beware, for i am free

"Scam" you mean people are fighting back against housing discrimination??? I don't think these people know what the word scam means

Scams are designed to trick someone into giving up money based on lies. This is just.. asking for information then legally enforcing the law??

Years spent between murders where they realize that the world is a little better when it’s not spent quite so alone, for all that alone didn’t factor before. Now it does, for all the problems it reveals. And that’s okay, because the world is fun and a challenge and annoying because they have to hide aspects of themselves that they know they shouldn’t have to (love, it’s love, for all they never say the words, never think them specifically.)

But then Alastor dies as per usual, as he does in a hundred different universes, and Vincent spends the rest of his time trying to summon Alastor as a demon bc Alastor mentioned Hell ONCE and that he believed it (had contacted it), so that means Vincent must, too, now that Alastor is gone.

One Table to Rule Them All…

Once a mama’s boy…

Sees Alastor as a human, doesn’t put together the pieces until later in life. Sees his deal with Rosie. Realizes the human and his deal are the same person as the deer demon he’s been seeing. Sees the plan that could work—strongest Sinner in Hell, hm? He can plan for that. He can do that. As a human, he sees these things out of order, but it all rearranges itself in order as a demon, where the details solidify.

Then he meets Alastor exactly as he saw. Realizes the little things match up; he’d seen a lot more than he’d thought as a human—probably dreamed them but couldn’t remember. It’s a strange mix of deja vu and second guessing himself.

But, oh, the feelings. It takes him awhile to sort through how he feels about Alastor, because these feelings are way too personal. They’re way too strong as a demon.

He wonders privately: is he seeing these things, or has he lived them?

This is a Vox and an Alastor that is closer, because Vox doesn’t push his touchiness so much. He’s aware of not pushing. He pokes just right, fumbles a little when he has to give (he obviously doesn’t want to but he respects Alastor, seeing everything, but to Alastor it looks like he’s restraining himself), and it gets Alastor going. It annoys him how well Vincent can read him—is he suspicious, because Vincent seems to mesh so well with him. But Alastor relents, because how can he not? Vincent cares—about him, about how he is and his past and in the little things. It’s almost too much, when he thinks about it alone in his home, away from Vincent. But then he meets up with him at the bar, and it’s like, “He’s not asking for anything from me. All he’s asking for IS me, how I am.” And he hopes, and fears, and bristles with it all.

And then Vincent has a choice. Does he tell Alastor? Does he say, “In a hundred universes, I have met you. I have walked beside you, I have stood against you, I have beaten and been beaten down by you. My skin has been bloodied by your claws and your knives and your teeth. My throat has been torn, my voice and agency destroyed, by you. I have been built with your hand in mine, rebuilt with your signal in my ears, your voice on my tongue. I have been encouraged to live anew, in a world where you have used me and cared, in world where you did not care, in a world where you cared and never used me.” Does he say, “Alastor, I have loved and hated you. I have been your friend, your lover, your brother in arms, your enemy and rival, your binary star in so many universes that in so few have I been me, myself, and I alone. Alastor, I know of your chain. I know of your arrogance and your hope and your fear and, yes, your foolish deal.” Does he plead, “I want to help you; let me help you. I will become The Strongest Sinner in Hell as long as you keep looking at me. As long as you love me—family, friendship, lover, soulmate, and all the things in between.”

Or does he take a step back. Does he propose a path well established—does he let his heart be broken by cruel words and misunderstanding, even expected, knowing that in many worlds, it is broken irrevocably, with no reconciliation? Is he strong enough for that possibility? Does he propose a business partnership, when what he really wants is so much more? He has had a hundred lifetimes to know how the future is, how society builds. He is no longer afraid, ashamed, of love and want and attraction or lack thereof—only in how it can be rejected. How can he, when he has seen lives spent curled with Valentino, with Alastor? When he can remember kisses and held hands and soul bonds and how fear hadn’t let that build.

He is selfish, he knows it. In every universe he has grabbed things greedily, but in those others, he hasn’t Seen like this. The way it can lead into regret. He has choices but he is frozen by them.

don't feed them after midnight / maybe the real circus were the friends we made along the way....