Work Text:
[ This fic is based on a snowy fanart by MadPanda that I can no longer find online. Anyone know how to contact MadPanda? I can't find a working contact and their tumblr is gone. ]
[Music: Wicked Game by Chris Isaak (Cover by Gemma Hayes) ]
Black Hat always said they were business trips.
That was fine, though Flug had personally seen no evidence of such. He never complained about them, despite knowing full well that they under-utilized his abilities. While their scheduling was unpredictable, he generally found the time away from usual projects to be a welcome reprieve, and his deadlines were always shifted to accommodate.
It was a little different each time. Sometimes he was merely expected to fly Black Hat to a destination city and wait, which he didn't mind, reasoning that less ostentatious travel than by Hatship or teleportation or shapeshifting could only help keep Black Hat's abilities and movements less known. It seemed like a useful tactic.
Sometimes rather than simply waiting, though, Flug was also expected to drive one of Black Hat's hearses to a further destination. Flug always liked that part, particularly after dark - speeding through the night, the whole world contracted down to only the part of the road illuminated by the headlights, nothing to interrupt the steady process of transportation that forced everything else to wait for its completion. It was a relaxing liminal space almost, but not quite, outside of his usual reality.
It also afforded him the rare opportunity to be in his employer's presence without interruption. It wasn't that these excursions didn't regularly involve long stretches of utter silence punctuated by insults and angry backseat driving, or being commanded to pull over should his boss sight a particularly ripe-looking road-killed animal. (He tried to refuse the latter as a matter of course; a few times, he'd even succeeded.)
It was that for those small spaces of time, there was nobody else in the world. Flug could revel in that beyond anything else, Black Hat chose him above all others for being exactly who he was, and he was exactly where he wanted to be. In all the noise of his everyday life that could be difficult to remember.
But driving from airfield to destination - a significant distance this time - was exactly what had gotten them into the present situation.
Flug wasn't entirely sure, but had a dreadful feeling that he'd pushed too far this time. He hadn't been well-rested before they'd left (in excess of his usual inadequate sleep). He couldn't remember clearly, but there was a chance that maybe, just maybe, in the comfortable quiet, and mesmerized by dry, sparse snow snaking in the headlights, he'd begun to doze at the wheel.
What he did clearly recall was a flash of something in the headlights - a deer maybe, though its head had been very lightly colored and the eyes very dark, so that in the glimpse he'd gotten, he thought it was a skull. And then the thing had leapt away again, but by that point, it had been too late.
He'd braked hard, and swerved, and the hearse had hit a patch of ice, and the only thing he could do to regain control was get them to the side of the road. Unfortunately the maneuver left them stranded in a ditch that had been hidden at the road's edge. Trying to back out only spun the wheels in the dirt.
"Did I tell you to wreck, you graceless clod!" Black Hat snarled from the back seat.
Flug winced. "I'm sorry, Jefe -" He caught sight of Black Hat glowering in the rear view mirror. "-cito?" If his hands hadn't been shaking from adrenaline rush, they'd have begun to shake anyway. He did not like that expression. He spoke faster, hunching his shoulders in anticipation of outburst as he turned to look at his employer directly. "I didn't want to hit the... deer...? And damage the car? Sir? Boss? M-maste-"
"Well done," Black Hat snorted in probable sarcasm, unexpectedly stone-faced, unlike his reflection. "Save your platitudes, doctor. The destination is less than a mile away."
Flug relaxed fractionally, but frowned, first at the hearse's dimly lit GPS on the dashboard and then at the utter darkness outside. The windshield in front of him was already beginning to fog up, but so far as he could tell, there was nothing but thick forest outside, neither light nor structure in sight. He turned off the headlights, and tapped at the edge of his goggles to adjust the light settings, and only then could he make out that the road curved a few hundred feet ahead, the thick woods hiding anything beyond.
"What's the hold up." It wasn't a question.
Flug startled - Black Hat was standing at the drivers' side door, gloved fingers drumming on the glass. There had been neither sound nor change in temperature to indicate that he'd opened the rear door, so he probably hadn't.
"You're - we're walking?" Flug asked, just to be sure.
"Are you injured?" Black Hat drawled, and Flug was suddenly grateful for the glass between them - pointless as it was - if only because his employer took the opportunity to appear a little predatory.
"N-no, sir."
"Then yes, there will be walking, if it is an activity you ever wish to partake of again!" Despite the fact that he could see his boss on the other side of the glass, a little greenish saliva dripping from his unspeaking leer, the voice hissed in Flug's ear as though Black Hat were in the bag with him.
Flug believed that he would eventually become inured to such harassment. Today was not that day. He gasped in shock, frozen tense, but this time managed not to cry out. "Yes sir," he squeaked the moment that he could unlock himself enough, and pulled the keys and reached for the latch.
The door swung open before he touched it, though Black Hat didn't appear to touch it either, instead standing prim in the middle of the empty road with both hands resting on his cane.
Flug stepped out of the hearse, wrapped his peacoat around himself tightly, and followed.
He knew better than to ask about the destination, or what sort of business transaction was involved. If that could possibly have any relevance to him, or him to it, he'd be informed. Instead, Flug took stock of the environment.
There was a very light dusting of snow on the ground - just enough to make it gleam just a little brighter than it would otherwise in the moonlight that filtered dimly through the thick cloud cover. The road itself was clear, but Flug knew that this was a deception - it had still been sun-warmed when the minimal snow had fallen, so it wasn't visibly covered, but the dry snow still blew across its surface, and patches that had accumulated enough precipitation to melt now sported black ice, like the patch that had caused their current predicament.
He could hear his breath against the inside of his paper bag, and knew it was fogging, if only by the puffs of slightly warmer, damp air against his throat. He couldn't help shivering and sighed, folding his arms tightly.
"What now," Black Hat growled, some paces ahead.
Flug decided that he shouldn't be surprised that he'd been heard. "It's - it's just a bit cold, sir." It was freezing. Or rather, the heads-up display in his goggles had informed him that it had been freezing when he'd exited the hearse. It was now several degrees below. The temperature had dropped quickly enough to be concerning.
"Name a color," Black Hat snapped.
"Sorry?"
"Did I stutter?"
"Uh." Flug swallowed nervously. It wasn't as though there was a wrong response to that command, given the parameters. Knowing Black Hat, that might not be the case, though. "Um. Yel-yellow?"
The most evil being on the planet barely looked at him, as he waited for Flug to catch up. He raised his hand from his cane - which conveniently remained at ready, standing upright next to him - and pulled open his coat, reaching in with his other hand. When the doctor came up next to him, Black Hat withdrew his hand and flicked it outward almost dismissively, barely looking as he flung something toward Flug's throat.
This time the doctor managed to yelp and flinched back, reaching up to grab whatever had just circled his neck, only to find nothing but a warm woolen scarf in a yellow-based plaid. Flug stared at the cloth draped over his hands in confusion. It was not a snake, and did not dissolve into hundreds of creepy-crawlies, nor did it burst into flame. It was simply a scarf.
He stared at it for a bit too long. It remained a scarf. Something was wrong and he couldn't figure out what it was and the longer he stared and the scarf remained nothing but a scarf, the closer Flug came to panic.
"What's wrong, don't you know how to put it on?" Black Hat huffed, wrapping a similar (but red and black) scarf around his own neck.
"Uh," Flug said with as much eloquence as he could muster.
Scowling - but still baring multiple pointed teeth - Black Hat whirled and snatched the material back from Flug's hands, and then roughly looped the long scarf twice, loosely knotting the ends so that the tails hung down his back. "It wouldn't do to have you freeze to death yet," he muttered with absolutely no eye contact whatsoever. Then he turned and took up his cane again and simply kept walking, cane swinging and tapping rhythmically with each step.
It took Flug another few stunned moments to remember that he was also supposed to be walking. It was just a scarf. It was really just a scarf.
It wasn't just a scarf. None of him felt cold at all, now, regardless of the fact that his goggles indicated another drop in temperature just in the past few minutes.
Well then.
...Hold on. Yet?!
Before long, a light appeared up ahead - their destination, Flug could only assume. But the closer they approached, the more the light failed to resolve into any sort of structure, revealing only a rudimentary wooden bench gleaming beneath a cheery electric streetlamp. There was a sign of some sort attached to the lamp post.
The bench looked a bit like either it had grown in place, or was old enough that the accompanying light - in the middle of the proverbial deep dark forest - made little sense. The snow that had dusted the surrounding woods appeared to have missed landing on the bench entirely, too, despite there being no shelter.
But what else could someone traversing this dense forest on foot at night hope to find, but a bus stop at which to rest and wait for transportation?
"That's a trap," Flug said aloud. "That's a really, really obvious -"
"Bravo. Shut up." Black Hat simply approached the bench, disappeared his cane, and sat down.
The doctor paused, debating for only a moment before he shrugged and sat down as well. There was nothing in existence that could be more threatening than his boss, so what did it matter if this was a trap. "Okay so... what now?"
"We wait."
Flug frowned. "For the... person... or whatever, that set the trap?"
"For the client."
Flug's goggles gave an almost inaudible beep to inform him that the temperature had dropped to what, without the scarf, would have been dangerous levels. He ignored the warning appropriately. "Right."
Nothing happened, and nothing happened again, except for the temperature lowering still more. Even with the apparently enchanted scarf, Flug thought dimly that it felt nearly as comfortably cool as his cryobed. He fidgeted a little, nervously twitching one knee, until he noted the conspicuous lack of any movement whatsoever next to him - Black Hat remained still as a statue, staring patiently into the lightless woods barely visible across the road. So Flug made an effort to keep still for fear of becoming an irritant. Well, more of an irritant than Black Hat was willing to tolerate at the moment.
It began to snow. Large compound flakes drifted down in the still air, and it was so quiet that Flug could hear them striking the foliage around them.
Nothing continued to happen.
Flug's stomach growled - it seemed loud in the stillness - but if Black Hat noticed he gave absolutely no indication. It didn't matter. Flug was embarrassed anyway, and huddled a little more tightly, head down. No matter how normal or outside conscious control, it always seemed especially mortifying to him to suffer any such indication of mortal, human physiology around his boss. He had to face it - he was likely intolerably disgusting to an entity of will and malevolence. Drooling and carrion-eating, among other things, aside.
He realized that he was suddenly starving. Huh. When was the last time he'd eaten? Usually he just kept to a schedule and never had to deal with the distraction of hunger - if not for the schedule he'd forget to eat for far too long anyway. Hunger didn't register well for him. But here he was, ravenous.
His breath came out in a huff as he folded his arms even more tightly. He could always chew on his boss if it came down to a survival situation. It'd probably kill him one way or another, of course, but he could.
Ha. They'd been out of the stranded car for less than an hour, the snow was barely laying on the ground, and already he was considering cannibalism. Well, not cannibalism. Not at all actually. Not remotely.
What was Black Hat, when it came down to it? Besides a creature that took pleasure in being as unsettling and disgusting as possible. The embodiment of a concept? A corporeal idea that had taken on a personality of his own? An inter-dimensional being that casually redefined shape, life, death, reality...
He was real. That was a start. Solid, if not noticeably warm (unlike the scarf he'd provided), right next to Flug. Silent, and unusually still, but just as visible as anything else. Flug turned his bowed head slightly. Scent. Smoke, corpses, the dirt underneath a rock, the rot of ancient leaves in still sun-warm water...
What did Black Hat taste li-
What the hell?! Flug's eyes snapped open. He couldn't remember when he'd closed them, or when he'd started leaning against his boss, dozing - but he was excruciatingly aware that he'd just been turning his face toward Black Hat's sleeve and opening his mouth. Oh god, he'd be lucky to survive this with his life, never mind his job -
"Don't move."
Black Hat's whisper sounded like it was inside his bag again. Flug abruptly stilled as much as was possible for a human experiencing an anxiety attack.
Instead, something across the road moved.
Without moving his head - he didn't want to spook whatever it was - Flug lifted his gaze to the woods. He could just see the movement in the thick foliage. A deer? Was it that same damned deer?! He was so hungry that he could pounce on it and tear its throat out with his teeth.
He blinked, grinding his teeth, a thread of anger cutting through drowsiness and hunger and fear. Why couldn't he stop thinking about -
It wasn't a deer. It crept forward.
It had paws. Hands.
It crouched like a primate, neither entirely quadrupedal nor bipedal, all long limbs and bones and spines and shreds of decaying hide. Its head was indeed skull-like, with the appearance of a large deer, but with the teeth of a carnivore. It was crowned with a magnificent rack of antlers like sharpened trees.
It stopped in front of the bench, huffing, icy bone muzzle within inches of the scarf. Its breath smelled even more of rotted meat than Black Hat's, and did not fog, despite the air temperature now dipping below zero.
Flug's breath was fogging. It was also coming faster, in puffs that the beast couldn't miss. It was staring him down with black hollow eyes, and there was nothing in those sockets but the dark of underground where no natural light had ever shone.
And he was. So. Hungry.
Screw this. He'd stashed multiple prototypes in his coat for travel; if he could just get his hand into his coat, any one of them would suffice to eradicate this threat.
Before Flug could move (or remember that he'd been told not to), the beast shrieked, its head violently jerked aside.
"Force a vehicle from the road, lower the ambient temperature, and wait for the survivors to do your work for you," Black Hat sneered. "Your hunting has become lazy."
The monster thrashed with a strained squealing sound, as though it were unaccustomed to vocalizing in this manner at all. It didn't matter. The claws of Black Hat's right hand were hooked nearly all the way through the lower jaw of the skull-head at the mandibular symphysis, and his grip remained steady despite the way the beast tried to toss its head. Somehow, it seemed unable to contact either of them, despite repeatedly lifting and replacing its hand-paws in a distressed dance.
None of this discouraged Flug from instinctively shrinking back against the bench at the violent movement.
"Stop stalling," Black Hat snapped, holding out his other hand, palm upward. "What made you even think you could look at something of mine? How far did you really think you'd get? Fool."
The beast quieted, finally settling on its haunches with a whimper, and after a still moment it opened its fanged jaw - though with Black Hat's claws still unmoving, it had to shift awkwardly to tilt its head back. Six glowing pinpricks floating in smoky multicolored auras rose up from inside. They curled wispy tendrils over Black Hat's waiting palm and abruptly vanished as he snapped his hand shut.
He opened his hand again and gestured impatiently, and the monster coughed, producing one further soul that drifted into Black Hat's waiting hand.
"There we are. Was that so difficult?" He closed his hand again, and the light vanished. "Keep up this pace, and you'll be free in, oh, another century or so." The demon grinned, showing more sharp teeth than the bare skull in front of him.
The monster made another whining sound. Black Hat withdrew his claws and roughly flung the skull-head aside. The beast collected itself in a second, and bounded off into the forest, disappearing entirely.
Flug sat very still for a moment, and Black Hat didn't immediately move either, despite the fact that Flug was leaned tight against him.
"That was a wendigo," the doctor said in shock.
"Don't be ignorant," Black Hat snapped, adjusting his cuffs. "Things like that wish that's what they were."
Flug curled forward, bag crinkling as he held his head. Even with that being the case, he was certain that it didn't make that creature less of a threat. "Why did you - why am I here," he groaned, barely a question.
"It can't sense me without contact. How else was I to draw it out?" The snow was still coming down, the fall intense enough that it was actually dusting Black Hat's hat, though Flug hadn't the presence of mind to wonder why this was allowed.
"It made a bus stop," Flug muttered, absorbed by wrapping his mind around what had just happened. "It made a bus stop to trick people it drove off the road into sitting exposed and waiting for it."
"Hmph." Black Hat brushed at his knees as he stood. "I made the bus stop and left it here so that thing would grow used to it. Much easier than having to hunt it down every time its payment is due."
"You used me as bait."
"We've been over this already," Black Hat said with a scowl. "Do you intend to stay here indefinitely or will you be returning to the car?"
Flug obediently pushed himself to his feet, following without really watching where he was going, lost in thought. He couldn't decide whether he should be upset or not, given that apparently everything had proceeded exactly according to Black Hat's plan. And Flug could certainly appreciate a flawless plan, even if he was disinclined to appreciate his place in it.
It was actually beginning to feel a little more cold, though his goggles said that the temperature had climbed back toward freezing. It seemed that the scarf that Black Hat had produced for him wasn't keeping him unnaturally warm the way it had been - doubtless it had only been counteracting whatever magic that creature had been using.
Still. Black Hat had thought to give it to him. Flug realized that at no point had his employer failed to safeguard against losing his bait.
He'd never intended to allow harm to come to what was his.
Flug almost laughed, but caught himself. He didn't need the scarf to keep him warm after all. Being undeniably useful enough to be so valued was... something. It was satisfying.
After another minute of silent walking in snow that somehow showed no tracks, he sighed. This was successful completion of a project, even if it hadn't technically been his project. "So... that's it?"
"Eh?" Several paces ahead again, Black Hat looked over his shoulder. "You're complaining now?"
"I'm just a little surprised, is all. I was starting to think you had me out here for the company, instead of, well..." Flug snorted, unable to resist. "The Company."
Black Hat stopped in his tracks and rounded on his scientist. "What."
Amused at his own joke, Flug missed the warning tone entirely. "Well, I mean. Sometimes it seems like you just want to spend time -"
"What possesses you to think that a nigh-immortal being like myself could ever be concerned about spending time with a flicker of existence like you?!"
They stared at each other. Flug's expression was unreadable beneath his bag, but he definitely saw the way that Black Hat's annoyed sneer became just a little less wide, and the way his brow raised fractionally, the moment the words left his mouth.
There was no sound but the almost imperceptible hiss of snowflakes on leaves.
Flug dropped his gaze first, as usual. "Out of the Manor," he said quietly.
"Mm?" Black Hat didn't change the set of his mouth, but his brow furrowed more deeply again.
"I was saying that sometimes it seems like you just want to spend time out of the Manor."
The demon stared a few moments more before his upper lip curled and the sharpened sneer returned full-force. "Pfeh!" He spat dismissively as he turned on his heel, the droplets sizzling where they struck the cold asphalt. "Enough of your idiotic chatter. Keep moving, doctor."
"Yes, sir."
It was a long time before there were further business trips, after that one.
But there were more.