Coconut Grove everything ends here

They came to say goodbye to the grove this morning. And it would be sorely missed. Bat parted ways with @Tegan for a little bit to roam through the palm trees alone, savoring the salty sea breeze and the feel of sand between her toes. Only a little while later, she rejoined him on the dunes overlooking the water. The coastline still looked strange, the tide further out than ever before, but Bat did her best to ignore it as she rifled through all the good memories they'd made here.

But it was time to go home to their family. "You ready?" Bat asked, throwing a gentle elbow toward Tegan's rib cage before giving in to a sudden urge to smooch his face. "Or maybe we should go out with a bang?" she quipped with a suggestive wiggle of her eyebrows. Perhaps one last tryst here in their happy place, during their last few moments of real privacy.

that had been bat's response to everything lately, though tegan couldn't really say he minded. punny, chirped tegan as he dipped to headbutt her cheek, still standing tentatively off his ankle... though he'd done enough resting it that maybe it was better? maybe he'd only sprained it??? idk. whatever. i'm not a fucking doctor. anyway, he definitely agreed with her that going out with a bang was a good idea. besides, when they got to the firebirds tegan was gonna be way less apt to just like fuck in the open. o m g. imagine. @Finley walks in??? train wreck. absolutely terrible. but hey! at least she known that her son definitely fucks. not that she ever doubted it, maybe. 

anyhoo. 

a little more forcefully, tegan gave her a heavier lil headbutt, paired with a funky lil growl. they were outta this bitch! and he was fully prepared to say goodbye to the ocean, even though it seemed so far away by now. lets get freeeeaky, he said with a waggle of his own brows, tail swinging.

He was on-board, of course. They'd been doing the dirty pretty regularly since that first time and Bat still hadn't gotten over the fact that they were really doing this. Not just bumping uglies. But operating as a real, actual couple. Just thinking that word (which she did just now) sent a little thrill through her, causing her to wriggle joyfully even as he tugged her close.

They were swept up in their coupling, Bat's eyes squeezed shut as she provided quite the soundtrack to their movements, when she picked up on a dull roar in the distance. She ignored it at first, though the noise grew and a tingle (not the pleasant kind) shot up her spine. Bat finally cracked open an eye to squint at their surroundings, both flying open when she panned to her right and saw a colossal wall of water racing toward the shore.

Bat could only stare as Tegan presumably humped away, a hysterical thought flying through her mind: That's not what I meant when I ordered "motion of the ocean."

tegan only stopped for 2 reasons -- 1, bat stopped giving him those 'this is good keep doin what your doin' signs, and 2, he kinda like busted. oh well. they could do it again later. he hadn't really been paying attention to the outside world. consequently, these two things happened at the same time. 

he made a few funky noises that included an attempt at the word, whusupt? but was feeling too hot and heavy in the brain to properly get it out. his head hung, nose in her scruff as he took a deep breath. okay okay. reboot. what's up? he asked more clearly, now just feeling like taking a nap but still very much attached at the junk. 

oh -- wait. she didn't even have to answer that question. tegan felt it in the ground. wait -- what the fuck, he exclaimed, head turning to stair into the ocean. in the distance, tegan saw exactly what bat saw, moving to yank himself from her so they could both RUN -- but instead just yanking her to the ground with her. fuck!! he cursed, trying to unhinge but also about to pull his dick off, what the fuck!! fuck!! holy fucking shit.

Some part of her recognized the telltale slump and what it meant, though Bat could hardly think about that with the shadow of death itself looming over them. The errant thought was still bouncing around her head when Tegan suddenly tried to pull out, only to drag her with him. They fell into a heap on the ground, which shuddered and trembled underneath them. Bat could not have guessed whether it was another earthquake or the tidal wave careening toward them with the force of a locomotive.

Another wild thought flung through her brain: Was the sex really that earth-shattering?! A crazy sounding laugh burst from her lips even as Tegan swore over and over, his voice partially drowned out by the roar rapidly increasing in volume. Her inane outburst faded into the swelling cacophony too.

And then a strange calmness and clarity overcame her as Bat suddenly sobered. We need to run. She assessed the situation in what felt like slow motion. Not only were they still tied together, there was Tegan's ankle to consider. And the sheer size of the incoming wall of water...

An indescribable feeling filled her as the yearling realized they were never going to make it.

why was it moving so fast?! it was HUGE?! things that big weren't allowed to move that fast -- they were supposed to move slowly and they were supposed to have enough time to RUN away!! but tegan knew he probably couldn't even run if he tried. this god damn ankle... fuck!! why was bat laughing? and why wasn't she trying to pull apart?! tegan knew there was no way in HELL she was giving up and accepting this fate -- absolutely no way.

come ON! he hollered, but his voice and his swears were being drown out by the sound of the roaring water that was, by now, starting to cast a shadow on them. as tegan scrambled and pulled he was only being pulled down by bat, who seemed to be accepting the wave in open arms. BAT! he screamed at her, tears rushing down his poor baby face. aw! how sad. but in the same moment, tegan became just as still, staring down at her with a shimmering gaze -- because he was a big fat baby crying right now... his words, not mine.

They were never going to make it but Bat knew they would have to try.

Tegan's cries (and crying) jarred her into action. She ignored the stab of pain as she forcibly separated from him, then surged onto all fours. Bat felt an immense urge to simply bolt, especially as the day appeared to grow dimmer around her as the shadow cast by the wave crept inland. They would never make it but she might have a fighting chance if she dropped him like it's hot and ran like a bat out of hell...

Bat didn't go anywhere. She pressed into Tegan, making sure he had any support he needed for his bum ankle, then began to move forward. They were going painstakingly slowly, though Bat wanted to let Tegan set the pace. She would not leave him behind, not even if it spelled her doom.

That's right: she would literally die before leaving Tegan. #Codependent or #Goals—you decide.

if tegan was another guy, he might've told her to go, run, save yourself -- but this was tegan, and if you expect anything romantic out of him you really haven't been following his threads well enough at all. i mean, the kid is selfish as all get out and had approximately 0 good character development and growth... it's all been downhill. but hey, if you wanna hold out on a miracle happening by the end of the thread i'm not gonna stop you. you're breaking your own heart. 

50000000 thoughts were running through his head right now. for starters, as bat leaned into him, supporting him the best she could, tegan noted how ouchie his man parts were after all that yanking. like... ): not that it would probably matter anyway, but he seriously doubted that bad boy would ever work the same. he was also thinking about how they should've just left earlier instead of dilly dallying around. or maybe they should've left like last week -- or maybe he never should've left in the first place. he was thinking about how he was never gonna see finley again -- or elwood -- or meet any of his probably stinky new siblings. how he'd never get to tell anyone that he'd managed to lock down a bitch. or meet the children he had probably knocked up mariposa with....... or tell bat that he probably had children. jesus christ this was a nightmare. he wished he could just stop thinking and fucking die already. 

the sound was louder, the territory darker, tegan choked on a sob and stopped misstep, grabbing bat's scruff with his teeth and wrapping his forelimbs around her. I LOVE YOU, he yelled directly into her ear -- just in case she couldn't hear it. he wished he would've said it earlier.

he would rather spend his last moments here than frantically running.

They were making steady progress, although every single fur on Bat's body stood on end with the knowledge that there was no way they were outrunning their fate. At least Tegan was beside her, her boyfriend, no... the love of her life. She could've been angry about only being with him officially for so short a time but, in retrospect, they'd been a pair long before Tegan had grown a pair and slapped a label on it.

When he practically tackled her, his silvery forelegs winding around her neck and his voice shouting directly into one of her over-sized ears, Bat gasped reflexively. "Tegan..." In the process of embracing her, he had spun her around so Bat had a perfect view of the tidal wave over his shoulder. Oh my fuck... "I love you too," she screamed back, her voice a shiver and her body trembling as the first drops of water began to mist over them.

In a matter of seconds now, the wave would not only destroy the two of them but their little slice of paradise as well, if not the entire coastline. There was no more running. And Bat didn't want to look death in the face. No, the last thing she wanted to see was Tegan's face. She clung to him hard for a moment, then pulled back just far enough to lock eyes as she mouthed, "With my whole ass."

the whole moment held them as long as it could, he locked eyes with her, his seafoam green gaze almost ironic in the moment. his face, wet with tears and the mist of the ocean broke into a small grin as she mouthed more words to him, but tegan couldn't fucking hear shit. at least towhee's fucking ptero had come in handy somehow. speaking of, tegan hoped she was swallowed by a wave too. 

it was true, it seemed, that right before you died you saw your whole life flash before your eyes. tegan managed to stretch his last few seconds into what felt like an hour -- staring into bat's eyes. it was funny, there were hints of easy and niamh, of fiadh and clover, of finley and elwood, of titmouse, of ceara and colt and raven and quixote and even mariposa -- but as tegan's life flashed before him he realized... it was all bat. 

when he rescued her outside drageda. when he practically stole her from drageda. all of their adventures. all of their talks. the time she'd almost died. the time she left him after she almost died. all of their late night cuddles. when she left again -- on purpose that time. when tegan found her again. when they started their journey together. when they found the grove. when they started to found a pack. when they almost fucked but didn't. then when they did... and every little moment in-between.

his whole life had been bat.

and as the weight of his life crashed down upon him, so did the wave. 

as a silver lining, at least the sheer pressure of the wave would likely kill him before the water could fill his lungs.

In her final moments, Bat's every fiber, sense and thought belonged to Tegan. As the water began to fall harder, like rain but salty, she gripped him again. Her forelegs wound around his neck in a stranglehold as she buried her face into his fur. Bat didn't know whether or not she believed in the afterlife but, wherever they were going, they were going there together.

The tsunami hit the coastline with such tremendous force that, in the beat of a heart, everything went black. Their tangled bodies vanished under thousands of gallons of seawater, as did the whole of Coconut Grove. It wiped every last scrap of Margaritaville off the face of the earth, taking no prisoners and leaving behind nothing but total destruction.