Neal Caffrey || Log || September/October Catch-All

[conning]

Who: Neal and OTA/some for existing CR
When: September/October Catch-All (with one backdated August thing)
Where: ALL OVER ZE PLACE
Summary: SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER CATCH-ALL. Neal being bovvered by the sleep stuff and rescuing people/needing rescue, Evil Twin TDM prompts, sleepwalking after his murdered adoptive aunt, painting at Bonnie's, a couple of SOL prompts, DEATH BREAAAD both lead-up and hypersensitivity, some talk about mental health.
Warnings: HORROR STUFF.... Awful deaths, possibly drowning, murder of loved ones, gun violence, suicidal ideation, some ableism might crop up in the mental health threads. Toplevels will be labeled with likely subjects.

Prompts TBA below as they're finished! Feel free to PM me or message me at researchboner on plurk for specific prompts or with questions.

Comments

[conning]

He smiles faintly, giving Malcolm's skin a light pinch. "Ooh, it bites. Sexy."

[abrightboy]

"I didn't say you could touch me," Malcolm says, walking away from him to put the kettle on.

cw dubious consent, EMPHASIS ON THE DUBIOUS

[conning]

Neal steps after him, wrapping one arm around Malcolm's waist to pull him close. "I didn't say you could leave."

[abrightboy]

"Get off of me," Malcolm tells him in a low voice.

[conning]

“Or what,” he says quietly, kissing the back of Malcolm’s neck with exquisite tenderness.

[abrightboy]

His lips feel like Neal’s lips, but he’s skincrawlingly aware that they’re not.

“Or I’ll have to do something you’ll regret.”

[conning]

“But you won’t? That hurts me, truly.”

The last words are a murmur in Malcolm’s ear before the faux-Neal lets go. “You’re showing a bit of that Whitly fortitude.”

[abrightboy]

“And you don’t want to test it,” Malcolm notes, turning to look at him. “Smart.”

[conning]

He’s not sure how it happened so quickly, but he’s fairly positive the jig is up. Faux-Neal sighs, leaning the small of his back against the counter and crossing his arms.

“I suppose it was too much to hope that his sappiness wouldn’t win you back over.”

[abrightboy]

“Whose sappiness, Neal?” Malcolm asks bluntly.

[conning]

He tilts his head and gives a dismissive wave. “The one who came before me. The one who doesn’t really get how far he can make people go for him if he wants to.”

He won’t call that first version by his name. “How about we call him Danny? For the sake of differentiation.”

[abrightboy]

Malcolm thinks Neal knows exactly how far he could get people to go if he wanted, but he’s not that man.

“I don’t know who you’re talking about. Before you, I wasn’t with anyone. Not for a while.”

[conning]

Faux-Neal lets his hands fall, takes a step forward. Traces his fingertips through the air next to Malcolm’s face, sensually close without actually touching the other man.

“No. Not for a long while. Lost, lonely Malcolm Whitly and lying, desperate Danny Brooks. You two deserve each other, honestly.”

[abrightboy]

“Finally, we agree on something,” Malcolm tells him, filing the information without reacting to it.

Stick to the plan. Neal will be here soon.

“What do you get out of this?”

[conning]

“To be,” he says simply. “To be him. To be what he could be.”

He hovers his fingertips closer by fractions until he touches Malcolm’s face. “Go ahead. Make me regret it. You know you want to.”

The front door bangs open and Neal bursts inside, but faux-Neal doesn’t turn around.

[abrightboy]

“You want me to want to,” Malcolm acknowledges. “You get something from that. But whatever you’re ‘being’, it’s not him,” he says, watching for Neal from the corner of his eye when he hears the door, but not turning away.

[conning]

Neal’s stomach drops into some dark pit and keeps falling as he sees the stranger, himself, with a hand pressed now again Malcolm’s cheek.

“Get away from him,” Neal snaps, taking several steps closer and stopping in sudden paranoia that if he gets too close—he’s not sure what he’s afraid of. “You don’t have any right to even be here.”

“I have every right.” Faux-Neal runs a fingertip down to the point of Malcolm’s chin, eyes still on Malcolm’s face.

Neal takes another little step forward. “Don’t fucking touch him.”

To Malcolm he says, “Are you okay?”

[abrightboy]

“I’m okay,” Malcolm tells him matter-of-factly. This being not actually being Neal took away all the power he had over Malcolm. Malcolm really is fine. “We were talking about what he gets out of this. He likes your brain. He wishes he had a soul to match.”

[conning]

The faux-Neal chuckles, and Neal’s skin pebbles with goosebumps at the sound of his own voice.

“I don’t need his soul. I’m well able to take this life and do a much better job with it.”

“Get away from him,” Neal says again, jerking forward finally and grabbing the thing’s arm.

Faux-Neal tangles his hand into Malcolm’s hair and grips. Neal freezes, and the imposter gives him a pitying glance that makes his skin crawl.

“You aren’t equipped for the kind of violence this world requires, Danny.”

Neal pales, his hold loosening a little bit. “How do…”

“I’m you, but better, remember?”

[abrightboy]

Malcolm arrived with a knife in his hand and he keeps it in the back of his closet.

But not today, because he knew they were going to have an unwanted guest. Today, he's tucked it into the waist of his jeans, under his sweater.

He's being held by his hair, looking unruffled by that, all things considered. Unruffled as the knife slips deftly out from under his sweater while the creature's attention is on Neal, to find its tip digging lightly - for now - into the space between not!Neal's ribs, hand steady as a statue. It's large and serrated and ugly. It's mean, even for a weapon.

"That's what I like about him," Malcolm informs the creature mildly. "He's good. Not like us. He's the one that's better."

[conning]

"This is where we could engage in a philosophical discussion of subjective and objective value," Faux-Neal says, his grip tightening a little at the prick of the blade through his clothes and into skin. "If I felt like you had the moral flexibility required."

"Malcolm," Neal whispers, his own eyes huge. There's so much to say, so much to respond to, but what he says is, "You're good."

The Faux-Neal lets go of Malcolm's and tries to step back, away from the knife, free of Neal's grip. "Let's talk. All three of us."

[abrightboy]

"Don't move," Malcolm tells the creature, keeping the knife pressed a little more firmly between his ribs. "You can talk from right there. Sitting and drinking tea is for guests. You're an invader."

He gives Neal a sidelong glance so he doesn't lose sight of the thing that isn't Neal.

Good people don't pack knives on the off chance they have to stab an intruder in their kitchen, Neal.

[conning]

Neal looks from Malcolm to the thing and back again. It takes its eyes off Malcolm to look at Neal, though Neal knows better than to think this imitation isn't acutely aware of Malcolm's physical position.

"Are you going to let your boyfriend stab someone, Danny? You know it'll mess him up. More."

"That isn't my name," he grits out.

The Faux-Neal waves one hand in a 'more or less' gesture. "It kind of is."

Neal glances at Malcolm, at the knife, at his own smug face. Even though he knew there would be a confrontation, there would be some kind of negative result from this, it didn't click in his head that it could be violent. He thought they'd arrest this thing, somehow. Turn it over to ADI. That doesn't guarantee it won't get away, but it's alive. It's as alive as Jeff, isn't it?

He tentatively steps forward, touches the back of Malcolm's wrist. "We don't--we can figure this out. We figure everything out."

The Thing That Isn't Neal moves fast. Too fast. There's a butcher's block of knives on the kitchen counter. It snatches one with a particularly keen edge and swings an arm up and around Neal's neck, yanking him back and resting the blade along his jaw under one ear. "You really aren't meant for this place, Danny-boy. Let me help you."

[abrightboy]

"And then what?" Malcolm asks. "You'll cut his throat and then I'll gut you until you wish you were dead. And then what?"

[conning]

"Or," the un-Neal counters. "I let him go and we talk like civilized people."

Neal, for his part, stays very very still.