#nonlinear narrative

Nonchronological narrative structures might be a challenge to pull off (the order in which everything is presented must still be logical, if not chronological), but when done well, it allows a more nuanced, masterful story to emerge. Here are some of the advantages of nonlinear storytelling:

Suspense: By disorienting the reader, a nonchronological structure creates a puzzle that requires more engagement with the individual pieces of the story. Cause and effect cease to be predictable or immediately visible, allowing the reader to curate their own logic. When a novel opens with a murder, the series of events that follow carry greater weight and add to the anticipation of the final (known) outcome. When the reader knows more about a character’s fate than the character does, opportunities also arise for moments of irony, be they tragic or comic. Nonchronological storytelling is especially popular in thrillers, since playing with time allows authors to withhold and reveal information at the perfect time, creating shocking twists. Hooking your reader by placing them in the middle of the story is called in medias res, and it’s a technique that works for all kinds of writing, including persuasive and informative texts.

Worldbuilding: A nonlinear structure can give readers different points of view and new perspectives on aspects of the setting—think subplots that take place on the other side of the world and will eventually become meaningful, or perhaps historical events that come to bear on the lives of your characters. Nonlinear narratives allow you to expand your worldbuilding and give your readers a glimpse into other time periods.

Character development: The more the reader learns of your main character’s backstory, the better they understand the choices they make throughout the narrative. Instead of simply telling the reader your character is an orphan, send them back to the moment the character became one. Those experiences stay with the reader as they continue through the story.

Damian moved a safe distance from the jumpy Tim. It wasn’t every day you can sneak up on him, even distracted. As he moved closer to a window showing an obviously stressed Raven, Damian felt something. His heart squeezed uncomfortably. 

Raven, dressed in a coverall jumpsuit of deep blue, raw silk by the way it reflected light and hugged her body, walked and laughed with what Damian could only describe as a wanna be gangster.

As she silently dominaded the screen, Damien noticed the tension in her shoulders and neck. Her hands moved animatedly as she talked, but there was something a little manic about it. A paranoia of not being sure, whether the next hit would come from. Or what kind of hit it would be.

Tim pulled up a Teen Titans member card. It covered the screen, blocking the video of Raven. Dominating the left side was a profile of the girl who appeared on his lap not an hour ago.

“Oh yeah. And she’s brought back so much data. About six months worth. Days of intel to sort through.”

The girl on the screen, her hair was longer now. She looked more healthy in her front picture than she had in the video or even on his lap. She’d been through some stuff, he could tell. Damian wouldn’t have said it this afternoon, but looking at her photo, her eyes held a sadness that wasn’t there in the before pictures on screen. 

“Shit!” Tim suddenly exclaimed. Scrambling to get up, remove his head phones from around his neck, the keyboard off his lap and right himself while only managing to tangle it all up and as a bonus, even managed to spill a bit of coffee.

Watching the struggle go on for a few more minutes, Damian decided to let Drake out of his misery. 

It cost him nothing he thought. And was again surprised that he really had let it go. The animosity he left towards Drake was no longer a dull ache. Not even a phantom pain.  

Without even thinking, Damian moved deeper into the cave, and helped untangle his brother, and Tim Drake was that. His brother in arms, which was worth any amount of loyalty. 

He grabbed the mug of coffee before it broke. He set it on the table, way back, and then reached for the keyboard. As I untangled the wires from Tim, he tried to set it on the table and slipped on a wrapper of junk food on the floor and fell back, the chair breaking his fall. 

“Shit, shit, shit!” Drake recited. 

Tripping and falling, trying to in his haste not destroy delicate machinery. Some of the data drives were prototypes. 

The guy was tripping to get to Raven. Of course that was after he forgot to meet upon teleport. And forgot to keep what seemed to be ‘her’ teleport chair clear. 

He glanced back at screen several times, but was completely silent about Raven being in his kitchen, happily chatting with Todd and Cass while Pennyworth got her stuffed.

Drake’s expression was a mixture of frustration and disappointment. 

Damian took pity on him. 

With my right hand grasping the chair and the left pulling the detritus from under it, Damian spilled. 

I watched Tim’s eyes light up at the mention of Raven, and get animated once her heard Raven was HERE. Tim rushed out, in earnest. Almost tripping, in his hast.

“Potter, McGonagall’s asked for us.”

He twirls the short note in his fingers, sliding it to Harry over the top of his desk, obscuring the stack of essays on casting form.

In her office, the barest of pleasantries exchanged, the headmistress casts a brusque Colloportus, layers an additional privacy spell quietly over the room.

From deep in the drawers of her desk, she withdraws and unfolds a map. The castle and its grounds— the Great Hall, the dormitories, and a number of the classrooms depicted in a soft, steady blue. Elsewhere, though, it is dotted and marred in red and gray, the lines shuddering on the parchment.

Tracing these lines, she explains: “The kitchens are at half what their capacity once was, the cellars at a quarter. The Quidditch field we reduced per the new international regulations, but the timing of this was a fortuitous cover for the fact that it was simply no longer manageable.”

A familiar stubbornness sets in her chin. “Do not mistake me— we have made do. But since the war…”

Her conclusion is hushed— careful, but not precious. “Hogwarts no longer has the magic to sustain itself.”

“How do we help?” Harry says at the exact same moment Draco answers, “What can we do?”

A weary smile of the proud sort graces her face, her finger tracing over the lightened lines of the map. “It is the truth that the founders were the administers of these wards. But. Well.”

Something in her tone goes grave. “It was Godric Gyffindor who laid them. Godric Gyffindor and Sirena Slytherin.”

Draco’s brow quirks. “The sister of Salazar?”

“The very same.”

“Why?” Harry asks, pulling at the thread, looking for their answer.

A considered pause settles over her. “The wards here are known as some of the strongest in Europe— protective and longstanding. Such a charm requires magic of a certain calibre. Soulmate magic. And the two… were.”

“Headmistress, I—” Draco’s hands brush absently down the front of his robes, smoothing creases that don’t exist. “Forgive me, perhaps I misunderstand. The wife of Godric Gryffindor was Felicity Gryffindor, of the Falconé family line.”

A pinched look. “No, Professor Malfoy. You capture it completely.”

His brows rise, clarity dawning. “Ah.”

“You asked how you might aid Hogwarts.”

Her lips purse unhappily, weary eyes determined.

“If you can, there is a place that will guide you to that answer.”

───────

“Give me your hand!”

The wards threaten to collapse in on themselves, the magic writhing in peaty veins beneath the sawgrass. Harry feels the pull like a burn in his muscles, and it dulls as Draco’s palm presses to his.

Still, though, there is the distinct sensation of the web wavering, the north tower of the castle giving a groan as the stones begin to tremble.

“Malfoy!” he shouts, redirecting his gaze from where he’s locked upon the sigils, magic crackling from the end of his wand.

Harry’s wand-hand releases holly and reaches for Draco’s face, a careful curl—

He can only think:

Forgive me.

I’m sorry.

I have to.

Please.

Draco’s mouth is soft beneath his own, in spite of his wind-chapped lips, the gasp tumbling out of him. He halts, spell mid-spoken, stun-still, before pressing in & in & in.

───────

The Cavern Etamluos is nestled in the cliffs of the Quiraing.

“Potter?” Draco says, attention averted to the chalk powder he’s distributing carefully over the grassy floor of the surrounding slopes. “I hoped I might ask a favor.”

Harry’s eyes crinkle in the dusk, currying to catch Draco’s expression, as he hums for further detail.

Draco meets his searching look. “Would you cast first?” He shifts, uneasy. “It might be easier, if…” He straightens a line of the chalk, the white of it clinging dusty to his fingertips.

“If it’s all the same to you,” he murmurs, “I’d prefer if you cast first.”

The beat of Harry’s heart may as well go careening through the cavern, announcing itself to the few straggling tourists on the marked path back to the carpark, startling the roe deer, the skylark.

He watches the tremble of Draco’s hand as he shapes the runes and sigils with practiced precision. He catches the careful set of his jaw, his mouth— focused, frightened.

“Yeah,” Harry answers.

“You will?” Draco says, eyes clipping gracious to Harry’s unerring gaze.

“Yes.” He will.

───────

The air is dotted with dust, the heavy electric feel of the magic pulsing over their skin. But beneath: something feels fuller. Steady.

Until the repair, the healing of the lines, the magic felt sure enough, or at least it did not warrant alarm. But now…

“We did it,” Harry breathes, his arms still wrapped around Draco’s middle, fists curled in his cardamom-colored robes.

Draco’s own breath is slipping through his lips in the faintest of gasps, eyes heavy-lidded. “We did?” And then, registering, reverent: “Merlin, we did.”

Suddenly, his palms are a press against Harry’s chest, extricating, untangling. Freed, Draco turns away with a shudder.

When he looks back, his gaze is guarded again, his posture careful.

“Potter, it doesn’t… change anything.” He rests his hand on Harry’s wrist, the gentlest dismissal, at once grateful and withdrawing. Pained.

In the dying flames, the ring on his finger glints.

“I— it can’t.”

“Right,” Harry says, heart a trip-wire, a malevolent Bombarda. “Sure.”

(… but now the lines are beating. Vibrant. Whole.)

───────

The summer fades. Autumn begins to signal her impending arrival, and with her coming— students, (as always & always).

The castle stays standing.

Now:

Danny’s vision had blackened at the edges after the ectoplasmic explosion had thrown everyone in the room in a different direction.

He felt some probably pretty nasty wounds as they smoldered.

Colter’s magic was trying to consume him.

It licked hungrily at his hazmat suit that was as much a part of his ghostly body as his skin and it burned like the worst sort of acid.

There had only been a quiet moment of breathless anticipation before the spell had unwound with incendiary force. He had tried to get a shield between Mehr and Hood and whatever supernatural fuckery was happening but he wasn’t sure if it had been enough to help. The other two men had been thrown like porcelain dolls.

Mehr was crumpled into a small heap in one corner and it didn’t look like he was going to be getting up anytime soon. Hood had missed the vaguely landscape style framed print that hung from the motel’s wall but he had definitely needed to contort himself to steer clear of any of the sharp edges of furniture and walls and had managed to crash half-way through the drywall from the momentum of the detonation. He was back on his feet and standing strong but Danny had a sinking feeling that it was all a facade.

Hood's helmet was tilted just enough that Danny was pretty sure he couldn’t quite focus on what was happening around him. He wrenched his gaze back towards Miranda, cursing himself again for not forcing her to leave even if it would have been against her wishes. He growled low and threatening at the partially formed poltergeist that was creeping towards her.

Colter’s form flickered and staticked in the darkened shadows of the small room.

He wasn’t as corporeal as most of the other ghosts that Danny had dealt with in the past but that same wicked energy that he had felt from both the gem and the half-finished spell that had wound itself through Miranda’s body was emanating from his less than solid edges.

The corners of Danny’s vision were graying in and out with agony as he tried to force himself to move.

Miranda was curled as much as she could around the swell of her pregnant belly and she too had been knocked to the ground after being at the epicenter of the spell.

Helpless against whatever nasty fuckery the old bastard had planned.

If Danny was a betting man. (He wasn’t really. But this was his luck). He’d bet someone a nickel that she was going through a contraction.

Her eyes were squeezed tightly shut and her hands were clenched into white knuckled fists.

As though she could force herself to not give birth through sheer force of will.

If anyone could do it, Danny would lay bets on her.

But even her snarling ferocity had to bend to the whims of ancient instincts and he could see the tightening ripple of her abdominal muscles through the thin fabric of her t-shirt.

The older ghost's mouth was agape and his hazy white eyes stared with unblinking avarice at the swollen curve and Danny felt his growl turn into a whipsaw shriek of rage and he threw himself at the other ghost with all of his might.

Tumbling into the larger man Danny managed to get in a couple of hard punches before the poltergeist turned towards him with a bellow. Colter’s teeth lengthened into inhumanly sharp fangs that snapped down like a bear trap on Danny’s shoulder with a guttural growl of his own.

Colter was probably pretty high up on the power scale for ecto-entities in this universe. He’d been around for a long time, generations, and had had multiple opportunities between bodies to learn how to control his spectral form.

He had nothing on Danny; who had years of consistent first hand experience and a truly nasty collection of old wounds that had taught him some hard won lessons.

Danny couldn’t phase his way out of the gnashing teeth and if he tried to pull away with too much power he was going to have an actual chunk of his flesh removed and he’d start spurting ectoplasm.

Not ideal.

The ecto from Gotham had definitely helped give him some energy back but there was another way to get even more. Turnabout's fair play and all that. Colter’s mind, what was left of it, was still trapped in his humanity and his teeth might have been monstrous but that was an almost instinctual transformation.

Danny’s form twisted and distorted and Colter’s teeth were dislodged as Danny’s muscle mass changed from human lean to monstrous bulk. Danny’s eyes glowed with green flames as he turned to stare down at Colter with his inhumanly cold breath frosting in the poltergeist’s face.

Then:

Danny had been afraid that if he released it the spiteful little gem was going to go flying through any buildings that were between it and its target.

He had let it tug restlessly against the leather cord that he had wrapped around the palm of his hand a couple of times.

There didn’t seem to be a way for them to determine how close they were to finding the witch.

Just a steady pull that ignored obstacles and was mindlessly leading them across the length of the city.

Mehr had quietly led them to a nondescript little sedan that he had parked a few blocks away from the emptied factory he worked in. Gotham was a large city. There were several different kinds of public transit available to its citizens.

Danny was pretty sure each could also be qualified as a public health hazard.

The rickety little rust-bucket of a car was a welcome barrier against the angry taxi drivers that seemed to stalk the streets in complete defiance of any traffic laws.

Mehr had given up the keys without a protest when Hood had wiggled his fingers in his direction pointedly.

The older man had slipped into the backseat and pointedly clicked on his seatbelt. Danny had settled into the passenger side and when Hood revved the engine he immediately did the same. \

He had absolutely no interest in being flung through the windshield, corporeal or not.

When the other man seemed intent on peeling out of the grody little parking lot that the car had been huddling in without doing the same, Danny frowned deeply.

The helmet and body armor the other man wore would definitely protect him from a lot of things but. He snagged the seatbelt through Hood’s body and quickly clicked it into place.

Hood’s helmet spoke to some sort of offended astonishment as he pointedly tilted it in Danny’s direction as though giving him a pointed side-eye.

Mehr gently cleared his throat and that brought Danny and Red Hood’s heads around in guilty unison.

“Not that this little display isn’t absolutely charming but I believe we are currently on the hunt for a murderous witch. So if we could hold off on the flirting for just a little bit longer it would be appreciated.”

Danny settled back into the ragged fabric of the car seat with the cooling burn of a blush splashing across the bridge of his nose. Hood cleared his throat harshly before he put the car in drive and eased it onto the empty street. Danny held up his hand high enough that the other two men could see the direction that the gem was pulling in.

“Well. Onward I guess. Go that way.”

“Go left?”

“Right.”

“Right as in turn right or right as in correct?”

Hood blew through a red light and completely missed the turn that Danny had been pointing at.

“Jesus Christ!”

Danny squeezed his eyes shut and huddled into his seat as a cacophony of horns and swearing marked their passing.

It was audible even through the closed windows.

One eye squinted open gave Danny enough vision to slide the leather cord around the rearview mirror. The gem hit the glass of the windshield with a clack before it slid to the right and strained gently towards whatever it was tracking.

“Magical GPS. Follow the evil little arrow and leave me out of this.”

“Pussy.”

“Troglodyte.”

“Boys!”

Danny’s gaze flicked up into the mirror so that he could meet Mehr’s in the reflective surface.

They were crinkled with amusement. Or stress. Possibly both.

“Sorry, Mehr.”

Hood ran through a stop sign this time and Danny’s stomach heaved with a sickening lurch and he let out a high pitched squeak.

Hood’s mechanical chortle was cut off abruptly when he saw Danny’s narrow eyed expression and he covered the chuckle with a less than stealthy cough.

“Right. Right. Magical GPS. Got it.”

Danny leaned back into the tattered seat and eyed the road ahead with trepidation. One hand was firmly wrapped around the oh shit handle and the other wound around his torso in a vain attempt to act as an additional seat belt. Danny shut his eyes and gritted his teeth as he tried to stay in the present.

Jack and Maddie had both been horrendous drivers his entire life and it was a good probability that he would survive any sort of blunt force car to the face.

It would still fucking hurt though.

Thankfully the epic side eye he was giving the other man seemed to be enough for Hood to at least try and follow the basic rules of the road. The men fell into an uneasy silence as they tooled through the late night traffic. The only sound that Danny could hear aside from their breathing was the steady chink chink chink of the gem as it slid gently against the glass of the windshield and led them on a circuitous route through the city.

Even with Hood’s slight restraint they were still whipping through the streets before the gem’s glow began to dim and it eased itself away from the glass before it began to point towards a decrepit little motel that looked as though it had been dragged directly from the pits of some less than fresh hell.

It lay like a great pollution-incrusted toad in the middle of the city.

Its many eyes gaped wide from broken windows and Danny sighed deeply and dug his knuckles into his eyes until he started to see spots.

“Yeah. That seems about right. I go from murder apartment building to the Bates motel. Rock, Paper, Scissors to see who has to talk to the front desk person?”

“Or.”

Hood drew out mockingly.

“We can continue to follow the magical GPS and not bother someone that is more likely to shoot us in the face than talk to a bunch of weird guys in widely differing outfits. In Gotham.”

Danny sighed deeply.

Heartfeltly.

Was that a word?

Didn’t matter he knew what he meant and Hood probably did too with the way his helmet tipped back in a blatant, why me, gesture.

“So instead we show up at a possibly terrified or possibly murderous woman’s hotel door holding a magically glowing gem.”

“Dream big Nightingale. She might be both.”

“Both?”

“Terrified and murderous.”

“You sweet talker.”

“Besides. We don’t need to just walk up to her room. We could figure out which room she’s in and…”

Mehr gently cleared his throat behind them, breaking their intense focus on each other.

“Sir. Stalking a woman through the streets after whatever traumatic experiences she has already been through would be a cruelty.”

Danny recoiled from the idea as well and shook his head.

“No. You’re right Mehr. We followed the gem this far but Lady Gotham wasn’t exactly straightforward.”

Hood’s shoulders tensed as he crossed his arms across his chest.

“ Did you notice?”

Mehr nodded slowly in agreement.

“Not a single gendered pronoun to be heard.” T

he murderous witch is still within my borders. This should lead you to them.

“You don’t consider the word witch to be exclusively a term for a female magic user?”

“No.”

Danny shook his head again this time more thoughtfully.

“I guess I wouldn’t.”

Now:

The fluctuating eddies of Colter’s skin were marred with layers of different runic symbols.

They had been carved deeply into the soul of him. Multiple lifetimes of spell work deeply embedded in a soul that was older than it should have been.

They looked heinously familiar.

He had just seen them wound through Miranda's abdomen.

Danny bared his fangs at the older ghost and his words resonated through the room like so much angry static.

“ Thief. Soul stealer.”

Colter swiped ineffectually at the bestial form in front of him.

Danny had no real idea what he looked like at that moment. He had only thought briefly about what it had felt like to be small. The way his form would shrink in upon itself and leave him in the body that he had originally died in. And then he thought about being big. A brief vision of what Dan had looked like.

One of his possible futures.

One that he was closer to now than he had ever been before with the loss of everything.

And then he felt the way that his body had expanded as though he had taken a deep inhalation of air.

He had expanded not only his lungs but all of his metaphysical form and he could feel the strange feeling of something keratinous scraping against the popcorn ceilings of the dank little room. No nerves except for where the growths (horns?) went into the top of his skull and less than a moment's thought left them vaporous and running through the ceiling without leaving any additional scrapes.

Danny’s head snaked around on a sinuous neck and he snapped with jaws that felt too long and bit too hard.

He left a gaping hole in the poltergeist's ribcage and within it pulsed a core that tasted like still burning cigarettes and the selfish bitterness that seemed to imbue the spirit with all of its malice. An evil that had given Colter the selfish strength to curse his own line for such a very long time.

It barely burned going down his gullet but it sat like a hot coal in his belly for long moments before it was extinguished.

Then:

In the end none of them had to make a decision.

Whatever she was Miranda was nobody’s damsel in distress.

One of the parking lot adjacent doors swung open and she came shuffling out of the shadows until they could see her in the dim light of the half broken lamp lights. One hand trembled and shook and clutched the pistol that she was holding at her side and the other was wrapped around the unmistakable swell of her pregnant belly.

Danny slunk out of the car without actually opening the door and he could see the sharp intake of breath that particular bit of theater produced.

But Danny could also still see the twin green flames that his phantasmal eyes produced. They flickered across the window that reflected them even with the scratches and chips wearing away its edges. There was no hiding what he was when he relinquished his human body. Pretending to be some shabby little twenty-something while he was flanked by two equally threatening men was disingenuous.

Hood’s helmet and his kevlar lined chest plate promised violence and Mehr’s more graceful lope as he trailed behind them was its own sort of statement.

Miranda’s throat quaked with a deep swallow before she braced herself against their presence.

“Hello, Mrs. Colter.”

Danny did his best to keep his voice placid and he pretended to ignore the gun. Miranda’s lower lip quivered for a moment before she bit down on it fiercely. Her chin went up defiantly.

“I prefer Miranda.”

Danny let his lips quirk into a faint smile.

“Miranda. I had some questions for you.”

She let one of her eyebrows arch sardonically.

“Had?”

“The generational curse that I can see has been placed on you has answered a lot of the questions I had.”

The sigils looked like they had been there for a long time.

Years.

They glowed sullenly with the same malice that he had felt coming from the gem that Lady Gotham had given them.

Miranda brought the gun up and pointed it at his chest, her face had whitened as Danny spoke.

“No! No, I fixed it. He’s gone! He can’t hurt my baby. Not anymore.”

Danny caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye and turned subtly towards it. Someone was peeking out from behind a curtain and Danny figured it was only a matter of time before a shaky cellphone video started making the rounds if they didn’t get out of the parking lot. It might already be too late honestly.

Curiosity killed more than cats.

Getting a terrified young woman to go back into an enclosed space with a bunch of strangers was probably asking for a lot as well. Hood thankfully was able to break the stand off this time. He tilted his helmet in a courtly little bow before he broke the growing silence.

“Has Drumm…Avery been helping you? If he has I can’t imagine he hasn’t taken the chance to complain about how much of a bleeding heart I am. We really are just here to help, Miranda. Please, tell us what happened.”

“Red Hood.”

The words were nothing more than a whisper of air. Miranda abruptly dropped the gun with a clanging clatter to the ground before she bent double over her belly. She wrapped both arms around her stomach as much as she could as she started sobbing.

Danny gently chivvied her back towards the door.

He made sure to keep several feet between them and trailed after her feeling helpless to stop her tears. He gingerly scooped up the gun to bring it in with them.

Danny felt his stomach roil with nausea as he tried to reconcile what he could see in front of him with what had happened over the last couple of days.

There was a picture coming together in his mind's eye.

A generational spell that entwined father and child in such a way as to make them inseparable.

A nasty sort of immortality that relied on the eradication of the next generation.

If Miranda had tried to consume Colter’s spirit to keep it from eating the baby’s growing soul; the job was only half done .

Just Before Now:

The circle was rough.

More of an oval than a true circle and the spray paint sat in haphazard droplets over the rough shag of the ancient carpet.

They’d started with red, it had felt appropriate. When that had run out Mehr had scurried out to his jalopy and brought in a bright orange that would have been more appropriate for a construction site.

Miranda had ignored Danny’s protests about her staying in the same room.

“If the circle isn’t going to keep me safe then I’d rather see him coming.”

She held up the little revolver she had been given back.

“The bullets have markings on them that will at least help slow him down if things go south.”

Danny had bickered a little bit with Miranda when he started to create sigils for his own personal circle.

“Those don’t look like the symbols that Avery found.”

Danny let himself float overtop of the still wet paint as he continued to spray in quick restrained little bursts.

“Yeah. I bet they don’t. I’m no historian but I think the ones Colter used were Old Norse. Perfectly serviceable for someone that wants to blunt force a ritual and doesn’t care about the side effects it may cause for the people caught up in it.”

Miranda had taken a heavy seat in the small recliner that the room had to offer and was watching everything with dull eyes encircled by bruised skin that spoke of a long history of sleepless nights. Her lips thinned and her eyes narrowed.

“Yes. That does sound like him. He always was a bit of a blunt object. Grandiose plans of immortality aside.”

When Danny had finished putting together the ritual he tossed the gem into the center of it and then floated a little hesitantly towards Miranda.

“Did you put Colter, his soul I mean, in a piece of jewelry? I need to pull as much of his spirit back out into this realm as possible. The more we’ve got the better.”

“Better for what.”

Danny’s grin was toothy.

“Why the better to eat him with.”

“You’ve contained his soul but if anything happens to the object you put him in he would be free to complete the ritual and take over your child’s body and mind.”

“My son.”

Miranda said, bleakly hand stroking at her belly.

“ Fred was so excited when I told him. A boy to ‘pass on the family name.’ he said. He’d always been disappointed in Avery. Barely talked about him at all. I only vaguely knew he existed before I found the books that Fred had. I don’t understand a lot of this magic crap. Just enough to make myself a problem I guess.”

She hesitated for a long moment before she slipped her wedding ring off of her hand and passed it to Danny.

Danny smiled at her, taking the ring delicately from her grasp before he dropped it next to the gemstone.

“Again. Not an expert but I think his soul looks to be a couple of hundred years old. So he’s done this shit for a couple of generations. I’m not sure why he waited this long though.”

Danny took a fang to his pointer finger and let a bit of green ectoplasm well up on the tip before he dropped it on to the circle he had made. Mehr crouched next to the chair and looked out across the ritual surface with narrowed eyes.

“Yeah. Drummond didn’t really like talking about it but I got a little bit of the story from him. Colter had his reasons for not choosing Avery. Not my business to talk about it but I think I know why. Regardless, we had a lot of long nights. Long nights working with this boy genius on his master plans.” He tilted a head towards Hood who was looking out into the parking lot through a thin gap in the curtains.

“Boy?”

Miranda’s voice was quiet but she looked askance at the muscular build of the masked vigilante in front of her.

“Oh yeah.”

Mehr chuckled. Danny thought he was trying, and succeeding, at cutting some of the tension.

“Took me a bit to figure it out. But Avery’s right. He’s a fucking bleeding heart with too much combat training and not enough therapy.”

Hood flipped the room at large off but didn’t bother to try and defend himself.

Danny thought his shoulders might be curled in just a little bit with chagrin though so he floated over to the other man and playfully butted his head up against the hard material of his helmet.

“Therapy’s for the birds.”

He said cheerfully.

“0/10 don’t recommend. Ignore being sad. Punch what pisses you off. And if it keeps coming for you, shoot it in the face. People can’t hurt your feelings if they’re souls have been moved to a different realm.”

“You mean if you kill them.”

“I mean 6 of one half dozen of the other. Death works in some cases but I knew a guy with a sword that could send people to nightmare dimensions for pissing him off. Boom. Problem solved.”

Hood slid a hesitant hand across Danny’s face pushing some of the wild white hair out of his eyes and tugging on it gently.

“You might be even more fucked up than I am baby boy.”

Danny grinned and leaned into the fond touch. “Sweet talker.”

Now:

Danny let out his breath with a deep sigh and let himself relax back into the ghostly twenty-something form that he was getting used to being.

He burped a little bit with his hand coming up to cover his mouth in a loose fist.

“‘Scuse me. Not the tastiest but a little heartburn isn’t going to be the thing that finishes me off. Now. Miranda.”

He leaned down and after a moment of hesitation scooped her up so that he could put her on the bed.

“I haven’t got the first idea how to help you...”

Miranda stiffened up into another contraction and she let out a low animal moan of pain.

“Yeah. With that. Those contractions don’t look to be too far apart. How do you feel about hospitals.”

Once she was able to relax her face out of the rictus of pain Miranda rolled her eyes at him.

“Get me somewhere with pain meds and an epidural or I promise I will cry all over you.”

Hood, who had gently tilted Mehr so that the older man was braced up against the wall muttered under his breath.

“Don’t threaten me.”

Before he tapped at something on his helmet. Getting in contact with emergency services it sounded like.

An ambulance ride for two.

Danny gently eased himself onto the edge of the bed. He reached out hesitantly to give Miranda a hand to hold on to.

“So did you have a name picked out?”

“Not…”

Miranda grimaced.

“Not really. I wasn’t expecting to get this far. And it might not matter anyways. If I get arrested for murder they’ll probably take him away from me.”

Mehr’s voice was raspy and a little wild but coherent.

“I mean I can probably get something figured out for you guys here. You won’t be a Colter or Slough but I’m sure we’ve got some room in our organization.”

He tilted his head and looked up at Hood through his lashes mockingly.

“Wouldn’t you say, Boss?”

Hood tilted his helmeted head backwards and let it hit the wall behind him with a thud.

“I’m going to regret all four of you. I can already tell.”

Mehr’s smile was a little crooked and mean.

“Five. You’re forgetting Drummond.”

“Goddammit.” Hood sighed.

“Five of you. Lucky. Lucky. Me.”

fin

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