Who: Neal and Tink When: Friday, Sept 5 Where: Neal's place What: Tink goes to show Neal the Catsuit Rating/Warnings: Low/None (dream plot, mentions of nightmares... lots of bugs.) Status: Complete
Tink had been exhausted for two days now. She was a little scared that the new birth control pills she’d started taking (after the other terrifying incident with Neal) were messing with her head, but, apparently, the rest of Valarnet was having problems, too. Tink had fallen asleep at work--under a car, no less--and had some really terrible nightmares about Pan, and having her shadow ripped out, and her WINGS. When she’d woken, she had to go to the bathroom, strip off her coveralls and check to make sure they were still there.
They were, of course.
Thankfully, Tink had a short shift on Friday morning. The Old Man had come in to man the fort at noon, so she went home to find her cat suit, then packed it all up and headed to Neal’s place. She really shouldn’t have been driving when she was as tired as she was. She nearly got into a couple accidents on the way, and decided she wouldn’t drive again until she’d had a solid eight hours sleep.
Then she knocked on Neal’s door, leaned against the frame, and closed her eyes...
After awhile all Neal saw were shiny things squiggling all about. The sounds of tearing meat echoed, cockroaches were devouring bodies on his floor. He’d tossed his laptop and his phone across the room, not bothering to get them, because it wasn’t as if he wanted to traipse through an ocean of insects to get to the damn devices.
The insects were people he knew. His friends and co-workers. Everyone. His father had turned them all into roaches.
They were here. The bugs were everywhere. The sting of lunacy, dementia, it was unavoidable. Once you saw these things, fell into the mouth of madness, there was no coming out. When he heard the knock he groaned, because if he opened the door the bugs would escape. But he shuffled toward it anyway, attempted to blink everything into focus, and opened.
“Tink...come in. Hurry.” He took her hand and tugged gently, to get her away from the invasion. “Are you okay?” Because he sure as fuck wasn’t. What the hell was wrong with him.
Good thing he tugged her in, as Tink was already starting to snooze on her feet against the doorframe. She might have fallen over backward if not for his strong hand around hers, bringing her back to reality and ushering her into his apartment. His voice made her eyes flutter open a bit, and she stepped in through the doorway. Tink dropped her helmet and napsack onto the nearest surface; chair, table, floor, whatever. “...I’m okay. Just… ex-ex-ex-hausted.” She yawned, and turned to wrap her arms around him in a “hello” embrace.
“Me too, exhaaaausted, fuck,” Neal sighed, burly arms going around her too - but he used the grip to tug them as one unit back onto the sofa, where it was comfortable and nothing could get to them. Like a kid running into the bed after a pee break, afraid of monsters nipping at their tootsies. Speaking of... “Pick up your feet,” he insisted, reaching for them in a tangle of limbs, and placing them in his lap instead of on the floor. “There are bugs that were once people here.”
He tipped his head back, staring at the ceiling. Which was beginning to swirl in all sorts of hypnotizing designs. Jesus Christ, had he eaten some bad shellfish or something?
“You alright?” he asked Tink, still watching dots crawl along the ceiling. To the windows, to the walls, to the light fixtures!
Tink was more than happy to let him move the two of them together to the sofa. The warmth from his strong arms around her made her feel both comforted and excited in a way that still confused her. But it was good. Hell, everything about Neal was good. Especially the way he tugged her feet into his lap. Tink was near delirious to the point where she thought he was being sweet, and even leaned forward to unzip her boots before his next sentence registered.
"Wait, bugs?" She asked, turning to look at him curiously. As curious as one could be when one was this tired. "You can't have bugs in your apartment, Neal. This place is spotless. Cockroaches?"
And then she noticed how strange he was acting. It was only a vague perception, though, because the room was darkening as her eyelids fluttered.
“My dream father turned everyone I know into cockroaches,” he said very seriously, and his hold tightened on Tink because he didn’t want it to happen to her. “Like he did with that one guy on the road who accidentally bumped into me.” It had scarred young Baelfire, obviously, as he came to the realization that his Papa was dangerous - and the man who had once been his doting father was now something of a monster. No one wanted to be around him because of it.
And Neal blamed himself. Blamed himself for every cruel act, every murder, committed by his father during the Ogre Wars. During that dark time.
He squinted one eye shut, watching Tink. “You gonna stay the night?” Because even when he was dreadfully fucked up, he was aware enough to not want her on the bike when she was likely as insane and tired as the rest of this ridiculous county.
Tink frowned as much as she could with as sleepy as she was. "He didn't turn me into a cockroach," she said, using a huge effort to turn her head and look around the apartment. "Neal, I don't see any bugs." Was she that exhausted that she couldn't see what was right in front of her?
“Yeah. Yes. If you’ll have me, I definitely want to stay over. I need some sleep.” She said, and turned back to face him, her head rolling onto the back of the sofa. Her eyes were half lidded now. “I don’t think I can drive home, anyway.”
“No, no,” he shook his head. “You’re not gonna drive home.” Not that Neal meant to be giving orders when he was dead to the world and fucking hallucinating, but it just didn’t seem like a good idea. Bad enough that Tink had made the trip here, that was already a risk and it filled the quota for the day.
What time was it? Hell if he knew. It was difficult to tell what was real and what wasn’t. The bugs, they were still everywhere, worms slithering to and fro, the snap and skitter of those cockroaches. He shut his eyes, squeezed them tight, attempted to focus. “We can go to bed,” he suggested, but that involved getting up. Climbing stairs. You know, those difficult things.
Fuck, he was exhausted.
Tink tried to wrap an arm around him. Something to show how much she appreciated his strength, his warmth, even when he was obviously going insane. But she was so tired. It would take more energy than she could muster.
Suddenly, without warning, Tink was asleep. But it wasn’t cockroaches that infested her dreams. They came on instantly, the moment her body relaxed, the moment her eyes fell closed. It was rats. She was back in the shipwreck, searching for the magic mirror, and hundreds--possibly thousands--of rats were swarming around. They had glowing, red eyes and sharp teeth. The terror filled her, making her sweat and breath in gasps, whimper in her sleep.
Tink was asleep, and Neal was sort of caught in that stage of fatigued and alert - like his brain had disconnected from his body or something, and he just kind of laid there, breathing shallowly, telling himself he’d move in a second. Just five more seconds. It was the frightened noises coming from Tink that got him more alert, and he reached over to rub her shoulder.
“Hey...” he said, voice more gravelly than it normally was. “Hey, baby, let’s go upstairs.” Somehow, he managed to slide his arms beneath her and lift her up, bridal style; all she had to do was hang on. And all he had to do was navigate the staircase without falling backwards.
Tink roused from the nightmare, almost pushing him off--for fear he was actually a swarm of plague rats coming to get her (remnants of Magic the Gathering mixed with her dreams about the mirror and the scepter)--but realized where she was. Safe. Neal. He was holding her, so she hung on for dear life. "Neal... I fell asleep..." She said, as if he needed the explanation.
“Me too,” he confessed, but wasn’t actually sure if he had or not. Maybe? Oh well, that was two minutes ago and he was far past that now. Onto the bed Tink went, he laid her down there gently, and then he was a bit of a lump when he flopped, shaking the mattress and face-planting down into the mess of blankets. He hadn’t made the bed from this morning either, so, oops.
All he wanted to do was stop seeing the bugs. They were still crawling on him. Up his arms. On his back. Maybe if he lit himself on fire, they’d go away. Seemed tempting.
“I think Imma sleep again.”
Tink nodded against the pillow. She was surrounded by Neal's smell, his warmth, his bed. It felt good. If she wasn't as exhausted as she was, she might have been a little more... enthused. Especially considering that Neal was laying beside her. She rolled onto her side and draped an arm around him to cuddle.
"Me, too." She said, then yawned deeply. "...Neal?" She asked, her voice low and sleepy, her eyes already closed.
Enthusiasm was something that Neal usually didn’t have any trouble with. Especially when he was in bed with Isabel, but right now, he’d end up falling asleep before either of them could fully even begin to enjoy themselves. Best to not start something you couldn’t awkwardly finish. He was good with cuddling though, always that. Pulling her closer, he kissed the top of her head and tucked her into her snuggling spot, letting his eyes close again. It helped. The bugs diminished that way.
Except she’d asked him something. “Hm?” he mumbled drowsily.
Oh, the snuggling spot. Tink loved the snuggling spot. It was probably her favorite place in the whole world, as close to home as she ever got. She closed her eyes and felt sleep tugging at her brain, felt the world starting to melt away. Though she was desperately trying to hang on. She had something to say, something to ask him, but what was it?
“I didn’t show you the suit,” she mumbled, but as soon as she’d finished saying it, she was asleep again.
The suit? Oh right. The suit. Normally, that would have been enough to get Neal to leap into action. But, unfortunately, in cursed OC land, that wasn’t going to happen. Didn’t stop the smile from spreading across his face though, a lazy Cheshire cat. “Tomorrow,” he uttered into her hair. His inventive tinker fairy making sexy catsuits! Truly, was there anyone better. “Before Disney.”
Now they’d sleep. For an hour, if that. But at least if they were going to experience a nightmare landscape, it was better to do it together than alone.