Work Text:
Tired
That's all that Biz-...Zach can feel
Just tired
Tired of the fights of his brothers yelling at each other for who is to blame for what. Tired of this constant pressure being placed on him. Him working to exceed the expectations that were forced upon him just for all of his efforts to be ignored. Fixing some of the loose ends that the others forget about just for him to continue to get ignored.
He is just...tired
Everyone splitting up after a death was...heartbreaking to just watch. Everyone was trying to stick together and that's what divided them all. Charlie was trying to make sure everything was perfect and pretend like it never happened. Condi locked himself away and kept making more potions as an attempt to undo what happened. While Bizly tried to maintain balance between the two. Which made the wildlife more hectic as there was no one keeping an eye on them.
The divides kept getting bigger, all three sides just kept disagreeing. Charlie needs them to follow certain rules. Condi is obsessed with just trying to fix it. Both arguing about what happened, one being stuck in the moment while the other is trying so hard to ignore it even happening. Both are trying to grieve but in the most self destructive way.
Bizly was forced to sit there and listen to them just yell. He has tried many times to stop them but he just can't control two gods. The only thing he has really done is get the attention on him when a fight was close to breaking out.
He can only deal with it for so long before just leaving.
Zach gets up at the sounds of howling and the paws hitting the wooden floorboards. The wolf is right next to him as he sits up from the bed. He rubs the tired out of his eyes before lazily raising a hand to pet the wolf.
The wolf dodges the hand and begins to nudge his leg. Zach looks over to the wolf as they get him up. He does what they asked and the wolf immediately starts to lead the way. The man follows the wolf outside with no questions asked. He can easily get the answer from each of the animals that he passes by. Their minds are still linked with his, but he has chosen to block off the access. Using any of the powers from before just reminds him of everything that he is just trying to get away from. The animals and him are still linked since they still view him as a leader of them all even if he doesn't use any powers against them.
The wolf leads him outside of the cabin to reveal the small pack that's carrying someone on their back. Zach rushes to the person and checks for a pulse first before lifting them up and having them hang off his shoulder. "Where did you guys even find them?"
Some of the wolves just look up to him while one of them tries to push the person to be on his shoulder. Zach looks down to the wolf before rushing back into his small cabin.
He quickly places them on his couch and goes inside of his room to find the emergency medkit that's been hidden away. It's always been kept just in case the animals ever stopped seeing him as a god. Zach rushes back to the person on the couch. Their breathing is still steady and he immediately gets to work trying to clean the dried blood.
.
Zach sits at his table while having a hot chocolate in hand. It took a while to clean and try to keep the wounds closed. Most of the blood was licked off as the rest just remained dried and stuck to the skin. He looks over and the person begins to stir.
The person begins to toss and turn like crazy. Their eyes shoot open as they sit up. Their breathing is getting more frantic as they look at their body to see the bandages. The breathing begins to slow down as they begin to scan the room. Their eyes finally reach Zach, who is trying to keep his distance but inching somewhat close.
Zach slowly gets closer to the person with his hands up. The person scoots a little closer to the wall and that just makes him stop. Zach clears his throat before speaking, "Sorry, but I found you beaten up. I-I just decided to help you out since you seemed really bad."
The person takes a moment to stare at him for a bit. They look down at themselves to see the bandages that's littered around their body. They take a deep breath before looking back to Zach. "Thank you for cleaning these...fucking hell." They muttered the final bit to themselves.
Zach lowers his arms and takes another step to the side to get a little closer to the door. "I have a truck if I need to take you anywhere."
The person looks up and starts to rub their face. They begin to look around on their arms. "I don't exactly have a place to go back to..." they looked embarrassed about it. They look down at their bandaged hands. "Thanks. For helping me"
Zach nods, "Yeah of course." Now he really doesn't know what to do. "You can rest here for now. I don't exactly have an extra room." He begins to rub the back of his neck and looks over to the door. The fuck is going to do with them? "Name's Zach by the way." He takes a step forward and sticks an arm out.
The person looks up to him and stares at the hand for a bit before slowly raising their own to shake it. "Milo." He gets up from the couch to give Zach a proper handshake. It didn't do much due to the pretty big height difference.
Zach squeezes the hand and lets out a small breathy laugh. Milo lets out a small chuckle after the two notice how getting up meant nothing. Even then, the two continue the shaking motion. "Nice to meet you Milo, now get some sleep." Their hands finally stop and Zach lets go. "You need to recover from whatever the fuck that was. I can get you some water."
Milo takes a deep breath and nods, "Yeah I would really appreciate that." He takes the time to sit down and his eyes immediately shoot up at Zack in the kitchen. The man actually had his one hand slightly raised while the other was getting the water from the tap. Milo lets out a small sigh of relief when he starts heading back. The cup gets placed on the small coffee table in front of him.
Zach nods at Milo as he gets the cup to take a sip. "I hope that you don't mind if one of my dogs ever stops by? They were a bit concerned."
Milo looked around to try to spot a dog anywhere. "No, I don't mind. Where is the little guy?" He had a small smile forming on his face at the mention of a dog. His heart warmed up a bit when it was mentioned that they were concerned. He looks down and sees a small head appear from the bottom of the couch. The pup starts to crawl out and runs around Zach before running back to the couch. They go to start to sniff one of the bandages on Milo, pushing the arm a bit.
Zach lets out a small chuckle before getting a few steps closer before just squatting nearby. He keeps his distance from them, "That's Beewee." The wolf heard and turned back to Zach, his tail begins to wag.
Milo begins to pet the wolf with most of the scratches being behind the ears. "Hi Beewee" his voice changed to a more babying tone. Beewee scoots closer to Milo and starts to climb onto the couch which makes him chuckle a bit. "I think the baby likes me." Beewee licks Milo's face as a way to confirm it.
Zach just lets out a small chuckle before getting up from the ground. He gets closer to the wolf to give him a quick head scratch. "Yeah, it seems like he does. Did you already replace me?" He tilts his head at the wolf and Beewee extends their paw out to him. "You're just a big baby." He gives him a quick scratch on the wolf's back and Beewee just fully lays on Milo's lap.
The two laugh at Beewee's antics before Zach starts to take a few steps to the hallway to his room. "Okay, I will let you rest now. Wake me if you need anything and make sure to take care of the big baby for me."
"I will! Thanks for letting me stay here." Milo said before Zach just smiled and nodded as a response.
He makes his way down the hall and enters his room. It suddenly doesn't feel as isolated anymore. He came to this specific place for a reason, to hide away from the outside world letting himself pass by. As a mere concept before the thought just fading away from people's minds. Now the man that lives in the woods has someone that he will need to help take care of. In a way, it makes him glad. To just be seen by another person again. Despite it being the complete opposite of why he even ran away in the first place.
Zach is unable to get rid of the small smile on his face. Getting back to bed, covering himself with a smile still stuck on his face.
.
"Zach! Zach get up!" He lets out a groan as his beloved roommate smacks the pillow against his head. "Beewee! We need him up for FOOD!" Another smack and a sudden shift on the bed.
Beewee jumped on the bed and began to sniff around Zach's arms. Zach moves his arms around to try to cover his face. The wolf goes to try to squeeze themselves in the arms and lick his face. Zach immediately shoots up as Milo begins to laugh at them. "Gross Beewee just licked my mouth!" Zach sits up and tries to rub the slobber off his face.
Milo hunched over as the wolf went over to go sit by Zach, believing they did a good job. "That's what you get for refusing to feed me!" Milo sat on the bed then stretched out to Beewee, who immediately laid his head close to Milo to get the head scratches. "Good job on getting the big meanie up." He was talking to them with a baby voice as their tail wagged.
Zach looked down to the wolf, "Beewee that was the meanest and grossest thing you could have ever done to me." They continued to get affection so the disappointed tone never registered in the wolf's head. Zach looked up to Milo, looking hurt. "What did you do to them to make them hate me?"
"Be a better father." Milo didn't even look up.
Zach's head immediately dropped as he tried to hide the chuckle that tried to get out. "Hey that's not true!" He grabs a pillow and throws it at Milo, who took it on the face and fell back.
.
It has been five months since that night. The sudden change was definitely weird, needing to somehow fit a new person in a house that was designed for solitude. The cabinets didn't have a single crumb at the time, the water and glass was created in the moment. The very few times that Zach even used any of his old powers. When asking Milo what he wanted as a snack, he quickly tried to create a small portion of it before they had to drive into a small town.
Now that's where the two are coming back from now. With the truck having food that Milo has chosen and a few snacks that Zach has grown to enjoy. He doesn't need to eat since his body naturally sustains itself, but he learned that it's somewhat nice to share a meal with someone. Let that be that it slowly turns into an light hearted argument about who stole whose food. It was nice just to share with others again.
The car ride takes some time and the radio is set to whatever Milo's playlist. He has managed to keep a phone while trying to get by, still completely cracked but it works. He would be singing along with a few songs, but his attention has been taken up by a small frog bobble head that's sitting on the dashboard. The way that convinced them to get it was just by them making the 'BOING!' sound effects. They are still doing it whenever a speed bump is hit
The truck pulls up by the cabin, the music is still lightly playing as Milo opens the door to exit. "You need to take down the frog."
Zach looks at the bobblehead that's still shaking as he turns off the truck. "Wait why? I thought we wanted a third driver here?"
"For he won't melt." Milo shuts the door and starts walking back to grab a few bags.
Zach gets off without the frog and starts heading to the door. "I'm not getting him! We still need our third driver!" He yelled out, he glanced back to see the reaction as the door was unlocked.
"If you don't get him, I will be throwing out your soda!" Milo yelled back.
Zach lets out a chuckle as he opens the door and gets inside. He takes off the sunglasses and the layered jacket. He looks back to the door as he sets the jacket on the kitchen table.
Milo isn't coming in...
His smile immediately drops as he walks back to the door. "Milo?" He can only hope that the truck is hiding him. That he wasn't joking about hiding the soda somewhere. Closer he gets, the more of the mess he sees on the ground. "MILO?" He yells out again when seeing the groceries on the ground.
No response from anywhere and now he is really paranoid. He frantically looks around the forest and runs the way where one of the items was thrown. While running, his mind is flooded with what happened.
Did a killer find them and decide to pluck Milo? No, because the bears that live around the area usually scare them off. If they get passed them, then the wolves that surround them would've taken care of it
Did any animals stop listening to him? Maybe, but it should be him not the person that stumbled into this.
The snapping twig brought his spiraling mind back to reality with this odd new sight in front of him. Milo's arm was stuck in a bears jaw but there's two things very off;
Milo's screams are silent
The bears eyes are golden
Zach was hesitant with his actions, slowly taking a step against the bear. The eyes kept him tense but the small glance down to Milo. The friend that's desperately trying to yell out for help. Bleeding out and in so much clear pain. It was enough to break him out of the small fear he was stuck in.
Zach runs closer and gets himself ready to free Milo. The bear pulls Milo back and he can tell that Milo tries to scream again but nothing. He doesn't even take a moment for the bear to think, he just runs straight at it with fist burning into its face.
With this sudden new force, the bear falls back and lets go of Milo, who finally lets out an audible scream in pain. It staggers back and shakes its head with blood starting to flow. The bear begins to stand to try to take a stronger presence, which Zach ignores and dives straight into them. The power of an old god courses through his veins and he is essentially beating the bear in a fist fight. Its mind was already consumed, he could feel that this bear was no one going back to normal. The one controlling it is looking for blood, it wasn't going to just stop at Milo. But Zach is going to make fucking sure it will.
The fight wasn't long, it was all over the moment that Zach was on top of it. It locked its jaw on his arm and he pushed down. Using the arm and his other hand to apply pressure on the head. Pushing and pushing till the head splattered on the dirt below them and the skull was broken. He wasted no time on getting off and running towards Milo, who was just behind them and still bleeding.
Zach scrambles by Milo's side and tries to inspect the heavily wounded body. "Milo! Milo you gotta stay with me!"
Milo tries to look as he is trying so hard to regain his breath as his arm is completely limp right next to him. "You fighting a bear was super fucking cool man..." The free arm is trying to hold on the side that was completely torn into.
Zach looks at what the arm is trying to cover and he immediately pulls off the jacket to cover it. "Milo I am not letting you die due to a fucking bear."
Milo can barely hear, it's just ringing all around him. "Zach...thank you for taking care of me." His eyes continue to get heavier as Zach is just trying to scream at him. But it just comes off as ringing till it gets louder and it's all that he can hear. Eyes close as the final breath is drawn.
Zach looks in utter disbelief as his grip softens on the bloodied jacket. "Milo?"
No response
"Milo!"
Nothing
"MILO!"
Zach's vision begins to blur as he begins to shake. He can't lose someone else, not again. He looks at the bear corpses ahead of him and a small spark of rage starts to form. This wouldn't have been prevented so fucking easily if it wasn't for the demon.
But the rage reminds him of the power he has.
Zach looks down at his hands and then at Milo's corpse. He takes a deep breath before placing a hand on the massive wound around the stomach. A blue light begins to surround him and the ox horns start to reveal themselves. The disguise that was hiding all previous features started to fade away. Covering the dirty grey tee with his old fur cloak. Being forced into his old self has the most disgusting feeling crawling all over him as this process continues. The light begins to transfer to Milo and begins to cover him.
The light covers the wounds and begins to close them. The light travels to the head and stays a little longer before revealing baby ox horns on his head. Milo gasps for air again and shoots up, frantically looking around. Flinching back at Zach being close then looking at their arm where it should've been in shreds.
Milo is trying his best to regain his breath, "I-I was supposed to die! The hell happened?! You're not supposed to have tHAT! AND-!"
"Milo, Milo, Milo." Zach put his hands on Milo's shoulders as an attempt to calm him, which immediately works. "It's a lot to explain but Im not exactly human-"
"Yeah I figured that out." Milo was obviously trying to process everything. Zach lets go of him as he lifts his hand to run through their hair, immediately getting pricked by the small horn forming. "What-DID YOU ALSO GIVE ME HORNS?!"
"-I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT WAS GOING TO HAPPEN-"
"-HOW DID YOU NOT KNOW-"
"-THIS WAS THE FIRST TIME THAT I EVER GAVE SOMEONE SOME OF MY POWERS BRO! IT AIN'T NORMAL!"
The two stare at each other for a bit after the last comment. This really is new territory for the both of them. Milo looks down at what should've been a destroyed arm again and lightly feels it. "So what am I now? What even were you?"
Zach looks at the arm that Milo is inspecting and some semblance of guilt can be seen on him. "I was a god...that would make you my angel I think." He rubs his face with one hand. "It's a...really long story"
Milo looks up to him and places the arm on his shoulder. "You can tell me this shit later. What we need to do is figure out what's happening now."
Zach lets a small slaugh escape him, nodding. "I'll tell you everything soon. Let's just go home now" he gets up and offers the hand to Milo, who immediately takes it. They begin to walk back with a new future ahead of them.
"So did you connect to animals?"
"Yeah, it also means you can talk to Beewee"
"I CAN TALK TO BEEWEE?! I CHANGE MY MIND BEING AN ANGEL IS THE BEST!"