Chapter Text
September 1955
The record sputters and warps, something interrupting its track momentarily as it turns, and turns, and turns.
Thunderbolt and lightning, very, very frightening me.
Rain hits hard against the window, a neon light filtering through the drops and lighting up the pitch-dark room with a killing red glow. It’s deep, so saturated it hurts his eyes. He can almost taste the static of it on his tongue, but he doesn’t let it get in his way.
Easy come, easy go, will you let me go?
His arm starts to grow tired, the skin irritated where old splatter has already dried and has become stuck to him in sticky red oblivion. He can’t say he’s had to deal with such a fighter before, someone who won’t just give the fuck up. It’s annoying him to say the very least.
He has much more important things to be attending to; so, so many to-dos he still needs to check off before the press meeting tomorrow afternoon. Now he has to clean this mess up as well. “All because you just couldn’t keep your head out of things, could you? Honestly, you’ve brought this upon yourself boy.”
Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me, for me, for me.
He honestly can’t remember the poor kids name, but really, he did cause this. No one can go searching into locked doors and not be expecting consequences, foolish truly. Journalist, press, detectives, private investigators. They all meant the same thing to him. A thorn in his fucking side. The House of Lords wasn’t going to let him stay if there was any dirt covering his name.
Even that stupid woman, Natasha Pitch, is getting more attention from those damn men than he is. She isn’t even allowed to be a part of the House, but still plays those devilish thoughts through her Grimm husband. For a second, he thinks about it, for only a second, that he might just have to take her out as well. She even had a son, just a few months before his very own.
He goes to pull his hand away with the bubbling frustration building through his veins, but it doesn’t budge, so he tugs even harder. Finally it comes free, but now there was even more splatter on the walls he’d have to scrub at later. In the hidden meanings, it all equaled to having wipe clean any and all surfaces. Those literal and metaphorical.
Just gotta get out, just gotta get right outta here.
The stupid kid is still breathing, barely. Persistent. Just like his old fossil of a mentor journalist had taught him. He thinks about taking another swing at it, to get it over and done with so maybe he can actually lay down some time tonight, but a shrill from the floor above interrupts his raised arm. Now?
He sighs, dropping his head and his arm. The knife chips into the wooden floor. How is he supposed to get anything done around here? He turns his head to the office doorway. Maybe if he waits long enough, the kid will calm himself down and go back to not dehydrating itself, but the cry gets louder, a baby tussled awake from its own worries.
There’s simply no escaping it. A huff through his nose, then he’s looking back at the boy laying half limp on his floor.
“You have any kids…,” he sees the BBC ID card peeking out from the pocket of his red soaked button up. Howard Wayne. It upsets him even more to finally be remembering it, such a waste of a good name. Why that blasted woman had to pick Simon of all things is beyond him,” Howard? You certainly look old enough for it. If you do, then you certainly know that they don’t know when to shut their mouths do they? Why did I ever have children.”
He's met with a gurgle in response. The blood’s starting to seep into the lines of the hardwood, running through the grout if he isn’t quick enough.
“Actually, don’t answer that, you’re creating a bigger mess.” The cry grows with intensity. Seeing that he can’t have any peace to himself, he throws the weapon to his desk, careful not to touch any of the documents he’ll be returning to the House in the morning.
Knees aching where they’re pressed into the floor, he finally sees that the slacks he wears are soaked through where he straddles his poor victim’s waist. He hadn’t even noticed. He really is getting too old for this. Putting his hand on the table next to them in hopes that he can stand somewhat gracefully, he accidentally knocks into the player. The needle bounces where it had just been unending static of an ended side and slips, warping the vinyl even worse, uncentering the circular wrap of music.
The same scratchy line plays over and over and over again. A voice attempts to sing on top of it.
“Da – Dav –“ A pop, a choke, a flow of ruby red that’s going to stain his floors if this kid doesn’t stop crying any quicker. He really doesn’t even know why he’s trying at this point. It would be easier for both of them if he’d just let the restful peace take him over already. Though unfortunately he doesn’t even have the time to worry about that either, because the baby is just as annoyingly unforgiving as his little reporter. He makes sure to step over the darker than black puddle that continues to grow.
David Mage refuses to drag filth around his house. “Alright Simon, I’m coming!”
The gurgled voice still trails behind him, but it’s overpowered by the same lyric.
Let me go – Let me go – Let me go – Let me go.