Chapter Text
It's been a whole month since turning back time. And to be honest? Besides the added trauma of knowing that the world was about to collapse in four weeks from now, of which he would like to prevent as soon as possible please and thank you, nothing changed much. Between those days, he was… busy. Gathering proof of the GIW’s existence and their fuck ups, finishing up his work and all that.
The upside was that he could barely feel the cores staying nice and snug next to his soul. Sure, the ectoplasm shots were godawful, but he felt that it was a pretty good trade for the deal. Another bonus was that messing around with time gave him a fairly detailed sense of how bad or good something would go, which made his life easier because he had to clear up his schedules before even touching that can of worms that was the Guys In White- GIW, idiot extraordinaire, whatever -with a ten foot pole, goddamnit.
If he felt guilty for dragging this out, well, he didn't even give himself a second to process everything anyways. Hell, the JLD members knew that he often bounced in between dimensions and as such, wouldn't bat an eye if he mysteriously fell off the face of the Earth for only a few weeks. Make a call to inform them about his blackout mission, bada bing bada boom, he could do whatever he wanted.
Finishing up the spell he made to banish another demon in a desolated warehouse, John sighed as he dusted his hands off of his trousers and stood back, stretching to loosen the sore muscles. Finally, he got three months’ worth of work done, even if it seemed impossible to do. Time abilities were handy. It should give him enough time to prepare for the downfall of those scientist wannabes at least.
Speaking of, how would he break the news to the league again?
___________________
Teleporting to the Watchtower was the same as always. Monthly-ish meet-ups were the worst, if only for the length of every single one he attended. It helped that he had a good memory, and so he could give a guess for how this meeting went. It did not help knowing that this one went terribly dull, and he was starting to feel the effects of his contract. Apparently, getting ‘emotional outbursts’ was a fancy way of saying mood swings, combine it with nausea and fatigue and he nearly regretted all decisions he took. For example, right this moment, in this meeting that he could have avoided by sending an email.
Wait. John stopped in his tracks, his hand pausing from rubbing his forehead. Why couldn't he just send a mail with all of the proof instead of having to drag his ass all the way up here? Oh wait, he did. And he would still have to deal with this. Groaning internally, he lamented the fact that it was too late to change his mind. He really was not looking forward to it.
Unfortunately, despite knowing that he would probably explode somewhere down the line, he couldn't not go to this meeting without a reason. There would be questions raised since they knew he wasn't at work- he already pulled the blackout mission card once -and Zatara would not stop bothering him until he caved and he didn't want to talk about, well, everything that had or hadn't happened. He also needed to inform the league about the GIW in person for credibility still, which, ugh.
Today was a full-ish one, too. He saw Clark peering over Batman's shoulder, Diana to the side chatting with Stewart, Roy cleaning his arrows and exchanging quips with Nightwing (seriously, he wouldn't call a guy Dick all the time). None of the Bats except for the big guy and his eldest attended, although he did see some from their groups like Cyborg- Victor -and Superboy. Captain Marvel the child and a few more he either didn't remember or didn't notice were present, too. He was kinda glad the Martians weren't here, though, the thought of any one of them knowing about his contract (and the future that was undid) made his stomach lurch. He took out the flask in his pocket and sipped the Gaviscon like he often did alcohol.
God, what he wouldn't fucking do for a swig of that sweet, sweet elixir right now. Or even coffee for that matter. Instead, he had to settle for cups of measly watered down green tea in an attempt to soothe the horrible heartburns, which, without fail, ended up with him clutching his toilet seat like a lifeline every morning when he woke up. Not ideal. He was fairly sure the gods loved to watch his misery if his past relationships with them were anything to go by, and he was 100% sure they decided to make his day even worse. To be fair, it was old news, but still.
Sitting down in the meeting room and watching Barry bicker with Zatara, John could feel his migraine from a mile away. You'd think by now, that he'd get over it, that everything would be easier, but a month wasn't nearly enough to negate his withdrawal even with his ability to speed up time in his body. Sometimes he would reach into his coat pocket to realize that no, he couldn't smoke, then he'd take the flask out of another just to register artificial butterscotch on his tongue, (which he enchanted it to taste like alcohol, except ectoplasm and magic didn't mix in his body because why not) then remembered he couldn't have that either.
In summary, he was having a shitty day, he couldn't drink or smoke, his stomach was doing flips and he sensed an impending headache.
He was running thin on patience. When was this over? A glance at the clock told him another hour. He sighed, frustration bubbling up his throat, oh so close to the verge of popping like a balloon.
He swallowed it down along with the stomach acid and said nothing. In the corner of his eyes, he could make out Captain Marvel- Billy's and Zatara’s concern, agitating him a bit further because he could now get overwhelmed by fucking people's emotions, what a blessing the world had bestowed upon him.
“Constantine.” Batman called him, broody as ever. As the last person to be called (as he predicted), he gave a few reports for his works, ignoring his finished projects as he always did. He thought he was done with the usual stuff and reached for his thumb drive in his pocket, but apparently not since he caught an incredibly subtle eye narrowing in the Bat’s expression - and a spike of paranoia in his emotions. He knew what happened next wouldn't be pleasant and raised his metaphorical guard. “Any updates regarding the Death's Servant cult?” And there it was.
Despite having mentally braced himself for it, the tone alone somehow made John's composure immediately crumble like a sandcastle getting ran over by a wave. That was the one case that he only needed to observe and do the cleanup, and now he wanted to know the update? Fuck him, did he even read the report sent to the business email? The one which he could have read instead of calling for this, frankly, fucking useless meeting? Of course he didn't, who was he kidding, the guy was Batman for fuck's sake.
John scowled and crossed his arms. He would feel like a petulant, stubborn child if he had the ability to think past the migraine pounding in his head and his elevated emotions. He was having a shitty day, sue him. “No.”
“No?”
“No. Everything's done, it's just a waiting game from now on if you can fucking read the report I sent. I have a fuck ton of other things to do rather than acting as a watcher for six months, y’know.”
Batman didn't frown, in fact, he'd never even seen his expression change drastically while in the cowl except for in the past (or was it the future? And it was in the middle of fire and ash and smoke don't think about it don't think about it don't), but John's worked with him for long enough that he knew what the guy was thinking through micro-expressions. Sometimes. Combined with the additional emotion-reading ability, he now knew that the Bat asshat was displeased.
“And what is this ‘thing’ you have to do? How is it potentially more dangerous than letting a cult endanger the world-”
“I had it handled, okay? That one was fine, this one I'm working on is more important.” John snapped. He knew he was digging himself a hole whenever he opened his mouth, and he was being unreasonable, and he was getting looks, but he couldn't stop getting deeper and deeper with his seemingly endless pit of directionless anger welling up to burst inside him. He slumped into his chair, ignoring how it dug into his back. “You don't have to work y’self up so much about it.”
“I am not ‘working myself up’, I'm asking you how this case is done when you refuse to elaborate. You are being unreasonable-”
Oh, oh that's it. He could practically hear the sound of what was left of his patience snapping like a particularly thin rubber band. No, fuck this, fuck all of this, he couldn't stand it a minute longer when no one was willing to listen and trust that he had it handled. John stood up abruptly and slammed his hands on the table, making his chair clatter to the ground. Everyone tensed up.
“Fuck you!” He snarled, pointing at the Bat. “If you've read the report like a fucking sensible person then you'd know that this cult is getting disbanded! And that a branch of the fucking government has found a hole to worm their ass out of the Meta Protection Acts by fucking around with magic and inhumane science and we don't even fucking know-”
“Constantine.”
He ground his teeth, looking ready to explode, “And it's what I'm investigating and I was just going to tell you that, thank you very fucking much for asking in such a polite way, I appreciate that you think of me so highly-”
“Constantine– John.”
“Then again, you wouldn't be asking me that if you don't have a stick shoved so far up your fucking pompous ass-”
“John!”
“What?” He snapped towards the voice. It was Billy. Oh damn. He'd have to apologize later when he cooled off.
“You- you need to calm down, John.” He sounded worried and he looked a little scared and- oh, since when was everyone looking at him?
John took a breath, then exhaled, ignoring how his breath stuttered halfway through and was that tears in his eyes? Fuck him hard with a pogo stick and a chainsaw, was he crying over this? Really? After all this time, was this the one to push him over the edge? He righted his chair. “I need a break,” he declared and promptly left the room.
___________________
All of the heroes present stared at the door from which Constantine went through.
“That was… something.” Barry commented.
Bruce grunted in a tone that Clark had long since associated with ‘I'm concerned about him but I'm disappointed at his behavior’, and he had to agree. Not the ‘I'm disappointed’ part, that man wasn't one of Bruce's or his kid or anything. Constantine was a bit unpleasant to work with, that he did have to admit, but the way he acted was unusual. This incident was the first time he had ever seen John furious, near tears even. Did he often get frustrated with Bruce being his emotional constipated self? Yes. Sometimes it even became a, well, fairly hostile conversation, although they normally tried to keep things professional. Mostly from Bruce's part. But to the point of full on snapping? Something must've happened for him to react like that. To put it simply, he was a little concerned.
“Alright, let's take a break,” Bruce let out an exasperated sigh and massaged his temples. “We'll discuss this later.” People in the room dispersed quickly, chatter filling the air.
Clark also stood up and made his way to the door, ears tuning into the magic user's irregular heartbeat as he followed the sound. He found John sitting in a corner of the small cafeteria they had on the Watchtower and eating- was that a bar of Kitkat dipped in barbeque sauce? A sniff told him there was some lemon juice squeezed on too. He raised an eyebrow, keeping an eye on the little plastic cups that held the sauce and a box of wings laid forgotten on the side. He scanned them all judgmentally, stopping at the flask that John usually had alcohol in that sat right next to the discarded box. “What are you eating?”
The man whipped his head up as if he didn't hear him until now, eyes widening to make an admittedly accurate impression of a deer in headlights. Seriously, for a magician so skillful, this man had the spatial awareness of a mole, which was to say next to none. Another point for weird behavior.
“Uh. I was craving it?”
They stared at each other for an uncomfortable amount of time, both stuck with various degrees of surprise. He watched in real time as John's face took up a bright shade of red in a few seconds.
Finally, John huffed, still looking embarrassed. “It's just a candy bar, don't be so prissy. You a cop or something?”
Clark's brow climbed higher. “With barbeque sauce.”
“Yeah.”
“And lemon juice.”
“What about it?” He snapped, now looking irritated. “Didya came here to do anything else rather than seeing if my food is up to your rich guy standards?”
The Kryptonian raised his hands in a placating manner, smiling calmly all the while. “Relax, I'm not judging you.” Not judging too hard, he didn't say. “I'm just a bit put-off that your eating habits and attitude seem to have changed suddenly. For the weirder I might add.”
The other bristled. Clark could hear how his heart beat faster, his breath hitched and his shoulders tensed up as if readying for a fight. The man was- scared? No, wary. He was hiding something. John glared, borderlining on defensive and hissed, “Well it's not your fucking business, is it? Sod off.”
“Okay okay, no need to get all prickly, I'm going,” Clark backed out slowly with his arms still in the air. “Just, are you okay? I'm worried.” He asked when he was at the door. The reply was slightly choked up, he only heard a small “Yeah.” He looked back. John had gone back to his abomination of a snack, his position now curled up as he stared at the boxes. Before retreating, Clark watched as the man reached for his flask, took a sip then grimaced. His mouth twitched to a frown.
Yeah, something’s definitely up.
___________________
That break and stress eating definitely helped in cooling him down, John mused. And maybe Superman being all worried about him, he had the slightly puffy eyes to prove it. His heartburn also reduced, to the point that he'd say with a hopeful attitude that things might be turning out for the better. He took another nausea-reducing sip from the flask just in case. It helped a little, albeit not enough to erase the feeling of his stomach doing flips in his body.
Now that he'd settled down comfortably in his chair, he felt stable enough to deal with this hour. Well, not exactly stable, more like patient enough with the JLA for the rest of the time to go peacefully instead of ending in a screaming match.
It was a bit awkward when he got a few stares for his outburst earlier, though. He could feel the prickle from the others eyeing him subtly, and it made him itch. It was fine, he kinda deserved that. That reminded him, he should probably warn Billy before notifying them about the GIW.
Batman, though, was looking at him without any of that ‘subtle’ shit. John's face tried (and mostly failed) to seem unreadable and not react to the amount of scrutiny that he could only describe as uncomfortable. “You said an unknown organization orchestrated by the USA administrators bypassed the Meta Protection Acts?”
John's mouth dried. Okay, okay okay, keep calm, this was happening, guess he was doing this, keep calm. Fuck, did the Bat have to spring this up on him like that? Feeling lightheaded again, he fiddled with the thumb drive full of evidence that he painstakingly collected between his errands in his pocket as he stood up. He sent a warning to Billy telepathically with a spell as he made his way to the front.
Shoving the drive into the projector, he took a deep breath and started to recount in detail of the GIW's wrongdoings, of how they worked around the Acts by burying the documents for the Anti-ecto Acts in a mundane, approve all kind of paperwork during Lex's time as president to enact unethical experiments on beings that could classify as ‘meta’, but instead called ‘ecto-entities’. He even added some pictures from the files he stole and the experiments themselves to really sell the point. The magic user had successfully sneaked in the only facility they built a few days ago– those guys were absurdly incompetent in some places –and what he found was… disturbing, to say the least.
It helped a little that the after-effects of the contract hadn't started when he tried to rescue some of them by untying the straps and shoving their organs back to the body. He lost his breakfast after he got home nonetheless. No one would be able to stand still when seeing something like that happened unless they were a heartless monster which, totally accurate considering he saw the “scientist’s” expressions. Curiosity, delight, fascination, none of them felt an ounce of unease they were supposed to feel when vivisecting live people. Unluckily, he could only save a few of them before he had run out of time.
Safe to say, everyone's faces were stuck on looking either horrified, faint or murderous, or a mix of the three by the time he was done. At least Batman stopped paying attention to him. He staggered as people raised their voices, bombarded with foreign emotions from all directions. That was not good, he was sure his nausea would get the best of him sooner the longer he had to stay here. Recalling the image of the ones in surgical outfits vivisecting the sentient beings, the people in there with glee was not doing him or his stomach any good, even if their blood was green. It might have even made things worse.
“Do with that what you will, but we'll need a full team for backup and extraction if we want them out.” John managed to croak out before he nausea consumed him.
Yeah, he needed something to cope with that added trauma, preferably alcohol. Or a smoke. He tried to recreate some breathing exercises he knew so that his breathing didn't come out as fast. It was fine, he did his part. He would be left alone for a few months. There was nothing to worry about. The burning rose up his throat steadily despite his self reassurance and ohhh fuck, his brain didn't agree with him. Fuuuck, the floor was spinning more than normal. Would he have time to get to the bathroom? He doubted he could perform any kind of magic in this state. It was like a concussion, but so much worse. Emotions were roaring inside him, clashing with one another and his chest burned.
Fuck, he was gonna be sick. Warning
“Fuck, I'm gonna be sick.”
In an instant, a trashcan was pushed into his hands. He took that as his cue and doubled over, retching into the bin as all of what he ate that day poured out into a disgusting mess. Somebody's hand was rubbing his back in a small circle, making repetitive, soothing motions as he emptied his stomach. It felt pretty nice, actually.
The heaving session finally came to a head after a few minutes and he found his insides settle down as he spit the last of his breakfast and bile out.
End
He blearily lifted his head. Barry was standing in front of him, shuffling nervously with a bottle of water and a box of tissues in his arms. “Thanks,” John took the tissues to wipe sweat, vomit and tears off his face. B-man the shadow was standing off the side, facing him. Wait. If Barry was there, did that mean Bruce's- Batman's hand was on his back? Well shite, it's official. This meeting became the worst one he ever came to. What was his life?
“Thanks?” He hesitantly said to the bat, but his uncertainty made it sound like a question. The man himself grunted and went to sit back down instead of giving a reply. That suited him.
John absently took the bottle and drank half of it to clear his mouth of the taste, ignoring the grimace on the face of the other members. Barry vanished with the trashcan and reappeared not a second later, putting the bin back in his lap just in case.
“So.” There was an awkward pause, everyone looking unsure how to proceed. John sighed, but he couldn't blame them. A lot had happened in a few hours, and it had mostly been his fault. “Can we discuss what to do later? I don't really want to deal with this.”
Silence. Then, “Meeting adjourned."
Thanks, Batman.