❥ immortal

Dean watches with satisfaction over the edge as he sees the figure being caught in his henchmen’s grasps. Crossing his arms before jumping down from the roof from each balcony. He’s not going to worry about being a shadow to whoever resided in each balcony. After all, it was dark enough to hide shadows.

Cerberus didn’t like it when people were up in his business. The only business he’s allowing people to be nosing into was glamour if they made it for him or helped him distribute it. His gang and his meetings were solely confidential. And for someone to spy or watch, it was disrespectful to easvdrop. 

Surely, Dean isn’t one easily to give mercy. He won’t give mercy to the kid. So when he finally lands on the ground on his feet. Stepping over towards his henchmen as they exclaimed, praising their boss and master for keeping an eye out. He smirks at them, glances at Pan who was noticeably laughing.

“You think this is funny kid?” In a gruff, low voice, Dean crosses his arms before snapping his fingers. His henchmen stepped closer with Pan in their grasps. Dean furrows his eye before giving Pan a punch to the face. Right to the cheek where he perfectly aimed. Would it give a bloody scar? Possibly as Dean was wearing some rings. 

“Now, pipsqueak.” He leans forward, eyes glowing a bright color before grabbing the younger’s chin so they can make eye contact.

Dean glowers, “Why are you spying on me? Because no one. And I mean no one, gets their nose in my business without my permission. A kid like you…this ain’t a playground. This is a bloodbath waiting to happen to you.”

The man approaches, all the assured arrogance of a leader, a stance that would be mirrored in Peter’s own attitude if he weren’t being held down by meaty henchmen and their sturdy need to obey their chief. Some of them are still staring at him in disbelief and confusion, as if they still can’t believe they’re holding a boy in their arms who had been, apparently, tailing them for who knows how long.

“You think this is funny kid?”

Peter’s grin doesn’t falter even as the gap between him and his captor shrinks ominously.

“A little-”

His next precocious chuckle is silenced abruptly by the impact of a fist against the sharp jut of Peter’s cheekbone. The edges of his teeth tear at the soft skin on the inside of his cheek, filling his mouth with the taste of iron to match the warm trickle running down the side of his face, from the gash left behind by an expensive ring. He doesn’t notice the pain until a few moments later, when the shock and surprise recedes and the sharp ache of bruised bone sets in. The grips on his arms have tightened in response to his instinctive stumbling, holding him even firmer in place.

“Oh, it’s me.” God grant him mercy– Just the sight of Peter send Yoongi’s blood boiling. It was a special trick he had come to know of the boy, whether it was intentional (he suspects that is it) or not, the young boy always managed to push Yoongi to his limit. 

Hands clenching at his sides, Yoongi kept up his passive expression as best that he could. This visit was truly going to test his patience tonight. 

“It’s nice to see you too, heathen.” A real pleasure. “If it is not too much trouble, I would like to come in. We have some matters to speak of.” 

In the recent weeks, the small little parcels that Peter usually dropped off for Yoongi, small, unmarked boxes filled with glamour (even though he was well above the means to legally buy it) or illegal sorts of drugs alike. 

Said boxes have been getting steadily lighter and lighter each week– his goods going missing without an explanation. 

Well– Yoongi had one. The little rat standing before him, oh so casually comfortable and unabashedly rude. 

Who else could it be? 

“Business matter– very important… business matters.” Yoongi’s tone left no room for argument. 

(He would get one from Peter anyways– he always did.) @twpan​

He stared down at the false prophet, sniffling once, his expression undeniably bored. One hand released a corner of the blanket around his shoulder, letting it hang like a makeshift cape as he reached up to scratch an imaginary itch on the crown of his head.

“What’s a heathen?” he asked with mild disinterest, but only after a few beats after Yoongi appeared to be done talking, as if he was considering shutting the door in the man’s face and giving him not further thought.

“Anyway, you can’t come in,” he continued, not giving the other a chance to answer the question, in spite of his genuine curiosity, “the boys are sleeping.”

That much was true, mostly. Though a few of the lost boys were stirring toward alertness in the apartment behind him, thanks to the disruption, most of them were still sound asleep, used to tuning out the sounds of forests and streams as they slept through bright mornings to gather energy for endless sunny days. It was different here, now that they were in the city, but the fact that most of them could sleep through almost anything had not changed.

“Business matters are for old people.” Which Peter was not. 

Dean normally would conceal his tracks very often whenever he and the gang met up in certain places. Usually, most of the gang meetings were conducted in the warehouse, but Dean spontaneously would change it up. One night, it’d be in their designated warehouse where most of the glamour was produced, distributed, and accounted for. The next, it’d be an alleyway. Or the next, it’d be at a secluded gated area where only the fence can be climbed to enter. Either way, Dean usually was careful.

One of his goons however, started to notice frequent shadows following them. Surely, his fellow henchmen brushed him off, thinking he was insane, but Dean listened. Hoping it was just his imagination, because yes, some people are still paranoid about the dark. Cerberus kept an eye out, but surely the shadows were clever. A bit of frustration at times because he doesn’t want his henchmen to worry about threats to their gang.

There would be no reason for someone to follow them right? Dean has always wondered because he maintains a reputation among the gangs of Fabletown. His gang are either labelled as vigilantes or perhaps, mysterious.

 They don’t do any of the stereotypical violence, unless it was necessary. But perhaps, if the shadows that keep distracting his goon are one of the spies trying to take advantage of their spontaneous meetings….Then maybe Dean shouldn’t have to show mercy once he cuts to the chase.

It’s when he manages to sniff around the area before doing their meetings gave much more clues. Usually, scents were easy to pick up unless one has intentions to conceal it with perfume or musk/cologne. The same scent kept returning. Tonight, they’re in the alleyway, where there’s open space to roam and run. And again, Dean is able to smell the same scent again that’s been following them. Cutting the meeting short, he whispers for his goons to gather in a tight circle. Disappearing into the shadows before following the scent. 

It wasn’t long with his resources of using a grappling hook that he manages to sneak up from behind the figure perched at the edge. He slowly makes light of his footsteps, eyes glowing red before, reaching out with a hand. However, Cerberus halts before extending his leg, with a hard kick to the figure’s back. A group of his henchman, just seemingly waiting for him.

It’s his arrogance that gets the best of him, the fact that he’s used to being the hunter and not the hunted, the fact that when he is the hunted, he is often more wily and clever than his lumbering predators. He thinks he hears the scuff of a shoe or a change in the wind, but by the time he deciphers either as an omen of his imminent fate, something hard and strong slams against his back and sends him toppling forward off of the rooftop.

It’s a short building and a shorter fall, though it’s a plummet that would terrify any normal person. It would undoubtedly break bones and skin alike if it were anyone else, but he hasn’t been afraid of falling since he learned how to fly. Only, he forgets, for a moment, too distracted by the sight of the group of strangers waiting below to catch him, as if this whole thing has been planned. 

He nears their waiting forms, attempts to fly just out of their grasp at the last moment, but feels hands curl around his ankle, tugging him down with unexpected strength. He tries to kick it off with his free foot, but fingers wrap around that one as well, and soon they’ve got him grounded, hands clutching his arms to keep him there until their leader returns.

He struggles fruitlessly for a few moments before something strikes him as funny. He stills, starting to chuckle, because the last time a group of men had him in their wrinkled grasp, he’d not only gotten free, but had succeeded in feeding their leader to a waiting crocodile the size of a small country. If Hook is behind this, it means Peter is only that much closer to finding him and killing him all over again. 

If not, well, it’ll certainly make for a fun game of cat and mouse.

like most mindless but kind souls, the boy reaches to help her and it is enough gesture for chaeyeon’s lips to stretch out in a thankful smile. she is ready to stand on her tiptoes to get back her work, but she should have known this one is unlikely a kind soul – but how would she know? they all looked so much like mundanes nowadays, it’s hard to tell – and the raven haired finds herself frowning slightly at the boy’s manners.

was he not able to read? the boy looked not much older than her own mundane physique did, which meant he should be old enough to be one more of the firey high school kids, yet by the look on his face his lack of knowledge was, indeed, sincere. “it’s…a story,” chaeyeon explains with equal curiosity, but towards this young boy. had she seen him before? the copper in his locks remind her faintly of another’s, and it wouldn’t be an absurd thing, this being her usual route.

the embarrassment of sharing her words suddenly disappear to give place to a child-like curiosity and a lady-like cordiality, shown as chaeyeon flips through her own pages before looking up at the male again. “the one you have is the introduction about the main character’s mannerisms, giving the reader a bit to think about his life and his own thoughts. he’s a pirate, you see.” the femme explains, the smile that doesn’t quite reach her lips easily reaching her honey colored eyes. 

“it’s just chapter one, though.” the disappointment in herself is faint in her tone, and chaeyeon puckers out her lips out of habit as she glances at the male’s greasy hand so close to her hard work’s only physical copy. “could you…give it to me? please?”

“a story?” he perks up, dropping his next handful of popcorn back in its paper container. then he slouches a little again, deliberately, as if to negate the fact that he was even remotely excited just a moment before. he feigns nonchalance, or at least attempts to, curling the hand holding the page around one of the bars of the fire escape guardrail and inadvertently crumpling the paper in the process. 

“i like stories.”

the scene feels vaguely familiar, and it’s a happy miracle that he doesn’t try and decipher why that is. if he did, he’d come out with memories of a girl in a nursery with a dog and two brothers, reenacting stories of pirates and sword-fights, sewing his shadow back onto his foot, giving him a thimble-

“you said the main character has manners,” he points out with a confused scowl, forsaking his already-forgotten snacks and getting to his feet. he hops over the railing with ease, scaling two stories in a matter of seconds and floating down the last few inches to the ground in front of her, as if they aren’t standing on the side of a crowded mundy road. while his meal, for lack of a better word, sits forgotten on the fire escape, the runaway page stays tucked between dirty fingernails and curious finger tips. he closes in on her, with very little semblance of personal space between them, as if urging her to continue with his physical presence alone. “pirates don’t have manners.”

he puffs up his chest proudly, starting to smile confidently, “and neither do i.”

it’s only the first chapter, she says, and that makes him frown. what good is a story if there are no gallant battles or grisly endings?

there is no attention paid to wandering eyes as he walks dripping through the club.

theirs is not a club that would initially find this strange anyway; he’s used to eyes staring at his usually shirtless form and so it does not bother hyungwon as he stalks over in just a towel.  there’s a clear set of his jaw and a fury in his eyes that would rival the anger in ocean waves, and there is no doubt that he is the fury of the seas himself.  if a mermaid can be blamed for ocean’s tragedy, then hyungwon has no problem causing one here tonight.

and maybe it is a good idea that he’s getting himself involved.  peter does not look like peter among the girls who brush their fingers along his arm, and even hyungwon can see it plain through narrowed eyes.  that’s the problem with mundies sometimes, they clearly can’t read a mood.  but just the fact that they’re picking on The peter pan makes him almost bemused, but more so - worried.  there’s a reason why he likes it when peter comes to the club in the off hours of the day.

this isn’t the kind of club for the picture of feral youth.

his eyes catch peter’s hand moving towards his pocket before the girls do, but more so - grits his teeth at the way they tease him, touch him, try to make him theirs.  it almost makes him sick, and so his steps begin to slow as he approaches but the expression on his face, still stormy, is just as violent as before.  peter pan is a boy and not a man, and he’s almost tempted to allow the dagger he knows lies deep in that pocket to slice them up, to gut them, to mar their pretty faces -

but that would be bad for business.

a low sigh escapes through gritted teeth, and hyungwon begins again his stalked approach.  he’s only a few feet from them now and when he finally manages to reach the small group, he tugs on peter’s hand, wedges himself between the clutches of the three only to maneuver peter out of sight behind him.  he doesn’t really give a shit about the looks of disdain in their eyes or the curling of their lips.  ( if he was back in neverland - no, if no one was around, he’d bash their heads against the bartop. )  “ sorry.  he was supposed to be meeting me.” he hums at them, crooning words that he knows will pacify and hypnotize.

he keeps peter behind him with a grip tight around his wrist, not because he’s afraid of the attack but more out of a form of protective ( possessive ) endearment.  “ it’s late.  you three should be heading home, shouldn’t you?” he raises a brow, the croon in his voice turning heads and drawing interest to him but still - hyungwon doesn’t care.  he just wants them gone before he himself destroys them all where they stand.  “ besides, i’ve got some business with him.  you’d be much happier in your beds.”

they gather their things without a word, the looks of disdain slowly disappearing and instead being replaced by chatting like nothing even happened, like nothing was amiss.  he turns his head with narrowed eyes to look at peter behind him, to hope that the croon of his tone didn’t affect him like the others. “ let’s go, peter.”  

and still, he doesn’t let go of peter’s wrist.

he’s already pulling the blade out of his pocket when hyungwon finally approaches, and his grip on it doesn’t dissipate, even then. normally he’d resent anyone standing in front of him, protecting him, because the very thought of him needing protection from anyone or anything is absurd. but these strange mundy creatures make him feel strange and unusual, feel something he doesn’t know the name of, and that is more frightening than anything he’s faced since a fairy pulled him away from a snow-induced death so many years ago.

hyungwon sings at the women, and peter’s own nerves start to level out at the sound: the grip on his knife grows lax, his heart rate begins to slow, the color in his cheeks begins to even out. he’s determined to stay poised to attack, even if the lilt in the merman’s voice works to convince all nearby lifeforms to do the opposite.

the women turn to leave, without sparing peter a second glance, as if nothing had happened, as if he’d never stepped foot in the club in the first place. hyungwon curls fingers around his wrist and tugs, and peter tenses up instinctively, only to realize the hand around him is a familiar one. he doesn’t relax entirely, but he doesn’t pull away either. if there was a slight glaze over his eyes from the merman’s music, it’s gone now, replaced by the normal bright red-brown of peter’s eyes, the one that houses curiosity and boldness and youth and, as of right now, glaring alertness. his pupils are still blown from the adrenaline of being accosted, and it makes the flashing lights in the room feel too bright and too much all at once.

1000 Picspams Challenge | #74 - Neverland

@twpan ,           tell me about the dream where we pull the bodies from the lake

his nails dig deep into his skin, but he can’t feel it.

metal on his tongue and fire in his heart, hyungwon could boil the water he finds himself swimming in if he’d had all the magic of the sea witch in her depths but as it is, he’s only a mermaid; as it is, he can only watch.  the scowl on his lips looks almost like it’s been written in stone, and he supposes when it comes to peter - especially lately - it might have been.  ( hyungwon may feel drugs running through his system on a good night, but peter is an addiction he hasn’t been able to rid himself of since neverland. ) his mood always tips scales when it comes to peter pan, and there is no in between.  there are only extremes.

for now, hyungwon watches and bides his time even though he should know better than this, thinks he knows better than this.  peter pan has always found a fascination in all the things that he was not, so the vicious metal he’s about to spit from his mouth is only but a pointless feeling and nothing more.  he watches their curves and their lines and the shape of their mouths when they talk to him, when they flank him, when they steer him out of the path of his pool.

had peter not promised to see him today?

venom runs through his veins instead of the blood that should be spilling from the way he’s digging his nails further into his skin.  hyungwon wonders why he bothers when peter doesn’t put up much of a fight but only comes to the realization in his head that he’s probably used to this behaviour.  it hasn’t changed since neverland, when his sisters would tear his attention away and he’d forget about the boy sitting on the rock.

“ typical peter.” he mutters under his breath, and hyungwon’s about to dive back into his pool to lay on the bottom and forget.  nevermore will he get his hopes up for peter pan. ( he can’t count the number of times he’s thought that very same thought in his head. )

his head is about to breach the depths when he sees it, though.  something isn’t quite right and hyungwon can’t quite put his finger on it, so he pauses for a moment and goes deathly still.  it’s in the way that peter carries himself stiff when hyungwon has never seen him as anything but loose limbed and uncaring because that’s more typical peter pan.

five minutes.

ten minutes.

he’s still sitting deathly still in the water and peter is still sitting just as uncomfortably as before.  hyungwon fights with himself internally; a battle not to care about it because peter has never once cared about him, versus everything that pulls him to his side.  it’s clear which one wins when hyungwon finally pulls himself from the depths of the pool, all dripping wet and grabbing for the towel that sits folded by its side.  within its folds and wrapped up tight is the very glamour that he dislikes to use, but still he lets the magic swath his body and give him legs for the time being.

wrapping the towel around his waist, he stalks through the club and parts seas with the dark look in his eye and the drops of water that fall from his skin to the floor.

all hyungwon knows is that if peter blows him off after putting on legs to get involved, he’s going to fucking drown him.

he doesn’t like the club all that much. he doesn’t like the way the burly men at the entrance eye him suspiciously through wrinkles and sweat and only let him in because hyungwon told them to. he doesn’t like the way the place smells of the sticky medicine the patrons toss back glass after glass or the steady pulsing thrum of the music that shakes the building like cannon fire. 

normally he makes a point of coming before business hours, but he’d got caught up napping on a rooftop after leaving mundy police officers in his dust. they kept telling him stealing was ‘illegal’ and he kept telling them he didn’t even know how to spell illegal. and he’d promised the merman that he’d pay him a visit today. and though peter’s enemies would fight the very thought with their lives, his friends would assure that peter pan was a boy of his word.

he has the pool in sight, starts his tricky weaving beeline through shifting bodies, mundy and fable alike, only to be stopped in his tracks by a trio of young mundy women with hands that cling to his clothes like brambles and wet seaweed.

they coo at him, tell him he hardly looks old enough to be in a place like this, giggle when his nervous, charming laughter melts away, when cheeks flush and his face goes hard. their perfumes suffocate him like a cloud, their nails are sharp and painted, like their faces, and all he is aware of is hands in his hair, hands on his arms, hands on his back. we’ll take care of you, one says. another asks him what he’s drinking, offers him the sticky sweet medicine swirling red and bright in her glass. the third drags a hand down his forearm, starts to tangle fingers with his, and he snatches his hand away. they only laugh, pressing in further, surrounding him like sharks in open water. 

something wells up inside of him that he isn’t familiar with, something too hot and too much; it’s strange and uncomfortable and he doesn’t like it.

he knows what he’d do if he was in neverland and surrounded by deadly creatures with not a friend in sight.

his hand hovers toward the familiar handle of his blade, resting in his pocket, even as hands continue to muss his hair and touch his cheek and tug at the fabric of his shirt. his heart pounds in his ears, almost as loud as the music, and he’s already counting down the moments until he can catch his captors unaware, until he can cut them down and break free from their clutches.

she was never a writer. no, beauty was a reader – books and people the same, how one would take over her interest a little more depending on the day. but she remembers it clearly how one of her older brothers would dabble in poetic endeavors, describing the ordinary with hints of fantasy and touches of (ironically) fairy tales. a lot of headache he had caused to others, but none to himself, clearly. jean baptiste enjoyed seeing the confusion in the ignorant’s eyes as much as he enjoyed the look on his youngest sister’s face whenever she was given a fresh story who would never come to see the light of day due to financial matters and primary duties.

perhaps, she wonders the talent with words could be a family heritage. with the number of books read over her centuries, it should be more than enough for inspiration to strike. that important muse, however, decided to come out to play only a few times per decade so it is with excitement she bursts it all on paper–not much, not nearly enough for a novel, but it was enough for her, and there’s a spring on her step – metaphorically, since she had her feet on her pedals – when she makes her way back to the woodland apartments.

the icy wind gets in between what could be a delightful stroll, and the ribbon holding the small book together comes undone, releasing a few pages filled with hard work and flourishes. “oh, no,” she mumbles, climbing off the bike and carefully putting it aside before she could start picking on the missing papers. one, two, three, four, she counts, furrowing her eyebrows when one still remains with its whereabouts unknown.

“hey! you dropped something.”

the male voice is nothing but almost guttural noises, but chaeyeon looks up nevertheless, to face a boy with copper locks and childish eyes – with the page three of her chapter one moderately close to fire escape and his lanky body.

“could you give it to me?” she questions, making her voice loud enough he’d be able to hear her, amber flicking through her eyes as she points them to the precariously stable paper.

he watches with vague interest as she runs after scattered papers, sips at the cream soda he often stole from supermarkets in packs of six, smacks his lips as the overwhelming salty and sweet of mundy foods linger pleasantly on his tongue. he swats a curious fly away, still swinging his legs to the rhythm of the evening, eyes her bicycle curiously, wonders if it was as expensive as it looks.

she asks of him a favor, and his gaze flits to the precarious page, the wind having carried it onto a branch just within his reach and threatening to blow it away just as quickly. he gauges her worth, considers what she might give him in return for helping her and if it’s worth even interacting with a silly girl in the first place. the mundies continue on their back and forth paths down the sidewalk, staring at screens, ducking their heads from the cold, seemingly unaware of the unearthly exchange going on all around them.

his eyes linger on her curiously as he sets down his drink, deliberately slow, as if challenging her to complain about it, before reaches out to pluck the page from its leafy perch. but he doesn’t return it to her, not right away. instead he brings it close to his face, squinting at feminine handwriting and attempting to decipher what few words he actually knows off the top of his head.

with @twpan

jiyeon doesn’t know how this became routine but it somehow did and she is extremely grateful. peter has a smile that can make her feel better about herself and her fall from grace doesn’t seem so bad after all. and on the worse days, he makes her feel that tomorrow is going to be better. 

“peter, get off the windowsill.”

his apprehension of the fairer sex hasn’t seemed to apply to jiyeon since he discovered who she really was beneath winged eyeliner and magicked legs. his curiosity always carries him back to her window, as it once did to the mermaid-filled lagoon of his homeland, all whispers of a father’s foreboding presence white noise to the boy who’s never been afraid of much of anything.

he does as she says, with the sort of lazy, casual air that would make anyone think he made the decision himself, swinging a leg over the sill until both are inside her apartment, catching a thin layer of dust on the back of his trousers. he moves about the window with a grace that boasts an almost deliberate hint of clumsiness, as if to make his companions worry that he might fall through the frame at any moment, even though they know he never will.