Springtime Challenge!
Title: On the Other Side, 1
Author: _ryouseiteki_
Rating: PG-15 (Griffin has a potty mouth and it is implied that he has sexytimes with some random in a brothel)
Word count: 3355
Prompts: Potentially 03/27 - name | 03/30 - control | 03/31 - The Virgin Islands | 04/01 - April Fools Day
Disclaimer: Characters belong to Steven Gould and 20th Century Fox, no profit is being made from this work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this story are fictitious products of the fan-writer’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblances to persons living or dead are entirely coincidental.
Characters:This chapter is Griffin-centric, Griffin/David/Griffin
Summary: David is a rookie paladin who's entire family has been in the business for generations. When he and his group discover that the jumper they've been chasing is the by now legendary Griffin they expect it to be suicide. But. Griffin leaves David alive. It's the start of a beautiful relationship.
Warnings: AU, OC death
A/N: It feels like a second epicfic is trying to get started here, but I'm going to try-TRY to keep it vaguely contained to the prompts.
It’s humid in Paris, the air stuffy and thick as the afternoon sun beats down on pedestrians who hurry across the city square, in a rush to their various destinations in order to escape the oppressive heat of the day. It’s not scorching, but it’s warm enough to be uncomfortable in any outfit. Some of the people, mostly tourists, pause next to the fountain in the center of the square; half of them in awe of the artistic structure, the other to steal a breather in the monument’s shadow or to splash a bit of the fountain’s cool, refreshing water onto their faces with rapture. They are not aware of the deadly dance being preformed within their midst.
Jeeze, it’s so ridiculously easy to recognize the sensitives, Griffin muses as he hawkishly watches the group of paladins search the area. They’re trying to be discreet, but he spotted them immediately due to the amusing quirks paladin sensitives tend to develop. Most Jumpers don’t survive long as he has; don’t know what to look for when hunting or being hunted by the religious nutters. But not him. He’s seen the one he’s labeled as the sensitive repeatedly stall with small jerks, disrupting the flow of the people around him-and he smirks as he watches people elbow aside and shove at the man who suddenly stops in the middle of the sidewalk and blocks their paths-to slowly tilt his head to the side slightly as if listening for a voice only he can hear.
They know that Griffin is here, somewhere. They have tracked him to Paris, to this general vicinity, and finally to the square that he’s been frequenting more often each day-and he’ll be the first to admit that he’d been waiting for the fuckers to catch up to him, things had been getting a bit boring to be honest. Even so, when they’re so close that a 5 minute fast-paced walk could lead them right to where he is, it’s hard to locate him in the large clusterfuck of people; the sensitive’s reactions lagging due to chatter on cellphones and the radio hum of electronics all across the square, his concentration interrupted by impatient humans who won’t let him stand still long enough to get a trace on Griffin’s signature.
He hasn’t jumped for a couple of months and a few weeks, but he knows by now that that small fact doesn’t matter in the scheme of things. He’ll always be covered in a thin layer of the typical rot left behind by the wormholes that Jumpers use to teleport. He wonders what it’s like when a sensitive catches one in their awareness. Can they see it? Does it look the same as a jump scar does to him-rippled like warped glass and shifting slightly like heat waves? Does it have a smell, a feel, a taste? He wonders with morbid curiosity what it sounds like; he thinks it should have a sound, with the way sensitives always seem to be listening for something just out of range of their hearing-twisting their head this way and that.
It’s not like he can ask one of them, they’re always too frightened before he drops them off of heights or into shark infested waters to reply to whatever he asks them, and he does ask, sometimes. He understands that it is their fault that they’re born with a gift that the paladins are able to use in opposition to his just as much as it’s his fault to be born a Jumper. They may be paladins themselves, but they’re trained differently than the operatives; they aren’t as prepared for their deaths.
Someone pushes him to the side and he blinks out of his thoughts, his pace has slowed while he was thinking, letting the multitudes of people steer him, and he curses himself for being sloppy. He’s somehow managed to move farther away from the paladins than he anticipated, any further and he’d have lost the position of the furthest operative. He shifts his line of sight with an exaggerated sigh; the sound and movement of his eyes letting those around him know that he’s slightly changing direction, letting his body language speak for him and for the crowd to gently maneuver him in an arc back closer to his searching enemies.
This is one thing that Griffin likes about big cities, and is one of the reasons he chose to lay low here as opposed to a more secluded part of the world; it’s simple to hide in plain sight, protected by the mass of bodies jostling him from all sides. He hates being touched, especially now that he’s walking the same path he had years before when he was weaker and inexperienced in both being hunted and living on his own, but for some reason he’s not bothered by the brush of shoulders and elbows, of the tight press of bodies that push and squeeze and sidle by him as if he’s not another person but merely an object to be avoided.
Griffin doesn’t think about how natural it is for him to convey his intentions through subtle bodily cues to the people around him, people who wouldn’t be able to notice the gesture even if looking for it yet in their single mindedness of travel are able to subconsciously understand that he’s moving this way, now that way, now going to pause or about face abruptly. It’s all very animalistic. He tends to notice such things only when he observes another having trouble integrating into the seemingly group mind.
One of the paladins is certainly having a difficult time of it, and Griffin can’t help but grin widely when the young man stumbles into the side of a little old French woman who promptly elbows him in the gut with as much proficiency as a New Yorker. The paladin gives a pained “oof” as the blow winds him and rubs at his stomach with a soft groan, glaring childishly at the back of the lady who has rejoined the flow of the crowd. He’s making an inappropriate gesture at her retreating back, and Griffin chuckles sadistically at the rookie’s misfortune. It’s obvious that the kid’s new-his guard is completely down, it would be child’s play for Griffin to step up to him, place a hand gently on his elbow, and end him.
Instead, Griffin ignores the temptation. Any action could give away his position to the sensitive, and his advantage of surprise would be rendered useless. Instead he bides his time, meandering in a gentle sloping curve that allows him to keep an eye on the newbie and the sensitive. The last operative is harder to pin down, but from experience he’s certain of the area he must be in and makes sure to keep wary attention to his peripheral in that direction.
Paladins travel in groups of three or five, with an even number of operatives and one sensitive. They tend to travel in certain patterns as they search; it’s actually quite simple to figure out if one takes the time to just watch their movements. He waits for it, waits for it… there.
The sensitive passes the rookie with a grimace of reproach; he gets the bird for his efforts and-ah, that must be her, the third operative-a slender woman bleeds out of the movement of people to whap him over the head and glare at the sensitive, who pouts in response. There’s a quicksilver riposte of tiny hand signals before they’re all blending back into the mass of people in different directions, seamlessly. It all happens very fast, and effortlessly they’ve separated again in that pattern that wouldn’t make sense to anyone but him and the paladins themselves. Griffin doesn’t ponder what that makes of him, that he can see the way they move-in insane puzzles only other religious murderers like themselves can comprehend. Or so they think.
He stalks closer to them, now keeping tabs on the female operative as she appears to have the most experience and therefore be the leader. Sometimes, if the others in the group aren’t completely trained yet-and by the rookie’s reactions he hasn’t been, unless he’s bluffing, and Griffin may be getting paranoid as anyone but the way the kid cusses vehemently when he steps into some dog’s leavings strongly suggest otherwise-they’ll panic and split after the authorative figure is exterminated. He is unsure about the sensitive’s experience, but you never can know with them. The most cowardly of them sometimes has some bite to him, and the most courageous sometimes flee like a mangy cur.
Griffin keeps these things in mind as he moves ahead of the leader in their pattern, intending on catching the most dangerous of their team unawares before dealing with the other two. He passes a bit close to the sensitive, but he’s been careful-rubbing against other people and smearing his signature is easy when everyone is jostling everyone else, determined to get where they want to go. They do some of his work for him, by going about their business and carrying a shadow of his wormhole rot after them. The sensitive glances in his direction before his attention is caught by a man passing him on the other side, he’s twitching a little-overstimulated, and by the time he turns back in Griffin’s direction the Jumper has already moved on.
He’s learned a few tricks by now, and most of the paladins he encounters don’t live long enough to pass on the information. He’s been using one of them already, has been using it. Body language; he’s focused on an area that he predicts the Paladin will cross paths with him. He does not, does not focus on her, does not seem to notice her at all. His posture is slack and relaxed and he has a good natured grin on his face, not tensing up or getting upset when the crowd displaces him slightly from his trail-instead adjusting his gait appropriately.
He fits in, looks completely comfortable and integrated into his environment. That can throw the paladins off when they’re so certain that he’s an abomination and expect the humans around him to somehow recognize him as abnormal and shun him. He sometimes surprises himself, actually, when he thinks about how easy it is for him to get used to places, cultures, languages. With how many different lands he visits it should be at least a challenge to recognize what makes the humans around him comfortable with even an obvious foreigner like him, at least a little difficult to know what to do and what not to do to be accepted.
…sometimes, he wonders if it’s like this for all Jumpers or just him. Sometimes-sometimes, he feels lonely.
Sometimes.
Another trick is his knowledge of their knowledge. They know he can move objects, but few know just how much he’s capable of moving. Most assume other people are the extent of his abilities. How wrong, how terribly, fatally wrong they are. Mostly though, they don’t know how he jumps. Well, for any longer it takes for him to drop them off tall things or into a sea of water or sand anyway…
The woman is making her way towards the exterior of the square and he approaches her at an angle, from the front, his hands in his pockets. There is no suspicion in her eyes when he accidently bumps into her, his elbow gently brushing hers. They lock gazes for a moment, and her eyes widen. She’s so shocked, Griffin supposes that they’ve been sent here unawares of exactly which Jumper they were tracking. Not one to condemn someone unless there is undeniable truth that they’re an enemy, Griffin smiles at her-not a human’s smile, more an animalistic grin that’s all teeth. She sentences herself to her own execution, however, when she foolishly opens her mouth, informing her companions of the danger and sealing her fate with two syllables at the same time, the two syllables that will be the last thing other than a half scream that she utters.
His elbow still touching hers, he wastes no more time Jumping them. The look in her eyes and the gentle sigh of his name on her lips before the Jump will haunt Griffin’s dreams tonight, he knows, as he softly pushes her and she overbalances off the edge of Mitchell Plateau in northeast Australia, the sound of the four waterfalls covering the woman’s shrieks of terror.
He quickly backsteps into his own Jumpscar-it’s faster than creating another-and the mirth is wiped form his face as he quickly scans the crowd for the sensitive. His gaze passes over the rookie, who seems confused and is mouthing something into his headset, no doubt wondering what the woman meant before her demise, not likely realizing that she’s long dead. Griffin ignores him; he’s new, small fry. He needs to find the sensitive and get rid of him quick, now that he’s Jumped and the man has the feel of his signature. He needs to catch him, needs to. He’s dead if the sensitive makes it back to the safety of one of the paladin strongholds with the means to scent him.
Adrenaline rushing through his system now, his sight sharpens almost painfully on the man shoving through the crowd towards the operative in a panic. He knows the name. Knows that their mission is now labeled ‘suicide’ in the paladin’s books. The sensitive lands a hand on the rookie’s shoulder, eyes bulging with horror as Griffin appears silently on the other side of the boy, expression inscrutable.
The newbie backs up a bit as the sensitive’s now painfully tight grasp on his shoulder turns him, his back bumping into something solid and unmoving. He whips back around, an apology rising automatically to his lips for the offense. He doesn’t quite get the words out as his line of sight abruptly drops half a foot and he promptly snorts at Griffin’s size in comparison to his serious expression. Over the rookie’s shoulder, the sensitive’s hands are over his mouth, trembling, and tears are coursing down his face.
Despite the damper of the sensitive’s plaintive whimpers on the atmosphere, Griffin’s mood improves a little against his will when the operative opens his obnoxious mouth. “Wup,” the rookie intones mock-gravely, “didn’t see you there little guy,” and really, does this kid want to die? The sensitive lets out a horrified sob and Griffin smirks, surely the moron will clue in to exactly who he is with his partner having a hyperventilating freak out not 2 feet away. Instead, he gets, “are you lost? I’m sure we can find your parents if we try,” delivered teasingly and now it’s he who is bewildered.
Griffin tenses, back going ramrod straight, as the newbie reaches out and ruffles his hair. It takes all of his willpower not to lash out and break the appendage that’s molesting his person. The sensitive is all but wetting himself now, and the oblivious rookie looks back at his companion questionably with a raised eyebrow. He makes a motion asking about their leader, and he must be so fucking dense to not get that she’s fucking dead and that her goddamn killer is standing in front of him awkwardly with his enemy’s hand curled gently through his brown curls. Griffin grits his teeth, becoming angry now, and the sensitive is staring at David in disbelief, breath coming in little stuttering hiccups.
He’s hyper aware of the petting, adrenaline still pumping through his system and still expecting any moment for this to be a trap to lower his guard, although the sensitive’s expression suggests otherwise. Every slight movement against his scalp sends an almost full body shudder through him, as he has never been touched by a paladin without the intent to harm, and the newbie has obviously felt the tremors of his twitches since he gets a look of almost concern. And yes, why exactly is it that he’s letting this-this paladin touch him and not rebel against the invasion of his personal space immediately and with extreme prejudice?
There are speckles of foam forming around the edges of the sensitive’s mouth, and his eyes are rolling back in his head. The man has been on the edge of hysteria long enough that it’s sending him into unconsciousness. The newbie turns to him with a curse, and now that the hand is no longer in contact with him Griffin feels his muscles release tension in a swift wave of relief, as if a switch is flicked. He feels like he’s lost control of his motor skills as his knees want to buckle and fold under him instead of supporting his weight. He snarls silently at himself that this is not a good thing and that he needs now more than ever to dispose of these ignorant liabilities to his well being.
The rookie is holding his partner up and looking indecisive, he probably wants to call for help but is unsure on how to ask his superiors when his problem isn’t Jumper related… little does he know. The two paladins are in physical contact with each other, it would be so simple to just grab his shoulder sympathetically and drop them into a shark pit off of the coast of Puerto Rico… So why in god’s name is he just standing here staring at them?
Griffin feels like slamming his head into a brick wall repeatedly now, self hate pooling in his gut like shame. It’s just, well, sensitives he can understand, but…paladins are never like this. They’re trained and trained until there’s no humanity left within their religious, Jumper loathing bodies. Griffin is faced with a glaring impossibility and for once he doesn’t know what to do. When a stranger places his hand on the rookie’s shoulder sympathetically-much like Griffin was contemplating earlier as a cover to Jump them, and the paladin’s attention is focused away from him, Griffin desperately grasps the sleeve of the newbie’s coat and Jumps them, leaving the concerned citizen confused and alone on a suddenly empty patch of sidewalk in Paris.
He doesn’t know why he changed his mind, that he doesn’t want the rookie to know that he was the Jumper. Instead of honorably killing them with an intimate face-to-face farewell, he leaves before the paladin can look over his shoulder to see who exactly pulled them through the wormhole. He’s dropped them off in a tiny village in South Africa, its name loosely translated into ‘fool’s alley,’ in tribute to his sudden bout of stupidity.
Though it’s written in the paladin’s records as being because it’s a few weeks after April Fool’s day and how he must have been too inebriated to be able to murder their operatives properly. Griffin would’ve laughed uproariously if he knew what was written, at the very suggestion that he could be too blasted out of his skull to Jump; though that has happened once before… well whatever, you live and learn. He knew exactly what he was doing, though the why does escapes him.
Griffin is sure that this will come to bite him in the ass later, but he pushes the event out of his mind and turns his mind to where his next hideout should be… maybe somewhere a little more reclusive, he’s a bit tired of the city. He smirks lazily when the decision is made, and suddenly he’s ankle deep in sand on a deserted stretch of island. He sighs wearily, stretching muscles sore from being tense and not getting to release the energy he’d been saving up for a good fight for weeks. Turning on his heel, he makes for the light obscured by the line of dense palms lining the beach. He could do with a good, hard fuck to spend his pent up energy.
As he enters the classy brothel, he can’t help but turn his mind to the rookie paladin absentmindedly. Tall, brunette, and teasingly sweet…
Author: _ryouseiteki_
Rating: PG-15 (Griffin has a potty mouth and it is implied that he has sexytimes with some random in a brothel)
Word count: 3355
Prompts: Potentially 03/27 - name | 03/30 - control | 03/31 - The Virgin Islands | 04/01 - April Fools Day
Disclaimer: Characters belong to Steven Gould and 20th Century Fox, no profit is being made from this work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this story are fictitious products of the fan-writer’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblances to persons living or dead are entirely coincidental.
Characters:This chapter is Griffin-centric, Griffin/David/Griffin
Summary: David is a rookie paladin who's entire family has been in the business for generations. When he and his group discover that the jumper they've been chasing is the by now legendary Griffin they expect it to be suicide. But. Griffin leaves David alive. It's the start of a beautiful relationship.
Warnings: AU, OC death
A/N: It feels like a second epicfic is trying to get started here, but I'm going to try-TRY to keep it vaguely contained to the prompts.
It’s humid in Paris, the air stuffy and thick as the afternoon sun beats down on pedestrians who hurry across the city square, in a rush to their various destinations in order to escape the oppressive heat of the day. It’s not scorching, but it’s warm enough to be uncomfortable in any outfit. Some of the people, mostly tourists, pause next to the fountain in the center of the square; half of them in awe of the artistic structure, the other to steal a breather in the monument’s shadow or to splash a bit of the fountain’s cool, refreshing water onto their faces with rapture. They are not aware of the deadly dance being preformed within their midst.
Jeeze, it’s so ridiculously easy to recognize the sensitives, Griffin muses as he hawkishly watches the group of paladins search the area. They’re trying to be discreet, but he spotted them immediately due to the amusing quirks paladin sensitives tend to develop. Most Jumpers don’t survive long as he has; don’t know what to look for when hunting or being hunted by the religious nutters. But not him. He’s seen the one he’s labeled as the sensitive repeatedly stall with small jerks, disrupting the flow of the people around him-and he smirks as he watches people elbow aside and shove at the man who suddenly stops in the middle of the sidewalk and blocks their paths-to slowly tilt his head to the side slightly as if listening for a voice only he can hear.
They know that Griffin is here, somewhere. They have tracked him to Paris, to this general vicinity, and finally to the square that he’s been frequenting more often each day-and he’ll be the first to admit that he’d been waiting for the fuckers to catch up to him, things had been getting a bit boring to be honest. Even so, when they’re so close that a 5 minute fast-paced walk could lead them right to where he is, it’s hard to locate him in the large clusterfuck of people; the sensitive’s reactions lagging due to chatter on cellphones and the radio hum of electronics all across the square, his concentration interrupted by impatient humans who won’t let him stand still long enough to get a trace on Griffin’s signature.
He hasn’t jumped for a couple of months and a few weeks, but he knows by now that that small fact doesn’t matter in the scheme of things. He’ll always be covered in a thin layer of the typical rot left behind by the wormholes that Jumpers use to teleport. He wonders what it’s like when a sensitive catches one in their awareness. Can they see it? Does it look the same as a jump scar does to him-rippled like warped glass and shifting slightly like heat waves? Does it have a smell, a feel, a taste? He wonders with morbid curiosity what it sounds like; he thinks it should have a sound, with the way sensitives always seem to be listening for something just out of range of their hearing-twisting their head this way and that.
It’s not like he can ask one of them, they’re always too frightened before he drops them off of heights or into shark infested waters to reply to whatever he asks them, and he does ask, sometimes. He understands that it is their fault that they’re born with a gift that the paladins are able to use in opposition to his just as much as it’s his fault to be born a Jumper. They may be paladins themselves, but they’re trained differently than the operatives; they aren’t as prepared for their deaths.
Someone pushes him to the side and he blinks out of his thoughts, his pace has slowed while he was thinking, letting the multitudes of people steer him, and he curses himself for being sloppy. He’s somehow managed to move farther away from the paladins than he anticipated, any further and he’d have lost the position of the furthest operative. He shifts his line of sight with an exaggerated sigh; the sound and movement of his eyes letting those around him know that he’s slightly changing direction, letting his body language speak for him and for the crowd to gently maneuver him in an arc back closer to his searching enemies.
This is one thing that Griffin likes about big cities, and is one of the reasons he chose to lay low here as opposed to a more secluded part of the world; it’s simple to hide in plain sight, protected by the mass of bodies jostling him from all sides. He hates being touched, especially now that he’s walking the same path he had years before when he was weaker and inexperienced in both being hunted and living on his own, but for some reason he’s not bothered by the brush of shoulders and elbows, of the tight press of bodies that push and squeeze and sidle by him as if he’s not another person but merely an object to be avoided.
Griffin doesn’t think about how natural it is for him to convey his intentions through subtle bodily cues to the people around him, people who wouldn’t be able to notice the gesture even if looking for it yet in their single mindedness of travel are able to subconsciously understand that he’s moving this way, now that way, now going to pause or about face abruptly. It’s all very animalistic. He tends to notice such things only when he observes another having trouble integrating into the seemingly group mind.
One of the paladins is certainly having a difficult time of it, and Griffin can’t help but grin widely when the young man stumbles into the side of a little old French woman who promptly elbows him in the gut with as much proficiency as a New Yorker. The paladin gives a pained “oof” as the blow winds him and rubs at his stomach with a soft groan, glaring childishly at the back of the lady who has rejoined the flow of the crowd. He’s making an inappropriate gesture at her retreating back, and Griffin chuckles sadistically at the rookie’s misfortune. It’s obvious that the kid’s new-his guard is completely down, it would be child’s play for Griffin to step up to him, place a hand gently on his elbow, and end him.
Instead, Griffin ignores the temptation. Any action could give away his position to the sensitive, and his advantage of surprise would be rendered useless. Instead he bides his time, meandering in a gentle sloping curve that allows him to keep an eye on the newbie and the sensitive. The last operative is harder to pin down, but from experience he’s certain of the area he must be in and makes sure to keep wary attention to his peripheral in that direction.
Paladins travel in groups of three or five, with an even number of operatives and one sensitive. They tend to travel in certain patterns as they search; it’s actually quite simple to figure out if one takes the time to just watch their movements. He waits for it, waits for it… there.
The sensitive passes the rookie with a grimace of reproach; he gets the bird for his efforts and-ah, that must be her, the third operative-a slender woman bleeds out of the movement of people to whap him over the head and glare at the sensitive, who pouts in response. There’s a quicksilver riposte of tiny hand signals before they’re all blending back into the mass of people in different directions, seamlessly. It all happens very fast, and effortlessly they’ve separated again in that pattern that wouldn’t make sense to anyone but him and the paladins themselves. Griffin doesn’t ponder what that makes of him, that he can see the way they move-in insane puzzles only other religious murderers like themselves can comprehend. Or so they think.
He stalks closer to them, now keeping tabs on the female operative as she appears to have the most experience and therefore be the leader. Sometimes, if the others in the group aren’t completely trained yet-and by the rookie’s reactions he hasn’t been, unless he’s bluffing, and Griffin may be getting paranoid as anyone but the way the kid cusses vehemently when he steps into some dog’s leavings strongly suggest otherwise-they’ll panic and split after the authorative figure is exterminated. He is unsure about the sensitive’s experience, but you never can know with them. The most cowardly of them sometimes has some bite to him, and the most courageous sometimes flee like a mangy cur.
Griffin keeps these things in mind as he moves ahead of the leader in their pattern, intending on catching the most dangerous of their team unawares before dealing with the other two. He passes a bit close to the sensitive, but he’s been careful-rubbing against other people and smearing his signature is easy when everyone is jostling everyone else, determined to get where they want to go. They do some of his work for him, by going about their business and carrying a shadow of his wormhole rot after them. The sensitive glances in his direction before his attention is caught by a man passing him on the other side, he’s twitching a little-overstimulated, and by the time he turns back in Griffin’s direction the Jumper has already moved on.
He’s learned a few tricks by now, and most of the paladins he encounters don’t live long enough to pass on the information. He’s been using one of them already, has been using it. Body language; he’s focused on an area that he predicts the Paladin will cross paths with him. He does not, does not focus on her, does not seem to notice her at all. His posture is slack and relaxed and he has a good natured grin on his face, not tensing up or getting upset when the crowd displaces him slightly from his trail-instead adjusting his gait appropriately.
He fits in, looks completely comfortable and integrated into his environment. That can throw the paladins off when they’re so certain that he’s an abomination and expect the humans around him to somehow recognize him as abnormal and shun him. He sometimes surprises himself, actually, when he thinks about how easy it is for him to get used to places, cultures, languages. With how many different lands he visits it should be at least a challenge to recognize what makes the humans around him comfortable with even an obvious foreigner like him, at least a little difficult to know what to do and what not to do to be accepted.
…sometimes, he wonders if it’s like this for all Jumpers or just him. Sometimes-sometimes, he feels lonely.
Sometimes.
Another trick is his knowledge of their knowledge. They know he can move objects, but few know just how much he’s capable of moving. Most assume other people are the extent of his abilities. How wrong, how terribly, fatally wrong they are. Mostly though, they don’t know how he jumps. Well, for any longer it takes for him to drop them off tall things or into a sea of water or sand anyway…
The woman is making her way towards the exterior of the square and he approaches her at an angle, from the front, his hands in his pockets. There is no suspicion in her eyes when he accidently bumps into her, his elbow gently brushing hers. They lock gazes for a moment, and her eyes widen. She’s so shocked, Griffin supposes that they’ve been sent here unawares of exactly which Jumper they were tracking. Not one to condemn someone unless there is undeniable truth that they’re an enemy, Griffin smiles at her-not a human’s smile, more an animalistic grin that’s all teeth. She sentences herself to her own execution, however, when she foolishly opens her mouth, informing her companions of the danger and sealing her fate with two syllables at the same time, the two syllables that will be the last thing other than a half scream that she utters.
His elbow still touching hers, he wastes no more time Jumping them. The look in her eyes and the gentle sigh of his name on her lips before the Jump will haunt Griffin’s dreams tonight, he knows, as he softly pushes her and she overbalances off the edge of Mitchell Plateau in northeast Australia, the sound of the four waterfalls covering the woman’s shrieks of terror.
He quickly backsteps into his own Jumpscar-it’s faster than creating another-and the mirth is wiped form his face as he quickly scans the crowd for the sensitive. His gaze passes over the rookie, who seems confused and is mouthing something into his headset, no doubt wondering what the woman meant before her demise, not likely realizing that she’s long dead. Griffin ignores him; he’s new, small fry. He needs to find the sensitive and get rid of him quick, now that he’s Jumped and the man has the feel of his signature. He needs to catch him, needs to. He’s dead if the sensitive makes it back to the safety of one of the paladin strongholds with the means to scent him.
Adrenaline rushing through his system now, his sight sharpens almost painfully on the man shoving through the crowd towards the operative in a panic. He knows the name. Knows that their mission is now labeled ‘suicide’ in the paladin’s books. The sensitive lands a hand on the rookie’s shoulder, eyes bulging with horror as Griffin appears silently on the other side of the boy, expression inscrutable.
The newbie backs up a bit as the sensitive’s now painfully tight grasp on his shoulder turns him, his back bumping into something solid and unmoving. He whips back around, an apology rising automatically to his lips for the offense. He doesn’t quite get the words out as his line of sight abruptly drops half a foot and he promptly snorts at Griffin’s size in comparison to his serious expression. Over the rookie’s shoulder, the sensitive’s hands are over his mouth, trembling, and tears are coursing down his face.
Despite the damper of the sensitive’s plaintive whimpers on the atmosphere, Griffin’s mood improves a little against his will when the operative opens his obnoxious mouth. “Wup,” the rookie intones mock-gravely, “didn’t see you there little guy,” and really, does this kid want to die? The sensitive lets out a horrified sob and Griffin smirks, surely the moron will clue in to exactly who he is with his partner having a hyperventilating freak out not 2 feet away. Instead, he gets, “are you lost? I’m sure we can find your parents if we try,” delivered teasingly and now it’s he who is bewildered.
Griffin tenses, back going ramrod straight, as the newbie reaches out and ruffles his hair. It takes all of his willpower not to lash out and break the appendage that’s molesting his person. The sensitive is all but wetting himself now, and the oblivious rookie looks back at his companion questionably with a raised eyebrow. He makes a motion asking about their leader, and he must be so fucking dense to not get that she’s fucking dead and that her goddamn killer is standing in front of him awkwardly with his enemy’s hand curled gently through his brown curls. Griffin grits his teeth, becoming angry now, and the sensitive is staring at David in disbelief, breath coming in little stuttering hiccups.
He’s hyper aware of the petting, adrenaline still pumping through his system and still expecting any moment for this to be a trap to lower his guard, although the sensitive’s expression suggests otherwise. Every slight movement against his scalp sends an almost full body shudder through him, as he has never been touched by a paladin without the intent to harm, and the newbie has obviously felt the tremors of his twitches since he gets a look of almost concern. And yes, why exactly is it that he’s letting this-this paladin touch him and not rebel against the invasion of his personal space immediately and with extreme prejudice?
There are speckles of foam forming around the edges of the sensitive’s mouth, and his eyes are rolling back in his head. The man has been on the edge of hysteria long enough that it’s sending him into unconsciousness. The newbie turns to him with a curse, and now that the hand is no longer in contact with him Griffin feels his muscles release tension in a swift wave of relief, as if a switch is flicked. He feels like he’s lost control of his motor skills as his knees want to buckle and fold under him instead of supporting his weight. He snarls silently at himself that this is not a good thing and that he needs now more than ever to dispose of these ignorant liabilities to his well being.
The rookie is holding his partner up and looking indecisive, he probably wants to call for help but is unsure on how to ask his superiors when his problem isn’t Jumper related… little does he know. The two paladins are in physical contact with each other, it would be so simple to just grab his shoulder sympathetically and drop them into a shark pit off of the coast of Puerto Rico… So why in god’s name is he just standing here staring at them?
Griffin feels like slamming his head into a brick wall repeatedly now, self hate pooling in his gut like shame. It’s just, well, sensitives he can understand, but…paladins are never like this. They’re trained and trained until there’s no humanity left within their religious, Jumper loathing bodies. Griffin is faced with a glaring impossibility and for once he doesn’t know what to do. When a stranger places his hand on the rookie’s shoulder sympathetically-much like Griffin was contemplating earlier as a cover to Jump them, and the paladin’s attention is focused away from him, Griffin desperately grasps the sleeve of the newbie’s coat and Jumps them, leaving the concerned citizen confused and alone on a suddenly empty patch of sidewalk in Paris.
He doesn’t know why he changed his mind, that he doesn’t want the rookie to know that he was the Jumper. Instead of honorably killing them with an intimate face-to-face farewell, he leaves before the paladin can look over his shoulder to see who exactly pulled them through the wormhole. He’s dropped them off in a tiny village in South Africa, its name loosely translated into ‘fool’s alley,’ in tribute to his sudden bout of stupidity.
Though it’s written in the paladin’s records as being because it’s a few weeks after April Fool’s day and how he must have been too inebriated to be able to murder their operatives properly. Griffin would’ve laughed uproariously if he knew what was written, at the very suggestion that he could be too blasted out of his skull to Jump; though that has happened once before… well whatever, you live and learn. He knew exactly what he was doing, though the why does escapes him.
Griffin is sure that this will come to bite him in the ass later, but he pushes the event out of his mind and turns his mind to where his next hideout should be… maybe somewhere a little more reclusive, he’s a bit tired of the city. He smirks lazily when the decision is made, and suddenly he’s ankle deep in sand on a deserted stretch of island. He sighs wearily, stretching muscles sore from being tense and not getting to release the energy he’d been saving up for a good fight for weeks. Turning on his heel, he makes for the light obscured by the line of dense palms lining the beach. He could do with a good, hard fuck to spend his pent up energy.
As he enters the classy brothel, he can’t help but turn his mind to the rookie paladin absentmindedly. Tall, brunette, and teasingly sweet…