Work Text:
Peter and Chris are reading next to each other in bed, a ritual of easy, quiet companionship they’d come to appreciate over the past decade of hard-won domesticity, when their soulmarks flare unexpectedly. Peter’s book tumbles from his hand with a hiss as he clutches at his wrist, the newspaper in Chris’s hand crumpling as he clenches his hand against the sudden stinging. At the same time as their marks flare, a bright light flashes in the middle of their bedroom and a body drops unceremoniously onto their floor.
Chris and Peter scramble from the bed as the light disappears, Peter’s claws unsheathed with a steady rumble in his chest while Chris goes for the gun in his nightstand drawer. They round either side of the bed cautiously, warily eyeing the seemingly unconscious young man on their floor.
The first things Chris notices is the blood. It’s coating his shirt, matting part of his hair, and streaking down his hands and arms. Great slashes have reduced his shirt to strips in some areas, and mud cakes his sneakers and the ends of his jeans. He looks to be in his early twenties, perhaps, and Chris can tell by the movement of his chest that his breathing is shallow.
“Chris!” Peter says urgently, pointing to where one of the boy’s arms is splayed out across the floor. Chris gasps as he sees what Peter spotted; partially covered in blood and glowing with the same light that had flashed through their room and flared on their wrists is a soulmark to match theirs.
Peter rushes to kneel at his side, a subtly trembling hand reaching out to brush his thumb over the mark, clearing the blood away to get a better view. It’s unnecessary, because energy jolts through them at the contact, making the boy arch with a pained gasp, eyes flying open. Chris thumbs the safety back onto his gun and tucks it into his waistband as he kneels beside their apparent soulmate, watching as rich brown eyes look around blearily, gaze landing on Peter at his side.
“Pretty wolf,” he mumbles nonsensically before his eyes flutter shut again, unconsciousness pulling him under once more.
Despite the dire situation, Peter can’t help but preen, shooting a pleased and mildly smug grin at Chris, who rolls his eyes at his husband.
“We need to figure out what his injuries are and how bad they are,” Chris says. Peter makes quick work of what remains of his shirt with his claws, revealing pale skin and a lean form speckled with several pale scars. Chris worries about how pale and cool his skin is and the amount of blood soaking through his clothing. There’s a particularly deep slash gouged into his side below his rib cage, and a set of 5 very distinct claw marks raking shallowly across his chest. “Peter, grab some wet towels to clean him off and my first aid kit from below the sink,” Chris says, grabbing one of the pieces of shirt from the floor and balling it up against the gash in his side to stem the blood flow. The jolt of the soulbond flaring between them doesn’t stir him this time, and Chris thinks that should probably worry him.
Peter makes quick work of Chris’s requests, unfortunately well-versed in dealing with emergencies, using his enhanced speed to make it back to his mates as quickly as possible. He sets the large box of emergency medical supplies — far more thoroughly stocked than a typical human first aid kit — next to Chris and kneels on the boy’s other side, using a damp towel to wipe away as much of the blood as he can. He’s relieved that doing so doesn’t uncover any more nasty wounds, and that it looks like the wounds on his chest have mostly stopped bleeding.
Once the gash in his side is cleaned off and clearly deep enough to need stitches to prevent him from bleeding out, Chris digs out a needle and thread, glad he knows how to do simple sutures and also grateful that the boy is solidly unconscious for this, since he doesn’t want to risk using an anesthetic he could be allergic to. He makes quick work of five simple stitches, tying them off and covering the wound with gauze. Peter, meanwhile, has been using a second damp towel — the first already too saturated with blood — to wipe off the blood matting the hair at the side of his head.
“The head wound doesn’t look too bad,” Peter murmurs, “but there’s no way to tell how serious it is.” He’s well aware of how dangerous head wounds could be for humans, and he swallows down the stabbing fear that thought sends through him.
“Help me roll him, carefully, so we can check his back,” Chris says. They work together to roll him onto his less injured side, towards Peter, so that Chris can see his back. Thankfully there seem to be fewer injuries here, though the blood drying across his skin makes it hard to tell. Before he can wipe that off, though, their attention is caught by the dull glow coming from the skin just below the nape of his neck, obscured by more blood. Chris and Peter meet each other’s eyes silently, a shared question between them, before Chris carefully uses the towel to wipe it away.
Chris falls back on his ass at what he finds, Peter’s grip tightening on the boy almost to the point of injuring him as he stares in shock.
The glow is similar to the way their soulmarks had lit up, this mark similarly sunk into his skin. But unlike the matching soulmarks on their wrists, distinct from everyone else in the world, this mark is instantly recognizable. This is a mark they never expected to see in person.
Right over the first knob of his spine lays a design that is vaguely reminiscent of a bullseye, if a bullseye were made up of over a dozen thin rings. Extending from the outermost circle are what look like the squiggly lines of an illustrated sun’s rays, but Peter and Chris know they aren’t sun’s rays.
They’re roots.
Their unknown mate has the mark of a Nemeton on his spine.
And a glowing mark of a Nemeton could only mean one thing: their mate…is a Spark.
Swallowing down the myriad of emotions he has at this revelation, Chris returns to cleaning off the rest of his back. There are five deep puncture wounds sunk into the back of his shoulder and Peter snarls low in the back of his throat, baring his fangs, when he sees the bite on his side. At least, being a Spark, they know it doesn’t matter whether or not the bite came from an Alpha; their mate couldn’t turn.
Chris disinfects and cleans out both wounds while Peter removes the rest of his clothes, leaving him only in his boxers. They need to check his legs for wounds, and there’s no use leaving him in blood-soaked muddy clothing. They wouldn’t remove his underwear without him conscious enough to give permission, but they’d clean him off as best they can before making him comfortable. The only significant injury they find is what is most likely a badly twisted ankle.
Peter takes away the first aid kit and dirtied towels once they’re sure there’s no more wounds to treat, leaving the painkillers so they could offer them to their mate when he wakes. He comes back with two damp cloths and an ice pack, and together they carefully run the cloths over their mate’s body, removing any last traces of blood, sweat, and mud. They do so silently, unsure how to break the silence and focusing on the task at hand to avoid facing the implications of the situation.
When they have him settled in the middle of their bed, as comfortable as they can make him beneath the covers, Peter and Chris stand at the end of the bed, staring at him.
“We have another soulmate,” Peter states blankly. Chris hums in acknowledgement, nodding his head.
“So it would seem,” he says. His voice is even, but he knows Peter can hear his racing heartbeat. Peter’s hand slips into his own and their fingers weave together without thought, a gesture done a thousand times.
“Our soulmate is a Spark,” Peter says, incredulity twisting his features as he says it. Chris nods again, eyes locked on their mate’s face. He looks startlingly young with the covers pulled up to his chin and sleep softening his features. It makes Chris’s heart squeeze uneasily.
“A Spark that seems to be in some sort of trouble,” Chris murmurs. They finally meet each other’s eyes, concern flitting across their features before a look of determination comes over Peter’s face.
“Well, clearly magic brought him to us for a reason,” Peter says firmly, squeezing Chris’s hand. “We’ll just have to handle it.”
“Of course,” Chris nods. After all, he’s sure they’ve dealt with worse before. With Peter at his side and their pack at their back, Chris knows they can handle whatever’s coming their way.
Together.