#yeemu

He waves the light around, pointing out a tree with a broken branch that totally had to be a mothman. “Cryptid hunting. What are you doing here? Wait, fuck. How do I know you’re not just stealing my scoop?”

It literally should not be physically possible for a blink to hold so much sarcasm, but Robert feels like 10 teenagers just backsassed him at the blink Damien just made. How dare. What a rude. He’s gonna make a garlic lei for him.

“Because I don’t care about your monster stories.” Damien flips his very pretty soft looking hair over his shoulder. “I’m walking here because it’s usually quiet.”

Robert is about to snap at him for destroying crucial evidence of a baby mothman (who predicts small tragedies, like when all of his boxers were dyed orange) when something... Moves.

Damien just turns to look, and as much as he wants to hate the guy, Robert can’t let him fucking die. So he grabs what’s nearest: cape. “Damien, we have to run!” The cape snaps off at the shoulders.

“I raised a child, do you think I have capes that can choke me? And why would I run? I’m texting Lucien.” He holds a hand out and Robert deposits the cape in it with a little embarrassment, then remembers their imminent death.

He waves the flashlight around. “Damien! We have to run!” The rustling gets louder as Damien blatantly ignores him to choose emojis.

Louder. Louder. Closer to them. A huffing, snuffling noise, claws on leaf-litter, panting, animal mouth. Close enough to smell them. Death is so close.

(Robert adjusts his jeans)

Betsy tumbles out of a bush about a foot from Damien’s spot, and doesn’t even seem to startle him. “Oh, aren’t you adorable.” He crouches down to pet Betsy, who rolls over agreeably, and Robert tries not to have a heart attack against the tree his maybe-mothman is in.

While Damien is making friends with his dog, Robert goes back to scanning. He’ll keep a civilian alive he guesses, if only because Damien is the only one he knows who can program his damn phone. He’s about to check in on Val, actually, when the bushes rustle again. Louder than they had with Betsy.