the apartment, where all three boys were passed out on the living room floor, and there was Morgan, standing there in an apron, spatula in hand, looking supremely displeased.
“What did you do?” he asked as Alex moved to the fridge and got out a Dr. Pepper. It wasn’t cold enough, so he chilled it in his palm and popped it open.
“Research facility interbreeding the eldritch and humans popped up, and I knew you don’t like child experimentation, so I took care of it,” Alex replied and took a sip of the Dr. Pepper.
“... Huh?” Morgan asked, and Alex stared at him for a moment, longing to get a kiss for his good deeds.
“Hm?” he asked as he realized his brain was wandering, and Morgan stared at him blankly.
“You did what? ”
“Your favorite new vagabond is apparently half eldritch,” Alex said casually and took another sip of Dr. Pepper. “They were experimenting on him, so I took care of the problem. He should be able to run now with just the FBI looking for him, instead of a shady government organization with the actual resources to capture him.”
Morgan stared at Alex blankly, and then gestured to the other two boys.
“And what about the other two?” he demanded, and Alex shrugged.
“Other experiments,” he said, swallowing down more Dr. Pepper. “I handled it. They’re just unconscious.”
“You put three eldritch monster babies in my apartment? ” Morgan’s voice cracked, and Alex blinked at him.
“If they break your brain, don’t worry, I’ll fix it,” he said, and Morgan gesticulated wildly.
“That’s not the problem here!” he exclaimed. “I’m not worried about my brain!”
“Then, what are you worried about?” Alex asked, and Morgan blinked.
“All of it??” he replied, and Alex blinked.
“I thought you wanted Druid back?”
“I never said that!”
“It was implied.”
“Okay, so what if it was!” Morgan said, and he was bright red now, embarrassed to be caught, and Alex grinned, wishing he could press a kiss to the tip of his nose.
“Welcome to fatherhood, Morgan,” he said sweetly, and Morgan blinked.
“That one looks grown,” he said and pointed to the black haired one with void manipulation.
“Fatherhood can start at any age,” Alex said in a singsong voice and turned aside. “Should I wake them up?”
“Wha— No! ”
It was too late. Alex set down the Dr. Pepper on the counter and clapped, and the three boys surged to wakefulness.
“Chop, chop, I think I destroyed all your clothes, so we’re robbing Target!” he said cheerfully, and the boys all scrambled back in unison, staring at him with wide, wide eyes.
“Wh—” the black haired one said, and Alex dropped into a crouch in front of him.
“You took off my leg,” he cooed. “Should I return the favor?”
The black haired one yanked back his legs, and Alex laughed.
“Kidding, kidding!” he said and straightened up. “Okay, no, seriously. Robbing Target?”
All four males in the room stared at him, and he beamed at them. Morgan rubbed his eyes, muttering under his breath, and Alex clapped his hands together.
“Let’s go! I’ll drive!” he said, and turned for the door. “Druid, you stay here, you don’t have any shoes.”
He was in literal hospital pajamas, and that wouldn’t do, not at all. Ah, this was fun. He wondered if their eldritch parents would try to lay claim to them. Probably not. They didn’t care for human concepts such as children and parenthood. Ah, well. He and Morgan would cope. This was great.
What the fuck was he doing?