[devils den] stumble through the wreckage, rusted from the rain. [jude part 1]

there's nothin' left to salvage, no one left to blame.

Things had been rough lately, he was an initiate, a recruit and nothing more and he was having a hard time getting right with that. For so long Darren had grown used to being the big fish of his tiny pond and now he was nothing but shark bait. And training wasn't exactly a piece of cake, it was a lot harder than he thought it was going to be. So when he was finally given time to step away and join the others in the Den upstairs Darren pretty much jumped at the opportunity. He knew, in the back of his mind, that they were making him better, that one day if he played his cards right he might just be able to be part of the notorious Nightmare League, so it was worth it. He just had to keep his head down and do his job long enough to get there.

That was the hard part.

As he ascended back to civilization he moved for the bar first. He needed a drink, desperately. He took a seat at the bar next to a fellow recruit and promptly ordered a Devil's Ale. Darren had been pushed into this but it was his own fault and that made it all that much worse. He had too many gambling debts and eventually they sent someone to collect. Darren didn't have the sickles and now he was here, in service to Grisha and by extension the big boss man himself. It was hard to consider yourself a slave to an organization, even if the machine was one like this.

Just as he finished off his beer, poised to order another, the recruit next to him started talking and Darren followed him toward the job board. They couldn't take the job, or at least he thought he couldn't, and he made a mental note to ask Grisha about it later but they could look. One day this would be their bread and butter and Darren assumed it was a wise choice to get acclimated with it. The two began to talk about the training they were going through, about what they hated and what they liked, both obviously needing to vent a little. Darren wasn't the type to make friends exactly, but he saw uses in everyone, so he replied.

"So we have to live here like students when she gets to come and go as she pleases? She's just as new as the rest of us." He said in a hushed tone, but not so much that Jude wouldn't of been able to hear as they passed him by. After spending more than a handful of years at Hogwarts with Jules the wizard was still wrapping his head around the fact that at the den she was a he and his name was Jude. It wasn't that he much cared one way or the other, he just hadn't gotten used to it yet, regardless of how insulting it might of seemed to the Potioneer. He was in the league, not a recruit, but from what Darren had heard Jude's origin story wasn't too different from his own and he was maybe a little bit jealous.

@Jude Blythe @Niska Zukov

Given the fact that he hadn't wanted to do this in the first place, Jude was actually loving his experience in the Nightmare League. He'd never really seen himself as a Criminal type, certainly not a 'Dark Wizard', but somehow the Den and the empire that lay beneath it had become familiar and... homely. In fact, he felt more at ease here than he ever had anywhere. Here, he could be himself. Here, he was Jude. No-one cared that he'd been born with a certain set of genitalia, no-one cared that his voice was high, he wasn't tall enough and his face slightly too feminine. He was accepted as a he. As Jude. Every night he marveled at it. At how easy it felt. At how right. He'd been called he before, but always when hiding behind another face. It was his Polyjuice addiction that had gotten him into this situation, and yet now he needed the potion less and less. He was getting more and more comfortable in his own skin.

The sense of belonging made him work hard. Before he might have toed the line, done the bare minimum required to pay off his debt, but as he felt so at home in Oogie's empire, he wanted to participate fully. He was getting time off of his brewing lengths, doubling up potions, multi-tasking more than ever. Experimenting too. Oh if Noemi could see what her young apprentice was up to out of sight. Jude was pushing the boundaries of his capabilities. When he wasn't working for Noemi, or brewing for Oogie, he found himself lingering in the corner of Bertram's lab, watching the potion's master work. Bertram didn't seem to mind, so long as he kept absolutely silent, which Jude did. Only the soft scribbling of a pencil against paper announced the young potioneer's presence as he took copious notes. Sometimes he felt a little guilty that he was 'cheating' on Noemi. Sometimes, he felt a lot guilty. But with Jude his fascination with the subject and his own career always came first. He wanted to succeed. He wanted to learn.

With a nearly-full notebook tucked under one arm, Jude came up from the lower levels, making his way through the bar. Usually, he didn't stop for a drink - he very rarely had time to spare in his double-life - but tonight he slowed his pace, eying the bar and considering it. He'd made good time on his tasks this evening, and already completed his work for Noemi earlier in the day. Perhaps he could relax for just a few minutes.

But he was distracted from his decision as a familiar voice pulled him from his thoughts and instantly shattered his good mood. He turned to eye the voice's owner, although he already knew who it was. Hadditch. The eldest one. Jude knew the boy, or rather the man, very well, as did all Hogwarts alumni of their age. Darren and Ryan had cut a name for themselves at the school. They'd been infamous. Truly feared, even by Jude himself. These days, Darren was at the bottom of the ladder though. Some kind of lackey to Grisha. A nobody. How the tables turned.

He knew that Darren didn't mean anything by the incorrect pronoun... or indeed by the shady comment. He was just frustrated. Jude got misgendered all the time. He was used to it. But this time it really hit a nerve. The Devil's Den was his haven. His safe place. The one place in the entire world where he could live out his life authentically. The single place where he could truly be himself and not worry about having to force a certain role, put on a mask and pretend. With a single word - she - Darren had shattered that haven. He'd inadvertently outed Jude. He'd made him feel vulnerable again and that vulnerability woke up a carnal, deep-seated anger and need to lash out.

Jude's lips curled into a nasty snarl immediately, not really thinking through the consequences before speaking. "Well perhaps, if you had some kind of worthwhile talent or skill, you wouldn't be languishing at the bottom of the heap. Too bad mindless thugs are ten-a-penny here, huh Hadditch?"

sprry I took forever Sammalicious, I really hope you still want this plot x.x