marcus keane (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
exorkismos) wrote2018-07-13 05:09 pm
exorkismos) wrote2018-07-13 05:09 pm
@thingpuncher
There are, supposedly, straightforward cases of possession, where everything goes to plan and no one has to do anything drastic or unsanctioned or improvised, and everything’s over in a week or two.
In all his years of experience, Marcus has never once come across one.
It’s not that they’re always long, but they’re always harrowing, and there’s always some complicating factor: a disapproving family member, a demon with a particular power, legal trouble, a nosy neighbour. A weak link in a chain. Something always goes wrong. At this point, Marcus knows to expect it.
There’s something wrong with whatever’s possessing Izzy Romano, a ten-year-old girl who lives in Boston with her mother and father and four siblings. They’re about six days in, though Marcus is starting to lose track: it’s hard to, when he doesn’t sleep right. Marcus has the run of their house, Jack Romano having cleared out and checked into a hotel with the other children: Yasmin Romano, Izzy’s mother, remains cloistered down below. She’d refused to leave, but Marcus won’t let her up to see her child like this: spitting and hissing like a cornered cat, her eyes lit all wrong and her lip all chewed up. The remains of manacles hang from her wrists where she burst out of them just moments ago.
“Come on,” he murmurs, crouched before her, inching closer. He's sort of aiming for her. He's sort of aiming for the tacky little plastic Virgin Mary water bottle on its side beside her. “C’mon, Izzy. S’alright. Nothing I ain’t seen before.” That’s true. He’s seen demons recover their strength, he’s seen them burst from their restraints. But there’s something about this one that feels wrong, though he’s not sure how or why. It’s a texture in the air, something about the way it moves. He’s on his guard. But he tries not to show it, tries to keep talking to Izzy, not whatever’s possessing her. “You just keep on fighting, yeah?”
“She’s gone,” the thing spits. “She gave up hours ago. It’s just me in here.”
“Wasn’t talking to you,” Marcus says, flat as if bored, and the demon lashes out fearsomely quick. He's waiting for the movement, though: it gives him a moment to lunge for the water, get it open: Izzy flies at him, knocks him back. His head cracks across the floorboards and her hands come to his throat, but he chucks the water in her face and she howls, cringes back.
Marcus gets his breath back while the demon scrambles away and squirms in apparent pain. "Yeah," he croaks, feeling at his jaw: it's sticky with blood where her fingernails caught him. "Alright, you can quit the theatrics. Hey. It wasn't blessed. Just standard H20."
In a second, the thing slumps. Stares at Marcus furiously.
Marcus says, "Earlier. Spoke to you in Aramaic, you didn't understand it. Speaking tongues, that's the first and clearest sign."
"I — "
"Can speak high school French and Spanish, and English, I'd be willing to bet. Cos Izzy can. You only know what she knows. You ain't a demon. What are you?"
In all his years of experience, Marcus has never once come across one.
It’s not that they’re always long, but they’re always harrowing, and there’s always some complicating factor: a disapproving family member, a demon with a particular power, legal trouble, a nosy neighbour. A weak link in a chain. Something always goes wrong. At this point, Marcus knows to expect it.
There’s something wrong with whatever’s possessing Izzy Romano, a ten-year-old girl who lives in Boston with her mother and father and four siblings. They’re about six days in, though Marcus is starting to lose track: it’s hard to, when he doesn’t sleep right. Marcus has the run of their house, Jack Romano having cleared out and checked into a hotel with the other children: Yasmin Romano, Izzy’s mother, remains cloistered down below. She’d refused to leave, but Marcus won’t let her up to see her child like this: spitting and hissing like a cornered cat, her eyes lit all wrong and her lip all chewed up. The remains of manacles hang from her wrists where she burst out of them just moments ago.
“Come on,” he murmurs, crouched before her, inching closer. He's sort of aiming for her. He's sort of aiming for the tacky little plastic Virgin Mary water bottle on its side beside her. “C’mon, Izzy. S’alright. Nothing I ain’t seen before.” That’s true. He’s seen demons recover their strength, he’s seen them burst from their restraints. But there’s something about this one that feels wrong, though he’s not sure how or why. It’s a texture in the air, something about the way it moves. He’s on his guard. But he tries not to show it, tries to keep talking to Izzy, not whatever’s possessing her. “You just keep on fighting, yeah?”
“She’s gone,” the thing spits. “She gave up hours ago. It’s just me in here.”
“Wasn’t talking to you,” Marcus says, flat as if bored, and the demon lashes out fearsomely quick. He's waiting for the movement, though: it gives him a moment to lunge for the water, get it open: Izzy flies at him, knocks him back. His head cracks across the floorboards and her hands come to his throat, but he chucks the water in her face and she howls, cringes back.
Marcus gets his breath back while the demon scrambles away and squirms in apparent pain. "Yeah," he croaks, feeling at his jaw: it's sticky with blood where her fingernails caught him. "Alright, you can quit the theatrics. Hey. It wasn't blessed. Just standard H20."
In a second, the thing slumps. Stares at Marcus furiously.
Marcus says, "Earlier. Spoke to you in Aramaic, you didn't understand it. Speaking tongues, that's the first and clearest sign."
"I — "
"Can speak high school French and Spanish, and English, I'd be willing to bet. Cos Izzy can. You only know what she knows. You ain't a demon. What are you?"