Do you believe in the monsters under your bed?

[Reagan Ryang]

But he could know witches! Witches that weren't that guy! Witches that didn't make people so suspicious when they were with Alva that his friends ended up calling him to tell him the details. (Or what they knew, anyway.) Either way, Rae didn't feel good about being lied to, even if he sort of barged onto the bus like a maniac to follow Alva all the way to the damn library.

Which was exactly and precisely what he planned to do. Alva wanted to go see this witch dude? Fine! But he could do it--with his boyfriend!

"I'm going with you," he said, still holding onto Alva, as if he expected him to sneakily grab the stop cord when he wasn't looking. (As if he was looking at anything else anyway.) "And we'll see what's going to happen when you meet him."

[Alva Ren]

"Excuse me?" Alva sat up straighter; he couldn't believe his ears. "You are not trying to police who I can and can't see on my own!"

What was Rae playing at? He was acting like a-a jealous possessive wolf! Like Alva was going to go off his rocker and start making out with some guy out of Rae's line of sight, when he'd been faithful for 5 years?! Rae was holding on to him like he thought Alva would dive out the window and Alva still couldn't believe what he just heard.

He didn't need Rae to "escort" him into the library. He didn't need Rae to protect him from someone who had given every indication of also wanting to protect him--of protecting the entire supernatural community as a whole. And if he wanted to see Susumu alone, that was his right! Whatever Rae's fears were, they were completely unfounded and this whole situation was getting out of hand.

Quick as lightning--because he was still a sneaky fox, after all--Alva called out to the driver. "Excuse me! We're getting off at the next stop!" Rae might have been holding on to him but he couldn't gag Alva! He didn't care that people were watching them like a bad daytime soap opera now. He wasn't bringing Rae around--in this crazy state of mind--to meet Susumu.

[Reagan Ryang]

"What? That's not what I--"

Policing him? When was he even doing that?! He was just saying... What the hell? Alva was being way too fucking cavalier with his life if he thought it was a good idea to go back to some witch who cursed him! Even if he claimed to do it on accident, who was to say it was? What if he did it on purpose? What if he was reeling Alva in? Alva could be blinded by the magic! There could be more than one spell on him! And what if it wasn't even a curse? What if it was a love spell? What if the witch was capturing Alva by lying? At least Rae could see right through that, being unaffected by that bastard! (So far, but he wasn't going to let the witch do anything to him or anything else to Alva, either!)

Gritting his teeth, he briefly tightened his hold on Alva but it wasn't like that changed anything. Alva had already called to the driver and the driver was already nodding, looking back in his mirror at Rae with a tight lipped expression. That guy from earlier, too, was looking at him like he was a piece of shit. Sticking his finger up at the jerk, he felt the anger rising.

The bus came to a halt at the next stop, which was only a stop or two away from the library, if Rae remembered correctly. When the driver came over to help, Rae shooed him away. He could do it on his own, thank you very much. He half expected Alva to make a break for it as soon as they were out on the street.

"What are you doing?" he asked, the second the stupid bus was out of the way.

[Alva Ren]

It was. It was exactly what Rae was doing, insisting on being there with Alva and Susumu, insisting on being there while they--what? Exchanged information about the curse? Tried to think of ways to halt its spread? Even if Rae was only going to protect Alva, the ham-fisted way that he approached the situation didn't sit well with Alva.

Plus, Alva really hated being stalked. It was a total invasion of privacy!

He sat stone-faced as Rae ran the driver off and wheeled himself onto the sidewalk. "Nothing without your supervision, apparently," he said a little cuttingly, then immediately regretted his tone. Too late to take it back now. Alva looked away; he could see the library in the distance, only a few blocks away. Seriously, he didn't need this level of babysitting. Even if Susumu was a creep who was using him, he could take care of himself. Nothing worse could happen--he was already under the death curse.

[Reagan Ryang]

"Supervision? Supervision? It's not supervision! It's protection!"

Why did Alva have to frame it in the ugliest light ever? Rae wasn't being a creep! He was trying to be a protective boyfriend! He didn't understand how Alva could be so nonchalant about it, about having a curse thrown on him. The whole thing gave Rae the worst feeling, for not being there in the first place, for not having the means to do anything about it, and even worse, being shut out and not allowed to even try and do anything if he could. It wasn't like the Alva he thought he knew to go around sneaking behind his back. Rae never had to be weird or suspicious before; it wasn't a good look on anyone and he knew it.

And he felt like he had no choice but to keep digging himself further into the hole he'd started digging the moment he'd made it known he was there at the bus stop. Maybe he should have quietly stalked him to the library but it just would have made things even worse, he thought.

"Why aren't you letting me help? You think I'm not good enough? Am I too stupid to understand it? Is that it?"

[Alva Ren]

"I don't need you to protect me!" Alva's growl was more wolf-like than fox-like as he stared at Rae. "I don't need anybody to protect me and I don't need someone to stalk me around town either!" They were together but they weren't joined at the hip. Alva didn't have to report everything that happened and if he wanted to keep the fact that he'd been cursed from Rae, that was his prerogative. There had to be plenty that Rae kept from him, too.

"What? No!"

Where the hell did Rae get that from? It wasn't even about him! (But of course, stereotypical wolves, center of their own universes.) Alva let out another noise, of frustration. "There's nothing you can do! And I knew you'd do this. Overreact and start leaping to conclusions. If I told you, the first thing you would've done was probably hunt Susumu down and punch him in the mouth. Then who would I get the antidote from?"

[Reagan Ryang]

"I wouldn't kill him! But he deserves a fucking punch!"

It wasn't like Alva couldn't get an antidote from the asshole over a punch! And if that was the case, that guy was even more of an asshole than even Rae thought. He still couldn't believe just how much trust Alva was putting into him! Somebody that cursed him! (And yeah sure, he overreacted sometimes but he had every right to in this situation--if anything, he thought Alva was under-reacting to everything!)

"And he didn't already give you the antidote? What the fuck?" His anger simmered down somewhat as he stepped closer to Alva. Yeah, he was angry and some of that anger was somewhat directed at Alva but the majority of it was reserved for the witch that hurt his boyfriend.

"Did he do something to you? Threaten you? Tell you not to say anything?"

[Alva Ren]

"Rae. Reagan." The kid gloves were off when Alva went for the full name. He stared sternly up at Rae. "You are not punching anybody." That wasn't the way to solve problems! Punching didn't work for anything! And in the few instances where, yes, somebody deserved to get clocked in the face, the aftermath usually involved a lawsuit for assault and battery!

"He gave me the antidote but it's wearing off. I probably just need to take another one to get rid of this curse." Alva sighed and rubbed his temples. This fight was giving him a big headache. Or was that the curse? He felt so unwell lately that he didn't know what was a normal symptom and what was the curse itself. "And he didn't do anything or say anything to make me quiet. He felt terrible about it, and it was an accident! He wanted to curse a hunter! He's after the hunters, he's a--"

Hero leapt to the tip of Alva's tongue but discretion being the better part of valor, he held it back. Not what Rae wanted to hear right now, that the guy he got all worked up about was someone that Alva saw in a positive light.

"He's a good guy and he's trying to help the community. So. Just stop. Please."

[Reagan Ryang]

"For how long?" was Rae's immediate question. How long did he have to be at this guy's whims? It just sounded like a set up. Why didn't Alva see it when it was practically screaming the words SET UP right in their faces? Worse than that, Alva was talking about this guy being a hunter of hunters. He's a--what? What? What was Alva going to say? Rae waited but Alva only finished up with he was a good guy. Helping the community. Rae made a face.

"Gag! He's probably just looking out for himself. How can you trust somebody who deals in curses, Alva? Curses! What kind of good guy curses people? Even fucking humans? I'd rather just rip their throats out and be done with it! Even Josh isn't that fucked in the head!"

[Alva Ren]

"Not people!" retorted Alva heatedly, "Hunters!"

Hunters weren't people--they were monsters. After what they did to his family and to him, he couldn't see them as anything else. That incident robbed him of a brother... of a bright and promising future. It ruined his parents; they were shadows of their former selves, consumed by grief. Time marched on and they marched on with it, but not a single day passed when Alva didn't remember his brother, when he didn't see the holes left in his parents' hearts still gaping and raw and hurting. They hurt. They all hurt. Still.

So yes--he loved the fact that somebody was taking the fight to the hunters. He loved that they were being made to suffer for their cruel and thoughtless actions, and that it was a handsome man who looked favorably upon Alva and who found him attractive only sweetened the deal.

And Rae! Rae whose own father was killed in a senseless act of violence by a hunter should know what that kind of loss felt like! He should have been thanking Susumu instead of trying to paint him as some kind of psycho! Alva lapsed into stubborn silence, brows drawn and lips pressed tightly into a thin, displeased line. He hated fighting with Rae; honestly, he did. Nobody felt good when arguing with their partner but he didn't see why Rae was acting irrational and jealous now, of all the times to get irrational and jealous.

Alva had other friends but none of them elicited this kind of reaction! What about Susumu set him off like this? Was it because Alva didn't tell him about Susumu and the curse? Well he was in for a big surprise--Alva withheld a lot of things from him. Not all of them to this degree of seriousness, true, but he didn't need to tell Rae everything.

"I don't want to argue with you out here. And you're not going to the library with me. Either you let me handle this on my own, or I turn around and go back home."

[Reagan Ryang]

"Okay... yeah... hunters..."

Rae couldn't argue that point. Hunters were bastards and proof positive was the death of his own father. But Rae didn't like the way Alva was talking about this guy like he was some kind of... god. Like he was some... hero to place on a pedestal. The guy cursed him, for fuck's sake! Anyway, who cared what the guy did? He didn't kill the one responsible for Rae's dad's death. Not soon enough. The guy wasn't even doing his job properly, far as Rae saw it! The guy cursed an innocent member of the supernatural community but didn't kill the asshole who took out the alpha male of a prominent pack in the area? Yeah! Piece of shit. Shit at his job. Shit at everything.

"Oh yeah? If he's so--"

Rae cut his words off as Alva spoke at the same time. Something about not arguing with him. "No fucking way. I'm going with you. And if you go back home, I'm still going to the library! I want to see this guy for myself since he's such an amazingly good guy that he goes around cursing innocent people instead of the assholes he claims to be hunting."

[Alva Ren]

"Go ahead, go in without me," Alva snorted, crossing his arms. "You don't even know what he looks like so how are you going to find him?"

Was Rae going to punch every single guy who looked like they might be a 'Susumu' in the library? That wasn't exactly a brilliant plan, was it?! He breathed out angrily, trying not to do something dumb like take Rae out at the knees and make a break for the library to warn Susumu. He couldn't even use his phone--unlike earlier on the bus--since Rae would just see what he was writing.

Besides... he came here to get that mark looked at. And if Rae insisted on being a jerk, then the mark wouldn't get looked at and Alva would be the one suffering the consequences in the end. (Which, he had to admit, really gave him the short, short end of the stick. He would suffer either way, it totally wasn't fair!)

[Reagan Ryang]

That didn't go as Rae planned. In his head, it was all so simple: Alva would cave after Rae made his brilliant point. They'd both go in. Rae may or may not punch somebody (or at the very least, he'd grab the guy by the collar and shake him around like a chew toy). Answers would be had. Alva might be fixed. Then they'd leave. The two of them. Together. With no stupid ass witch who hunted hunters coming along for the ride.

"I'll just shout his name," Rae said triumphantly. He wasn't afraid of no librarian. They might tell him to shut his mouth but that bastard would hear him and even if Rae got kicked out, he'd probably be curious enough to come out and find him!

"Just let me go with you," Rae said, as if it were a matter of letting Rae do anything. "I promise I won't break his goddamn nose if he's as innocent in all this as you say he is."

[Alva Ren]

"Yeah that'll work," Alva scoffed, shaking his head. Because Susumu would respond to the weirdo who burst in yelling his name to the heavens? And what if, alarmed, Susumu then cursed Rae? It could happen--he might mistake Rae for a hunter out for vengeance or something! Alva was blessed with an imagination; he could conjure up any number of scenarios in which somebody could get seriously injured!

"No. You're not going with me." No way, no how! Besides, Rae would find something about Susumu to find fault with, Alva was sure. Rae was like that--he forced the world to accord to his viewpoint, even if it made no logical sense. As long as he felt justified, and even if the reason was completely nonsensical, Alva was sure that Rae would find a way to escalate the situation. Such as, for example, punching him in the face.

"And it's not your place to judge how innocent he is either!"

[Reagan Ryang]

"Fuck," he swore under his breath, irritated that Alva wouldn't see reason. (At least, reason as Rae viewed it.) Alva might have been showing how serious he was by using his whole name instead of his nickname but Rae was serious, too! He didn't want Alva going there alone. Why was that such a sin? Why protect this guy so much? Just the thought of it left him feeling more and more unsettled and uneasy about it--and when Rae was unsettled and uneasy, he got angry.

"Just... just--fine, whatever! If you go see that fucking quack and you want to do it without me, don't fucking come back."

It was harsh and definitely a heat of the moment decision but the whole situation was driving Rae fucking insane. He wanted Alva to let him help him. He wanted Alva to let him be a part of this, whatever it was. He wanted Alva to let him protect him. He fucking knew that Alva was independent (or that he wanted to be) but there was no understanding where the hell Alva was coming with this shit. They were both stubborn and pig-headed as hell when it came to decisions but it had been a while since they'd butted heads this hard on something before.

And Rae could not understand it. What sin was there in protecting his boyfriend? If he didn't want to be protected then... why the fuck were they still together? Alva saved him when was at his worst and Alva wouldn't even let him try to do the same for him and it left him embittered.