salvation [rafe x barry]

natural born killer

"It's just murder, man. All God's creatures do it. You look in the forests and you see species killing other species, our species killing all species including the forests, and we just call it industry, not murder."

Rafe didn't particularly like nature. He never did. Nature was cruel, because in nature, there was no money, no mansions or white walls, separating Rafe from the rest of the world. In nature, the weeds grew wild and weren't cut clean like the lawn at the golf club. The water wasn't still and tempered like in his pool, it was untamed and hungry for human life, waves crushing down with loud roars that reminded Rafe of the wild life documentaries he'd watch at 5am in the morning when he would come home after a party and couldn't sleep from all the coke. Lions making that breathtaking sound from the bottom of their lungs before jumping at their victims. Sometimes, Rafe had the urge to just scream like that. Sometimes he did. He'd never been a man to control his impulses.

Rafe had grown up in an ultimately tamed world. With fences against the gators, traps against mosquitos, with gardeners trimming the bushes into pretty figures, AC's in every room against the heat, all those man made luxuries. And Rafe always preferred playing inside, with his actions figures and video games instead of going outside, getting himself dirty and scratched.

Nature, to Rafe, was an antonym to control. Nature was chaos. Nature was storms, that scared Rafe when he was a little boy, but Ward had said he was a big boy and he tried to ignore the old building aching under the impact of the wind whistling through its roof, tried to ignore the trees screaming outside as they bend under nature's forces but he was just too scared and sneaked over to his Fathers bedroom on his tip toes in the middle of the night and when he opened the door, Sarah was peacefully sleeping in between Ward and Rose and Rafe had crawled back into his own bed with cold feet and he'd held his mothers scarf as the thunder rumbled over the outer banks.

Rafe didn't use to like nature, because out there, he was no one. Out there, his wealth, his family name, it didn't matter for shit. Nature was just cruel.

And it was funny, because a loving gentle God made this cruel earth. A loving God made a lion kill, a loving God let baby turtles be eaten by birds before they could reach the sea, a loving God made the gators in the swamp around Barry's boat and a loving God made Rafe. And did a lion ask for forgiveness? Did a wolf pray to God after it killed? Did a gator ever say sorry, for his teeth, for his hunger, for the way he was made to be?

Nature wasn't all chill, like everyone always said. Nature was cruel. Nature was killing. And the best part about all of it? It was all according to Gods plan, it was alright. Killing was the way God intended it to be. Killing was just nature.

A lion did not ask for forgiveness. No gator begged for salvation. And neither would Rafe.

God already forgave him, anyways, the second he was born, naturally born to kill, and if God was real, if God had created him, he wouldn't let Rafe get arrested. He'd watch out for him.

Despite the creeping terror of being caught, the pain of leaving his Father, his home, and Barry, Rafe felt a weird sense of peace overwhelm him as Barry steered the boat through the swamps. He thought it was all gonna work out, somehow, he felt protected, by God, fuck, he really felt God watching out for him for the first time and he wanted to tell Barry about it, If he didn't think too, this was all Gods plan, Rafe shooting Peterkin, Barry finding out about it, Rafe failing to kill Sarah, sleeping on Barry's couch instead of home when the cops showed up, all those coincidences, but Barry would've probably asked what Gods goal was then, in the end, what this chain of events was leading up to and Rafe didn't want to say it; us.

Rafe was thinking about Noah's Ark, because God really had let every single animal on this earth onto the saving ship, each one of his creations, had let the bunnies and puppies, but also the lions, wolves and gators. Because God made them, and God loved them, no matter how violent they were deemed. He loved Rafe.

And Rafe had a spot on that Ark too. He thought, that it truly felt like he was on that ship now, while he was in the boat with Barry, because if it was up to Rafe, if the world was ending and a deluge to flood it all, if he were just with Barry on this boat, he'd be with all he loved, he'd be on Noah's ark.

Rafe had been obsessed with control ever since he could think. It was probably because he had so little of it, over his thoughts, his actions, over the way other people felt about him. He wished he could just control it, he could make people love him as easily as it was to get someone to hate you, with brute force and his own fists but it wasn't that easy and Rafe wasn't in control, of anything, really.

With all that, Rafe always disliked the idea of religion, of a higher power, that controlled the world, your every action. The thought of not actually being in control of his own life scared the shit out of Rafe, and he hadn't understood why people would want to believe in such a depressing concept. But oh, he got it now. Not being in control was pretty damn easy. If God was in control of everything, he was in control of Rafe, of Peterkin, of all that happend. And Rafe wasn't to blame.

Clearly, there had been something wrong in Rafes equation though. Surely, killing was natural, but for some reason, God was still mad. For some reason, God wasn't watching out, let Rafe be kissed by Judas, well, Barry and Rafe wasn't forgiven, or redeemed. Rafe wasn't saved.

It was all just fucking bullshit. Or well, maybe God was just like the world he had created, like Nature, like the lion he birthed, the gator he crafted, like Rafe. Was just cruel.

notes
Honestly, I don't think too many of you will enjoy this chapter or even read the whole thing and it's really not relevant to the story but well, it's my fanfic so who cares.
Rafes "killing is nature" speech reminded me a lot of Mickeys "natural born killer" speech in natural born killers, I included it as the quote of the chapter but I also just really recommend you guys to watch natural born killers it's a nice movie. And it's not just the content of the speeches that is similar, the scenes are also set up really similarly so I think it was intentional.
Btw, no offense to my fellow Barry x Rafe writers because this pairing truly has some of the most amazing fics I've ever read and insanely good writers but can we talk about JJ x Rafe fics? Most of them are so extremely well  written it makes me want to quit writing all together lol. Just so thankful to be apart of a fandom with this many talented writers right now, this is incredible.
02/20/2022 | Words: 1001