Chapter Text
"...keeping up this camp charade and tricking kids to drink Kool-Aid, to sacrifice them-! Ohhh, wait."
Daniel looked from the now empty cup in his hand to the man he had previously been arguing with. David looked on curiously.
"Well, this certainly puts a damper on things," he stated and stood up from his crouched position.
"Huh?" David wasn't sure why Daniel had stopped their song, and he'd be lying if he said he wasn't disappointed it was cut short. "What's wrong?"
Daniel took a step towards David, the children all content with standing idly by for the moment. "It seems They have it in Their will for me to ascend today. Who woulda thunk it!"
Confused was an understatement at this point, David was completely dumbfounded. "Ascend? What?"
Daniel let out a little chuckle. "Don't be shy David, you can join us all in ascension too! There's plenty more punch, after all."
It was at this moment that David looked to the table where Daniel had the kids prepare the Kool-Aid. Packets of artificial grape flavoring littered the ground, along with empty water jugs, and...
"Rat poison?" David noted with alarm. He looked from the poison to the punch to the empty cup in Daniel's hand and gasped. "Oh my god, Daniel! You just drank rat poison! We need to get you to a hospital!"
Daniel held up a hand. "Don't be ridiculous. It's just my time to go, it seems."
"Someone must have mistook the poison for flavoring, somehow. But the box is so clearly labeled!" David was going on, barely registering what Daniel had said.
"Oh, no no," Daniel interjected with a laugh, "I added it! So you could all ascend together and become a part of the universe again. Now, you should all drink up and-"
".....You added rat poison?" Now David was interjecting. "You put poison in a drink for the kids?!"
"Of course!"
It took a moment to process that. How cheerfully he admitted to trying to kill children. Speaking of the children, they were still looking on the scene way too calmly for David's comfort. The same happy faces as before.
"What did you do to them?" He asked in a dangerously low tone.
"Purified them! I cleansed their souls of all that pesky free-will and negative emotion. No need to thank me!"
David stalked forward and decked Daniel in the jaw. Not the thanks he had in mind. Daniel staggered a bit, holding the spot where he'd been punched.
"What're you-?" He started before being cut off by David grabbing him roughly by the collar and pulling them face to face. Seeing as they were the same height, some of the effect was lost, but Daniel wasn't concerned with the theatrics of the moment.
David didn't move or say anything for a moment, just stared at him with the utmost contempt and disgust. Daniel was too confused -and frankly, a little scared- to try moving. And now that he thought about it, his stomach was starting to churn. It made a loud gargling noise. That seemed to snap David out of his thoughts, as he then kneed Daniel in the stomach.
Daniel dropped to his knees and doubled over, holding his abdomen. He retched up his stomach contents at David's feet. David stepped back quickly, trying not to look at the alarming amount of blood that came up in his vomit.
"This..," Daniel wheezed out, "this is fantastic!"
"What?"
"The Ancient Ones have finally deemed me worthy!" He hacked up more blood. "This is the best moment of my life!"
David detested the worry building in his gut. "I really do think we should get you to a hospital."
"Nonsense," Daniel said as he tried to stand up. His legs wouldn't cooperate and he ended up falling flat on his face. He curled up on his side and continued as if nothing was wrong. "This is obviously a sign that my time on Earth is done. My purpose is complete."
"I can't let you die on camp grounds; I've been given explicit instructions that any more deaths wouldn't be excused. I'm calling an ambulance." David couldn't believe he was trying to save the life of an attempted mass murderer, but the guilt of watching another human suffer like this was too much.
Daniel groaned, still clinging to his stomach. David was already on the phone with a 911 dispatch operator. She said they had about a 20 minute wait before the paramedics could arrive. David put his phone back in his pocket and looked at Daniel.
"The doctors will be here soon," he said dryly.
Daniel shook his head. "No doctors. Doctors are impure, they fill you with toxins."
David tried not to roll his eyes.
"I shouldn't even be helping you, you know. The least you can do is be thankful you pulled this stunt on someone with a conscience."
"I was helping you!" He managed to say through gritted teeth. "Ascending to Their domain is the highest honor imaginable."
The cult jokes Max had been making earlier finally clicked in his head. This guy was totally off his rocker, he thought. He felt like such an idiot for allowing a threat like this near the campers, and an even bigger idiot for apparently being the only one who didn't notice.
David had to check several times for a pulse while they waited. He also had been checking on the kids to see if he could snap them out of it.
He tried throwing cold water on Preston, to no avail. He shook Dolph around like crazy hoping for a reaction. Nothing. He was in the process of trying to force Nikki back in the Whatever-He -Called-It brain washing machine in hopes it would reverse the effects when the sirens were heard.
The paramedics wasted no time in rushing towards Daniel, who immediately started protesting. They backed off until David ran over.
"Oh thank God you're here!" He said in an overacted staccato, "I'm his brother and he needs help. He's been poisoned and isn't in a clear state of mind. Please help him!"
"We can't take a guy who doesn't want help," one of them stated.
"Please! He's my only brother and I love him! I can't loose him!"
He wouldn't be winning any Oscars any time soon for this performance, but it seemed to be working.
The paramedics seemed uneasy about basically kidnapping a man who didn't want help, but David had apparently appealed to their emotion and they lifted Daniel onto a gurney. He was kicking and screaming for them to let him die, how he needed to die, but their minds seemed made up.
David denied their invitation to ride along with him. /I need to watch the kids/, he said. He didn't mention his other need to whack him over the head with a chair, but they didn't need to know that.
The ambulance tore off towards a hospital and David was left with 10 brainwashed kids and an empty feeling inside.