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Augustus “Gus” Porter’s dream was to become the Boiling Isles’ leading human expert. He found them fascinating- their culture, food, round ears… It was hard gaining information about them, but that only added to his desire to know more: as nice as it was to be able to perform illusion magic with little to no effort, he longed for a challenge.
However, now that he was in the Human Realm, he had a chance to learn more, to explore! To fully educate himself on humankind, he needed to reach far back into their origins- and what better place to start learning than the Gravesfield Historical Society?
Gus was still very new to the area (and he was also, you know, twelve ), so when he left for his investigations, Camila insisted that he bring someone with him. Willow had been busy trying to grow something called ‘tomatoes’ and Luz was spending time with Amity, so Gus had asked Hunter to accompany him to the building. They’d formed a connection after the whole Adrian Graye Incident, and Gus often caught himself thinking of himself and the sixteen-year-old as brothers.
He still wasn't sure how to deal with all that he'd seen in Emperor Belos's memories– none of them really made any sense without context. They popped back into his head at random points, uninvited, no matter how much his mind tried to repress them.
There had been death, and destruction, and pain, and each onslaught of Belos's memories arrived alongside an overwhelming mix of emotions. Gus had seen a man who looked like Hunter, heard the names 'Philip' and 'Caleb', watched as a body rose from the dirt, and seen a book on… On Grimwalkers.
Grimwalkers were an urban legend: a scary story that was told around campfires. They were like… Lifelike abominations. But they weren't sentient, not like Hunter was ( they rise from the dirt, none of them ever right as they make eye contact with him-) . Grimwalkers were created to replace someone and, like the purple sludge monsters that Amity made, to serve the witch who created them.
There was no way that Hunter was a Grimwalker, no matter what the evidence suggested. He was just Belos's nephew, and after Caleb's death(?) ( pure, raw betrayal as the knife rises and plunges into skin, red red red spilling everywhere as regret and fury poisons his mind-) , the blonde had been taken in by the emperor.
He'd seen a variety of scenes with maybe-Caleb, though all of them had slight differences. A stronger jawline, a slightly off nose shape, the body just a little too tall or short…
But all of them had the same eyes. The same garnet eyes only found in Grimwalkers and Gus wasn't ready to go there just yet.
So. Gravesfield.
Hunter was a logical choice to bring with him anyway because the teenager knew how to defend himself without the use of magic- Gus revealing his own could have catastrophic effects, so he wasn’t technically allowed to use it outside of the Nocedas’ home. Still, he saw no harm in using illusions to make his and Hunter’s ears appear rounder, even as the tips shone a little blue ( he sticks out from the rest, those creatures with their colorful irises and pointed ears-) .
Finding their way to the Historical Society was surprisingly easy, coming across the large building after wandering through the streets of Gravesfield for a while. Gus and Hunter stepped forwards to enter just as a familiar voice- Vee’s voice- called out, “wait!”
“Vee?” Gus said, turning to face her. “What are you doing here?”
“You can’t be here!” She hissed, sounding genuinely terrified. “It’s dangerous !”
“Hey, it’s just a museum,” Gus said at the exact same time that Hunter asked, “dangerous how ?”
“There’s a man. He- he’s bad . He knows about the Demon Realm and he- and he… You can’t go in there,” Vee told them, practically pleading. “He’ll hurt you !”
Gus felt a sinking feeling in his gut that Vee was telling them this from experience.
“Hey, Vee, don’t worry about it,” Hunter reassured her, placing a hand on her shoulder (he places a hand on the teenager's shoulder, and irony-satisfaction-amusement-longing flood through him) . “He can’t be that bad. I can take on a human if need be, and we’re in disguise. I can protect you and Gus if things get bad.”
“And yourself,” Gus cut in, sending him a pointed look ( Gus couldn't see those eyebrows rise in shock as a dagger pierced skin, not again) . “Right, Hunter?”
“What?” Hunter’s eyes switched over to him before he nodded dismissively. “Yeah, of course.”
Vee looked hesitant for a second before setting her mouth in a firm line of determination (she looked so much like Luz in that moment that the resemblance was uncanny- and Gus had gotten used to seeing his friend’s face on someone else by that point), saying firmly, “If- if you’re going in then I’m coming too.”
“Vee, you really don’t have to-” Gus tried to persuade her, his mind focused on how scared she’d been seconds before.
“Yes, I do,” Vee interrupted him, her hands balled into tight fists. “Let’s go.”
They entered the building together, Hunter slightly in front of the younger two as he looked cautiously around the entryway ( he enters alongside Caleb, both marvelling at the unfamiliar new world around them) . “Looks safe to me. We should keep our guard up though, just in case.”
( Guard guard golden guard so many masks and bodies and the blood never stops-)
Gus nodded with an eager grin that felt a little too forced, and while Vee’s confidence faltered slightly, she did the same (minus the aforementioned eager grin). Gus immediately began peering at all of the displays, his eyes scanning each one of the information boards hungrily.
"Oh. My. Titan," Gus gasped, practically jumping with excitement as he read a newspaper article. "Possums are real!"
"Wait, what?!" Hunter hurried over (Caleb runs towards him with a beaming grin, lies lies lies about some Clawthorne spilling from his lips-) to Gus quickly, reading out, "possum infestation in old Gravesfield shack. Huh. I guess they do exist."
"Woah!" Gus bounded towards a collection of spiky weapons. "These look like they could have come straight out of the Savage Ages!"
“Observing my collection of relics, are we?” came a new voice from behind them, and Hunter whirled around faster than Gus could process, fists at the ready. “Woah there, I’m just the curator here. A little jumpy the-”
The man who was speaking stopped abruptly when his eyes landed on Vee, who let out a small squeak.
“You!” He shouted, a mixture of angry, scared and intrigued all at once.
The man’s eyes flickered from Vee to Gus to Hunter, stopping at the eldest’s eyes. The eldest’s magenta eyes. Yeah, Gus probably should have put an illusion on that.
“You two, you’re- you’re her kind, aren’t you?!” the curator gasped, grabbing some sort of medieval weapon from where it was leaning on the wall. “More demons!”
Gus grimaced at that, folding his arms. “Not quite, buddy.”
“Witches, then!” the man cried out ( witches are foul, loathsome beings, unnatural, they should be eradicated-) , and Gus found himself almost impressed. ‘Almost’ being the key word in that sentence. The curator’s wild eyes quickly turned from scared to scheming, clearly having thought of a plot. That guy really needed to get a better poker face. “Well, this is all more proof that I’m right. I’ll show the world that I’m not crazy– I’ll show them, and I’ll finally get my MewTube account verified!”
“He’s really hung up on that MewTube thing,” Vee whispered to Gus.
“And what exactly makes you think we’re going to let you do that?” Hunter raised an eyebrow.
There was a pause before, with no notice, the curator rushed forwards with a loud noise (maybe some sort of battle cry? Gus would have to make a note of that later…). Hunter reacted instantly, dodging the man as he charged at him and sending the curator crashing to the floor ( the mask crashes to the floor as yet another one betrays him, it always ends the same-) . Hunter was scary when he wanted to be, and Gus couldn’t judge the curator for the frightened squeak he let out as the blonde stood over him.
“You’re the person Vee told us about,” Hunter stated, no room for argument in his tone. “The one who hurt her.”
“I didn’t hurt her,” the curator’s voice was high and scared. “I just–”
“You hurt her,” Hunter repeated icily, something dark in his eyes that Gus had never seen before ( his eyes are reflected back at him, full of a new, cold fury as he washes his hands clean of the liquid staining them-) . “And I don’t appreciate people targeting those I care about.”
Vee’s green cheeks turned a little pink at that. “It’s fine, Hunter. We should just go.”
The girl sounded more tired than anything, her voice soft, and Gus felt the urge to wrap her in the biggest hug he'd ever given.
“No, it’s not!” Hunter waved his arms around. “I’m not going to let him get away with what he’s done. You’re scared of him!”
“Camila already dealt with him,” Vee met Hunter’s eyes. “We locked him in the cage he had me tied up in–”
“He locked you in a cage ?!” Hunter hissed, a mixture of incredulous and enraged ( the curse brings rage, but is it really a curse if it brings so much power? He craves palismen, needs them, he chose this and now he's a monster monster monster nO-).
Gus felt uneasiness and fury swirl in his stomach. This man, as… Harmless as he seemed, had done horrible things to his friend, and this was Vee’s chance to get revenge on him.
But Vee didn’t want revenge.
“Hunter, wait!” Gus placed a hand on Hunter’s shoulder just as it seemed that the teenager was going to attack the curator. “He’s not worth it. Vee deserves to make this call.”
Hunter opened his mouth to argue, then saw Vee’s pleading expression. For whatever reason, the girl didn’t want her former captor to get hurt. So, with one last venomous glance at the curator, the trio left, and Gus tried to hold back his anger.
“Why wouldn’t you let me attack him?” Hunter asked, his tone unreadable ( he keeps his tone unreadable when he speaks to the grimwalkers, makes sure that they care enough not to leave and are not foolish enough to think he himself loves them when they're all wrong wrong wrong, he wants Caleb back-) .
“I don’t want to give him any more reason to hurt you,” Vee admitted quietly. “And I’m sick of seeing people get hurt. No matter what he did, it’s in the past now, and I’m just… I want nothing to do with him. I thought I could handle seeing him again, that I could tell him everything I think about him, but I can’t.”
Vee’s eyes were glistening with tears, and Gus wrapped her in a tight hug.
“I’m sorry,” Hunter said, his voice almost inaudible. “I got so… So angry , and I don’t want to hurt people anymore, but I…”
“You don’t need to apologise,” Vee offered him a watery smile.
“What he did… He reminded me of Belos ,” Hunter whispered, and Gus felt his heart drop.
The twelve-year-old had known that Belos wouldn’t have been the best guardian ( another body dropped off the bridge, the remains will decay and sink back into the soil like the rest, maybe the next one won't betray him as quickly-) , but he’d been Hunter’s uncle . Surely that had counted for something…
But Hunter and Vee seemed to have some sort of understanding that Gus did not. He was missing something, and wasn’t sure if he wanted to find out what.
“Let’s go home,” Vee said wearily. “Camila’s really good at making comfort brownies. Oh, and if it’s any comfort to you, she did beat Jacob up with her chancla .”
Gus didn’t know what a chancla was, but he suddenly admired Camila even more than he had done before.
“Comfort brownies sound great, Vee,” Gus grinned at her, pushing down his variety of emotions for another time. His emotions, and that of a man who Gus hated and understood and hated that he understood more by the minute. “...What are comfort brownies?”
Vee simply giggled, and Gus felt proud that he’d made her smile wide again. His trip to Gravesfield Historical Society had been far from what he’d expected, but he left with two of his siblings best friends and the promise of comfort brownies ahead.
Belos's the voice quieted down sometimes, like it was doing just then, and in that moment, that was enough.