Post by Bene Elohim on Feb 8, 2024 13:20:17 GMT -8
~[Reader discretion]~
~[This series contains mature content and situations which may make some feel uncomfortable.]~
~[Read at your own risk]~
Ashley Kenyon’s home in New Orleans, Louisiana was about what you’d expect for somebody who had money but didn’t want to flaunt it. Two stories, yet somehow managing to look almost retiring from the curb, the house had spent the better part of the last year without its owner occupying it. The last few weeks, however, had seen a sudden flurry activity following the rescue of Ashley’s girlfriend, Maiko Adachi. Ashley had asked her friend, business manager and part-time co-worker, Nikki Peltier, to try and help in the search and Nikki had eventually managed to find Maiko electronically. This had led Ashley to go to the location in search of Maiko, though Nikki, their brothers, Khary Kenyon and Caliban Peltier, and Ashley’s best friend and tag team partner, Aerynn Maguire, had refused to allow Ashley to go alone.
Now, ten days after returning with Maiko in tow, and a day after taking a trip to Sacramento for Ashley’s wrestling match, Ashley and Nikki stand in the kitchen of Ashley’s home, staring at each other, Ashley leaning against her counter while Nikki stands a few feet away in front of the refrigerator.
Ashley Kenyon: “Bethy make the trip back ok?”
Nikki nods tentatively. She knew how volatile the situation could get here.
Nikki Peltier: “Yeah, she’s gonna be fine. Little annoyed maybe but you know Mama Bethy…”
Ashley nods, grimacing slightly at the nickname for her older sister.
Ashley Kenyon: “She should be fucking pissed off right about now! Those two giant brick shithouses have made a habit lately of trying to pound her into a puddle of country gravy and she don’t seem to mind if they use her to baste everybody else!”
Nikki nods, raising her hands up to try and calm her friend.
Nikki Peltier: “You know that’s not Bethy’s style. Even if she is angry, she doesn’t show it out the way you do.”
Ashley nods pointedly, knowingly.
Ashley Kenyon: “Always made it funny that she’s the one who likes to blow things up, don’t it? I’m the one everybody always says is the explosive one with a serious impulse control problem and yet she’s the one who…”
Trailing off, Ashley pauses and then nods in acknowledgement.
Ashley Kenyon: “I spose that’s actually a good thing, ain’t it? If she wasn’t as calm as she was, her handling explosives would be a really good god awful idea, wouldn’t it?”
Nikki snickers as she nods her agreement.
Nikki Peltier: “Yeah, but that always made y’all a good team.”
Ashley shakes her head, her right hand raising up to allow her to extend her index finger and point to Nikki.
Ashley Kenyon: “Made us a good team. We could never have worked as well without you calling the shots or Jezzy making them.”
Nikki nods, smiling quite genuinely now.
Nikki Peltier: “This is true…”
The smile fades as she bites her lip, considering her next thought carefully for what seems like years. Finally, she exhales heavily and nods to herself as if steeling against an onslaught only she knows is coming.
Nikki Peltier: “Do the outbursts happen often?”
Ashley stares at her friend for what feels like an even longer time before glancing to the hallway behind them that leads to her master bedroom.
Ashley Kenyon: “You mean the latin and anger? The demon shit?”
Nikki nods and Ashley sighs before nodding in response, her gaze moving back to Nikki from the hallway.
Ashley Kenyon: “Decently often, yeah. That shit broke her, Nik. Whatever they did, whoever they were, they found the perfect grain and split it down the middle like she was a weld job being held together by angel dust and duct tape. The one side is like a puppy that’s been kicked so many times that now it expects it and just hides away and the other half is so out for vengeance it just wants to kill ‘em all and let God sort it out in the afterlife. I’m…”
She bites her bottom lip and looks to the floor.
Ashley Kenyon: “I’m scared, Nik. I don’t know how to reach her. I mean, I’m trying and she seems to like being surrounded by me, Wolfie and Sif and even seems to like knowing Eef’s around and that Khary and the Dragons are watching the house. The Maidens come by a lot too and yet…”
Nikki nods, knowing all too well.
Nikki Peltier: “She always feels like the door is going to open any second now and there will be more…”
Ashley looks up and sees the suddenly vacant expression in Nikki’s eyes.
Ashley Kenyon: “Oh fuck, Nik, I’m sorry!”
Nikki quickly shakes her head and looks to her friend, forcing a smile.
Nikki Peltier: “I’m getting better, but, then again, I know who did this to me and so does everyone else. Does she?”
Ashley nods slowly.
Ashley Kenyon: “Yeah, but she hasn’t said a word about it really.”
Nikki glances back at the hallway and then nods to herself again.
Nikki Peltier: “I should have checked the place for prints before we left.”
Shaking her head, Nikki turns back to face her friend, guilt written all over her face. Seeing this, Ashley shakes her head sternly.
Ashley Kenyon: “Nik, this is not your fault! These guys were somehow both good and shitty as fuck at the same time. If they managed to avoid you, Epsy, Noah, Rivers and whoever else was looking for them and you guys only managed to find them because Maiko managed a post…”
Nikki nods, still looking somewhat guilt-ridden and ashamed.
Nikki Peltier: “Still, I should have been able to do more. If only we knew who we were looking for.”
Going silent, Nikki steals a glance back at the hallway before turning back to face Ashley again.
Nikki Peltier: “You gotta find out who it was…”
Ashley nods slowly.
Ashley Kenyon: “I know, I just don’t wanna push her til it hurts more, ya know?”
Nikki nods understandingly.
Nikki Peltier: “I get it, believe me, I get it, but we need to know and there’s only one person who can tell us…”
Ashley’s head droops forward.
Ashley Kenyon: “Fuck me running… ok…”
Nikki walks over and hugs her friend.
Nikki Peltier: “You can do this, Ash. It’ll be ok, you’ll see.”
Ashley hugs her back.
Ashley Kenyon: “Thanks, Nik, for everything.”
The two separate and Nikki leaves the room. Ashley stares at the hallway and then turns back to the cabinet just above the stove. She reaches up and opens the door, pulling down a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. She opens the bottle and takes a pull. She replaces the cap and then puts the bottle away.
Ashley Kenyon: “Come on, Ash, it’s only her life… what could possibly go wrong…”
She turns, nods to herself and squeezes her right hand into a fist.
Ashley Kenyon: “I am gonna fuck these bastards right in the ass with a rusty barbed wire sawed-off shotgun and pull the fucking trigger!”
Ashley nods to herself again and marches up to the bedroom door. She gently opens the door, steps inside and closes the door again behind her. The bedroom was no longer a bedroom. Not anymore. All that remained in the room was the bed and a single dresser against the furthest wall.
The walls were covered in the darkest most grotesque images in black and gray paint. Shadowy figures with red eyes hiding in the darkness looking down at a girl playing in the flowers. Monsters devouring meat at a beautiful banquet table. It covered every wall and the back of the door.
The bed was a mess, the sheets and bedding ripped to shreds and strewn about. Stains of blood, some dark and old and some fresh and still wet littered the bed. The only thing on them untouched was a single pillow. A pillow on the left side of the bed.
Ashley’s. Untouched by the violence.
The woman herself sat crouched in the corner with her hands over her face. The once raven black and red hair was dyed a ugly blonde. It once hung down to her shoulders but was now cut at odd angles and lengths around her head.
The plaid top was ripped making it a half shirt showing the bare stomach and bad, covered in bandages from the wounds. Blue loose fitting hospital pants and bare feet.
When she heard the door close the face lifted showing the little cuts healing on each side of her face and cheeks. There was no fear in that gaze that locked eyes with Ashley and she let out a bestial shriek and shot up. Her arms parted and palms slapped on the wall on each side of the corner where she had been crouched.
Maiko: “DESPOILER! FLEE!”
Ashley Kenyon: “You’re not gonna make me go get the holy water and hose your ass, are you?”
The woman’s lips curled and she let out a feral snarl then spun around and her hand became a fury of movements. Red paint turning a beautiful scene of a girl playing in a park into a bloodbath.
Maiko: “LEAVE ME!!”
Ashley simply crosses her arms.
Ashley Kenyon: “Or what?”
The woman spun around again and tossed the paint brush behind her as she sprinted across the room. Bare feet padded across the floor at a full sprint and hits Ash at full speed driving her back into the door. An arm raised, fingers curled into claws….but it doesn’t come down.
Even Asmodeus knows….this is Pool.
Her arm begins to shake and tears well in green eyes as she bellows.
Maiko: “LEAVE ME ALONE!!!”
Ashley shakes her head, her gaze never leaving the figure before her, her arms staying folded in place.
Ashley Kenyon: “Not happening.”
The woman’s lips pull back again baring her teeth and she begins to pant through her nose, the raised arm shaking as her subconscious retrains it. It was obvious that half of her mind wanted to do Ashley serious harm, but the other side wasn’t letting it.
Then as quick as it happened it was over. The bestial look faded and the arm slowly lowered. Her head followed, hanging and those bare feet began to pad backwards. Back toward the corner. When she gets there she drops to her knees and picks up the paint brush. Her hand shaking as she begins a new painting on the wall near the floor.
Ashley Kenyon: “Twoey?”
Maiko: “...Sorry…”
Ashley frowns in both sadness and confusion.
Ashley Kenyon: “Sorry?”
Maiko: “...It’s not...here anymore. Hard to...control...Please don’t...punish me….”
The hand holding the brush begins to shake harder at the thought she had done bad.
Ashley walks over to her and kneels next to Maiko, tears welling up in her own eyes.
Ashley Kenyon: “I would never…”
Maiko never looks over but when she heard her the hand stopped shaking so bad and she gives the faintest of little nods. Maiko leans forward and begins to work on the wall. Small strokes with the trembling hand.
Ashley Kenyon: “Twoey… we need to talk…”
Maiko: “...Please....”
The trembling hand suddenly drops the brush and though she never takes her eyes off the wall, as if she felt she had to “stare at the wall” she reaches out and laid that shaking hand on Ashley’s own.
Maiko: “...Don’t leave me....”
Ashley kisses the hand.
Ashley Kenyon: “I love you, I went back to Hell for you. I’m not leaving you now.”
Maiko chanced a glance to the side, only a brief little second before she returned her eyes to the wall.
Maiko: “...talk?...”
Ashley nods slowly.
Ashley Kenyon: “Can you tell me who did this to you?”
Maiko: “...Don’t want to think about it…”
Ashley nods again before hugging Maiko to her.
Ashley Kenyon: “I’m sorry, Twoey…”
Tears start to stream down her face.
Ashley Kenyon: “I’m sorry I let them get to you. I’m sorry I let them keep you long enough to do this and I’m sorry I didn’t destroy them when we found you!”
The arms around her caused her to tense up but it was enough to get three words out in a whisper.
Maiko: “...It was Demons…”
Ashley sits back, looking slightly more confused now.
Ashley Kenyon: “Demons like… from the fields… or.. like… Children?”
Maiko: “...No Abaddon...this time…”
Ashley stares at Maiko for a second, looking long and hard into her eyes.
Ashley Kenyon: “Ab… Joshua…”
Suddenly, her eyes go wide in realization.
Ashley Kenyon: “They were the same as before?”
The hand holding the brush began to shake anew and she slowly nods.
Maiko: “...Demons…”
Ashley can’t believe her ears.
Ashley Kenyon: “They were your own people???”
Maiko: “...Only saw...three...heard more....”
The hand closed around the brush so tight the knuckles begin to turn white and she begins to pant hard through her nose.
Maiko: “....They…..THEY….”
Ashley hugs her again.
Ashley Kenyon: “It’s ok, Twoey… it’s ok… you’re safe… they’re not here…”
Maiko: “...No more…”
Ashley kisses her head.
Ashley Kenyon: “It’s alright, thank you… we don’t have to talk about this anymore… ok?”
Maiko: “....”
Slowly she shifts to the side and rests the side of her head against the black haired woman beside her.
Ashley Kenyon: “I love you, Twoey.”
Ashley leans over and presses her lips into the trembling woman’s head and gets to her feet heading back out to the living room. She knew what she had to do now, she just wasn’t thrilled in the slightest.
Lucifer had to be informed.
This has come from inside.
