He can't describe what happens next — what any of it is. For a brief, horrible moment, he's been half-aware that the hole in him was being filled, that his hunger was being appeased, (even if not enough, not enough). But it was something, some glorious, nightmarish thing (he hurt Kate, Kate's crying shaking gasping, Kate's somewhere he can't reach and he needs to go to her, to fix this, to hold her in his hands)
Vitality pours into him and seeps into all the aching spaces, and the hungry thing with its mouth wide open demands more, and he feels better. Through the pain and blood and bleary eyes, he feels better, too. Some dark place inside of him has been fed, and he thrives in that place, now. In the dark.
Abruptly, reality changes again. Abruptly, the boy on top of him is draining him of that same vitality, maybe in a different shape, but Edward feels himself losing— himself. Like lungs taking a breath of much-needed air suddenly made breathless again.
He barely has time to process any of this before the boy is a beast. Dimly, Little recognises the creature as a wolf, the very same beast that lives beneath his own breast. On some level, he knows all of the pieces of this can be no coincidence, that all of this surrounds him too well: darkness, hunger, beast — but he can't make sense of it all.
The wolf bites him, and he screams. It's out loud but it's also in his head, in a place he's never been able to access before, an ability sucked right out of Kate Marsh — the scream sounds in the minds of those in the near vicinity, loud and howling.
He isn't a fighter (a killer, Wynonna told him. You've never been a killer and you aren't one now.) And maybe the truth of it is that Edward Little has wanted to die for a very long time. But there are people he has to live for, he's realised that time and time again. He can't leave Kate alone to this. He has to protect her—
He's still screaming, maybe just in his mind now, mouth wet and gasping, but he hits the wolf as hard as he can, and his knee shoves up and into it as hard as he can, and there's an anger that pulses up under everything. It won't be enough to do anything now, maybe he knows that, too. He's bleeding and broken in places and the wolf can rip him to shreds. He doesn't even have the strength to unleash his own beast form.
But he grits his teeth and his lip peels back enough to expose them (and even in his human form, his canines are sharp, fangy, and he bares them right back at the wolf) and his eyes are hard and angry and his scream becomes a roar. He tries. It never will be enough.
cw: brief suicide ideation things
Vitality pours into him and seeps into all the aching spaces, and the hungry thing with its mouth wide open demands more, and he feels better. Through the pain and blood and bleary eyes, he feels better, too. Some dark place inside of him has been fed, and he thrives in that place, now. In the dark.
Abruptly, reality changes again. Abruptly, the boy on top of him is draining him of that same vitality, maybe in a different shape, but Edward feels himself losing— himself. Like lungs taking a breath of much-needed air suddenly made breathless again.
He barely has time to process any of this before the boy is a beast. Dimly, Little recognises the creature as a wolf, the very same beast that lives beneath his own breast. On some level, he knows all of the pieces of this can be no coincidence, that all of this surrounds him too well: darkness, hunger, beast — but he can't make sense of it all.
The wolf bites him, and he screams. It's out loud but it's also in his head, in a place he's never been able to access before, an ability sucked right out of Kate Marsh — the scream sounds in the minds of those in the near vicinity, loud and howling.
He isn't a fighter (a killer, Wynonna told him. You've never been a killer and you aren't one now.) And maybe the truth of it is that Edward Little has wanted to die for a very long time. But there are people he has to live for, he's realised that time and time again. He can't leave Kate alone to this. He has to protect her—
He's still screaming, maybe just in his mind now, mouth wet and gasping, but he hits the wolf as hard as he can, and his knee shoves up and into it as hard as he can, and there's an anger that pulses up under everything. It won't be enough to do anything now, maybe he knows that, too. He's bleeding and broken in places and the wolf can rip him to shreds. He doesn't even have the strength to unleash his own beast form.
But he grits his teeth and his lip peels back enough to expose them (and even in his human form, his canines are sharp, fangy, and he bares them right back at the wolf) and his eyes are hard and angry and his scream becomes a roar. He tries. It never will be enough.