Tuesday mornings were uneventful. Blue had fallen into a routine when it came to market days, to the point that it became a competition: who could set up their table the fastest? For Blue, hers was easy—there was nothing breakable, like Ronan's; there was nothing that required exact placement, like Adam's. All Blue had to do was throw a bunch of softly knitted items on the table. The vibrancy of the pieces did the work for her. And so Blue took her win and spent the last few minutes before opening spooning yogurt into her mouth.
There were fruit bits at the bottom, a purposeful choice. Not that she needed a reason to bother her boyfriend, but it was a surefire way to steal some time together before he was trapped behind a booth selling eggs and milk, and doing his Richard Campbell Gansey the Third thing—which was being frustratingly lovely at schmoozing the locals into buying organic.
Instead of waiting, she slipped over to his end of the table, colorfully painted combat boots kicking up gravel and dirt, and hip checked him. Or well, hip checked him the best she could.
"Did you eat breakfast this morning or just mainline coffee?" Blue asked, offering up the mixed berries settling at the bottom. Not really food-food but it was a start.
Because Blue had to look up (and up, and up) at him, her view over his shoulder was full of sky rather than what was behind him (the rest of the Barns residents putting up stalls). And dotted in the sky was birds? But they were moving strangely and abnormally quick toward the Barns. She gently hit his shoulder to make him turn around and confirm. "Gansey...?”
“I had a banana,” Gansey confirmed, but a half second later he would’ve snagged her yogurt cup happily, having already been banking on that when he’d seen her eating it from across the way. He had his head down and was tightening the braces on a table, but the question in Blue’s voice had him following her look over his shoulder.
He stood, slowly, maybe a little dramatically, and sucked in a breath as he reached out for Adam and Cabeswater. Since Adam had deepened his connection with Cabeswater, and the two had ended up further linked for it, they’d worked on quieteing that, so feelings and emotions weren’t felt so instantaneously. Opening himself up to it and getting worry and dread from Cabeswater - though Adam was fine, he could feel that - made him frown.
“We still have protection wards up,” He was still frowning, even as he sounded so sure of that fact. It also didn’t stop him from glancing over at his sword, which lay in its scabbard nearby, as a precaution to any monster attacks. “Maybe it’s just-- the forest acting odd again.”
Blue inched closer to Gansey, protectively and for protection, keeping her attention to the skyline. She didn't have a connection to Cabeswater to give her warnings about impending doom, but Blue was resourceful. She had good instincts. And all that gut-reaction bubbling up inside her was telling her that it wasn't the forest acting off. Her and Gansey had stomped around the forest to know. This was something bad, something that froze her in place.
Unlike Gansey though, she didn't have her axe near her. Just a pair of scissors to cut away loose threads from her pieces and that was all the way back over at her table.
"We should move, or I don't know, something. I don't like it, even with the protection wards up." But Blue was banking on those explicit wards to keep whatever was flying closer to shoo them away. But with a single-mindedness that started to cause alarm, the black dots were getting larger, their shapes more defined. Not birds but birdlike creatures, and they weren't stopping. They weren't turning away. They barrelled right through the invisible barrier at the edge of the property that had been keeping them all moderately safe.
Blue grabbed Gansey's arm, her nonverbal way of saying don't leave me.
Before they reached the barrier, Gansey had his hand wrapping around the hilt of his sword, pulling it up. He didn’t go any farther, though, heeding Blue’s call to not leave, and not wanting to rush off without her anyway. They were always a unit, a team that worked better together.
Gansey glanced back and saw motion far behind them, on the other side of the farm. He hissed through his teeth, but saw others moving into action and that helped, even as worry ate at his gut.
Blue didn’t have a weapon, and he didn’t know where her weapon was, though he certainly didn’t underestimate her ability to put those scissors to good use, or to pull a switchblade or three out of a back pocket. She was the most resourceful person he’d ever met, but the bird-- things were headed in their direction and fast. He pulled his arm free from her, gently, and reached out to the forest and trees surrounding the edge of their home. “Protect us.” It was a command, unpracticed and a little hoarse, but different than his normal voice. His energy and ley line magic fueled it, boosted it, pushing it forward as it caused the trees and the barrier to rebuild, stronger, and reach for the sky in an attempt to fortify them from above.
But it wasn’t impenetrable, it gave them an extra minute, at most, as the monsters were already starting to break through, as if they were about to rain death. “Jesus Christ--”
Once the sword came free from Gansey's belt, Blue spurred into action. She didn't particularly like Gansey swinging a sword alone, but there was little she could do except throw a mostly-empty glass jar of yogurt at whatever was tearing through their wards. Not really a weapon if she could only use it once. So in true Blue fashion, she went sprinting toward her booth, upending the table to turn into a barrier, knitwear raining to the ground.
What she really came for was the scissors. As she wrapped her hand around the handle, and wondered if she had stashed a switchblade in her emergency kit, she slowed. She stood, making herself absolutely vulnerable for a brief second, but she was entranced—watching the trees winding into a protective wall at Gansey's command was worth it.
"Gansey!" Blue hollered trying to draw him back toward her once it seemed done protecting them. Everyone else had scattered to their own defensive (and offensive) positions and they needed a plan. Scissors in hand, she ran to him to drag him back. "Now is not the time to face them head on until we know what they do! And what they do looks not good."
She hadn't meant to shriek in surprise, but one of the bird creatures landed not thirty feet from them. Blue threw the yogurt jar at it.
Gansey backed up a little, keeping one eye on Blue and one eye on the monsters breaking through the barrier. It was almost a sure thing at this point, with the speed at which they were managing already.
And then they were through, and Gansey barely had time to fully pull his sword up at the defensive before it was within yogurt-throwing-distance. “When would you suggest?” He quipped over at her, the moment after the yogurt jar made impact and fell to the ground in a shatter. “Because I’m fairly certain we’re beyond that point now--” They were, as the vulture stalked forward to them, claw dragging along the table it passed with an ear-piercing screech.
Both hands on the hilt for extra stability - he lacked a shield at this point - and Gansey was able to deflect an arm swinging towards them both, and he backed up closer to Blue with a less-than-graceful stumble. “There was a shovel over-- Is it still there?” Gansey’s pause was barely there. “Have you practiced throwing scissors?”
In true Blue fashion, she almost snapped back I don't need a man to protect me—because putting her foot down when it came to fighting felt like a boundary she needed to draw. But maybe just not right now. No, right now, Blue was kind of hiding behind Gansey (not because she thought he was in any way disposable, but she did only have the scissors and the monster was coming closer.)
She wanted to pull him back, she wanted to find a safe place to hide. She wasn't prepared to fight something this morning, but this was karmic justice for saying Tuesdays were boring. Blue promised to never say stupid things like that again, even in her mind. She just wanted Gansey to not get hurt, she wanted—where was the goddamn shovel?
As she tried to look, Gansey was deflecting the arm with the sword, and Blue couldn't waste time. "No better time than the present!" Blue shouted, throwing the scissors as a distraction. And okay it wasn't the greatest throw—balance and weight mattered!—but it managed to puncture a hole in its collarbone before it fell to the ground. The Vulture seemed unphased.
To her left was the fabled shovel, and Blue squeezed Gansey's left shoulder to indicate that she was going to make a break for it now, just as the Vulture lifted his clawed hand, fire forming between its talons.
Gladio’s teachings took hold, but he gave himself a half second to look pleased over Blue’s scissors striking true. He knew she probably wouldn’t see it, and he was putting himself between the two of them so she could grab for a shovel or some kind of weaponry behind them.
“Go!” Gladio had taught him a lot over the last year, even if Gansey didn’t have the benefit of the same amount of bulk mass. But he could push back, swinging his sword with steady flourish, getting the Vulture to hiss out something in a language Gansey wasn’t familiar with before striking again. It was close, talons coming within a breath of his skin, but Gansey twisted and turned, putting himself at the Vulture’s side, an open spot he could sink his sword into.
He didn’t expect it to do almost nothing. In retrospect, after seeing that scissors impact, he should have. But Gansey cursed low under his breath, and then a little louder for Blue. “Ah-- Fuck. Blue, this--” He was dislodged from his attack mid-sentence, pushed back from the Vulture with a shove as it continued forward, towards Blue. Gansey followed, shouting out across the distance. “Do we have fire?”
The shovel had been knocked over and was lying on the ground by one of the tent beams. Blue had barely wrapped her hands around it, holding it up like a baseball bat ready to swing, when she caught Gansey in a—wow, a supremely amazing display of skill, which was way better than the time she had him recount his swordplay.
But then the whole fight sped back up and Gansey was being pushed aside, and Blue lost all sense of reason. She wanted to run back toward him, combine their efforts, but the Vulture was coming toward her. Blue took a step back. "Oh sure! Let me just pull a molotov cocktail out of the pockets of my skirts! Try the zombie method, I don't know!" Blue shouted back, terror rising up in her, as she adjusted the grip on her handle.
"Hey, you ugly feathered asshole!" Blue shouted at the bird monster. She had one shot, and she had to make sure it underestimated her. Like tiny helpless prey, even though Blue was anything but. Blue was able to get one hard swing in, whacking it with the blade on the same side Gansey had just stabbed.
A distraction, she was going for a distraction. But the Vulture grabbed the handle, dragged Blue into it with alarming speed, before it whacked her hard enough to fly into one of the other tents.
Zombie method. It tied Gansey’s brain up for a moment, as he caught onto her meaning. Documentaries were much more his thing than-- Oh. “Go for the brain,” He muttered the words under his breath when her meaning snapped into place, and he didn’t even bring himself to snark back about never knowing exactly what she might have stuffed in her pockets.
Really a molotov cocktail was on the least-surprising end of things some days.
“Blu--” He didn’t even get her full name out before she was flying out of his reach, and Gansey swore again. It brought all of his focus to a head, Blue being put in even more danger made his muscles move from pure memory. Later, he wouldn’t remember swinging the sword a few more times, he wouldn’t remember the sound of the vulture’s head hitting the ground with a deep thunk.
“Blue?” He smartly didn’t drop his sword when he rushed forward after, towards Blue, sending up a silent, desperate prayer to a god he didn’t believe in.
There was a minute where Blue blacked out. It was so quick, but her stubbornness won—stay conscious, help Gansey, swear off all birds in the near future (sorry, Chainsaw). She went from standing to on the ground, looking at the monster to looking up at the sky, and between her brief flight, she had missed Gansey lobbing the head off the Vulture. Blue had many regrets.
But then Gansey was there, leaning over her, sword in hand, frantic and beautiful and— "What's on your face?" Blue asked, reaching up gingerly to his cheek to try and smear away blood. Not his blood. She frowned. And her hand moved from his face to hers. Oh, that was bad. She could feel the wet bruising from a cut in her temple. Nope, nope, nope. She tried to sit up—ah, more agony from crashing into one of the tents. A large cut ran from rib to waist from its talon, which ruined her favorite knitted top. Not deep, but painful.
Blue immediately laid back down.
"I think I might have a concussion," Blue stated, because that seemed the smallest injury in retrospect. "And maybe... my side? I need help getting up, unless there are more. Are there more?" Blue could rally herself to be upright if they needed to get away fast.
“Yeah- just might.” Gansey confirmed, taking in all of her injuries. He made a few quick glances around, saw some action across the way, but the blur of sundogs took over his vision, and Gansey had to smile just a little. He knew they could handle things, just the same as hearing Gasoline’s trample across the property.
It at least let him know he had a few minutes to spare, and Gansey pulled a tablecloth down off of a nearby setup and took to ripping it in strips. “Stay put, the sundogs are out, I think everything is handled for now.” He was gentle when he squeezed Blue’s leg, but it was a reminder not to move, nonetheless. “We’ll have to get you to the clinic, or call someone to help, but--” He gingerly lifted her top and wrapped the tablecloth as quickly and carefully as he could, trying to go with gentle hands.
When he was finished, he let his focus drift from her wound, to her head. “For now, this’ll do. The first aid kit is inside, I can get it once I’m sure you’re safe.” He pushed back a little of her hair. “That shovel move was phenomenal.”
She nodded in agreement and settled back down to let the sundogs do their thing. Blue was more than content to keep still while Gansey handled her most immediate injury concerns. It could have been worse, Blue had to remind herself of that. It could have been so much worse, and yet here was Gansey being her knight-in-armor, and for once. Blue was okay with being the damsel.
But as he complimented her, and where Blue should have said something like yeah, I know I was phenomenal, she scoffed so loud. He had to be kidding. "Is there not a whole monster head laying on the ground over there. Wait, don't look—I can answer for you, and the answer is yes. You need to give yourself some credit."
There was another beat, her memories of the last few minutes sluggish to come back. That was the head wound, but still she managed out, "What was that with the trees? I mean, I know, but that was incredible and—ugh! I cannot believe you were trying to compliment me about the shovel!" And then followed up her outburst with ow, ow, ow.
“I don’t have to do anything I don’t wish to do, Jane.” Gansey replied promptly and with no measure of modesty or smugness in his voice. He was more worried about her, more focused on her, and more concerned with their home as a whole than he was about his sword skills.
Though he would be thanking Gladio later.
He dabbed at the cut on her head, and then winced when she said ow, as if he’d felt it somehow. But it put him into action again. He brought up one of her hands to hold the makeshift cloth to her head, and then leaned in to press a kiss to an uninjured part of it. “It was teamwork, but I need you to lay still.” He scanned the area again, the chaos was quieter now.
“I think they’re dead or gone, I’m going to go get the others, the first aid kit, and some transport for you to the clinic, do not move,” The last bit was an order, but not an order, he made sure of that. He slid the hilt of her sword to her side, just in case. “Stab, if another monster shows up.”
Every time Blue tried to move, Gansey was a step ahead, telling her not to and to lay still. That seemed very much against her nature, but when the ache was settling in and her legs just wanted to not haul her body around, she listened. She closed her eyes when he kissed her forehead, and took over holding the temporary bandage in place. Again, she nodded, giving in.
"Be fast?" Blue asked as she felt him slide over the sword. He would be without a weapon now, so she was loath to let him leave her alone but there wasn't much she could do. It's not like she was going to be able to cover him.
"I'm going for its balls from this angle by the way," Blue said, wrapping her hands around the hilt, and practicing stabbing upwards, gently. "Although, I'd rather take my chances with another yogurt cup."