Chapter Text
Brock and Boldy had been out on the ice early for once, just passing the puck back and forth while they warmed up their legs. The clean, sharp sound of their skates cutting through the ice filled the arena as they skated in slow, lazy laps. He loved afternoon practices, when there was plenty of time to wake up before he had to come in to change.
Brock had just started messing around with a puck—scooping it up on the blade of his stick and gently tossing the puck up into the air—when he saw Quinny make his way out onto the ice.
He was about to nod over at the guy in a casual greeting when he noticed something… odd about the way Quinny was standing.
Hughes was standing off to the side, right before the entrance of the ice from the tunnel. He was all geared up for practice, but his usual focus was shifted towards something off to the side. It almost looked like he was staring at somebody in the stands, but when Brock glanced up, there was literally nobody in the audience.
Weird, they had a closed practice today. Maybe he was just dissociating? He always did that during a game, or a scrimmage. Really, it was anytime Quinny had to sit on the bench for an extended period of time.
Brock watched for another second, trying to see if Hughesy was gonna decide to move or not, but no dice. The poor guy was probably exhausted though, they’d just come back from their road trip late last night, so everyone in the locker room had been a little sluggish.
Yeah, that was probably it.
…So why the fuck did Hughesy look like he was about to cry?
Brock dropped the puck he’d been juggling and skated over to where Boldy was practicing his stick handling between the pile of loose pucks on the ice. He whispered between his teeth, totally nonchalantly, as he pretended to stretch next to Boldy.
”Dude. I think something’s wrong with Quinny.”
Boldy barely looked up from what he was doing as he answered absentmindedly. “Yeah? Like, how absolutely insane he is on the ice or something?”
“Bolds, no. Like—look at him.”
That finally caused Boldy to sigh and glance up towards the entrance. While Brock had been skating over, Moose and Zuccy had filed onto the ice and were chatting quietly. And Hughes was still just standing right in front of the ice, looking like somebody came over and killed his fucking dog or something.
Quinny’s brown eyes had this sort of glazed-over quality that sent a shiver racing up and down his spine, and he turned to see if Boldy saw it too. “You see what I’m talking about, right?”
“Fabes, you’re fucking stupid. He looks like that all the time.”
Brock groaned and tapped his stick against the ice. “No man, you don’t get it. He’s been standing like that since we got on the ice.”
He chanced another look back, only to see Quinn’s eyes widen and his mouth part—like he was breathing heavily, or panicking, or trying, really, really hard to imitate those mouth-breathing snakes that lowkey freaked Brock out whenever he watched the Discovery channel with his sisters.
Boldy frowned and finally tore his focus away from the puck. “What the fuck are you talking about? Dude, he’s literally fine—”
Just then, Boldy chose to turn around full to watch Hughes full body flinch so hard that his eyes rolled back in his head.
Brock felt his mouth drop open as he watched Hughesy’s body start to shake, beginning from the tips of his fingers and spreading up his arm, until Brock could hear the rattling of his fucking visor against the plastic of his helmet.
“Oh sweet Mary, Mother, and Joseph, whatthefuckisthat.”
As soon as it happened, it was over. And there stood Quinny, blinking away whatever demonic shit had just happened to possess him—like he was simply dusting off some stray snow from a sudden stop on the ice. And then he was stepping out onto the rink alongside Spurgy and Bogo, cool as a goddamn cucumber.
“Brock.”
”Matt.”
Brock felt like he was wheezing, and turned to stare—wide-eyed and absolutely horrified—at his best friend. Who had just watched their newest D-man audition for the role of possessed doll in the newest scary movie.
What just happened?
“Hey guys.” Quinny called out from where he had been spinning around on the ice, practicing some simple movements.
Brock’s mouth opened and closed, then opened and closed again. He felt himself struggling to speak, like somebody had reached into the back of his throat and ripped out his vocal cords.
Quinn skated to a stop in front of them, casting a worried glance at both of their stares. “What’s wrong? Why are you looking at me like that?”
He knew he had to say something, anything, to try and play it cool.
Play it cool, play it cool, play it cool. Think ice cubes, hockey, snow, uh, polar bears? Those are cool, right? They were definitely super cool. Also, icebergs, and the Titanic, and—
“Are you an alien?”
As quick as he blurted it out, Brock slammed his glove over his mouth, absolutely betrayed by what had escaped his lips. Hughes blinked in surprise and furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, and wow, those were some bushy brows.
“No? What? Fabes, are you okay?”
Boldy let out a laugh that was more like a squeak than anything remotely intelligent.
Oh, thank God.
“Oh, thank God,” Brock sighed out, feeling a weight lift off of his chest. “Because aliens aren’t real, and if you turned out to be an alien I’d have to rethink a lot of things in my life.”
“Dude, no, so not important right now,” Boldy sounded strained, but not like he was about ten seconds away from shitting his pants anymore. So, small win. “You’re supposed to ask him about the possession.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Brock almost missed how Quinny flinched and straightened up. But he ignored that to punch Boldy in the arm, right in the gap of their body armor.
“Bolds.”
“Ow, what the fuck, asshole?”
“You can’t just ask people about why they get possessed! That’s like, survival instinct 101,” Brock scrunched up his face in disgust at the idea. “What if Quinny was possessed by, like, I don’t know, a demon?”
“You think he’s possessed by a demon? You think demons are real?”
“What, no, I’m just saying, in like every single horror movie ever—”
“Dude, he’s totally possessed by like a ghost or something, that’s way more classic than a fucking demon—”
“No man, you don’t get it, like think about it. Total deal-with-the-devil type shit happening here—”
“Bro, what the fuck are you talking about? He’s definitely the type to get latched onto by a bunch of depressed ghosts—”
“I’m not.”
Brock and Boldy both cut themselves off to turn and look at Quinny, who had been watching them with… a smile on his face?
He grinned again and shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not possessed by a demon, or a ghost. They’re too weak to possess me.”
Brock felt his brain begin to break into about five gajillion pieces.
“But…” Quinny’s face smoothed out and he let out a sigh of frustration, “they like to use my brain as a—a gathering place, I think?”
“It’s annoying, but they’re not that bad. Definitely not demons, either.”
And with that, he skated off to find the rest of his line for drills, as cool as a stupid, fucking cucumber.
Like he hadn’t just broken Brock’s stupid brain into five million, gajillion pieces.
“Fabes.”
Brock’s head was spinning as he stared at the retreating back of Quinny’s jersey, the number 43 almost mocking them as he went to join the rest of the team by the bench.
”Brock.”
“I need to lie down.” He felt dizzy, like he’d been checked face first into the boards and left to sprawl across the ice. Fucking ghosts? Really? They were really, really real?
…At least it wasn’t aliens.