onebehind | making war just for fun (for first

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making war just for fun (for first_rule)

The good news was, at some point before the end of the week, before hurting Jack, before most of the truly terrible thing he'd done, Dylan had realized he needed help. The bad news was this realization had hit during one of the lows, and he'd decided what he needed wasn't to be fixed, to regain his (mostly) moral high ground, but to sink entirely and stop having moments of conflict and hesitation. He also wanted to be able to keep this power, once the week was out, because really, what fun would the ultimate loss of what little light remained in him be if he was left largely impotent again, at the end of it all, half his magic still missing? What point would there be to finally wanting to throw his weight around here, without concern for who he hurt in the process, if he had no weight to actually throw?

And so he'd gone to one of the darker Agents. Attar, Loki -- take your pick, really. He'd made a deal for a couple of favors at a later date, none of which he had any intention of ever actually fulfilling, and after he'd walked away, he'd spent the rest of the week dealing with the final death throes of his morality, desperate flickers of panic and conscious, before it curled up and died entirely. Now, there was nothing holding him back, he had power overflowing at his fingertips, and all was well. Thankfully, he'd also leveled out to a certain degree, but only a little. He wasn't so hellbent on murdering Jack, now -- now, it seemed more sensible to try and turn him and the other Horsemen, first -- but destroying Teleios? Oh, that was certainly on the agenda.

Maybe he'd find Samuel and Bailey and, after making them suffer for the hurt they'd inflicted on him (maybe he'd force them to hurt themselves as he'd hinted at Daniel might be in store for Jack, his voice still and now forever a thing of power), find whatever little doom they planned to use on the city and make it his own. Maybe he'd just see what trouble he could get up to on his own or with the Horsemen. Maybe -- well, there were so many possibilities, really, and he had so many ideas.

Right now, though? First, he was going to have a drink. A toast to himself and to something actually going right in this hellhole for once.

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Sadly for Daniel Dylan didn't try and do things in just such that way. If he had, Daniel might have been more careful about being around Dylan, to take chances with his mentor.

Instead he was going in a way that would keep Daniel close, and he would think they still had a chance. He thought he still had a chance.

"That's... That's good to hear," he said, though Daniel didn't sound the least bit convinced that Dylan was actually doing well. Or maybe that was actually fear about why Dylan was doing well.

"I'm... I admit I'm concerned. About you and Jack, about us together. You bringing us together gave me a conscious and a concern about people," he pointed out, trying to make it sound like a joke.

Dylan could smell his apprehension, practically taste it, not having given up the vampire shapeshift in favor of anything else, just yet, for how useful it was, and hummed, almost pleased. He wet his lips with his tongue, like a snake scenting the air. Just because he'd leveled out a little, planned to use the Horsemen rather than destroy them, didn't mean he didn't appreciate a little good, old fashioned terror. It was, like the power, almost a drug, no matter the source.

He let it go after a moment, however, and with some small measure of reluctance. "Well, good news is, I'm done trying to hurt you or Jack or Henley."

Daniel had honestly considered what he'd have to do for the sake of the others. Obviously he would do what he had to for Henley's sake. He couldn't stop thinking about Jack when they met in that hallway, the way he had reacted to Daniel. Now, with the danger so close and intimate, he was starting to realize he would do the same for Jack as well. As much as he could.

"Oh well good. I mean, I'm sure there was some really bizarre lesson in it all but glad for that. Now, moving on. Apologies probably need to happen, maybe a group meeting to try and get things back where they should be."

Yep, he's trying to sound excited and hopeful. He was worried as hell and hiding it in the clasping on his hands and bright words. Or trying to hide it.

Dylan's was pretty sure he wasn't going to apologize. Make Jack forget all he'd put him through, maybe, or convince him that he'd enjoyed the abuse so he could keep at it from time to time, but not apologize. He figured that would be best not to mention, however, and a meeting, at least, wasn't a bad idea. That way, he could get to all of them at once.

That in mind, he nodded. "Probably, yeah."

There was a part of him that was expecting an argument, or worse a strike. He had been threatened and Daniel knew he'd been on the easy end of things. That meant facing this and trying to be a voice of reason. It was a new position for Daniel, but one he was willing to take to keep what he had.

Then Dylan agreed, nodding even. He stared at him a moment. "Good. I'm glad you're with me on this." He hadn't liked his options if he hadn't agreed, after all. "All my other plans involved locked rooms and forced watching of some sugary kid shows for therapy."

Dylan hummed, amused, and grinned sharply. There were no fangs, not like last time, with Daniel or Jack, either or, but there was still something off to the expression. He couldn't quite help himself, no matter how much he did or didn't want to keep up appearances.

"Yeah, I'm not sure how far that would've gotten you." For more than just there not being a whole lot in the way of television here.

He knew it could go so bad, and he was taking chances but he wasn't willing to turn his back on this and walk away. He didn't want to lose Dylan or the Horsemen. He wasn't willing to lose what he had.

"Oh I would be expecting the explosion, literally or figuratively, but we'll see what I have to do," he said with a grin.

"I meant more in a 'this place doesn't exactly get the Disney Channel' sort of way than one of us hurting you for trying the whole movie with a moral thing."

Though, an explosion might be fun. Not at the brownstone, of course -- he knew better to shit where you slept -- but maybe, if and when he found Samuel and Bailey, he'd take over their work. Maybe he could get it to work right and get them home. He still wanted to be there, rather than here, despite his sudden and rather permanent change of heart, and -- oh. Oh, the things he could do, back home, like this.

"Oh well. I'll get someone to put on a puppet show for you. Punch and Judy. Sure that will help," he said with a smirk. Never let it be said that Daniel didn't have an answer. Except when Dylan had gone totally crazy. Then the answer had been illusions and to run. Now though he knew he couldn't rely on that. He couldn't rely on not being there for Jack and the Horsemen.

"So where do we take this now, Boss?" Everything was okay. It was normal. It was back to what it was supposed to be. Right? He'd keep telling himself that.

Dylan snorted, another brief, sharp grin coming to his face before it disappeared a moment later at the question. "Now, we figure out how to get home. Maybe destroy the Agents on the way out. All of it for real, now, though, no more just -- just talking about it."

Yeah, that grin. It really needed to go. Or Daniel wishes they had seen it sooner, if that was the way he looked at people he had done a damn good way of hiding it before now.

"Okay." He couldn't argue. He wanted their lives back. "You got a plan in place for this?"

"Not yet," he answered, raking his tongue over his teeth thoughtfully. "But I'm sure I'll come up with something, and if not ... " He shrugged. "I'm not sure it matters much. They have no idea how much power I have, right now. How much power they let me keep."

Worse came to worst, he'd just tell the Agents to swallow a handful of razor blades, and keep torturing them until someone with a higher pay grade showed up. Like the Emissaries -- he wouldn't mind torturing that bitch Roxanna for awhile, for kicks. The the Two themselves.

That was again worrying. He knew that things had changed, and he knew that he hadn't kept the ability. Not like he'd had before. A little here and there to transform, but not enough to use it if they needed it. He had to work hard to try and keep things settled, to keep them balanced.

"And we still don't know just how much they have either, Dylan. We may have only seen a glimpse of it. I don't want to see you hurt by them," he said, meaning it as he took a step closer. "Maybe that's what we need to find out first. Just how strong they are."

"I'm kind of hard to kill, anymore." He could be anything, after all. Something with a healing factor -- maybe even an Agent, himself. Never mind the fact that that hadn't stopped Loki from killing Odin. He could at least put himself on their level, if he really wanted to. "But yeah, alright, we test the waters first."

Which would be easy. One word in any ear and he could have whoever throw themselves at the Agents for his assessment.

"Even by these guys?" He didn't believe they were gods. That was what he kept telling himself. He didn't want to believe it could be real since he hadn't believed in god for a lot of years and wasn't ready to believe in a lot of them. "Even if they..." He shook his head, not even sure he wanted to know what they had done to him. "Listen, it's not worth the chance," he pointed out. "We want you here. We ... We need you, okay?"

Damn but emotions were still hard, and likely always would be.

Dylan frowned at him for a long moment -- he'd already told him he'd be careful, what more did he want from him? -- and then held up a hand, indicating that he needed a minute. That done, he disappeared from the room briefly, only to return with his gun a moment later, the weapon held down, pointed at the floor rather than Daniel. If he wanted to threaten him, it wouldn't be with a weapon. This was to be a demonstration rather than anything else.

That in mind, butt-first, he held the gun out to him. "Shoot me."

It wasn't a command backed by power, not yet. If Daniel refused, maybe then it would be, but first, he'd give him the option to go along with it.

The moment Dylan had him wait, leaving the room, Daniel honestly wondered ifhe would come back to the room. When he did, despite knowing how many other ways Dylarn had of hurting him, he still tensed. It took everything in him not to back up a step, then another.

His gaze dropped to the gun and back up.

"Uhmmm, no. I get it. You can stop the bullet. I believe that without shooting you," he said, shaking his head. "And I'm a magician and human for all I know. They're possible gods, Dylan, and I'm not sure I believe they're leaving you with the ability to stop them. It would be madness on their part. You're smarter and quicker than they are."

Compliments. That would help, right?

Not as much as Daniel thought it would, if only because Dylan saw through them.

"I went to one of the guys playing the other side," he told him, despite that, despite the scowl that had crept onto his face at the thought of Daniel trying to play him. "So, I'm pretty sure I'll get to keep what I've got, if only because they wanna see this place burn just as much as I do."

A beat. "It also has nothing to do with whether or not I can stop a bullet." Though, all things considered, he probably could if he chose his shift carefully. "It's more about -- well, shoot me and find out. Aim for the head."

This time, he did put power into his voice. This time, Daniel would do what he said without question or hesitation, whether he wanted to or not, and there was something intensely satisfying about that. Even if he planned on keeping the Horsemen close, now, there was something to be said for making someone else's body betray them, regardless of who they were.

Knowing logically that Dylan was strong, magically powerful, and knowing that he was somehow capable of not merely some sort of mesmer ability but to speak like that and despite all of Daniel's desire to do anything but, he found himself already reaching for the gun.

"Dylan, don't make me do this," he said, fingers curling around the stock and drawing the gun to him so he could check the safety, ensure it was off. "I believe you, okay? You are immortal, indestructible. Whatever it is. I believe you."

He spoke in earnest, panic creeping into his tones, even as he raised the gun, leveling it to stare down the site.

"I don't care if you can live through this! Don't make me do it."

Living through it or not, Daniel was going to have nightmares about shooting the man he looked up to, the first role model he could remember truly respecting in his lifetime.

He fired.

Dylan said nothing, just watched him expectantly and with no small amount of pleasure, despite the fact that he doubted being shot in the head would be fun. Just because he could survive being shot didn't mean it wouldn't hurt, though again, there was something to be said for watching Daniel struggle with it. That made it worth it.

He was all but smirking when the gun finally went off, in fact, and then, obviously, abruptly, the expression disappeared. With little more than a grunt, he fell backwards, the thud as he hit the ground more resounding than the gun going off, somehow, and enough to knock the breath out of him if he'd needed to breath. If he wasn't, for all intents and purposes, dead, if only for a moment.

A beat or two ticked by, the silence that followed absolute, and then all at once, he was sitting up as quickly as he had fallen. He exhaled heavily, through his teeth, his canines fangs now, and reached up to thumb idly at his forehead where the bullet was pushing its way out of his skin. It was an inconvenience, itching as it healed, and nothing more. The look on his face probably said that, too, if Daniel wasn't too distracted by the fact that his eyes were blood-black, now, when he looked up at him.

"See?"

Daniel screamed. He wasn't sure he had screamed, but he did. He had expected Dylan to stop the bullet, and while he had, it wasn't supposed to have been with his face!

Shaking so hard his teeth was chattering, he dropped the gun be cause he was no longer under orders to hold it.

"Fuck you! Fuck you, Dylan, or Shrike, or whoever the hell you are. Fuck you!"

He had just killed a man. Sure he was sitting up and flicking the bullet that had done it away with the nonchalance as one would a piece of lint, but Daniel had shot him and killed him and he was a lot of things but not this. He wasn't a fucking killer.

"I see you're acting like a fucking psycho," he said, not thinking about his words or the danger they put him in. "What the fuck was that for? So you're goddamn immortal. Woohooo," he mocked, waving about jazz hands. "You had to make me a goddamn killer to prove it?!"

"You're not a killer if it doesn't stick," Dylan answered with a roll of his eyes. A swipe of his tongue over one of his fangs followed, the faintest of shivers following that -- that felt good, Daniel smelled good -- and then, fairly simply, he continued with, "So calm the fuck down."

Again, it wasn't a command. Yet. If Daniel kept carrying on, or when he decided he wanted to find out what his blood tasted like, then it would be.

He snorted, not looking at all convinced at that. "Calm the fuck down?" He rolled his eyes, folding his arms over his chest as if that would protect him from being ordered to do such as that again. "Really? What reaction were you expecting when the man I look up to, the one I look to for the first time in my life makes me shoot him? Do tell me the proper reaction?" He asked, giving him a look.

He was hiding fear in anger and sarcasm and doing it poorly.

Dylan recognized that Daniel was afraid, didn't really care, except for maybe what it was doing for him, how much more appealing it was making his scent. What he did care about was the fact that Daniel was talking back to him, and if the growl that issued from his throat was any indication, low and unmistakably inhuman, he didn't like it much.

"I said calm down," he repeated through bared teeth, wrapping power around each and every word so that Daniel would. He moved to get to his feet, fluid, frightening. "You can still be afraid -- actually, keep that up, you're doing good -- but just stand still and shut up for a few minutes."

That said, he moved towards him, circling him like a shark might circle a wounded animal. He wanted to savor the fear he had allowed Daniel to keep, even if he had stripped him of the ability to express it.

The growl made Daniel's heart race, peaking in a way that made him worry he was going to lose consciousness. He was pretty sure that would be a bad idea, mostly because he wasn't entirely certain that if it happened, he would ever wake up.

And he did, because he had no choice. Holding still, shaking but unable to do more than that. Caught up in that spell, the magic that held him still despite the raging that went on in his head, the pain and panic that coursed through him.

He stayed still, chin up, not moving though he almost wanted to flee. He was almost glad that Dylan had done something to stop him from doing just that.

"What do you want?"

making war just for fun (for first_rule)

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