Fic: The Care & Upkeep of Rainbows
The Care and Upkeep of Rainbows
Vain
7.19.2012
Disclaimers: I own nothing except the plot and various OCs. Metalocalypse and all the elements therein are the intellectual property / registered trademarks of Brendon Small, Tommy Blacha, and Williams Street Productions. This is entirely a work of fiction; no profit is being made.
Summary: Follows The Church of the Black Klok; Toki dreams in rainbows, but the real world is made of blood. It's okay, though. They're going to save him. They promised.
Warnings: Language, Magnus's buckets o' crazy, slash, torture, violence, & non-con. Seriously triggery happenings and NC-17 content. PLEASE do not read this if these things disturb you.
Pairings & Characters: Magnus/Toki, some heavy Skwisgaar/Toki overtones, and really pissed!protective!Skwisgaar, and reeeeally pissed off Charles and Nathan.
Notes: This is un-betaed. If you would like to send me corrections or catch something I missed, please do so & I'll make the appropriate corrections. Also, Toki's accent is a bitch to write. [Happy ending, though!]
On a sidenote, to folks wondering why the hell I'm posting in a new fandom, I have resolved to only post fics that are complete so as not to accrue anymore WIPs. A lot of my other projects are still being worked on since I'm a wordy bitch and I am still writing. Just not enough to post anything.
This was originally written for the anonymeme at metalbandwagon.
Plagiarizers suck. Be a dude, not a dick.
Enjoy!
------
My names am Toki. In my dream I can sees de birds and de kitties and sometimes a little girls in a steel chair along a rainbow bridges. Sometimes dere ams de clowns covered in snows and a man whats has a red throats and glass eyes who fixes teddy bears and sings when he ams drunk. Dere ams an octopus sometimes, too. He hits things with his arms and drink de stars out of green bottles. He makes de alligators sing so dat de grounds shake and de sky turns into rainbow. De tiger ams also dere withs deems. He growls too lows to hear and rolls over to show his bellies, but his claws ams sharp and cold like steels.
And then dere ams the owl. He's big--bigger dan the whole world--and when he flaps his wings, the air sings and I can feel my whole bodys tremble.
I likes my dream. It am safes and nots cold at alls. Dere ams no straff hull, or de yelling, or de juling.
And sometimes de birds ams wrappings his wings around Toki and de alligator is humming and while the tiger growl and octopus hit and de glass-eyed man hold up de sky so dat everything is covered in de rainbows.
In his dreams, Toki ams safe. But we all gots to wake up eventually.
---
The lash whistled as arced through the air, ripping through the torn and bleeding skin of his already red back with an abrasive crack. The captive made a harsh whimpering noise, screams long-since spent, and sagged in his chains.
"Worthless little shit!"
CRACK
"Think you can replace me?! Think you can fucking replace Magnus fucking Hammersmith?!!"
The whip fell again and again and again, but Toki was beyond any sort of ability to comprehend the questions and invectives being shrieked at him. Two days into his captivity, they'd forced a ball gag into his out to stop him from chewing on his lips and tongue so--even if he had been aware of Hammersmith's demands--he couldn't have answered. He didn't even realize when the blows stopped until the chains were being undone and his body dropped heavily to the floor.
Despite the screaming pain in his back and shoulders, the Norwegian tried weakly to curl up into a fetal ball in a futile attempt to protect himself. The maneuver earned him a swift kick at the still-healing wound on his side and the guitarist almost choked on an aborted, muffled scream.
"Enough!" ground out a rough voice somewhere beyond the violet-red haze of pain that covered everything. "We need him alive."
Magnus turned away from his victim, face twisted in rage, and whirled on the man in the metal mask. "Alive? The stupid little shit doesn't know anything worth knowing!"
"That's not your call," the Assassin stated flatly. Emotionless eyes, obscured by glass and steel, turned down to the brutally beaten young man on the floor. "You've had your fun for today, Hammersmith. Pick a new game for tomorrow."
Magnus clenched his fists and looked as though he was going to argue for a moment, but a sharp glare silenced him. Instead, he settled on spitting on the rhythmist before he stormed out of the room.
"What the fuck ever. By the time 'm done with him no one will want him anyway."
The Assassin said nothing, merely stepping aside to allow the smaller man to stomp past him. Once he was sure Magnus was gone, he turned back to the boy on the floor an sneered. As long as Wartooth breathed, Magnus could do whatever he wanted. The boy was only bait after all, and he intended on landing much more challenging prey.
He stepped out of the doorframe and slammed the door hard behind him. It was only a matter of time before Offdensen came.
Behind him, alone in the dark and cold, Toki trembled and sobbed against the unforgiving steel floor.
---
Nathan likes'd de sea. He taught me about my underwater friends--de ones I mades in de tube doing de guitars recording for Dethwater. He mades me repeats de names until they'd was right. Sjøhest er 'seahorse'. Hval er 'whale'. Delfin er 'dolphin'. Hummer er . . .
Er . . .
On de rainbow bridges I tries to ask him, but the alligator ams dancing with a swan whats am bleeding from her hearts while de octopus beats on the bridge and drinks de stars. De bridge ams crackings, but no one listens to Toki when he says this to them.
"De bridge ams gonna breaks!" he yells, but no one wants listens.
"Toki."
And den dere ams de glass-eyed man. His throats ams more redder dan usual and his face is hidden by purple flowers. The owls am sits on his shoulder with de claws like knives, but it ams so much more bigger than the glass-eyed man that he should bes crushed. But he amn’t because he ams strong like the fjell, all rooted downs in the earths.
"Toki,” he says, “we're coming."
De owl flaps his wingses and the air turns into de sunlights.
"You have to hold on. We're going to find you. I promise."
But I can'sk promise de glass-eyed man or de owl anything. De bridge ams crackings.
Beside, how cans he saves Toki when he can'st even sees dat he's bleedings?
---
The room looked and smelled exactly like what it was: a torture chamber. It was small, soundproofed steel box, empty except for the single bright bulb by the door, the chains hanging down on the ceiling, and the naked Dethklok member on the cold floor, curled up beside the drain. Magnus surveyed the ruined young man at his feet with a smile. It felt so good to see him laid low. . . . Better than the best blow he'd ever had.
Oh, he'd hated the boy from afar for years now. Watching Dethklok soar to fame, take over the airways, buy a house and have it declared its own fucking country--! All of that, under the smug eyes of that neanderthal Explosion and that self-righteous little shit Pickles would have been more than enough. But to be not only replaced, but utterly EFFACED by some nobody kid from Nowhere fucking Norway? Intolerable.
And to see the little bastard PLAY? To hear the easy, hypnotic musical call and answer between this little nothing and that walking case of the clap Skwigelf was enough to move Magnus beyond reason.
Meeting Wartooth had not made anything better. If nothing else, the blathering idiot's naivety merely convinced Magnus that the little candyass deserved what was coming. This was death metal, not a Baskin fucking Robins. Walking around like that, broadcasting weakness like wounded gazelle on the serangetti . . . Well, Toki was as much to blame for this as anyone else.
And seeing those other asshole show up to rescue him in their bathrobes of all things? Watching Explosion mutilate some asshat just for breaking the kid's toy snowglobe? Oh, this would be perfect.
Whatever asshole said that the best revenge was living well was a pussy. The best revenge is carving out your enemy's still-beating heart and devouring it before his very eyes.
Those fuckers thought they could take his band? Steal his fame? Erase him from history?
Well, that was just fine. Because he was going to eat their fucking heart.
Magnus smiled, a slow, hungry expression and lightly kicked the semi-conscious guitarist to flip him on his back. The kid's skin was flushed with fever, but he was pale beneath the unnatural pallor. Still smiling, he bent and removed the ball gag roughly, tossing it aside. Then he stood and retrieved Toki's wake-up call. Moments later the boy sputtered and gasped as Magnus dumped a bucket of ice water over the his head.
"Wakey, wakey~! Eggs and bak~ey~" the former guitarist trilled with a twisted smile.
Toki whined and rolled over, body wracked by tremors as another bucket was dumped over his back, washing away some of the blood and filth that coated him. Trembling, the young man squeezed his shut against the light. No one had been in to see him for two days and his eyes weren't ready for the bright fluorescents.
"Jeg beklager, Far," he whined piteously with a shot raw voice from screaming. "Toki vil være bra."
"What?" Another light kick. Couldn't risk doing any more physical damage with that metal-faced psycho breathing down his neck. "Speak English!"
"Toki ams sorry, Father! Please no more beatings!"
A cruel smile twisted Magnus's lips as he understood just where his toy's pain and fever-wracked mind had taken him. Oh, this was just too rich. Magnus started to laugh. Too rich.
"Poor baby," he crooned in a voice that held no kindness. He knelt down, ignoring thing vile smearing of blood and body fluids on the floor, and gently ran cold fingers along Toki's cheek. The roughly stubbled skin felt like fire.
"Far . . ."
Oh . . . God, this was better than Christmas and his birthday all at once. . . . And he'd always had a daddy kink.
Toki whimpered and leaned into the cool touch for a moment and then Magnus stood. The older man reach down, smiling as he rubbed his slowly hardening dick through his pants. This . . . this was going to be a thing of beauty.
"You want Daddy to make it better?" he cooed as he undid his pants.
Toki remained huddled on the floor.
"Then you gotta do something for Daddy." Magnus freed himself from his boxers and pants and stroked himself, breathing heavily as he took in the sight and smell of the boy's humiliation. All those marks on his back, all from him . . . Christ, the kid would be wearing Magnus's marks for the rest of his life. … Not that that would be long. And those soft little whimpers…
God, the only thing that could make this better would be if the rest of those assholes were here to see this. Fuck it. He's give them a repeat performance after those arrogant bastards were caught. They'd pay. They'd all fucking pay--
The older man released himself with a shaky groan. It wouldn't do to ruin his fun this early. Not yet.
He reached down and grabbed Toki's long hair, shaking the boy roughly to get him to focus, before forcing him onto his knees. "Bet'cher hungry," he breathed darkly as he settled the guitarist in front of him. "Bet Daddy knows what you need.
Toki's eyes were squinting in pain and focusing on nothing somewhere just in front of Magnus's face. He looked dazed and hopelessly lost.
Magnus grabbed his lower jaw, forcing his mouth open with bruising force. He paused, drinking in the moment. Christ, he wanted to relive this every day. Maybe he would. He released Toki's hair and, holding the battered young man steady with the grip on his jaw, slowly traced the edges off the boy's rough chapped lips with the head of his aching arousal. The motion left shiny little smears of precome in its wake, like macabre lip gloss.
Magus tightened his grip on the boy's jaw to punishing proportions. "Daddy's got what you want." And then he shoved in all the way.
The effect was instantaneous. As warm, wet heat wrapped itself lovingly around Magnus's cock, Toki choked, his air supply completely cut off. The younger man tried to wheel back with a strength born of panic and cried out around the obstruction in his mouth. Magnus was ready, though, and grabbed Toki's hair with the hand not gripping his jaw. He twisted his hand through the soft, fitly strands and yanked viciously, forcing Toki's head back and opening his throat more. Tears leaked out of Toki's eyes as he looked up at the other man in terror and confusion.
Magnus jerked him forward, viciously ramming his erection mercilessly down the boy's throat, and grinned into his face, heedless of the desperate, frantic clawing at his thighs. He stared deep into Toki's eyes, memorizing the fear. The terror. The desperate 'Why?' staring at him from those perfect crystal blue eyes.
"Think you're good enough to replace me?!" he grunted between thrusts. "You think you're anything?"
Toki's eyes wheeled in terror. His whimpering, gagging noises danced up along Magnus's cock to his spine, like little sparks that went straight to his head.
"You're nothing!"
Toki's hands slid limply down his legs to the floor.
"Not even good enough to suck my cock!!" he roared.
Those perfect, terrified blue eyes rolled up into his head, his throat relaxed, and Toki went limp. With a cry of frustration, Magnus threw him off of him, oblivious to the way the boy's head bounced off the steel floor. He clenched his fists and yelled in wordless rage.
That little bitch--that worthless little bitch--shoulda choked him on my fucking dick--
The former guitarist forced himself to step back and away from his victim before he lost control of himself completely.
"Fuck!"
He turned around and pressed his palms against the cold, metal walls to ground himself, ignoring the pounding ache between his legs as he forced his heart rate and breathing to slow down. If the kid died, then the psycho Assassin would carve it out of his ass, and Magnus liked his ass intact.
After a few moments of forced deep breaths, Magnus was able to turn around. His erection was still jutting out at full mast and he could only smile at the sight before him. Toki had swum back up to a semblance of consciousness and was trying to crawl away, croaking nonsense in Norwegian, but he was too hurt, weak, and disoriented to make any progress. It was a simple matter to kneel down and grab Toki's hips, dragging him backwards. He spat on his palm and rubbed it on his painful erection. The friction would be a bitch, but for now spit and blood would have to do. Next time, he'd bring lube.
"You wanna be Magus, you little bitch?" He lined himself up behind the younger man, ignoring his pleas and sobs. "Then I'm gonna give you Magnus." He thrust forward.
And Toki relearned how to scream.
---
The bridges ams broken ands covered in bloods and shit. The rainbows ams becomes nightmares and de clowns freezes to deaths in de snow. De alligator and de octopus are fightings ands de tiger ams cuts hims self up on his own claw and de glass-eyed mans ams turned all to bones.
De owl ams gone. Not evens a feathers wast left for Toki.
"Ugle!! Min ugle!! Løgnere!! Whys yous ams lies to me?!"
But de owl is gone and glass-eyes mans ams dead.
It ams stupid to be mads anyways.
De owl never mades any promises.
---
Three weeks.
It took them three fucking weeks to find them.
Charles was as close to beside himself with fury (and anxiety) as he'd ever been in his life (and that was saying something) and it was only the fact that he had to keep a stiff upper lip for the boys that stopped him from tearing a bloody path through the Gears. His people were supposed to be better than this, godamnit.
Nathan and, surprisingly, Murderface were the only ones really holding it together well. Murderface had simply started working with his weapons--not playing, actually working--to ensure that he'd be ready and his whining had been kept to a noticeable minimum. At least in front of Charles and the boys. Charles knew for a fact that the bassist was running his personal squad of Klokateers ragged when he was away from the others. Nathan had taken to working out in the gym at every available moment and was learning to box from some of the Elite Unit. Charles had supervised a few sessions and was deeply impressed with the frontman's resolve.
Pickles had spent the first two weeks trying to dope himself into a coma before the first promising leads began to trickle in. Then he had seemingly snapped out of it and became Charles's second shadow, demanding to be made aware of every development as it occurred. Really, though, it was Skwisgaar Charles was most worried about. At first the Swede had seemed fine, but as time passed and there was no sign of Toki, the lead guitarist appeared to fall apart. He wasn't sleeping enough and what little sleep he got, according to the Gears assigned to him, was broken by nightmares. He had pretty much stopped eating too, which worried Charles immensely. Skwisgaar was not a big man and could ill afford to lose the weight. The lawyer was deeply concerned that if Toki didn't make it, they might lose Skwisgaar, too.
Then how the fuck were they supposed to save the world?
It was the Church that ultimately saved them. Again. They seemed to have spies everywhere. (Charles was still trying to figure out which of his Gears belonged to the Church and it irritated him immensely that he only had a handful of numbers.) They found the facility and even managed to procure floor plans.
That was how, three weeks, two days, and roughly an hour and a half after the earth swallowed Abigail and Toki, he found himself charging into a nameless defunct military base in Oregon, surrounded by a very pissed off group of Elites and highly aggressive musicians.
"Remember, we need Magnus and boy alive."
Initially the plan was to split into three teams. Alpha Team, the Elites and some highly trained Church members, cracked the facility first. They took out the security and cleared the way. Then Charles, the band, and the rest of the Elites swept in. Beta Team, led by Pickles and William, were to go after Abigail and Delta Team (Nathan and Skwisgaar) were responsible for retrieving Toki. And Charles (Gamma) was going to put that metal-faced bastard into the ground once and for all.
At first, everything went as planned. The drummer and the bassist split off with some of the finest troops Charles had ever trained, heading to the wing where Alpha Team had signaled Abigail was located. Charles stayed with Nathan and Skwisgaar as they moved deeper in the facility, sidestepping bodies along the way. Alpha Team still had not sent word back about Toki, though, and it was beginning to worry him.
Then he saw him.
It was only a peripheral glance, but through the flames he could see the Assassin glaring a him in rage as his headquarters burned around him.
"Stay with the boys," he barked to squad leader, and then he was running down the halls before the large man could reply.
The Assassin was running from him, a fact that sat heavy in Charles's gut. This was not a man who ran from things . . . and that could only mean that he was running to something.
His headset crackled to life in his ear, momentarily distracting him as he slipped slightly on someone's innards. A passing glance assured him that it was not one of the Klokateers.
"Sir!" a voice in the earpiece crackled. It was the squad leader with Nathan and Skwigaar. "Sir, we think Lord Wartooth is in the direction you're heading."
"Then move your ass and stop distracting me, 642."
There was no reply, which was good, because as Charles rounded the corner he saw the man at the end of the hallway, punching a code into a door. His gun was raised and the world dropped into the molasses-thick slow motion that had become so familiar to him during his time in The Unit. He inhaled and peered through the sight. The Assassin finished punching in the code. He exhaled and squeezed the trigger.
The sound of his boots on the floor, the cock of the rifle, the bang of the shot . . . Something gave him away. At the last instant, the Assassin jerked and what should have been a clean shot to the head struck the man's steel mask. He staggered back, momentarily stunned and then wheeled around to face the lawyer. It looked for a moment as though he would charge Charles, then the sound of boots and Nathan's harsh shout sounded directly behind him. Charles could see the man mutter the exact same curse at the exact same time he did, both knowing that neither of them would die today, and then the man took off running down the hall again.
Charles moved to give chase, but was dragged to halt at the sound of Nathan's voice calling for him. "Fuck him, Charles! Where the fuck is Toki?!"
The lawyer changed directions with a soundless growl. "Take two men and follow him," he barked to 642. The Elite snapped to attention, nodded to 873 and 755, and took off at a dead run down the corridor while Charles headed towards the door his opponent had unlocked. The Assassin had risked getting shot to get into this room. Whatever was in it had to be damned important. He hit the green entry button on the panel and then time just sorta . . .
Stopped.
He saw the room. The blood on the walls. The chains hanging from the ceiling. The shit and piss on the floor. He smelled the fetid air. He could almost taste the horror of it. But it somehow didn't . . . mesh in his head with the occupants. It wasn't possible. What he was seeing couldn't be . . .
Not Toki. Toki, who always had a smile, who always had the top score in DDR, who couldn't sleep without Deddy Bear, and who forgot to take his insulin so Charles had to make him a little Facebones reminder app, and who was quite capable of gleefully beating in a man's skull with his bare hands and then eating a pudding cup and pouting like 5 year old all through subsequent lecture . . .
This--Magnus paused in mid-rut behind a shattered and sobbing Toki--could not happen. Not to one of his boys. Not on his fucking watch.
"Oäkta!!!!"
For the rest of his life, Charles would never recall the next sixty-some seconds that followed. The memory was not a blur or a haze of red or anything like that. It simply did not exist.
Time stopped when he opened that door to see Magnus raping Toki.
When it next started, he found himself being forcibly restrained by three Gears. Nathan and the two other Elites were restraining a grimly quiet Skwisgaar who was desperately scrambling towards Magnus with alarming determination. As for Magnus, he was now laying on the floor, crying out in a hoarse voice and curled desperately around his groin. One eye was already swelling shut and his nose appeared to be broken. A few of his teeth were also on the ground. From his awkward position between the Gears, he could see blood on Magnus's hands where he cradled his crotch, though whether it was his or Toki's, he couldn't tell. Charles knuckles were split and aching.
Toki was curled up on his side on the floor, terrifyingly still.
"Sir. Please, Master Offdensen!" 698 whispered urgently to him. "We need him alive, sir!"
Abruptly Charles went limp. He hadn't even realized he'd still been struggling. He could feel the tension in Gears around him immediately drop as they carefully lowered him back to the ground. "I'm fine," he assured them in a voice that sounded distant and strange. He gently brushed aside their hands. Part of him was afraid that if he moved too fast, he'd break one of their arms on principle. "Thank you."
The commandos immediately disengaged. "Forgive us, sir--"
"You did well," he interrupted coldly. He knelt down next to Toki and gently turned him over and pushed back his matted hair. "Secure him," he ordered the Gears.
They immediately set upon Magnus.
"Toki?" he breathed. His questing fingers felt a pulse beneath the little rhythmist's fever-hot skin. It was fast and thready. "Skwisgaar, he needs your help."
The harsh, flat staement seemed to snap the lead guitarist out of his murderous fugue and he suddenly sagged against the men holding him, Magnus completely forgotten as he took in Toki's sorry state. "He ams . . .? He ams . . .?"
"Is he alive?" Nathan grated out in a voice that sounded like hot coals.
The lawyer gently tipped Toki over to look at the mess that was his back and his eyes narrowed in sympathy. "Yes," he curtly replied. "But he is badly injured.” It took every ounce of his self-control to contain his rage and he vowed that Magnus would pay sevenfold for every hurt inflicted on the boy in his lap.
Skwisgaar crumbled to his knees as Charles stripped off his flack jacket and began to remove his button-up. Understanding what he was doing, Skwisgaar moved to follow suit, only to stop as Charles firmly touched to his shoulder.
"Keep yours," the older man admonished with uncharacteristic gentleness. His green eyes bore into the Swede's blue ones. "You're too valuable to risk."
He felt more than saw Nathan's glare at that remark, but ignored it in favor of carefully wrapping Toki in the garments with Skwisgaar's help. As they worked, he noted with clinical detachment that Skwisgaar's hands were shaking.
Skwisgaar had hands like a surgeon. They never shook.
It only took a moment and one of the Elites' undershirts for the Norwegian to recover a bit of modesty, but his numerous injuries and the fact that he remained unconscious were alarming. Skwisgaar had managed to pull Toki into his lap with unmistakable possessiveness during the clothing process and was now muttering in angry Swedish at his injured bandmate. Charles took that as his signal to step away. It was common knowledge that Skwisgaar was not good a sharing and, given the way he was hovering over Toki, he was liable to take off someone's arm if they got too close right now.
Nathan meanwhile had moved over to where Magnus was being restrained by the three Elites and currently had one massive hand wrapped halfway around the former guitarist's face, covering his mouth. One of the Gears was viciously twisting the captive man's hair back to force him to meet Nathan's eyes. The lead singer was maybe a centimeter away from Hammersmith and his voice whisper was low thunder in the quiet room, menacing and incomprehensible. The growing look of terror in Magnus's eyes was deeply gratifying.
Charles turned away and put a hand up to his earpiece. "This is Gear 1. We have retrieved the Asset. Check in."
A moment later, Pickles’s Wisconsin drawl filled his ear. It was heavy with anxiety. "We got 'er, Chief. It's . . . De Klokateers kicked ass. Are de guys ahlright?"
The manager swallowed hard. "We're all alive. No casualties. Please report back to the Dethcopter. Dokateers are on standby."
"Rahger."
Charles frowned at the off note in Pickles voice. This didn't feel a whole lot like a victory. He stared at the doorway in the vague direction of the masked Assassin's flight. Next time . . .
Next time, he wasn't wasting a bullet on that motherfucker. He would kill him with his bare hands.
Nathan joined him and followed his gaze. He frowned, understanding his manager's thoughts and not at all liking the intense expression on Charles's face. "You still got unfinished business with that asshole?"
For a moment the smaller man was silent, then his mouth quirked into an odd little sneer and he turned his attention back to Toki and Skwisgaar. "Not today. The Gears will follow him." His snake green eyes flickered to meet the frontman's emerald gaze for a moment before he turned to the struggling Magnus. "Right now, I have more important business here."
One of the Commandos stepped forward to pick up the little rhythm guitarist's battered frame, but Skwisgaar abruptly interceded, pulling Toki closer with an angry hiss at the large Klokateer. "You no touches him!"
The Gear bowed his head and stepped away. The Swede then gently gathered the other guitarist in his arms, lifting him up with surprising strength. The two Klokateers with him fell into step as he headed towards the door.
"You got him?" Nathan growled without looking away from Magnus.
"Jah." The blond tightened his grip, earning a weak whimper of protest from Toki. "I gotsk him."
Abruptly Hammersmith laughed, seeing something in the look on the lead guitarist's face. It was a thin, hollow noise, but the sound rubbed on Charles's already frayed nerves like a cheese grater "Is that the way it then? You get him to roll over for you, blondie? That how he earned his keep? I gotta admit, by the time I had him, the bitch was kinda worn out."
"Fuck you!" Nathan roared. The frontman surged forward and would have no doubt throttled the former guitarist had Charles not stepped in front of him to stop the charge.
"We need him alive for now, Nathan. He may have information."
"And when we don't need him anymore?" the singer growled menacingly.
The lawyer pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose and his lips twisted into a small, cold parody of a smile. "Well, ah--"
"Don'tsk kills him," Skwisgaar ordered brusquely from the door.
The other two men looked over at him askance, but the Swede was not looking at them. He was staring at Magnus with eyes as cold and inevitable as the heart of winter. "His life ams mine."
Magnus sneered, but there was no hiding the way he paled with fear beneath the blood on his face. Skwisgaar swept out with Toki without another word.
For a moment, Nathan looked torn between following after his bandmates and remaining to mete out further punishment. Eventually, he turned away with an angry rumble and glared at Charles. "I'm gonna go get Pickles and Murderface. You got this?"
"Yes, Nathan. I, ah, think we can handle the situation from here."
"You fucking better." And then he was gone, vanishing with surprising speed for a man so large, two protective Gears trailing in the band members' wake.
Charles looked after him for a moment with a small frown. This was a fucking mess. And there was really only one person to blame.
"I'm not going to talk, you pencil-necked bastard. I'm not telling you shit."
Green eyes flashed in the low light as the manager turned back to his former employer and smiled. Magnus was afraid. That was good. He should be.
The smile grew.
Here, in this blood room that smelled like piss and sex and fear and despair, Magnus should be fucking terrified.
Charles chuckled softly and took a step forward, dropping into a crouch so that he was at the other man's level. He leaned forward so that his lips just brushed the shell of Magnus's ear and exulted in the shudder that wracked the other man at the motion. "Oh, you'll talk, Mr. Hammersmith," he promised quietly. "They always do."
And then, you will beg Skwisgaar for your death.
And Skwisgaar had never been known for his compassion.
Charles stood, still smiling that cadaverous smile. "Get him out of my fucking sight."
---
Beeping. He could hear beeping.
Then a voice.
"You needsk to wakes up, Toki," a familiar, angry voice told him urgently. "Jah, you ams dildos at guitars, but you ams less dildos dan dose oder jackoffs and I can'sk keeps slowing down for oder dildos. It ams like playing the grandpas guitars and you ams . . . I ams . . ."
A long beat of silence.
"Comas ams nots metal! Yous--! Yous . . ."
More silence, punctuated only by beeping.
Then a broken, ragged whisper: "Fucks you, Toki." A warm, soft weight against his right arm. The scent of sandalwood. "I fucking hates you."
Toki opened his eyes slowly. He could smell metal and antiseptic and sandalwood. Home. The infirmary. Skwisgaar's shampoo. He slowly turned his head towards the warm weight on his arm and thought for a moment that the sun had come to rest with him on his hospital bed. Then the sun lifted and there was Skwisgaar.
He was paler and thinner than usual and his eyes were rimmed with red, but the only things that filtered through the rhythm guitarist's opiate haze were sandalwood, sunlight, and the warm brush of phantom wings.
Toki scowled. " . . . dildos . . ." he slurred in a barely audible voice.
Skwisgaar gaped at him. ". . . Toki?"
"Your playings am dildos," he elaborated weakly, still scowling stubbornly.
Skwisgaar surged to his feet. "NATHANS!!!!!!"
Then there came a whirl of activity, a spinning circus of Klokateers in green, Nathan's bellows, and Charles's lighter, sharper tones demanding order and explanations. Toki was oblivious, though, somewhat struck by the startling smile on the sun's face--on Skwisgaar's face--and the firm, warm grip the other man held on his hand. Rough calluses, born from long year of playing, seemed to be trying to embed themselves on Toki's softer hand and he was surprisingly okay with that.
It could be like a rainbow bridge between them--one just for them.
The noise seemed to fade after a few minutes until it there only Nathan, Pickles, Murderface, and Charles standing at the foot of his bed, all looking down at him with strained, anxious faces. He smiled up at them and gripped Skwisgaar's hand a little more tightly.
"Stays awake," the Swede ordered urgently. "You already sleeps for like a week. Stays awake!"
But the drugs were pulling him down again, this time into a deep, healing sleep. "It ams okay," he soothed the other Scandinavian in a weak, slurred voice. "Toki ams home now."
Ams safe.
And then he slipped away into a safe dream of mended rainbows, warm wings, and a sun that never set.
-----
Translations (via Google!)
straff hull - punishment hole
juling - beatings
Hummer - lobster
fjell - mountains
Jeg beklager, Far. - I'm sorry, Father.
Toki vil være bra. - Toki will be good.
"Ugle!! Min ugle!! Løgnere!!" - "Owl! My owl! Liars!!"
The Unit - US Airborne 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta (Delta Force)
Oäkta - Bastard (Swedish)
Vain
7.19.2012
Disclaimers: I own nothing except the plot and various OCs. Metalocalypse and all the elements therein are the intellectual property / registered trademarks of Brendon Small, Tommy Blacha, and Williams Street Productions. This is entirely a work of fiction; no profit is being made.
Summary: Follows The Church of the Black Klok; Toki dreams in rainbows, but the real world is made of blood. It's okay, though. They're going to save him. They promised.
Warnings: Language, Magnus's buckets o' crazy, slash, torture, violence, & non-con. Seriously triggery happenings and NC-17 content. PLEASE do not read this if these things disturb you.
Pairings & Characters: Magnus/Toki, some heavy Skwisgaar/Toki overtones, and really pissed!protective!Skwisgaar, and reeeeally pissed off Charles and Nathan.
Notes: This is un-betaed. If you would like to send me corrections or catch something I missed, please do so & I'll make the appropriate corrections. Also, Toki's accent is a bitch to write. [Happy ending, though!]
On a sidenote, to folks wondering why the hell I'm posting in a new fandom, I have resolved to only post fics that are complete so as not to accrue anymore WIPs. A lot of my other projects are still being worked on since I'm a wordy bitch and I am still writing. Just not enough to post anything.
This was originally written for the anonymeme at metalbandwagon.
Plagiarizers suck. Be a dude, not a dick.
Enjoy!
------
My names am Toki. In my dream I can sees de birds and de kitties and sometimes a little girls in a steel chair along a rainbow bridges. Sometimes dere ams de clowns covered in snows and a man whats has a red throats and glass eyes who fixes teddy bears and sings when he ams drunk. Dere ams an octopus sometimes, too. He hits things with his arms and drink de stars out of green bottles. He makes de alligators sing so dat de grounds shake and de sky turns into rainbow. De tiger ams also dere withs deems. He growls too lows to hear and rolls over to show his bellies, but his claws ams sharp and cold like steels.
And then dere ams the owl. He's big--bigger dan the whole world--and when he flaps his wings, the air sings and I can feel my whole bodys tremble.
I likes my dream. It am safes and nots cold at alls. Dere ams no straff hull, or de yelling, or de juling.
And sometimes de birds ams wrappings his wings around Toki and de alligator is humming and while the tiger growl and octopus hit and de glass-eyed man hold up de sky so dat everything is covered in de rainbows.
In his dreams, Toki ams safe. But we all gots to wake up eventually.
---
The lash whistled as arced through the air, ripping through the torn and bleeding skin of his already red back with an abrasive crack. The captive made a harsh whimpering noise, screams long-since spent, and sagged in his chains.
"Worthless little shit!"
CRACK
"Think you can replace me?! Think you can fucking replace Magnus fucking Hammersmith?!!"
The whip fell again and again and again, but Toki was beyond any sort of ability to comprehend the questions and invectives being shrieked at him. Two days into his captivity, they'd forced a ball gag into his out to stop him from chewing on his lips and tongue so--even if he had been aware of Hammersmith's demands--he couldn't have answered. He didn't even realize when the blows stopped until the chains were being undone and his body dropped heavily to the floor.
Despite the screaming pain in his back and shoulders, the Norwegian tried weakly to curl up into a fetal ball in a futile attempt to protect himself. The maneuver earned him a swift kick at the still-healing wound on his side and the guitarist almost choked on an aborted, muffled scream.
"Enough!" ground out a rough voice somewhere beyond the violet-red haze of pain that covered everything. "We need him alive."
Magnus turned away from his victim, face twisted in rage, and whirled on the man in the metal mask. "Alive? The stupid little shit doesn't know anything worth knowing!"
"That's not your call," the Assassin stated flatly. Emotionless eyes, obscured by glass and steel, turned down to the brutally beaten young man on the floor. "You've had your fun for today, Hammersmith. Pick a new game for tomorrow."
Magnus clenched his fists and looked as though he was going to argue for a moment, but a sharp glare silenced him. Instead, he settled on spitting on the rhythmist before he stormed out of the room.
"What the fuck ever. By the time 'm done with him no one will want him anyway."
The Assassin said nothing, merely stepping aside to allow the smaller man to stomp past him. Once he was sure Magnus was gone, he turned back to the boy on the floor an sneered. As long as Wartooth breathed, Magnus could do whatever he wanted. The boy was only bait after all, and he intended on landing much more challenging prey.
He stepped out of the doorframe and slammed the door hard behind him. It was only a matter of time before Offdensen came.
Behind him, alone in the dark and cold, Toki trembled and sobbed against the unforgiving steel floor.
---
Nathan likes'd de sea. He taught me about my underwater friends--de ones I mades in de tube doing de guitars recording for Dethwater. He mades me repeats de names until they'd was right. Sjøhest er 'seahorse'. Hval er 'whale'. Delfin er 'dolphin'. Hummer er . . .
Er . . .
On de rainbow bridges I tries to ask him, but the alligator ams dancing with a swan whats am bleeding from her hearts while de octopus beats on the bridge and drinks de stars. De bridge ams crackings, but no one listens to Toki when he says this to them.
"De bridge ams gonna breaks!" he yells, but no one wants listens.
"Toki."
And den dere ams de glass-eyed man. His throats ams more redder dan usual and his face is hidden by purple flowers. The owls am sits on his shoulder with de claws like knives, but it ams so much more bigger than the glass-eyed man that he should bes crushed. But he amn’t because he ams strong like the fjell, all rooted downs in the earths.
"Toki,” he says, “we're coming."
De owl flaps his wingses and the air turns into de sunlights.
"You have to hold on. We're going to find you. I promise."
But I can'sk promise de glass-eyed man or de owl anything. De bridge ams crackings.
Beside, how cans he saves Toki when he can'st even sees dat he's bleedings?
---
The room looked and smelled exactly like what it was: a torture chamber. It was small, soundproofed steel box, empty except for the single bright bulb by the door, the chains hanging down on the ceiling, and the naked Dethklok member on the cold floor, curled up beside the drain. Magnus surveyed the ruined young man at his feet with a smile. It felt so good to see him laid low. . . . Better than the best blow he'd ever had.
Oh, he'd hated the boy from afar for years now. Watching Dethklok soar to fame, take over the airways, buy a house and have it declared its own fucking country--! All of that, under the smug eyes of that neanderthal Explosion and that self-righteous little shit Pickles would have been more than enough. But to be not only replaced, but utterly EFFACED by some nobody kid from Nowhere fucking Norway? Intolerable.
And to see the little bastard PLAY? To hear the easy, hypnotic musical call and answer between this little nothing and that walking case of the clap Skwigelf was enough to move Magnus beyond reason.
Meeting Wartooth had not made anything better. If nothing else, the blathering idiot's naivety merely convinced Magnus that the little candyass deserved what was coming. This was death metal, not a Baskin fucking Robins. Walking around like that, broadcasting weakness like wounded gazelle on the serangetti . . . Well, Toki was as much to blame for this as anyone else.
And seeing those other asshole show up to rescue him in their bathrobes of all things? Watching Explosion mutilate some asshat just for breaking the kid's toy snowglobe? Oh, this would be perfect.
Whatever asshole said that the best revenge was living well was a pussy. The best revenge is carving out your enemy's still-beating heart and devouring it before his very eyes.
Those fuckers thought they could take his band? Steal his fame? Erase him from history?
Well, that was just fine. Because he was going to eat their fucking heart.
Magnus smiled, a slow, hungry expression and lightly kicked the semi-conscious guitarist to flip him on his back. The kid's skin was flushed with fever, but he was pale beneath the unnatural pallor. Still smiling, he bent and removed the ball gag roughly, tossing it aside. Then he stood and retrieved Toki's wake-up call. Moments later the boy sputtered and gasped as Magnus dumped a bucket of ice water over the his head.
"Wakey, wakey~! Eggs and bak~ey~" the former guitarist trilled with a twisted smile.
Toki whined and rolled over, body wracked by tremors as another bucket was dumped over his back, washing away some of the blood and filth that coated him. Trembling, the young man squeezed his shut against the light. No one had been in to see him for two days and his eyes weren't ready for the bright fluorescents.
"Jeg beklager, Far," he whined piteously with a shot raw voice from screaming. "Toki vil være bra."
"What?" Another light kick. Couldn't risk doing any more physical damage with that metal-faced psycho breathing down his neck. "Speak English!"
"Toki ams sorry, Father! Please no more beatings!"
A cruel smile twisted Magnus's lips as he understood just where his toy's pain and fever-wracked mind had taken him. Oh, this was just too rich. Magnus started to laugh. Too rich.
"Poor baby," he crooned in a voice that held no kindness. He knelt down, ignoring thing vile smearing of blood and body fluids on the floor, and gently ran cold fingers along Toki's cheek. The roughly stubbled skin felt like fire.
"Far . . ."
Oh . . . God, this was better than Christmas and his birthday all at once. . . . And he'd always had a daddy kink.
Toki whimpered and leaned into the cool touch for a moment and then Magnus stood. The older man reach down, smiling as he rubbed his slowly hardening dick through his pants. This . . . this was going to be a thing of beauty.
"You want Daddy to make it better?" he cooed as he undid his pants.
Toki remained huddled on the floor.
"Then you gotta do something for Daddy." Magnus freed himself from his boxers and pants and stroked himself, breathing heavily as he took in the sight and smell of the boy's humiliation. All those marks on his back, all from him . . . Christ, the kid would be wearing Magnus's marks for the rest of his life. … Not that that would be long. And those soft little whimpers…
God, the only thing that could make this better would be if the rest of those assholes were here to see this. Fuck it. He's give them a repeat performance after those arrogant bastards were caught. They'd pay. They'd all fucking pay--
The older man released himself with a shaky groan. It wouldn't do to ruin his fun this early. Not yet.
He reached down and grabbed Toki's long hair, shaking the boy roughly to get him to focus, before forcing him onto his knees. "Bet'cher hungry," he breathed darkly as he settled the guitarist in front of him. "Bet Daddy knows what you need.
Toki's eyes were squinting in pain and focusing on nothing somewhere just in front of Magnus's face. He looked dazed and hopelessly lost.
Magnus grabbed his lower jaw, forcing his mouth open with bruising force. He paused, drinking in the moment. Christ, he wanted to relive this every day. Maybe he would. He released Toki's hair and, holding the battered young man steady with the grip on his jaw, slowly traced the edges off the boy's rough chapped lips with the head of his aching arousal. The motion left shiny little smears of precome in its wake, like macabre lip gloss.
Magus tightened his grip on the boy's jaw to punishing proportions. "Daddy's got what you want." And then he shoved in all the way.
The effect was instantaneous. As warm, wet heat wrapped itself lovingly around Magnus's cock, Toki choked, his air supply completely cut off. The younger man tried to wheel back with a strength born of panic and cried out around the obstruction in his mouth. Magnus was ready, though, and grabbed Toki's hair with the hand not gripping his jaw. He twisted his hand through the soft, fitly strands and yanked viciously, forcing Toki's head back and opening his throat more. Tears leaked out of Toki's eyes as he looked up at the other man in terror and confusion.
Magnus jerked him forward, viciously ramming his erection mercilessly down the boy's throat, and grinned into his face, heedless of the desperate, frantic clawing at his thighs. He stared deep into Toki's eyes, memorizing the fear. The terror. The desperate 'Why?' staring at him from those perfect crystal blue eyes.
"Think you're good enough to replace me?!" he grunted between thrusts. "You think you're anything?"
Toki's eyes wheeled in terror. His whimpering, gagging noises danced up along Magnus's cock to his spine, like little sparks that went straight to his head.
"You're nothing!"
Toki's hands slid limply down his legs to the floor.
"Not even good enough to suck my cock!!" he roared.
Those perfect, terrified blue eyes rolled up into his head, his throat relaxed, and Toki went limp. With a cry of frustration, Magnus threw him off of him, oblivious to the way the boy's head bounced off the steel floor. He clenched his fists and yelled in wordless rage.
That little bitch--that worthless little bitch--shoulda choked him on my fucking dick--
The former guitarist forced himself to step back and away from his victim before he lost control of himself completely.
"Fuck!"
He turned around and pressed his palms against the cold, metal walls to ground himself, ignoring the pounding ache between his legs as he forced his heart rate and breathing to slow down. If the kid died, then the psycho Assassin would carve it out of his ass, and Magnus liked his ass intact.
After a few moments of forced deep breaths, Magnus was able to turn around. His erection was still jutting out at full mast and he could only smile at the sight before him. Toki had swum back up to a semblance of consciousness and was trying to crawl away, croaking nonsense in Norwegian, but he was too hurt, weak, and disoriented to make any progress. It was a simple matter to kneel down and grab Toki's hips, dragging him backwards. He spat on his palm and rubbed it on his painful erection. The friction would be a bitch, but for now spit and blood would have to do. Next time, he'd bring lube.
"You wanna be Magus, you little bitch?" He lined himself up behind the younger man, ignoring his pleas and sobs. "Then I'm gonna give you Magnus." He thrust forward.
And Toki relearned how to scream.
---
The bridges ams broken ands covered in bloods and shit. The rainbows ams becomes nightmares and de clowns freezes to deaths in de snow. De alligator and de octopus are fightings ands de tiger ams cuts hims self up on his own claw and de glass-eyed mans ams turned all to bones.
De owl ams gone. Not evens a feathers wast left for Toki.
"Ugle!! Min ugle!! Løgnere!! Whys yous ams lies to me?!"
But de owl is gone and glass-eyes mans ams dead.
It ams stupid to be mads anyways.
De owl never mades any promises.
---
Three weeks.
It took them three fucking weeks to find them.
Charles was as close to beside himself with fury (and anxiety) as he'd ever been in his life (and that was saying something) and it was only the fact that he had to keep a stiff upper lip for the boys that stopped him from tearing a bloody path through the Gears. His people were supposed to be better than this, godamnit.
Nathan and, surprisingly, Murderface were the only ones really holding it together well. Murderface had simply started working with his weapons--not playing, actually working--to ensure that he'd be ready and his whining had been kept to a noticeable minimum. At least in front of Charles and the boys. Charles knew for a fact that the bassist was running his personal squad of Klokateers ragged when he was away from the others. Nathan had taken to working out in the gym at every available moment and was learning to box from some of the Elite Unit. Charles had supervised a few sessions and was deeply impressed with the frontman's resolve.
Pickles had spent the first two weeks trying to dope himself into a coma before the first promising leads began to trickle in. Then he had seemingly snapped out of it and became Charles's second shadow, demanding to be made aware of every development as it occurred. Really, though, it was Skwisgaar Charles was most worried about. At first the Swede had seemed fine, but as time passed and there was no sign of Toki, the lead guitarist appeared to fall apart. He wasn't sleeping enough and what little sleep he got, according to the Gears assigned to him, was broken by nightmares. He had pretty much stopped eating too, which worried Charles immensely. Skwisgaar was not a big man and could ill afford to lose the weight. The lawyer was deeply concerned that if Toki didn't make it, they might lose Skwisgaar, too.
Then how the fuck were they supposed to save the world?
It was the Church that ultimately saved them. Again. They seemed to have spies everywhere. (Charles was still trying to figure out which of his Gears belonged to the Church and it irritated him immensely that he only had a handful of numbers.) They found the facility and even managed to procure floor plans.
That was how, three weeks, two days, and roughly an hour and a half after the earth swallowed Abigail and Toki, he found himself charging into a nameless defunct military base in Oregon, surrounded by a very pissed off group of Elites and highly aggressive musicians.
"Remember, we need Magnus and boy alive."
Initially the plan was to split into three teams. Alpha Team, the Elites and some highly trained Church members, cracked the facility first. They took out the security and cleared the way. Then Charles, the band, and the rest of the Elites swept in. Beta Team, led by Pickles and William, were to go after Abigail and Delta Team (Nathan and Skwisgaar) were responsible for retrieving Toki. And Charles (Gamma) was going to put that metal-faced bastard into the ground once and for all.
At first, everything went as planned. The drummer and the bassist split off with some of the finest troops Charles had ever trained, heading to the wing where Alpha Team had signaled Abigail was located. Charles stayed with Nathan and Skwisgaar as they moved deeper in the facility, sidestepping bodies along the way. Alpha Team still had not sent word back about Toki, though, and it was beginning to worry him.
Then he saw him.
It was only a peripheral glance, but through the flames he could see the Assassin glaring a him in rage as his headquarters burned around him.
"Stay with the boys," he barked to squad leader, and then he was running down the halls before the large man could reply.
The Assassin was running from him, a fact that sat heavy in Charles's gut. This was not a man who ran from things . . . and that could only mean that he was running to something.
His headset crackled to life in his ear, momentarily distracting him as he slipped slightly on someone's innards. A passing glance assured him that it was not one of the Klokateers.
"Sir!" a voice in the earpiece crackled. It was the squad leader with Nathan and Skwigaar. "Sir, we think Lord Wartooth is in the direction you're heading."
"Then move your ass and stop distracting me, 642."
There was no reply, which was good, because as Charles rounded the corner he saw the man at the end of the hallway, punching a code into a door. His gun was raised and the world dropped into the molasses-thick slow motion that had become so familiar to him during his time in The Unit. He inhaled and peered through the sight. The Assassin finished punching in the code. He exhaled and squeezed the trigger.
The sound of his boots on the floor, the cock of the rifle, the bang of the shot . . . Something gave him away. At the last instant, the Assassin jerked and what should have been a clean shot to the head struck the man's steel mask. He staggered back, momentarily stunned and then wheeled around to face the lawyer. It looked for a moment as though he would charge Charles, then the sound of boots and Nathan's harsh shout sounded directly behind him. Charles could see the man mutter the exact same curse at the exact same time he did, both knowing that neither of them would die today, and then the man took off running down the hall again.
Charles moved to give chase, but was dragged to halt at the sound of Nathan's voice calling for him. "Fuck him, Charles! Where the fuck is Toki?!"
The lawyer changed directions with a soundless growl. "Take two men and follow him," he barked to 642. The Elite snapped to attention, nodded to 873 and 755, and took off at a dead run down the corridor while Charles headed towards the door his opponent had unlocked. The Assassin had risked getting shot to get into this room. Whatever was in it had to be damned important. He hit the green entry button on the panel and then time just sorta . . .
Stopped.
He saw the room. The blood on the walls. The chains hanging from the ceiling. The shit and piss on the floor. He smelled the fetid air. He could almost taste the horror of it. But it somehow didn't . . . mesh in his head with the occupants. It wasn't possible. What he was seeing couldn't be . . .
Not Toki. Toki, who always had a smile, who always had the top score in DDR, who couldn't sleep without Deddy Bear, and who forgot to take his insulin so Charles had to make him a little Facebones reminder app, and who was quite capable of gleefully beating in a man's skull with his bare hands and then eating a pudding cup and pouting like 5 year old all through subsequent lecture . . .
This--Magnus paused in mid-rut behind a shattered and sobbing Toki--could not happen. Not to one of his boys. Not on his fucking watch.
"Oäkta!!!!"
For the rest of his life, Charles would never recall the next sixty-some seconds that followed. The memory was not a blur or a haze of red or anything like that. It simply did not exist.
Time stopped when he opened that door to see Magnus raping Toki.
When it next started, he found himself being forcibly restrained by three Gears. Nathan and the two other Elites were restraining a grimly quiet Skwisgaar who was desperately scrambling towards Magnus with alarming determination. As for Magnus, he was now laying on the floor, crying out in a hoarse voice and curled desperately around his groin. One eye was already swelling shut and his nose appeared to be broken. A few of his teeth were also on the ground. From his awkward position between the Gears, he could see blood on Magnus's hands where he cradled his crotch, though whether it was his or Toki's, he couldn't tell. Charles knuckles were split and aching.
Toki was curled up on his side on the floor, terrifyingly still.
"Sir. Please, Master Offdensen!" 698 whispered urgently to him. "We need him alive, sir!"
Abruptly Charles went limp. He hadn't even realized he'd still been struggling. He could feel the tension in Gears around him immediately drop as they carefully lowered him back to the ground. "I'm fine," he assured them in a voice that sounded distant and strange. He gently brushed aside their hands. Part of him was afraid that if he moved too fast, he'd break one of their arms on principle. "Thank you."
The commandos immediately disengaged. "Forgive us, sir--"
"You did well," he interrupted coldly. He knelt down next to Toki and gently turned him over and pushed back his matted hair. "Secure him," he ordered the Gears.
They immediately set upon Magnus.
"Toki?" he breathed. His questing fingers felt a pulse beneath the little rhythmist's fever-hot skin. It was fast and thready. "Skwisgaar, he needs your help."
The harsh, flat staement seemed to snap the lead guitarist out of his murderous fugue and he suddenly sagged against the men holding him, Magnus completely forgotten as he took in Toki's sorry state. "He ams . . .? He ams . . .?"
"Is he alive?" Nathan grated out in a voice that sounded like hot coals.
The lawyer gently tipped Toki over to look at the mess that was his back and his eyes narrowed in sympathy. "Yes," he curtly replied. "But he is badly injured.” It took every ounce of his self-control to contain his rage and he vowed that Magnus would pay sevenfold for every hurt inflicted on the boy in his lap.
Skwisgaar crumbled to his knees as Charles stripped off his flack jacket and began to remove his button-up. Understanding what he was doing, Skwisgaar moved to follow suit, only to stop as Charles firmly touched to his shoulder.
"Keep yours," the older man admonished with uncharacteristic gentleness. His green eyes bore into the Swede's blue ones. "You're too valuable to risk."
He felt more than saw Nathan's glare at that remark, but ignored it in favor of carefully wrapping Toki in the garments with Skwisgaar's help. As they worked, he noted with clinical detachment that Skwisgaar's hands were shaking.
Skwisgaar had hands like a surgeon. They never shook.
It only took a moment and one of the Elites' undershirts for the Norwegian to recover a bit of modesty, but his numerous injuries and the fact that he remained unconscious were alarming. Skwisgaar had managed to pull Toki into his lap with unmistakable possessiveness during the clothing process and was now muttering in angry Swedish at his injured bandmate. Charles took that as his signal to step away. It was common knowledge that Skwisgaar was not good a sharing and, given the way he was hovering over Toki, he was liable to take off someone's arm if they got too close right now.
Nathan meanwhile had moved over to where Magnus was being restrained by the three Elites and currently had one massive hand wrapped halfway around the former guitarist's face, covering his mouth. One of the Gears was viciously twisting the captive man's hair back to force him to meet Nathan's eyes. The lead singer was maybe a centimeter away from Hammersmith and his voice whisper was low thunder in the quiet room, menacing and incomprehensible. The growing look of terror in Magnus's eyes was deeply gratifying.
Charles turned away and put a hand up to his earpiece. "This is Gear 1. We have retrieved the Asset. Check in."
A moment later, Pickles’s Wisconsin drawl filled his ear. It was heavy with anxiety. "We got 'er, Chief. It's . . . De Klokateers kicked ass. Are de guys ahlright?"
The manager swallowed hard. "We're all alive. No casualties. Please report back to the Dethcopter. Dokateers are on standby."
"Rahger."
Charles frowned at the off note in Pickles voice. This didn't feel a whole lot like a victory. He stared at the doorway in the vague direction of the masked Assassin's flight. Next time . . .
Next time, he wasn't wasting a bullet on that motherfucker. He would kill him with his bare hands.
Nathan joined him and followed his gaze. He frowned, understanding his manager's thoughts and not at all liking the intense expression on Charles's face. "You still got unfinished business with that asshole?"
For a moment the smaller man was silent, then his mouth quirked into an odd little sneer and he turned his attention back to Toki and Skwisgaar. "Not today. The Gears will follow him." His snake green eyes flickered to meet the frontman's emerald gaze for a moment before he turned to the struggling Magnus. "Right now, I have more important business here."
One of the Commandos stepped forward to pick up the little rhythm guitarist's battered frame, but Skwisgaar abruptly interceded, pulling Toki closer with an angry hiss at the large Klokateer. "You no touches him!"
The Gear bowed his head and stepped away. The Swede then gently gathered the other guitarist in his arms, lifting him up with surprising strength. The two Klokateers with him fell into step as he headed towards the door.
"You got him?" Nathan growled without looking away from Magnus.
"Jah." The blond tightened his grip, earning a weak whimper of protest from Toki. "I gotsk him."
Abruptly Hammersmith laughed, seeing something in the look on the lead guitarist's face. It was a thin, hollow noise, but the sound rubbed on Charles's already frayed nerves like a cheese grater "Is that the way it then? You get him to roll over for you, blondie? That how he earned his keep? I gotta admit, by the time I had him, the bitch was kinda worn out."
"Fuck you!" Nathan roared. The frontman surged forward and would have no doubt throttled the former guitarist had Charles not stepped in front of him to stop the charge.
"We need him alive for now, Nathan. He may have information."
"And when we don't need him anymore?" the singer growled menacingly.
The lawyer pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose and his lips twisted into a small, cold parody of a smile. "Well, ah--"
"Don'tsk kills him," Skwisgaar ordered brusquely from the door.
The other two men looked over at him askance, but the Swede was not looking at them. He was staring at Magnus with eyes as cold and inevitable as the heart of winter. "His life ams mine."
Magnus sneered, but there was no hiding the way he paled with fear beneath the blood on his face. Skwisgaar swept out with Toki without another word.
For a moment, Nathan looked torn between following after his bandmates and remaining to mete out further punishment. Eventually, he turned away with an angry rumble and glared at Charles. "I'm gonna go get Pickles and Murderface. You got this?"
"Yes, Nathan. I, ah, think we can handle the situation from here."
"You fucking better." And then he was gone, vanishing with surprising speed for a man so large, two protective Gears trailing in the band members' wake.
Charles looked after him for a moment with a small frown. This was a fucking mess. And there was really only one person to blame.
"I'm not going to talk, you pencil-necked bastard. I'm not telling you shit."
Green eyes flashed in the low light as the manager turned back to his former employer and smiled. Magnus was afraid. That was good. He should be.
The smile grew.
Here, in this blood room that smelled like piss and sex and fear and despair, Magnus should be fucking terrified.
Charles chuckled softly and took a step forward, dropping into a crouch so that he was at the other man's level. He leaned forward so that his lips just brushed the shell of Magnus's ear and exulted in the shudder that wracked the other man at the motion. "Oh, you'll talk, Mr. Hammersmith," he promised quietly. "They always do."
And then, you will beg Skwisgaar for your death.
And Skwisgaar had never been known for his compassion.
Charles stood, still smiling that cadaverous smile. "Get him out of my fucking sight."
---
Beeping. He could hear beeping.
Then a voice.
"You needsk to wakes up, Toki," a familiar, angry voice told him urgently. "Jah, you ams dildos at guitars, but you ams less dildos dan dose oder jackoffs and I can'sk keeps slowing down for oder dildos. It ams like playing the grandpas guitars and you ams . . . I ams . . ."
A long beat of silence.
"Comas ams nots metal! Yous--! Yous . . ."
More silence, punctuated only by beeping.
Then a broken, ragged whisper: "Fucks you, Toki." A warm, soft weight against his right arm. The scent of sandalwood. "I fucking hates you."
Toki opened his eyes slowly. He could smell metal and antiseptic and sandalwood. Home. The infirmary. Skwisgaar's shampoo. He slowly turned his head towards the warm weight on his arm and thought for a moment that the sun had come to rest with him on his hospital bed. Then the sun lifted and there was Skwisgaar.
He was paler and thinner than usual and his eyes were rimmed with red, but the only things that filtered through the rhythm guitarist's opiate haze were sandalwood, sunlight, and the warm brush of phantom wings.
Toki scowled. " . . . dildos . . ." he slurred in a barely audible voice.
Skwisgaar gaped at him. ". . . Toki?"
"Your playings am dildos," he elaborated weakly, still scowling stubbornly.
Skwisgaar surged to his feet. "NATHANS!!!!!!"
Then there came a whirl of activity, a spinning circus of Klokateers in green, Nathan's bellows, and Charles's lighter, sharper tones demanding order and explanations. Toki was oblivious, though, somewhat struck by the startling smile on the sun's face--on Skwisgaar's face--and the firm, warm grip the other man held on his hand. Rough calluses, born from long year of playing, seemed to be trying to embed themselves on Toki's softer hand and he was surprisingly okay with that.
It could be like a rainbow bridge between them--one just for them.
The noise seemed to fade after a few minutes until it there only Nathan, Pickles, Murderface, and Charles standing at the foot of his bed, all looking down at him with strained, anxious faces. He smiled up at them and gripped Skwisgaar's hand a little more tightly.
"Stays awake," the Swede ordered urgently. "You already sleeps for like a week. Stays awake!"
But the drugs were pulling him down again, this time into a deep, healing sleep. "It ams okay," he soothed the other Scandinavian in a weak, slurred voice. "Toki ams home now."
Ams safe.
And then he slipped away into a safe dream of mended rainbows, warm wings, and a sun that never set.
-----
Translations (via Google!)
straff hull - punishment hole
juling - beatings
Hummer - lobster
fjell - mountains
Jeg beklager, Far. - I'm sorry, Father.
Toki vil være bra. - Toki will be good.
"Ugle!! Min ugle!! Løgnere!!" - "Owl! My owl! Liars!!"
The Unit - US Airborne 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta (Delta Force)
Oäkta - Bastard (Swedish)