Journal of Mistress Kat

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Title: Eye of the Beholder
Author: kat_lair 
Fandom:  Cobra Starship
Pairing: Victoria Asher/Ryland Blackinton/Nate Novarro/Gabe Saporta/Alex Suarez
Tags: Spooktober, Ficlet, Alternative Universe - Creatures & Monsters
Rating: T
Word count: 598

Summary: The fundamental mistake most people make is to assume they can recognise a monster by sight, by its appearances.

Author notes: Spooktober 2024, Day 8/31. Prompt/theme: Monster.

Eye of the Beholder on AO3


The fundamental mistake most people make is to assume they can recognise a monster by sight, by its appearances. Guess Gabe has centuries of folklore and good old-fashioned prejudice to thank for that, tales of hooked-nosed wart-covered witches, hump-backed outcasts, signs of the devil manifesting in extra digits and large birthmarks, as if evil was somehow as inherent as the arbitrary shuffle and mutation of genes that dictate the shape of people’s bodies.

It's all deeply unfair, of course, and if Gabe was a better man he might even feel bad for all the perfectly kind pro-social people weighed down by the constant suspicion and disgust, judged on their looks and looks alone. As it is, he’s mostly just amused and a little grateful. After all, all that petty, shallow intolerance makes it easier for him to hide.

And to find others like him.

Vicky-T is the first. He finds her in a greasy spoon fifty miles outside L.A., wearing cherry-red lipstick and eating a – you guessed it – cherry pie. There’s dried blood under her nails, which Gabe tastes in the air with the first flick of his tongue. He sits opposite her, offers to lick her plate clean when she’s finished. She looks at him for a long time, her pupils bleeding dark, and offers him her fingers instead.

Alex and Ryland come as a pair, playing on stage in one of the rougher blues bars of New York, weaving their web with clever fingers and pretty notes, gobbling up anyone who gets caught, rich, poor, beautiful and ugly alike. Refreshingly egalitarian really, all things considered.

“I like them,” Vicky says, a thick glass of bourbon dangling off her fingers.

Gabe doesn’t know about liking yet, but he does know he wants them. And that’s that, really. When Gabe wants something, he gets it.

“We got you,” Ryland says, two hours later when Gabe is hanging upside down in an alleyway, Alex’s guitar pick pressed against his cornea, Vicky’s laughter bouncing off the brick walls like an echo of a bad dream.

“Oh, you do,” Gabe agree easily, because the two truths are not mutually exclusive. What a lovely group Gabe is collecting, beautiful on the outside, terrible and terribly beautiful on the inside too, at least by Gabe’s standards.

They don’t find Nate, Nate finds them. Hunts them down might be a more accurate description of the cat and mouse, snake and mongoose game of chase they play across state lines and time zones. The four of them scatter in the four winds and Gabe is not surprised when it’s him Nate chooses to follow.

“You’re a hard man to find,” Nate says when Gabe finally allows him to catch up, sliding into a booth opposite.

“Bold of you to assume I’m a man at all,” Gabe replies.

“Oh.” Nate’s eyebrows go up, but it looks fake, and Gabe doubts he’s actually surprised. “Even better then.” He offers his hand to shake across the table, his nails neatly trimmed and deep blue, his grin sharp and his teeth sharper, his face so very, very beautiful, like Gabe’s own.

Gabe leans over and kisses him instead, a chaste brush of lips, a taste of things to come. “Welcome,” he says. “Let’s gather the rest of them up and have some fun, eh?”

Gabe doesn’t know what a collective of monsters is called. A legion? A horde? A slew, a storm, a savaging? Or perhaps it should be something that leans into their beauty. A radiance of monsters. A gleam.

Or maybe just… A family. It fits.

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