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asphalt-cocktail · 5 years

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Codebreaker- Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Girl in the Chair

Summary: Zero isn’t the absence of value, in fact, Zero is perhaps one of the most valuable people among the ghosts. Being coined their ‘guy in the chair’ meant that Zero was a ghost among ghosts and is only called from her spot in the shadows when she and Four are the only people who haven’t been caught on camera by a large criminal organization.

A/N: What’s up cuties! AC here again, back at it with a brand new series! I’m not going to lie, not a lot happens in this chapter it is really just to establish sort of a background on the characters, get the plot rolling, and establish some tension between these two. I am trying to make this one a slow burn fic with a lot of sexual tension and pinning, maybe there will be smut, maybe there wont. It all depends what the people want! The taglist is open so please shoot me an ask if you would like to be added!

Pairing: Four x F!Reader

Word Count: 5.2k

Warnings: Violence, illegal activity, guns, kind of kidnapping, language, tension is building, very politically charged content, not proof read

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Tag list is located at the bottom, please send an ASK if you would like to be tagged or if you would just like to chat about the fic/life in general and let me know if the tags do not work.

Beads of sweat trickled down the back of your neck while you sat, kneeling in front of the mess of wires and metal parts. It was so god damn hot in this stupid shed. They really couldn’t have housed you somewhere else?

Of course not, you were a grunt worker, the low man on the totem pole, a peon compared to everyone else in the organization. That was why you were stuffed in this hot dusty shed in the back of someone’s house. Mike probably didn’t even know you name, he only cared that you could make his products work.

You were a 23-year-old engineering PhD student studying materials. Your dream was to create more ecofriendly and cheap filters for water so that it could be easily accessible to those in impoverished areas of the world. Water is a basic necessity, not a right. So how the fuck did you wind up here, making bombs for what may or may not be an ecoterrorism group and hacking into large corporate databases on their behalf?

Well, you hang around the wrong crowd long enough, you’ll eventually find your way stuffed in some guy named Mike’s shed who believes Lions should be fed tofu.

You really didn’t mind it, aside from a few wacky ideologies Mike held, he and his troupe were relatively nice and stood for what you stood for: clean water, properly paid migrant workers, and sustainable living.

You wiped the sweat off your forehead with the back of your greasy and dirty hand as you tinkered away, piecing together a small pipe bomb. It was for your next target, a large family corporation that had a penchant for exploiting migrant workers by promising benefits and paths to citizenship in exchange for low, nearly inhuman pay. What they stood for make you feel sick, so you honestly didn’t feel bad knowing that this pipe bomb was going to be used to blow one of their corporate office entrances to bits in the middle of the night when no one was there.

It would serve as a warning.

After you finally finished connecting the last few bits together you carefully wiped it down and placed it inside the packaged box, then disposed of your gloves and changed your clothes, making sure to put your old ones in the burn pile. It seemed a bit excessive, but the last thing you wanted was to have anything linked back to you with bomb residue on it.

You sat in front of the computer, back slightly hunched over the keyboard while the lighting from the screen illuminated your face “Are you sure you don’t want the light on?” Mike said turning towards you

You let out a deep and irritated sigh, “What are you, a fucking idiot?” You a snapped as your eyes continued to stare at the security footage that rolled on the screen, “We’re in a van about to set off a bomb do you think turning on a light, so I don’t damage my eyesight is more important than getting caught?” Mike shrugged, you had a point.

You checked the clock 12:30am. It was time.

You grabbed the burner phone and flipped it open, dialing the number that would set off the timer. You gaze caught a small flicker of movement in the corner, a shadow that shouldn’t have been there. Your heart jumped when you saw a security guard walking to the front door, “Fuck,” You said, “Fuck, someone is in there, I have to disarm it!” You felt panic flooding through your veins and your heart rate began to increase.

“[Y/N], there isn’t enough time,” Mike snapped, his voice causing you to jump, “You won’t make it and you know it.” He pointed out, “It’s fine, what’s one less corporate pawn.”

Your breath hitched in your throat as you watched the seconds roll past on the security footage, knowing there were only minutes until it detonated, you could make it couldn’t you? You burst out the back of the van, gripping your laptop tightly to your chest and began to run as fast as you could. You tripped over your feet, stumbling in the grass and picked yourself right back up. You flipped open the burner, 1 minute 37 seconds. You could see the building coming into view and could feel your lungs burning, you honestly couldn’t remember the last time you had run that hard and that fast.

The closer you got to the building, the closer the bomb got to detonation. You clenched your jaw, ignoring the burning in your thighs and pressed on.

Your efforts were useless, you realized that when you woke up on the ground covered in rubble with your ears ringing. You coughed, your lungs felt chalky and your eyes burned from the layer of soot that had built up in them. When your vision finally cleared you could see grey and black dust settling and that the majority of the corporate office had been destroyed.

Fucking hell, your pipe bomb shouldn’t have been that strong. It should have just been enough to collapse the front entrance. You struggled to get up, the pain in your arms was excruciating and the dizziness in your head made it seem almost impossible to stand. You cried out in pain when you finally pushed yourself up, I need to get out of here, you thought. You still had that stupid burner phone on you.

“Excuse me, Ma’am,” You turned to see an EMT coming towards you, his voice hammered against your ringing ears and his figure looked fuzzy, you really needed to get the fuck out of here.

“I’m fine, I don’t need help.” You barely recognized your voice from how hoarse it was.

“Ma’am, you’re bleeding, you need to sit down.” The EMT grabbed your shoulders and you shrugged them off, once again yelling in pain.

“Get off me.” You said stumbling as you thrashed against them.

It wasn’t until you felt the cold barrel of a gun nipping at your temple that you realized this wasn’t an ordinary EMT, “You’re going to come with me, got it? Or do you want the feds finding your ass.” His voice was harsh and sent a shiver down your spine.

You nodded your head, wincing at how tightly he was squeezing you before he threw you in the back of the ambulance. He drove for what seemed like ages only because you were fading in and out of consciousness. When he finally stopped, he woke you up, slapping at the sides of your face. You harshly turned your head way “What the fuck?” You croaked once more and tried to twist away only to find that you were hand cuffed to a gurney.

“How did you hack into the security system?” He was obviously done with formalities.

“You can’t prove anything.” You hissed.

“Where did you get the supplies, and how have you and your organization been able to go under the radar with these attacks for so long?”

“Bet you’re a fucking fed,” You spat, you couldn’t stand the cesspool that was more commonly known as the American government.

The guy smiled at you, flashing a perfectly aligned smile, “I’m not a cop. I just want to know how you’re so good at navigating the deep web and creating explosives.” He seemed genuinely interested, and it didn’t seem like you denying things was going to get yourself unhandcuffed anytime soon.

You let out a shaky sigh and shrugged, “I don’t know, I’m an engineering student I just wanted to buy Adderall to help me study for finals, so I bought it off the deep web, then Mike invited me to join his wanna be ELF group and I joined.” You answered honestly.

“Wanna be ELF group?” He his eyebrows arched with amusement, “You realize they have been using your explosives all over the country, did you really think that their attacks were only focused in this area?” You really hadn’t been paying attention to how many devices you would make or what Mike wanted you to order from the deep web, you would just do it with no questions asked, “There were six bombs planted in that building, you realize that don’t you?” You furrowed your brows with confusion, there was only supposed to be one at the entrance and what did he mean by all over the country?

You shrugged and let out a long sigh, you had really dug yourself into a deep hole “I don’t ask questions, I just make and order whatever he gives me on the list.”

“Why?” His question caught you off guard and he repeated himself, this time leaning in closer.

“Jesus, what are you going to do, kiss me?” You said turning your face away, “Give me some space, you smell like fucking garlic.” After he backed up you continued “I think that the American government is a cesspool on the face of society and they just stands by while people suffer. I’m sick of it.” you answered honestly.

“I’m Wade by the way.” He said finally introducing himself, “Don’t worry, I already know who you are.” He said brushing your response away, “Anyways, how would you like to join a group of people who are going over some real nasty people. I’m talking top of the line scum.” You arched your eyebrow with interest and urged him to continue, “This isn’t some small-time gig, I’m talking about taking down whole governments.”

“Do I get paid?” you quickly asked.

Wade couldn’t help but smirk, “No,” He laughed, “But don’t worry I’ll take care of your expenses.”

“What like some glorified sugar daddy?” You asked making a weird face at him.

Wade shrugged his shoulders “Something like that,” He sharply inhaled, remembering one important detail “Oh, right one more thing, if you’re going to join you have to go completely off the grid. You know like fake your death, no contact with your family, that sort of stuff.”

“No student loans?” Wade nodded his head, seeing interest sparkling in your eyes, “Fine with me, it looks like I died anyways with that fucking blast.”

After that meeting you were given the number zero.

Zero isn’t the absence of value, in fact you might have been one of the most valuable people on the team. The only problem was that the team didn’t know who you were. They didn’t know who ordered their supplies, or how One knew everything about everyone, or how their records were able to be so easily erased.

From what you saw they all seemed like nice enough people, but you preferred your ‘girl in the chair’ position and behind scenes work.

One even promised you that he would only call on you in a special occasion. Right now, seemed to be that special occasion considering he was ringing you up at 3 in the morning.

“Someone better be dying, One.” You said immediately upon answering your phone.

“No one is, not yet at least.” You could hear the stupid grin behind his voice, “I need you for a mission.”

You sat up in your bed, “Mission? No, I don’t do missions, I sit in the chair.” You said, panic arising in your voice.

One let out a sigh, “Well, you do now. Be at the base within the hour, we have a team meeting.”

So, you were thirty minutes late for good measure. There was no way you were going to be the first one to show up, it would have been hell having to sit there and explain the same story over and over again as new faces entered the room. So, you walked in the room, confidently late.

You might have been a little too confident because the sound of several guns being cocked and pointed in your direction as well as everyone being on guard caused you to freeze, “Easy, easy, guys. Christ you’re like a bunch of fucking animals.” One said quickly running in front of you with his arms up, “Put your guns down, and you” He said turning and pointing in your face, “You’re late. I told you an hour.”

You shrugged, “I didn’t want to be the first one in the room.” You said stuffing your hands in your sweatshirt pockets and walking around him, taking your seat on a stack of pallets.

One pinched his forehead and let out a deep sigh, “Well, now that everyone’s shown up you can go ahead and introduce yourself.” He said nudging your shoulder.

You gave an awkward wave “Hello, I’m Zero.” You introduced yourself and gave a short nod “Nice to meet you all.”

“Tell them what you do, it’s not fair knowing why everyone else was picked.” One sounded like a scolding mother

You sighed “What is this the first day of college?” you quickly retorted, causing a few of the team members to cover their mouths, hiding their laughter “I’m the codebreaker, the supply man, the explosives expert, the guy in the chair. Whatever you want to call me, just know I do the behind the scenes work.” You tried to not sound too prideful on your position.

“We have a supply man?” You recognized the thick British accent that came from Four.

“Where the hell do you think all your ammunition came from?” You asked him, “Did you all really think One did this all on his own?” their silence answered your question. You scoffed “Tch, One couldn’t navigate the deep web if he ever looked at it, probably would end up buying shit from some cop,” You spat on the ground when you mentioned law enforcement.

One rolled his eyes before continuing with the meeting, “So, as we know we’ll be needing to split up for the next few assignments which, is why I called in Zero to so kindly help us.” He paused for a moment to allow everyone to soak in the information, “Zero, you and Four are going to be sent to gather first hand intel on our target, Vincent Beck.” He cleared his throat “Two and Three were caught on camera sneaking around and Seven, Five, and I have our own assignment.”

You furrowed your brows “I couldn’t erase their footage?” You asked, somewhat shocked at what you were hearing.

One let out another, long sigh, “No, you tried to get into their data base, and they put that virus on your computer, remember?”

You remembered now, that stupid virus that caused endless popups to show up, once one was closed two more would show up, “Right,” You mumbled, chewing on your bottom lip.

One tossed you and Four your files, “Read up on those and come up with a plan, at noon the plane takes off, but I want to debrief at 11.”

And with that you found yourself in Four’s trailer, sitting on his lumpy couch “I’ve never done this before.” You admitted, “I only know how to gather intel through the computer.”

Four’s knee bounced, you didn’t know if it was because he was anxious or because of the constant need to keep moving, “I haven’t either,” He tried to sound reassuring, “But I think it’ll be fine, One usually knows what he’s talking about.”

You pursed your lips and gave Four a skeptical look, “Does he though?” You weren’t very convinced.

The blonde-haired man shrugged, “Yeah, he’s kind of a goon sometimes but he usually figures it out.” It sounded like Four wasn’t very convinced either.

“Well, do you have a plan for this?” You asked leaning back against the uncomfortable and cheap couch.

Four frowned “Got nothin’, you?” You could already tell this was going to be a disaster.

You paged through the file, “Vincent Beck,” You hummed, tapping your finger on your chin in thought, “Well we can’t do a guns blazing approach, we both are better suited for sneaking around, plus the fighting is going to come later.” You mused aloud.

“We just have to talk to him and build some trust, right?” He asked, building off your thoughts.

You nodded your head, still intently reading the file, “This guy is a real sicko,” You said frowning, “Human trafficking? Who the fuck even does this shit?” the details you read caused your stomach to churn, “We have to get as much dirt on this asshole as possible, really gain his trust.”

Four cleared his throat, shifting uncomfortably “What if… what if I posed as a potential client?” He swallowed thickly, you could tell that the details of Vincent Beck did not sit well with him either.

You stared at Four, a long hard gaze, “That could work, we can get a way in, gather information on his sales, inside people, so on and so forth.” You rubbed your face, exhausted from your early morning wakeup call, “What about me?” You asked.

Four gave you a cheeky grin, “You can be my assistant.”

You scoffed, dropping the file on the floor next to you “Your assistant? Absolutely not.” You said shaking your head, “I can be a business partner.” You answered, a small smile playing on your lips.

Four rolled his eyes, “You’re a computer nerd, you don’t know about business.” He retorted.

“Yeah, and you’re a thief, what do you know about running a business?”

Four clutched his chest feigning hurt feelings “I’m hurt, truly,” He responded, “Running around with a band of thieves has a lot of business tactics behind it, plus, I know how to talk with other criminals.”

You crossed your arms over your chest “Know how to talk to criminals,” You scoffed “I talk to criminals every day-”

“Yeah- through a computer” Four scoffed right back at you.

“Wow looks like you two are getting along well.” You turned to see that One had let himself into the trailer.

“We’re getting along just fine.” You snapped at One.

“That’s why the two of you are screaming at each other like that, right?” the sarcasm was dripping from his voice, “Anyways, what’s the plan?”

Four leaned forward, anxious to share the idea he came up with “Okay so hear me out, we just need to get close to this guy and gather intel, no actual fighting right? So,” He pauses for what you can only assume is for dramatic effect, “What if I pose as a client, and Zero is my assistant?”

You shook your head “No, I already said no to the assistant.” you quickly said.

One tapped his chin with his index finger, “What if you posed as his girlfriend?” he suddenly said, going along with the idea.

If you would have had a drink in your mouth, you would have spit it out right then and there “Girlfriend?” You almost couldn’t believe the words as they left your mouth, you shook your head “No, I’m not doing that either.”

One stared at you “Do you have a better idea?” He challenged, “And I don’t want to hear business partner, what are you going to buy for everyone in his company? No, Four is going to go in there and say he was referred by one of his previous clients and you are going to pose as his girlfriend.” You moved to argue him, but One put his hand up “Nope, no questions that’s it. Wheels are up in an hour.” He stood up and moved to leave the trailer but stopped “Do the two of you have anything other than sweatpants to wear? You’re going to want to pose as someone with money to make it appealing.”

You sheepishly averted your gaze and Four let out a soft ‘uhhh’ which proved that the two of you really had nothing other than athleisure in your closet, “Fucks sake,” One said shaking his head, “Buy yourself some real clothes when you land so you at least look the part. Zero, you can figure the money out, I know you’ve been sifting through my accounts.”

You scratched the back of your neck and let out a small laugh, have you been slowly taking a bit of money out from One’s bank account? Yeah. But did you care? Nah, he was literally a billionaire and constantly had money flowing in from stocks and other investments.

Your plane ride was short, but most of it was spent establishing your fake relationship with Four while Five slept and Seven and One piloted the plane, “What are our names going to be?” Four asked, “I was thinking could be Jason, or a Roger, or something like that.”

You let out a sigh, you could tell this was going to be a long mission, “Why can’t we just use our actual names, no one knows that we’re still alive and we can just make up last names.”

“Wouldn’t it be fun though-”

“No,” You sharply interjected, “I think that it would be a lot easier to remember our own names since we have a lot of other details we need to remember, like how long have we been together?”

Four ran a hand through his neatly coifed hair, “What about a year and a couple months, you know couples always track little stuff like that.”

“A year and three months?” You asked, he nodded, you checked that off your list and moved onto the next thing, “Okay what about how we met?”

“Childhood friends?” Four suggested.

You shook your head, “No, I’m too lazy to remember all that info, plus we are from two different countries.”

He nodded his head, “Right,” He said, feeling slightly stupid, “What about a business conference?”

You quirked your brow, this actually sounded like a good idea, “Okay, we can meet at a business conference, you know grabbed a few drinks then the rest is history kind of a deal?” a thought popped into your brain, “Oh!” You said, “We need to lay down some ground rules.”

“Rules?” Four asked quirking his eyebrow at you.

“Yeah, rules, you know so we don’t weird the other person out.” You tried to reason, Four’s mouth made an ‘o’ and he nodded, urging you to continue “Number one, no PDA.”

Four rolled his eyes, “We’re supposed to be fake dating, we have to at least make it convincing.”

You let out a sigh, “Fine, no graphic PDA then.” He nodded in agreement, “Number two, no parading around with other people, this has to be convincing” You paused and waited for Four to interject, when he didn’t you continued “And three, stick to the story, no changing it up or adding onto it without telling the other one.”

“That’s it? Only three rules?” Four questioned, you nodded your head “Sounds simple enough.”

The two of you sat in silence for a moment before you glanced over at Four, feeling his eyes on you and caught the surprisingly charming smile he shot in your direction, “How about what I do for work? Can I say I’m inheriting my father’s business?”

You shrugged your head “Yeah, sure, just make sure it’s something you can actually talk about. Rich assholes love talking about what made them rich.”

“Yeah, any opportunity One has to brag, he leaps at it.” Four said laughing, you couldn’t help but join in.

The plane landed and after a short drive you found yourself in LA on a ritzy road with expensive shops. You felt out of place in your stained sweatshirt and beat up shoes, but who was going to stop you from entering with a platinum credit card?

After what seemed like hours’ worth of pointless shopping you and Four finally had a sufficient enough wardrobe gathered up to pass as wealthy couple and were able to check into your ritzy hotel. You and Four made your way up to the hotel room, floor 27 out of 35, the view of the city was absolutely breath taking. You had honestly never seen anything quite like it, “Wow,” You gasped dropping your many bags onto the floor and walking towards the large window that looked over West Hollywood.

The skyline was a mix of pastel pink and orange that had the dark shadows of tall buildings cutting jagged and rectangular shapes out of it, it looked as though it was something straight out of a magazine.

You’d also never been in a nicer hotel, it was large and spacious with a kitchenette, and one large bed covered in white sheets. You felt like there was a rock in your stomach “Why is there one bed?” You asked, furrowing your brow.

Four shrugged “One made the reservation, not me.” He said throwing his duffle bag down on the left side of the right side of the bed, opposite the window, “Guess it’s to seem more realistic? If the room gets searched, they won’t have to wonder why we use separate beds.” That was a far-fetched idea and part of you knew it was just One fucking with the two of you, “Don’t worry, I don’t snore.” Four joked, shooting you a cheeky winking at you.

You looked at him, slightly taken back by his blatant flirting, it caused your stomach to clench “Right, well,” You cleared your throat “I hope you’re not a blanket hog either.”

You sat on the bed, your laptop open and on your lap. It wasn’t the most ideal position, but you had to make do with what you had. Your fingers flew across your keyboard, satisfying clacks filling the large hotel room while you gathered information on Beck’s previous clientele. You turned towards Four who was mindlessly scrolling through his phone, “So for tomorrow, Beck is going to be at a vineyard for a tasting, that is where you’re going to approach him.” You said looking at Four to make sure he was paying attention. He wasn’t. You reached over, lightly kicking him and grabbing your attention, “Did you hear me?” You chastised.

Four jumped and sheepishly looked at you, “Yeah, I did, tomorrow we’re going to a vineyard and I’m going to talk to Beck.” He repeated looking at you and setting his phone on his chest.

You nodded, relieved that he was actually listening to you, “Good,” You said exhaling lightly “So, your referral is going to be this guy,” You said turning your screen towards Four, he leaned in and nodded his head “But what Beck doesn’t know is that Mr. Harrison is in prison and unable to answer any calls he may have regarding the validity of your referral.” You paused, giving the blond haired man a moment to soak in the information before you continued, “So, what you’re going to do is you’re going to introduce yourself, make some small talk, and then Segway to talk about your business associate Mr. Harrison. Mention something along the lines of special products and how high quality and reliable Beck’s side business is, say whatever you have to say to butter him up.”

“So I just need to kiss his ass?” Four asked for clarification.

You nodded your head, “Exactly, and for good measure we’re going to bring a bag of cash that I’ll be carrying.”

Four hummed, “Clever plan,” He complimented, you felt your face heating up, “You sure this is your first time in the field?” He gave you a skeptical glance before settling beneath the sheets and reaching to turn off his bedside lamp.

You shut your laptop, “Yeah, I just sit back at base most of the time, One didn’t even take me along to Italy,” You said and leaned over, putting it on the floor.

“You’ve been with us since Italy?” Disbelief filled Four’s voice.

“Yeah, I helped One track all of you down, he might be good with magnets but gathering info isn’t really his forte.” You said and sat up, shifting your pillows around before you laid back down, pulling the blankets up to your chin and burrowing in, “We better get some sleep, big day tomorrow.”

Four rolled onto his side, “Right, well, night.” He mumbled.

----

Your sleep was restless because of you nerves, you kept tossing and turning, sighing when the sheets got tangled in your feet until Four finally said something, “Stop moving, for the love of god.” He mumbled against his pillow, not bothering to even open an eye to look at you.

“Sorry,” You whispered, “I just can’t sleep.” You said smoothing your hands over the blankets that covered your chest.

Four let out a long, deep sigh, “Well try,” He was obviously someone who valued sleep and did not take kindly to be woken up.

When you finally awoke in the morning you stretched, feeling your back cracking as you groaned “Fuck,” You sighed, sitting up and looking around at the unfamiliar surroundings, right, you were on a mission. Four walked out of the bathroom, his hair still wet and messily towel dried, and wearing a white tee-shirt and boxer briefs.

You felt heat creeping up your neck and flushing your face at the sight, he turned around, feeling your eyes staring holes into him “Morning,” He greeted.

“Morning.” You answered back.

Four rummaged through the bags of clothes you bought yesterday, frowning “What do you even wear to a vineyard party?” He asked tossing several shirts aside.

You pursed your lips “A well-tailored suit?” You suggested, pulling the blankets back and grabbing your own things before heading to the bathroom, “You done in here?” You asked poking your head out the bathroom door.

Four looked up at you, still frustrated over his outfit of choice and nodded “Yeah, ‘m finished.” He said turning his attention back to the bags.

The hot water from the shower soothed your stiff shoulders and the steam filled your nostrils, you let out a soft sigh slicking your hair from your face and scrubbed your hair and body, freeing it of the filth that had built up from your travels. Your shower seemed to put the nerves you held over the meeting today at ease even if it was only temporary.

When you walked out of the bathroom, dressed and almost ready to go your gaze caught Four, “You- you clean up nicely.” You complimented.

It was true, he did clean up nicely. His hair was neatly slicked back and the buttons on his crisp white button down were taut against his fit chest, threatening to give way if he moved just right. His collar was upturned and a tie loosely hung around his neck. He turned, drinking in your figure a ghost of a smirk playing on his face “So do you,” He said casually struggling with his tie.

“Need help?” You asked, walking towards him your hands reaching for the tie as you closed the gap. You were close to him, nearly chest to chest and could smell the cologne he had bought the other day. You fiddled with his tie, tying it properly and tightening it comfortably against his neck, “There,” you said placing a lingering touch against his chest.

The two of you stood for a moment, staring at each other before you forced yourself to be the first one to pull away, quickly grabbing your purse and slipping your shoes on. Your throat felt tight, you needed to get some fresh air quickly before you went mad.

Taglist: @lapofthemusicgods, @chonkyhambs, @teageowen, @l0ve-0f-my-life, @takemetoneverland420

#ben hardy x reader #billy/four x reader #four x reader #ben hardy fanfic #ben hardy concept #ben hardy series #ben hardy fluff #fake dating #Codebreaker fic #four!ben #6 underground #6 underground fanfic #ben hardy fandom

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camomills · 4 years

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Title: Old Souls Relationships: Sinon/Lisbeth; Sinon & Agil Fandom: Sword Art Online Word Count: 1767 Summary: Sinon realizes she is allowing others to become closer to her, and that scares her. A conversation with an older friend might help assuage her fears. Notes: Made for SAO Pride Week 2020 - Day 1: Small Steps. This is a reworked draft from last year's SAO Pride Week that I turned into some Sinon/Lisbeth, mostly Sinon-centric. I also just really wanted to do something with Agil because I think he's a fun character, and I personally think his wise demeanor makes him a nice character to bounce off the younger cast.Thanks to redbluezero for beta reading!

AO3 Link

The smell of coffee has always been one of Shino’s favorites. It reminds her of rainy days spent in the company of a book in her favorite bookshop, staring mindlessly at the steam as she waited until her drink cooled. It’s no wonder Dicey Café became one of her dearest places.

“Here’s your order!”

The company might have something to do with it, too.

“This one’s on the house,” Rika declares as she sets the cup on the counter, then winks.

From behind her, she hears someone clear their throat.

She slowly turns to meet Agil’s gaze, and sure enough, he’s scowling at her. The grip on the glass he’s drying has turned vice-like.

“That one’s on your salary.”

“Agil, c’mon! Let me be cool!”

They bicker for a short minute, Rika being cheeky whereas Agil is composed. The tone of the discussion is more akin to foolish banter between friends than a squabble between a boss and his employee, so Shino allows herself to laugh at it.

Rika’s shift soon ends and she heads to the ladies’ room to change. As per usual these days, Shino waits for her so they can keep company to one another on the train ride back home.

Yesterday’s commute was much like any other.

The train car shook and rattled against the steel and gravel tracks as the whirls of metal and the passengers’ chatter filled the compartment. The two girls partook in idle chatter, holding onto the same metal pole to keep their balance inside the box car. Shino’s proximity to Rika allowed the girl to filter the blacksmith’s words through the fog of sound.

Shino’s hands scraped against Rika’s on each stop.

“So, so,” Rika continued telling excitedly, “he destroyed the best sword in my shop! My masterpiece, turned to smithereens.”

Shino let out a horrified gasp in jest.

“Oh, my. I lost my dear Hecate’s scope trying to help him out in BoB. I wonder if we’re liable for some sort of compensation?”

The two nodded in tandem over their two-person class-action lawsuit plans. They broke the comical act when the train stopped at the next station a bit too roughly, bumping them into each other. They couldn’t contain their chuckles at their own silliness.

“Ah, next one’s my stop,” Rika announced.

Shino knew. They’d been sharing this commute for a while.

“I’ll be seeing you then. Until next time, Rika.”

Shino expected Rika to leave as the train doors opened, but she approached Shino instead. Rika’s arms bundled around Shino’s frame.

It’s a moment that allowed Shino to take note of a small list of Rika Things. Rika is only taller than her by a few inches, but it’s enough that it allowed her chin to rest on Rika’s shoulder slightly. The fake fur on Rika’s coat bristled against Shino’s nose, gentle and irritating— much like Rika herself, she thought. The pressure at the shorter girl’s back where Rika’s slender fingers intertwined was rough, yet fond.

A wave of warmth radiated through Shino’s body. She weakly squeezed Rika back.

“Until next time!” Rika said as she uncoiled her arms from around the other girl.

She beamed at Shino before hopping through the train doors, waving as she exited at the station.

That was the first time Rika had ever hugged her.

Shino’s body wanted to feel elated, but her brain didn’t allow it; the affection in Rika’s gesture got muddled in her spiral of guilty thoughts. Since when did she allow people to get so close?

Since when did I let myself want that?

The rest of her commute was spent staring out the cart’s window, hoping that the train’s AC would manage to cool down her emotions before long.

As the bathroom door slams shut, Agil rests his arms on the counter and leans against it, a hand sitting upon his bald head.

“Can you believe her? I offered her this part-time job because I knew it’d help her with college, but...” He throws his hands out, his fondness for Lis peeking through a smile fighting his scowl. “You know?”

Mm-hmm, Shino nods empathically, as she’s wont to do with Agil. The company that lures her in here, of course, includes both of the bartenders.

She had grown to care for all of her new friends, but she was caught by surprise at how much she related to Agil, of all people. He is the oldest in their merry band of players, by far, and despite that– no, because of that, they got along.

People her age, throughout most of her experience, were uncaring at best and cruel at worst. The adults around her, dry as they could be, served as the closest to good company she had growing up. There’s a bitter taste in her mouth as Shino realizes she’s grown more proficient in talking to adults due to the past cruelty of all the people her age in her life up until very recently. Thankfully, it’s easy enough to wash it down with the sweetness of the cappuccino Rika had mischievously handed her.

Agil, on the other hand, appreciates having a regular other than Asuna with whom he could default to intellectual conversation and wouldn’t call his establishment, ‘a dump’. How did Kirito manage to rope even Silica into it?

As their conversation strays away from Lisbeth’s demeanor, they fall to their more usual topics: Shino asks about how he manages to do latte art so perfectly every time and he asks if she finally reached the fourth chapter of the book he lent to her a couple of days ago. One “final” plea for him to try out Gun Gale, and his unacceptable excuse that he doesn’t have the time.

Mundane topics like that are their speed, but for once, Shino has something less mundane in her mind. There’s something in that space, with the gentle ambiance music and the calming presence of a wiser friend, that brings her to feel that Agil is the right person, at that time, for those thoughts.

“I think I like Lis,” she professes like a secret she wished wasn’t true. It doesn’t seem to be the meat of what she has to say, judging from the way her jaw clenches.

Agil simply hums. He’d rather talk about latte art.

“Yeah, I figured. I mean, you really started coming here more often once she started working here.”

He laughs, a wry, good-natured sound, hard to define between his fondness for the girls and his apathy for the topic.

“I mean… yes. But that’s not the point. How do I…”

Shino gulps. Her gaze turns to the counter in front of her, where her hands lie. She fiddles with her fingers, watching as her thumbs graze each other through their rotations; staring at them without thinking about the words she’s about to say, are the only way she manages to go through it.

“I guess… I don’t know if I remember how to be around people. Or if it’s... right, for me to be around people?”

She remembers what those hands did; the cold of steel and the heat of gunfire, the maroon of splattered blood and the gray of post office tiles.

Is it okay for a broken person like me…?

Agil would be lying if he said he’s particularly interested in involving himself in the romantic squabbles of teenagers. The other aspect of her plea, though, is something he’s unfortunately familiar with. He ponders, his face a mix of sagely and worried, as the soft thudding of her trembling hands are barely drowned out by the bar’s blues music.

“I was worried, too, back when I had to come back to my life after SAO.”

Shino raises her gaze to Agil’s eyes.

“I mean, it's not the same thing, but… it’s hard being around people who judge you for what you went through, and trying to make connections when everyone thinks you’re screwed in the head is a pain in the ass. ‘The game where those freaks killed each other.’ ‘The murderer girl’.”

Agil knows what Shino did. Shino told all of them, eventually.

“But everyone who spent those two years in the flying castle went through a lot of things they shouldn't have had to, and probably did some things they regret. To others. To themselves. I did, Kirito and Asuna did, and so did Rika. We talk about it…”

His eyes turn to the ladies’ room’s door, where Rika is changing. He decides her past is not his to divulge.

“Uh. I guess all I’m trying to say is that you’re friends with people who get it, because none of us are sure it’ll ever be okay with people. So, we just stick together. I doubt Rika minds… whatever it is you're worried about? I think people like us have little besides each other.”

The last bit sticks with Shino. As she chews on the words once more, she stares at her hands. The weight they carry is impossibly heavy, but if what Agil says is true, then that means others, too, carry the same burden.

Her trembling ceases.

He pauses. “Or something?”

He’s not sure how much sense he is making.

“I’m not sure how much sense I’m making.”

That gets a chuckle out of her, and that’s good enough for him.

Rika exits the bathroom, her former bartender-y, formal-ish ponytail from a few minutes ago undone into a mess of brown hair. Her lack of an apron reveals the cute hammer patterns on her graphic shirt.

"Are you two nerds done talking about nerd stuff?" She says, as if not just as much of one.

Agil and Shino roll their eyes.

"Yeah, we’re done with our nerd stuff."

Rika starts sliding her arm into her jacket, then turns to Shino. “Sweet. Are you ready to go then?”

Shino looks at Agil, who simply offers her a friendly wave and a knowing smile.

“Yeah, I think I’m ready.”

The two girls walk off together to the train station. The empty night streets give them quiet, with little to focus on other than the sound of boots hitting pavement, the cold breeze, and each other. It’s then when, bashful yet confident, Shino tries to interlock her fingers with Rika’s.

Rika squeezes her hand in return, rough yet fond.

As Rika wordlessly taps her fingers on Shino’s knuckles, Shino realizes that Agil was right. There’s no way that those hands, fitting so perfectly together, were meant to be apart. Perhaps such heavy hands have no other pairs but each other, and that is fine.

#SAO #Sword Art Online #Lisinon #Fili writes #saoprideweek2020

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tenspontaneite · 5 years

Text

Peace Is A Journey (Chapter 11/?)

In which Claudia and Soren contemplate weather, General Amaya becomes a folk hero, and Callum tries to wrap his head around the proceedings of a very eventful day.

(Chapter length: ~14k. Ao3 link)

Chapter warnings: Progression of permanent damage to a limb.

Spoilers for some s3 information pertaining to the Dragonguard and implications about Zym’s egg.

---

Something hit him on the cheek, not far from his eye; Soren flinched, and raised a hand to feel it. A droplet of water, trailing down his skin.

He looked up at the sky, stilling his horse, and received three more raindrops to the face. “Well, isn’t that just great.” He said, sourly, as Claudia stopped as well, her horse settling alongside his.

She followed his gaze, stared upwards, and took a raindrop directly to the eye. She made a surprised and vaguely alarmed snorting noise, rubbing at the eye in question, and grimaced a little. “….yyyeaaah,” She sighed, drawing the word out until it was heavy with resignation. “That’s a problem.”

“That’s rain.” Soren said, after stopping to whistle sharply to command the dogs ahead to stop.

Claudia sighed. “Yep.”

“That’s definitely rain.”

“I noticed, Soren.”

He glared at her. “We’re going to lose the trail.” He emphasised, as if holding her personally responsible for the unfortunate weather. He was kind of tempted to, honestly. Surely there was some sort of creepy dark magic thing she could do to mess with the weather?

She pursed her lips, and for whatever reason, looked up beyond the treeline to the looming silhouettes of the mountains. “Probably.” She admitted. “But for now, let’s follow it for as long as we can, until the dogs lose the trail.”

“And then what?” He demanded, restraining the urge to cross his arms if only because he needed at least one hand on the reins.

“And then, we go for plan B.” She said, eyes still fixed on the mountains. One of her hands fluttered over to rest on her satchel of magic-things, almost unthinkingly. “…There’s a town near here, I think. As long as the trail doesn’t go the completely wrong way, we can stop by and pick up some supplies. We’ll definitely need it.”

Soren frowned at her. “That really doesn’t sound like anything good.”

Claudia made a dismissive sort of pssh noise, and then spurred her horse back into a walk. “It’s nothing you’ll hate, don’t worry.”

“That’s really not-“

“Just move, Soren, until the rain completely wrecks the scent trail. Then we’ll talk about mountain-climbing.”

He blinked. Oh, right, she’d mentioned that before, hadn’t she? He shrugged, and whistled for the dogs again. Well trained and eager, they approached with tails wagging to weave between his and Claudia’s horses, eyes bright and intelligent. He smiled at them, and issued commands with a few more well-placed whistles, regretting that he was too high up on his horse to pat them. They responded quickly to the command and went on ahead to keep tracking, like the good dogs they were.

Following a trail for days on end was incredibly boring, but the dogs were definitely a bright spot. Being a Crownguard didn’t usually leave all that much time to spend with any animals other than horses, and it was usually someone else who took care of the horses at the end of the day. Not on this trip, though. He’d been brushing down and tending to both of their horses for the days of their pursuit so far, which he had found was just the thing to do to take his mind off…other things. Things Dad said he needed to do, which Soren really didn’t know if he could follow through on.

With a twinge of regret – for a second, Soren hoped they’d lose the trail. The rain was almost a relief, because…well, he couldn’t be blamed for what nature did, right? If they lost the trail because of rain, and couldn’t catch up to the princes…well, dad couldn’t really hold that against him, right? …Right?

…But Claudia had her dark magic things, so…the trail wouldn’t stay lost. He wasn’t sure whether to consider that a good thing or a bad thing. He didn’t want to disappoint Dad. But…

Soren thought of doing the right thing, and looked ahead, brow furrowed. The dogs were barking and sniffing, looking up to wait for the horses to catch up to them before running on again. Their mouths were open with tongues lolling around their doggy grins, utterly full of enthusiasm and cheer for the tasks ahead of them, and that did make him feel a little better.

The journey mostly sucked, and so did thinking, but at least the dogs were good.

---

The consecration was not well-attended. How could it be, when Amaya had announced her intentions to Opeli mere hours before? Gren was there, of course, though he wouldn’t be translating for her vows – they were for Amaya and Lady Justice alone, or so said the Priestess of Paragons. And what the Priestess of Paragons said, apparently, was how things would be.

Despite the short notice, there was still something of an audience, including a number of her unit. As soon as the word had spread, as it was wont to in a city full of gossiping guards with nothing better to do, she’d accumulated an entourage of soldiers who all of a sudden needed far more input and confirmation from her than usual, all full of a barely-restrained curiosity and eagerness that they probably thought they were successfully hiding. In the end she rolled her eyes, announced the time of the ceremony, and gave leave for anyone not on duty to attend.

Viren had come, too, though Paragons only knew how he’d heard. None of the other Councillors had heard, or they’d not have missed it for the world – even if they didn’t actually care about Lady Justice one way or another, something like the consecration of a new Justiciar was significant enough that they’d probably get a lot of mileage out of it at diplomatic meetings. It probably made good political conversation material…and Paragons wept, Amaya was glad that her job involved more battle and military tactics than political intrigue.

Or, well, it had. This consecration did, more or less, represent her taking something of a leave from her official duties as a general.

In any case, Viren had found his way to the Hall of Paragons for the event, which somehow didn’t surprise her in the least. He always did seem to find a way to know of everything significant that happened within the city limits. The man had seated himself in a row behind all of the soldiers who’d arrived first, calm and cool and collected as always, and she wondered, briefly, if it rankled him to sit behind people so much lower in status than himself.

“General Amaya.” Opeli murmured to her, turning to allow her to see the words. The two of them, plus the attendants, lingered in the archway that opened from the antechamber to the main hall. “Are you ready?”

Amaya shot her a look. If she thought the Priestess would understand it, she might have said, “If I wasn’t, after all this fussing over the ceremonial articles, I’d be very concerned.” Instead, she allowed the ascension of her eyebrow to do the talking, and watched the greatest religious authority in Katolis restraining a laugh.

The amusement reached Opeli’s lips, regardless, her smile slanting upwards at the edges. “Come.” She said, and beckoned her forwards. Amaya inclined her head, and moved into the light.

She wore her armour and her shield, of course, but the ceremonial adornments as well. The sword was her own, though it had been polished to a gleam, and was now carried at her side by an attendant robed fully in white, the metal shining from a cloak of navy velvet. Had she not needed her hands to make the vows, she might have carried the golden scales; instead, she was draped in a shimmering banner, royal-blue embroidered with gleaming gold, the symbol of those same scales shining in the candle-flames. Carefully, another attendant arranged the banner over her shoulder as she stopped at the podium and fell to one knee before Opeli.

The congregation was arrayed in the Hall, and rustled in a thousand metallic murmurs of armour-plating as she settled. One attendant righted the banner, the other offered her the sword; solemnly, Amaya settled it on the stone at her feet.

For a moment, she looked out at the hall – at the congregation – and felt the gravity of the moment settle on her shoulders with a hint of religious awe. She’d never been much for Paragon worship, herself, and thought that most of the commonfolk most besotted with it seemed to miss the point of the faith entirely. But, even so…the sight of the long hall lined with grand statues was undeniably impressive. Something about the whole picture of the place – morning light filtering through the mural-windows of coloured glass in the stone-hewn walls, ceremonial flames and candles lit along every foot of stone, the hushed and reverent quiet – it had a potent atmosphere. Potent enough to move even her.

The hall had been draped in Justice’s colours for the consecration. Blue and gold; almost the same shades that Amaya had been wearing already for years. If she were a more superstitious woman, she’d almost think it fateful. Instead, she turned the thought aside, and returned her attention to the Priestess of Paragons.

The attendants receded; Opeli turned to address the congregation.

Protocol dictated that Amaya ought to keep her eyes fixed on the sword at her feet. But at this angle, she had little hope of seeing anything that Opeli said, so she glanced up through her eyelashes, every so often, to see Gren signing subtly along. She caught snatches of the grandiosity, phrases like ‘pledges herself to the service of Justice’, and ‘as the sword is to represent the swiftness and the sharpness of a fitting verdict’, and Amaya assumed the symbology of the other two articles was discussed as well, but she didn’t manage to catch that.

In the end, Opeli turned back to her, and took a strip of white fabric in her hands. That was the signal she’d been waiting on: Amaya looked up, and watched her implacably as she spoke.

“You are Amaya, called the Shield, who come here today to be consecrated in the name of Lady Justice, that you might act with Her will, and speak Her truths, and mete out Her sacred justice where you find it is needed.”

Amaya’s part in this was, for the most part, marvellously redundant. It felt more sacrilegious than usual, to sit here at the podium and think the trappings of ceremony pointless, but her opinion remained: her vows seemed largely redundant when Opeli was saying it all anyway. All she did was repeat the Priestess’ words back at her, fingers careful, signing “I am Amaya, called the Shield, and I come here to be consecrated in the name of Lady Justice. I will act with her will, and speak her truths, and mete out her sacred justice where I find it needed.”

Opeli nodded, satisfied, as if she’d understood a word of it. Amaya could have been saying ‘I intend to prance around farmsteads waving this banner and clanging loudly on my shield to wake the goats’, for all she’d know.

Well. She thought Opeli did have a basic vocabulary of sign, but…even so. She could hardly be understanding enough to ensure the vows were valid. It was a matter of trust, she supposed. And, really, if Opeli couldn’t trust the person she was consecrating to take it seriously, she probably shouldn’t be consecrating them in the first place.

“I call on you to administer justice swiftly, when it must be done, and to neither flinch nor hesitate in your duty.” Opeli said, to evoke the Sword. “I call on you to weigh the crimes and the harm that a person may wreak against their character, their circumstance, and aught else that may drive them.” The Scales. “I call on you to blind yourself to that which drives you, and that which you think, and that which you have been raised to know, that you might judge as does Lady Justice: without bias, without discrimination, and without any sour influence that might cloud your sacred judgement.” The Blindfold, the representation of which was still held in Opeli’s hands.

Traditionally, Amaya knew, the blindfold would have already been tied around her eyes. But then she wouldn’t know when she was being spoken to, or when she was meant to speak herself. She had an inkling that she was probably the first deaf Justiciar yet. Certainly there had been amputee Justiciars – at least one, since every self-respecting child in the Pentarchy had been raised with the stories of Old Heartwood and his outlandish Xadian prosthetic – but if there’d been others who were deaf, she’d not heard of them.

Opeli had apologised to her, beforehand. Said she’d normally have devised a full alternative ceremony that accommodated her deafness, but that it was a little short notice. Apparently, given the symbolism writ in every detail of the consecration, there had to be careful and lengthy thought given to the crafting of a variant ceremony, and since Amaya had to leave more or less the instant this was done….well, there just wasn’t time. It wasn’t ideal, but it was enough for her. Tailored ceremony or not, she’d become a Justiciar today.

Amaya recalled, at once, just how many historical Justiciars were folk heroes, and had to restrain a grimace. If there was any Justice in the world, she’d never suffer such a fate.

Amaya snapped herself back to attention at the indicative tap of Opeli’s finger, her signal to speak, and spared a moment to be glad she’d practiced this a few times to memorise it. Carefully, she shaped her fingers and prepared to repeat the Priestess’ whole spiel back at her…and paused, just for a second, to run her mind over her reservations. As much as she’d never been much of a good religious woman, Justiciars were important. They were sacred. The respect was ingrained into her bones, part of a cultural and moral heritage that went deeper than religion alone could signify. Amaya could not, in good conscience, speak these final vows if she didn’t mean it.

So maybe, no matter how she liked to mock a lengthy and contrived ceremony, there was some point to it after all.

The swift administration of justice wouldn’t be a problem; Amaya had ever been talented with a broadsword. The weighing of harm…that was harder. That was the sort of thing the law officials were meant to train for – the sort of thing Justiciars were meant to train for. She had a better awareness of the Law than most every other soldier in the Pentarchy, due to her rank and familial connections, but even so…she still doubted, very much, that it was a good enough substitute for the decades of cross-discipline training a Justiciar-aspirant usually undertook before they were consecrated.

Still, she could mostly accept that Opeli knew better than she did. Opeli was devout. She believed in the Paragons, in the original teachings of Paragonism – that it was the duty of every living person to embody the best of themselves, and be truest to their greatest virtues, and act as if they themselves had a Paragon within them, waiting to be named. Opeli believed in the concept of Justiciars – believed that Amaya could and should open herself up to become a true vessel of virtue, and act in the world as an extension of Justice herself. And if Opeli believed so strongly, who was Amaya to question it?

Except she had to. Because how could she ever think herself capable of the Blindfold?

She was hunting an elf that might, or might not, have killed her nephews. Her boys. Sarai’s sons. How could she possibly approach objectivity in a matter so horrifically, viciously personal? She thought she’d be hard-pressed not to cleave the assassin in two the moment she saw her, no matter her guilt, no matter the weighing of the harm. How could she possibly stay her blade from a creature like that?

…Opeli trusted her as a Justiciar, which Amaya thought she had good reason to doubt. Opeli did not know her all that well, after all.

But Gren had faith in her, too, and that meant a great deal more.

She exhaled, and raised her hands to speak the vows.

She swore to wield the Sword. She swore to use the Scales as she ought. She swore, albeit falteringly, to wear the Blindfold.

Opeli reached out then and tied the ridiculous symbolic strip of fabric around her eyes. From then on, Amaya had only her expectations and her remaining senses to go on. Her heartbeat resounded steadily beneath her skin eight times before Opeli’s fingers touched her brow, cool with the wet ashes she painted there. The symbol of the Scales. She withdrew, and then for a while, there was little to go on.

She had an idea of what Opeli was saying, of course, and Gren would retell it for her later. The Priestess of Paragons accepted her vows, and declared her Justiciar until such a time as she abdicated or until she died. She was ostensibly informed that, should she ever break her sacred oaths, the title and the honour would be stripped from her, and she would never again be welcome in a house of Paragons, nor be permitted to speak in a court of law, nor have the right to sit in authority over any other soul than her own; she would be named across the kingdoms as a barren thing, honourless and forsworn, to wander in the empty and cursed and soulless way that all oathbreakers must do.

Which, she supposed, gave her some extra incentive to not lose her mind at the first glimpse of an elven murderess. There were stories about oathbreakers, too – and none of them good.

The blindfold was lifted from her eyes, all the candle-flame of the hall blurring back into view. Opeli smiled, and looped the thing twice around the hand that held the sword. “Rise, Justiciar, and go forth.” She said, and stepped back, clasping a hand to her chest: respect of the Priestess of Paragons to an agent of the divine. Behind her, the congregation rose, and did likewise, heads bowed. If Amaya were the type to be easily embarrassed, it might have been mortifying. Instead, she only bowed her head in turn, and took the holy articles with her as she left, striding down the Hall.

Behind her, Gren and a few of her Battalion peeled off from the congregation, and followed. Gren caught up with her not long before they reached the doors, but didn’t speak until they were outside, stepping out of the side of the Valley that the Hall of Paragons had been excavated from.

She eyed the other end of the Valley, briefly, where her sister’s grave presided. But there was no time for that, and she turned to stride the other way.

“Congratulations.” Gren said to her, with his hands, as they walked. “How do you feel?”

She considered it. “Tired and ready to get moving.” She decided, after a moment, and rolled her eyes at the way his face fell. “I also have an uncomfortable feeling that this is going to get a song written about me.”

“Another one, you mean?” Gren inquired, with a very specific sort of innocent expression that meant he was teasing her. “Didn’t the one near the border praise you as being an embodiment of Valor?”

She made a rude gesture at him. “Seems like I can’t go a year without tripping over a Paragon these days.” She said, though it felt a little sacrilegious to say it while still wearing the ceremonial pieces. “Someone will be trying to consign me to Mercy next, I’m sure.”

Gren’s lips pursed as he thought. His hands moved the next moment, saying “Fortitude, I’d think. I’ve already heard people muttering about that on the long marches.”

She sighed. “Of course.” She made sure to sign it with all the weary emphasis she could, because really. “Better than Mercy, at any rate.”

He offered a very pointed look at the Blindfold still looped around her arm, but said nothing. Still, the lack of comment felt cheeky, in that very characteristically Gren way, where he’d never so much as think of saying anything impolite, but the implication…

Amaya shook her head at him, just a little fondly, and gestured for them to hurry up. If they were going to get moving this afternoon, it had to be soon.

---

After what had happened – what Ezran had done – it felt utterly bizarre to set out walking again.

It was so…normal. Routine. They fell into the familiar rhythm of traversing unpleasantly steep slopes, and the increasingly-familiar menial vagaries of travel. Callum’s shoulder grew sore again from the strap digging into it, the items in his pack conspired to dig into his spine in the most uncomfortable ways possible, and his legs resumed their perpetual complaints of ill-treatment. It was unspeakably weird to keep climbing and keep walking as though everything was normal, as though nothing had changed, when – less than an hour ago – his little brother and an unhatched dragon had worked a miracle.

He kept looking at Rayla, and her hand, not quite able to make himself believe in what had actually happened. It was so…surreal. This morning he’d woken from nightmares, not long after that he’d been fighting off panic with what seemed like every breath, and now…

Now, they were…walking.

The bewilderment of it hadn’t quite worn off. Neither had the part of him that was coiled and anxious, waiting for disaster to strike, waiting for time to run out. He could still feel the tension of it in the pit of his gut, though so much lighter than it had been before. He kept waiting for something to go wrong. For something to change. But…

Despite everything, against all odds…it had happened. A miracle.

That thought, whenever it arose, made him stare back at his brother again, as if seeing him for the first time. It was just…Ezran. His little brother. A weird kid, true, but – who could have predicted he’d pull something like that out of nowhere? Except, he supposed, it wasn’t exactly out of nowhere, he’d seen the way he’d behaved with that egg, after all.

It seemed that no matter what he looked at, he was doomed to bewilderment. There was Rayla and her miraculously-probably-saved-hand, there was Ezran and his improbable dragon-channelling talent, there was the increasingly stark and mountainous terrain that he had ascended himself, so far away from home…

It was all so bizarre he pinched himself once or twice along the way, just to make sure it wasn’t all some crazy dream. And even that couldn’t dispel the surreality of everything.

Part of him kept wanting to stop and have another hysterical moment or ten to try to come to terms with everything that happened, but Rayla was still walking and Ezran was still walking so that meant he was walking as well, even though everything was crazy and he had no idea what was going on anymore-

“Stop that.” Rayla told him, abruptly, the words such a shock in the midst of his preoccupation that he stopped and nearly tripped over a rock. Ez stopped as well, and tilted his head in their direction, curious.

“…Er, what?” He managed, after a second.

She shrugged, reaching into her pocket to extract a piece of willow bark she’d stashed there. “Whatever you’re worrying about.” She elaborated, and popped it into her mouth. “I can practically see your thoughts getting all tangled up in there.” As she said the last word, she leaned in and tapped him on the forehead, a smile pulling at her lips as she drew away again. He intended to roll his eyes at her, but what actually happened was that he started staring and couldn’t quite stop until she made a face at him. “What?” She demanded, arms folding. His eyes, almost on reflex, followed the motion of her hand.

“Aren’t you worrying? About…anything?” He found himself asking, a little bemused. With all that had happened – how could she not be worrying about something?

“Like what?” Ezran asked, in her place, with a guileless frown. Rayla looked a little more understanding as she inspected him, but…yeah, neither of them seemed to be fretting like he was.

“Oh, I don’t know.” Callum started, a little sarcastic, waving his hand as though confused before gesturing it emphatically at Rayla’s, still dark, still bound. “That, maybe?”

Rayla seemed vaguely sympathetic at that, but…not worried. Ezran, on the other hand, just kept frowning. “But we loosened it.” He insisted, setting Bait down at his side as if he felt the need to have his hands free for the conversation. “Her hand’s gonna be fine now.”

“Is it, though?” Callum demanded, and then – then, perhaps unsurprisingly, all the worries that had been chasing themselves in his head came spilling out. “Are you sure about that? Because it looks to me like it’s still hurting her, and – don’t you remember what the Healer said? Taking the binding off might make some horrible….body-shock-thing happen!”

She grimaced at that, but hadn’t managed to open her mouth to say anything before Ez got his reply off. “But we didn’t take it off.” He pointed out, firmly, as though he thought Callum were perhaps missing something abundantly obvious that needed pointing out. “We just loosened it, like the Healer said. So she should be fine.”

“’She’ is standing right here.” Rayla said, dryly, hands going to her hips. She raised an eyebrow at them as they turned to look at her again.

“…Sorry.” He offered, after a moment. “But even if the binding just loosened – it was still by kind of a lot, right? What if it does…” He waved his hands sharply, frustrated at the lack of good terminology. Increasingly, he couldn’t stop remembering the Healer’s warnings about the dangers of reviving a near-dead limb; how the experience could shock the body, and poison it, and strike at the heart to still it. He hoped that, given the binding had only been loosened and not outright removed, it wouldn’t get that bad. The Healer had advised they impose their own looser binding if they managed to remove the first, and…well, that was essentially what had ended up happening, so…it should be fine, right?

But what if it wasn’t fine?

“…Poison my blood?” She suggested, after a moment, moving her bound hand to look at it herself. She flexed the fingers with a slight grimace.

“I guess?” He sighed, and followed her eyes to it. She’d put on a jacket about an hour ago, evidently starting to feel the chill of their surroundings, which obscured even the bandages over the binding. “I mean…does it feel any different? Better? Worse? I can tell it’s still hurting you.”

“Was it the willow bark that gave it away?” Rayla said, still dry, but eyes remaining on her hand. After a moment, she shrugged, and answered “It still hurts, I suppose, but in a different way. Feels more like pins-and-needles now. Before it was just kinda….numb, and aching.”

Ezran winced in sympathy. “I hate pins-and-needles.” He expressed, expression going pensive. “One time me and Bait were waiting in the grate behind the baker’s kitchen for hours, because we timed it wrong and there were a load of people there, and by the time we got out there were no jelly tarts left and my feet were completely numb. All the prickling was horrible.”

Her lips quirked upwards, clearly amused. “Think that, but maybe ten times worse.” Rayla advised, and his brother shuddered.

Callum didn’t pay a great deal of attention to the story, being more focused on her hand. “Does your pulse feel normal?” He asked, and in an unthinking gesture, reached out to check for himself. She looked momentarily startled as his fingers settled on her skin, but held the hand out for him anyway.

“How should I know?” She asked, sounding a little exasperated as he pushed her sleeve back to investigate the binding, hesitating at the bandage. In the end, he’d grown familiar enough with where to look for her pulse that he just felt for it through the bandaging, and…well, it felt normal enough? Not too fast, not too slow, not weak or jittery or anything…

“….I think it seems okay for now.” He decreed, almost reluctantly, and stepped back again. “But you should tell me if anything changes, alright?”

She rolled her eyes. “You worrywart. I’ll be fine.” She pronounced him, with an oddly fond smile, and then walked off up along the path again without so much as a by-your-leave.

Callum sighed, patted Ez on the shoulder, and followed after her.

---

The walking today was depressingly steep. It was almost entirely uphill, and the ongoing ascent was starting to wear strangely at the heels of his feet. They were growing sore, in a sort of abrasive way that he thought heralded blisters. His boots were broken-in enough by now that it had been a long time since he had any blisters, but apparently, enough mountain-hiking was perfectly capable of changing that. He wondered, uneasily, if he’d need to start padding his heels to stop them blistering too badly. It wasn’t as though he’d be able to stop climbing mountains any time soon, after all.

Rayla did not find a campsite she liked in the next hour, so he just…walked, and watched, and reflected on how much a single day could change everything.

Only a few hours ago, he’d been crying with relief. They’d all cried and laughed and shook like leaves from the awful, wonderful, horrible catharsis of what had happened. He still felt a little fragile – strange and tremulous, like his emotions weren’t quite up to any more hits or surprises, and he might have a breakdown at the first hint of trouble. It was unpleasantly exhausting, how wrung-out the experience had left him, as though all the mounting stress and dread he’d been cultivating had torn its way straight out of his gut, leaving the space behind empty and terribly raw.

He’d never imagined that something so fortunate – so miraculous – could leave him feeling so drained.

And, despite that, despite what had happened, despite everything…they were just…walking.

It wasn’t like they could stop, what with how far they had to go, and the lack of a suitable campsite, and the risk of ambush that Rayla insisted existed. According to her, those hunters they’d tied up ought to be able to get free and get to Verdorn within the day, and then they could mount some sort of pursuit force. So there was definite pressure to keep moving, but…still. It hadn’t stopped feeling strange.

Rayla chewed willow-bark more or less continually as they walked, and carefully pressed at her still-bound hand even though it made her grimace awfully. She avoided the raw bandaged area around the bind, but…even with the thing loosened, it obviously wasn’t going to be an instant fix. Her skin still looked dark, albeit not quite as much so, and she was obviously still in pain. Evidently though, it was better enough that the jacket she’d put on earlier wasn’t bothering her too much.

It was strange to see her in a jacket basically identical to his. Strange enough to distract him from worrying for a good few minutes, but certainly no longer.

He stewed over his concerns in silence, unable to stop and yet not wanting to bother her too often with queries about her health. In time, though, with something approaching mercy, the actual walking became tricky enough that it commanded a lot of his attention, and he couldn’t afford to dwell too much. The way ahead became more and more precipitously steep, and much more rocky; the incline seemed to be too much for most trees, and all at once the forest thinned noticeably. The trees that remained were pale shadows of the vast things in the forest below, with thin trunks and comparatively short statures…but, evidently, very stubborn roots. Some of them clung to the cliff-edges at frankly alarming angles, looking like they’d fall off at any moment.

They kicked up clouds of stone-chips as they walked, sending tiny dusty avalanches clattering down-slope. Without the thick carpet of years’ worth of pine needles, the ground was silt and gravel, and dangerously loose. He slipped a few times before he got the hang of looking for firmer, rockier foot-holds, and several times had to clamber up the steeper areas with his hands holding onto the rock for support. Ezran, with his smaller stature, needed help up the steeper sections frequently – and he’d had to hand Bait over to Callum entirely. The glow-toad was riding haphazardly stuffed into the top of Callum’s backpack, because there was no room for him in Ezran’s.

Rayla called for a break after one particularly unpleasant stretch that was basically rock-climbing rather than walking, and they collapsed gladly against some nearby boulders.

“Is it going to be this steep all the way up?” Ezran asked, a little plaintively, as he caught his breath. He seemed to be holding up better under the strain of the climb than Callum, because Callum couldn’t quite conceive of the idea of talking yet. He was too busy with things like breathing, and contemplating how unnaturally comfortable boulders became when one was exhausted enough.

Rayla, who had crouched near them but not deigned to sit down, peered up the slope and shrugged. “Hard to say. I’ve not gone through these mountains before.” She said, grimacing as she pressed her fingers into the palm of her hand, the skin going white in their wake. “But…probably, yep.”

Ezran groaned, and Callum would have done the same, had Rayla’s hand not distracted him. He blinked at her, decided it had probably been long enough since the last time he asked, and after a few seconds mustered the energy to ask “How’s your hand doing?”

She glanced over at him, then back down at her hand. She grimaced a little, then rolled the sleeve of her jacket up to show him her arm. He made a dismayed sound at the same time she exhaled, leaning forwards as she said “Well, my whole arm is sore now.” She made a face at the arm in question, and he could see why. “I didn’t expect to be able to see it though.”

There were raised pink lines along her skin, taking routes that looked like the pathways of veins. Pathways of inflammation, travelling with her blood. “Why didn’t you say something?” he asked, dismayed, and touched his fingertips to the skin to gauge the temperature. Was it warmer than it ought to be? He couldn’t tell.

“It’s not exactly agonising, Callum.” Rayla told him, dryly. “It’s just a little sore, like I worked the muscles too hard. Anyway, I’m assuming it’s normal.”

“Normal.” Callum repeated, deeply sceptical.

“As normal as something like this gets. Lots of nasty in this hand, right? And now it’s…circulating.” She shrugged, as though unbothered, but he thought he could see the hint of tension around her eyes.

“Isn’t that bad?” Ez asked, anxiously, as he shuffled over to look. “Didn’t the Healer say that that’s super risky?”

“From what I eavesdropped on, she thought it would help if it’s done slow and careful. And my hand’s still bound, so…probably counts.” She shrugged, trying for nonchalance, but he could see the tightness around her eyes. She was worried, too.

He inspected her, attempting not to be too outwardly anxious, and then reached out to take her healthy hand before he’d quite thought it through. He settled his fingers over her pulse to feel it, and asked “Does your pulse feel weird? Do you have any…I dunno, weird aches that aren’t in your arm?” Her pulse…well, he wasn’t exactly an experienced and knowledgeable pulse-taker, but he thought it felt a bit strange. Too fast, too light, and jittery. Oddly irregular.

She grimaced, and he saw a little of her fear slip through into her expression. “…Does feel a bit weird.” She admitted, quietly. “Hard to describe, though. Jumpy, maybe?” She shrugged, plainly uneasy. “So far it’s only my arm that hurts, though.”

Callum clamped down on his anxiety as best he could, holding silent for several seconds, and then released her wrist. “If your heartbeat feels off, I think you need to be careful to take it easy.” He said, eventually. “Don’t let yourself get too out of breath. Take lots of breaks.”

“…Sure.” She said, unconvincingly, and he glared at her. Crossed his arms, even.

“I know you don’t want to waste time.” He told her, with a little asperity. “But if you push yourself too hard while you’re sick and you have a heart attack – I don’t know about you, but I don’t know the heart-starting spell.”

She straightened a little at that, and while she did glare back at him a little, he thought something in his words had struck her. “…I did sort of guess that, Callum.” She said, dryly, and rotated her dark wrist a few times, careful.

He did not unfold his arms, and stared at her expectantly. “So….?”

She rolled her eyes, and pushed away from the rock she was leaning against. “Ugh. Fine. I’ll go easier on myself. Happy?”

“Ecstatic.” He answered, in tones just as dry as hers. She rolled her eyes again, standing with enough abruptness that it seemed a dismissal.

“Good.” She said, hefting her bags. “Because it’s time to keep going. Still a long way to go today.”

“You’re not exactly filling me with confidence, here.” He complained, hauling himself upwards with considerable effort. His every muscle protested the move – and so did Bait, who apparently wasn’t impressed with the sudden jostling.

“I’ll be fine, Callum.” Rayla insisted, and then stubbornly walked off back up the mountain again. Evidently, that was the end of that. He stared after her, unimpressed and worried at the same time, and huffed with the annoyance of trying to care for the health of someone so unnecessarily stubborn about it. You’d think an elf assassin who knew all the stuff she knew would be a little more practical about her own health, but, apparently…not so much.

He sighed, and held out a hand to his brother. “C’mon, Ez. Seems like we’re moving again.” He said this last part more loudly, and pointedly – a deliberate prod against the elf he knew could hear him perfectly well.

Ezran looked between him and Rayla with a vaguely wide-eyed expression somewhere between interest and concern. Then he shrugged, accepted Callum’s offered hand, and got to his feet. “I guess we just have to keep an eye on her.” He said, apparently unconcerned about being overheard. “So she doesn’t work herself too hard.”

A little playfully, Callum shook his brother’s hand on that before he released it, eliciting a giggle. “Sounds good to me.” He agreed. “Now, let’s get moving, before she leaves us behind.”

He wasn’t sure if the huff he heard was Rayla or the wind, but he was putting his money on the former.

Their resumed climb took them further and further into the thin cold air of the mountain, with trees becoming so sparse that there was little to no cover from the gusty mountainside conditions at all. In the morning, when they began walking and left the tied-up hunters behind them, Ezran had been delighted by the white puffs his breath made in the cold air, and had stomped around puffing in imitation of dragons, bringing a smile even to the then-despairing Rayla. He’d since obviously lost the novelty of it, but now…now it was windy enough that the gusts blew back the haze of their breath in their faces, trails of white vapour spilling out around their cheeks.

He wasn’t sure if windiness was just characteristic of mountains, or if this was worse than normal. Either way, it was getting unpleasant. In the end, he just tucked the tail of his scarf in so it wouldn’t flap around quite as insistently, and carried on.

If Rayla took things any easier, he couldn’t see any obvious signs of it. But, in unspoken alliance, he and Ezran conspired to be conspicuously and insistently exhausted after every particularly steep stretch of climbing, collapsing where they stood and calling for a breather and a drink from the waterskins. If the way Rayla eyed them was any indication, she was more than aware of the subterfuge, but she didn’t outright speak against them. She only sighed, very put-upon, and prevailed upon her own use of the waterskin before ushering them onwards.

Mid-afternoon, they started to see snow on the ground.

“Told you.” Rayla said, a little cynically, as Ezran bent to examine the scattered frosty patches of it. “Give it another day and we’ll be hip-deep in it.”

“Hip-deep?” Callum repeated, sceptically, while Ez picked up the evidently very icy bit of snow. It looked like it had melted from the gentle powder he was accustomed to, and then probably frozen again, forming larger icy clusters that crackled under his brother’s fingers in a weak echo of broken glass.

Her lips twitched. “Well. Shin-deep, maybe.” She admitted, and looked up at the sky. “’Course, all it would take is a decent snowstorm, and then we could be hip-deep in snow.”

“That must be a pain to walk in.” Ezran said, thoughtfully, as he looked up at her. “You could have some great snowball fights, though! And then maybe once we’re going back down a mountain, we could just sled instead. It would be way faster.”

“Sorry to say it, bud, but I’m pretty sure Rayla didn’t bring a sled from the Lodge.” He said, amused, and then followed Rayla’s gaze to the thickly-clouded sky. As if responding to his attention, a particularly stiff breeze puffed down his collar, and he shivered, tightening his scarf against the wind. “I guess it’s going to be colder from here on.”

“It won’t be so bad as long as we’re walking.” Rayla claimed, and hefted her backpack; the usual signal that they were about to start moving again. “And when we’re not moving, we’ll have a campfire, so…” She shrugged, and without further word, resumed her pace up the slope.

Callum and his legs took comfort in the knowledge that they’d almost certainly start looking for somewhere to camp soon, and followed her up.

They walked another good half-hour in the increasingly-moody winds before the ground evened out a bit, still sloping upwards, but much more gently. The trees apparently approved of this milder incline, and they found themselves travelling through a spindly pine-forest full of windswept branches; it was apparently windy enough frequently enough that the trees were all growing slanted westwards, apparently from the buffeting of the same powerful easterly wind currently blowing in his ears.

Eventually, they came to a loosely-forested cliffside where the rockiness of the terrain had denuded most of it of foliage. It sloped gently downwards towards the face of the cliff, at enough of an angle that he’d be worried about losing the egg over it if it fell out – it’d probably roll straight down and off the cliff. He winced at the intrusion of the thought, even as he looked to Rayla, perplexed at why they’d stopped. She was staring at the rocky expanse as if its modest dusting of frost and snow were particularly vexing, or particularly noteworthy.

“…We should probably camp here.” She said, with noticeable distaste.

He blinked, then stared back at the cliffside. “What, really? But it’s…” He searched for a word.

“Windy.” Ezran supplied, from beside him, his hair looking vaguely windblown in the same way as the trees. “And right next to a cliff.”

“Right next to a cliff is defensible.” Rayla informed them, though she did not look pleased. “Means if someone wants to ambush us they don’t have as many places to do it from. Anyway,” She gestured at the nearby trees. “This’ll be the easiest firewood around. If we keep climbing it’ll get steep again, and we won’t have much to pick from.” She frowned, ears drooping a little. “Just….don’t lose anything off the cliff-edge. Especially yourselves.”

Callum recalled the thought he’d had, and shuddered. “…Be careful with the egg.” He advised his brother, who practically recoiled at the words, flinching as if struck in the face.

“…I will.” He said, wide-eyed, with another glance towards the cliff.

Tentatively, Callum approached it, and peered over the edge. It was…a long way down. Not as far as he’d expected, maybe, and it wasn’t an entirely sheer drop – it was more like a near-vertical slope than an outright drop-off – but he didn’t expect the fall would be that much more gentle for it. There were trees at the bottom, and a little further along, a wide river. Beyond that there was another cliff face, rising up to join with the mountain behind it. He thought he could see a silver glimmer of water somewhere between the trees at the bottom. “…I think this is the gorge.” He said, after a moment. “You know, the river valley between Dorel and Farel. That the people of Verdorn use.”

“Makes sense.” Rayla said, setting down her bags against a snow-dusted rock. “Bit worrying, though. I hope no one spots the campfire.”

“If they do…” He frowned, paused, and thought through it. “Well, if they do, won’t they only be able to see it from Verdorn? Or the other mountain? So it probably won’t matter. It’d take them ages to get here from there.”

“Hopefully.” She sighed, and unzipped the tent pack. The wind billowed into it, puffing out the sides of the leather with a rhythmic sort of thwip sound. “Okay. This is going to be a pain.”

Ezran looked between her and the tent, quizzically. “…How come?” He asked, trotting over to put his bag (very carefully) down beside hers.

“Because of your hand?” Callum guessed, after a second.

“Me and Callum can put it up, like yesterday.” Ez added, expression bright, and she snorted.

“No, it’s not that.” She said, lips twitching. “Though my hand – and arm – being a pain…that’s not going to help. No, it’s the wind.” She waved her hand towards the spindly, wind-swept trees, as if to indicate the very pronounced gusts still buffeting them from that direction. “We’re all going to need to do this, or the tent will blow off the mountain.”

“…Oh.” Ezran considered this for a second. “I guess we’re using all the tent pegs today, right?”

“You bet.” Rayla agreed, and carefully extracted the outer-tent, promptly stamping her foot down on it to pin it to the ground. It was already ruffling and blustering along the ground, even rolled and folded and barely able to catch the wind at all. “Get the poles ready, will you? And maybe tie yourselves together with rope or something. Make it easier to catch each other if we go off the cliff.”

“Isn’t that a bit much?” Callum asked, sceptically, as he swung his bag around. Despite his words, he went rummaging for his rope coil, even as Ezran extracted one of the poles and began to assemble it.

Rayla raised an eyebrow at him. “Would you prefer to take a little tumble off the cliff, Callum?” She inquired, sardonic, and he huffed.

“…No, thank you.”

She nodded. “Then let’s just be careful.”

Ezran clicked the tent pole into place and reached for another. “Better safe than sorry.” He said, sagely, as Callum tied the rope uncertainly around his middle. Watching him, Rayla rolled her eyes, and shuffled over to take the rope from him.

“You need to learn to tie better knots.” She informed him, unceremoniously unravelling his apparently-inadequate attempt. She then proceeded to loop more rope around his middle, running it in and around in a looping knot that was considerably distinct from his own.

His eyes moved between her and her hands. He’d never really considered that there might be a lot of ways to tie a rope around someone, or that one would be better than another. He watched her setting both hands to the task, and wondered if it was hurting her. “…Well, I’ll practice that one later?” he offered, watching her progress with an eye for memorising it. She stepped back and pulled the length of rope with her, stamping down on the outer-tent that had begun to flutter rebelliously about in her absence.

“You do that.” She said, and approached Ezran. “Here, Ez. Don’t mind me, I’ll just tie you in.”

“Sure.” He said, agreeably, already at work on the third tent-pole.

In short order they were all tied together and had the tent-poles assembled and ready to apply to the tent. Callum still considered the rope to be flagrant overkill – sure, it was windy, but not that windy. It wasn’t like it was a struggle to stand upright or anything, so it wouldn’t be that bad, surely? So, when Rayla called for him to get a good grip on the tent with her while Ezran would have the duty of putting the poles in, he was perhaps not taking it all that seriously. He held on as directed, of course, and Rayla unfolded the tent fabric, and Ezran stood by with a tent-pole at the ready-

And then the wind billowed into the tent as if into a sail, and suddenly, he was struggling to stay on his feet.

“Holy-“ he yelped, as Rayla grimly dug her heels in and yanked back on the tent as it filled with air, puffing out as if fully-boned with the tent-poles and making a valiant attempt to wrest itself from their hands. The sound of the air rushing into it was a loud and enthusiastic whomp, and thereafter it billowed and flapped and rattled as it pulled at them, the force of the wind throughout it alarmingly strong. “This is crazy!”

“Told you!” Rayla called to him, wrestling the tent to the ground. It puffed around her, flapping rebelliously, and a sudden wind-gust nearly tore it from his hands. With a noise that was almost a snarl, Rayla hooked herself into the ground of the cliffside with her blade, wrapping a storm-line around her arm. “Ezran!” She reminded, a moment later, and his brother snapped from his stunned daze.

“Right!” Was all Ez had to say, as he attempted to flatten down a section of tent enough to get the pole into it.

He’d managed to get two poles in and had started on the third when the wind shrieked in from the east, blasting into the tent and yanking Callum along with it – with enough force that it sent him sprawling against the ground, the thick fabric ripped from his hands. His teeth clacked together around the shape of a yell as he hit the ground, with a pinch of pain at the edge of his tongue. He lay there, utterly dazed, for a timeless second filled with thoughts of sails catching the wind and the tent becoming a vast kite to carry them all away…

“Callum!” Rayla shouted, and when he looked over she was busy battling the tent to the ground with nothing but her hook and the storm-lines as leverage. Even so, she managed to spare enough attention to look over at him with urgent concern.

Ezran stood, craning his head to look past the flapping tent to see him. “Are you okay?” He called, anxiously, the third tent pole braced between his hands.

His mouth tasted like blood, and there were sharp scraping pains along the skin on various parts of his hands and arms, but…. “I’m fine.” He called back, a little hoarsely, and scrambled to his feet, head still wiped oddly blank by the shock of the impact. “I’ll just-“ He grabbed at a roiling corner of the tent-fabric and emulated Rayla, unspooling one of the tied storm-lines and looping it around his arm. It definitely made it easier to get a grip on the thing, but keeping himself upright was hard. And now that there were two poles in the tent, the damned things were nearly poking his eyes out every other second. “Just, get the poles in already!”

“I’m trying!” Ezran said, plainly agitated, as he tried to grasp at the relevant bit of tent for long enough to stick a pole in it. “Can you – hold this part down, or something? It’s really hard to get at it!”

Rayla responded to his request by practically throwing herself over the tent and tackling the piece in question to the ground. Amazingly, it was so full of the prevailing wind that it actually bucked and roiled underneath her. It was utterly ridiculous. Why did no one ever mention that tents could turn into stupidly deadly wind-socks under the right conditions?

The effort was enough, apparently; Ezran pushed the segmented metal pole into its tube and in that fashion the three of them worked, pinning the tent down in the right places for the last pole to be applied. Rayla then determinedly oriented the tent-door away from the wind, and then rooted herself and the storm-lines to the ground while Callum and Ezran made several desperate and largely unsuccessful attempts to pitch the stupid thing.

It took enough tries that his fingertips were sore with the effort of trying to pull the ends of the tent-poles into their proper places, but – they managed it eventually, and then Rayla was rotating the tent-door into a more favourable position while Ezran scrambled for the tent pegs, and they were basically done. They whacked in the pegs into the hooks on the tent proper – all twelve – and then laid out the storm-lines around the tent and secured those down too. Rayla enlisted the end of a blade as a hammer to knock the pegs solidly into the hard ground, while Callum and Ezran prevailed upon the use of large rocks for the same purpose.

“Ugh. Stupid wind.” Rayla muttered darkly, when they were done, and beholding the sight of their securely tied-down tent with exhausted eyes and aching bodies. “I hate putting up tents in bad wind.”

“….You’ve done it before?” Callum managed to ask, after several seconds of attempting to muster the energy. He looked at his hands and found the fingertips red and raw. He could feel scrapes along his arms and elbows from the fall, which his jacket hadn’t managed to protect him from. The fabric looked a little frayed from it, too.

The tent still flapped in the wind, but…ineffectually. Like a fish pinned on a knife. The sides fluttered noisily in the wind and the storm-lines quivered, but they’d done a solid job of it. That tent was not moving. Even so, Rayla seemed to find it a good idea to move around its perimeter, covering the heads of the tent-pegs with piled rocks. “A few times.” She answered, after a moment. “’Course, I had a whole team helping with holding the tents down then. Made it a lot easier.”

He nodded, a little numbly, and raised an aching hand to rub at his ears. The wind had been blowing in them for hours now, and combined with the fall, they were really aching, in a cold-feeling pain that was steadily spreading to the rest of his head. “…Inner-tent?” he questioned, flapping a hand a little ineffectually at the tent-pack, open and fluttering ominously in the ongoing gusts.

“Inner-tent,” Rayla agreed, and the three of them wrestled that part into the tent’s interior. This, at least, they could keep folded until they were inside, and out of the worst of the wind.

Setting up camp that afternoon continued to prove an exercise in problem-solving, when the wind promptly extinguished their first three attempts at a campfire and nearly set fire to the tent on the fourth. Eventually they moved it to a spot uncomfortably close to one of the trees, risking setting fire to that for the chance of some meagre shelter. It worked, finally, and Rayla set them to work melting snow to replenish their waterskins.

“Easier than looking for a water source.” She said, shrugging, pulling on some gloves to go scoop up more snow. “That’s one good thing about snow and ice, I suppose. If we’re unlucky, the nearest stream could be a good hour away, so….” She dumped the latest handful of icy snow into the pot and then waved towards it, demonstratively. The little-finger glove flapped around with the movement, plainly empty.

“Huh.” Callum said, committing the detail to his growing knowledge on journeying, and went to aid in the snow-gathering efforts.

The downside of having the campfire upwind of the camp meant that a large part of the campsite couldn’t really be traversed unless he wanted a lungful of smoke, which was yet another lesson he hadn’t really asked for and certainly hadn’t enjoyed, but it was probably helpful knowledge. Somehow. Once most of the camp-stuff was attended to, though, Callum started giving Rayla’s hand some pointed and meaningful looks until she rolled her eyes and came over to let him inspect it.

She rolled the jacket sleeve up again, and then he had a pretty good amount of arm to inspect for anomalous swelling. He eyed the places where, earlier, there’d been raised red lines along the veins and noted “I think your whole arm has just swollen up a bit, now.” Gently, he poked it. “Does that hurt?”

She grimaced, but shook her head. “Not when you put pressure on it? Not like a bruise.” She offered. “But it sort of…aches. Kinda. On its own. A bit like an overworked muscle.”

Callum’s own overworked muscles took that moment to remind him of how sore they were, and he shuffled his crossed legs uncomfortably. He shifted his hands more gently down the affected arm to where the binding still sat, albeit blessedly looser. “How’s the hand feel?” He asked, after a moment, reaching to the side to pull his medical supplies over, complete with the boiled bandages. “Any better?”

“Bit less painful.” She said, after a moment of consideration. “Still really bad around the binding…but not much helping that, what with the open sores and all.”

Ez side-eyed her then, glancing down at his bag and then back at her hand. “…Does the binding still feel loose?” He asked, after a moment. “I’m pretty sure me and Zym can do our thing again, but…I don’t really know how it’s gonna work. If your assassiny-ribbon is going to get tighter again or not.”

She was silent for several seconds, eyes straying back to the bandage obscuring the binding. “I can’t really tell.” She said, eventually. “Directly around the binding is mostly just…well, you know.” By ‘you know’, he assumed she meant ‘so sore and wrecked I can’t actually feel much from it except pain’. Like, he knew she wouldn’t actually say that, but the meaning seemed relatively clear.

“If it’s still doing the pins-and-needles, it’s probably still looser. Maybe?” Callum reasoned, fingers hovering over the knots on the bandages. Considering he’d only changed them a few hours ago, it seemed maybe too early to do it again, but… “And I think you’ve got a little bit of colour back in your hand. And definitely your wrist.” He touched his fingertips to the skin. It still felt cold; if there’d been much change there, he couldn’t really feel it yet. For a second, he near-reflexively went to look for her pulse – but on this hand, that was solidly obscured by bandage.

He set her hand down and went for the other one instead, pressing fingers over the radial artery. She looked down at it, then up at him, and asked “How is it?”

“Better than earlier.” He said, with some relief. “Your arm might be all swollen but at least your heartbeat feels less…weird.”

However unconcerned she tried to pretend to seem, he could see that that relieved her. “Well, thank the stars for that.” She sighed, then shifted back, retrieving her arm from his grasp. She stood and shuffled over to rummage in the bags, pulling out several containers still packed with goose meat. “Let’s get dinner out of the way now, and then we can actually rest a little.” She sounded almost wistful at that. He could sympathise entirely – even their downtime, lately, had been rather fraught.

“Sounds good.” Callum said, thinking briefly of his sketchbook, and the nascent sketch of Verdorn sprawling across a page. He thought, too, of the neglected sketch of Rayla’s hand, symbolic of the dread that had been gripping him so strongly the last few days. He wondered what it would be like, to look at it now.

“Are we going to heat it up?” Ez wondered, as Rayla unpacked their provisions. “Or just eat it cold again?”

Rayla shrugged. “Whatever you prefer, I suppose.” She said. “Though it is harder to heat up leftovers with the sort of equipment we have. If we boil it it’ll lose flavour, and it’s tricky to pike cooked meat sometimes.”

“I’ll just have mine cold.” Callum said, abruptly really feeling his exhaustion, and accepted a jar from Rayla with a sigh. “I don’t really want to wait.”

Ezran considered that. “I’ll do the same, then.” He decided, and took his own jar, making a slight face at it. Bait, sensing the entrance of food into the proceedings, immediately perked up from where he’d been sitting near the fire, and hopped up to Ezran with a demanding croak. Ez looked down at him, a smile chasing its way onto his face, and proffered a chunk of cooked meat at the toad. “I know it’s not exactly your usual,” He said, to the toad, as he knelt down to bring his hand closer. “But you’re okay with that, right?”

Callum, watching, noted that Ezran nodded as if in response to something before Bait shot out his tongue to accept the offering. It made him feel distinctly weird, in an on-the-edge-of-realising-something sort of way. He recalled the way Ezran had been talking to the egg, and uneasily considered that…well, Bait was a magical creature too. Did Ezran’s talent extend beyond talking to unhatched dragons?

…And, if it did, how far did it go?

…Could Ez really talk to animals, like he’d been saying for so long? …But then, if he could, why would he have got it wrong when Callum asked him to prove it?

He shifted uneasily for a while before he finally elected to just ask. “…So, Ez,” He said, slowly, in apparently a strange enough tone that his brother looked up warily. “This whole…talking to the dragon egg thing. Is that…” he hesitated. “Where did that come from? How long – I mean, was it something you realised you could do straight away, or…” He trailed off, not wanting to quite come out and say ‘have you been telling the truth this whole time?’

Ezran stilled, for a second, and then abruptly looked mulish. His shoulders hunched a little and he looked away. “It’s not exactly a new thing, you know.” He muttered, setting the jar down to fold his arms. “I’ve been talking to Bait for years. It’s not my fault you never believed me until it was a dragon I was talking to.”

His hands fluttered up in a sort of unhappy defensive motion, and his stomach twisted. It was a fairly bald confirmation of his uneasy suspicions, and…and he wasn’t really sure how to respond to it. Even with the evidence in front of him, and with what Ezran had managed with Rayla’s binding….somehow, it was still hard to wrap his head around the idea of this being true, too. He’d thought Ezran a liar on this for years, after all. For several seconds he struggled to find something to say, until Rayla took the matter out of his hands.

“Hold on,” She said, straightening, and looking between them with a raised eyebrow. “What are you on about, Ez? You can talk to Bait too?” Then, at Callum: “And you knew about this?”

“Not just Bait.” Ezran refuted, before Callum could speak. “It’s just animals. All animals. I’ve been able to understand them for most of my life, and been able to make them understand me for years – and I tried to tell Callum about it but he never believed me.” A hint of his temper leaked into those last words, the line between his furrowed brows deepening.

Rayla’s eyes slid to Callum then, expectantly, as if waiting for an explanation. His shoulders hunched and he hastened to say “But…Ez, if you really could understand animals, how come you got it wrong that time I asked you to prove it? Why would you have been wrong?”

“Because raccoons are huge liars, Callum.” Ezran said, impatiently, with a light scowl furrowing his brow. “I told you that, too. I didn’t know it back then, but raccoons are always playing tricks and they’ll never tell you the truth if they can get away with tricking you – and I wasn’t good enough to tell when they were lying back then, either, so…” He shrugged, and made a sort of there-you-go gesture with his hand.

“…So, they told you there was a treasure behind the waterfall when there wasn’t, and I ended up getting soaked for nothing?” Callum supplied, and his brother nodded. He looked away, frowning lightly, and….yeah, he thought he remembered that. Ezran trying to tell him about the alleged dishonesty of raccoons. After the waterfall incident, it had seemed a pretty blatant lie, and he hadn’t even considered the idea that it might be true. And then after that he’d got pretty used to dismissing Ezran’s subsequent claims to animal-talking as play-pretend kid stuff.

“Yeah, pretty much.” He agreed, expression a little less ornery now. Perhaps because Callum was listening to him without immediately denying everything? “So after that you just…wouldn’t believe me, because I’d been wrong, so I gave up on trying.” Carefully, his fingers drifted to his bag, and the egg within. “But…then me and Zym knew we were Rayla’s last hope. So we had to try.” A little solemn, he slipped the bag open enough to put his hands in, fingers settling over the egg. His eyes closed, just briefly, and Callum experienced a little rush of vertigo at knowing that his brother was communicating with a baby dragon right now.

“…I’m glad you did.” Rayla said, eventually, her fingers hovering over her left wrist, and the binding there. “I’d…well, I never really had much hope about it all even to begin with, but I was pretty ready to give up.” She reached out, and settled her hand on his shoulder. “Thank you, Ezran.”

He looked up at her over his shoulder with a small, shy smile. “…Well, it’s not like I did all the work.” He said, posture unfurling a little at her praise. “But, um, you’re welcome. I’m really glad we could help.”

Rayla blinked at him for a second, then slowly reached out with her bound hand to touch her fingertips to the eggshell. The motion was…careful, and tentative. Almost reverent. “Thank you, Azymondias.” She murmured to the egg, and Ezran smiled more widely beside her.

“He’s happy he could help, too.” He said, contentedly. “He’s still pretty tired now. But I think maybe we can try to work on your binding again tomorrow.”

Her lips twitched into a smile of her own. “I’ll look forward to it.” She said, and withdrew, leaning back from Ezran and the egg for a second, regarding them with a strange expression. “You’re a talented kid, Ezran.” She expressed after a second. “I’ve never even heard of someone being able to talk to animals before. Not even the greatest elven mages.”

Callum looked between his brother, who seemed very pleased at that statement, and Rayla, who had professed to his brother’s ability being something unheard of even in Xadia. He shook his head, disbelievingly, and said “It’s…it’s crazy, Ez, that you were walking around with this amazing weird power all this time and I didn’t even know.”

Ezran looked over at him, and his expression closed off again, just a little. “Only because you weren’t listening when I told you.” He reminded, mutinously.

Callum sighed, raising a hand to rub at the back of his neck, and nodded. “Yeah, I know. I’m sorry, Ez. I should have believed you…or at least tried to listen.” He set his face in the most earnest contrition he could, because, well…he did always try to own up to his mistakes, when he made them.

His brother inspected him, as if for signs of any duplicity, then relaxed again. “Well, you’re listening now.” He said, with a note of satisfaction. “And I accept your apology. I guess now you just need to make all the buttheadedness up to me.” There was a glint in his eyes, and Callum knew exactly what it heralded. He slumped, resigned, and considered how much his legs would protest to the Jerkface dance after so much uphill walking.

In the next second, though, he received some unexpected salvation. “Something I don’t understand, Ez,” Rayla said, diverting his brother’s attention back to her. “How does talking to animals mean you can talk to a dragon? Dragons aren’t animals, they’re people. So is it really talking, or…”

“It’s not really talking.” Ezran admitted, after a moment. “Animals don’t really have language like we do. I mean, some of them have noises they make to warn each other if there’s trouble, and sometimes they have enough of those that it’s kinda like they have words, but…animals don’t talk like people do, so…what I do, it’s kind of more like…” His words slowed, as if he were testing them one-by-one. “Like, understanding. And making them understand me.”

Callum made an interested noise. “So, kind of….more like some sort of magical empathy thing than talking?”

“I guess?” Ezran offered, shrugging. “I don’t really think about how it works. I just do it. And besides, it’s kind of more like talking with Zym, anyway.”

Callum looked over at Rayla and shared an interested glance with her. A moment later, she ventured, “Because he’s…smarter? Not an animal?”

“I don’t think so. Otherwise I’d find it easier to understand people, not harder.” Ezran said, a little automatically, and then abruptly looked over at them in alarm, as if he’d said something he hadn’t intended. “Uhh…”

“…Ezran, um.” Callum said, after a moment of looking at his brother’s decidedly shifty expression. That was a ‘caught stealing jelly-tarts’ face if he ever saw one. “I really need you to be honest with me here. Can you read minds?” The tone was joking, but…he was kind of serious too. ‘Harder’ to understand people? That definitely seemed like an implication that he could ‘understand’ them. What did that mean? Could he ‘hear’ thoughts? Pick up on feelings? And what would ‘making them understand’ constitute with a person, anyway?

“Of course I can’t read minds!” Ezran said, indignantly, which made him relax a little. At least until he followed it up with “Well, not really.”

Somewhat at a loss for words, Callum looked at Rayla again. Her eyebrows were very, very high as she stared at his brother. “…Care to elaborate, Ez?” She asked, dryly, and he squirmed.

“It’s not mind-reading.” Ezran insisted. “Really. What I have with Zym is – different. I can’t only understand how he’s feeling, we can talk with words – no one else is like that. You two, and other people – it’s so much harder to get anything from you than the animals.”

“…But, you can get something?” Callum prompted, when his brother went quiet.

Ezran looked away, furtive, and slid his fingers over azure eggshell. “Feelings, mostly.” He admitted, shrugging. “It’s easier when I’m touching someone. It was always like that. At first I could only understand animals if I was touching them, too. I’m better now, though.” He glanced up at Callum, and his shoulders hunched a little. He seemed bizarrely worried, and…Callum couldn’t really figure out why. What reaction was he anticipating, with the way he was watching like that?

Tentatively, Callum reached out, and laid a hand on his brother’s shoulder. Bemusedly, he noted that the contact – according to him – might be conveying some of his emotional state across. What was he projecting, then? Confusion? Concern? “So, if you’re a super-special magical empathy-mage now,” He started, intentionally teasing, intentionally warm. “Can you tell me what I’m feeling?”

Ezran eyed him warily. “…Kind of confused, and…worried about me?” His face screwed up. “What are you worried for?”

“I’m your big brother. It’s my job to worry about you.” Callum claimed, staunchly, and managed to prompt a smile. “Aunt Amaya said.” Mom, too, when she’d been alive. But bringing that up wouldn’t do anything except make everyone sad.

…Then he recalled that Ezran probably had access to that quick flash of grief, if he was sensitive enough to catch that sort of thing, and felt a little weird about it.

His brother dipped his head at him, subdued, in a sort of half-nod. “See, that’s…that there.” He said, abruptly. “People don’t like it when you know too much about them, or how they’re feeling. It makes them feel…I dunno. They don’t like it.” His eyes slid to Callum’s, with a kind of caution he hated to see. “…You don’t like it, either.”

“…That’s what you’re worried about?” Callum said, after a moment, and then very deliberately reached down to clasp his brother’s hand, just over the eggshell. “Ezran, you’ve always been weirdly insightful about people’s moods. Sure, that can be a bit of a pain sometimes, when I don’t want to talk about my feelings or whatever, but it’s not like – not like it’s actually a problem. I really don’t care if your….emotional insight is more of a magical thing than I thought it was. It doesn’t change anything.”

Ezran blinked at him, looking down at their hands, and frowned. “But you felt weird about it.” He insisted. “Just now. Kind of weird and uncomfortable?”

“I’d feel the same way if someone pointed out how I was feeling just by looking at my face, you know.” He pointed out, pragmatically. “People pointing out your feelings is uncomfortable, a lot of the time. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing. And you’re my brother. If anyone gets to have super-special insight into my feelings, of course it’s going to be you.”

Ez studied him for several long moments, and Callum wondered if he was doing his empathy-thing even now, to feel whether he was being genuine or not. Then he sighed, shoulders slumping in what definitely seemed like relief. “…Thanks, Callum.” He said, quiet. “I guess I was kind of worried about what you’d think.” He paused, and looked up. “…Rayla?” He said, tentative. “What about you?”

It was then that Callum realised how quiet she’d been, watching them talk, watching them interact. She was still sitting a short distance away, just around the fire, and her expression was a little inscrutable. “…It’s really not mind-reading?” She asked, after a moment. “You can’t tell what we’re thinking?”

Ezran shook his head. “Aside from with Zym? No, I’ve never had anything like that before.”

Rayla considered that, then nodded. “Okay, that was my main worry. I’m not going to lie – it is a little bit uncomfortable, Ez, but…I don’t mind too much, as long as you’re careful with it.”

He tensed a little, perceptible to Callum through their joined hands. “…Like how?” He ventured, oddly timid.

“If you can tell what people are feeling – you can learn things that they…might want to keep hidden. Or don’t want to talk about.” She said, after a pause for thought. “So I think you need to be very careful about what you say about the things you learn, and…be respectful, I suppose. Feelings are…personal. And private. You need to make sure to know when it’s appropriate to talk about the things you pick up.”

Ez went a little more tense and a little more drawn-in as she spoke, but…not especially upset. Just…resigned. He nodded. “Yeah, I know. A lot of people just really don’t want other people knowing how they feel. Especially when it’s something that’s important, or secret.” He hesitated. “…I’m pretty used to knowing when to say something or not, by now. And I don’t spread around secret-feelings unless it’s really important.”

Rayla pursued her lips, thoughtful. The line of her brow made her look a little troubled. “You’re a good kid, Ez.” She settled on, eventually. “I suppose if I had to pick someone to have magical insight into my feelings, you’d be a good choice.” She hesitated, and then shuffled over to pat him on the shoulder, as much a reassuring gesture as it was a sign of trust.

He looked up at her, eyes wide and grateful and vulnerable all at once. “I know you don’t like other people to know what you’re feeling. You’re a really private person. I know.” He said, the words coming in a quick and sudden rush. “I’ll be careful, I promise. You can trust me.”

She looked at him, and her expression loosened a little. She moved her hand and laid it over Callum and Ezran’s, still joined over the egg. “I know.” Tentatively, her lips settled into a soft half-smile. She withdrew her hand, then, and sat back.

Callum looked between them, oddly touched by…by the open exchange of concerns? Reassurance? The obvious trust that Rayla had put in his brother? All of those, maybe. In any case, his chest practically ached with fondness for both of them. And wasn’t it crazy, that Ezran could probably feel that?

As if reading the thought – which he apparently couldn’t – Ezran looked up at Callum and smiled. Then he looked down at the egg again, as if distracted by…something it’d said? Something Azymondias had said?

“What makes him so different?” Callum wondered, aloud, as he allowed his hand to drop from the egg. “How come you can talk with him so much more clearly?”

“…I really don’t know?” Ez said, shrugging. “I…it’s weird. He just feels different. Like – the feeling of him, his mind and emotions? It just…fits. It’s easier to reach out to him. And he’s learning to kind of…almost reach back, sort of. Even though it’s hard for him.”

“I never thought dragons would be…awake and aware, even inside the egg.” Rayla offered, expression a little strange.

“Not awake. Not really.” Ezran shook his head. “It really is like he’s asleep and dreaming, and just…when we talk, it brings him closer up to the surface. But he knows me.” A smile flickered across his face. “And he knows you guys, too, from the sounds of your voices, and – Rayla, from the feeling of your magic. So yeah, I guess he’s pretty aware, for an unborn baby.”

Rayla seemed briefly nonplussed, perhaps at the implication that the Dragon Prince might recognise her, whenever he got around to hatching. And…wasn’t that a thought? “How long do dragons stay in eggs before they hatch, anyway?” Callum asked, leaning forwards to inspect the shimmering surface of the shell.

Ez made a complicated series of faces, then, like he’d just seen something profoundly baffling. “Uhh….” He frowned at the egg. “Good question, I think. Zym thinks he’s ready to hatch now. But there’s something he needs before he can, and he doesn’t know what it is, or how to get it, except that there needs to be a lot of magic.”

“I doubt it’ll come up.” Rayla said, with a quick glance at the shell. “That egg is years old by now – I’m not sure how old, but my parents left to be his Dragonguard a long time ago.” A shadow passed over her face, but she didn’t comment any further on that matter. Instead, she cleared her throat, and concluded “If it were that easy to hatch Storm dragons, he’d be a dragonling right now instead of an egg.”

“…Probably for the best.” Callum decided, tactfully refraining from asking exactly how young Rayla had been when her parents left. “If it’s this much work to keep us fed and travelling, we don’t really need to be feeding an entire baby dragon too.”

“Fair point.” Rayla agreed, and stood. “Well, you two watch the pot and the egg and do…whatever. I’m going to go get more wood.”

Callum suspected, looking at her, that her objective was less to get firewood and more to walk around a bit, and perhaps get some breathing room from all the somewhat-difficult conversations they’d been having. But still, he could appreciate that. He nodded. She promptly sped off into the windblown treeline, leaving him and Ezran and Bait sitting there with a dragon egg, a bubbling pot, and several jars of food.

He sat silently staring at the fire, oddly uncertain of what to do in the quiet, and exhaled a very long and tired breath. Beside him, Ezran nodded understandingly.

“Long day, huh?” he commented, sympathetic, with his hands still on the egg of the dragon he apparently had some sort of magical connection with.

Callum considered the early awakening, the mounting despair over Rayla’s hand, the unexpected arrival of those human hunters, the whole exhausting event of what Ezran and the Dragon Prince had done with the binding, the several hours of uphill walking, and the incredible effort it had been to get the tent up in the wind. And that wasn’t even considering the difficult talks on the subject of Ezran’s abilities and the associated privacy concerns…

“Really long day.” He agreed, with feeling, and looked up at the sky.

Despite everything, despite everything that had happened….it was barely past late-afternoon. The sun was low enough for it to be evening, but…only just.

Abruptly, he considered that he’d need to change Rayla’s bandages and get her to do her hand massage before they slept, so really, the day still had a way further to go. He sighed again, this time with heartfelt exhaustion, and slumped backwards to the loose rocky ground. It should have been hideously uncomfortable, but he was too tired to care.

“Callum?” Ezran asked, alarmed, head shooting up to look over at him. “Are you okay?”

“….I’m fine.” He said, weakly, from the ground. “I’m just gonna…lay here a while, okay? It’s been a crazy day.”

Ezran considered that for a moment. “I think I’ll join you.” He decided, and flopped back beside him, egg held securely in his arms.

Callum huffed, lips quirking in a smile, and let his head fall back. “We can just watch the clouds for a bit, I guess.” He said, and that was exactly what they did.

He was so very, very ready for this day to be over.

---

End chapter.

S3 notes: If you’re not a new reader, be aware that I’ve gone back and made edits to chapters 1-10 to accommodate new s3 context and information, but only on ao3. Tumblr editions remain unedited. Nothing really needed any major changes, but the stuff’s in there. There are edit notes at the beginning of every chapter on ao3.

Notes: In a fairly sudden decision made today, 30/11/19, I cut this chapter in half. The second half will be finished and posted as chapter 12 instead, and all my future chapters have been renumbered. This is because even I was getting sick of how long my chapters were getting, and my desire to avoid obscenely high chapter counts was not compelling enough to stop me from cutting it. Otherwise I think this chapter would have ended up being about 23-25k, and no one wants that.

From now on, I’ll be making an effort to keep chapters under 15k unless there’s compelling reasons not to, such as it being an important chapter with important emotional and narrative flow.

Next chapter is currently like 9k now, and I expect it to maybe conclude at around 10-12k. Lots of Corvus in that one.

Story notes:

Timeline: This chapter takes place on 19.05, day 9. Kids have camped at an altitude of 1500m, and have ascended maybe 250-300m in the day.

Quite early in the morning, Soren and Claudia contemplate weather. This occurs more-or-less concurrently with Callum and Rayla tying up the hunters last chapter. Early afternoon, the Zym-Ez Machina happens, and after that they’re travelling. It’s been an eventful day. Not much later in the afternoon, Amaya is consecrated as a Justiciar.

Camping note: The windy campsite experience is one of my own. Except in my case, it took ten people to hold the tent down while other people put the poles in and pitched it, not two. Same tent size as the kids have, pretty much, and it took ten people to stop the wind from flinging it and us off the mountain. So…I’m making gratuitous allowances for Rayla’s strength.

Camping on a slope? Also personal experience – though in my case it wasn’t the same campsite as the Windy Place. One of my group lost her bowl over the cliff, and someone else had to tackle her backpack when it started rolling downhill towards the edge. Considering we were all carrying group gear – losing that backpack would have been dire. See more slope-camping difficulties next chapter.

Medical note: Thanks to the Zym Ez Machina, Rayla’s binding has been loosened somewhat. Now it’s about as tight as it was a day or two past the ritual. This is allowing her to reperfuse to an extent – there’s enough leeway for blood to circulate into the hand and start oxygenating it properly again. This also carries the toxic waste products left by dead or deoxygenated cells into the rest of the body, causing inflammation and tissue death and mild systemic shock. As I have stated before, I’ve decided that elves are less susceptible to reperfusion injury than humans, so this will not approach life-threatening levels for Rayla. It will, however, be pretty unpleasant, and exacerbate the severity of her permanent damage. In this chapter, the first signs of systemic shock start to set in, and then the elfy biological mechanisms she had kicked in and stopped the worst effects.

On Zym’s egg: From s3, a lot of people seem to assume that Zym’s egg was laid on the day Avizandum died. I disagree. I’m pretty sure it was supposed to be Zym’s hatchday, and Zubeia was off catching a storm or something that she could bring back and hatch him with. Some reasons: if it was the day he was laid, Zubeia would have been there, because she’d be laying the egg, and I doubt she’d have gone flying off immediately afterwards. Rayla’s parents left to join the Dragonguard when she was a kid, years ago – I can see the Dragonguard being formed in advance of the egg being laid, but not that far in advance. And lastly, Viren seems to know about the egg’s existence already – his realisation of why Avizandum was there was much more ‘oh this makes sense now’ than ‘what if….the dragon king has an egg…what a horrible thought’. He certainly knows that Avizandum has a mate. So I maintain that Zym’s egg is years old, and he’s been maturing inside it for a long time as his parents wait for the right conditions to hatch him.

That's all for now. Expect another update within the next few days!

#tdp #rayllum #tdp fanfic #tdp rayla #tdp callum #tdp ezran #piaj #piaj chapters

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crowsent · 5 years

Note

👶,⭐,💘, and💻. Love you!!

thank you for ask anon! writer ask game is here if yall wanna send in something. still taking asks for these btw

👶- advice for new writers =

yall this is hella fucking generic but PRACTISE. theres a reason almost literally every writer on tumblr gives the advise of “practise practise practise” and that reason is it works. practise doesnt mean ‘oh just write bc youll automatically get better over time’ it means ‘write bc if you dont, you wont figure out what you need to improve.’ did yall know that i literally had no sentence variation in the past? i started every sentence with [character name] or [character pronoun] and i didnt realise until i was 15/16 and i only realised bc i started writing a lot.

i think there’s a fear of failure with new writers. there’s this lingering doubt of “what if its not good?” and boy howdy i will answer that question right fucking now. it wont be good. when i compare my current work to my earlier work, my earlier work sucked fucking shit. i spelled soldier with a fucking ‘j’ and i had no idea what the hell a point of view was. and thats okay. whoever tells you that youre going to perfect writing is a fucking liar. there is no perfecting writing. 20 years from now, imma look at the writing from today and im gonna think it sucks shit. writing is a process. its a craft. you get better and better over time and the way you get better is by experimenting w different styles, different genres, different ways of writing.

and the only way you can experiment and improve is through practise. in video games, especially rpgs (which are my favourite kind of video games), you struggle in the early game. youre at a low level, you dont have good equipment, you have a hard time moving to the next area. but the only way you progress is by grinding, gaining levels, and getting stronger. same w writing. if youre a level 1 writer, just starting out, no idea what to do, just experiment. fuck around a bit. write crackships, write rarepairs, write niche self-indulgent reader/character fics. at the end of the day, you should write for yourself. its good and cool if other people like your stuff and validate all your hard work, but at the end of the day, the one who should enjoy your writing the most is yourself.

you WILL mess up and you WILL struggle, but thats the only way you can improve. i struggle with pacing the most. still do. but others might have pacing down pat and struggle instead with word choice or pov or something else. cant figure out where you need to improve if you dont write, so just practise and worry about all the fine print later

⭐️- how do you get your inspiration? =

this is definitely not universal, but i just sit on my bed, close my eyes, and meditate. cycle through all my emotions and thoughts and filter them out. then i just toss everything out the damn window. like. id just meditate for a while, focus on breathing, on experiencing the present, picture a field and a tree and myself and breathe. thoughts fly by and i let them happen but dont focus on it.

meditating gives me some semblance of emotional control bc i normally have none, and it gives me kind of this space. this safe space that only exists for me and me alone. so i use that space to let the world drift away. just me and my thoughts and sometimes, those thoughts end up being good writing ideas. but i usually meditate for a set amount of time. like 15 minutes or 30 minutes so i dont write until i finish meditating.

then when i get out of my headspace, i open up my laptop and see what i remember. thinking too hard about something causes it to muddy up. same with art. in digital art, artists flip the canvas to refresh their eyes, see if there’s anything weird or wonky about the illustration that they normally dont see bc theyve gotten used to it. flipping the canvas is like giving our eyes a jumpstart and lets us see what we could do better. in traditional art, its turning the canvas this way and that or repositioning yourself. meditating is like that. a break. a cleanse. a kind of pause where you dont think about anything and just try to process what you already have. you relax and kind of let yourself float down a river of thoughts and sometimes, a fish would jump out of that river and youd go “hey, thats a good idea. i should try that” so when you get out of the river, youre refreshed and ready to go.

same principle with showers. more ideas come to you in the shower when you dont have anything to write with bc youre not thinking about it. youre not focusing on finding inspiration or motivation so ideas naturally flow through you. you know that feeling when you want to do x then someone comes along and says “hey you should do x” and suddenly all motivation to do x leaves? same w your brain. focus too much on “i should be writing” or “i want inspiration” and its never gonna come. just let things happen. at least, thats how i do it. some people might get inspiration by reading or watching tv. everyones different so if thats not what works out for you, dont feel pressured to try my method

💘- what’s your favorite AU? Least favorite? =

magic au. specifically fantasy au set in like a pre-modern era. shows like avatar where theres all this magic and fantastical beasts and so on and so forth. semi-modern like six of crows and nevernight are great too. i want that magic to be woven into people’s lives. harry potter is okay but there’s like this separation between magic and muggle. there’s this feeling of “magic” but like as a tool. like a spoon or a gun or a shovel. i want magic au’s that are INTEGRATED with the world its set in.

like in atla, earth kingdom people have trains they move with bending while fire nation people have machines powered by heat and steam. both correspond to their bending and makes sense for the world they live in. but if your plot is like harry potter and its less worldbuilding and more action, then there’s this book series called seasons rising (read it. so good) where there’s a bunch of spells but the spells have character. the people using the spells GIVE it character and it feels much more intimate. pokemon does the whole fantasy mixed w reality better. give two trainers the exact same pokemon and by the time that pokemon reaches lvl 50, its gonna have a different moveset, different fight style, etc bc it was shaped by the world and people around it. i like harry potter but tbh it could have been so much better

for the least favourite au, it’s A/B/O i dont like the whole “omegas are only good for breeding hurr durr” and “alphas are violent and aggressive and cant control themselves around omegas” thing and it squicks me out. major squick. i read the original harry potter squick (THAT one. yeah. you know the one) and i still hate a/b/o more. i get why people like it, and there are one or two fics set in a/b/o au that i enjoy reading, but as a whole, i severely dislike a/b/o fics.

the themes are squick, the character dynamics get so messed up, and shipping dynamics (bc a/b/o fics usually have shipping) just get so blown out of proportion. there are so many a/b/o fics that turn ooc or the character interpretations radically change or something else. no hate against a/b/o fans bc yall are amazing for writing/drawing yalls au. there are things that you can only do in this setting and exploring those things can be incredibly fun for people, but for me personally, its not an au i like to visit.

💻- three works of yours that are must reads =

i. dont know what fandom youre in anon or your genre preferences. so ill just rec you one fic for a different fandom each with kind of different genres. ts masterlist is on my side @hufflepuff-deceit and regular fanfic masterlist is on my writing blog @crownonymous

(BNHA) Viper. its my first serious attempt at fanfic in YEARS and its my baby. currently has 7 chapters, i havent updated it in a while bc im hyperfocused on ts rn, but i love it to bits. its just all of my fav bnha fics crammed into one fic. quirkless kind of villain izuku with stain as a mentor as they work together to bring light to the injustices of hero society and where bakugos bullying has visible and long-lasting repercussions? sign me the fuck up. you can read it on ao3 HERE bc its not on tumblr. kind of fast-paced, has a lot more action scenes than anything else ive written. heavy plot-wise but has a lot of humour and comedy to break things up

(Kimetsu no Yaiba) I Pray To God He Hears You. not related to my other kny fic oleander which is a multichap retelling au. iptghhy is a standalone one-shot and kind of a character study on one giyuu tomioka. i love him so much. giyuu is my baby and i adore him. so of course i wrote a sad fic focusing on him. well technically, the fic focuses on giyuu AND his relationships. SPOILERS for chapters 130 and 131 of the manga. focuses mostly on giyuu and sabito, but there’s a fair bit of giyuu and tanjiro and urokodaki. you can read it HERE bc this is also not on tumblr. also deals with heavy things but more emotion-wise since it doesnt have that much of a plot. loss. grief. moving on. survivors guilt. that kind of stuff. very sad. hurt but with comfort, especially at the end.

(Sanders Sides) Logan’s Birthday Fic: Logicality. just what the title says. i wrote 5 different fics and published them all on logans bday but the logicality one received the most feedback and honestly? the cutest of the bunch. its gonna be crossposted onto ao3 but for now, you can read it HERE on my ts sideblog. theres no plot since its literally just domestic and relationship fluff. and puns. patton is in the fic, theres gonna be puns. nothing but good things and warm feelings bc logan deserves it.

thank you so much for such interesting asks anon! i enjoyed answering these. have a lovely day!

#crowsas answers #kny #bnha #sanders sides

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saxonspud · 5 years

Text

The Outlaw and the Treasure Hunter - Chapter 19 - A Hanging

Izzy woke up as sunlight filtered through the windows of the cabin. She hadn't been able to bring herself to wash the scent out of Dutch's shirt. In fact, she had taken to wearing it. Each day his scent faded just a little bit more. Some days she would just sit in the cabin, on the floor leaning against the wall, smelling the shirt and thinking what might have been. Other days she would tell herself not to be so stupid. She would sit out on the jetty, on the edge of the lake, and fish. She'd found a fishing pole in the cabin. She wasn't the greatest at fishing, but had caught some small fish, enough to cook for herself.

She had been slightly surprised, when no one had returned to the cabin. Especially since it was so well stocked with food. But it was pretty much out in the wilds, so it wasn't really a surprise.

She had only been there a day, when her treasure hunter instinct kicked in. Or maybe it was her fathers words, which still echoed in her ears, "keep your wits about you."

She still had the treasure, that she had recovered from the little island. She decided to hide it. She found an old sack, and tied it under the jetty, so that it was just above the water. That way, if she had to travel, which she was sure she would do at some point, it would be safe. Especially if someone else decided to squat in the cabin, when she was away.

Izzy got up, and made herself some coffee. She would need to decide on a plan of action. She couldn't sit around here day after day. She needed to buy a map, so she could get to work on the treasure map she had found. It was the only one she had now. She should also think about visiting a fence, to get some money for the treasure she had collected. She still had a fair bit of cash, so that wasn't a priority.

Izzy was woken from her day dream, by a loud bang at the door.

"Isabella Pickett. You better get out here now!"

Izzy went to the door.

"Who's there?" she asked, nervously.

"We're here on behalf of the Valentine Sheriff." The man yelled.

Izzy opened the door, a crack.

As soon as she did this, the door was pulled out of her hands, and yanked open.

The man on the other side of the door, pointed his revolver, in her face.

"raise your hands, you can either come quietly, or I'll shoot you where you stand," he growled.

Izzy swallowed hard, and raised her hands. "What do you want, I don't understand?" she gasped.

The man grabbed Izzy by the shirt, and threw her onto the ground. Pinning her there with his foot, he holstered his gun, and started to tie her hands behind her back.

"I'm taking you in for murder," he snarled.

"Murder! I haven't killed anyone!" She exclaimed.

"You would say that," he laughed, humourlessly. He picked her up by the shirt, so that she was standing. Drawing his revolver, he smashed the butt, into her jaw. Knocking her senseless.

He quickly tied her ankles together, and stowed her on his horse.

"Easiest bounty, I've ever collected," He chuckled, and mounted up.

Arthur woke, as the sunlight shone through the curtains of the St. Denis hotel room. He couldn't remember the last time he had slept in a bed. Although, from what Dutch had told him last night, it seems he couldn't remember much at all. He glanced over to the other side of the room, Dutch was sitting in the chair, just looking at him.

"Did you stay there all night?" he asked.

Dutch smiled, and nodded. "I thought I was gonna lose you, Arthur." he whispered.

"Or are you afraid I might go crazy again." Arthur sighed. "Are you sure you made the right choice, between me and the girl. Sounds like I ruined her life." he added, sadness clouding his face.

"No son. I couldn't let you die." he replied.

Arthur shook his head, "she might die now, because of me. If they think she murdered all those people, when it was me. If they catch her and hang her. How will I ever live with that. Bad enough I killed all those people."

Dutch stood up, "I ain't gonna let that happen." He walked over to the bed, and sat on the edge of it.

"And I wont let you keep blaming yourself for what happened, either. So lets talk no more about it." he demanded.

Arthur nodded, "guess we better go see the doctor, let him check me over."

"I'll meet you downstairs." Dutch said, as he walked to the door.

Arthur was a bit steadier on his feet today, and managed to climb onto the back of John's horse, without any help. He'd managed to put his hat on at such an angle, so that the metal patch, wasn't so noticeable. John had stopped staring at it now, but he didn't think that the denizens of St. Denis, would find it so easy.

When they arrived at the doctors office, he walked in. The doctor was somewhat surprised, to see how calm and relaxed Arthur was.

Arthur smiled, and extended his hand. He shook the doctors hand, "I think I owe you a debt of gratitude." he said.

Nathaniel smiled. "You were the first person to have this done. You have no idea what good you have done, by letting me do this."

Arthur took a deep breath, "Its never gonna make up for all the bad things I did, but I guess its a start."

Nathaniel, pointed at his head, "Any pain, headaches?"

Arthur shook his head, "No. Guess it may take a while for people to get used to seeing it," he replied, as he gently touched the plate.

"With a bit of luck, the hair will grow around it, and hide it a little," Nathaniel continued, "I think, you can go home, where ever home is!"

Arthur laughed, "not even I know that."

Dutch interrupted, "we better get going. If you ever need anything Nathaniel, send a letter to Tacitus Kilgore. It will reach us, one way or another."

"Thank you, Mr Van Der Linde. I hope I never have to, but the sentiment is appreciated, none the less."

John, Dutch and Arthur, left the doctors office. Leaving Hosea to say his goodbyes to his brother.

After several minutes he joined them outside.

They all mounted up, and headed out of St. Denis.

Izzy opened her eyes, everything was a blur. Her face hurt like hell. She squeezed her eyes closed, and reopened them. Allowing them to focus. She was in a jail cell.

At least she wasn't tied up. But that was small consolation.

She sat up, and looked out to see Sheriff Malloy, sitting at his desk.

She stood up, her head spun, for a few seconds.

"Sheriff, there's been some sort of a mistake." she pleaded, as she wrapped her hands around the bars of the jail cell.

The Sheriff looked over at Izzy. "No mistake, Miss Pickett. You were seen with that Outlaw, and that Mexican. But taking over the murdered man's cabin, well that was just foolish."

"Murdered!" She exclaimed, "I thought it was just abandoned. I never killed anyone."

"Your parents were good people. You're a cold blooded killer, walking around like nothing happened. And poor Ethan. You played that boy like a fiddle." He snarled.

"Please! You gotta believe me. I haven't killed anyone. I was kidnapped. Then I got attacked by wolves."

The sheriff laughed, "I guess being the daughter of a treasure hunter, I might have guessed you could tell a good story." He sighed, "I feel sorry for your family, that came visiting. Now all their gonna see is you hang."

"Hang! I haven't done anything wrong!" she cried.

Sheriff Malloy, glared at Izzy. "Now I suggest you shut the fuck up, unless you want another bruise on your cheek, to match the other one!" he threatened.

Izzy felt her cheek, where the bounty hunter had hit her. She walked over to the bed and sat down, holding her head in her hands. This was it. She was gonna die.

Leopold Strauss, stepped off the train. He felt that this was getting rather tiresome. Everyday, he'd made the same journey. It was quicker to go to Rhodes, then catch the train to Valentine. Rather than ride. He didn't particularly like riding anyway. The tiresome part, was that the same thing happened everyday. He'd check for post, there would be none, so he'd make the same journey back home. A complete waste of time. When he could be doing something far more constructive.

But he had promised Dutch, that he would do this, so do it, he must.

He walked to the counter and sighed. "Any mail for Tacitus Kilgore?" He asked.

"Oh yes," the clerk said, "it was dropped off this morning. Marked urgent."

he handed him the envelope.

Leopold Strauss, opened the envelope. He read it in disbelief.

"When is the next train to Rhodes?" He asked, a sense of urgency in his voice.

"Should be one along in about twenty minutes." The clerk replied.

Strauss looked at his pocket watch. He could only hope, he made it back in time.

As soon as the train arrived in Rhodes, he ran to his horse, which was still hitched at the station.

He rode as fast as he dared, back to the camp, at Clemens point. He ran over to Charles, who was talking to Javier.

"Gentlemen, quickly. The Sheriff has Miss Pickett. They are going to hang her for murder this afternoon."

He passed the letter to Charles, who quickly read it, and passed it to Javier.

"I'm going to get her!" Javier exclaimed.

Charles put his hand on Javier's shoulder. "You can't, they're looking for you as well. Dutch told you not to go into Valentine."

Javier shook his head, "Dutch isn't here, I'm the best shot. We can't let her hang. Dutch would never forgive us, and besides she's innocent. All the people she's accused of murdering, were killed by Arthur!"

Javier, shrugged away, from Charles grip, and ran over to his horse. He pushed it straight into a gallop, not slowing down for anything.

The four outlaws rode back to camp at a relatively steady pace. Mostly because Arthur was riding as a passenger, and the extra weight would have tired the horse anyway. By the time they reached the camp, it was mid-afternoon. As they rode in, Bill who was on guard duty, stared at Arthur, as he rode by.

"It's ok Bill," Dutch commented, "he's back to normal."

Bill rolled his eyes, "You better go see Charles, something's happened."

Dutch frowned. Quickly dismounting, he left Hosea and John, to help Arthur.

He rushed over to Charles, who was talking to Strauss.

"What's going on Charles, Bill said something has happened. Where's Javier?"

Charles took a deep breath. "The Sheriff arrested Izzy, for Murder. She's due to be hanged this afternoon. I tried to talk him out of it, but he's gone to Valentine."

Dutch, dragged his fingers through his hair, then scratched the back of his neck.

Strauss looked at him. "Javier is probably her only hope now. She was due to be hanged at Four O' Clock. It's now three. You wouldn't get there in time. I'm sorry."

Arthur walked across to where Dutch was standing.

"What's going on?" he asked.

Dutch pinched the bridge of his nose. "The Sheriff has Izzy. They're hanging her this afternoon. For murder." He sighed.

"No! They can't. She's innocent." Arthur held his head in his hands, "god dammit, this is all my fault."

Dutch looked at Arthur, he bit his bottom lip, and closed his eyes. "I know. But we're too late!"

The Sheriff, walked over to Izzy's cell.

"Turn around, and don't give me no trouble," he warned.

Izzy did as she was told.

As the Sheriff, bound her wrists behind her back, she sighed.

"You're making a big mistake. I haven't killed anyone."

He grabbed her roughly by the arm, and marched her out the jail house, just around the corner was the scaffold. She felt a knot in her stomach. She hoped it would be quick.

There was a large crowd already gathered. A lot of people she knew.

"Murdering bitch!" she heard someone shout.

She felt tears, pricking her eyes as a tear fell on her cheek.

Izzy stood at the top of the scaffold, as the Sheriff placed the noose around her neck. He walked to the lever.

Izzy closed her eyes. She kind of wished the wolves had eaten her now. It would be preferable to this.

"Isabella Pickett. You are being hung for the murder of..."

Izzy, heard a scream, then a gunshot. She opened her eyes. The rope that had been attached to the scaffold, now hung loose. Shot in half.

"Izzy, run!"

She looked up, and saw Javier, next to the Scaffold, on his horse.

She ran, and leapt towards him. He caught her.

She adjusted herself, so that she was sitting in front of him, astride his horse. He wrapped his arm around her, so that she didn't fall.

As he pushed his horse on, Javier heard a couple of gunshots, and felt something whizz past his left ear. He heard Izzy scream, and felt her body go limp.

As he galloped away, he lifted his hand, and saw blood.

Izzy was still breathing, but unconscious. He looked down at her shirt, and saw a red pool forming. He pressed his hand to the wound in her side. Praying he could stem the flow blood for long enough, until they got back to camp.

#rdr2 #original female character #javier escuella #charles smith #leopold strauss #arthur morgan #dutch van der linde #hosea matthews #john marston #wattpad #a03

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naughtyneganjdm · 6 years

Text

The Savior - Chapter 19

Summary: The reader learns more about Negan's past while they try to enjoy their small vacation together.

Characters: Negan & reader

Warnings: Swearing and the after effects of parental abuse.

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11995341/chapters/40932143

Absolute bliss filled Y/N’s body as she kept her eyes closed and listened to the sounds of the waves splashing around her. It wasn’t often that she got to relax like this, but this specific moment in time felt amazing. The sun was beating down on her skin, the sound of the water was amazing and the warmth of Negan beside her made this a moment to remember. If someone would have told her months ago that she would be ditching school to spend a weekend with Negan somewhere she would have never believed them. School was so important to her, but this was nice. This was beyond nice.

Opening her eyes, she looked to her side to see Negan stretched out on the huge flat rock that they had swam to in the middle of the water. It wasn’t too far away from the shore, but it was far enough out to give them space alone. Negan had his sunglasses on and his arms were folded behind his head as he lay out in the sun.

Part of her was still confused as to why Negan decided to bring her to this place. It was nice to get to learn more about Negan’s past, but it still made her question things. It was sad, but it actually made her uncomfortable that Negan had all of this money. She was just trying to do her best to think past it and enjoy her time with Negan. Instead of thinking of it as his place, she was just attempting to think of this as a small vacation with Negan and that was all.

Gulping down, she shifted on the hard surface of the rock and turned on her side to face Negan. Reaching out, she traced her fingertips over Negan’s abdomen, watching it rise and fall with his breathing. Teasing her fingers through the thick hair over his body, she smiled and moved in to press a soft kiss over Negan’s chest. His heavy breaths told her that he was still somewhat asleep when she lowered her hand down his abdomen and slid her fingertips underneath his black swimsuit.

“Would you stop it,” Negan grumbled with a huff when her hand connected with his body and he reached down to collect her wrist before pulling her hand out from beneath the material. “You are like a fucking sex ninja. Dial back the horny…geez.”

“Oh please,” she giggled watching Negan push his sunglasses up to look over at her. “I learned from the best.”

“Well the best got drunk off his ass last night and he’s suffering from dehydration. My testicles need some time to replenish what I’m missing,” Negan bluntly responded making a laugh fall from her lips as he reached down to touch himself through his swimsuit. “Trust me, I like doing it with you, but I’m not kidding. The alcohol gave me a hangover and a half. I need time to restore everything.”

Negan gave her a silly wink before pushing his sunglasses back down over his face. He leaned up and over enough to press a quick kiss over her lips before lying back down.

“Do you realize how uncomfortable fucking would be on this thing?” Negan grumbled, getting comfortable again. “One of us would end up with bruises.”

“Who said it would have led to fucking?” she retorted and Negan’s eyebrow arched up over his sunglasses. “I’m just saying, maybe I would have just given you a hand job.”

“Oh no, you are too greedy for that,” Negan nonchalantly responded making her reach out to poke him in the ribs making a goofy laugh fall from his lips. “I’m just saying, everything leads to sex. It always does. I just want to sit out here and enjoy my time with you. I know the water is romantic and we’re on the beach so ultimately you want to have sex and we’ll do it before we leave, but right now just is not the time.”

“You are so romantic, you know that?” she rolled her eyes and got comfortable again beside him. Negan’s fingertips stretched out in search of hers so he could hold her hand and squeeze her fingers in his.

“It’s a talent,” Negan teased listening to the sound of the waves, allowing them to comfort him into relaxing, something that he hadn’t done in quite some time. “Just think, right now at this time you would be in school just waiting for the time to run out so we could go back to my house and just sit around for a while.”

“I like what we do when we are home. I mean, the beach here is amazing, but…” she sighed, reaching out to caress her hand in over the planes of his abdomen. She drew small shapes over his skin before frowning. “I like our normal life.”

“As opposed to?” Negan breathed out, confused where she was headed with things.

“Maybe I’m just not used to this whole thing yet. A big house right off the beach in a rich city…” she rambled on and Negan’s dimples sunk in the longer he listened to her ramble on.

“There are places around here that I know you will love,” Negan insisted, laying back again on the rock before some of the water splashed up on the rock onto them. Negan heard her gasp and let out a small laugh. “That does happen in the ocean here sweetheart.”

“Oh ha ha,” she playfully hit him in the center of his stomach and a deep laugh fell from his lips.

“How about I take you into town? It’s a nice little town and there is some really cool stuff down by the piers. What do you say?” Negan sat up on the rock and she followed his movements. “There are some areas I used to love down there that I think you would like.”

“Won’t people notice you? Are you sure you are okay with walking around with me?” she confirmed and he shrugged his shoulders. He pushed his fingertips into his wet hair to slick it back before smiling.

“It’s been a long time. I highly doubt these people are going to remember me anyway,” Negan moved out to grab a firm hold of her to pull her close. Tipping in closer to her, he nudged her jaw playfully with his thumb before cupping her face in his rough hands. “Plus I really love you and don’t care what anyone else thinks.”

“I love hearing you say that,” she hummed in approval as he kissed her a few more times before jumping into the water. “Are we going to head back there now?”

“It’s going to get dark soon. You’ll want to get some food in you and then we will walk around,” Negan answered after motioning her to follow him into the water. “So let’s go get showered and then see what we can get into.”

“This is a cute town,” Y/N muttered, following Negan out of the small diner that they had just eaten at. Negan had said that he thought no one would remember him, but so far he had run into several people that knew he was. No one questioned what he was doing with her, but it still felt odd being in a place where people clearly knew Negan and grew up with him. “You really liked it as a kid, huh?”

“I did,” Negan reached out to grab a tight hold of her hand and hooked his fingertips with hers. She was uncomfortable and gulped down, looking at their hands. “What’s wrong?”

“You’re okay with doing this out and about around here?” she confirmed and Negan smirked before nodding. “I mean, they know you Negan. Are you comfortable with them knowing that you are dating someone…younger?”

“Is it any of their business?” Negan’s eyebrow perked up and she let out a long sigh. “I’m fine. That’s all that matters. These people don’t know me. They know the me from when I was here. We live hours away from here. We’re okay.”

“If you…are comfortable with it,” she nodded, allowing him to hold onto her hand as they walked down Main Street. The city had bright lights filtering the street from the small shops and diners that were up and down the main road. “Thank you for dinner.”

“Absolutely,” Negan winked, bringing her hand up to his lips to deposit a small kiss over the back of her hand. Negan stopped in front of the stores to look at the display that was set up in the window and she stepped forward to look at a necklace that caught her eye. “You like that?”

“It’s beautiful,” she answered, looking to Negan with her big eyes before looking back to the piece of jewelry. Negan watched her with a smile and he urged her toward the shop after watching her eye it over. “What?”

“Let’s take a look,” he suggested and she let out a hesitant laugh. “Come on.”

“Negan no, I just…” she rejected, but felt Negan tugging her into the store and he pulled her closer to the necklace. Negan nodded toward it and he watched her lean in to look it over. “It is beautiful Negan, but…”

The price tag caught her eye and she let out an uncomfortable sound, “Not that beautiful…”

“Do you want it?” Negan offered and she shook her head quickly, trying to pull away from Negan. “It’s okay; if you want…I can get it for you. No biggie.”

“Oh it’s a biggie,” she tried to pull her fingers from his hand and he hushed her.

“Excuse me, can we see this please?” Negan pointed down at the necklace and he watched the person at the cash register motion him to wait a moment. Y/N uncomfortably pulled away from him and he laughed. “What’s wrong?”

“You can’t afford that,” she reminded him and Negan smirked, his bright smile expanding over his features.

“You know just as much as I do that that’s not true,” Negan pointed out and she felt her heart sinking at the fact that he was willing to spend his father’s money on her.

“But you aren’t the kind of person that uses that part of your money, remember?” she insisted with an uncomfortable breath as Negan gave her a confused look. “Teacher Negan could not afford that.”

Y/N pulled her hand away from Negan and quickly moved for the door, “I’m sorry Negan, I just…I can’t have you keep doing this.”

Moving out of the shop, she saw Negan still standing there somewhat confused. The person working in the store clearly came over to talk to Negan, but she didn’t feel comfortable with Negan buying her things. When she saw the shop keeper put the necklace back in the display at the front of the store she felt a sense of relief.

“What are you doing?” Negan walked out of the small shop and closed the door behind him. “If I want to buy you something…”

“I don’t want you to buy things for me. I just…I love you,” she insisted with a shake of her head, stepping forward to cup his face in her hands lovingly. “I don’t want you to think I’m with you for your money. I want you to know that I fell for…”

“The poor me?” Negan filled in her words and he saw her give a small head tilt. A laugh fell from his lips as he shook his head. “I know that. A while ago I stressed to you that I would never be anything more than what I was and you insisted that you still loved me for me. I know you are true to me. I don’t think you are with me for my family’s money. I didn’t bring you here to give you a panic attack. I brought you here so you could relax.”

“But you would probably never have to work again if you didn’t want to Negan. That’s how fucking rich you are,” you reminded him with a tense sound and Negan nodded slowly. “You are proud of who you are and what you have accomplished on your own. I don’t want me to be the reason you start dipping into your father’s money.”

“You are stressing way too fucking much,” Negan insisted with a snort. The sounds of laughing filled the air and she looked beyond Negan to see that between the shops she could see the ocean beyond the shops. There was a pier where they were clearly having some kind of event going on. “You want to go see?”

Nodding, she was eager to get away from this conversation and what was going on. The whole money situation just made her very uncomfortable and she didn’t want Negan to eventually get upset with her and assume that she just wanted his money.

Y/N followed Negan out onto a beach and toward a festival they were clearly having. They walked out onto the pier and there were multiple people that came up to Negan to hug and talk to him. She felt out of place. It was hard not to really, but when Negan was done he would eagerly turn back to her and tell her stories about the past. About the people that he had run into and things he had done as a kid. She loved hearing about his past, but there was something that was uncomfortable about all of this.

“I have to run to the restroom, do you think you could give me a minute and just…wait right here,” Negan urged her and she nodded. Taking a seat by the edge of the pier, she waited for Negan hearing the singing and dancing that was happening just beyond where she was sitting. Turning to look over her shoulder at the couples dancing together, she smiled brightly. The environment was beautiful and she could definitely see how everyone was happy here. She would be too if she grew up in a place like this. It was honestly beautiful and it seemed like the people were just…happy. It was rare compared to what she was used to.

“Where did your father go?” a voice pressed in behind Y/N making her shift uncomfortably on the bench she was sitting on. Y/N looked up to see a brunette standing before her. Clearing her throat uneasily, Y/N watched the brunette slide in beside her and Y/N felt uneasy. “My name is Emma. You’re not from around here are you?”

“He’s not…my father,” Y/N answered staring down at the hand that Emma had offered her. Emma’s dark brown eyes were watching her carefully and Y/N gulped down heavily. She accepted the hand shake and nodded. “Yeah, I’m definitely not from here.”

“I could tell,” Emma responded with a heavy sigh, looking around the area. “So if he’s not your father, then who is he?”

“Well…” Y/N began trying to think of a way to explain Negan to a total stranger. “He’s…”

“Oh fuck off Emma, you know she’s not my kid,” Negan’s voice filtered through the air, making Y/N sit up straighter on the bench and Negan squeezed between the space that was between the two. Negan sat down on the bench and wrapped his arm around Y/N. “Emma knows me. She knows I don’t have a kid, she’s just fucking with you to try and make you feel uncomfortable.”

“If you did end up having your kid though…it would probably be older than her wouldn’t it?” Emma recalled and Y/N felt every muscle in Negan’s body locking up. The fact that the woman knew about the child that Negan had lost as a teen told her that Negan and Emma had to be close. “It’s been a while Negan. Aren’t you going to introduce me?”

“Didn’t you introduce yourself already Emma?” Negan blurted out and he leaned in to nestle his nose against the side of Y/N’s neck. A whisper fell from his lips as she closed her eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

“And she is?” Emma egged Negan on and Negan laughed.

“None of your business,” Negan winked, looking over at Y/N for a moment. “Would you excuse us for a second? How about you go and get us a few churros over there? I’m kind of in the mood for something sweet.”

“Sure,” Y/N nodded with an unsure expression, but Negan pulled his wallet out of his pocket and handed some money to her before waiting until she was far enough away from him and Emma.

“Sending her to the longest line here Negan, that was smart…” Emma retorted with a half laugh. “So that’s the new flame of the week, huh? Little young for you, isn’t she?”

“Fuck off Emma,” Negan snarled, looking to her with a shake of his head. “She’s of age and I love her. We’ve been together for a few months and she means everything to me. So I don’t need a snake like you trying to filter into her brain with your stupid psychobabble bullshit that you do.”

“You love her? Wow,” Emma chuckled; looking to Y/N as she stood in the fairly large line that Negan had sent her off to. “That’s new for you isn’t it? I thought Lucille was the only woman that you ever loved.”

“Yeah, well…times change,” Negan shrugged his shoulders, leaning forward on the bench. “I thought if I came here I could avoid people like you.”

“People that know the real you?” Emma snapped back making Negan take in a sharp breath. “What does a girl like that want with you? Your daddy’s money?”

“Up until this weekend she knew nothing about my parent’s wealth,” Negan insisted with a firm nod. “We’re good together. She loves me and I love her. We’re very much alike and that’s that.”

“So she’s a good fuck, huh?” Emma egged on further and Negan rolled his eyes. “Sex is a big thing for you Negan, she has to be pretty important to get you to want to be with her and be official, right?”

“I don’t know what you are trying to pull here Emma, but you did this shit with Lucille too and it worked on her,” Negan thought back to his younger years and he shrugged his shoulders. “I didn’t want to be in a relationship with you. You think after all of these years you would just…get over it.”

“You think that’s what this is?” she questioned with a growl and Negan nodded, his thick eyebrows arching up as he nodded. “People don’t know the real you Negan. You like to pretend that you are this nice guy, but you can only put a mask for so long.”

Negan nodded and looked toward Y/N who seemed nervous and looked back at him. Negan waved his fingers and shot her a small smile. Y/N smiled back and stepped further up in the line.

“So tell me Negan…are you still really bad at sex?” Emma dug deeper at trying to annoy Negan. A laugh fell from Negan’s lips as he looked to her with a shake of his head.

“You know I’m not bad at sex,” Negan retorted with a snort. “The last time we fucked you had no problems with what I did.”

“Yeah, but the first time…” she began and Negan held his hands up in the air to silence her.

“You were the first girl I slept with Emma. Of course I was awful,” Negan laughed uneasily before shrugging his shoulders. “What the hell is the point of this? Why do you always want to pop in and try to fuck with my head and the head of people I love? I don’t even live here anymore. I’m here for the weekend. I don’t want to be with you, I don’t want to rekindle what has happened in the past…I’m here with the girl I love and that’s that. We’re just here to enjoy our time.”

“You do realize…you are just going to do what you always do, right?” Emma leaned forward in her seat. “You are your father’s son Negan. You know that.”

“I’m not my father,” Negan snapped, looking to Emma with a shake of his head.

“Really? Your father cheated on your mother. Your father was very abusive both mentally and physically,” Emma dug further into Negan watching his fists curl up in the center of his lap. “How were you with Lucille again?”

“I never physically abused Lucille and you know that,” Negan growled, his thick eyebrows adding emphasis to the anger that was pressing in over Negan’s face. “You’re just a bitch.”

“So tell me Negan, are you still all about you when it comes to sex?” Emma stood up and followed Negan toward the edge of the pier. “Just fuck until you cum? Does your new girl give the oral most of the time? You were always very selfish when it came to that kind of stuff.”

“I’m far from selfish,” Negan answered with a shake of his head. His face was on fire and he knew that Emma was trying to work him up, but he couldn’t help getting irritated. “In fact I make her cum all the time. The first few months we were together, I was always the one that was giving and not receiving. You remember how good I was the last time Emma and I think that’s why you are such a nasty bitch.”

“Can you blame me Negan?” she inquired and Negan shrugged his shoulders. “It sounds like you have everything figured out with this one, huh?”

“Yeah, I do…” Negan nodded, looking to see that Y/N was up at the counter to order what he had asked of her. “And what kills you is the fact that she’s the one I’m making squirt at night, not you.”

“Oh, right. You make her squirt,” Emma chuckled and Negan nodded with a proud smile. “Sure. I’d love to see that.”

“I’m sure you would, but I do,” Negan licked his lips and looked to Y/N with a proud smirk. “We’re very good together. Physically…and mentally. So if you will please piss off, I’m trying to give her a good weekend and I really would rather not see your face for the rest of this week.”

Negan moved around the brunette before him and headed off in the direction of Y/N to wrap his arm around her shoulders when she handed him over the churro that he had asked of her.

“I think we should go for a walk on the beach…” Negan urged Y/N before Negan headed off in the opposite direction of where Emma was. A moment later Emma cut them off and Negan let out a frustrated sound.

“Listen, we got off on the wrong foot. I just hope you have a good weekend,” Emma held her hands up in the air as if to say goodbye. “Keep an eye on this one. A lot like his father he is…”

“Negan,” Y/N stopped Negan from getting agitated and she pulled him away from the pier and urged him to follow her to the beachside. Negan’s face was red and she could tell by the way his nose was scrunched up and the lines that were over his forehead that he was angry. “Ex-girlfriend, huh?”

“I don’t even think that’s what I would call her,” Negan huffed and he felt Y/N reaching out to grab a tight hold of his jawline to urge him to look at her. “I’m really sorry. I should have thought about the past and how it could…”

“I don’t care about your past. You are honest with me about everything and I’m not worried about the past. I love you…all of you,” she hushed him seeing the lines his forehead relaxing as she stroked his rough cheek. “But let me tell you something…you are nothing like your father. You are a wonderful, sweet caring man. She doesn’t know you at all.”

“She probably knows me quite well…” Negan tried to state with a heavy sigh and Y/N shook her head slowly. “I wasn’t a good guy.”

“That was the past,” she insisted, tipping up on her toes to press a loving kiss over his lips and he felt her fingertips brushing throughout his hair. “We’re living in the present and that’s all that matters. Who you were then isn’t who you are now. You’re not your father. You never were and you never will be.”

Negan nodded, lowering his head enough to rest his forehead against hers while she held him in her arms. Negan took the time to just enjoy being held by her. Their relationship was so different in comparison to all his previous ones and he was surprised with how much he loved being around her.

“You should probably eat those churros you made me stand in line forever to get,” Y/N reminded him of the treat that was still in his hand. “I know it was just to get me away for a minute, but you better eat those after all the time I spent in line for that shit.”

“Yes ma’am,” Negan snorted urging her to follow him to the edge of the beach by the water to sit down with him. Negan got settled in behind her, pulling her to sit between his legs while they sat on the beach together. His left arm hooked around her waist loosely while she rest back against his chest and he handed her one of the sweet treats. “You know I love you, right?”

“I don’t know, I’m kind of only getting used to you just saying this now,” she stated with a smirk and looked over her shoulder to see Negan taking a big bite of his food. “But I like hearing it.”

“And I like saying it,” Negan insisted with a mouthful seeing her smirk. “I feel like I should explain Emma.”

“Only if you want to,” Y/N shrugged. “It’s really none of my business unless you want it to be.”

“You’re really just going to be like that?” Negan retorted with a sense of confusion. A lot of women would want every single detail, but she didn’t seem to mind at all. “She was the first girl I ever slept with.”

“Oh, okay…” she shrugged and took a small bite of her churro. “That was a really long time ago I imagine.”

“Ouch?” Negan chuckled seeing her cheeks blush over with embarrassment. “I was never really interested in her. I loved Lucille and…”

“She’s one of the ones you cheated with?” Y/N confirmed and Negan nodded when she spoke up. “I kind of assumed that. When you are the mistress and the guy still loves the woman he’s cheating on, it probably makes you an angry bitch.”

“I’ve only loved two people and I think that killed her on the inside. It’s probably partially my fault that she’s a bitch,” Negan shook his head, a heavy sigh falling from his lips. “When I was with Lucille she got into her head and…”

“Tried doing to me today what she did to Lucille back then?” Y/N finished again and Negan nodded. “Don’t worry about it. I’m not going to listen to people try to tell me about the man I know. I’m just going to listen to him myself. He’s honest with me and I know that.”

“I love you,” Negan was amazed with the way she was reacting toward everything as he tipped down to nestle his nose against the side of her neck. “You really are amazing. I hope you know that.”

“I can’t believe we’ve been here all weekend and we haven’t had sex here once,” Negan slurred against the side of Y/N’s neck as they stood on the beach together after going swimming in the water. She laughed as his stubble teased over the side of her neck. Negan wrapped his arms around her waist and felt her leaning back into his wet chest.

“There is still time,” she responded with a laugh when she felt him pressing playful kisses over the side of her neck. “To be fair, you’ve kept us so busy going around town that I’m pretty exhausted by the time that we get back to the house.”

“I just want you to have a good weekend. One that makes you happy,” Negan stated with a sigh, squeezing his arms around her tighter. Y/N reached down to grab her phone from the towel and pulled up the camera. When she went to take a photo of the water, Negan reached for her phone and grabbed a hold of the phone. He turned it on the selfie section and kissed over her temple taking a photo of the two of them. “We need more photos together.”

“Are you sure about that?” she confirmed and Negan nodded. “I thought you want us to be careful.”

“Are you thinking of sharing these?” Negan questioned and she shook her head slowly. “Then we are fine.”

Negan pressed in closer to her and kissed her while he snapped another selfie of the two of them together. Her cheeks blushed over when he looked at the photos and his nose wrinkled when he looked them over, “you’re going to have to send these two to me though.”

“Deal,” she winked, releasing him long enough to look to her phone again.

“You want to go four wheeling again? That was pretty fun, right?” Negan thought about the things they had done the previous day. When he looked over his shoulder to see her looking panicked, he stepped in closer and rubbed his towel through his hair. “What’s wrong?”

“My father sent me a text message. Apparently he knows that I’m not at my friend’s house that I told my mother about,” she informed him with a nervous breath and Negan’s eyebrow arched up in interest. “He wants me to call him and tell him where I really am.”

“Fuck that,” Negan reached for her phone and looked through the text messages seeing the several messages that her father had sent clearly getting angrier each time he had texted her. “They never care where you are on most nights, so what does it matter this time?”

“I should write him back Negan. Come up with a good excuse as to where I really am,” she gulped and Negan shook his head turning her cell phone off after sending himself the photos of them together. “He’s pissed. Something is wrong.”

“You’re on vacation with me. You don’t have to worry about that right now, okay?” Negan insisted, stepping forward to urge her chin up toward him. “I want to take you somewhere. Erase this from your mind and I promise everything will be all right.”

“This was my favorite place to come and relax as a kid,” Negan pulled on Y/N’s hand, tugging her up toward the lighthouse that was right off the beach. She looked up at the lighthouse and saw him smiling brightly as he looked up at it. “My favorite thing was to come here as a kid at night and think things out. Think about my future and all that fucking shit.”

“Yeah?” she arched her brow in response, taking a moment to look around the area. From what she knew of Negan it didn’t really seem like a place he would have loved as a kid, but it sure was beautiful. The lighthouse looked like something you would have seen from a movie, it was that gorgeous. “It’s beautiful.”

“It is,” Negan agreed and looked over his shoulder to wink at her. Negan motioned her to wait as he set up a blanket in the sand. The sun was setting and he urged her to lay down with him. “Later I can try to sneak us in so you can see the inside…”

“And get you in trouble? I don’t think so. The people here would love the story about how Negan got caught breaking into the lighthouse with his new, young girlfriend,” she snickered seeing him roll his eyes before leaning forward to press a soft kiss over her jawline. His kisses led toward her neck and she tilted her head up allowing him space to do as he pleased. “I take it you were quite the rebel growing up?”

“I’m still quite the rebel,” Negan insisted with a shrug of his shoulders, pulling away to look her over with his wicked glance. “I thought you would know that by now.”

Negan reached for his phone and took a photo of them with the lighthouse in the background of the photo. Negan leaned in to kiss her over and over again before she pulled away from him with a deep breath.

“Negan,” she looked to see that he was recording a video and he shrugged his shoulders. “Are you trying to be playing dangerously right now or…?”

“I just want something for the spank bank eventually when I’m alone,” Negan teased with a wink making her cough upon his admission. Her cheeks blushed over and Negan loved that he could make her turn red just with his words. She was so innocent and he loved every bit of it. Negan playfully teased his tongue over the front of her lips while he was still recording the video and he watched her shudder before he pressed stop. “You’re still tense, aren’t you?”

“I’m scared about my father,” she answered truthfully and felt him reach out to nudge her jaw with his rough fingertips. He carefully brushed her hair over her shoulder before moving in to kiss over the side of her neck again. “He knows I lied…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Negan insisted with a slur while he kissed over her neck and bit at her skin.

Her eyes closed feeling Negan’s tongue tracing lines over her flesh and she inhaled sharply. She wanted to just forget it, but she didn’t think she could. The consequences of this weekend truly had her in fear of what he father might do. “If they were looking for me that means that it was something serious.”

“It’s fine,” Negan hushed her, trying to get her to relax as he sat up straighter and held his finger up. “Close your eyes.”

“Why?” she retorted with a confused look. Negan snapped his fingers almost in an order and she felt him nudging her into a position that he clearly wanted. A moment later there was a cool sensation pressing in over her neck as she heard the clip of something closing. “Negan?”

“You can open your eyes,” Negan responded, pressing soft kisses over her neck again. When she saw that it was the necklace from the night before he heard her gasp. “I know you didn’t want me to get it for you, but I just…had to. It looks beautiful on you and I knew you really thought it was beautiful.”

“When did you…?” she looked down at the necklace seeing the way it glimmered as the sunset shined from it. “Negan, I can’t accept this.”

“I can’t return it,” Negan shrugged his shoulders with a wicked smirk. “It’s yours now.”

“Negan…” he watched her frown and she reached down to trace her fingertips over the white gold chain that led to the charm at the bottom. Her fingertips grazed over the diamond and she felt her heart pounding inside of her chest. “You shouldn’t have done this.”

“I wanted to pamper my girl,” Negan responded with a shake of his head. “That’s why I left the other day. I ran back to quickly go get it. I know you are paranoid about me spending money on you, but I love you. You liked the necklace; I bought it for you to show you how much I love you. It will be our special thing.”

Negan reached out with his rough fingertips to grasp a hold of the diamond to look it over. A smirk pressed in over his lips and he shrugged his shoulders.

“I just want you happy,” Negan whispered, moving forward to press another kiss over her lips and he felt her arms wrapping around his shoulders to hold onto him tightly.

“You…make me happy,” she whispered in his ear, pressing a quick kiss over his flesh before pulling away to look down at the necklace again. Her eyes were tearing over and he reached out to brush at her cheek lovingly. “I don’t want you to think this is the kind of person I am.”

“I think you are a wonderful person,” Negan shook his head and frowned when a single tear slid down her face. “That’s why I fell in love with you Y/N. Shit…I’ve fallen hard.”

“You’re making me swoon here Negan,” she informed him with a half laugh, reaching up to brush her fingertips throughout his thick hair. “You are amazing.”

“I was thinking…” Negan began with a long sigh, reaching up to grab a hold of her fingertips in his. He brought her hand to his lips and pressed a soft kiss over the back of her hand. “I know you are worried about your father. You are a lot. Why don’t you just move in with me?”

“I couldn’t do that Negan,” she shook her head firmly, a small laugh falling from her throat. “How are we going to hide that from people?”

“Very carefully,” Negan shrugged, attempting to think of something to say to make her feel comfortable with the suggestion. “I don’t care. I want to be with you. I want to keep you safe. I just want to make you happy.”

“I know and I love you,” she hushed him with a shake of her head. “I just can’t have you getting in trouble because of me.”

“Then let me buy you a place until you get a job. An apartment or something…” Negan reasoned with Y/N and she reached out to cup his rough face in her hands. His eyes seemed confused and upset as she shook her head. “Please. I want to keep you safe.”

“After you told me about the money Negan, I’m not going to accept these things. I want to be with you. I do, but I’m not a gold digger,” she insisted firmly. Moving in, she kissed Negan in a loving manner. “The necklace is enough to make me uncomfortable.”

“But it shows you are mine,” Negan reached down to trace his fingertips over the white gold necklace.

“I was yours long before this was on my neck,” she reminded him and a smirk pressed in over his features. Her fingertips brushed into his short beard and she leaned in to rest her forehead against his. “I didn’t need a necklace or something fancy to tell me that.”

“I want to protect you,” Negan sighed heavily, his warm breath pressing in against her face. “You are so scared and I don’t want something bad to happen to you. We can take measures to keep both of us safe. No one would know you are living with me.”

“If it ever gets to the point I think it has to be that way…then we can talk about it,” she suggested and Negan frowned, sighing heavily as he stared out at her with his sincere hazel eyes. She moved in to kiss him over and over again as he clutched tightly to her. “I love you Negan. More than you will ever know.”

“I love you too,” Negan stated against her skin, nipping softly at her bottom lip as they kissed. “So much.”

Negan stretched out on his leather couch at home as he scrolled through the photos he had taken over the weekend with Y/N on their trip. They had finished their trip and driven back on Sunday. They had gotten so many great photos while they were there and shared so many wonderful experiences. Their whole time away they had spent time doing things together and not once did they end up sleeping together. That wasn’t how most of his relationships had gone in the past and it was nice to have something different for once. Being able to share memorable moments together was something that he actually enjoyed and looking at the photos he’d taken of them together actually made him feel a sense of happiness.

The sound of his doorbell ringing was heard and Negan closed up his phone. Looking to the time, he could see that it was late at night. It had been a few hours since Y/N had headed home. When she had left, she was worried about her parents, but knew that she had to return to find out what was wrong. Moving to the door, Negan first noticed the bags at his feet in front of him and lifted his head to let out a gasp when he saw Y/N standing before him.

“Jesus Christ,” Negan blurt out reaching out to grasp at her face and he heard her wince upon contact. Negan pushed the hood that was covering her head down and took a look at her face. It was clear that she had been crying. There were small wounds over her eyebrow, under her eye and bottom lip. Her face was bright red and he could feel her shaking before him. “What the fuck happened?”

“Just…let me in?” she begged and Negan nodded, grabbing her bags to allow her into the house. Negan urged her toward the couch and he saw her shaking when she took a seat on it. She was still crying and Negan could feel his own body trembling with the sight of her. “I’m so sorry…”

“What happened?” Negan demanded to know hearing the shaking in her voice. She was trembling against his touch as he tried caressing over her face. “Baby?”

“I went home and my father cornered me. While we were gone they had apparently had gotten a call from my doctor who wanted to make sure I wasn’t having any bad side effects from my birth control pills,” she informed Negan and felt his body tensing up. Negan’s eyes grew wide as she nodded and nervously licked her lips. “Which apparently made them go upstairs to look through my things and he found some of the condoms that I had. They called my friend’s house that I was supposed to be at and found out that I wasn’t there and he’s been fuming all weekend.”

“That fucker did this to you?” Negan snarled seeing her nod slowly and he reached out to brush some of the blood that was dripping down her face away. “I’m going to fucking kill him.”

She motioned Negan to wait and he saw her moving for the sweatshirt. She shook as she carefully pulled the material from her body and Negan could see that she was reaching for the back of her shirt. His heart pounded inside of his chest watching her pull up the back of her shirt to show that she had belt marks all up and down her back.

“He called me a whore and locked me in my room,” she told him about what happened and he could hear her start to cry harder. “That’s not the worst thing…”

“It gets worse?” Negan felt every muscle in his body locking up and he watched her reach inside the pocket of the hoodie to pull out the necklace he had gotten her. It was clear that the clasp was broken and he reached out to grasp her hands in his.

“He ripped this from my neck. Apparently he knows that it came from the person I was sleeping with,” she trembled before him and he could hear her sobbing by this point. “I’m so sorry Negan. I didn’t mean for this.”

“We can get the necklace fixed sweetheart, it’s okay…” Negan hushed her, holding her in his arms as he heard her sobbing. Negan pushed the necklace he had bought her into the pocket in his pajamas before continuing to comfort her.

“I snuck out the window… I can’t go back….” She insisted with a whimper and Negan slid his hand in over the back of her neck. Pulling her close in a supportive manner, Negan let out a stressed sound. Negan tried comforting her to the best of his ability. He hushed softly when he heard her continue to cry and stroked her hair in soothing way. More than anything he wanted to go and attack her father for hurting her. It broke him to see Y/N hurt and he absolutely hated it. “I’m so sorry Negan.”

“It’s okay,” Negan promised with a hush, pressing a tender kiss against her temple. “You never have to go back there again, I promise.”

Y/N trembled in his arms and he felt her cuddling her head into his chest as she cried. Negan felt the adrenaline rising inside of his chest. The way his heart was hammering caused Negan to inhale sharply. There was a strong sense of rage filling his veins and Negan knew that he couldn’t take it anymore.

“You stay here…I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch,” Negan pulled away from Y/N, giving her a quick look before heading toward the front of the house. Searching through one of the closets, Negan found his baseball bat and grabbed a tight hold of it. Negan went to go for the front door until he felt her grasp desperately at his shoulder. “It’s fine…”

“It’s not,” she shook her head repetitively. “I left after they locked me in my room. I grabbed as much as I could and took off crawling out the window and climbing down. I don’t even know if he knows I’m gone yet. I can’t have you go there and get in trouble. You are all I have. If you get in trouble for hurting him…”

“He can’t do this. This is wrong. You should never hit a woman like this and you should never, ever treat your child like this,” Negan grunted with an angered sound. His body was shaking and he knew that he wanted to tear her father limb from limb. “He’s a piece of shit and this is what he deserves.”

“It is, but I love you. I love you and I can’t have anything happen to you,” she pleaded desperately and he felt her grabbing a tight hold of his wrist to stop him from leaving. Negan frowned and sighed before setting the bat down. “If I lost you, I don’t know what I would do.”

“You’re not going to lose me, but he needs to be taught a lesson,” Negan insisted with a hiss and she nodded. Negan stepped forward to cup her face in his large hands and moved forward to kiss her. “We need to call someone. Tell them what he did because this is wrong.”

“No, we can’t,” she denied the offer and Negan was confused because this abuse was completely wrong. “If we go to someone and tell them what happened they are going to question why I came to you. Why it was you that I picked to go to after he beat the hell out of me. I don’t want you in trouble. I can’t have you losing your job because of me.”

“Something has to be done,” Negan demanded and he could feel her shaking in his arms. “Something…”

“Please Negan. I’m never going back there…I just…have to figure out what to do,” she stuttered, thinking of something to say. “I can’t tell people about this. I don’t want to be seen as broken. I don’t want people to know about…us. I can’t…”

“Relax,” Negan interrupted her with the shake of his head. “I love you, okay? So I’m going to do what you want of me. But fuck…if I see your father again, I don’t know what I’m gonna do. I wanna fucking kill him.”

“I don’t even know what I would do if I saw him again,” she agreed and Negan reached out to grab a tight hold of her hand. He led her toward the kitchen and picked her up to place her on the island in the middle of his kitchen. Her soft cries filled the air and he wanted to kill her father for what he had done, but he was trying to do what she begged of him as he gathered some ice in a cloth and moved over toward her. He motioned her to hold it to her by her eye where the most swelling was. Quickly moving to the bathroom, he grabbed things to clean her wounds and moved swiftly to get back to her in the kitchen. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I can’t go back there.”

“You’re going to live here,” Negan hushed her, his eyes staring into hers with a serious expression while he started to clean the gash on her lip. “I’ve been trying to get you to move in with me for a while now. You think I’m going to change my mind when you need me the most?”

“What about school?” she stammered and he shrugged his shoulders. “I can’t do this to you.”

“We’ll figure it all out,” Negan silenced her with the shake of his head. “Trust me. I’m not going to let anything bad happen to you. You are not going back to that house. You are going to stay here where I can protect you. Nothing like this is ever going to happen to you again, I swear.”

Negan heard her start to cry again and he reached out to pull her in closer to him so he could comfort her. He held her close in his arms trying to do his best to comfort her, but there was still part of him that felt responsible for this. He told her to avoid her father while they were on the trip and the only reason that she had condoms in the first place was because of him.

“I’m sorry I let this happen. I told you I would protect you and I couldn’t,” Negan grumbled with a heavy sigh, his lips pressing a lingering kiss against her temple. “This is all my fault.”

“No, no it’s not,” she denied his words and turned to touch the side of his face with her palm. “Imagine everything I would have gone through if you weren’t in my life.”

“But this…this is my fault,” Negan looked her over and he felt his body trembling with anger while he stared out at her. “I’m so fucking sorry and I promise I will never let this happen to you again sweetheart.”

“You have no control over my father,” she insisted seeing the sadness that was filtering over Negan’s face and she slowly lowered from the counter of the island to step forward. Her arms wrapped around him and he embraced her lovingly. “You are the best thing in my life Negan and I would be absolutely lost without you.”

#Negan #negan x reader #negans-network #negans thirst squad #Jeffrey Dean Morgan #twd fanfiction #The Walking Dead #the walking dead fanfic #my writing #the walking dead fanfiction #negan fanfiction

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angelskyladiana · 5 years

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Tenebrae (Lucifers daughter)

Chapter 6: Heaven vs Hell? Sounds fun

Summary: Lucifer never loved anything, or at least that’s what people thought. It wasn’t Eve and long before Chloe- he had Tenebrae. His daughter.

Warnings: Fluff

Word count: 1746

(Baby daughter)

CHAPTER 5

"This kid has some serious issues." Maze stated, staring down at the baby rolling back and forth on the floor in front of her fathers feet. For what seemed like hours she had been doing this and somehow still had energy to continue. The tufts of fluff on her back helped her roll side to side, each one extending one by one to help her sway.

At least she was smart.

"I have no idea what you're referring to." The devil spoke, his head moving, gaze following his daughter back and forth. She was having the time of her short life, so there was no way he was gonna stop her.

"You don't see anything wrong with this?"The demon quizzed him, pointing at the crazed infant on the floor, giggling her heart out.

"She's a baby. What would you rather her do? Turn in to a bat?" He joked, finally to Maze and raising a brow towards her. The demon's eyes were wide and complete and utter confusion. Lucifer sighed, holding the part between his brows with his pointer and thumb, "she can't actually do that."

"Thank Hell." she breathed, her thoughts surrounding how difficult babysitting would be if the child of the devil could turn in to a bat, though sooner or later the demon was sure the child would be flying. But not being a bat was good enough she supposed.

Lucifer's eyes rolled back, continuing to look back at the creature that was apparently growing tired at her repetitive movements as she started to slow down.

"Hey Lucifer," Maze began, "you know how I said she looked like a chicken?" The dark-haired woman's head tilted on Tenebrae, eyes narrowing, "she looks much more like a turtle stuck on her back like that." She spoke, raising both her arms and pretending to scratch the air as if stuck on her back like a turtle.

Lucifer's gaze turned into an annoyed glare at his closest demon, he was completely over his daughter being compared to animals but then again Maze had never even seen a baby before Tenebrae.

The devil huffed, bending down and scooping up the baby in his arms, her fluffy grey wings flapping wildly as if trying to take off from his arms before ultimately slumping on him like the rest of her small form. Her head rested on his forearm, a light sigh escaping her lips and although he couldn't see, he knew her kids were beginning to shut. His arms moved up and down, bouncing her slightly and helping lull her to sleep softly.

He had never reacted to anything so soft and gently in his life, never cared for anything so deeply, nor held something so tightly in his arms and in his heart. It was a feeling he never wanted to stop, a thing he never wished to leave his grasp.

"Don't you have souls to torture? You know, your job?" Lucifer questioned sarcastically. Right now Maze was torturing him, which was nothing out of the ordinary to be honest, but the devil just wasn't in the mood for it. Right now Lucifer was in the mood to put his daughter down to sleep and then have sometime alone. Alone.

He hadn't had five seconds to himself recently, he hadn't really allowed himself to have it anyway after what had happened the other week. Lucifer had moved all of Tenebrae's things to the room next door to his own straight after the incident, even though for a few days after she had slept in his room on his chest. Basically Lucifer had been a 24/7 father recently, leaving no time to be the literal devil.

The poor sinners were missing out, obviously.

A small sigh fell from her parted lips symbolising her beginning beginning to pass out into a deep sleep, hopefully. Her 'wings' or flab's of useless flesh and fluff had gone back to her back instead of uselessly flapping around. They had become lighter every day and soon Lucifer could see them turning identical to his, a pristine white. It was overwhelmingly exciting for him to watch them come to be, to watch her come to be.

Stepping into her room, he careful placed his bundle of joy in the cot, lifting a blanket up to her chin and placing a plush toy under her arm. He watched as she quickly snuggled into it tightly, a smile unconsciously forming.

Almost as if tip-toeing, he exited the room, looking over his shoulder as he closed the door softly behind him, half-heartedly expecting her to mewl after him. She didn't. Honestly it hurt a bit.

Lucifer wandered in to his room, keeping the door slightly ajar in case she woke up at some stage. Anything for his little girl, obviously. He threw himself on the bed in the centre of the room, covering his eyes with his hands and breathing forcefully in the quiet room.

He had found himself doing this a lot recently. Being exhausted. Who would've thought you could get exhausted from being exhausted.

A sharp stream of light filtered in from the open door and hitting his eyes, it was a soft light produced from torches held on the walls of the castle and flickered from moment to moment- which was fine. What wasn't fine was when it went dark for a lengthy period of time as if someone was passing by before the stream of light continued to travel into the room.

The devil was paranoid, that was it.

But looking couldn't hurt.

He inwardly groaned, getting up from his comfortable position and shuffling to the room beside his own. His feet dragged behind him as he walked in, pushing the door open and watching the light filter in.

It was quiet. Not a mewl. Not a breath. Nothing, and he didn't like that.

"Tenny..." He whispered, looking over the crib, a shiver running down his spine at the sight of the empty crib. He had left her alone for less than a second. Spinning on his heel, he practically sprinted out of the room and into the hall, "Mazikeen!" he screeched.

"Maze!" he continued yelling as he ran past the throne room. The devil running faster and faster, the only thing driving him was sheer panic, "Tenebrae!"

His voice held complete and utter desperation, his thoughts could only occupy one thing; whoever had his daughter. Maze would never do such a thing and neither would Amenadiel, they wouldn't dare. It could've just as easily been her mother, but why would she want her back after abandoning her in Hell? Maybe his siblings?

But why would any of them dare do such a thing to an innocent child?

Lucifer stopped at a fork in his path, utter dread consuming him. Then he heard it, a quiet, tired and fearful cry. "Bababa!" She was left.

So he turned right, a shortcut, it was better to be in front than try to catch up, he didn't know how fast the assailant could possibly be. Never had the devil been more focused on a single goal.

Soon he saw her. Or rather- them. Her long, straight hair was unmistakable, the look of pure determination and anger present and he had always seen her have. She was a hunter, his child was the hunted. In this moment as he stood in front of his annoying sister, old family ties meant nothing. There was only Tenebrae.

The deep, dark-haired woman glared and stopped in her tracks, "brother."

"Give me my turtle." Lucifer spoke threateningly, his eyes narrowing on one of his least favourite siblings.

Remiel rolled her eyes, "You named it turtle?" In all honesty it sounded like the dumb crap Lucifer would do, even to his own offspring.

"No, no, I..." he huffed, beginning to get frustrated and flustered all at once. "Remiel, if you don't put her down..."

"You made a crime against nature, a new celestial shouldn't exist!" She yelled, just by her eyes you could see how furious the angel was, but he wasn't paying any attention to that, the only thing that stole his attention were the wobbling lips of the bright blue eyed babe in her arms. Also he was a little peeved at how she was holding her, it wasn't the best and it was obvious Tenebrae wasn't comfortable in her grasp. In her other hand she grasped her spear, inching closer to the small babe. That wasn't ok. Remiel sneered, "especially an offspring of the devil."

"That's not for you to decide," He stated with a shaky voice, not of fear, but utter aggression. Lucifer just didn't know what to do, he couldn't physically attack her, his sister could possibly hurt her, drop her, maybe even stab her. All of it was too much of a risk, "Little sister, you should know I wont let you leave with her. Tenebrae will never leave Hell."

"An angel does not belong in Hell, brother." She called him brother as if it disgusted her. Remiel's words held secret meaning to them, just like she didn't consider him her brother, neither did she consider him an angel. Not anymore.

"Bababa!" Tenebrae babbled almost in disapproval of her 'aunts' words, her eyes spilling tears.

"Look in to her eyes, Remiel, she's no angel," he spoke slower, eyes training from the infant to what was behind his deranged sister. He held back a smirk, "God's watching, how 'bout we give him a show, sister?"

Without a word her spear was raised- perfect. Lucifer finally smirked, his hands falling to his hips with a certain level of sass before slowly strutting over to them. Remiel watched him in confusion as he came closer, what game was he playing at?

Suddenly the spear was no longer in her hands, and Lucifer leaped. The devil took Tenebrae back into his arms. Remiel watched as the spear was soon pointed at her throat and at the end of it was none other than the devils most trusted demon.

"The hunter becomes the hunted, eh, angel?" Maze questioned as the angel only sneered at her. Maze glanced at Lucifer, "protecting Tenny's my job too, Lucifer."

Lucifer nodded, looking over his child's small body, not a hair out of place or a knick on her skin luckily. She was perfect as always. Tenebrae snuggled into his chest, rubbing her eyes and snotting nose on his shoulder.

"You know what she is! She will bring nothing but chaos!" Remiel yelled, glaring at the spear.

He glanced at the demon and angel, "get rid of her." He demanded Maze, watching as the demon pulled the angel up before turning on his heel and facing away from his sister, uttering one last threat, "bummer Heaven vs Hell sounded fun." He turned his head to look over his shoulder, "come here again and I'll break father's commandments,"

"I'll kill you."

CHAPTER 7

#tenebrae #lucifer #morningstar #chloedecker #tvshow #daughter #oc

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fandommemporiumm · 5 years

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Talking Does Wonders Chapter 5: New Journey

Chapter 1 ~ Chapter 2 ~ Chapter 3 ~ Chapter 4 ~ Chapter 6

Warning: None

The next cycle after meeting stakar began the process of becoming a ravager. Sending medical records, getting a galactic I.D., and gathering some supplies like toiletries and new boots. Stakar had sent a message to Iru saying things like a sewing machine and other supplies were already there from the previous tailor. A simple jumpsuit was sent to the shop for AL. It was a bit big but that was to be expected since the jumpsuits were mainly made for men. AL was going to be the only female on board an all male ravager ship, but she was certain nobody would really notice she was female since her body wasn't the voluptuous type and this jumpsuit was pretty baggy. Over the next couple of cycles she made some adjustments to it and finished up her orders so iru wouldn't have to. The hardest part about accepting this offer was that Zippa was not happy. She tolerated certain ravagers but overall she wasn't fond of them. Even though zippa wouldn't admit it AL knew that she had grown kind of attached to her. But the time came where she was to leave and start this new journey. With her new jumpsuit and boots on and a duffel bag packed with all her belongings, AL was ready. Zippa said her goodbye with a tight hug and watched as AL and iru went off to the shop from the door. When AL and iru made it to the tailor shop they could see that stakar was waiting outside. Iru opened the shop and let stakar in.

“Ya ready girl,” stakar said.

AL just nodded her head. Iru handed back the bag he was given with a jumpsuit that had holes in it once but was now pristine and perfect back to stakar. Iru's goodbye was a simple pat on the back and a nod. Stakar and AL walked out of the tailor shop into the snowy weather. It was a good distance walk to the ship. A standard m-ship painted blue and gold, very similar to stakars outfit. When they entered and climbed up a small ladder to what AL assumed was the cockpit, she saw two other men looking back at them and did some sort of salute to ravager captain. Both appear to be zandarian like stakar only the one sitting up front on the right has big curly dark hair with a big beard to match. The one sitting in the middle chair has dark skin with very little black hair. Stakar went to sit in the front left seat while the other two men in the ship stared at AL.

“New recruit,” the man with big hair said to stakar.

“New tailor, this is AL.”

“Welcome, i'm vrix and that's scrad,” the man with big hair said to AL while pointing to the dark skin man in the middle chair.

“He doesn't talk much unless he needs to or he's drunk,” vrix said.

Scrad gave vrix an evil eye and resumed whatever he was doing on the small halo pad.

“Better strap in kid,” stakar said over his shoulder.

“Where do I do that exactly,” AL replied

Stakar turned to look at AL with a puzzled look, “There's some passenger seats we passed by as we walked in.”

AL nodded her head and turned around to go back down the ladder with her duffle bag. She saw some basic benches up against a wall with harness belts and went over to one and sat down strapping in. when AL was done she heard stakar yell,

“Buckled up kid?”

“Yeah,” she yelled back.

AL heard the blaring noise of what she assumed was the engines and without warning she felt the pull of the ship moving. AL quickly grabbed her duffle bag, pulling it to her lap and clenching onto it for dear life. After about twenty minutes or so everything came to a halt and it sounded like the engines were shutting off. Stakar came down the ladder and looked at AL who looked like a scared cat clawing onto something for dear life.

“First time flying,” stakar asked

AL just nodded unclenching the duffel bag.

“Well you wont be flying much anymore, come on now I gotta show you your room. Welcome to the Sun Streaker.”

Stakar opened the hanger door as AL was unbuckling her harness. She slung her duffel bag over her shoulder as she stood up and made her way to stakar side. Her mouth fell open when she saw how big this place really was. Other m-ships hanging everywhere and many walk ways that lead to different places, not to mention all the people that were quickly running around and many new familiar sounds.

“You coming or what kid?”

AL looked to see stakar off the ship and walking ahead. AL quickly made her way to his side. As they made they're way through elevators, hallways, stairs, twists, and turns stakar abruptly stopped at a metal door. He punched in a code and the door opened. Stakar and AL stepped into the room and a pungent smell somehow hit AL nose even with the filter built into her breathing mask. AL looked around and the small place and it is filthy. Different color bottles and trash askew everywhere, heavy dirt and dusk covering every inch of the place, and what AL assumed was mold is growing on the walls. By the door was a big box and next to it was a small desk with a sewing machine on it. These items seemed to be the only clean things in the room. Crates aligned the back wall which AL assumed are supplies.

“Sorry about the place. Our former tailor wasn't the cleanest.”

“I don't know what gave that away.”

Al was in the process of trying not to gag as stakar went to a door within the room and motioned with a hand to it. AL went to the door and looked in to see a much cleaner room that smelled like finish construction. A small bed with a night stand, a sink with a medicine cabinet hanging over it, and a fogged glass box that could fit one person which AL assumed was the shower and toilet.

“My men weren't exactly pleased to find out that the new tailor was getting a room remodel, but I didn't tell them why. It's none of they're business until you tell them. If anyone gives ya a hard time let me know, I don't tolerate harassment to women.”

AL nodded and walked into the room dropping her duffle bag on the bed.

“Before I forget here.”

Stakar was holding out what looked like a circular makeup compact. AL took it from him and looked at it strangely. Stakar then pushed down on the compact and it opened up to reveal a screen on the part that opened and a small ball button on the part she was holding.

“It's a map of the ship and a communicator, it'll take you a while to get used to navigating the ship but there's not many places you need to memories.”

Stakar showed AL how it works both as a map and a communicator. The only contacts in the communicator section was stakar and some guy named martinex which stakar said was his first mate. Stakar gave AL the run down on several more things including how the previous tailor did orders and the ravager salute which AL thought was ridiculous.

“Dinner is in five hours so do what you will with that time, I'll send someone down to get you,” was all the captain said before making his exit. AL got unpacked and by the time she was done the ship felt like it was moving. AL went back out to the work room and looked at it in disgust, then started rolling up her sleeves to get to work.

Tagged: @dicksoutformtl @loveisyondublue

#talking does wonders #ravager #ravagersona #martinex #martinex t'naga #stakar ogord #GotG #Guardians of the Galaxy #original character #fanfiction #fanfic #marvel fanfiction

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izanyas · 6 years

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Nothing Noble (3)

Here it is at last. The third chapter of the agency!Chuuya and mafia!Dazai fic.

Rating: M Words: 8,000 Warnings: very vague allusion to potential sexual assault (no actual assault takes place).

[Read from Chapter 1]

Nothing Noble Chapter 3

Something about the air that day should have given Chuuya warning.

The sky had opened sometime during the night, letting through needles of starlight. He had spent those unslept hours pouring over the files obtained through Sasaki, listening to the whispers of the city and the soft murmur of Katai's snoring. Katai never did close his bedroom door fully. The change in weather had resulted in a sun-bright morning, colder maybe for it than it would have been through the thick of clouds.

Chuuya was too used to insomnia by now for it to bother him. He showered leisurely as the city awoke, scorching water unknotting his back and flattening his hair against his scalp. The bangs over his forehead were almost long enough to reach his eyes; he'd have to take care of that soon.

He brushed his teeth, dried himself, put on clean clothes. He glanced at his fogged reflection in the mirror; he traced the ugly scar on his cheekbone habitually, feeling the depth and width of it with his index finger; he plastered gauze on it, hiding it from view.

"You're always up so early," Katai mumbled when he emerged from the bathroom.

He was stumbling half-blindly toward the couch, a bowl of cereal threatening to spill its content in hand. Chuuya kept it from doing so without thought, milk turning pink under the glow of his power until Katai was seated at last. His roommate thanked him with what sounded more like a groan than an actual word. The TV lit up without any of them touching the remote—whose location had long been forgotten by both of them anyway.

"Gotta get to the agency early anyway," Chuuya said, grabbing his coat from where it hung on the back of a kitchen chair. "I said I'd help Yosano sort through the archives."

"Mrrph," was Katai's answer. His mouth was full.

"See you later."

Katai swallowed hurriedly. "Tell them I'll be around at ten! I promised Kunikida I'd take Atsushi out on his first mission."

Chuuya waved at him and left, the door creaking loudly behind him.

The outside air hit him like an ice wall once he exited the building. Everywhere he looked people were walking by, scarves wound around their faces and hats pulled over their ears. Chuuya tightened his collar around his throat in a meager attempt to ward off the cold, his scarred cheek flaring with pain under the dry and icy wind. Not even his leather gloves could prevent it from filtering in like tiny little knives, their tips pricking his fingers to numbness. Walking did little to keep him warm that day.

"Hey," Yosano greeted him once he hurried inside the office.

"You turned on the heaters," he huffed, tugging off his gloves. "Thank fuck."

"I'm not about to work in a freezer, am I?"

He shot her an absent smile. It seemed they were the only ones in yet; Kunikida's desk was stacked neatly with the files of the day, not yet opened for perusal, and Edogawa's wasn't yet covered in wrappings or empty bottles of soft drinks.

A loud thumping sound broke him out of his observations. He turned back toward Yosano, standing near the newbie's—Nakajima's—desk with several piles of old carton binders. Some were so full of documents that only thick rubber bands held them together, their spine long torn or gone away.

Chuuya frowned. "Is that it?"

"Oh no," Yosano replied, smiling darkly. "That's just the first row. We're going in alphabetical order."

Great.

They sat on either side of the desk and went to work.

The good thing with Yosano was that she valued silence. As flashy as her personality could be given the right circumstances, as dark as her words and eyes could get, she was an accommodating woman. Their interactions easily reduced themselves to asking each other for one file or the next, she telling him what to do and he requesting her advice. The rest was comfortable and quiet in the soft, curtained light, their side warmed by the wall heater and paper shuffling between their fingers. If comments there were, they were equally peaceful. Chuuya couldn't imagine working with any other member of the agency with such ease. Kunikida would be tense by his side as he always was, Katai nervous and distracted, the Tanizaki siblings or Miyazawa playful. He preferred not to think at all of working with Edogawa.

The others trickled in one by one—or two, in the Tanizakis' case. Chuuya let their greetings go unanswered, though Yosano took the time to salute each of them. He filtered through the archives, noting down the ones to be copied by hand or on a screen, putting aside those too damaged to be read by anyone but Yosano herself.

"This is gonna take us weeks," he muttered once they reached the bottom of the third stack Yosano had brought out of the archive room. "Some of this stuff isn't even from the agency."

"My old clinic," Yosano replied. "I still see some of the patients. And Fukuzawa brought in relics of his work to get the agency opened in the first place, alongside Souseki's own stuff. Plus a ton of other things from the previous occupants of this floor."

"Loan sharks," Chuuya said. He'd never been very good at numbers, but he knew suspicious money exchanges when he saw them. Not to mention a few familiar names.

Yosano frowned. "I thought they worked in real estate."

"Loan sharks parading as real estate agents, then. It's not unheard of."

"Bringing back memories?"

Chuuya hadn't stooped so low as to startle, but the sound of Edogawa's voice was always an unwelcome one. He eyed with disdain the mug full of hot cocoa that the man put on the desk beside them—firmly enough that droplets of the beverage stained the old documents brown in places, he noticed irritatedly—and then his face, once he had brought close a chair and sat in it. "Morning, sensei," Edogawa chirped, his piercing eyes fixed on Chuuya.

"Hey," Yosano replied. "How's it going?"

"Good, good. Excellent, even."

Chuuya once more thanked Yosano, internally, for her tact. He had no doubt that she had heard Edogawa's comment, as she must have all the comments he had made since Chuuya had joined the agency, but as usual she paid it no mind at all. She simply went back to her work.

It gave him the energy to withstand Edogawa's stare. "Are you gonna help us?" he asked.

"No," Edogawa answered happily.

"Then fuck off."

"That's no way to talk to a senior," Kunikida declared, announcing his arrival and making a beeline for his desk. "Ranpo-san, Yosano-sensei, good morning." His eyes landed on Chuuya. "Kashiwamura," he added.

"Not my name," Chuuya said.

Kunikida's face pinched into some sort of pained expression. It was becoming a permanent fixture every time they interacted.

Though by now the exchange was more game than anything else, at least for Chuuya, he still didn't enjoy being called by that name. It hadn't been his since he was only a boy, hadn't been his when Kouyou had forged a new one for him and he had adopted it into the depth of his heart like a secret treasure, a bounty of love and acceptance, the kind he had never felt before.

It was a weakness. He knew it. Having most everyone he met call him by his first name was easily done, but it wasn't something he should do. Not anymore. He might as well have introduced himself as Nakahara to them, for all that his birth mother's name was worth as a disguise.

Pain rang hollowly through his chest at the thought of Kouyou, images flashing through his mind as they did every time he slept, every time he let down his guard—the mansion floor awash with sticky blood, her ashen face and limp hair and torn clothes as he stood, still, in the knowledge that he had been too late.

Her cold hand in his as he forgot how to breathe.

It grew inside him like a weed, rotted his heart and lungs with the acrid bite of anger, burned his words to ash at the back of his throat.

Mori Ougai. Sakaguchi Ango.

Chuuya exhaled.

His eyes landed on the timid silhouette of Nakajima Atsushi, who had trailed into the office behind Kunikida like a scared cat. The boy hadn't addressed him a word since Chuuya had run his entrance exam, which might have been understandable for someone without the guts to throw themself into the way of a flying knife; yet that had been almost a week ago. Nakajima had opened up to almost everyone else, the eldest Tanizaki especially. He hadn't stopped looking at Chuuya with worry tensing up his shoulders.

"Hey," Chuuya called out to him.

The boy jumped as if electrified.

"Er, me?" he said weakly.

"Yeah." Chuuya turned around in his chair to look at him more closely. Now that he thought about it, he and Yosano were occupying the boy's desk. No one else's had enough room for them to sort through the thick binders. "Katai says he'll be here later to take you out. Show you the ropes. A client has an appointment with us, something about smugglers around her neighborhood."

"Oh." The boy blinked, some of his fear abating, probably out of understanding that Chuuya was not about to try and stab him again. "That's great, then. I need to apologize to him."

"No need for that. I'm sure he doesn't even think about it anymore."

Or at least, Katai had stopped having night terrors about a great white tiger and taking refuge at the foot of Chuuya's bed for protection.

"Still," Nakajima mumbled.

There was nothing else Chuuya could think of saying. Nakajima's eyes had lowered, no doubt to stare at the bandage on his cheek as he had been wont to do since they met. "I'll take that back with me," Chuuya told Yosano, grabbing what was left of the pile they had been working on, turning away from the boy entirely. "Same time tomorrow?"

"And the next, and probably the whole week after," Yosano promised grimly.

Chuuya allowed himself a sharp laugh.

Their short morning hours slugged by uneventfully. The heated air inside the office, coupled with sunlight streaming through the windows, made it feel like a spring day rather than a cold winter one. Chuuya's desk was next to Kunikida's, his back to one of the windows, a space made stifling by weather and tension both. Chuuya hadn't been sent out to do more than investigation and paperwork in a while, and so his workload had consistently dimmed over the days. He took the opportunity to sort through more of the archives, eyeing the elegant penmanship of their director and the unreadable scribbles of who he guessed to be Souseki Natsume, the man's mentor and the one who had supposedly acquired a permit for the agency in the first place.

Weirdly enough, most of the pages left by him looked like manuscripts of short stories. Maybe even a scrapped novel idea or two. Chuuya let his eyes wander upon the words and thought, not for the first time, of the half-finished poems he had left behind in Kouyou's mansion.

(A mocking voice by his ear, like a cold breeze on canicular evenings—"Poems."

"Shut up."

"Of all useless things you could be writing—"

Hitches in the words, a paltry attempt at keeping things the same, even as Chuuya could feel the arm around his shoulders grip him for dear life. Even as he could sense the struggle, even as he had to all but drag the weight on his back to the closest place he could find help.

Stop talking. Stop, stop, stop.

There was a bullet lodged between Dazai's ribs.)

"What did you say your name was?"

"I didn't say."

"Ah, um… yes, yes. You didn't, did you."

Chuuya paid very little attention to the discussion taking place on the other side of the office. From his desk he could only see a fragment of the reception area anyway: the cut-off silhouette of the sharply-dressed young woman who was their only appointment of the day. It was amusing to hear Katai blubber his way through the questions he ought to ask her and trying his best to appear unbothered and professional in front of Nakajima, who was probably sitting by his side and hunching in on himself.

He was proud of the progress Katai had made, though. He still remembered the pale man he had met all those years ago who couldn't stand to step foot outside of his home.

"He's doing well," Kunikida said quietly, echoing his thoughts, his eyes fixed to the green plants giving the lounge a semblance of privacy. The scent of green tea wafted through the air, similar to the kind Katai always prepared at home.

"He had an appointment in town the other day too," Chuuya replied. Kunikida gave him a startled glance. "Went out all on his own and everything."

"That's… good. That's extremely good."

He seemed surprised. Chuuya told him as much.

"I am surprised." Kunikida's pen was not touching the paper on which he was drafting his report anymore; it spun between his fingers deftly, an anxious habit that had more than once thrown Chuuya back years ago to another desk and another person playing idly instead of doing any work.

Funny how such different people could develop the same ticks.

"I've never managed to really help him with his agoraphobia," Kunikida said. "I tried, but he never really wanted to improve."

Once, twice, thud. Rinse and repeat. Kunikida spun the pen and touched it to the desk and spun it again in perfect, precise order.

You've got your own issues to deal with, Chuuya thought.

"I guess," Kunikida continued, voice tense, "I have you to thank for this."

"I did nothing," Chuuya replied. It was true; Katai had changed all on his own. "No need to push yourself into having a good opinion of me."

Katai may have once seen him at his worst, and Fukuzawa offered him pity, but Kunikida would never extend the same mercy. Not after Chuuya had sequestered and threatened his oldest friend, not with what he knew of Chuuya's past exactions, however little that was.

Kunikida rubbed the lacquered length of his black pen with his thumb. "Kashiwamura—"

Noise from the reception area interrupted him. They both turned their heads toward it, watching Katai and Atsushi rise from their couch and the young woman do the same, her fine suit uncreased despite the long time spent sitting down.

It was rare of a woman to pick such stiff fabric at any tailor's, Chuuya wondered, eyeing the gloss of the suit's finish, the sharp and steely gleam of the buttons keeping it close over her upper body. This wasn't just any wear. It was fitted to her, expansive and practical at once, betraying the youth in her face for a lie—no soft-spoken, demure lady wore such things. If anything the bulky handbag she carried on her arm clashed with the rest of her outfit; it was shiny, cream-colored, digging deep into her sleeve as she carried it up. There was no makeup on her face that he could see, nor jewelry or heeled shoes to balance the femininity of it.

Chuuya frowned.

"We'll join you in a few minutes, then," Katai told her, hand trembling at his side as he probably considered offering to shake hers. The woman made no such offer on her end, and so Katai refrained with obvious relief. "Feel free to use the bathroom, or… there's a café downstairs?"

"I'll wait in front of the building," she replied bluntly.

She had taken a step toward the exit when her eyes met Chuuya's. He expected her to stare at the side of his face, but instead her pace turned hesitant for the briefest second.

"Have we met somewhere?" she asked, her voice steady across the room.

All heads turned to look at her and Chuuya both.

He had no memories of ever meeting her. Chuuya didn't fancy himself able to remember names and faces any better than the next man, but he thought distantly that he would not soon forget someone who cut as striking a figure as she did.

This consideration drowned under the tension suddenly gripping his spine. He felt his heart beat against his palate as he answered, "No," keeping his voice even.

The woman stared at him for another second, the glimmer of recognition in her eyes igniting something akin to fear in Chuuya himself; it vanished, however, and her face went back to looking as it had since she came into the office.

She left.

Chuuya leaned back into his chair, heart beating off-tempo, the collar of his own jacket suddenly suffocating. He undid it a bit too forcefully; the button holding it close to his sternum pulled harshly, its string loosening in the process.

"I wonder what that was about," Katai said in a strangled voice, shooting Chuuya panicked glances. "Well, Atsushi-kun, we better get going and all. See you guys later!"

Nakajima must have been in the process of saying something—his mouth closed sharply as Katai tugged him toward the exit as well.

Kunikida took a deep breath. Chuuya turned his back to him and said, "I've got work to do."

He couldn't read a single word anymore.

There were so many reasons this could have been a scare without substance. Chuuya had roamed the streets of the city so many times, face open to the sights of the crowd, attracting looks for his outfits and hair color; he could have met the woman in any sort of way through the years even without remembering it—she could be family of any worker on the docks, perhaps a worker there herself, though he doubted it. She could be one of the paper-filling employees of the city's many construction companies, which he had visited on behalf of the mafia for so many reasons. Maybe it didn't have to do with his days in the mafia at all. Maybe he had crossed paths with her in the streets during the past months, maybe she had noticed him and simply had a knack for remembering faces that he himself lacked.

The possibility that she was affiliated with the port mafia, with the ministry, was so thin. No employee of the mafia would come to a detective agency to deal with smugglers, for one. Neither would anyone working for the special ability department.

Sometimes people met by sheer, simple luck—and Chuuya had no memory of her at all. None that could indicate she was a threat to him.

He barely saw Yosano sitting down on the corner of his desk. "You know, I could take care of that if you want," she said, and for a second he had no idea what she was talking about.

It was only when she pointed to her own cheek that he realized he had been thumbing the gauze on his, feeling the shape of the scar under it unthinkingly.

"There's nothing to take care of," he replied at last, lowering his hand.

Yosano's look was skeptical. "It won't be pleasant, but I can make any scar disappear. You wouldn't have to walk around looking like you've lost a fight anymore."

"I don't give a shit about that."

His tone had been harsh, perhaps, but he couldn't find it in himself to regret it. Yosano simply shrugged and walked way, the door to her office left ajar behind her.

Chuuya looked back at his desk, at the scratched and scribbled words left by a man who must have fancied himself an author, and closed the binder sharply.

He spent the following half-hour pushing all thought out of his mind, inhaling dust as he filed the archives of the agency one by one and left traces of his fingers onto paper, the buzz of Miyazawa's young voice and Edogawa's snide comments hanging over his head like a wasps' nest.

He fooled himself so well into complacency that he thought perhaps this would be the end of the day's surprises. That he would be going home later that night and ask Katai how Nakajima had dealt with his first official mission, that he would spend the dark hours that followed browsing once more through the piles and piles of information he had gathered over the years for a glance, a trace, a whisper of Sakaguchi Ango's whereabouts.

Yokohama shone in the sun like a beacon, winter making way to spring for the first time of the year. Cold air crawled between the feet of passersby; light flashed off of the ocean's wave and pulled out of the dark things ready to be woken.

"Shit," Kunikida murmured after a long string of silence. "I forgot to give them one of the flyers."

"What flyers?" Chuuya asked mechanically.

"The director got them from the police last night," Kunikida said, opening the first drawer of his desk and quickly pulling a stack of thin-papered photographs out of it. He slid one of them toward Chuuya, his other hand pulling up his phone. "This guy—no one knows his name—he was witnessed murdering a member of the city council yesterday morning, you must've heard about it on the news. He's an ability user, very dangerous…"

Kunikida's voice drowned out of Chuuya's focus.

He picked up the picture. It wasn't blurry at all, as though its subject had chosen to pose for the snap. Another man may have smiled at the camera, even, smothered in the certainty of his own strength, but not this one. Though he had been caught red-handed and never before cared for witnesses, Akutagawa didn't smile.

"Kunikida," Chuuya said, cutting the man in the middle of his monologue. He hadn't realized that the other was still talking. "Where was it that the woman earlier said there were smugglers to take care of?"

"What?"

"I just remembered I forgot to tell Katai something."

Kunikida didn't immediately answer. Chuuya wondered if it had anything to do with what Kunikida knew of him—that he seldom forgot to do anything—or if he suspected something, the way Edogawa, staring at them from his side of the room, probably did.

"Behind the Red Brick Warehouse," he said at last. "She said that's where she suspected the transactions were taking place."

Chuuya rose from his desk. He grabbed his coat from where he had left it at the entrance of the office, sparing no thought for gloves, and closed the door behind himself carefully.

Then he rushed to the nearest window.

The streets were populated at this time of day. Lunch break was near for many, and although Chuuya could find no one watching up from the street, he had no doubt that someone, somewhere, must have caught on to the exceptionally clement weather and be staring out from a neighboring building. He'd have to take the risk.

He opened the latch with one last glance behind himself and floated out of the window, kicking against the building to drive himself up to the roof.

The Warehouse was about twenty minutes away by foot. Thirty if they took their time, which they must have, with Katai explaining to Nakajima what they would do on the way. Chuuya could make his way there in five with the help of his ability and as long as no one spotted him on the way—and he prayed, for a silent second, that no one would, that by some miracle no port mafia or ministry scion would be out and about at this time and in this perimeter, or at least none who would recognize him.

He flew from rooftop to rooftop with as much speed as he could gather, his feet digging into concrete as if it were butter each time he landed and leaped again. Another day perhaps he would've relished in the feeling of flight, in the wind stabbing his marred face, but with Akutagawa's somber face still gripped tight in his hand, he had not the heart to.

What kind of person would come to the armed detective agency for a matter of non-gifted smuggling that could be handled by the police? What kind of woman wore suits made of fabric so stiff it gave nary a crease—the kind he himself had worn to conceal much more than simple body shape?

He was a fucking idiot. Of course she would have known his face.

Air whistled past his ears at every turn he made, numbing his skin until he couldn't feel anything at all, not even the sharp tugs his scar gave into the dry and cold. One of the roofs he landed on had clothes and sheets hung up on strings to dry; Chuuya tore a beanie from one of them and shoved it onto his head as far down as it would go. He closed his coat, raised its collar, concealing what he could.

Gunshots rang through the silence when he reached the Warehouse. Chuuya perched himself atop its tower-like peak, heart solidified to ice, listening as screams echoed down in the street and people started panicking.

In a way, it saved him the trouble of trying to be discreet. No one would pay attention to the roofs when a machine gun could be heard from one of the alleyways and all were too busy running to safety. He flew over the red building and the narrow streets behind, fearing the sound of violence as much as he sought it.

Katai was there. He was there, unarmed, with for only defense a boy who couldn't control his powers.

Chuuya found them in the dark of the smallest alley. It was a foray between buildings with only one exit, like an accidental turn of the pen on the map of the city—and the woman from earlier, whose heavy handbag now rested at her feet, had both arms loaded with firearms.

He didn't pay attention to what she was saying, or to Nakajima's screams of anger and terror. It was obvious that she had already proved her willingness to aim and shoot; Chuuya felt no need for sympathy.

He jumped down, lading behind her and kicking her knees out from under her.

One of them cracked ominously, and to her credit the woman only grunted. Chuuya grabbed both her arms and twisted until she did yell out; the guns fell from her lax hands.

"You—"

"Where's Katai?" Chuuya interrupted, looking up from the bent back of the woman to meet Nakajima's eyes.

They were ever so bright.

He didn't answer, but Chuuya didn't need him to. The lack of light around them could not mask the slick sound of spilled blood, nor the brownish tint that the ground was taking in the shadow of the farthest building. Katai was lying on the ground, and he wasn't moving.

"Go see if he's alive," he heard himself order.

Nakajima didn't move.

"Now!"

Chuuya didn't watch him scramble away. The woman had started squirming under his hold, twisting this way and that in familiar movements. Whatever martial art training she had received would not be enough to push him away, however; he swept her off her knees entirely, making sure her head hit the pavement as she landed on her back, and pressed a foot against her throat.

She choked, pain and anger warring over her face in equal measures. Chuuya bent down to pick up one of the guns. He kicked the other one away, and her bag with it for good measure.

"He's breathing," came Nakajima's trembling voice, "but he's bleeding so much, I don't know—"

"Take off your shirt and use it to put pressure on the wound," Chuuya replied. He didn't let relief take him, not yet. "Use his phone to call an ambulance and then call Yosano, he's got her as an emergency contact. The pin code is 0830."

He looked down at the woman again. She grinned viciously at him, though her leg must be in agony.

"It's useless," she wheezed out. "We'll get the man-tiger, your tiny little agency can't protect him against the port mafia—"

Chuuya pressed down onto her neck with his foot until she choked again. "I don't care," he replied, "I just want to know who you called for back-up."

Her smile was gone. She didn't answer him.

For a long while nothing else happened. Chuuya was reluctant to knock her out on the off-chance she would talk; he was reluctant to force answers out of her in one of the many ways he knew as well, not only because of Nakajima's presence, not only because Katai had such faith in his being able to turn a page from his past.

He hadn't come back to Yokohama to torture the port mafia's lower ranks. There was only one among them he planned to find and bring vengeance upon.

Nakajima's labored breathing came to him in the dark. Chuuya focused on it rather than anything else, though his eyes never left the woman's face. There was no sound yet of an ambulance coming; no sign of Yosano or anyone else coming to their aid.

"You should kill me," the woman said.

Chuuya leveled a warning glance at her. Her next words were spat, and no doubt that he would have felt them on his face had she been in any state to stand.

"You moralistic, idealistic fools—if you don't kill me now you'll only regret it later," she said.

"Shut up before I make you."

"With what?" she laughed roughly, a hint of hysteria shooting through her from adrenaline alone. Her twisted knee spasmed once against the ground. "People like you don't have the balls to prove your words with action. Pathetic."

"Nakajima," Chuuya called instead of answering her, "any update?"

"He's still alive," the boy replied. "I don't—I don't know how bad it is."

Chuuya wished he could go and see for himself. If he could get close enough to Katai then he could use the Tainted Sorrow to at least stop the bleeding efficiently, but he dared not leave Nakajima in charge of a port mafia member by himself. She wouldn't hesitate to shoot again if she got her hands back on a weapon.

Frowning, his tension kept at bay by the news of Katai's continued living, Chuuya crouched above the woman's body. He replaced his foot with a hand, gripping her knee in warning so that she wouldn't move, and used his other to pat her sides.

Her eyes widened. "What are you—"

"Checking for weapons," he told her.

Her fear was not unjustified. It did little to stop the disgust that washed through him once he understood it. Chuuya focused on stripping her of the knives strapped to her forearms and the handgun concealed at her hip, and only when he pulled back did her eyes stop staring at him in open fright.

She must not be as old as her outfit and attitude would let think. The mafia had always liked to hire them young.

"Did you call for back-up?" he asked her once again.

Now that he was within breathing distance, she did spit at his face. Chuuya wiped it off with a mere grunt of distaste.

"It would be easier for you if you cooperated."

"Loosen your tongue and lose your life," she replied.

He smiled tersely. Those words were as familiar to him as nursery rhymes were to some.

He might as well knock her out, then. They needed to be off as soon as the ambulance arrived, and she would be difficult to transport if she fought him the whole way. At least it seemed she hadn't recognized him; Chuuya was in the middle of thinking through what he should do to make sure she never heard his name or wondered who he was while in agency custody, when she started laughing.

"What is it?" he snapped.

She breathed in deeply, choked by her own laughter. "You're dead, detective," she replied.

The very air split around them.

Chuuya used his powers without thinking; a tendril of black matter, sharp as a blade, stabbed the place where he was crouched a second ago. His feet buried themselves deep into the ground as he landed a few feet away, holding the stolen beanie down on his head and waiting for the wind of the attack to stop slapping around him like the heart of a hurricane.

Nakajima was not so lucky; Chuuya felt his heart lurch at the scream of agony he let out and didn't dare turn around to look, not when all he could stare at was the thin silhouette of Akutagawa emerging from the shadows.

"Move around and I'll cut the other one, were-tiger," Akutagawa rasped out.

The woman had moved as soon as she had felt Chuuya's hands leave her. She managed to get herself up, somehow, limping toward Akutagawa and picking up the gun Chuuya had dropped on the way. She aimed it at him as soon as she was by Akutagawa's side.

"Senpai—"

"Shut up," Akutagawa cut in. "I thought you could handle this."

She hesitated, sweating bullets from the pain of standing but still keeping her composure somehow. "I could, but that man…"

For the first time in years, Akutagawa met Chuuya's eyes.

He could have thought himself back at the black tower, in one of the training rooms, looking from the side as Dazai disciplined his student. Akutagawa had changed without changing; the white streaks in his hair had not regained color, he was still thin as a skeleton, he still dressed like someone come from a past century. He was taller, though. His steps quiet enough not to be heard even by Chuuya. The black coat Dazai had once given him didn't hang limply from his shoulders anymore.

Chuuya realized how futile his own disguise was at the same time Akutagawa did. He could cut and dye his hair, he could dress as banally as possible, hide himself behind high collars and low hats all he wanted… there was nothing to be done about the recognition twisting Akutagawa's fine features into shock.

For the most fleeting of seconds, he almost wanted to say Hi.

The air moved once more. White light unfurled around them as if a sun had suddenly appeared in the alley, blinding the sky and blinding them, and this time Chuuya did turn around to look at Nakajima.

Except it wasn't Nakajima anymore.

He had heard all about the white tiger from Katai and Kunikida before. Shapeshifting wasn't an uncommon ability to have, and Chuuya had expected the creature to look like the ones he had seen in photographs during his life. The beast that emerged out of the pool of blood Nakajima had been lying in was none of that.

Twice as big as a normal tiger and at least thrice as powerful, it sat on the gored ground like a nightmare come alive. Saliva steamed out of its open mouth and light shone brightly off of its claws, each as long as a blade. The tiger's growl resonated through the very walls. Its golden eyes were fixed to Chuuya's left.

Before he could do anything, it had leaped at Akutagawa.

Rashoumon opened around Akutagawa like black wings to parry its attack, yet it could not seem to hurt it at all. Its black tendrils, which Chuuya had watched cut through rock and steel in the past, ricocheted off the beast's fur as if stopped by an invisible wall. Through the chaos of the fight he saw the blond woman open fire on the tiger—saw with his own eyes the bullets fall uselessly to the ground, their target unharmed.

Chuuya took his chance while she was reloading. Her attention was completely caught by the monstrous battle happening a few feet away; she made the mistake of taking her eyes off of her remaining opponent, allowing him to sweep her feet from under her once more and knock her out for good this time.

In the back of his mind, thoughts of Katai bleeding out without anyone to tend to him kept his heart athrill. Chuuya ran to his side and pressed the man's own hand over his bleeding belly—he could see two holes through it, closer to his flank than his center—and pushed gravity into doing its job. Only then did he turn back to the carnage that the other two were making.

The tiger's massive jaw had opened around Rashoumon's barrier. It pierced through it as if breaking simple glass, and in the ashen glow radiating from its form, Akutagawa's face seemed like a corpse's.

Chuuya planted his foot into the ground and pulled the beast down.

It fell with a roar, thrashing against the invisible bonds keeping it tied to earth; Chuuya had never had to struggle so to keep anything in his grip, be it man or army, and sweat slicked his temples under the woolen beanie. He fended off Rashoumon's next attacks more easily, focusing his energy on the coat Akutagawa wore until the man himself had no choice but to kneel down under its weight.

Only then did he let go of his breath. At least seventy percent of his strength had to be focused on the tiger alone, which left very little for the fine control required to keep Katai's wound pressurized and Rashoumon down. He could only hope that Akutagawa would not notice how thinly he was stretched as he approached him.

Though the tiger was still squirming and growling, its claws scratching the pavement as if tearing through mere paper, Akutagawa was not watching it anymore.

"Nakahara Chuuya," he murmured, staring at Chuuya with apprehension.

Chuuya stopped a few feet away from him. "I half-expected to see you here, to be honest."

Akutagawa bristled, Rashoumon fluttering in vain over his back and shoulders.

Chuuya ignored the painful tightness in his chest. He looked at Nakajima's struggling form for a moment and wondered how to proceed.

He wouldn't be able to hold on for much longer. Whatever Nakajima's true form was, it was no simple animal. Chuuya felt as though his strength were being siphoned out of him, each second leaving him more brittle, his hands threatening to shake. He wouldn't be able to apprehend Akutagawa by himself, not if he had to maintain control on Nakajima and Katai at the same time.

"Fuck," he said between his teeth.

He glanced at Akutagawa again. The other was still looking at him, face impenetrable.

Then, to Chuuya's surprise, he asked: "Are you going to kill me now?"

Chuuya found himself entirely wordless.

Akutagawa had never been one to fool around. His bluntness and single-minded attitude had been his downfall the entire time Dazai had trained him; Chuuya had too many memories to count of trying to talk sense into his then-kouhai, only for his words to fall on deaf ears. There was only ever one person who could get Akutagawa to listen, and even he had struggled to.

Akutagawa didn't back down. He didn't surrender. He never asked such questions, no matter how battered he was.

"Why would I kill you?" Chuuya replied warily.

The look he was given was even more confusing; Akutagawa seemed more astonished by his words than his very presence.

"I thought—"

The sound of a siren reached them, growing stronger by the second and cutting Akutagawa short. His face paled even further. Chuuya felt him start to resist gravity's hold.

He let go of it.

Part of him expected Akutagawa to attack him on the spot. The man wasn't exactly the type to pull his punches, no matter how many times it had landed him in trouble. But Akutagawa only rose to his feet and brushed the dirt from his sleeves and legs, still looking like a man headed to the gallows.

Nakajima chose this moment to revert back to his human shape. White light once more enveloped the narrow street, blinding Chuuya to all but its source. When it was gone, the boy lay on the ground, unconscious but unscathed.

"Take the girl and go," Chuuya said, releasing his grip on Nakajima's body. He almost reeled back with relief. "Unless you want to try and fight me with the military police on its way."

Akutagawa was at least smart enough not to tempt the devil. Rashoumon's tendrils picked up his subordinate with less care than they probably should, and he stepped away from Chuuya without showing his back to him.

The realization made Chuuya ache in a new way. This pain was distant and fogged, like something half-forgotten which he ought to have prepared for.

"You won't escape alive," Akutagawa said, almost a whisper. His asthma must not have improved over the years, for he coughed afterward, a frightening gargle rising from his throat. He wiped spit from his lips and added, "Not now that we know where you are."

"I'm not that easy to kill," Chuuya retorted.

"Dazai-san—"

"I don't want to hear it."

He felt exhausted. The ambulance must be very close now, and its siren rang through Chuuya's head like the beginning of a migraine. He shot Akutagawa another glare, as dark and furious as he could make it when his heart still stung with nostalgia.

"Tell that shitty Dazai not to get in my way," he gritted out. "Or I'll grant his wishes and have him eat grass by the root."

His anger broke apart as the words left his lips.

In the second that followed, Chuuya felt the kind of exhaustion he hadn't known since that night of blood and grief. He wanted to say something without knowing what to say; he watched Akutagawa hesitate, caught in that same fragile reluctance to part, his thin lips open on air.

He said nothing. The unconscious woman held up by Rashoumon floated away from them both, and Akutagawa followed her, his grey eyes leaving Chuuya's at last.

Now he was alone, Nakajima's soft breathing in his ears and in his mind the awareness of Katai's still-moving chest, caught under the pressure keeping him alive. For now.

There wouldn't be anyone waiting for him at the apartment. No tea to warm his hands and hollow heart, no voice to quiet the horror and fear in a child leaving his home behind.

Akutagawa didn't linger in the hospital wing of headquarters after leaving Higuchi there. She had remained unconscious through the journey home, though the resident nurse had assured him that outside of a twisted knee and sprained wrist, there was nothing to worry about. The bump on her head wasn't dangerous at all—the blow there had been delivered, he knew, with great precision.

He made his way through the long corridors without speaking to anyone. At noon the activities in headquarters weren't so intense, at least, lessening the risk of someone stopping him on his way. Night was the port mafia's time, the moon-silver hours the ones which they tainted with their presence.

You may yet claim responsibility for Kouyou's death.

Why would I kill you?

It made no sense at all.

Akutagawa knew fear very well. He had grown nurtured and shaped by it through all of his formative years; fear for himself, fear for Gin, fear of the world and what it could do to them. His fear had been honed into a weapon in the hands of his mentor, to the point of leaving him estranged from his body each time they met.

Yet he hadn't known the kind of fear he discovered upon recognizing Nakahara Chuuya in that alleyway earlier.

The man had seemed a ghost himself, utterly unrecognizable if not for his eyes and voice. Akutagawa had not forgot that voice talking to him eons ago, soothing aches he hadn't noticed with its mere presence. He could never forget the times he had met Nakahara Chuuya as a superior, as a mentor figure of his own, someone he ached to reach for as he failed and failed and failed to win Dazai's approval.

Dazai had told him that Chuuya would kill him; Dazai had said that his poorly-played part in the Mimic conflict four years ago had been one of the causes for Ozaki's untimely demise, one of the reasons for Nakahara's defection and vow of vengeance.

When he had seen him earlier—when he had met his cold eyes in the dark of the city—Akutagawa had felt death stare him in the face. He had felt the need to fall to his knees and beg; he had felt remorse like a bite at the throat, so much more frightening than the man-tiger's sharp fangs breaking Rashoumon apart.

After this kind of fear, walking to his superior's office with the news of his failure was nothing at all.

"Enter," came Dazai's bored voice when he knocked on the door.

"Akutagawa-kun!" He was greeted thus, Dazai's obviously fake enthusiasm failing for once to make him shudder. "I've been waiting all morning for you. How went the hunt? I expect great things from you, you know."

"Higuchi and I failed to retrieve the shapeshifter," Akutagawa replied bluntly.

There was no point in beating around the bush. Dazai would punish him more for excuses than he would for honesty.

Dazai sighed dramatically, letting his chin hit his desk in a mockery of disappointment. His eyes slid away from Akutagawa and toward the man who was always by his side. "Why do I always get my hopes up, Odasaku?" he asked plaintively.

"You like to see the best in others," Oda replied.

"That is hilarious. Truly, truly hilarious."

Akutagawa watched the theatrics unfold wordlessly. His fear of Dazai felt for once detached from him, as though dimmed by the absolute terror he had experienced in front of Nakahara earlier. He didn't twitch even as Dazai rose from his chair and made his way around the desk, his eyes dull with distaste.

"I thought my orders were so simple," he bemoaned, and Akutagawa tensed only when Dazai was but a foot away, staring down at him. "I said 'get the tiger boy back alive and as unharmed as possible', didn't I?"

"You did," Akutagawa replied between his teeth.

Dazai shook his head. He was so close that Akutagawa felt the air move against his face. "So tell me, how do the port mafia's most destructive ability user and his trigger-happy subordinate fail to recover a teenager with no training or control whatsoever? I'm sure this is gonna be a fascinating story."

Akutagawa could have told him of the tiger's monstrous strength, of its claws tearing stone apart like mud or its immense, gaping jaw. He could've told him that not even Rashoumon's control of matter had resisted its assault—something that was bound to impress even Dazai, considering his involvement in shaping that defense technique to perfection.

He said, "I found Nakahara Chuuya."

Dazai didn't still, per se. He didn't gasp or widen his eyes or sneer at the name like he had so many times before. Instead Oda was the one whose movements stopped altogether, his bright blue eyes open to the light of late-winter.

Dazai hummed, considering, and the thumb of his right hand started rubbing its neighboring index rhythmically. Back and forth, back and forth, as if massaging pain away.

"Well," he said in the silence. "This is getting interesting."

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#bsd #bungou stray dogs #nakahara chuuya #dazai osamu #soukoku #fic: nothing noble

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