#implied huskerdust

Angel mock gasps while his secondary hands reach for the filled glass. "Ya just don't understand my art! The 'Choke Me, Daddy' cocktail recipe is like a, uh, commentary on like..." One hand makes a waving gesture. "How life chokes you. Like a fucking bitch. But sometimes it feels good. Ya get me?"

Husk shrugs, trying not to laugh. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. If you get choked, you're on your own for that."

"Aw, that's nowhere near as fun." Angel downs his drink, the bar lights drawing highlights across his fur, the briefest streaks of purple and pink. "But admit it. Last night when I came in with my face full of splinters because of Val's new wooden paddling shtick, you even went and got out the tweezers to help me!"

"Only because I had one on me! And it was damn painful watching you wince every time you tried to take a shot."

Angel raises an eyebrow, but he smiles. "Who the hell carries around a tweezer? Weirdo."

Husk cleans out a whiskey tumbler, putting it back on a shelf. "If I see someone come to my bar every night with a new bruise or a broken lip, it gets harder to ignore. So, fine. I feel like taking care of you when it comes to that."

"Ohhh-"

Then Husk turns over his shoulder. "Just that. Got it, kid?"

Angel bats all eight of his eyes cutely, even somehow getting his face to blush to really sell it. "Yes, mister. I'll be a good wittle boy, I pwomise."

That was enough to break Husk, his laughter spraying out across the bar, Angel's stupid expression now shifting over to smugness.

It was easy to have a bleeding heart for someone who felt like they deserved it.

–

.

.

.

Oh, how pitiful, someone might say if they saw him now. Oh, how pathetic, someone might say if they saw him sprawled out on the floor, wings half-shorn, eyes hollow, mouth dry.

That someone is now here. Their shadow spreads over Husk, freezing him. It's all he deserves anyway.

"Oh, Husker," that same someone says, their teeth sharp, their voice barely holding back in laughter. "Do you even know where you are?"

Husk blinks. Everything is just colors to him, but then he sees the bones hung up on the wall, the antique radios on the shelves, the plush armchair where Alastor sits, one leg crossed over the other.

Did it matter if Husk was summoned here? Or did he stumble in through the door, collapsing to the floor, right before Alastor? As if one would do before a god?

Husk grits his teeth, curls in on himself. He pricks his arms with his claws. "Just kick me out," he says. He can't remember anything from hours ago. Days ago. Weeks. It all mixes together.

How did it get this bad? But Husk knows how. It's been a month since Angel left. Pitiful. Pathetic.

Alastor leans forward, humming curiously. His smile widens as he looks over Husk who lays like a dead body that had been given to him as an offering. "Such a boring thing you've become! Are you looking for me to fix you? Is that it?" The grainy voice falls through Husk's ears like fine sand. "All you had to do was ask."

Nothing stems the hollow ache in Husk's chest. The way it gnaws straight through his bones, desiccates his organs, leaving him rotting from the inside. That's exactly what Alastor wants, so he doesn't believe the Radio Demon will do anything besides finding a salt shaker to make him more palatable.

So he flinches when hands reach to pick him up easily, one grabbing his arm, the other his waist. A soft, gentle pull, then they bring Husk to rest against a chest that's all sharp angles. The tip of his ear brushes against a chin, hearing the soft, textured notes of some song that he can no longer remember the name of. His tail wraps around one leg like a clinging vine. His wings hardly weigh anything at all. 

Husk realizes then he's not wearing any clothes. There’s a slight chilliness settling in his fur. Alastor’s fingers shift down, unbothered by anything. Had Husk just been lying naked on Alastor's floor, like some sad pathetic thing? He doesn’t even want to know for how long he was there, Alastor’s eyes on him, his hands following soon after.

"Why?" Husk asks. Instead of answering, Alastor brings him closer to lay with him in the chair, making Husk straddle his lap. Husk hears nothing when he presses his ear against that chest, not even breathing. After all, Alastor has never needed to.

A hand rakes down his back. Claws that break skin just so barely. It takes away strands of fur in their path. "Such a troublesome thing. I always tell you to not worry your fuzzy head about matters that are out of your hands. And yet, here you are."

Here you are. Here you are. Troublesome. Pitiful. Pathetic. Husk can't stop the echoes inside his head.

He wants to get drunk and forget Angel's haunted face. He wants to forget the way Angel tore his hand away from him, no longer looking back. He wants to. He wants to. The same hand on him soon plays with a few of those leftover feathers on a drooping wing.

"Stop treating me...like your pet," he says into Alastor's shirt. His breath is heavy, and he can feel the very smallest of shakes from Alastor when he speaks. His mouth is right near the wound of Alastor's, its jagged shape seen through the shirt's light material, like a fissure. It still hasn't healed, even after Alastor got everything he wanted.

"But what kind of owner would I be?" Alastor says in the same teasing voice he loves to use. "I take care of all my property well."

Such words to say from one who broke his own chains. But Husk isn't that much of a dreamer himself. The chains are heavy. Sometimes, they even feel like hands on his shoulders, keeping him close. He will never never tell Alastor that.

Husk closes his eyes. He expects the scent of rotting flesh, of wet soil, of mold. But all he can catch is the faint acrid scent of cigarettes, coating his tongue as he breathes it in. He lays his hands over Alastor's shirt. There's a small bump against his palm, the upraised skin of that wound. For a moment, he can smell blood.

The wound is open. Not completely. But it must have torn earlier. Maybe when Alastor was alone. Maybe when Alastor had moved to pick up Husk from the floor.

Alastor shows no indication that he knows. That, or he's ignoring it. He instead continues to pet Husk, letting one of his claws trace a line over the spine. Husk shivers, feeling that claw press into skin, like Alastor was making a very precise cut, all in one motion.

It's an attempt to soothe, and it works. Husk shivers again, and a low rumble starts within his chest. The stroking repeats, changing its rhythm, carving tangents in its path. Alastor is always so oddly touchy with him, hands gentle, and maybe it has to be when you need to tear out the good meat from bone.

Husk hears no heartbeat, but he hears a very shuddered breathing. Faint. Subdued. Air rattling through damaged lungs and a cracked sternum. The man never takes care of himself.

It's what angers Husk suddenly, even as those hands pet his back, tug at his wings, and mold themselves against his hips. The end of his tail waves, still clinging to Alastor's leg.

"How can you even think about helping me," Husk whispers, narrowing his eyes at Alastor's chest, "if you're still so messed up yourself?"

If Alastor's hand pauses, if there's a slight shift, it's not something his boss, his soul owner, his self-appointed caretaker will ever mention. Alastor grips some of those feathers in warning, as if he would pull out the rest.

"You're going to have to be a bit more specific, dear."

The demon always thinks he's so hilarious.

Husk has only seen the wound once, how it opened wide like a sharp-fanged mouth, held together by green threads. To think it still hasn't healed, but Husk is only assuming by the scent. His claws furl into the shirt.

Alastor notices. He grips Husk's wing feathers even tighter in response. "Don't be a naughty pet."

"I'm not your pet," Husk hisses out. Then, he tears down Alastor's shirt in the middle.

He refuses to ignore this.

The wound is a red scar, no longer festering. It doesn't open wide like a mouth ready to devour, but still shows the jagged teeth, like some grimacing smile. The skin is still inflamed and thin, and it shows weakness. Something Alastor never wants.

There's a small sliver of bright red. The green threads are no longer there. Even so, it's a break in the skin that's new and fresh, stretched out from whatever Alastor had done. Trying to tear himself to pieces, or letting another cannibal try to take a bite out of him. Or he just woke up wrong.

"You're so fucking stupid," Husk says. His tail wraps around Alastor's leg even tighter, as if his soul owner would vanish right there. It's not out of the realm of possibility.

Alastor doesn't rip out those feathers like he silently promised. But Husk sees the slight drooping of his ears, the hiss of static raising in volume. The pleasant song that had been playing before is gone. "Now you owe me a new shirt, Husker."

"You were bleeding through it anyway," Husk snaps back. "How fucking long have you been like this?"

"And why does that concern you?" Alastor's voice is tight. But its sound is that of a tired animal.

Neither of them know how to ask for help. No wonder they've been stuck to each other for too many damn years. The closest is Niffty, but she obeys Alastor to the letter.

Husk doesn't.

His tongue extends from his mouth before he knows it. The action is natural. He's barely even conscious of it. It's this stupid cat body, he thinks. Or maybe it's because his mind has been stuck in blackness for so long that he's operating on instinct alone.

Even so, he takes his time to taste. Bitter and metallic. It soaks into his tongue like water to soil. Husk expects himself to flinch, but he doesn't. He drags his tongue along the edge of the ripped wound, memorizing the shape of it. It reminds him of when he would lick his own scrapes, when shattered glass would make their way into his palms, and he had to use his teeth to take out each of those tiny pieces.

A high-pitched sound makes him lower his ears. Inhuman and piercing. Alastor should be biting his head off now, and it seems like he would at any moment.

And yet, he doesn't.

Husk risks a small glance, his tongue still over the wound. Alastor has his eyes shut, his hair slightly frazzled. The hand that's on Husk's back tightens, claws digging through fur and so dangerously close to breaking through the skin. The other hand lets go of his wing, only for Alastor to bring it to his own head. Fingers curl into his hair, pulling slightly.

It's hard to know if he is in pain or something else altogether.

Maybe if he was sober, Husk would have been weirded out and stepped back. But if he was sober, he wouldn't be licking Alastor's months-old wound in the first place. So he stays, shifts more comfortably on Alastor's lap, and takes another lick. Like a cat slowly lapping at his own paw, or carrying away fur. But he only takes in any leaking blood, and the salt from Alastor's skin. Maybe he even licks away whatever magic residue is left from those threads that were once there. He tastes more while Alastor trembles.

"Stop," the Radio Demon utters out. The filter is gone. The put-on accent is erased. It's Alastor when everything is laid bare and not covered over with several shades of lies and mimicry.

Husk stops, but only for a moment to say, "I will if this is hurting you."

Alastor is still shaking, his hand still pulling at Husk's fur, the other at his own hair. But his antlers stay unchanged, and his eyes are dim.

Yeah, it's something else altogether.

Husk moves in to lick again, determined to forget all about this the next day. But now, he's set in his role; if Alastor wants to treat him like a pet so badly, then Husk will act accordingly. A pet that sees his owner's wound still not healed, licking away the blood and hurt, because nothing else works.

Alastor breathes harder. The hand rushes up Husk's back to grip at the tuft of fur at his neck. There's an odd texture in his breathing, like he's confused, like he's not sure where any of this is leading. Neither does Husk, but he stays close, his own breath falling over Alastor's gash from Adam. How it has stayed for so long, barely even healing into a full scar, makes little sense. Husk know’s he’s lucky that he never got a scratch from an angelic sword, and yet here is Alastor, carrying his own around like a weight.

It's actually fucked up that he's doing this, but Husk continues until he hears Alastor become calm, like an animal that finally understands he's not in danger. There's nothing Husk can even do to Alastor, nothing that really matters. But they stay like that, clinging together, some of Alastor's blood now staining Husk's white fur on his chin.

He's getting used to it. It's soothing—maybe for both of them. It gives Husk something to focus on, watching the way the lines on Alastor's face smoothen out, the straining grin finally relaxing, if only by a little.

"You...worry yourself over nothing," Alastor finally says. It's sharp, but only after he can finally catch his breath.

Whatever emotions run through the Radio Demon's head, Husk never wants to know. He still expects any moment for Alastor to dig his claws into Husk's back, ripping out his spine, and putting it up on his wall to join with the others. Husk takes another risk again, despite knowing that whenever he does, it blows up in his face. He loses more than he gains, every time.

He licks further up the wound, and he doesn't stop. He licks up Alastor's chest to his neck. His wings fold over the armchair, draping over Alastor's body like some shoddy blanket. When his mouth finally reaches higher, he can feel a pulse. Alastor's heart, finally beating, like he’s a living human instead of some awful monstrosity that would eat him for lunch if he was feeling just slightly hungry.

The hand over his fur tightens again, but not as roughly. Another soft breath from Alastor, and then an arm brings Husk closer, as if they can finally melt together.

Husk expected rejection. He still does, ready for it at any moment. He licks again, slowly, breathing faster. He'll take up as much as he can before it all gets ruined.

"I'm not worrying," Husk says, feeling his heart in his throat, like it's about to rush out of there and impale itself against Alastor's teeth. "I'm taking. Push me off if you hate it so much."

That's only half-true. Sometimes Husk can believe himself. Sometimes.

But Alastor smiles. Husk only sees it at the corner of his eyes, but that smile always stretches far. It highlights those eyes that always draw him in, pits of black within a red lake. Alastor's fingers circle around the base of Husk's tail.

And then, he whispers to him, "Husker, you and your bleeding heart."

Husk stops. The blood is still fresh on his tongue. His claws tighten over Alastor's shirt, thinking of ripping it to shreds completely.

All he can remember is the way Angel had turned away.

Husk leans up to face Alastor fully, greeted with that smile. He sees a sheen of sweat over Alastor’s forehead, crimson hair sticking to it in soft tangles. He doesn't ask how his boss knows. Or how long he’s known. Or if Alastor really did drag Husk to his room, left him out on the floor and watched him struggle through nightmares, listening to him talk and cry and spill out all his secrets in his sleep, all while his own chest was stinging with agony.

Husk just covers Alastor's mouth with his, sliding his tongue in so his owner can taste his own blood, hidden deep there. The hand doesn't leave his back.

Part of him hopes that maybe Alastor really will rip him apart then. The man has always threatened that, up to the point that it was now like a scary bedtime story that Husk has grown tired of listening to. Except, that would have been too merciful of him.

Instead, Alastor accepts his kiss, wrapping his tongue around Husk's, hands firmly over his waist. He brings Husk closer, closer, they can't even get any closer than this. Except Husk is already hard and trying to find Alastor's to rut against, to break down completely. His own breathing sounds strange to his ears, like he's about to choke, like he's about to drown from the all the whiskey he drank the other night.

He can only think about the softness of Alastor's lips for much too long, and then his boss flinches. Not because of the kiss, or the way Husk is humping him like they were about to get skewered by some exorcists tomorrow, but because the wound had opened again. Another small tear in the new skin. Another trickle of blood, already blooming and staining Alastor's chest.

Husk doesn't give any warning. He leans down to lick away the blood, lapping the wound until the harsh bitterness fills his mouth. He hears a sound that's like a mix between a moan and a frayed cord sparking. It's enough to rend Alastor into incoherence.

But Alastor still doesn't stop him. Again, Husk tastes his blood, his torn skin, and if he kisses it gently once or twice, both are smart enough to not make any mention of it.

(It's something he can never do with Angel, even if everything had gone right. But Alastor accepts it, because he's already seen everything that Husk is.)

Husk leans up to share the blood he's taken, coating it over Alastor's tongue. It's enough to make his boss shake. Their moans are muffled before Husk decides to break it.

"If you ever get hurt again, you tell me." Husk isn't sure why he's angry, but he feels it all too well. Even as he breathes against Alastor's mouth, falling into those eyes that see much too deeply in him. "That was part of our deal."

It would be like Alastor to forget such a detail.

The Radio Demon chuckles, even if he looks exhausted. He reaches up a hand to Husk's face, stroking a finger down a cheek, to play with the fur in such a soft manner that Husk is nearly convinced that none of this is real.

"Such a good little pet of mine to remember," Alastor says. "I know how much you love taking care of me."

It sounds too genuine to think it's said in sarcasm. In fact, Husk thinks Alastor sounds almost relieved.

How fucked it is that the Radio Demon is the only one to fully accept him this way, bleeding heart and all. Still, he also feels relief, muscles relaxing, heartbeat steady, to know whatever they have between them is still here, binding them together.

Husk doesn't answer Alastor back. He just goes to lick at his wound again, achingly slow. And if Alastor makes another strangled sound again that Husk can't help but want to hear over and over, he doesn't mention it.