Chapter Text
It comes from nowhere.
One minute Marc is walking back from the store to pick up some more milk (because Steven forgot to check if the regular stuff they had in was still okay when he did the list), and the next he’s in a puddle, staring down at the red dripdripdrip that’s diluting - no? It can’t dilute. It’s being diluted.
Blood, anyway. Blood in the puddle. He’s vaguely aware that the blood is coming from his head, and some Sensible Part says: this is shock.
It’s all very well and good saying This Is Shock if you can’t then do anything about it, which is how he feels right now.
His brain rattled pretty hard from the blow, and it still feels like it’s spinning inside his skull.
There’s hands frisking him which he should be stopping. Pushing into pockets and it’s clear they just want his phone and his wallet. He hasn’t got the physical strength to fight them off, nor the executive function. He’s just.
A brain. Thinking. Unable to act.
Steven?
Steven?
This is where the alter would come in really handy. Even without the suit to heal and protect, or give them access to weapons, Steven has learned ridiculously quickly how to defend himself. Marc tries to reach out to him but he’s just… not there.
If he can’t fight back, then he might as well just stay still. Marc knows they are only likely to kill him if he sees their face or resists too much. A phone is just a phone, and his cards can all be cancelled. He doesn’t keep much that’s sentimental in his wallet, he’s learned over the years. The fact that he’s been wiped out by someone who - only a few months ago - would not only have been incapable of doing it, but would be the one on the receiving end of his fists…
Khonshu at least was not the god of poetic justice.
He’s fairly sure they’re going to leave him bleeding in the puddle he’s slowly sunken into - half his face now wet and the stagnant water is lapping at his lips.
Marc knows he should stay awake, but it’s so fucking hard.
He should stay awake for Steven, though.
You don’t go to sleep with a head injury, and if only Steven had found some way to not need him to survive he could maybe--
UNHAND MY AVATAR
Marc hears the roar, feels the whoosh of air past him.
He must be hallucinating, unless it really is Khonshu again.
But the god can’t affect the world without an Avatar, and unless he found a new one, then he’s just posturing. Marc made the mistake once, if it was even a mistake. This time he’s not going to let his maybe-impending death endebt him to the god’s service. Not without Steven agreeing, and Steven isn’t here.
(Where is he? It’s so hard to think when his head is pounding. So hard when he reaches out for help but can’t find him. He should panic, but it’s going weirdly--)
Marc cries out in shock as a familiar rush slides over his skin. The world outside him shifts, a soft, moon-kiss glow as his body is pulled against his will. No! NO!
Marc said no.
Khonshu can’t be doing this! He can’t just force his suit on Marc! Steven isn’t here, so he didn’t consent!
(He can’t, can he? Do this against Marc’s will?)
Marc feels his head starting to clear and his heart beating faster as the loops and whirls enrobe him. The world shifts in tone as his whole face is masked, and he fights to breathe even though he knows full well it won’t restrict him. His body rejects the cocooning, the barrier that cuts him off from the world.
YOU WILL PAY FOR YOUR CRIMES
His hand moves without his agreement, and the crescent blade (so familiar, so reassuring) flies from his wrist and into the mugger’s heart.
Marc watches the blood well up around the spike embedded in the man’s chest, and through the slits in the balaclava he sees the light go from those eyes.
Another death.
Another.
He wants to vomit, but the mask would make that… unpleasant.
The pain in his head is gone and he realises the suit has healed the injury, but there’s something keeping him from reaching out to Steven, now.
Shame.
He stands over the dead asshole, and he wonders why Khonshu only sees one possible ending every time.
Marc didn’t want this.
Marc said no.
I would not allow them to hurt you, my Avatar.
Marc stops still. That tone… he remembers Khonshu being fervent, possessive, but that tone…
The god paces behind him, and Marc can’t make himself turn. A hand drops on his shoulder and since when did Khonshu ever make contact?
It’s heavy. Heavy in a way that weighs nothing, but keeps him from moving at all. A finger draws up the side of his neck, and Marc doesn’t resist the strange caress.
You are too precious to me. You are too important to me.
Now this is just weird, and when Khonshu grabs his wrist and twists it up between his shoulderblades and shoves him bodily into the wall, Marc lets out a cry of shock. He’s not so much in pain as he is aware that he’s in danger.
Did he hit his head so hard he’s lost all sense of reality? And if he did, why is he mute in the face of this? Why is this what his brain chooses to give him in concussion, or worse?
You must take better care. Although I can heal you, I do not like to see you in pain.
He belies that with a scratch of his beak-tip along Marc’s flank, scoring through the fabric and briefly bloodying his side. Marc groans because it… it… does something. Does something that makes his body ache, and Marc had always heard those other tones in Khonshu’s voice when he demanded bloody vengeance. That lilt that said he enjoyed it that little bit too much.
Unless, of course… it is me who delivers it.
Marc yelps at the way those words go through him, and the way suddenly-sharp nails seem to press through Khonshu’s gloves. He’s raking over his hip as the beak presses a spot at the back of his neck that makes him want to surrender for fear of his spinal column being severed.
For that reason, no other.
The god flays him, scoring a shoulder, then his waist, then all the way from his knee to his buttock. Marc can’t tell if he’s healing between, all he can feel is the sharp sting and the way it’s whipping his body into a frenzy. He’s helpless, he’s utterly helpless, and the worst part is he’s enjoying this.
He’ll never admit those fantasies in the darkest dreams. Those weird ones that swung between utter destruction and violent climax. The way Khonshu’s voice and presence had been so overpowering that it had filtered through to the deepest, darkest layers of his self.
Khonshu flips him like he’s a freaking pancake, slams him into the wall and then there’s a foot braced by his hip and a thumb under his jaw. His head is back and the god slashes across his chest, then pushes in just above his collarbone. He doesn’t puncture the skin, but he could. He could pin Marc to the wall like a butterfly, or he could slice through and end it all. Pull the suit away to remind him that he said no even though everything in him right now screams yes.
What’s the matter, my precious one? You don’t scream for me? You don’t praise my name?
Marc can’t talk. His lips work behind the mask but it’s nothing but whimpers that come out. Maybe he hit his head harder than the suit has managed to heal?
Do you need to be reminded that you belong to ME?
One claw unknits the suit seam all the way up his thigh. Marc’s eyes go wide in fear as his leg is lifted and bent, providing access.
He.
It’s not.
It’s…
The claw pushes up and in, dry. Marc screams but it’s muffled. He’s not sure he’s not just been skewered to bleeding on that digit, and he doesn’t know how to tell because the pain and pleasure are so tightly wound up that it’s impossible to tell one from the other.
That’s right. That’s right. Your body is mine. You heart is mine. YOU are mine. You will perish only when I allow you to. You will serve me, and you will praise me. You will thank me. You will worship me.
Marc’s daydreams were never quite this intense. He’s pinned to a wall being fingered raw, not sure if he’s haemorrhaging in the process (god he hopes not), unable to talk and getting off on it so fucking hard.
The fact he hasn’t - really - consented?
He hasn’t said no.
Not to… this.
But he also hasn’t said yes. Marc does not like what it says about him that he’s harder for thinking it, or that he’s humping the air and now has his hands above his head of his own accord. His eyes close as the sensations start to get too much, and he’s fighting to breathe enough.
That finger. Sharp. Bony. Each bend, each knuckle popping in and out of him… each curve that swerves to hit inside just… so... He has little warning before he’s coming. It just slams into him like the mugger did, and he feels the hot, sticky sensation of his spend hitting the suit and having nowhere to go. It seeps through the fabric and the way his over-sensitive cockhead grinds into the damp patch makes him want to come all over again.
Khonshu pulls his finger out and Marc finds himself dropped to his knees on the floor.
There you go, my precious one. You are such a good little pet for me, Jake.
JAKE?!
Marc feels something angry snarl that isn’t Steven, and he’s unceremoniously pushed to one side.
The last thing he can sense before he’s out is the body rising to its feet and the start of a furious tirade launched at the god.
Uhm.
Well.
It both explains a lot of things and raises even more questions.
Right now Marc is mortified, satisfied, and in need of the longest sleep ever.
He also hopes he doesn’t remember a damn thing when he does wake up, because there’s no therapy in the world to help him if he does.