Chapter Text
Gaz stares through the scope at the corpse he just sniped. This particular bastard just keeps coming back after he’s been killed by one of the 141 and Gaz’s job is to figure out how.
“Gaz, you copy?” Price asks over the comm.
“Confirm,” Gaz replies, keeping his eye through the scope, “König is down, now we wait.” The comm clicks to tell Gaz that his reply was heard, before silence surrounds him. The bastard isn’t going to get back up without one of the 141 knowing how he does it.
Of course, the first few times it happened, they thought he was someone else, using a title instead of a callsign. That was, until the fuck got into a fight with Ghost and hit the Lieutenant on a still tender wound that only the 141 and the fucker who made it would know about. From then on, they took note of the Austrian, wary of whatever supernatural means the man uses to rise from the dead.
Suddenly, there’s a shift in the area around König’s body, pulling Gaz’s attention to the strange ripples. He aims carefully, ready to fire at any threat, only to hold his fire. A portal solidifies enough for a gorgeous, exhausted looking person to step through, looking down at König’s corpse. They motion at the body and seem to speak to someone beside them. Gaz watches as the person flinches before waving their hand, warding off something he can’t see. Eventually, they sigh and turn to the body.
Of course, with a high-speed sniper round, there’s not much of a head left. The first shot had severed his leg completely from his body, now resting a meter or two away. None of that seems to deter the person, as they flick out their wrists and an ominous purple glow encases their hands. Gaz watches in awe as the flesh starts to pull back together, the leg dragging across the ground as bits of skull reconnect and meld back into a whole bone.
“Cap,” Gaz mumbles into the comm, “He’s got a necro.” The string of curses in his ear does nothing to pull his gaze from the necromancer, who makes the rebuilding process seem like child’s play. Barely five minutes after they arrived, König’s body is completely reformed and they kneel by his head. They rest a hand against the reformed head, their mouth moves with some kind of chant and the bastard seems to burst back to life.
Immediately, the necromancer pulls out of König’s reach, which seems to do nothing to deter the Austrian, as he clamors to his feet and grabs their arm. Gaz frowns as the necromancer flinches away from the tall man, so obviously uncomfortable that he wants to fire again, kill the bastard again to get the poor sod away from him. However, Gaz has his orders to just observe and the necromancer seems to finally escape the man’s grasp, fleeing back into the portal. Gaz slowly sets down the sniper rifle, his mission complete. Find out how König keeps coming back. How you fit into this whole thing, as the necromancer reviving the Austrian, is a new question Gaz is sure will need to be answered.
Six years prior
You stare at the lunatic standing in your shop. She smiles at you, like she didn’t just confess to killing a man who she’s been stalking for who knows how long and plans to raise him back from the dead.
“What the fuck?” you finally ask, lip curling in disgust, “No. No. I’m not going to ‘lend’ you any book on necromancy. There is a procedure with this kind of thing, and it never includes fucking murder!” The girl looks at you in surprise.
“But you bring back the dead,” she simpers.
“Yes! BRING. BACK,” you snarl, “The dead recall who killed them, whether they saw them while alive or not. The spirit remains long enough to see their killer, and that’s how most ghosts are created.” The girl huffs and pouts. You admit, in the far recesses of your mind, that she’s rather pretty, with pouty lips and big doe eyes. Unfortunately, she’s a fucking psycho who murdered a man just because he didn’t know who she was after she’d been stalking him.
“But you can give me the book that will let me bring him back,” she argues. You growl and scratch at your scalp, agitated at how fucking thick this idiot is.
“If, you bring him back,” you explain, again, slowly, “and he was murdered, which he was, he will attack his killer. He knows who his killer is. He knows who you are.”
“I know!” she gushes, seeming excited about that prospect, “He knows who I am now! How I’m perfect for him!” You bury your head in your hands, trying not to scream. Your familiar, a black-flame phoenix named Ogun, coos and flies over to settle on your shoulder, nuzzling your cheek to soothe the headache this idiot is giving you. Taking a deep breath, you decide to take a different approach to discourage her apparent suicide attempt.
“There’s no guarantee that you’ll bring him back right,” you try, “After all, there’s a lot of little things that could go wrong. Why don’t you start with, like, a cat? There’s a reason cats are claimed to have nine lives.”
“But I don’t wanna kill a kitty,” she whines. You try not to mull over the implications of how she won’t hurt a cat, but she’ll kill a grown ass man, as she continues, “And I can’t wait too long. I don’t want his handsome body to start deteriorating.” You plant your face back into your hands, Ogun cooing and trilling at you worriedly.
“…Get out,” you finally say. The girl looks at you in shock, like she didn’t expect you to send her out. Fuck, you should have done that as soon as you realized she killed a man just to raise him. You lift your head from your hands and point at the door.
“Leave, and pray I don’t report you for murder and attempted misuse of magic,” you order, feeling your magic swell and ebb with your frustration. The girl huffs, slamming her hands on your desk.
“You can’t do this!” she insists.
“I can,” you assure her, feeling Ogun briefly take the form of whoever your soulmate is. From the corner of your eye, you see the most beautiful man lean over your shoulder, his brown eyes burning with the black fire of a phoenix. The girl takes a startled step back, blinking at Ogun in confused terror. Apparently, no one ever told little miss psycho that any witch or magic user worth their salt had a cheat code to meeting their soulmate in the form of a familiar.
“Leave,” Ogun growls, borrowing your soulmate’s voice for a moment. The girl shrieks and runs out of the shop. Once the door closes behind her, you close your eyes and lean back. Ogun returns to his phoenix form, chirping at you. Smiling, you scratch his chin.
“Thank you, Oggie,” you coo, giggling as he fluffs up, posturing proudly at scaring off a pain in your ass. Feeling drained from dealing with the idiot, you decide to close up shop for the day. Flipping the sign to close, you head up to the apartment above your shop and set about making dinner. Tomorrow, the shop will be closed, and you’ll worry about straightening everything up then.
You wake in the middle of the night to a loud crash, Ogun waking with you. Despite the fear that tries to grasp your throat, you stay silent, listening. Heavy footsteps wander around your shop downstairs, followed by a man’s voice saying something, calling out something. Ogun puffs up, an intensity entering your normally relaxed familiar that sets you on edge too. The man’s steps get closer to your apartment’s entrance, and he calls your name.
Ice drops into your stomach, the way only Unwanted Bonds can make you feel. Whoever this is, he has been risen and wants to Bind himself to you. Slipping out of bed, you prep a decay spell, holding it in your hand, before entering your living room. Slowly, the man plods up the stairs, icy blue eyes meeting your own upon getting high enough on the stairs to see you.
“There you are,” he croons, before you shoot out the spell.