as we fall ✤ octavian ✓

twelve

trigger warning for mild gore

"Where's Logan?"

Laoise, who had been trailing several feet behind Octavian, emerged from the green trees a second after she heard those words, her heart plummeting to her stomach.

"What do you mean?" She sputtered, rushing up to get a better view of the sand, the night, the beach, in which Logan was notably absent. When Octavian was silent, all the blood drained from his face, she lifted her head towards the sky and screamed. "Fuck!"

"It's okay," Octavian pivoted his head to properly reassure her, though she could see the panic in his eyes the moment their gazes met. "He's probably just...gone off to pee."

"Off to pee?" She let out a breath, shaking her head. Rushing over to the spot he had been at, her eyes were wild as she searched for any sign of where he may have gone off to. "No, no, where is he? Logan? Logan, can you hear me?"

Deep within her chest, her heart was slowly caving in on itself, a glimmer of hope she'd grabbed onto slipping from her grasp once again. Instead, any sensation of calm, of dare she say contentment, had been ripped out from within her and had pure, utter panic shoved into the hole that had been created.

"Logan?!" Octavian cried out, voice echoing through the cool night air. "Logan, are you there?"

"You don't think he..." her eyes trailed towards the water, which she herself had only just narrowly escaped death from.

"He wouldn't," he shook his head, biting down on his lip. "Logan isn't an idiot. He wouldn't—"

Octavian's protest was cut off by a scream that pierced the air, sending a jolt through them both as Laoise whipped towards him. The scream was nothing short of horrifying, sending a chill down Laoise's spine as it instantly occurred to her who it belonged to, and what it could mean. Their eyes met, and one word slipped from their lips at the exact same time. "Logan."

"Fuck!" Laoise swore once more as they rushed through the sand and into the general direction of the scream. Octavian remained behind, rushing to their materials which remained at the floor of the beach, just next to the gentle waves, frantically searching for a weapon. She didn't bother glancing behind her to see if he got it.

She was in the woods once more when she heard the scream radiate again, this time from somewhere much, much closer. Laoise's head pivoted towards the side as something like being stabbed in the gut punctured her. "No, Logan, no!"

She didn't know where to look first, the boy on the ground, or the beast mounted on top of him, claws digging into his flesh. All she knew is she had to separate the two as fast as she possibly could, and if that meant putting herself in the middle of them, then so be it.

Laoise wasn't sure when she told her legs to move, but she was behind the creature that had Logan pinned to the ground, her hands were atop the thing's horns in a frantic attempt to pull it off. Only two sounds flooded her ears, the blood rushing through her veins and pounding in her heart, and the wails of the child as she used every ounce of strength within her body to save him.

Useless, a small voice in the back of her mind rang. She was useless. What was she going to do? How could she, a child of someone as pathetically inept at battle as Cupid, possibly manage to get this thing that had to be triple her weight off of Logan? How was she supposed to save his life?

The beast let out a wail of its own, but she didn't let go into it was scampering off of Logan, and taking flight, wings bursting out from the sides of its body and soaring into the air, leaving drops of crimson blood as the only evidence it had ever been there."

"A Mayan God," Octavian panted from next to her, her own knife wielded in his grasp. "Not sure the na—shit, Logan!"

He collapsed to his knees the moment his eyes came into contact with Logan's chest — or what was left of it. What had once been a bright yellow t-shirt was now stained red, alongside patches of flesh that had been ripped off from beneath his skin by the talons of the horned creature. The God.

Laoise couldn't stop to think of what that implied, too busy letting out a scream of her own as she too sank to her knees, pressing her hands into the bloody mess that was Logan's barely breathing body.

"Lee-Lee..." he began, but sputtered out blood from his mouth and cutting off any words he wished to speak. His eyes, those wide brown eyes had a silent scream written into them, an agonized plea for his suffering to end. Through the blood, he choked out a small, horrible phrase, "It...it hurts."

Laoise screamed again, her helpless choir of wails sending birds flying from their nests and rattling the trees.

"Cupid!" She lifted her head towards the sky, barely able to see the moon through the tears clouding her vision. "Cupid, you bastard, get down here! Please, Cupid! Dad! Please!"

When a voice emitted from next to her, her heart leaped in a preemptive happiness, only to fall right back to the ground when she realized it was not a God, but Octavian. Nor was he speaking, did she understand as she sobbed, but singing.

Singing, she understood with a click in her brain, because his gift from his Godly heritage was his ability to sing people to sleep. Because once Logan closed his eyes and drifted off, his pain would be over, and would never return.

And a life without Logan would be a life without the sun. Not a life worth living.

"Octavian, no!" Laoise began, but he didn't so much as look in her direction, eyes focused on Logan as his final lullaby was sung.

"And I'd give up forever to touch you
'Cause I know that you feel me somehow
You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be
And I don't wanna go home right now
And all I can taste is this moment
And all I can breathe is your life
And sooner or later, it's over
I just don't wanna miss you tonight
And I don't want the world to see me
'Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am
And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming
Or the moment of truth in your lies
When everything feels like the movies
Yeah, you bleed just to know, you're alive
And I don't want the world to see me
'Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am"

As Octavian's singing trailed to a halt, Logan's body ceased its rabid convulsions, alongside any movements at all.

Octavian, who stared down at the ground with eyes widened in horror, though no tears slipped from him. Instead, his bloodied hands reached for Laoise, yanking her close to him, their embrace uniting their hearts, their sorrow, their grief.

A corpse lay in front of them, reminiscent of the loss of innocence that day, not just Logan's, but their own. No matter how hard they scrubbed their eyes, no matter how tight she shut them, she knew she'd never unsee the blood, the pain.

Even as Laoise bawled into the arms of the boy who held her, she was capable of understanding one thing; there would be no time for negotiations. Brigid would go down screaming for what she'd taken. ㅤ

a/n: i've been procrastinating this chapter a lot lol, hence the lack of updates. this chapter is fairly short, but i didn't want to draw out such a painful scene more than needed. my nephew is about logan's age, so this really ripped my in two to write. the song octavian sang btw is "iris" by the goo goo dolls, a really beautiful song in my opinion. we're nearing the end of the story, only a few chapters left :)