Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Kevin tugs and adjusts the tension of the strings on Neil’s racquet for the fifteenth time that night while Andrew, Renee, and Matt get cleared from the hospital after the riot in Binghamton. 

He cares about his teammates being able to play the next match, yes, but he cares more about the missing striker. 

He cares about Nathaniel . 

Kevin curses in silence and wishes for the burn of vodka to wash away his concerns until morning comes to show him that there's nothing to worry about. That Neil is back with them, safe and ready to take on the next team. 

Minutes—was it still minutes and not hours? —later, Abby walks inside the bus with Renee holding her hurt wrist and Allison looking ready for murder. For the first time, Kevin agrees with the dealer on something. If Kevin could’ve done something to stop this mess, he would’ve. 

Just when Abby leaves again, Nicky walks inside with Andrew close behind, followed by a seething Coach. Kevin thought he wouldn’t see the man as angry as he was during the Thanksgiving disaster, and yet, here he was sulking behind his players. 

Andrew looks to the racquet in Kevin’s lap in a silent question and Kevin shakes his head before tugging at the strings again. 

Kevin will never admit it out loud but it also hurt seeing the nasty bruise on Andrew’s temple. He shouldn’t be cleared so soon and risk the rest of the season; he should be taking it easy.  

It’s like no one ever hears Kevin. When he says to take health seriously is for a reason. 

A snap of fingers brings Kevin back to the bus, now with Dan and Coach helping settle Matt on a seat. 

Still no sign of Neil. 

“Where’s Neil? No news of him?” Dan voices out loud Kevin’s concern. 

“No,” Abby replies as he tends to Matt’s recently stitched wound. “I’ve called every hospital in the area and there’s no sign of him.” 

“We should get back to the stadium. Maybe he’s hiding or hasn’t been taken yet?” Renee suggests next. 

Coach turns to look at Matt to ask if he can bear the drive and the backliner nods with a wince before falling back on the seat. 

The way back to Binghampton is silent and laced with fear. Kevin can almost hear the clock ticking on Andrew’s patience before he snaps.  

In the back of his head, Kevin knows that whatever is between the goalie and Neil is much stronger than just a protection deal like his own, but he’s too worried himself to care enough about the emotions churning in Andrew’s head. 

As soon as Coach parks the bus, Kevin rushes outside with Allison and Andrew on his heels. He’s yards away when he sees Dan and Renee following to search for their missing striker.  

Kevin goes the way back to where he found the racquet and makes a mental path from there to the lockers only to come empty-handed. 

“Neil!” 

“NEIL?” 

The girls’ voices echo all around the empty parking lot with no reply. Kevin braces for finding Neil unconscious any time when he catches a glimpse of orange farther away from the way they came and Kevin rushes, heart, hammering his chest, thinking of the worse. 

Only to find Neil’s duffel bag.  

“Neil? Neil!” Despair takes hold of Kevin as he shouts and turns around, hoping in vain to find Neil somewhere close to his belongings. After his throat burns and the rest of the Foxes gather around him, Kevin takes a look at the bag. As if that would give him any clue of his owner’s location. 

“He must be close,” Nicky says. 

Seconds later, a ring coming from the bag roars around them.  

Kevin fumbles to find the phone so he rejects Allison’s call, and gets back to the bus in search of clues because what are the odds of Neil losing his bag during the riot when the rest of the team could keep their belongings? 

Back in the relative safety of the vehicle, he starts messing with the pockets of the bag to find that Neil’s keys are also there and that’s when the real fear starts to devour Kevin. 

He ignores Matt’s efforts to walk and sit close as he takes out Neil’s phone again to go through the call history and the messages. 

Kevin’s heart fight to escape his chest when he recognizes the area codes of the unknown number with an accepted call and the one that sent a 0. 

The world blurs and fades to black as memories and fears twist together in one nightmare of knives and pain and fear, and that day when Kevin saw the Butcher cutting a man into a thousand pieces with Nathaniel and Riko by his side. 

“Where is he.” 

A bang on his head against the window of the bus sharpens reality and a second hit focuses Kevin back on the present, where a furious Andrew is using all of his strength and weight to choke Kevin and slam him against the wall demanding answers. 

“What do you know.” 

Kevin zeroes on the hatred and fear in Andrew’s eyes and knows that there’s no coming back from this. He should be terrified for what’s to come: the knives and the pain and the blood that this man who was supposed to protect him will inflict on him, but still, he is just scared for Neil, because he’s dead. 

Nathaniel is gone. 

“Fucking hell, Minyard, what are you doing!” 

“Leave him alone!” 

The air leaves Kevin’s body and he thinks his hands clench around Andrew’s wrist in a desperate attempt to get free when in reality he wouldn’t mind dying now. Kevin knew this was going to happen since he discovered the truth about Neil and he told him to run, he told him he told him hetoldhim and now Neil is dead. 

“Where. Is. He.” 

Another bang against the window gives Kevin two more seconds of clarity—or maybe not.  

Wymack, Matt, and Renee are fighting to get a grip on Andrew and release Kevin. Kevin himself is still fighting but that’s just his body working on autopilot; his mind is going back and forth from the bus parked in an empty stadium and the guilt of leading Neil to his tomb when he should’ve been better. 

All because of Exy. 

“What do you know.” 

One more hit against the window and suddenly air fills his lungs at the time that Abby rushes to him. 

Kevin ignores everyone around him once more to cough violently until the crush in his throat recedes and he finds Andrew’s eyes again.  

No, he didn’t imagine the anger and fear in them.  

“I’m not asking again.” 

“Neil is Nathaniel.” Is all Kevin can manage. Is all the explanation he needed back after that dreadful banquet. 

“What is that supposed to mean?” Allison asks, patience growing thin.  

Coach, Matt, and Renee struggle to keep Andrew away from Kevin when he lounges at him again and Kevin flinches on instinct even though he’s not afraid of the goalkeeper. 

Kevin takes a deep breath and tell the Foxes the little he knows about the Butcher, the Moriyamas, and Nathaniel. By the end of his talk, all of them sit defeated around Kevin, frozen in time, unable to think about what to do next.  

Even Andrew. 

A phone chiming breaks the silence again and Coach heads out to reply. It takes forever for him to return; however, Andrew doesn’t attack Kevin anymore and waits for the older man to talk. 

Neil is alive, Neil is safe, Neil is with the FBI. 

Coach drives them to Baltimore without a second thought and Kevin spends the entire ride waiting for a second attack from Andrew that never comes. 

For all his indifference and apathy, it looks like the man is having all the feels at once and Kevin only hopes that Neil is well enough to be the same. That they didn’t lose him—That Andrew didn’t lose Neil. 

The way to Baltimore and the waiting at the motel are eternal but it’s very much worth it when Neil comes walking to them.  

He kneels with Andrew on the floor and Kevin swear he could take a handful of the emotions swirling around them but stays quiet, rubbing mindlessly at his throat and waiting again for Andrew’s and Neil’s return from the FBI. 

The next night, when he lies awake on the floor, hearing the steady breaths of his teammates and watching Andrew giving his back so he can watch Neil, Kevin knows that his end of the deal was fulfilled.  

Andrew found something to live, Neil is back with them, Kevin is ready to prove to the Ravens that they won’t go down without putting one hell of a fight, and eventually, everything will be okay. 

Chapter Text

Fire everywhere.

On his hands, on his face, on his lungs.

The black and red of the Nest were all orange and blue of flames licking at him.

As fast and hard as he ran, there was nowhere to go with his world turn to ashes and smoke.

Was it worse the pain or the crushing knowledge that he would never escape his prison?

Jean knows that turning around is the worst thing he can do, and still, he does. Only to find Riko—a ten-story dragon made of charcoal scales and boiling fury—, spitting fire at him.

For failing, for helping Kevin, for failing again, for allowing Nathaniel to escape his fate, for staying, for breathing, for existing...

Jean lifts his hurting arms to cover his face from the new blow of fire even though it’s useless. He’s doomed to die at the claws of this monster.

He closes his eyes tight anyway, wishing for the pain to go away and he’s back in Marseille, at his parents' home. A big place made of thin walls and twisted fates where only his sister lighted his world.

His sister.

The dragon is chasing Jean here too, to the only safe place he used to have and he rushes to his sister’s bedroom only to find it empty.

“Mon petite soeur! Mon petite! Où es-tu?”

It doesn’t matter how loud he shouts or how fast he runs, Riko is still behind Jean and his sister is nowhere to be found in the house that turns into an infinite labyrinth, quickly engulfed in flames spat by Riko in his rage.

“She’s mine. I ate her before I eat you. You belong to me Three! Never forget that you belong to me!”

“No! NO.”

“Hey. Jean? Jean, it’s okay, calm down.”

Jean prepares for the last blow, resigned to dying without seeing his little sister again.

At least the pain will end, he thinks as Riko’s mouth opens wide, showing bloodied fangs and a cruel smile that doesn’t disappear despite of him being a dragon of all things.

It was about time to—

“Moreau! JEAN.”

Jean bolts awake still feeling the flames on his arms and Riko’s teeth sinking into his flesh. All too real, all too powerful. The darkness around and the sound of the air conditioner of his room in Evermore remind him to stay quiet, to stay still in case the real, human Riko hears him and comes to “play”.

“Jean? It’s alright. It was another nightmare.”

Words don’t make sense. They whirl and get lost in the French pleas that Jean was murmuring to Riko the dragon before being swallowed.

Regardless, after a few blinks, he finds himself on a lower bunk bed, the darkness isn’t complete, and... is it Dermott? She’s in front of him, keeping her distance but close enough to reach if she’s needed. Jean focuses on her disheveled braid and finds it impossible to force his mind away from the fire and the agony when that’s something he knows well.

Not the concerned look of her roommate.

Never the kindness of the Trojans. That’s too much. It can’t be real.

Before Jean stops to process what is he doing and the consequences of his insubordination, he jumps out of the bed and runs away from the room, far away from the worried glances and the warm lights of the dorms at USC until his bare feet find pavement and the steady burn of each step, matches the remaining pain from his nightmare.

The one he just had and the one he lived.

He keeps going even after, until he stumbles on the court and takes half a turn. Fuck Exy. Fuck this place. Fuck Kevin, and Riko, and Nathaniel, and the Moriyamas and his family. Fuck everyone.

This world is too small and too big all the same for people like him.

Jean keeps running until he reaches the farthest edge of campus and wonders for a moment if he could be like Neil; running away from his past and future until something better finds him.

“Jean?”

Jean turns on instinct. Conditioning still working even though this voice doesn’t mean pain and finds Knox approaching him with both hands up, one holding a phone on a call. Jean freezes.

What is he supposed to do? Run? Go to him? Is he in trouble? What kind of trouble? Are the Trojans going to finally realize that Jean is too broken to work with smiles and gentle pats on the back?

“Hey, let’s go back to the dorms, okay?”

Jean takes a tentative step back, savoring freedom. But he will never be free, can he? Not with a leash on his neck still tying him to the Moriyamas for life.

“Jean, it’s all good. You had a nightmare. You are in USC, you are number 29, you are one hell of a backliner and we need you. We have a match next Friday and God knows only you can stop those strikers from Texas.”

Knox’s words slowly make sense to Jean and he takes a deep breath. The warmth and salty air of California remind him that he’s not in the Nest anymore.

Riko is dead, he’s free, he’s across the place that turned him into dust. He has another chance.

Realizing that he went too far on his own, Jean walks his way to Knox and follows his captain’s lead to climb on the passenger seat of the beat-up Corolla. For once, Jean doesn’t compare it to the sleek black cars driven by Ravens and stays silent on the way back to the dorms, waiting for a reprimand that never comes.

“Nightmare protocol, everyone!” Knox commands with a few claps when they are back on Jean’s room. Dermott, Alvarez, and a few other Trojans are spread on the couches and moving up as soon as their captain speaks.

In a few minutes, Jean is tucked under a light blanket, holding a glass of iced tea, and looking at how Alvarez and Dermott pour an unhealthy number of snacks over a big bowl that is attacked immediately by another backliner.

“Leave it, Jace. This ain’t for you yet.” Dermott chides as she slaps the man’s hand away.

After a few minutes, Knox sits by Jean’s side, leaving an arm's length between them and Dermott does the same by his left. She takes the bowl of snacks with her and waits until Alvarez plays the DVD to pass the bowl around to everyone.

When it reaches Jean, his hands tremble, just like any other time the Trojans had done “Nightmare protocol.”

He grabs a chip from the bowl and munches on it for a few seconds, letting the salt and slight spice remind him once again that is really over. He can eat junk food now. He can waste a few hours of sleep watching a silly movie. Or he can leave to his room and no one will say anything because this is how Trojans are.

“Here’s your phone, if you wanna call Renee,” Knox says after his turn with the bowl as he hands Jean his phone.

Jean thinks about it, about the comfort that she gives him and the debt he owes her for taking him out of Riko’s hands. He looks for the contact and is ready to get outside when he turns around and finds the faces of his closest teammates washed in blue light.

Dermott and Alvarez are quietly chuckling with the movie, Thomas and Xi are fighting over more snacks and Knox is smiling at Jean in a way that unsettles him to no end.

This smile doesn’t mean suffering, or blood, or screams, or people about to hurt him. This smile is safety, is warmth, is freedom, and for the first time in a very, very long time, Jean thinks that maybe he will be okay.