#9. SKY.. very pale blue and white... perfect.. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

racingliners · 10 months

Text

Life In The Fast Lane Chapter 10 - 2023 Race 6: Monaco

Rating: Teen & Up

Warnings: None apply

Pairings: Original Female Character(s)/Original Male Character(s); OFCs & OMCs

Work Tags: Re-write of a previous work; Mentions of IRL current and past F1 figures; Eventual romance; friends to lovers; found family/work family; actual family; racing drivers and their various shenanigans; how to handle pressure (and how not to); with a sprinkling of the power of friendship; tags will be updated as work progresses

Chapter 10/57

Word count: 7.2k

Summary: When times get hard, you need a shoulder or two to lean on

Sunday 28th May – Monaco

Sophie felt warm sunshine all over her face the second she opened the curtains in her hotel room, and took in a deep breath as she could just about pick out fragments of the track peeking through the yachts that were packed in the marina.

She was grateful at least that when she looked up at the sky and saw an almost perfect shade of blue barely scattered with small white clouds, she hadn’t been greeted with a thunderstorm instead. That really would have put her on a downward spiral.

Instead Sophie slowly exhaled, and went to the bathroom to brush her teeth and hair. Even with the race set to start at 3pm, Sophie had to be at the track by half past 9 for the final pre-race strategy meeting, and everything else that seemingly made up race day in Formula 1. She had always known that being an F1 driver meant being constantly busy, but there were moments when Sophie had felt like she’d landed on a treadmill set at full speed that had no intention of slowing down.

There was a firm and solid knock at the door which dragged Sophie out of the bathroom. She padded across the soft pale grey carpet and left the chain on the door as she prized it open, only to smile when she saw who was on the other side.

“Oh, hey Mum. One sec” Sophie quickly closed the door so she could undo the gold safety chain and opened the door wide enough to let Mary in. “I thought we were all meeting each other in the restaurant?” Every morning without fail over the race week thus far, Sophie had always met her Mum and Vanessa at the hotel restaurant for breakfast (Richard had occasionally stopped by either before or after eating with his PR and Comms department colleagues).

Mary sighed as Sophie closed the door, and put her hands on her daughter’s shoulders the second she was able to.

“How are you doing sweetheart?” She asked with a slight tilt of the head and wide, kind eyes. It was more than enough to stop the pre-rehearsed answer Sophie had been using with the paddock journalists for most of the weekend.

“I…” She took in a small breath and very quickly exhaled. “…don’t know”

Mary let out a soft hum as she moved one hand from Sophie’s shoulder to brush a thumb back and forth across her daughter’s cheek.

“Do you need me to do your hair?”

“I’ve managed fine so far this year Mum” Sophie said with a small huff, which Mary frowned at.

“I just thought it would be one less thing for you to worry about” Mary said softly, which broke the last of Sophie’s resolve.

“Fine…” Sophie marched into the bathroom to grab her hairbrush and hair bobbles and flopped down on the small beige two-sweater sofa that was in the living room section of her small suite, and once again found her face being bathed in warm sunshine as she positioned herself to be looking out of the large glass sliding doors.

Sophie fiddled with the soft hem of her pyjama top as Mary gently combed her fingers through her dark hair, and even briefly closed her eyes as her Mum started the process of twisting her hair into the French braid she’d always worn during a race weekend ever since she was 8 years old. Then she opened her eyes somewhat abruptly.

“What’s the weather forecast for today?” Sophie asked quickly, not turning her head as she squinted up at the sky.

“Completely dry” Mary said reassuringly.

“No, I mean the temperature” It wasn’t even half past seven, and yet Sophie was sure that the light on her face felt warmer than it should have for the time of day.

“Oh” Mary paused to briefly rest her arms. “I’ll check as soon as I’m done love” Sophie just hummed, and tried her best to focus on her hair being twisted into place, and not how unpleasant the sun had started to feel on her face.

The sunshine hadn’t faltered in the slightest by the time the drivers walked out for the drivers parade at a few minutes to one. As had very quickly become the norm, Sophie walked out alongside Nico and the pair climbed onto the back of the flatbed truck together and found a spot half-way down. They both gave a small wave to the crowd before resuming their conversation, only for Nathan Watkins and Cristóbal Vasquez to appear somewhat out of the blue.

“Hey guys” Nathan smiled brightly at his fellow drivers, clapping them both on the shoulder. “Good luck today”

“Thanks, same to you” Sophie smiled. “Oh, and congrats on getting engaged Cris” Sophie slightly leaned back to look at the Alpine driver, who’s face split into a wide grin. He had proposed to his long-term girlfriend Laura on Friday, and judging by the Instagram pictures of the two of them on an empty stretch of sand, the whole thing had been quite romantic.

“Thank you” He too gave a small wave to the crowd as the truck slowly pulled away to begin the parade. “How’s your Mum enjoying her first trip to Monte Carlo?”

“Your Mom’s never been here before?!” Nathan exclaimed, unintentionally cutting Sophie off.

“Well, she always ended up being busy with work so…”

“She works at Edinburgh Airport, right?” Cristóbal asked genuinely. And for a very brief moment, Sophie was surprised by the fact she was having a perfectly normal conversation with the 12 time race winner, only for her to remember that it wasn’t the first time the two drivers had spoken. Vasquez had been one of the few that wasn’t bothered by Sophie’s presence on the grid, and even before China, more than a few drivers had warmed to Sophie being around rather quickly. At least to her face, as evidenced by the fact that nothing close to the driver’s briefing incident from Melbourne had happened since.

“Sorry to interrupt your conversation” Lee Howard appeared from Sophie’s left with a cameraman lurking behind him, and the small echo that rang around the circuit told the quartet of drivers that his microphone was live. No one could remember when interviews on the driver’s parade had become the norm, but they certainly weren’t going away any time soon. “I’ll start with you Nico, since it’s almost your home race if you squint, you must be looking forward to today”

“Ah, it feels quite nice actually, my second time here as an F1 driver” Nico smiled as he adjusted his navy and white Alpha Tauri cap. “I think there’s more French flags than there was last year so…” Almost right on cue he spotted a trio of fans on a balcony, all wielding French flags, and Nico beamed as he waved at them. “We’re not quite as fast as these guys,” He paused to gesture to Sophie, Nathan and Cris with a wry smile. “But anything can happen around here so hopefully we’ll have a good race” Nico finished with a small nod, as Lee and the cameraman turned to Sophie.

“Now Sophie, your first Monaco Grand Prix as an F1 driver, you must be very excited”

“Yeah it’s uh…” She deliberately paused to take in a small breath and plaster on a bright smile. “It’s such an honour to drive around a track with so much history, it does feel a bit strange finally being here in a way,” Maybe that was why Sophie hadn’t quite managed to shed her pre-race anxiety all weekend. That after so many years of hoping to get to F1, she didn’t quite know what to do with herself now she was here. “Pace wise we’re not quite where we want to be but hopefully if we keep our heads down we can get some decent points”

Poor Cris put on a brave face when asked how he felt about having to start from the back thanks to an engine penalty, and Nathan grinned at the prospect of going for the race win even though he was starting from third.

“You know it’s been a long time since I’ve won around here so…” While Nathan’s smile was bright, Sophie could see that his eyes were filled with the steely cold determination she saw in so many of her colleagues. Nothing was going to get in-between him and his first win at Monaco since 2017 it seemed. “Hopefully things will fall our way today”

“Well thanks to all four of you, and the very best of luck for today” Lee gave the group of drivers a warm smile before he wondered off to the far end of the flatbed truck, likely to seek out polesitter Marc Pavard. The truck ever so slightly juddered as it began the descent to the Lowes hairpin, and Sophie took a step towards Nico as he wrapped a hand tightly around the nearest stretch of metal railing.

A brief moment of silence fell over the four drivers as they waved to any fans that they saw, and they all took in a small breath as the large truck somehow managed to round the hairpin with ease.

“You know,” Nico spoke quietly as he leaned down to talk to Sophie. “You can give me as much room round here as you want on the first lap”

“Oh no,” A small smile made its way onto Sophie’s face before she chuckled and playfully elbowed her friend in the ribs. “You will not be getting past me that easily”

“I’ll be proud of you whatever happens today sweetheart, try and enjoy it okay?” Sophie closed her eyes and threw her head back at the warm words from her Dad. No matter how hard her phone was pressed against her ear, it wasn’t going to come close to the reassuring hug she desperately wanted.

“I’ll try” Sophie eventually replied, trying her best to sound optimistic. “How’s Will? Is he starting to feel any better?” As well as being unable to fly out to Monaco because of the workload at the garage, Mark had also found himself on nurse duty when Will had come down with a nasty fever on Friday night.

“Ah he’s on the mend. And keeping the throat lozenge industry afloat”

Sophie let out a soft chuckle in reply. “Tell him I say hi”

“I will love, but you worry about yourself okay?” If anything Sophie was worrying about herself a little too much.

“I love you Dad”

“You too, good luck. I’ll be cheering you on from the sofa. And give my love to Julian”

“I will!” After a quick exchange of goodbyes, Sophie ended the call and crossed her driver room in two paces to put her phone in her backpack. She’d already replied to her manager’s good luck text before calling home, so all that was left to do was to finish getting ready. Already in her fireproofs, Sophie pulled on her race suit with various firm tugs and pulled the zip up all the way to the base of her neck, before she remembered how warm it was outside and quickly undid the zip so the top of her suit hung from her hips.

“You ready yet Soph?” Vanessa called from the other side of the door, and for a few seconds Sophie had completely forgotten her trainer was there. She hurriedly opened the door, and Vanessa looked at her driver for all of two seconds before placing both hands on her shoulders. “Breathe” She said firmly.

“It’s like I’m just…” Sophie paused to bite down on her lip before letting out a small groan. “Waiting for something to go wrong”

“Well that’s your anxiety talking and it’s an idiot” Vanessa scoffed, and pulled Sophie into a tight hug. “Just count the corners, okay?”

“Well, they mainly have names here actually” Sophie frowned, reluctantly stepping out of the hug.

Vanessa affectionately rolled her eyes as she put her hands on her hips. “Whatever works best, I just want you to do it okay”

“Okay” Sophie sighed, and fixed her sunglasses over her eyes, deciding it was time to head for the garage. Richard accompanied both of them on the way, since the distance between the motorhome and garage was much longer than normal.

The sun was now properly beating down on the principality, and by the time Sophie had finally reached the garage she had a few beads of sweat on the back of her neck. And because the temporary garages in Monaco were so small, there wasn’t any room for the air-con units the teams usually brought with them. By the looks of things the mechanics were feeling the heat too.

Sophie quickly looked over to James’ side of garage and saw that he hadn’t arrived yet (he hadn’t spoken to her that much over the course of the weekend, which Sophie had found odd but she tried to think nothing of it) so instead she turned her attention to Mary and Julian who had already made their way over to the garage.

“Good luck today” Julian smiled, and pulled his cousin into a tighter than expected hug. He’d finished in fifth in the F2 feature race that morning, a very respectable outing for a rookie. Sophie happily returned the hug and had barely stepped away before Mary swaddled her daughter tightly in her arms. Sophie wasn’t sure if it was down to that it was the first race of the season her Mum had been to, or because of just how easy it was for a driver to crash around the Monaco circuit.

“I love you so much sweetheart” Mary whispered into Sophie’s hair and kissed the top of her head before finally letting go.

“I love you too” She smiled the first genuine smile she had mustered since the drivers parade as her engineer Chris emerged from the upstairs pit wall, pen and notebook in hand.

“Ready to go?”

“Almost” Sophie replied as she zipped up her race suit. The pair quickly exchanged a brief nod as Chris adjusted his new dark tortoiseshell glasses before going over to talk to Steve at the front of the garage.

Sophie gave her head a small shake, closed her eyes and took in a small breath, and after opening her eyes she fitted her in-ears and pulled on her balaclava. Vanessa was on hand with Sophie’s helmet and HANS device, which Sophie put on in one swift movement. She gave her chin strap a sharp tug, and after giving Mary and Julian’s hands a firm squeeze, she climbed into the car and put on her gloves.

Tommy strapped her in, and even gave Sophie a small thumbs up before moving out of the way so Sophie could plug in her radio cable.

“And radio check 1-2” Chris, still stood next to Steve, spoke into his orange headset.

“Copy, I can hear you” Steve and Chris slightly raised their eyebrows at Sophie’s reply, but didn’t do or say anything more than that.

“Given how warm it is we want to take an extra few minutes to check the car over, sit tight, and I’ll see you on the grid” Chris gave Sophie a thumbs up as he made his way back towards the rear of the garage, likely to oversee all the pre-race checks from the pitwall upstairs.

Sophie took in a deep breath as her mechanics buzzed round her car, all talking to each other through their own headsets that were on a separate radio channel. As she shifted her gaze from Aditya to Luke to Tommy to Steve, she tried to read their body language as a gauge for how her car was. And none of them appeared remotely distressed or anxious. So that was a good thing.

It felt like an age, but Sophie had only been sat waiting for ten minutes before Steve gave the all clear for the car to go to the grid. The procedure was easily ingrained into Sophie’s memory by now – Steve gave the okay, the tyre blankets were taken off, the car lowered, and the tyre blankets laid back on top of the tyres as Steve backed into the pitlane, and gave Sophie the all clear to drive out.

While she knew that it was impossible for the barriers to have been moved overnight so the track had been narrowed, it still felt like they had as Sophie drove up Beau Rivage. And despite deliberately taking her outlap much easier than the previous five races, she found herself braking for Rascasse in the blink of an eye.

Sophie switched off the engine once she had passed through Anthony Noghes and let her mechanics roll the car onto her spot on the starting grid, and all she could think about was how hot it was as she flicked up her visor to let some air into her helmet. When she climbed out of the car and took off her helmet, her first thought of seeing all the people crammed onto the starting grid was that it felt less like the usual sardine tin, and more like a pressure cooker.

“You okay?” Chris walked over from his usual spot next to Steve, and over towards his driver. The sun glinting off his sandy blond hair. Vanessa was stood by the side of the car and watched, slightly concerned, as Sophie ripped off her gloves and helmet.

“Fuck, it’s so hot” Sophie pulled off her balaclava with a tug so sharp she accidentally pulled on a few strands of her hair, and she ever so slightly winced.

“Yeah, it’s about five degrees warmer than what was forecast” Chris explained, also looking at Sophie with a slightly concerned gaze. He and Vanessa let Sophie unzip the top of her race suit, in the hope it was all that she’d need to feel better. It only slightly helped.

“Deep breath” Vanessa instructed, and Sophie did as she was told. Breathing in and out for six seconds. Vanessa looked over at Chris, and give him a small nod before walking away to the side of the track with Sophie’s things.

“How did the car feel?” He asked, sliding one half of his headset back so he could listen to his driver. It was a good question, one that would have definite answer, and it cleared Sophie’s head somewhat.

“Good, same as yesterday,” Sophie paused to take another small breath. “No problems that I could tell”

“Great” Chris smiled and put a hand on his driver’s shoulder. “I will get you through this, okay?”

He had pulled Sophie aside after the team’s post-qualifying debrief the day before, saying that as long as her nerves were to do with the track and not the car or herself, it was normal to be a little bit nervous going into your first Monaco Grand Prix. 2023 was only Chris’ second season of being a senior race engineer, and while today would be his and Sophie’s sixth race working together, they already had a sturdier than solid working relationship. “I’ve got your back”

Sophie just nodded, while she had no idea just where the strange headspace she had found herself in had come from, she did know that she trusted him completely.

“Team Black Knight, right?” Chris held out a clenched fist with a small smile.

“What?” Sophie let out a light laugh as she bumped fists with her engineer.

“Chris Black, Sophie Knightsbridge… I hope you don’t mind me shortening your name”

“When did you come up with that?”

“Doesn’t matter, it made you laugh” Chris looked at Sophie with a somewhat triumphant smile as he led her a few paces away from the car to go over the strategy for the race. “So, it’s probably still going to be a one stop even if it’s warmer than we expected. Though the hypers might deg a bit faster, if that’s the case we might switch to the supers instead of the ultras. What do you think?” Chris’ calm, North London accented voice was almost like a cool breeze in the warm air. Trees lined the left side of the start-finish straight, and where Chris and Sophie had found themselves was under a very decently sized shaded spot.

“That sounds like a good plan” Sophie nodded, already starting to feel the knots in her shoulders ease. “I’ll see how everything feels after the start”

“And you will make it through Saint Devote in one piece” Chris said with a reassuring smile.

“If you say so” Sophie and Chris clapped each other on the shoulder as Vanessa led Sophie back towards the garage for a comfort break, after she’d very quickly told Steve that yes, her car was absolutely fine.

“Well, here we are, the jewel in the crown of the F1 calendar! Round 6 of the FIA Formula One world championship brings us to Monaco,” Jack beamed from his seat on the furthest right in the thankfully air conditioned commentary booth. “78 laps of the famous Monaco circuit, 19 corners, some of them the most famous in the world, and 20 drivers vying to add one third of motorsport’s triple crown to their CV”

Amy and Simon tried their best to restrain from chuckling at just how their colleague had embellished his opening segment. While Monaco was certainly the most glamourous track on the calendar, the races themselves never quite had the reputation for being the most entertaining.

“And it’s certainly a beautiful day for it, even though the temperature seems to have caught everyone in the paddock by surprise. It’s a pretty scorching 31 Celsius today”

“Well, I think this weather is normal for the French riviera, but you are from Scotland Amy so we’ll let you off” Simon affectionately teased, nudging her with his elbow.

“But, most importantly, will the high track temperatures throw a spanner in the strategists works? Monaco is almost always a one-stop in the dry, and we have the hyper soft, ultra soft and super soft tyres available today, with the vast majority of the grid choosing to start on the pink walled hyper soft tyre”

“And speaking of the grid, here’s how our drivers line up today. Marc Pavard of Mercedes becomes the second ever Monegasque driver to start on pole for his home Grand Prix, Benedikt Schmitz for Red Bull lines up beside him in second, can he get his second win in Monaco today?” Nathan Watkins, Alistair Mitchell, Giovanni Carotti and Audi’s Erik Braun filled the spots from third to sixth. “…And then we have the first of the two McLarens. Sophie Knightsbridge becomes, as she has done at almost every race so far this season, the first woman to contest the Monaco Grand Prix, she lines up in seventh alongside Ferrari’s Teo Martinez. 2018 Monaco winner James Hewitt is in ninth, while Frenchman Nico Dumont rounds out the top ten”

Jack just about managed to get through the second half of the grid without taking a breath, and Amy and Simon took over while Jack took a much needed drink of water.

“Now, we do have a slightly out of sync grid order today, as we can often have in Monaco. Which means some teams like Audi, you could also argue McLaren given their… somewhat rough start to the year, could get a very nice haul of points for the constructors championship today”

“Absolutely,” Amy chimed in, as the global TV feed cut from Schmitz’s Red Bull to Pavard’s Mercedes. “But, as we say many a year, it is so crucial around Monaco to simply get to the finish line. The drivers around you could have reliability problems or even crash out. And that’s why this race is one of the most challenging of the entire season, if your concentration goes for even a second – you’re out of the race”

Steve gave a nod to the rest of the boys a few seconds before the three minute signal blared across the track, and Sophie’s car was lowered down off the jacks while Tommy, Luke, Jamie and Aditya lay the tyre blankets on top of the pale pink side-walled hypersoft tyres. Not that it felt like the tyres needed their heated blankets given just how harshly the sun was beating down on everyone.

Vanessa was stood as always with a McLaren golf umbrella over the cockpit and holding a small fan in her driver’s direction, as Chris gave his watch a final check and briskly walked over towards his driver. He likely didn’t say must past good luck as he squeezed Sophie’s hand before sprinting over to the small gate in the fence that provided the only access to the circuit from the garages.

The mad dash through it while the drivers made their way round the formation lap always seemed to get worse every year.

As the seconds counted down, Steve gave the second signal for everyone to clear out and ensure that Sophie’s car was in exactly the right place in its grid slot. As number one mechanic, ensuring that they didn’t get a penalty for any kind of pre-race infringement was a big part of his job. While Vanessa and the boys pressed themselves against the fence, Steve crouched down and just about met Sophie’s eyes before she flicked down her dark tinted visor. He gave his driver a small thumbs up, a bright smile, and gently patted the tip of the nose on the number 16 McLaren, before joining his colleagues.

He allowed himself two seconds as he watched Sophie ease her car away on the formation lap to say a small prayer to whatever deity looked after racing drivers (if there even was one) that Sophie would get through her first Monaco Grand Prix in one piece. Then he turned round, took in a deep breath of awfully hot air and waited for Vasquez’s Alpine to drive past before he and everyone else sprinted to the small gate in the fence, and hoped he would make it back to the garage for the start.

One red light. Two red lights. Three. Four. Five.

Deep breath. Hold the clutch, right foot just hovering over the accelerator pedal and no more.

Just get through turn one. Please just let me get through turn one.

Lights out.

Go.

Given that the run to Saint Devote was so short, Sophie reached her braking point before 8th gear, and quickly flicked back down through the gears as she kept a very close eye on the cars around her. She hoped she didn’t have to worry about James out braking himself behind her.

She just about managed to clip the apex before accelerating up Beau Rivage. The charcoal and red Audi was metres in front of her, and she could just about see Ferrari red and papaya orange in her wing mirrors as she turned left for Massenet, and veered right for Casino. The screen on her wheel still said P7 somewhere. That was good.

Sophie checked off each corner as she went through the first lap. Mirabeau, full 180 lock for the hairpin, sharp right at Portier, into the dark tunnel, flick through the Nouvelle chicane, almost 90 right for Tabac, more flicking the car through Piscine, then Rascasse, Anthony Noghes, and accelerate past the black and neon pit boards that Sophie could hardly read as she sped down the main straight to start lap 2.

“Great first lap Sophie” Chris said over the radio as Sophie sped out of Saint Devote for the second time. “Keep your head down you’ve a long way to go, pace is good so far. Told you you’d make it though in one piece” He very quickly added before Sophie broke for Massenet.

“Yeah, I’ll try to listen to you more often” Chris didn’t give a reply over the radio, but Sophie assumed he allowed himself one small chuckle before turning his attention back to the data screens on the pitwall. Sophie let out a long exhale as she broke for Portier, and pressed back down on the radio button as she entered the tunnel. “Let’s go get some points”

James didn’t have the privilege of seeing Carotti’s supposed mare of a pit stop when he pitted on lap 19. Damn the exceptionally hot weather for not making his tyres last long enough. His almost melted hyper softs were switched out for the red-walled super softs, and James was away after just over two seconds. There was a chance he would have to stop again given the track temperatures, his engineer Paul had told him on lap 5, but James would let himself worry about that after he’d exited the pits without getting a penalty.

He came out in seventh, and his position didn’t change when Sophie pitted a lap later, as she clearly pulled a brilliantly fast in lap out of nowhere. They were barely half a second apart when Sophie re-joined the track.

“Okay so we have Carotti 3.2 behind. It looks like he has some sort of DRS issue, so watch him in the corners” James and Gio had both started F1 in the same season, so they knew each other as drivers better than most, despite the fact they had never been team mates. Which was why James, and Paul, knew that if Giovanni couldn’t make a pass on the main straight using DRS, he would do everything in his power to overtake him in a corner instead. And it would likely be at the hairpin or Rascasse – they were his two preferred spots.

James confirmed he got the radio message, and hoped that Gio’s DRS problem was so bad that he wouldn’t get anywhere near him to begin with.

“Safety car! Safety car. Box, box” Sophie had just entered the tunnel when the call came over the radio on lap 64. “It’s going to be very busy in the pitlane so be careful. The incident is at turn one so watch for debris on exit. Lima and Jakobsson are both okay”

“Am I pitting for ultras?” Sophie asked, watching the delta time on her steering wheel.

“Affirm, ultrasoft tyres”

“Is everyone else pitting?”

“Yes, everyone has reported high deg due to the higher than expected track temperatures”

“Copy” Chris’ steady voice had almost been her North Star during the race up until that point. Reminding her to drink, updating her with the gaps to the cars in front and behind (not that James had really been a problem during the race, the gap between them had barely fluctuated past 2.6 seconds for the past twenty laps).

Sophie just about managed to avoid one of the Red Bull’s exiting their pitbox as Sophie swerved into hers. As Chris had told her, every team had taken advantage of the safety car to pit their drivers with fresh tyres that would definitely last until the end. She re-joined the track still in sixth, the sidewalls of her tyres now a bright purple instead of red, and glanced over at an Alpine that had half its front suspension hanging off, and an Alpha Tauri that was sat at the end of a tangle of skid marks, and had a gaping hole in the right sidepod.

The Safety Car period lasted for seven laps while the marshals cleared both the wrecked cars and any remaining debris. Braun was still ahead of Sophie in fifth, and she knew that the restart was the best opportunity she had to get past him, despite the fact he had been surprisingly fast during the race.

And there was the chance that James would try to get past her, but Martin had all but read them the riot act in the pre-race briefing, saying that unless one of them had a mechanical issue they were not allowed to race each other on this occasion – given just how narrow the circuit was.

So Sophie focused entirely on the Audi in front of her, that she managed to stay with at the restart and even through the entirety of the first sector. He’d pulled a gap of around two tenths by the time they got to Portier on what was now lap 72, and Sophie decided that breaking late into the Nouvelle chicane was her best chance at both overtaking him and making it stick.

The golden tinged lights that illuminated the darked tunnel passed by in one long streak as Sophie lined up her car for the pass, and barely half a second after she exited the tunnel and drove back out into bright daylight she just about managed to spot her braking point as her eyes adjusted to the light and pressed her food hard on the brake pedal.

But the car didn’t stop.

She tried again, sifting down through the gears as she sped downhill, and the car still didn’t stop.

Sophie kept her steering wheel straight, knowing the safest option for her and Braun was to go straight across the chicane, and just as she reached it at the third time of trying the car finally slowed with a foul smelling plume of dark smoke.

“Argh! Brakes failed!” She skidded over the chicane, and watched Braun’s Audi, and then James disappear round Tabac as she yelled into her radio to anyone who would listen.

“Rear brake failure” There was a nervous edge to Chris’ normally cool and steady voice. “Can you bring the car back to the pits safely?” Sophie jabbed her thumb down on the pit limiter button and finally exhaled knowing that at least she wouldn’t be able to go above 60kph.

“I think so” Sophie was already driving her car off the racing line, as well as lifting and coasting through the remaining corners of the lap. It felt like it took an age to reach Rascasse, but she turned right into the pitlane, and just about managed to stop the car in the McLaren pitbox, even though she was well long of the painted yellow marks.

Steve looked at the car for all of two seconds before giving the engine off signal. And if it weren’t for all the adrenaline now coursing through her veins Sophie probably would have burst into tears.

She slowly hauled herself out of the cockpit, and was led a few paces away by someone. Sophie didn’t see who as they were behind her and all she could look at was the smoking brakes of her car. Whoever it was spun Sophie round and flicked up her visor before lifting the larger one on their own helmet and she found herself looking into Luke’s very wide and very dark green eyes.

“Are you okay?!” He shouted so Sophie could hear through the padding of her helmet. Though she didn’t know what to say. Eventually, she gave a small and cautious nod, and let herself be led into the garage. Sophie’s hands started working on automatic pilot as she peeled off her gloves, undid the chinstrap on her helmet and lifted it and the HANS device off. She didn’t have time to reach for her balaclava before she found herself in a rather suffocating hug.

“Oh my darling” Mary cradled the back of her daughter’s head with her hand, and for a moment Sophie wondered if she would ever let go.

“I love you” The words flew out of Sophie’s mouth before she realised she’d said them. But it was enough for Mary to lean back and give Sophie a hurried once over.

“I love you too” She planted a very firm kiss on Sophie’s forehead as Chris rushed into the garage from upstairs.

“Are you-”

“I’m fine” Sophie exhaled and pulled off her balaclava, Vanessa had taken Sophie’s helmet right before she got hugged. “I’m sorry, I let you down” The adrenaline was starting to wear off, as Sophie felt the beginnings of a large lump forming in her throat.

“Hey, you didn’t let anyone down” Chris sighed, and pulled his driver into a brief and much gentler hug. “If anyone has to apologise it’s Brembo. There was nothing in the data or telemetry that even implied we were close to a critical failure” He shook his head, and frowned as Steve deemed the car safe enough to wheel back into the garage. “It wasn’t your fault Soph, okay?”

“Okay” She nodded, and tried to swallow any potential tears away as Chris clapped Sophie on the shoulder and went to speak to Steve.

“We can wait for a little bit for you to go to the press pen if you need it” Richard, who had been watching from the back of the garage with Vanessa, Julian and Mary all race, said softly with a hand on his driver’s shoulder. Sophie just nodded again, as she wasn’t sure how long a sentence she would be able to string together, and she let herself be hugged by Julian and Vanessa instead.

Then, to her surprise, Tommy, Luke, Aditya, Jamie and Steve all came over with polite hugs and firm claps on the shoulder as well.

“Sorry Soph”

“You’ll get them next time”

“Don’t worry about it”

“We’re just glad you made it back in one piece”

“You’re sure you’re alright?” Steve dipped his head down so he was looking straight into Sophie’s eyes. His eyes were such a dark shade of brown that they almost looked black, and yet they were always so warm whenever he spoke to her.

“Yeah” Sophie puffed out a small exhale and nodded. “I’m okay now”

While the sun was still beating down, a soft breeze had started to blow in from the sea by the time Sophie was in the press pen giving her post-race interviews. She pretty much said the same thing over and over, that she was disappointed to have a mechanical failure with just six laps to go. And that no, the team hadn’t seen anything to suggest her rear brakes would fail.

“What’s morale in the team like? It’s your 60th anniversary year, and you only have one podium after six races, when this time last year McLaren had been on the podium at almost every single race” Sophie gulped when the microphone was pushed towards her by the reporter from the Dutch broadcaster.

“It’s uh…” Sophie adjusted her cap while the podium celebrations played on one of the large screens (the top 2 had finished where they started, while Mitchell and Watkins had swapped places at one of the pit stops) and she let out a long sigh. “We know that the car isn’t where we want it. But it doesn’t mean that we aren’t working extremely hard at every single race and back at the factory to move ourselves further up the grid”

“Fundamentally though, isn’t it down to the fact that the team have gotten it wrong when it came to designing the car?”

Sophie always knew from watching a many post-race interview (and being in plenty herself during her career) that journalists were never afraid to pin people down with harsh questions after a bad race. Yet it still left Sophie with a feeling of discomfort in her chest. She saw how hard everyone worked back at Woking. The long shifts away from their families cooped up in offices, staring at computer screens or spent in meetings. And yet all it had been good enough for today was sixth place.

“Well, I know Eoin is certainly much more capable of being Technical Director than I am” Sophie huffed out a nervous laugh, and she felt grateful that she had both Richard by her side, and dark sunglasses over her eyes. “We all know that we’re not meeting the… expected standard of race results for a team like McLaren. But we can either mope about it, or we can work hard to try and fix it. And everyone is working so, so hard to try and put ourselves closer to the front. Like every other team we’re always working on upgrades back at the factory or spending as much time as we can here trying to find the best set up that will get us the most points we can. And we just have to hope that eventually, all that hard work will pay off”

Richard tapped Sophie’s left shoulder blade, their silent signal that she had given a reporter more than enough material to work with. And thankfully, Dutch TV had been Sophie’s last press pen interview. As she left all the other drivers who were lucky enough to finish the race started drifting in with their press officers. Including James, who had inherited Sophie’s sixth place after her retirement.

The two team mates tightly clasped the other’s hand and clapped each other on the shoulder. James waited a second or two longer than normal before he let go.

“Good to see you in one piece” He huffed. While he had let go of Sophie’s hand, he still had a gentle grip of her shoulder. Even through her Nomex fireproofs Sophie could still feel the warmth radiating from his skin. “Are you okay? Coming out of the tunnel is the last place you want your brakes to go”

“Yeah… I’m fine now. I got a nasty fright but…” Sophie trailed off and shrugged her shoulders. “There’s always next year, hopefully” The contract that she had signed back in December had only been for one year, though Sophie hoped that despite her result today, the McLaren board would remember who was responsible for the most recent addition to the team’s trophy cabinet.

“See you in the debrief” James gently squeezed Sophie’s shoulder before following Katie who led him over to the Mexican broadcaster, as Sophie and Richard made their way back to the team motorhome.

She had no idea what to say to her press officer other than sorry. Sorry for giving him more paperwork, sorry for not getting any points (she had at least been trying her best to remember what Chris had said to her about not letting anyone down).

“If I’m ever upset with something you say in an interview, you will very quickly know about it” Richard said as he pocketed his Dictaphone. “And I’m sure Eoin will appreciate you not wanting his job” Eoin, who had been Head of Aerodynamics for the past five years, had unexpectedly found himself promoted to Technical Director not long after testing, as his predecessor had accepted a job offer from Audi. He’d been much more present at race weekends after the flyaway races, in an attempt to try and figure out just how he was going to make the car faster, constantly in the garage at during every session. And he always spoke to James and Sophie, as well as their engineers, to get their opinions on how the car felt.

The message that the team were putting out, was that they were going to fix whatever problems they had together. Not as a bunch of people running around like headless chickens, but as a team.

Sophie just hoped that their efforts would pay off, no matter how long it took.

* * *

2023 Monaco Grand Prix Classification

1st - Marc Pavard (Mercedes) - 25pts 2nd - Benedikt Schmitz (Red Bull) - 18pts 3rd - Alistair Mitchell (Red Bull) - 15pts 4th - Nathan Watkins (Mercedes) - 12pts 5th - Erik Braun (Audi) - 10pts 6th - James Hewitt (McLaren) - 8pts 7th - Giovanni Carotti (Ferrari) - 6pts 8th - Nico Dumont (AlphaTauri) - 4pts 9th - Aaron Jones (Aston Martin) - 2pts 10th - Cristóbal Vasquez (Alpine) - 1pt 11th - Owen Nichols (Aston Martin) 12th - Tadashi Sato (Haas) 13th - Evan McKinley (Williams) 14th - Leon Bauer (Haas) 15th - Aidan Glover (Williams) 16th - Jan Martens (Audi) RET - Sophie Knightsbridge (McLaren) RET - Antonio Lima (AlphaTauri) RET - Daniel Jakobsson (Alpine) RET - Teo Martinez (Ferrari) Fastest Lap - Benedikt Schmitz (Red Bull) - 1pt

2023 Championship Standings after Round Six

Drivers Standings

1st - Benedikt Schmitz - 110pts 2nd - Giovanni Carotti - 78pts 3rd - Cristóbal Vasquez - 77pts 4th - Nathan Watkins - 68pts 5th - Alistair Mitchell - 57pts (8th - Sophie Knightsbridge - 32pts 9th - James Hewitt - 29pts)

Constructors Standings

1st - Red Bull Racing-Honda - 167pts 2nd - Ferrari - 126pts 3rd - Mercedes AMG - 113pts 4th - Alpine-Renault - 101pts 5th - McLaren-Mercedes - 61pts

#my writing #Life In The Fast Lane #LITFL Chapters

0 notes

animebaby00 · 3 years

Text

She Has Your Eyes (Present for @mochi_imochii)

Gon is upset when he discovers his and Killua's daughter Mahoro doesn't seem to have any of his genetics. Luckily, Killua is there to comfort him.

This is my first fic based off of an artwork/comic created by @mochi_imochii on Instagram.

I was so inspired to write something based off her content and I received full permission from her to write this fic in relation to one of her most recent posts with Gon, Killua, and they're love child she created for them named Mahoro Freecss. It's a cute little mini comic.

This work is entirely credited to her and I want to give a huge thank you to her for letting me do this so please go give her some love on Instagram. Her content and art is absolutely incredible!

(Gon and Killua are aged up in this fic)

~~~~~

Evening was upon them.

It wasn't hard to tell, especially after experiencing so many of them, and in so many different places. But deciphering the differences was easy once you've been in one place for a decent period of time.

The day was at its busiest, the sidewalks and streets packed mostly from people leaving work and heading home for the night to prepare for the next day, the sounds of voices and car engines or horns evident even from inside.

Buildings were lighting up, gray-black windows igniting in white and yellow from both nearby and far away. More rectangular on closer view, but dotted farther in the distance, resembling that of flickering fireflies.

But a common sign, one known to everyone, was a sunset.

When the ball of light was low in the sky, whose crisp blue begins to bleed with added shades of red and orange, accented by the powerful rays of yellow that could light up everything from the tallest building to the ground below in it's fading, warm light.

And currently, 2 individuals in particular had the perfect access to all of those things.

Gon and Killua were sitting comfortably on their sofa in their home in Padokea, quiet and content with the sun's warm rays beating into their living room behind them due to the open window lined with gray silken curtains. The both of them were set on taking it easy due to how busy they've been, for just a week ago, the two of them welcomed a new member into their family.

Mahoro Freecss. Their daughter.

The idea of having children became a very popular topic amongst Gon and Killua and they knew they wanted to be parents more than anything and decided to start looking over their options, but one stood out more than most.

Because of their time in Greed Island, the two of them knew of its existence, that of a card, but weren't aware of anyone who had used it as of late. It was a Pregnancy Stone, one that allowed someone of any sex to carry young if held onto for one month.

There were some questions and some what ifs, but the decision was quick and absolute. They went through with it, and 9 months later, Killua (after much discussion) delivered a healthy baby girl with Gon in utter tears directly by his side. She was a beautiful little thing with her pale skin, long lashes, and chubby cheeks, head completely covered with tufts of wavy white hair and an adorably cute, button nose. She couldn't have been any more perfect.

A few days later, they were allowed to go home, and they've been adjusting to life as new parents ever since, taking leisure time whenever they could when Mahoro was content and asleep, either nestled in her crib or in her parents arms.

That was the case now. In their settlement for the night, Gon had Mahoro in the crook of his right arm while his other fed the small infant a bottle of milk. Her eyes closed and content, a chubby hand up and grasped onto Gon's pinky as she ate. Killua was sitting next to him, working on sewing up a hole that had formed in one of Gon's jackets, hand supporting the green fabric while he sewed away with the other.

But even in the calm, tranquil silence with his husband and newborn daughter by his side, Gon's mind was racing with thoughts, especially about one thing in particular as he watched his daughter suckle away peacefully at the bottle in his hand.

"Ne, Killua? Do you know what eye color Mahoro has?"

The white haired male shook his head, hands moving diligently in a repeated pattern as he sewed.

"No, she hasn't opened her eyes yet."

"When will she?" Gon asked, putting Mahoro's bottle down.

Killua's focus on sewing Gon's jacket lessened a bit, eyes raising to look at him.

"Leorio told me that newborns open their eyes 1 to 2 weeks after they're born," he said, pushing the needle through the fabric once more, "Why do you ask?"

Gon's lips pressed into a thin line at Killua's inquiry, head tilting off slightly to the side.

"It's just…" he started, voice low and the tiniest bit unsure, "I've been asking myself...if Mahoro has anything from me…I mean she looks exactly like you so could it be that something went wrong when we used the card and maybe she only has your genes?"

At this, Killua paused at his sewing and looked over at his husband, "Huh?" he questioned, slightly confused.

Gon stroked Mahoro's little fist with his index finger, eyes closing as a sigh left his lips,"Don't get me wrong. I'll always love Mahoro, even if she only had your genes since she's my daughter too. I guess I'm just a bit...insecure if the card actually worked right…"

Killua blinked, and a small, sentimental smile crossed over onto lips at Gon's subconscious vent. He slowly put down the needle and jacket, scooter closer to the distressed male's side.

"Gon you baka," he said softly, "Nothing went wrong. Believe me, Mahoro has a lot of traits from you."

Killua watched as Gon's eyes opened a bit, golden orbs settled directly on him. With intention of comfort, Killua laid his head on Gon's shoulder, words still soft as they left his lips.

"Look, I don't look much like my mother or my siblings since I luckily got a lot of my genes from my dad, but I'm still their child right?"

Killua could feel Gon nod against him, and he caught the tiniest of smiles etching it's way back over his lips from out of the corner of his eye and Killua hummed a chuckle.

"Mahoro has your active soul, and your cute eyebrows, not to mention she has your-"

A teeny coo sounded from below and Killua stopped talking. He looked downwards, as did Gon, and they both let out a small gasp at what they saw.

Mahoro's face was scrunched, her lips pursed and eyelids fluttering before they completely opened to reveal a pair of shimmery, toasty golden irises. They were beautiful, wide, full of wonder and happiness, and they creased ever so slightly due to the teeny, gummy little smile that was growing onto her rosebud lips.

"Your eyes…" Killua breathed, and Gon choked back a sob as he lifted Mahoro further up his chest, his own eyes watering and lips trembling as he patted the infant's back.

"Wahhhh Killua she has my eyes ! I'm so happy !" He wobbled out, both crying and laughing as Mahoro let out a burp and snuggled closer into he father's shoulder.

Killua simply sat back to watch the ridiculously funny yet adorable scene unfold before him with a knowing, cat-like grin on his face.

"See?" He said, "I told you...baka."

#gon freecss #killua zoldyck #mahoro freecss #aged up characters #post mpreg #greed island #greed island card #pregnancy stone #family fluff #cute

28 notes · View notes

dontmindmyshadowhunting · 3 years

Text

Welcome to Faerieland (Fan Fic) - Chapter 9 - The house in the hollow hill

This is Chapter 9 of “Welcome to Faerieland”, a sequel to my Kitty Fan Fic "To never being parted" although it can be read as a standalone story.

AO3 Link to the full story here.

****

“Livvy? Livvy, is that you? I should have guessed I would be the first one to join you.”

The girl - the one he had met in the weapons room, the one from the drawing - shivered in his arms. Ash tightened his embrace, shielding her as best as he could from the chill and the wind as they soared through the night sky. He flapped his wings harder and winced. It felt as though a thousand needles were piercing through them, but he couldn’t slow his pace. He needed to get her to safety and tend to her wounds. She didn’t have much time, the demon poison was spreading through the long gash in her leg. Already, she was hallucinating.

“Livvy.” She sighed and smiled. Her eyes were half-open, but they were blank as stones. “I have so much to tell you.”

Ash could now see a familiar landscape stretching ahead of them, up to the white sea cliffs and the hollow hill in which the golden cage he called home stood. It was risky to bring her there. Save for the usual cleaning and kitchen staff sworn to secrecy, there had never been anyone but him, J, and very occasionally his mother in this house since they had moved in three years ago. But he needed the potion to draw out the poison in her system.

“I am… I am not Livvy,” he whispered back.

She blinked but her blue-green eyes remained unfocused, their pupils fully dilated. Her gaze set upon his wings.

“Are you an angel?”

Ash swallowed the lump in his throat.

“If I were, it would be the fallen kind,” he replied grimly.

Her eyelids were heavy now. She was mumbling something but it no longer made sense. Just as he thought she would pass out again, she jolted back to consciousness. She was suddenly staring into his eyes, a look of recognition flashing across her face.

“Clary?” She said, startling him, before she blacked out, her body once again limp in his arms.

****

When Dru came to, she registered dimly that she was no longer flying but half lying, half sitting on a mattress - much softer than what she was used to at the Academy or even at the Institutes - and propped up against plush cushions. There was a funny taste in her mouth and she idly remembered having been forced to swallow a liquid. She no longer felt cold, and she realized that a silk blanket had been pulled over her.

Was that what the afterlife was about? An everlasting sleep in a comfortable bed? What a letdown.

When she blinked her eyes open, she was greeted by a beautiful sight. Her faerie prince was staring at her with his grass-green eyes, a lock of his tousled fair hair falling across his outrageously handsome face. He brushed it away with an impatient gesture, tucking it behind one of his pointy ears, and she noticed that his refined velvety clothes had been replaced by a plain long-sleeved black shirt.

“You,” she breathed. She narrowed her eyes. “I knew it! I knew you were too hot to be real!”

“Er- What?” His lips parted. He looked utterly dumbfounded.

Dru’s hands shot up and she started pinching his sharp cheekbones.

“What- what are you doing?” He tried to articulate, but she made it somewhat difficult, as she was squeezing his face and kneading his cheeks.

She could not help it. She giggled.

“Look at you. You are so… perfect. This is ridiculous.”

One of his blond eyebrows raised.

“So that’s the part where we kiss and there are fireworks and romantic music playing in the background?” Dru pursued.

She grabbed him by the collar, drawing him closer and his breath hitched. When their lips were so close they were almost touching… he turned his head away in a swift motion. She was left staring at his jawline - again, she marvelled at its sharpness - and noticed a wide X-shaped scar on his neck that had been hidden by his collar when she had first dreamt of him.

“What is it? I am not your type?” She said jokingly. Maybe her fantasies involved a bit of resistance to make things more fun.

He slowly turned to face her again. There was no trace of humour in his expression. His gaze was intense and serious.

“Not my type? On the contrary. You are exactly my type. You defined it, actually.” The sharpness and bitterness of his tone startled her. She swallowed.

“Then... why won’t you kiss me?”

“Because I don’t kiss girls who are under the influence of alcohol, drugs or - in this instance - demon poison.”

He started standing, but she grabbed him by the arm and almost cried out at the sudden throb in her right leg. She blinked and noticed for the first time that she had a long gash across her limb. The bleeding had stopped but it still looked awful. Several Iratzes had been drawn on her skin, near the wound. She remembered the searing pain she had felt as the demon’s claw had ripped across her flesh… It all came back to her then. The battle. Ty. Kit. Jaime.

“We need to go back! My brother and friends are still out there on the battlefield!” She clapped a hand over her mouth. “Raziel, how long have I been out?”

The faerie lifted his hands hesitantly to rest them awkwardly on her shoulders. He stroked lightly in a reassuring gesture, as his green eyes bore into her.

“The battle is over. King Kieran’s knights and the Wild Hunt swooped in, right after you were injured, and saved the day.”

She exhaled a sigh of relief as she fell back on the soft cushions. She felt dizzy.

“They are all alright.” A dark veil seemed to have covered her eyes. “I can’t-” I can’t see.

“Shhh. Stop talking. Spare your strength. Get some rest.”

It was suddenly all dark. An unbidden image came to her... black wings smeared with blood flapping furiously against the cold wind...

“You carried me… Your wings… you are hurt,” she said, before she fell back into unconsciousness.

****

Dru woke to a soft breeze tickling her skin. She immediately sat up, wincing at the pain in her right leg, and took in her surroundings.

She was in a vast high-ceilinged bedroom, illuminated by a soft light that spoke of dawn. The windows were equally huge, framed by velvet curtains.

Bookshelves were covering almost every inch of wall, and though they were entirely filled with books, there did not seem to be enough space for all of them.

More books were stacked in piles, others scattered haphazardly across the floor.

A latest generation laptop was resting on a large mahogany desk in the corner, as well as several tablets - what was the point of having so many? Dru wondered - video game consoles and controllers, a huge sound speaker in the shape of a silver skull and… more books.

The room harbored several collections of various items, weapons mainly, but also figures from comic books and fantasy novels. A real size shiny C-3PO seemed to serve as a valet stand, a black leather jacket comically wrapped around its shoulders.

The contrast was odd, as if an enthusiastic teenager had decided to set up his headquarters in the ballroom of a palace.

A pillow and a crumpled white blanket had been spread on the floor, next to the bed. They were tainted with smears of blood that could be traced on the thick carpet toward a half-open wooden door. Artificial light was pouring through the gap.

With strenuous efforts, Dru whirled her legs out of the bed. She blushed as she realized she was no longer wearing her dress - which had been torn and covered in ichor anyway - but in a plain black shirt. On her, it was long enough that it covered her thighs. She tried not to think too much about who must have dressed her and picked a long staff made of oak wood, probably a rokushakubō, that was resting against the wall. She used the weapon as a walking stick as she limped across the bedroom, looking out the windows as she passed them. All she could see in the dim light were large stretches of green grass. She was still in Faerie, she knew that much at least.

When she reached the half-open door, she peered around and... gasped.

It was a bathroom, much bigger than her own bedroom at the Academy, and to say it was luxurious would be an understatement. Everything was built in the most precious and refined material, even the taps looked like they were shaped from gold. The blond fey was seated at the edge of a huge circular bathtub with his back to her, only wearing boxer shorts. His pale skin was covered in Marks, some freshly inked, others faded, as well as battle scars. He was clutching large cotton pads and seemed to be struggling to clean the wounds on his black wings. Vials filled with different colours of liquid were scattered all over the marble floor as well as boxes of dried herbs. He whipped his head at the sound she made.

“I- I am sorry,” she said, feeling her cheeks flush at his nakedness.

“Sorry for what?” He replied, in his euphonious voice.

“I didn’t know you were…” She replied, waving her hand at him.

“Didn’t know I was what?” He looked puzzled.

“Naked!” She rolled her eyes.

He just stared at her for a few seconds before he let out a short back of laughter.

“I don’t mind,” he finally said and went back to tending his wounds.

Dru swallowed.

“Let me help you with that,” she said, as she slowly crossed the distance, and sat behind him. She picked a few bandages and started working on the cuts on his wings that were the least accessible to him.

They remained in companionable silence for a moment.

“You are a Shadowhunter,” she eventually said, breaking the stillness. “Why didn’t you tell me so when we met earlier?”

He shrugged. “You didn’t ask.”

“That’s not it. Your skin was covered in clothes. You are hiding it.”

He tensed. “So were you. I assume you had your reasons. I have mine.”

Okay… He had obviously decided to close the subject. And she didn’t want to pry. She redirected the conversation.

“About earlier… What I said…” She swallowed and blushed at the memory of her throwing herself at him. Ugh. How pathetic she had been.

“Did you speak earlier? I didn’t hear a thing,” he replied, casting a knowing glance at her over his shoulder, his lips suppressing a smile.

She exhaled.

“Thanks,” she said. “You know what, I do think you are beautiful. But so are Michelangelo’s sculptures. And you won’t catch me snogging them.”

He was still sitting with his back to her and she couldn’t see the expression on his face but he seemed to be smiling as he replied. “Message received.”

“So… is this where you live?”

“It is.”

“Alone?”

“No. It’s just me and my uncle J, though.”

She fell silent for a moment and he heard her unspoken question.

“I hardly see my mother. And my sorry excuse for a dad is dead. Good riddance.”

She flinched at that. She had noticed there was a darkness about him and wondered if it was linked to all the scars on his body or his evident hatred for his late father. Or both.

“I guess I never thanked you. For saving my life earlier.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“I am Drusilla, by the way. Drusilla Blackthorn. People call me Dru, though.”

He nodded, as if it confirmed something he already knew.

“I am Ash.”

“Ash…?”

“Just Ash.”

“Don’t you have a last name?”

He shrugged. “Does it matter?”

“What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” She playfully quoted Shakespeare.

He chuckled, shaking his head.

“Your turn.” He suddenly stood and turned to face her, folding his wings. Dru realized that it brought her gaze right at the level of his… She swiftly turned her face away, blushing. When she glanced back at him, shyly, he was sitting seiza-style on the floor, in front of her. He gently lifted her right leg to rest it on his lap, a small smile playing across his face. She could not catch the look in his eyes, under his silvery eyelashes, as they were focused on inspecting her injury, but she was pretty sure he knew exactly what was going on in her head. He slowly brushed his long and deft fingers across her skin while his other hand cupped her calf, and she couldn't stop her leg from shaking. Holy crap. He had barely touched her and she was already a flushing mess, her breath now coming in short gasps. She was very much aware that her toes were nudging at the waistband of his boxer shorts and that if she brought her foot a few inches lower…

They both startled at the sound of a loud banging on the bedroom door.

“AAaaash,” uttered a man in a slurred speech through the wooden material. “You self-righteous b-bastard. Open the f-fucking door.”

The voice sounded familiar but Dru couldn’t pinpoint exactly where she had heard it before. It didn’t help that it belonged to a man who was obviously inebriated.

Ash cursed. He brought Dru’s leg down and put a finger over his lips.

“You. Are. Not. Here.” He mouthed to her, his green eyes suddenly deadly serious, all of the earlier playfulness gone from one moment to the next, and she almost cringed. He stood and swiftly exited the bathroom, closing the door behind him. She grabbed the staff and lifted herself up from the edge of the bathtub to get closer and hear the conversation.

“Asssh,” the voice repeated. “I know you are ho-home. You left a m-mess in the infirmary. Anything you wish to tell m-me? You got into a f-fight again?”

Dru heard the bedroom door open with a creaking noise.

“What about you, J? Went out for liquor again?” Ash’s voice replied sharply.

“Ash. I d-don’t tell you where to put your d-dick. You d-don’t get to tell me what goes into my m-mouth.”

“The fact that you just said that with a straight face is evidence that you had one too many, J.”

“F-Fuck you, Ash.”

“Hmm… I’ll take a rain check on that. Not that I don’t find you attractive, but you know I don’t screw drunk guys. Come on, let’s get you to bed.”

When she heard the door close behind them, Dru came out of the bathroom, in search of her phone, on the off chance it had survived the battle. There it was, resting on the nightstand, plugged in for battery charge. That was… thoughtful.

She grabbed it, swiped the screen open and tried to call Ty, but there was no service. Crap.

She rummaged through Ash’s drawers to pick a pair of shorts that she pulled on clumsily, and gathered a few weapons. She headed for the door, opened it and… ran straight into a pale white torso. Ash clutched her arms to steady her, then brought his lips against her ear. “Going somewhere?”

Dru jutted her chin out. “I need to find my brother. He will be worried sick.”

He didn’t move his mouth from her ear as he softly whispered. “You only need to ask.”

She stepped back to stare into his green eyes. His expression was unreadable.

“Okay,” she replied hesitantly. “Can we… go now?”

“Whatever you wish. Can I show you something first?”

She smiled at him. “Hmmm sure. I have to tell you though, I have four brothers, including one who has absolutely no issues with nudity. Trust me, I already know what it looks like.”

He laughed softly, shaking his head, and went to confiscate C-3PO’s black leather jacket. He put it on her shoulders. The sleeves were so long she had to roll them three times so her hands could peek out of them.

As Ash shrugged on his black shirt and black jeans, Dru cast a quick glance at his body. He had broad shoulders and was definitely muscular, as all Shadowhunters were, but not in a bulky way. His long and pale limbs emphasized his tall, overall narrow figure. He was like a spear, shooting up and deadly.

He caught her watching him, and gave her a lopsided smile. In turn, he allowed himself to look her up and down, but it was quick, efficient and not in the lazy, lingering, creepy way guys usually eyed her.

“You look good in my clothes,” he said finally. He came to stand in front of her, and gently grazed her cheek with his knuckles.

“Your skin is so translucent that it feels like a splash of red ink leaked from a pen underneath when you blush.”

She was pretty sure the red on her cheeks must have spread even farther, the colour brighter, and she did something she had never done in front of a man before. She looked down.

“Grab my neck,” he said, and she complied.

In a swift motion, he swept her off her feet and carried her in his arms like a damsel in distress.

He moved to the open window and… jumped out.

It was different now that she was fully conscious and aware of her surroundings. She let the wind blow through her hair, allowed herself to be overwhelmed by the surreal feeling of being suspended in the air without the fear of crashing to the ground.

She whooped in excitement, crying out “I am the queen of the wooooorld!” and he laughed.

They landed on a narrow patch of grass on top of a cliff. A nightmare for anyone who had vertigo, but Dru didn’t mind great heights.

They both sat at the edge, enjoying the landscape. It was absolutely breathtaking, an unobstructed view of Faeries lands, patches of dark forest, small lakes and plains of green grass extending farther than the eye could see.

Dru understood why Ash loved this spot. It looked like you could see everything while not being seen. It was a spot no one could access, unless well, they had wings…

“Look,” he said, pointing towards a chain of rocky mountains. The sun came out lazyly, spreading its first rays to scout the sky before making its glorious appearance and altering all the colours of the picturesque landscape from one moment to another.

Her breath hitched and she grabbed his hand reflexively.

He whipped his head around to look at her and she pulled it back immediately. “Sorry,” she mumbled.

“Don’t be,” he said gently. He cocked his head, a questioning look on his face. “Do you have a boyfriend, Drusilla Blackthorn?”

She smiled at his use of her full name. “I don’t.”

“A girlfriend, perhaps?”

“Nope. No boyfriend, no girlfriend.” She exhaled. “There is a guy, though…”

She looked up at him and he was staring back, his expression unreadable.

“I have had this crush on him since… Well, since forever. He seems to like me too, but he won’t act on it. I think he’s afraid of my brothers.”

He lifted his eyebrow. “He’s a bloody coward, then.”

She punched his arm. “Don’t say that! You don’t know him.”

He shrugged. “The question is… does he know you?”

She looked at him then, and was struck by the intensity of his gaze. There was a hidden message there, as if what he had really been asking was “Does he know you like I do?” But that could not be it, right? They had just met. It would be quite presumptuous of him.

“That’s not all. There is another reason, I think, and that’s why I haven’t made a move myself. I think… he is still figuring things out about himself...”

“Clearly,” Ash muttered.

“...And of course, there’s the issue of... my age.”

She waited for a change in his expression, a question, but he remained silent, his gaze steady.

“Aren’t you going to ask me how old I am?”

He shrugged. “Does it matter? Age doesn’t really mean anything in Faerie. I’d love to know your birthday, though. So I’ll know when to throw you the most decadent party you’ve ever been to.”

She let out a free, careless laugh. It was as if a weight had been lifted, that she didn’t even know had been there.

“What about you? Do you have a girlfriend or a boyfriend?”

He crossed his arms against his chest. “I don’t date. I screw around, though. A lot.”

“Why don’t you date?”

He shrugged. “I guess I have major trust issues. Oddly, it’s the only way I know how to get close to people I will never see again anyway. And of course…” He smiled crookedly. “I like sex. Don’t you?”

“I wouldn’t know.” She cleared her throat, rubbing her thighs nervously. “So... I am ready to go when you are.”

“Sure, your carriage awaits. Where to?”

“If possible… the New York Institute?”

He tensed. “Is this where you live?”

“Oh no, I was just there to attend a birthday party. I study at the Academy, so that’s where you can usually find me these days. My real home is the Los Angeles Institute, where my family lives.”

Ash didn’t say anything. He was watching her with a thoughtful expression. She looked down, at the frightening drop into emptiness.

“Is this the moment in the movie when the guy turns out to be a psychopath and leaves the wounded girl on top of a cliff and she is left to choose between jumping and starving to death?”

“You have a lot of imagination,” he said, his expression still musing. He grasped her chin to lift it slightly toward his face. “I rather thought it would be the moment in the movie where they kiss and there are fireworks and romantic music playing in the background.”

“Heeey! I thought you hadn’t heard anything !” She swatted at him and he grabbed her wrist in a motion so swift it was almost a blur.

“Heard what?” He said, and she didn’t reply, she couldn’t reply because the next moment he was kissing her, his incredibly soft lips hesitant at first, leaving her plenty of occasions to withdraw. She didn’t.

The kiss grew deeper and it was as if the ground was a rug that had been swept from under her, she was in a free fall, tethered to reality only by his gentle fingers holding her chin while his other hand moved to cup the back of her neck. He smelled like the best Faerie had to offer, all at once, rocks warmed by the sun and fresh grass, luscious petals twirling in the wind, a storm turning a gentle stream into a torrent.

They both jerked away at the sound of an ear-splitting noise.

Before them, a giant eagle was flapping its wings steadily, observing them through narrowed eyes. Josephine, Dru vaguely remembered. And it was not alone. Behind it, an even larger creature, that made the first look one like a fly in comparison, was hovering.

“Drusilla Blackthorn?” The smaller bird screeched.

“In the flesh.”

“I am Josephine. And this is my father Rocky. These are the names Tiberius Blackthorn blessed us with. Our real names cannot be spoken by your mere human tongues. Your brother is looking for you and we are to bring you to him. You can ride on my father’s back.”

“Wait, are these… rocs?” Ash said in awe, his green eyes glittering. “These are thousands of years old legendary birds of prey thought to be extinct. The most dangerous predators among birds. And your brother actually named one Rocky? How cool is that guy?”

“Where is Ty now?” Dru asked.

“He is with my mother, looking for you,” the bird answered. “But we are to meet him at the polyamorous cottage.”

Ash turned to look at her, amusement mixed with curiosity plain on his face. “The polyamorous cottage?” He mouthed.

She elbowed him playfully.

“Okay, let’s go,” she said with more confidence than she felt.

“Wait-” Ash shot an arm in front of her. “I am not sure how I feel about you riding on an unearthly predator.”

“What do you suggest?”

He pondered for a moment before giving her an answer, his expression clearly torn. He finally sighed, seeming to have come to a decision.

“Well… You can ride me,” he said, gesturing at himself and giving her a wicked grin. “And that’s not a one-time offer.”

She rolled her eyes but could not help to feel relief.

“Are you sure you are up for it ?”

“Are you kidding me? A private invitation to the polyamorous cottage? And of course, I can’t wait to meet your brother Tiberius. It will be fun.”

She threw her hands up. “Wow. Don’t get your hopes up. My brother is very difficult to befriend. I love him, but “fun” is definitely not the word I would use to describe him.”

Ash turned to look wistfully at the two giant creatures waiting in front of them. There was a mischievous glint in his eyes.

“Well, he sounds pretty fun to me.”

****

Tagging @gabtapia and @bookeater34 ;)

16 notes · View notes

hargrove-mayfields · 3 years

Text

You’re The One I Want To Go Through Time With

Day one of HWOL is finally here!! So excited to share all I’ve written! For today I chose the prompt Neighbors AU!!! You can read this on ao3 also as part of the collection as well!! Hope y’all like it!!

Word Count: 11,952

Rated: G

It finally happens when he’s 15 years old. It’s not like he hasn’t seen it coming, but Steve gets kicked out.

In the very beginning of a particularly brutal Hawkins summer, he had decided to invite Tommy over to smoke weed in the pool house. He thought nothing of it, but the neighbors complained about the smell, and, coupled with every other act of his deemed irresponsible, immature, disgraceful, by his stuck-up parents, a couple of blunts was apparently the last straw.

They tell him the Harringtons had a reputation, an air of elegance and respect they had to upkeep, so they couldn’t just let him bring drugs onto their property. He thought it was ridiculous, considering that they were allowed as much wine aging in the cellar and expensive whiskey propped up on a hutch as they wanted, but when he’d brought it up he’d gotten nothing but a stern look.

They’d been through this a thousand times over, how worthless and terrible a son he could be, grounding him for bringing too many girls home, taking his car away when he failed a class, so he knew to expect a punishment.

This is obviously the next step, the throwing him out on the street thing, for years he could feel the neglect and tension starting to build up and boil over. Sometimes, they’d even hang threats of it over his head, so now that was told he had to be out of the mansion by the end of next week or there would be consequences, it couldn’t be too much of a shocker.

Though at some point, he’s got to wonder if they ever really thought as far ahead as consequences, or if they just knew they trained their boy well enough that it never got that far. If only he had more of a spine.

Now, as unsurprising as the scenario may be, Steve was still absolutely in no way, by any means ready to be thrown out on the streets before he even had his driver’s license.

In the case of emergency, like the time Stephen Sr. got just a little too rough and popped his wrist out of place, or when they’d left him alone for a month at age 9 and he went three days without food because he didn’t know how to turn the stove on, he had his aunt, the thankfully much more compassionate counterpart to his mother, who lived over in California.

The minute they’re gone, having passive aggressively hurried off somewhere, probably the country club or something, to complain about how disappointing their son was with their rich friends, Steve grabs a suitcase from the closet and gives his Aunt Margaret a call.

Before he knows it she’s got him a flight booked, a written agreement from her sister that proved taking him in was legal, and a set of luggage. Three days later, he was flying first class towards the rest of his life.

~~~~~~~

Touching down in San Francisco has got to be the most surreal thing he’s ever done.

He’d never even left the Midwest before, his farthest ventures being into the three states surrounding his home state, so to be charted off to the west coast? It’s an experience alright.

Aunt Margaret is there waiting for him, her jet black permed hair a few inches above the rest, her brown eyes sparkling with the kindest smile he’s ever seen as she runs up to hug him.

She takes all of his bags, swatting his hands away when he tries to carry even one, and makes him sit in the car while she shoves it all into the trunk.

He wasn’t used to not being the help, since that’s all his parents ever really saw him as anyways, only valuable as their son if they got something out of the time they spent with him. It’s got him feeling weird the whole drive back to the Margos apartment, like he’s in some alternate reality where people are nice to him for a change.

She lives in one of those shared places, a duplex where the house is divided into two halves for two different renters, the very kind his mother would’ve turned her nose up at despite having been raised in one herself. Margaret told him there was a mother and son who lived in the other half, but they’re quiet enough, and polite.

Just pulling up outside of the house, Steve already knows it’s everything he’s ever wanted.

The house itself, painted a pale shade of peeling yellow and missing the majority of the shingles off of the roof, is actually a reasonable size, a direct contrast to the mansion he grew up in, fit for a dozen but occupied by one most days.

Brutal summer heat has dried up the lawn and the garden so they aren’t perfectly tailored, not trimmed by underpaid staff or watered by automatic sprinklers. All across it there’s a scattering of ornaments, like colorful pinwheels in the front garden, and plastic flamingos standing guard by the mailbox.

There’s even a rickety old fence, all mossy and broken up to mark the edges of their property, so different from the white vinyl fence in his backyard at his parents house.

It would seem too that the garage was only big enough for one car, not three like he was used to, and that the makeshift gravel driveway leading up to it was at max capacity with only his aunts Oldsmobile Cutlass Calais, and a dinged up old Karmann Ghia the same color as the house parked in it.

Basically, there were none of the telltale signs that a neglected rich boy lived there, and from that alone he already knew he belonged here.

His aunt hurries him into their section of the house, theirs is the right side, so he can get to resting off the jet lag before he starts unpacking, but he’s far too distracted taking everything in to worry about being a little drowsy.

The rooms are small and the ceilings are low. Where there would’ve been beige and white and other sophisticated tones, there was a rainbow of colors in Margos apartment, from the curtains to the carpet, the Afghan on the back of the couch to the little trinkets in the entertainment center and windowsills.

He notices that, to accommodate for the heavy summer heat, there was a fan spinning in the corner, and all the windows were left wide open. His parents had the windows painted shut back home.

It might’ve been overwhelming, being thrown into a place like this so suddenly, but in his heart he knows this was what he was made for: a cozy life with someone who treated him with the bare minimum of respect.

~~~~~~~

Eventually Steve does fall asleep, the switch from Eastern Standard to Pacific time just being too great for his body. He doesn’t really mean to, he thought he’d just lay down for a minute while he was putting his clothes away in his new dresser, but he ends up sleeping until it’s almost dark out.

He goes looking for Margo when he realizes the house is empty, an irrational pit of dread growing in his chest at the familiarity of being alone, and finds her out back.

The yard also seems to be shared with the other house, a wispy line of barely showing through grass separating the two where a divider had once been, but had since been ripped up.

His aunt is with another woman, a blonde lady who he assumed was from the next door apartment, were sitting in mismatched lawn chairs, cigarettes glowing as the sun got lower and lower in the sky.

Margaret beckons him over once she notices him, and shows him off to the woman. It’s not at all like his mother would’ve done it, none of the flaunting him to make a good impression. This is more like her wanting to introduce him because she genuinely cares.

In a way, it almost makes Steve more uneasy. He could handle all the fake stuff with only the slightest hint of discomfort at being gawked at, because most of the time he’d never have to see those people again, but this was astronomically different.

“Maria, this is my nephew Steve.” Deep blue eyes seem to take him in, accompanied by a polite smile that makes his stomach drop for no good reason.

He panics, shifts into the role of the perfect little socialite he’d been working on his whole life. Without thinking, he extends his hand for her to and produces the generic response his mother’d trained into him. “It’s a pleasure to meet you Ms..”

She takes his hand, but looks a little surprised about doing it. “Hargrove. But we don’t have to do formalities.”

“Right.” It feels awkward to Steve, but judging from the laid back attitude of the women, it’s not a universal sentiment. That only makes it more embarrassing, to be the only one bothered by it.

His aunt leans back in her chair, tapping the ash of the end of her cigarette and tells him, “Go ahead and grab a chair Stevie.”

He straightens his back out and scans the yard, expecting a chair to already be propped open somewhere. The confusion must be apparent on his face when he finds nothing but grass and more grass, because his aunt specifies, “By the shed, kiddo.”

His parents always told him they weren’t allowed to have lawn furniture except the pool chairs cemented to the ground, because they said it didn’t fit the lifestyle they tried to lead. Even the concept of a shed would’ve been insulting to their tastes.

He's done enough growing up to know now that they were just afraid to look too much like they were people who lived in rural Indiana instead of in true big city luxury. They couldn’t risk seeming too much like they weren’t in the upper middle, it would be a disgrace.

The contrast between that and just sitting out there and not having his guard up is so, grounding. Not having anything at all to do but just, sit and appreciate instead of performing and worrying, it’s a lot to take in at once.

He was so nervous the whole way up, even though it was his aunt and he already knew she was nice, that they wouldn’t get along, since that’s the way things always were with his own mum, and lord knows he hardly ever even spoke to his father.

But it’s really not tense at all, actually, it’s sort of the opposite. For once in his life he feels free of expectations, and takes the moment to just exist. Ruthie and Stephen Sr. had long ago made sure that was a concept he could barely understand.

It’s not too long after that that the screen door to Maria’s side of the house swings open, scaring Steve so bad he almost tips his chair over as he startles.

There’s a boy who he’s guessing is about his age leaning out the door, but from the distance he’s at and with how dark it’s getting, Steve doesn’t see much else about him. “M back momma.”

“Okay baby.” The screen door clicks shut again in the next moment, and Maria offers Steve an apologetic smile “You’ve gotta excuse my Billy. He’s not too good with other kids.”

“No, it’s alright.” He assures her, like a polite social butterfly should.

Maria goes in a little while after that, and Margaret and Steve follow suit, since the sun’s almost all the way down.

But Steve’s curious now. He wants to know more about the boy, Billy, he thinks was what Maria called him. It’s only right to wonder, being that they’re neighbors now and all.

It gets brought up later that night, when they’re watching TV on the couch, a thrifted, feather stuffed thing he thought was simultaneously the most hideous and most comfortable thing he’d ever sat on.

“I didn’t know you had neighbors.” He’d been trying to work himself up to talking about it, sitting in the corner of the couch in a little ball and picking at his nails as he worked up his courage.

It was funny, being so nervous over casual conversation, but he guesses he could blame his parents for that one.

His own mum wouldn’t have even paid him any mind, at most pretending to listen while her eyes stayed trained to the television or magazine or coworker in front of her and hummed a non committal response, but Margo turns her whole body on the couch to face him while she answers him, with a complete sentence even. “Oh, people used to come and go all the time over there.”

“How long have they been here? Maria and her son?”

She thinks for a moment, a little surprised at her nephew's interest in the topic of their neighbors. “I don’t know, probably about a year or so now.”

“What’re they like?” He comes across as maybe a little too eager, and his aunt notices.

“What’s got you so curious?” There’s a teasing bit of reprimanding in her tone, just enough to suggest that she knows he’s being a nib-nose, but doesn’t mind it.

And he feels himself flush, because he is being nosy. To try to save face just a little, he comes up with an excuse that isn’t quite a lie. “Nothin’, just knew all my neighbors back in Hawkins, I guess.”

But she wasn’t upset with him, it wasn’t her intention to get him to shut up, like it would’ve been had he heard the same thing from one Ruthie Harrington, so she answers that question too. “I don’t know, they’re nice, sort of reserved, but I’ve never had any problems with them.”

~~~~~~

The two boys are properly introduced for the first time the next morning, when Steve goes out to fetch the mail for Margret. It feels like the least he can do for bumming off of his aunt.

Stepping out on the porch just shy of 8 in the morning and not seeing dewey grass, or the early sunshine muted behind rolling fog and dreary clouds is something he’s going to have to get used to.

Summers in Hawkins were always muggy, full of thunderstorms and unpredictably dreary days. San Francisco is so bright, so different, and such a relief.

While Steve basks in it, the already warm breeze and the sun shining bright, the neighbors’ door opens up and Billy comes out to do the same, standing on his tip-toes to reach up into the mailbox beside the door, holding a traveler's mug of coffee in the opposite hand.

When he turns around to go back inside, Steve, staying true to wanting to get to know the other boy better, has taken a few steps closer, and has extended a hand for Billy to shake, the same sort of introduction panic he’d felt last night.

But, Billy, seeing that his hands are a bit preoccupied by a stack of bills and a cup of coffee, just offers a sheepish smile.

Steve settles for a formal introduction without a handshake, though it’s still too stiff an interaction to really get to know him beyond the awkward new rich kid in town. “Hi. My name is Steve Harrington. I’m uh, I'm your new neighbor.”

“Pleasure to meet you Steve Harrington. M’Billy” They stand there, neither of them making any move to do anything but just look at one another. Billy clears his throat and shakes the coffee cup towards Steve, sensing that maybe this was the place for hospitality. “You want some? My momma always makes too much.”

“No thanks. I’m uh, allergic to coffee beans.”

“Huh.” He seems amused by that, scrunches his nose up like he doesn’t believe it, and Steve wants to curl up and disappear. “I’ll see you later then, Steve Harrington.”

He watches the other boy turn back to leave after that, and still sort of just stands there before his brain comes back on and he realizes he should say something in return. “Right, uh, bye.”

It’s just a moment's passing, but Steve can’t get the interaction out of his head.

He chalks it up to being nervous that his new neighbors won’t like him, the fear that Aunt Margo will send him back to his parents if he can’t get along here, and that makes logical sense, except, what he’s caught up on is Billy’s crooked smile, and his blond curls that lay just past his ears, messy from just waking up and bleached from the sun, and the spatter of dark freckles across his nose.

First full day in California and he has a crush on the neighbor kid. He can’t believe himself.

There isn’t very much time to mull that fact over though, because, over breakfast, what his aunt calls her ‘special occasion breakfast’ of cinnamon rolls with ice cream, she tells him she’s going to do some errands today.

And that’s alright, he tells her he’ll be fine all by himself, and he is, for the first few hours, but the more time she’s gone, the worse and worse he starts to feel. It’s that worry again, that deep rooted fear that he’ll be left alone forever.

Experience has taught him to try to calm himself down, to catch his breath and try to focus on the fact that he knows he’s being irrational, but those techniques don’t cut it, as they often don’t, and he’s sending himself further into a panic attack trying to think too hard about it

Sitting inside, he gets stir crazy, feels suffocated by everything that had before been inviting to him, so he goes for some fresh air out front. Watching the road for so long, just waiting for the Oldsmobile to pull up, he starts to feel antsy again, so he goes out back where it’s quiet instead.

There’s a glider on the porch back there, an old rusty thing that squeaked every time Steve rocked it forward or back, but the calming motion of it is probably the only thing keeping him from spiraling too far.

He doesn’t really know what time it is anymore, only that he’s hungry, and that the sun’s going down, and that he’s been sort of zoned out back there for a long while. He feels hot and cold at the same time, and he’s lost in his head.

The sound of a screen door gently tapping against the side of the house brings his eyes up from the spot on the ground he’d been staring at with tears in his eyes, but it isn’t his aunt Margaret coming home, it’s just Billy.

With his hands stuffed in his pockets, leaning against the wall between the back doors, he says real quiet like, “Momma told me to ask if you wanted some of the dinner she made.”

He shrugs. “I’m alright.”

“I figured.” Billy looks at the floor while he tries to figure out how he wants to approach this. For a long moment, neither of them say a word, no sound between them but distant field crickets, until Billy asks, his voice quiet enough it barely registers in Steve’s mind. “You okay?”

If he’s being entirely honest, Steve doesn’t really know if he’s okay. He trusted his aunt enough to move all the way across the country with her, and yet he can’t manage enough trust to believe her when she said she’d come home from some errands? Doesn’t sound too okay to him.

But he’s not in Hawkins, he’s away from the people he knows for sure wouldn’t be coming back for him unless it was to pull something like they had and treat him like garbage. So in a way, he guesses he’s better than ever.

Unable to think of any words that might convey what he’s thinking, Steve just shrugs again, but Billy seems to get it. He sits down next to Steve on the glider and plants his feet so it won’t move, and so Steve’s attention will be on him.

Knowing he’s got Steve’s focus, since he looks over at him with glossy eyes, Billy tries to reassure him, “Your aunt’s a good lady. She wouldn’t leave you.”

“Who said I thought she would?” It sounds pathetic, wet and stuffy with the remnants of tears he hadn’t known were falling, but there’s a vulnerability he couldn’t hide behind even the toughest of masks that reveals he isn’t being honest.

“The way you watched for her car said enough.” It makes Steve feel exposed, having a total stranger see right through him, but Billy explains himself. “When my momma went out looking for this place, I was sure I’d never see her again.”

“Why did you guys move here?” If he was going to psychoanalyze Steve, he felt it was only fair to ask Billy a pressing question back.

“I’ll tell you if you tell me.” He deflects it back onto Steve in a way that might’ve seemed cocky, but it's obvious he’s just trying to avoid the question.

Steve won’t let him win this one though, maybe just to save his own ego, or pretend like he hadn’t been caught crying by someone he met that morning, or maybe it was just because he had asked first, but he wants Billy to answer, so he tells him, with the slightest hint of a bashful smile playing at his lips, “You first.”

“Stubborn.” He cracks a smile back though, and goes ahead and goes first at the other boys insistence. “My dad’s a real nasty s.o.b. Would get drunk and mean for no good reason, so momma took me and we high-tailed it before he did anything too drastic.”

He didn’t know what he was expecting, why he even felt like it was any of his business, and he doesn’t know what he should say to that.

For lack of a better response, he gives his own little life story summary. “My parents were rich. They didn’t want me, so they have the time of day for me. No matter what I did they punished me for it, grounded me, hit me, sent me to Christian school, until they just got sick of me, I guess.”

“That sounds pretty shitty.” Billy offered.

“Yeah, yours too.”

After a while, Billy, sounding for a moment like he’s a lot wiser than any 14 year old has the right to be, says “What matters is we’re here now.”

Steve feels so touched hearing that. It was so simple a thing for the other boy to say, but coming from Billy after he’d just shared what he did, it means a lot more than just basic condolences.

Hardly anybody had ever been that genuine in anything they said to him. Steve can hardly force a response out of his shocked mouth. As he looks over at Billy’s face, still turned up towards the sky, he sees all that meaning there illuminated by the stars, and he's able to mutter a breathless, “Yeah.” in response.

They both jump when the door flies open, and aunt Margo comes running over to Steve. Frantically she explains that she’d been trying to make sure everything was legal, only to find that some of Steve’s papers were missing, and they had to try to track them all down and get some of them faxed, and it ended up taking way longer than expected.

It feels nice to be understood. Just a few years ago his parents left for what was supposed to be a three day trip to Indianapolis, only they didn’t come back for what was almost two months. Once they were home they didn’t even mention it, just continued going about their business as usual until it was time to leave again. His aunt taking the effort to explain herself was already a vast improvement from that.

He lets her pull him into a big hug, accepts her apology as the air is squeezed out of his lungs, and when he pulls away from her, Billy’s gone.

~~~~~~~

Finish reading on ao3! You can find this posted under the same title by ej_writer or as part of the hwol collection over there! Sorry tumblrs word limits deemed this too long!

#harringrove week of love #billy x steve #harringrove #steve harrington #billy hargrove #story by ej!#this is both a neighbors au and a billy lives with his mother au!#and there's no upside down!#you can also maybe probably read this as autistic billy! it wasnt intentional but that happens sometimes #if its a fluffy fic chances are 90% of the time someones going to end up neurodivergent bc my autstic brain can’t help it #disclaimer I think tumble deleted a paragraph or two from this so if it doesn’t make sense just go ahead and find it on ao3 lol #can y'all tell I've never left the midwest and was sorta just guessing what california is like #the closest experience I had to what I wanted the vibes to be like was growing up on my mawmaws property in the country #and thats deffo not even a little bit the same but hey. work with what ya got!#out of all of the prompts I think this'n turned out to be one of my favorites to write #its kind of all over the place but that's okay lol #lord knows I never intended it to be this long either #this is barely edited because i stayed up literally all night to finish this because I procrastinated it too hard haha

41 notes · View notes

broken-clover · 3 years

Text

Tagged by @rex101111, how fun! I guess it’s neat to look back on some stuff and think about how I make things

Rules: List the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20, just list them all!). See if there are any patterns. Choose your favourite opening line. Then tag 10 of your favourite authors!

Now that I think about it, I realize I don’t actually know that many writers, so I suppose I’ll tag them all? @mama-nana @boardjames @irl-diluc @doreamu-san @sylveonsylk and anyone else who’s interested is free to give it a go!

1. Gear Grove- Chubby little hands reached out towards the night sky. He didn’t understand what any of it was or what it meant, but he was completely enraptured at the sight of little dots flashing and blinking overhead against the darkness.

2. Pack Bonding- Sol was lazy, but he wasn’t a moron.

3. See You, Space Hippo- “Hey, Sly, is it just me or has Murray been gone a while?”

4. Broken Bird- Sol didn’t like visiting Illyria. He hated every inch (sorry, centimetre- fucking Europeans) of that pretty white castle with its pretty white towers like it had been ripped right from a child’s storybook, with a bunch of oh-so-important politicians faffing about in its pristine halls in and out of meetings, with everyone in a hustle and bustle yet accomplishing absolutely nothing, with its toy soldiers poised at every corner and doorway, with their pretty toy king sitting on his pretty toy throne.

5. Breadtime- Venom awoke at half past midnight to the sound of creaking wood.

6. The Centurion- From a glance, Sol could tell that he hated the kid. Looked too clean, for starters. The still-immaculate bleached-white fabric and polished buckles was a pretty heavy tell that he was a newbie when it came to real battles. Probably one of those idealistic idiots that genuinely believed they had some ability to turn the tide of war.

7. Primum Non Nocere- The air was fuzzy, the trees were exploding, and the sky was a taunting blue below, perfect for dipping feet in on a hot summer’s day to cool off.

8. Playing The Part- As it had turned out, Dimitri took to diving with the same level of enthusiasm he had for most things.

9. Flyboy- The job was going off without a hitch, and everything was going smoothly.

10. Sensoria- The sky had taken on that pale gray only winter seemed to manage, where it was impossible to tell what time of day it was unless you had a watch to double-check.

11. A Father’s Heart- The turtle had made it sound so easy and straightforward. They’d all had roles to play, but they were so simple, so basic, he had almost been disappointed by it.

12. Alone Together- Haohmaru was aware of the fact that he wasn’t the most complex or philosophical of individuals, but even he enjoyed taking some time to relax and reflect.

13. Patchwork- Baiken was by far the toughest person Anji had ever met, but that didn’t mean she was invulnerable.

14. And There You Are- Sometimes, when he looks in the mirror, Venom can still see a reedy, trembling seven-year-old looking back at him.

15. Accommodation- Milo could tell that things were going south halfway through the ceremony

16. Einheit- Something was horribly, horribly wrong. Maybe it was just the concussion fucking with his head, but Axl knew that something, whatever it was, was horribly, horribly wrong.

17. Party Ghouls- As things always tended to go during dull days in the office, as soon as one of the cleaning staff came by to pin a flyer on the board, everyone not-so-subtly slipped away from their workstations to get a better look.

18. Dinner Theatre- The feeling of slipping free from dead flesh was liberating.

19. The Painted Man- Illyria was dying.

20. Into the Void- “You could have prevented this, you know.”

Patterns: Years of English and writing classes have hammered it pretty heavily into my brain that The first couple of lines are important to try and draw in the reader. I don’t know if I necessarily succeed, but I know I at least try to either have it start out vague so there’s some kind of intrigue, or right in the middle of things that are happening.

Something I’ve also noticed I have a habit of doing is opening with a paragraph and follow it with a single sentence, structured almost like a buildup and a punchline. It’s a habit I’m trying to not do as much, since it gets a little repetitive.

Favorite: Ah, that’s hard! I really liked writing the opening for Broken Bird since something about writing things from Sol’s point of view is just really fun. It’s a tie between that and Primum Non Nocere because I rewrote that one like three times, since I wanted to try and make an intro that would suitably reflect the weirdness that would ensue in that fic.

Very fun! Thank you so much for the tag, Rex!

#long post #writing #writing meme

10 notes · View notes

tsc-living · 4 years

Text

Kit, Ty, Livvy and Church

Based entirely on this beautiful piece of art by @nairafeather which you can find here!!!

5,022 words/9 A4 typed pages

Ty had been avoiding Kit for a few days now, ever since the blonde boy had come to the Los Angeles Institute to help the Blackthorn family with their newest under-the-radar investigation; as under the radar it could be with Ty himself a graduated Centurion, and the Consul’s husband lending a helping hand when the High Warlock of Brooklyn and family friend was requested. Even Mark Blackthorn and Cristina Mendoza Rosales, important members of the Alliance, were at the LA Institute to help. Still, it wasn’t entirely sanctioned by the laws. Lex malla, lex nulla Ty thought to himself as he carried a large tome down a sparsely decorated hallway towards a bedroom that had been converted into a study for him before his arrival.

“What are you thinking about?” Livvy asked, floating along beside him as she often did. Ty had long since grown used to the fact that she didn’t leave foot prints as she travelled with him, but it was a new feeling to be relieved about it; he worried seeing how small her footprints would be compared to his would make him sad for he was a man and she still resembled a teenager.

“The family motto, and how apt it always is when the Blackthorns, Carstairs and Herondales are under this roof,” he replied, gesturing around him at the empty hallway to encompass all the occupants of the Institute.

“A bad law is no law,” Livvy mused, a shadow of her vibrant, young smile from her life flickering at the corner of her lips.

“Yes, so they say,” he agreed, pushing open the door to his study, forcing against the resistance of the thick, plush carpet. The room wasn’t very big, but it was comfortable and with the amount of time he had spent in there avoiding Kit, it had become as familiar as his bedroom. There was a Holmes detective cap resting on the mantle of the fireplace in a near mockery of his earlier teen years. Above it, on the light blue wall, was a pin up board that Ty had turned into a detective board; a map, some pages pulled out of books and other clues connected by red wool. Ty had memorised all the contents, all of the clues and the connections. He wasn’t sure it was helping him yet, but he would leave it up until the case was solved.

“What are you going to be doing?” Livvy asked, drifting through the fern coloured couch towards the window that faced the ocean and framed the sun when it began to set.

“I am going to peruse this book in the hopes that I find something of use, and then after the usual dinner hours when Kit will be anywhere except the kitchen, I will go find something to eat,” Ty explained, putting the book on the low coffee table as he passed it on his way to the bookshelf beside the window. The bookshelf sat on top of a sideboard that rested under the window, but he hadn’t yet filled the cupboards with anything. He wasn’t going to be in LA long enough to have any cumbersome personal belongings that he would need to store. The only personal things in the room were the hat, and the branch in a beaker he was trying to preserve with a potion Magnus Bane had made for him. The branch was a small cutting from the tree that grew inside the library at the Scholomance, a room that he had spent more time in than his bedroom for the past 3 or so years.

“Why are you avoiding him?” Livvy asked, still looking outside the window with more longing than he had seen on her face since they had left the Institute. “You told me that the two of you spoke when you portalled in.”

“We did speak, we said hello and then we got invaded by Dru, and Mina started crying. I was promptly guided here by Julian,” Ty said, running his index finger along the spines of some of the books he had collected from the Institute’s library.

“That isn’t ‘talking’ Tiberius,” Livvy said firmly, finally turning to face Ty. He turned to face his twin as well, but he kept his gaze on the books, more interested in them than he was the conversation.

“That is talking, we said ‘hello’,” he told her. He saw her shake her head out of the corner of his eye, her gossamer hair floating around her.

“Shouldn’t you talk about how you feel? About everything you have felt since you met, since he left?” She pressed. Ty looked at her then, his cheeks pink and his stomach starting to ache like it always did when he thought about Kit leaving.

“I don’t want to talk to him, I have nothing to say,” Ty told her. “I don’t even know who he is anymore. I knew Kit when we could look eye to eye, when his hair was so blonde it was nearly white and his skin suntanned. Now his hair is more yellow, his skin pale from England… he doesn’t even sound the same.” Livvy laughed, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

“Just because you grew taller than he did and that England has less sun than here, doesn’t mean it isn’t still the Kit you knew,” she said. “You are just being difficult.”

“I am difficult Livvy,” Ty said, but he didn’t really care if she paid attention. He slid a bookmark off the sideboard, the red tassel swinging as he walked around her to the sofa, settling against the high back and thick, deep cushions. He rearranged the little throw pillows until he was comfortable enough to pull the book onto his lap and read.

“Do you want to watch the sun set with me?” Livvy asked. Ty was relieved she had dropped her line of questioning about Kit, and he glanced over his shoulder to see that she was looking at the yellow lemon colour of the sky, streaked with blue and orange as the sun drifted closer to the water.

“No, I want to read this book,” he said, turning back around. He got halfway through a paragraph on winged creatures when he heard a soft thud down the hall, followed by padding footsteps. There were no bedrooms in use on this floor; the Blackthorn family had their own wing of the Institute in the opposite direction, and the Carstairs family with Kit were on the floor below this one. Nobody should be up this way, unless they were exploring, or worse… looking for him. The footsteps were not Julian’s and they didn’t sound urgent, which meant Ty didn’t want to be found.

“Where are we going Church?” He heard a muffled, deep, and dreadfully familiar voice on the other side of the door and Ty dropped his head against the back of the sofa with a sigh. There was a scratching noise against the door, a pause, and then a tentative knock. “Hello?” Ty looked over at Livvy, but she was determinedly looking out the window with a real smile on her face. Ty balled his hands into fists for a moment and then slid the book to the coffee table again, the bookmark secured in place.

“Come in Church,” Ty said, pulling the door open only wide enough for the cat to slink in. The mangy, ridiculously old, somewhat magical cat slunk in and began sniffing around like he had most evenings when he joined Ty in the study. However, the cat had never brought with him a guest.

“Oh, Ty!” Kit said sounding genuinely surpised, but Ty was already beginning to close the door on him. Kit put his hand out, arresting the process and Ty contemplated pushing harder. “Wait, don’t shut me out. Please?” Kit asked and Ty released the door, looking down at his bare feet and the hem of his black trousers, plunging his hands into the pocket of his dark grey hoodie.

“What do you want?” Ty asked, the witchlight slowly lightening in the hallway as the sun set further.

“I…” Kit’s feet were bare too and he shuffled against the carpet for a moment, not saying anything. “I just want to talk to you?” He said, but it sounded to Ty like it was more of a question than it was a statement.

“What do you want to talk about?” Ty asked, but he was met with more silence and feet shuffling. “Do you have anything to say at all?” Ty asked the quiet, finally looking up. Kit was dressed in black pyjama pants and a light grey V necked sweater, his collar bones standing out prominently and one of his shoulders was more exposed as the blonde boy tugged on his sleeve. He was still slim and angular, but he had broadened out and grown into the sharp Herondale features they were so known for having.

“Can I come in?” He asked. Ty stood in the doorway for another long moment, considering his options. Technically, yes, he could walk into the room, but did Ty want him to?

“Yes,” he decided, stepping to the side. Kit walked in, pushing the sleeves of his shirt up over his elbows.

“What is this room?” Kit asked as Ty closed the door behind them. “Hey Livvy,” he added, nodding at her.

“Hello Christopher,” she said with a warm smile before turning back towards the now mostly yellow sky.

“This is my study, Emma and Julian set it up for me before I arrived,” Ty explained, hovering on the opposite side of the coffee table, unsure what to do next as Kit sprawled himself out on the couch.

“Is this where you have been disappearing to while you avoid me?” He asked, eyebrows lifting in near perfect arches over his pale blue eyes. Not everything had changed then, his eyes were still the exact same, perhaps even more handsome than he had remembered.

“If you knew I was avoiding you, why did you come and find me?” Ty asked with genuine curiosity, walking around the coffee table to the couch. Kit had mussed all the pillows up and was taking up more space than any one man needed. “Can you please move?”

“Church found me, and I followed him to you,” Kit said, sitting up a little bit, his legs still stretched out. Ty sat down in the corner, tucking his feet onto the soft material, trying in vain not to be leaning his back against Kit’s arm, but this was proving difficult with the other boy sitting in the middle of the two-seater. Kit dropped one foot to the floor and pulled the other closer to his leg, his knee bent at an acute angle and near enough dangling in the air, swaying softly. Ty wondered if he was nervous, with his arm crossed over his stomach and wedged under a pillow that rested between their hips, but Ty couldn’t really tell.

“You didn’t have to follow him,” Ty pointed out, gripping the arm of the sofa. Church hopped up behind him on the back of the sofa, a short purr in his throat and his tongue stuck out. He dragged his fluffy grey tail across Ty’s face and Ty spat it out of his mouth, wiping his face against the neck of his hoodie to get the feeling of the tail off his skin. The cat made another bruup noise in his throat and Ty lifted his head up, eyeing the boy beside him out of the corner of his eye. He could see that Kit was doing the same. He heard Church’s claws dig into the sofa as he stretched. Ty couldn’t uncoil the tension from his body. He wanted to tell Kit to leave, but he didn’t want Kit to leave. He wanted to talk to Kit, but he didn’t know what to say. He wanted Kit to talk, but he didn’t know what he wanted Kit to say, which meant he had no way to prepare for a conversation. He wanted to twist away, but he also liked the warmth radiating off Kit. He wanted to stand up and pace the tension out of his body, but he also wanted to take hold of Kit’s hand. He didn’t know what to do, and he really didn’t like not knowing.

“Should we… I don’t know, like start over or something?” Kit asked quietly, looking away. Ty frowned at him, burying his hand in the pouch pocket of his hoodie.

“What? Like you come in the door again?” Ty asked, “Because I didn’t want you to come in the first time.” Ty hadn’t expected a smile, but the other boy did so anyway, and it was so familiar that Ty felt an ache in his stomach. Another thing that had not changed, the way Ty’s heart raced for a few moments when Kit smiled like that, like he had been surprised by something Ty had said.

“No, I meant like begin again. Forget that we knew each other when we were fifteen, introduce ourselves like we have never met before.”

“Why?” Ty asked, his forehead furrowed.

“So that we can begin again, so there is no history to trip over and no stories that can cause pain. We forget, and we try again,” Kit said, putting both feet on the ground and turning to face Ty who nearly fell sideways when his support moved. He immediately missed the warmth. Ty turned too, facing the other boy, crossing his legs on the sofa. He pulled a pillow out from under his legs and held it on his lap, fiddling with the gold tassels. Did Kit really want to forget their friendship and start all over again?

Ty remembered the first time he met Kit, when he had held a knife to his throat and threatened his life. Kit had been small then, young and scrawny- they both had been. His blonde hair had been dirty, and the bones of his shoulders were so thin Ty had felt them digging into his arm where he held Kit barred. He had been weak, Ty could have broken him and they both knew it, but even then, Kit’s eyes had blazed fiercely, defiantly.

He remembered the intense fascination he had felt when Kit came to the Institute, the want to be close to the new person so strong that Ty had slept on the floor outside his room. The fear that he would leave in the night and Ty would never see him again keeping him awake sometimes.

The time that they sat on a bed laughing with each other, moments before Magnus walked in to tell them something, but Ty couldn’t remember what it was Magnus had said. In that moment, what had been important was that he had made Kit laugh, even if it had been an accident.

There was the time he’d had a panic attack on the roof of that very Institute and Kit had held onto him, grounded him, his sporadic heartbeat slowing down to match the slow, steady beat of Kit.

He remembered standing in the ocean, the water inky with night, the stars and moon picking the silvery bits out of his hair as if they belonged there. It wasn’t the first time that Kit’s eyes had drawn Ty close, but it was the first time Ty let them as he put his arms around Kit’s neck and shivered when their bodies aligned. Kit had held him that night too, his arms around his waist. He had felt stronger then, than the first time they had met, and his heart had beaten more erratically against Ty than it had on the roof.

“No,” Ty whispered and Kit’s face, which had been lit with some kind of hope or happiness, burnt out in disappointment or sadness.

“I understand if you don’t want to know me anymore,” he said quietly, his voice cracking strangely like before someone cries.

“No, I meant,” Ty began, a little louder than a whisper, and he reached out to grab Kit’s wrist before he could stand and flee. “I meant no, I don’t want to forget.” He felt Kit relax into the cushions again, clearly not about to run away, but Ty didn’t let go as the same fascination and longing to be close to him lit in his chest like it had when Kit had come to the Institute in the first place.

“Oh,” Kit breathed as a red blush seeped along his neck and threatened to colour his cheeks. “So, you do want to still know me then?”

“Yes, I do.” Ty still didn’t let go of Kit’s wrist, but he stared at where their skin met. Even after his years in wintery England, Kit was still a shade or two darker than himself. He glanced up at Kit, looking at his shoulders and not his eyes, and he realised with a start that the other boy was holding his breath. “Breathe Kit, you will make yourself dizzy,” he said. Kit let the air out in a whoosh and sucked in a lungful before he spoke.

“I’m already dizzy,” he said, a wide, carefree grin on his face that looked strange after the crushing sadness that had been there a moment before. Ty frowned again, pulling his hand away and reaching for the stele that rested in a mug of pens and two small daggers on the coffee table.

“Are you sick or hurt?” He asked. Kit laughed and reached out for Ty, pulling his sleeve until his empty hand was resting on Kit’s knee.

“I’m not sick no, I’m happy,” he said and Ty looked at him, surveying him, and Kit really did look happy, although his face was pink as if feverish.

“Dizziness is not a sign of happiness,” Ty pointed out. Kit shook his head and very slowly interlaced their fingers where Ty’s hand rested on his leg. Ty let him, the warmth of Kit’s hand already warming the cool tips of his fingers.

“No, but it is a sign of unbelievable amounts of relief and being overwhelmed,” he replied. Ty supposed this was true, he had felt dizzying relief himself in battles, when realising his family was safe after a moment of peril.

“Do you have a plan?” Ty asked and Kit raised his eyebrows a second time, which Ty knew was a request for more information in place of asking a question. “If we aren’t going to start again, and we aren’t going to forget being fifteen… what are we going to do?” Kit was silent for a moment as he considered the question, a small smile dancing along his lips. Ty remembered that look, it was the one that meant he had a million responses to a question and he was trying to think of the one that would either get him into the most trouble, or get him out of it.

“Well, do you want to talk?” He asked. Ty shook his head, he still didn’t really know what he could talk about, he didn’t want to ask why Kit had left in the first place and he didn’t want to know what he had been doing in the meantime. And he really didn’t want to talk about the Scholomance right then, and all he had been talking about since his arrival was the investigation, but he didn’t want to talk about that right then either. “Do you want to sit here in silence and hold my hand?” Kit asked, his voice light. Ty was watching his lips as he spoke. He did want to sit there, and he did want to hold Kit’s hand.

“Can I touch you?” He asked, Julian’s lessons from his childhood reminding him that not everyone likes to be touched or crowded. Kit’s eyes went really wide and he looked as if he was holding his breath again, but he nodded. Ty reached out his empty hand as Kit turned to sit cross legged facing him, mirror images of each other. He closed his eyes, which did make Ty feel less tense and nervous, and let his curiosity grow. Ty touched his bare forearm first, the pulse at his wrist jumping against his fingers. He trailed his fingers against the soft skin of his inner forearm until he met the polyester material of his sweater, the wrinkles and ridges from where it bunched above his elbow smoothing down under his touch. Ty wanted to feel Kit, he wanted to know which parts of him were the softest to touch, which parts made him smile. Mostly he just wanted to understand Kit, he wanted to know him, and feel that he really was there, after years of his absence.

His fingers dipped at the curve of his collarbones, and he felt goose bumps rise along the skin of Kit’s neck as his fingers traced up the side. Kit shivered, but he smiled.

“It’s okay,” he whispered when Ty took his hand away. He put it back, this time feeling his pulse point in his neck and then up to his jaw, his cheek, curls of his blonde hair wrapping around Ty’s fingers. He traced his nose, felt the tickle of his blonde eyelashes, the shape of his lips and the lobe of his ear before sliding up into his hair. Kit’s breathing had long begun to come out in softer, but louder little gasps and Livvy blinked out of the room with a roll of her eyes and a grin on her face.

“You’re real,” Ty confirmed, keeping his hand curled into the back of his hair, their faces closer than they had been since that night in the water. Kit opened his eyes, blue meeting grey, and Ty felt the intensity of his gaze and he looked away. He looked down. Kit’s lips were parted and Ty realised that the sun had completely set and the room was being lit only by a single witchlight on the desk, and the moon.

“I’m real,” Kit agreed, sitting completely still. He swallowed, loudly and visibly, his lips closing for a moment before parting again.

Ty had thought about kissing Kit before. When they had been in the water, when they had been laughing on the bed, when they were walking shoulder to shoulder on a mission, the night before he had tried to raise Livvy from the dead… and many, many times when he had been alone at the Scholomance and ached for the boy he had grown so used to.

“Do we need to talk?” Ty asked. Kit licked his lips and shook his head very slowly.

“Not right now.” He sounded breathless, like he had been running for a very long time and had only just stopped.

“Good,” Ty decided and closed the gap between their lips. Kit gasped, his hand tightening around Ty’s nearly painfully and for a long, drawn out moment, Kit didn’t kiss him back. And then the moment passed and Kit shook his hand free, putting his hand against the side of Ty’s neck, his thumb against his cheek, and he kissed him. Ty’s face went bright red with heat and his newly freed hand followed Kit’s to his own cheek, their lips moving gently together, carefully. There was an ache in Ty’s lower stomach, warm and languorous as it spread through his body. He had never kissed anyone before, had never wanted to kiss anyone expect Kit, he didn’t really know what he was doing, he just knew that he liked it. Kit untucked his feet from under his knees and lay back, pulling Ty with him by the front of his hoodie, their legs entwined with cushions along the length of the sofa. Kit smiled into the kiss and used one of his hands to fish for a pillow and put it under his head, and Ty used the pause to catch his breath and touch his kiss swollen lips. Kit pushed a lock of black hair off his forehead, but his gaze was snagged by something over Ty’s shoulder.

“You bloody cat,” Kit said, fishing for another pillow and throwing it at the back of the chair beneath him, but Church didn’t move, just flicked his tail lazily.

“He brought you to me,” Ty said, shifting to align their bodies more comfortably. Kit’s hand rested lightly on the small of his back.

“Because you’ve been avoiding me for nearly a week,” Kit pointed out, touching his nose to Ty’s. Ty closed his eyes and rubbed his face against the warm, soft skin of the side of his neck.

“I didn’t know what to say to you,” he said against him. Kit’s other arm came around him and held him tightly, enough to feel secure but not enough to hurt or restrict.

“Apparently we don’t need to say anything,” he whispered, his chest vibrating under Ty as he spoke.

“I wish you hadn’t left,” Ty said. Kit hugged him a little bit tighter for a moment, before relaxing his grip again and speaking.

“I wish I hadn’t either, but I also know that I had to. Tessa, Jem, and little Mina… they’re my family Ty and with them I got to have a home, and I got to train like a Shadowhunter, and I got to be loved by parents.” Kit knew that what he said was true, but he couldn’t stop the pain in his chest from flowering at the memory. “I may have been running away from this,” Kit whispered and then Ty felt him kiss the top of his head, “Of how I felt for you and the fear that you didn’t feel the same way back… but what I found was a family of my own.”

“You didn’t say goodbye,” Ty pointed out, feeling wounded still. Kit’s chest deflated with a long sigh.

“I know, and I should have, and if I hadn’t been running away from how I felt about you, I would have said goodbye,” he said. Ty knew it didn’t really change what had happened, nothing would, but it did make him feel a little better to know that Kit had at least thought about it. “I loved you, even then, and I was so terrified of it,” he said. “And I was so hurt that you didn’t love me back.” His voice had dropped to a whisper. Ty put his palms into the cushion on either side of Kit and pushed up to look down at him, feeling annoyed.

“I did love you though,” Ty said, pointing out a fact he thought had been obvious. “You should have talked to me,” he added. Kit had the audacity to laugh.

“I think we were busy thinking about a lot of other things,” he said, “like Livvy and the war at Brocelind and… everything.” He was looking up at Ty from under his eyelashes, keeping a layer between direct eye contact, but still looking at each other.

“I know,” Ty agreed. “I also know that I was not easy to talk to at the time, Livvy has explained what it must have been like to know me while I was grieving.” Kit put his hand on Ty’s cheek too lightly so Ty pressed against his palm.

“You were in a lot of pain, and I was so self-absorbed….” Kit sighed and then smiled, “I guess we found a moment to talk,” he added. Ty nodded, an anxiety bubble he hadn’t realised was there leaving his chest and giving him room to breathe. He inhaled deeply and then lowered himself down again, supporting himself just enough to kiss the other boy without squishing their mouths. Kit gasped as he had the first time, almost as if surprised he was getting kissed again. Kit wrapped his legs around Ty, the pressure new and strange, but not unwelcome and Kit smiled into the kiss. Ty bit his lip gently, feeling as if he was punishing him for taking the kiss away, but the bite just made another, newer noise escape Kit’s mouth. Ty laughed and smoothed his blonde hair off his forehead.

“I have always thought you were beautiful, but you did grow into your features,” Ty told him. Kit smiled and shook his head, some of the blonde locks falling forward again.

“Thanks Ty,” he said and leant up to kiss him quickly. “Can I as you something?” He murmured, resting his head back again.

“Of course,” Ty said, waiting patiently.

“What happens now?” He asked. Ty sat up, properly this time, and Kit tucked his feet back under him again, sitting up as well.

“What do you mean?” Ty asked.

“What happens now? Do we just… be together like Emma and Julian or like Jace and Clary?” He asked. “Or do we just sneak around and turn this room into a make-out den?”

“I don’t want my study to be turned into a secret rendezvous,” Ty said. “Although I don’t mind if you come and distract me sometimes.”

“I can do that,” Kit said with a grin.

“I assumed as much,” Ty said seriously. “But I don’t think we need to be together like my brother and Emma, or Jace and Clary.” Kit tilted his head, waiting for more, or perhaps just thinking, but Ty had more to say. “We don’t need to be together like them, because we will be together like us.”

“I like that answer,” Kit agreed, reaching for Ty’s hand. Ty let him take it, but there was a long, pointed grumble in his stomach, reminding him that it was past dinner time. Kit laughed and stood more gracefully that Ty had ever seen him move, pulling Ty up with him. “Let’s go get something to eat,” he said. Ty nodded, following Kit to the door, but Church was the first one out of the room and scampering down the hallway with his tail in a question mark as he went. He had clearly done his job for the evening.

#kitty #kitty blackdale #twp #tda #kit herondale #ty blackthorn #livvy blackthorn #ghost!livvy #fanfiction

147 notes · View notes

moulinrouge78-blog · 3 years

Text

Sex fantasies and other surprises - Part 1

Netflix made me do it. This is my first fanfiction contribution ever posted. It’s hot and erotic because I love and live for SMUT. Enjoy.....

They have been together for a year now and he couldn’t be happier. Their long distance relationship isn’t easy but works out pretty well and today wasn’t just the Friday she would come to Capeside to be with him for a long weekend but also their 1st anniversary of being Joey and Pacey the happy in love couple who make it work.

And he’s got a plan. ‚You are a lucky bastard‘ he smiled to himself standing in front of his bathroom mirror getting ready for his drive to Capeside train station where she would arrive in around an hour. The thought about his girl made him feel light headed and gave him electric shivers that went straight down his groin. He looked down and could see his dick standing In excitement. But there was no time for that, first stops where the florist by the harbour and Capeside‘s fine jewellers. One last look in the mirror to ensure he didn’t miss a smudge of shaving cream on his face and his hair sat in place before he turned around grabbing his keys and went out the door. It was barely 9am and the sun was already warm standing high in a cloudless blue sky. The air smelled of seaweed and sand coming from the dunes with the birds chirping in the trees. He went around to his Ford Explorer and looked at the beach, breathing in the fresh air. Three years ago the Dudley‘s passed away and Pacey didn’t hesitate to buy their beach house. While the winters are long and cold just as they are around everywhere in Massachusetts he thought Capeside is the most beautiful place on earth in summer when the weather is like this.

Pacey checked the weather forecast for weeks and this weekend was perfect. He couldn’t stop smiling all the way to the florist and greeted one of the delivery drivers once he parked his car and run over to help the man handling big buckets of Magnolia, Echinacea, Roses, Poppies, Water Lillies, Day Lillies and Pale Grass Pink Orchids.

‚Hey Rob, let me give you a hand‚ he said taking two of the buckets from the struggling man’s arm, nodding at him. ‚Oh thank you Pacey, these flowers don’t look heavy but they certainly are and I am not getting younger‘ Rob said wiping off a thin layer of sweat he felt forming on his forehead. ‚Ah man, you are still as chirpy and not a day older than 45, are you not?‘ Pacey said with a wide grin. ‚Well add another decade to it and you are about right!‘ Rob chuckled returning a friendly smile. ‚Ohh before i forget. Your flowers are ready! Rob said. Ohh brilliant timing. That’s why I am here. Thank you!

Ten minutes later, Pacey left the shop with his wildflower garland made of blue false indigo, bowmen‘s root and peach leaved bluebells. He asked for seasonal wild flowers and the arrangement couldn’t be prettier.

The jewellers was just up the road, 2 traffic lights and 5 minutes away and he suddenly felt very nervous. This was the tricky part he wanted to get right out of all things. He knew how he wanted to propose to the girl who stole his heart. It usually is Dawson’s expertise to do the fluff and romantic stuff, Pacey did lack in this department a little he thought so he took Jen with him a fortnight ago to show her the ring he selected for Joey.

‚What do you think, Lindley?‘ he bit his lip, nervous as hell, hoping it wouldn’t be too bad. Jen stared at the open black velvet box with the tiny yellow pear shaped moissanite diamond in the platinum ring base he picked, bedded on a satin cushion. The ring wasn’t pretentious and simple despite the yellow colour of the stone. He knows Joey doesn’t like gaudy things, keeps it elegant and classy and he respected that, ok who is he kidding? he thought. Joe‘s disgust for trashy things and the want to be authentic and real was adorable and sexy as hell. A sigh escaped Jen’s mouth and than there was a long pause. ‚Uh oh, that bad, Lindley?‘ he asked suddenly his throat terribly dry, not sure if he wanted to get a response from his dear blonde friend next to him. Jen also liked being real and true at all times and usually he admired her for that but today he hopes she’s gentle on him. Jen looked at him and back down to the glass counter where Hilary the sales assistant placed the ring for them to view and her face was not showing any sort of emotion, she looked blank. ‚Listen...Jen...there is still time, I can return it and you...YOU are a women of many tastes, you can help me making the RIGHT decision!‘ He felt frantic, his palms were sweating as he took he reaction as a sign, that this ring was a terrible pick. She finally looked up at him and her face lid up. ‚Oh my god...Pace....this is the most, beautiful ring I have ever seen. Joey truly is a lucky girl!‘ Her voice trembled a little as the emotion kicked in and she hugged him tightly ‚You did well, Witter! ‘ I wonder...‚ What’s that? He asked, breaking their embrace, looking at her happily but confused raising a brow. ‚Does this ring come in a set with earrings, if so I’ll take them!‘ Jen said with a giggle. Pacey laughed at that remark and lightly slapped her shoulder. Ouch, Witter!!! He kissed her head and logged his arm through hers leaving the shop after he paid his deposit. At the train station the clock just outside the station tower read 9:58am. Great 2 more minutes, I am not late.

He quickly checked the arrival table on the monitor and was glad that the train was on time before he made his short way to the platform. With that he heard the chuffing sound of the fast train approaching the platform slowing down until it came to a noisy halt. Passenger‘s got off the train, restricting his view, so he tiptoed and bend his neck. It took him a few moments and he saw her. His heart pounded fast in his chest. It was only a few days ago that they been together but his body reacted like he hasn’t seen her for weeks, months or even years. She stepped off the train, holding onto a small beige hard shell travel trolley with her right hand. She wore a tie front puff sleeve midi dress in light blue with matching hairband holding her hair in a ponytail and white leather sandals with block heel. Each movement made the dress show off her long silky tanned legs. She still hasn’t spotted him, looking from left to right, a puzzled look on her face that made her mouth pout.

Ohh those lips he thought. He could tell she didn’t bother with make up, only a little bit of mascara, a little rogue to make her cheeks glow peachy and a colourless chapstick is all she would use, she was the most beautiful girl he ever laid eyes on and he was glad she finally grown in confidence to see herself not just as a too tall woman with long limbs and feels comfortable in her skin. The tie front of her dress was open a little and he could faintly guess where her chest bone would turn into the bulge of her breasts. His heart skipped a beat and he manoeuvred the best he could into her direction without being seen. She fumbled on the zipper of her trolley standing with her bare back to him. He reached for her waist while his other hand went to her neck placing little kisses onto the bare skin underneath her hairline. ‘Hello gorgeous!’ ‘Mmmm’ was the only vocabulary escaping her lips. She leaned into him, eyes closed and smiling her big smile that drove him insane.

He felt her ass rotating and grinding into his hard bulge ‘Ahhh, Pace happy to see me?’ and suddenly his khaki shorts felt way too tight. His hands holding onto her arms for stability he whispered into her ear, nibbling her lobe and finally resting his chin on her shoulder ‘Ohh Jo, you have no idea. I wouldn’t like anything more than to pull up that fabric of your dress and take you right here, right now giving by passengers a show of their life time.‘

With that he swirled her around and let her fall into his arms, looking deeply in her dark brown eyes. ‘God I missed you, Potter!’ ‘I missed you so much, my sweetheart!’ she whispered back. There it was. Just like that he was on fire. She licked her lips. Her way of saying that she is ready to be kissed. He didn’t need an Invitation to place his lips on hers. Their lips met and she opened just a little to let him in and he darted his tongue around her full mouth, stifling her moan by dancing with her tongue tip. She opened her mouth wider and he took all of her tongue, sucking on it, releasing her and sucking her tip once again, breaking free for air.

‘Let me take you home, before Doug gets send here for sexual assault in public!’ Um, yeah probably not a good idea to be stars of Capeside journal as ‘horny couple set off at train station!’ she said with an amused wink at him. They went for a quick early lunch at the ice house before heading arm in arm to the beach house. Oh my god, Pace you really went trough with it? She gestured at the outdoor shower in the garden as soon as they arrived. This is so cool. It’s not just cool but also practical in the summer after a long shift in the restaurant. Here let me show you. The shower was attached to white wooden panels with hanging baskets for toiletries, soaps, hair care, sponges and even a back rub. Two big yellow towels occupied two of the four metal hooks. The floor was made of deep blue and green mosaics and an anti slip finish. It had a long bench at the side with futon pillows where the water couldn’t reach. For privacy the shower area was secluded by it’s own 8 ft. garden fence made of thick hazel hurdle woven wattle with bushy leafy planters in front of it. The top was free but Joey noticed a handle at the side and a large panel above. ‘What’s that for?’ she wondered.

Ohh this is for chillier evenings to keep the rain out. He turned the handle and a retractable yellow thick shade pulled out. This looks just like...

...the sail of True Love? he finished her sentence, smiling at her. Yes, Joey it’s the same material I used for true love since it’s weather resistance and I like to feel being out of sea while having a shower outside. He smirked. I understand Pace, once a Captain always a Captain. She chuckled. I haven’t used it yet since it just got finished two days ago. But the water is on...here...step back, I’ll show you! Joey stepped back and he turned the shower on. Warm water splashed from the shower head. He was about to turn the shower off but Joey laid his hand on his.

‘Leave it on Pace!’

She unfastened her sandals, slipped them off and untied her hairband. It took him a moment to register what she was doing. He closed the gate and she came towards him, started to unbutton his shirt looking him straight in his eyes. ‘I want to shower with you and feel you!’ He lost his voice and was only able to mumble ‘God Joey, this is one of my fantasies of us!’ ‘I know it’s mine, too’ she replied. She yanked his dark grey shirt off his shoulders and placed it on one of the free hooks. His chest hairs stood in anticipation as she began licking his right nipple over to his left, making them stand. His breathing was now fast and he desperately needed her out of her dress. She suckled on his now hard nipples and he was able to free her arms from the dress, letting it slip to the floor. She stepped out off the dress and tossed it to the side, now opening the zipper of his khakis, pulling the waistband down together with his boxers. A quick ‚Ahhh‘ escaped him. He stood naked in front of her and she let out a high pitched sigh. He was so handsome, his broad shoulders and wide chest, defined long legs and his glory of dark pubic hair and big cock standing to his attention solid for her. Just looking at him sends shivers down her spine to her centre. His size used to concern her but now she just feels all tingly inside looking at him, knowing how good he feels and what electric shocks she experiences when his full length fills her. Pacey went out of his shorts, kicked off his flip flops and pulled her by the slim line of her thin thong pulling her closer with his hands freeing her from the last shed of material that was between them. She reached for his cock and held him tight, kissing his slightly open mouth. He returned the kiss, moaning in her mouth meeting her dancing tongue with his. ‘Mmmm Joey...I love it when you are in this mood, mmm....ahhhh....don’t stop.‘ Pacey was now fully under the shower, her hands rubbing up and down his shaft, his balls hard and heavy. I need to taste you, Pace. ‚I won’t last, Jo‘

‚Than don’t, sweetheart!‘ with that she pulled his skin to expose his juicy cherry and slowly went down as much as her mouth could take, her tongue sucking on the throbbing top, licking up and down his vein, increasing the speed. Ahhh...Fuck...Jo!! His hands got lost in her now wet hair, watching her moving mouth on him. He needed to focus on something else to not burst right there and than. She felt him edging in her mouth, droplets of his salty pre-cum making her vagina quiver. Cupping his full sack, she released his length to take his hard marbles in, licking and sucking on the crinkly skin. ‘Jo, I am so close.’ This was the best foreplay. She was so wet and wanted him to shoot but couldn’t decide where she wanted it. She went fully in the warmth of the shower now. Sitting on the floor, opening her legs as wide as she could, pulling him down with her. Her vagina was on full display, her lips open to show her meaty flesh and her clit erect standing out like a flower bud. Her breath was pitchy, her eyes heavy with lust. She started moving her index and middle finger around her clit, masturbating with swift and fast movements. Jo, you are everybody’s wet dream. You are so gorgeous. He was wanking his cock hard, looking at her delicate flower, kissed her, watched her touching herself, her nipples equally beautiful and erect. This view was all he needed and with a long ‘ahhh Jo, my sweet giiiiirllll, ahhhh...he finally exploded, his load hitting her hard on her open center. She used his juices to rub herself, hissing at the feeling that build in her. He could see her ecstasy, still panting he went down, his nose touching her soft folds so juicy and inviting like a piece of fruit. Her smell mixing with his juices, he inhaled and flickered his tongue out founding her hard clit, his fingers replacing hers, entering her slowly, not letting go off her clit to than lick up and down her slit. Ahhh, Pacey, Yes...there...yes...faster, fuck me harder.

God, what went into her? His cock hardening again, he moved her over to the soft padded bench for her to kneel on. With her ass in the air like that, her hard nipples on standing up and her breasts bouncing, he shoved his hot length in one fast thrust and she cried out ‘Yes, Pace, oh god yes, take me. Don’t hold back. I need it!’ He thrust in and out, hard and forceful, each stroke making her reach closer to the edge. Come for me baby, he said now holding onto her tits, pulling her nipples, thrusting harder like there was no tomorrow.

She was now shrieking

Ahhh... Ohhh.... God.... yes.....yes.... Ahhhh...FUCK....I...Uhh...Ohhh...fuck....Pace....yes

He felt her walls tightening around him....she came like a tornado and with her last quiver, he pushed into her one last time, releasing his hot fluid, collapsing onto her back, trying to fetch his breath.

She was a hot mess...giggling...after 10 minutes or so...

Pace? Yes, Jo? ‘Let’s take a shower now.’

With that he pulled her up, squirting the almond and milk shower gel on the sponge, starting on soaping her arms and shoulders, with a smirk on his lips he said huskily.

‘Your wish is my command, my sweet sexy kitten!’

And just like that her nipples lifted up again. Her not breaking his gaze responded with a wide sheepish smile

‘Ohh boy!’ To Be Continued

#fanfiction JoeyPacey Mature Lemons Graphic

17 notes · View notes

actress4him · 4 years

Text

Whumptober 2020 - Day 9

I've gotten multiple requests (and one threat) for a part 2 of the previous chapter, and since I did enjoy writing that AU and already had somewhat of an idea of how it would continue in my head, I'm gonna try to write one. I'm currently writing Day 23, which means I have several prompt days left I can try to stick it in. If that doesn't work, I'll either do a bonus chapter at the end, or repost that fic separately with the second part added.

This one's definitely another dark one. I may have gotten slightly carried away with the whump. So make sure you check the warnings before you read! There's a lot of them! I also may have gotten slightly carried away with the syntax of these aliens...haha. We've got a little bit of Shiro in here, but mainly it's Red who gets her turn in the spotlight with Keith.

Read on AO3

Read on FFN

Day 9 - “Take Me Instead”/Ritual Sacrifice

Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender

Warnings: human sacrifice, alien religion, a little bit of fantastic racism, non- consensual drug use, lots of non-consensual touching (not sexual), death mention, forced stripping (not sexual), nudity (not sexual), very vague references to child abuse if you squint, drowning, fire, burns, wrist cutting (not self-harm), blood, wishing for death (not actual suicide ideation)

Of all possible ways to be woken up, the sound of Shiro struggling to breathe was certainly not one of Keith’s favorites. He was on his feet the moment his groggy brain realized what he was hearing, but was immediately put into the same headlock that he could see his roommate for the night in. It wasn’t often that someone could get the jump on either one of them. Keith was going to blame the fact that the cowards had struck while they were asleep.

The cowards, in this case, were the Luktorians, a race that had seemed perfectly nice up until this moment. A bit odd, perhaps, and difficult to understand - Lance kept insisting they sounded like drunk Yoda - but peaceful. They had rather human-looking faces, offset by the various shades of blue skin they sported and the fact that they had impossibly long and skinny necks and four arms. It was those four arms that held him in place now, one around his neck, one across his chest and shoulders, and two latched onto his wrists.

“Shh. You Paladin calm yourself must. Harm no mean we you.”

“If you don’t mean us harm, then why are you attacking us in our sleep?” Keith growled.

The alien holding Shiro spoke up. “Need only have we of him. Sleep may you.”

“I don’t think so.” Keith attempted to lunge forward, but made it nowhere. “What do you need him for? You’re not taking anybody anywhere without some answers!”

A slight smile came over the pale blue alien’s face. “Come have you at a time perfect. The night tonight of the sacrifice great is.”

Keith’s brain stuck on one word out of that gibberish. “Wait, sacrifice? What do you mean, what sacrifice?”

The Luktorian behind him bent his long neck forward to look him in the face. “A sacrifice it is for enemies our protection from. Away keeps the Galra the goddess great and harm us others who would.”

“Okay, we can understand that,” Shiro finally broke in, though he seemed to still be struggling with the arm that was around his throat. “But, uh...that’s what Voltron is here to do. Right? We’re making an alliance with your people so that we can keep the Galra away. S-so...maybe you don’t need a sacrifice this time.”

A stormy look came over both the alien’s faces. “Claim do you the goddess great with equal to be?”

“N-no, no, that’s not what I was saying.” Keith was glad that Shiro knew at all what they were accusing, because he was lost, himself. “I’m just...thinking that perhaps your goddess is the one who brought us here. Perhaps she’s already protecting you, using Voltron.”

They seemed to consider this for a moment, and Keith held his breath. “Perhaps,” one answered at last. “Must make we if so the goddess great a sacrifice to thank.”

Keith let out a groan. There didn’t seem to be any way they were getting out of this one easily. But they still hadn’t actually heard what this sacrifice actually entailed, so maybe there was hope yet, though based on the late night choke hold he wasn’t counting on it.

Shiro seemed to be on the same train of thought. “So, um...what exactly do you need us...me...to do? How can I help?”

His captor smiled again, and Keith decided he did not like that look at all. “Quietly must come you prepared the altar for to be. Short running time is.”

Shiro paled visibly even in the dim lighting. “Right. So...I’m the sacrifice.”

Keith lunged again. “No! You’re not sacrificing him, I won’t let you!”

The Luktorian tipped his head to the side and regarded him as if he was a child. “Warrior strong the Paladin Black is and ties to the Galra has close. A candidate perfect is he.”

As Keith continued to struggle, Shiro did his best to lock eyes with him. “Keith, it’s okay. We’ll...we’ll figure this out, it’ll be okay.”

“No, it’s not okay, Shiro!” He had one more thing to try. It was a long shot, and Shiro would hate him for it, but he had to try. “Listen. You want somebody with close ties to the Galra? Then take me.”

“Keith, no!”

He ignored the interruption and made direct eye contact with Shiro’s captor. “Shiro...the Black Paladin...has been hurt by the Galra just as much as your people have, maybe more. His ties to the Galra are like yours. But me…” He sucked in as deep a breath as he could. “I’m part Galra. I’m a warrior, too, and you can’t get any closer to the Galra than me without sacrificing a pure-blooded one. Take me.”

Silence fell as everyone stared at him. Keith stubbornly refused to meet Shiro’s gaze, not wanting to see the pain that would be there.

“The truth think you do tells he?”

“Mm, think I does he.”

A definitive nod. “The sacrifice be then shall the Paladin Red.”

Now it was Shiro’s turn to struggle and lunge. “No! No, I’ll do it, I’ll go with you! I’ll be your sacrifice, okay? Just leave him here, leave him alone!”

Keith gave him a tight half-smile. “It’s okay. It’ll be fine.”

The pale blue alien released his one arm from Shiro’s shoulders so that he could reach into his pocket and pull out a small vial. Popping it open with his thumb, he poured the powdery substance over his captive’s head. “Sleep.”

Immediately Shiro’s eyes dropped shut and his chin slammed into his chest. The Luktorian deposited him gently back onto his bed and threw the blanket back over his legs. “Wake not the others and he will morning until.”

Keith clenched his teeth. Guess that rules out the possibility of screaming and alerting everyone out in the hall.

The royal blue alien holding him moved his top two hands down to grip his upper arms, finally leaving his neck free. “Come. Prepare the altar you for must we. Fight or your mind change not do or back come will we the Paladin Black for.”

Right. Cooperate or lose Shiro. There wasn’t even a debate to be had. He would always, always protect Shiro anytime he had the chance. He was his brother, in everything but blood or law, and he had already been through far too much for someone so young. Don’t you think you dying will be hard for him? He quickly pushed that thought aside. Yes, it would, but not as much as suffering at the hands of more aliens would. Besides, the team needed its leader a lot more than it needed its hotheaded half-breed.

Keith didn’t pay very much attention to their trip through the many intersecting hallways, lost in his head. He only became aware of his surroundings again when they entered a long, narrow room that was lit by torches along the walls and smelled very strongly of something perfumy and definitely not from Earth. Several other Luktorians, all dressed in the same simple white shifts, stood with their hands clasped in front of them, waiting.

His escorts wasted no time in handing him over, holding a brief, whispered conversation with a periwinkle-skinned female before exiting. Periwinkle clapped her hands, and the two that now held his arms, Grey Blue and Sky Blue, pulled him further into the room. He wanted to resist. He wanted to fight and kick and bite and spit so, so badly. All the instincts that he had been cultivating since childhood were shouting in his ear that he should not be letting someone drag him around like this, that he was bound to get hurt soon, but he squashed them back down with one single word. Shiro.

That almost wasn’t enough once they got to the apparent designated spot and Grey and Sky swiftly began stripping him. The shirt was one thing, but when they went for his belt and pants he panicked. “Hey! No, wait, stop, what are you doing?”

Periwinkle appeared in front of him with one eyebrow arched. “Told was I that a sacrifice quiet, good would be you. A problem there is?”

Keith’s shoulders heaved with shaky breaths. For Shiro. For Shiro. For Shiro. “N-no. No...problem.”

“Good.”

The stripping began again immediately. Clenching his fists and squeezing his eyes shut, he sent his mind somewhere far, far away, somewhere that was bright and happy and no one was touching him without his consent. By the time he had finally gotten his mind occupied, he was stark naked and being prodded forward to the next checkpoint.

Paladin. Hurt?

No, Red. I’m...I’m okay.

More Luktorians were waiting for them around an oval-shaped pool of lavender water. As Keith was positioned at the very edge they began chanting something in low voices. He was too busy worrying about what was about to happen to him to try to decipher what they were saying, and with good reason, too. Almost as soon as the chanting began, a set of hands landed on his back and shoved.

Keith could swim, that wasn’t a problem. The pool wasn’t even deep enough to worry about needing to swim, anyway. But the liquid - probably not water, he now realized - was heavy, and pulled him down to the bottom with no chance of fighting his way up. More importantly, it was scalding. He just barely kept himself from opening his mouth and screaming as his skin burned.

An instant later, multiple hands grabbed his arms and yanked him back up into the cool air. He was in the midst of panting for breath and shaking from pain when he was assaulted again, this time with rough sponges that scoured every inch of his body. It was becoming harder and harder to detach himself from reality, and more tempting every moment to punch every single one of these aliens in the face and race back to the safety of his team.

But he couldn’t. He had to stay for Shiro.

Paladin! Come?

No, Red. Stay. You can’t come.

His toes gripped the edge of another pool, this one deep purple, and he at least knew what was coming. More chanting, another shove. This time it was like breaking through an icy lake, making all his muscles seize up instantly. When he was pulled out, he was shivering uncontrollably.

The chanting continued as some kind of oil was poured from an intricately painted vase over his head, turning his already wet body slick and shiny. Lastly, Periwinkle produced a garland of pungent blue and purple flowers - the source of the perfumy smell - and set it carefully atop his hair.

“Ready the sacrifice is. Us let proceed.”

Just before the procession left the room, Grey and Sky wrapped a strip of silky fabric around his hips and knotted it on one side. Well, I’ll die with some of my dignity intact. At least there’s that.

The ceremony was apparently taking place in a cathedral-like space. Strange music was playing as they entered, with the Luktorians deep, humming voices singing along. Hundreds of them were gathered, their waving, bobbing heads almost looking like an ocean.

Directly in front of Keith and his parade was a steep set of stairs leading up to a platform. A Luktorian in heavy purple robes with the deepest blue skin he had seen so far stood at the top, looking down on them. They halted at the foot of the stairs. Deep Blue, probably a priest, was saying something, probably initiating the ceremony, but Keith’s heart was pounding too loudly in his ears for him to hear.

Forward again. Up the stairs - eleven total. Counting them kept his mind off of what was coming, even if it was only for a few seconds. Then they were at the top, and the priest was placing a hand on Keith’s head. Even after everything he had been through over the past hour, the touch still made him flinch.

More indecipherable words as his eyes zoned in on the stone structure looming in the background, oval shaped, like the pools. The altar. Already he could see orange coals glowing in the open space underneath it, and his breathing kicked into high gear.

Of all the ways to die. The fact that it was idiotic and humiliating was bad enough, but now he knew he would die by fire. Just like his dad. Just like his nightmares since he was six.

For Shiro. For Shiro.

Grey and Sky dragged him forward. He was more resistant now, only because his body was momentarily winning over his mind, but no one seemed to care anymore. They lifted him off his feet, holding him up high and parallel to the ground for only a moment before lowering him down onto the metal grate.

This time Keith did scream. The metal had been heating over the coals for who knew how long, and it seared into the bare skin of his back. While he was busy blinking back the tears that sprang to his eyes, straps were expertly tightened over his ankles, thighs, chest, biceps, and throat. His arms had been positioned out away from his body, resting in two troughs that angled down toward the lower part of the altar.

Paladin hurt. I come.

Red...Red no. You can’t. I have to do this...I have to.

A knife flashed in the light over his head and he jumped, jarring the burns on his back. Biting down on his lip, he let out a quiet whine.

I come! Paladin needs.

I...I do need you. But…if you want to help me, then get the others to try to wake their Paladins. You can’t save me until we make sure the others are safe. He didn’t expect it to actually work. Whatever substance the Luktorians had used was probably stronger than a mental bond. But at least maybe it would keep Red occupied, pull her away from having to listen to his panicked thoughts.

The priest was standing over his right side now, the knife he had glimpsed held aloft in his hand. “The sacrifice first now - the blood spilling of.”

Before Keith could think to react, it came swooping down and sliced deep into his wrist. He cried out through gritted teeth. As the priest circled to the other side, he twisted his head as best he could to look down at the damage and saw blood flowing rapidly over his hand and down the trough. A second later, his left wrist was cut open as well.

Already he was growing lightheaded and nauseous. As the priest faced the audience and droned on about who knows what, Keith let his eyes slip shut.

I’m sorry, Shiro. I know you’re gonna be so angry and hurt when you wake up tomorrow. Just remember...I did it because I love you. You’re my brother.

“The sacrifice second now - the flesh burning of.”

His breath hitched and he pressed his lips together, trying not to make any more pathetic noises, but his rapid breathing gave away his terror. He could hear the clunk of wood echoing below him as more fuel was thrown in, and the crunch of coals being stirred. Mere seconds later, a flame flared, and he sobbed despite his efforts as it licked his already raw back.

The Luktorians were chanting again, the whole assembly, and they sounded like a hive of bees in his ears. More flames jumped up, higher and higher. He was full-on weeping now, and he didn’t even care. It was so much worse than his nightmares had ever been. He could only hope now that it would consume him quickly, or that the blood loss would take him first.

Please...please just let me die…

Paladin! We come!

His eyes flew open just in time to see five beautiful, colorful Lions burst through the roof of the cathedral, mouths wide open in a chorus of ferocious roars.

9 notes · View notes

crystalgirl259 · 3 years

Text

The Flame and the Dragon Ch9

Chapter 9: The Boy in the Castle

Kai's amber eyes remained fixed on the huge castle before him. The structure stood dark, curved, and magnificent with an unearthly quality that invited doom, but drew unwary travelers to it like ships to a beacon in a raging storm. The two towers boarding the main castle and the multiple spikes, towers, and spires created a jagged line against the sky. Every gargoyle, every window, every arch, and balcony is a perfect mirror of the castle in Kai's mind.

"This is.." He trailed off, the words dying in his throat; his hands gripped the iron bars of the gate so hard the rust of the iron dug into his hands. The only difference between the two castles was this one was dark and foreboding, while the one he was used to was white and rich with life. "This place was only supposed to be a dream! It can't exist." He tried to tell himself and yet there it was. A perfect dark, mirror-image of the castle he saw every time he closed his eyes.

This was where Lloyd and Nya were trapped?

Shaking his head free of the trance once his gaze fell back on Nya's coat, Kai released his grip on the gate then took a few steps back. With a mighty kick, the gates swung open with a loud screech.

"Come on Flame." He called, but the second his foot stepped through the gates a chill ran through his body, either from coldness or fear. The stallion followed, though was much more cautious in his steps and a look of trepidation in his eyes. Kai scowled to himself. Even the horse thinks coming here is a bad idea. But he ignored his own apprehensions and bolted to the entrance.

"Stay here." He told Flame, before cautious climbing up marble steps. He approached the massive doors of the enormous castle, cautiously. The decoration was more lavish than any Kai had seen. He couldn't even begin to imagine what it must've been like centuries prior without age and weather to wither its contents. Swallowing a lump of hesitation, he pulled on the door knockers. The doors open just as the gate did, and once again, the second he stepped through the doors it was like he'd entered another world.

Despite the castle's outwardly withered appearance, the inside was nothing short of magnificent.

With slight hesitation in his step, the teen took a step down the stunning red carpet. Walls of glass were at both sides of him, hazy from years of neglect and caked with dust. A crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling. He could only imagine how lovely the crystals and glass looked in the sunlight. He came to another set of enormous doors, much nicer and more elaborate than the ones outside. Vines and roses were elegantly carved into the fine oak wood, climbing up the sides of the door and surrounding the stunning carving of what looked like an enormous dragon.

Kai shook his head again, forcing himself to stay focused.

The doors flung open with a mighty shove and again he found himself within the depths of the castle. His eyes widened in shock. He had never imagined the inside, nor had he ever dreamed it, but even he had to agree it was far more magnificent than he could have possibly imagined. The front hall alone was huge and alight with enormous iron and crystal chandeliers filled with burning wax candles. Brass candle holders lined the inner hallway.

The small candle flames bathed the entire front entrance in a pale glow.

A majestic marble staircase spiraled in one direction leading above the first staircase to what looked like a balcony-hallway. The hallways were like crystal-lined marble chambers that could lead anywhere. The ceiling seemed to go up and on forever like a giant cathedral. The chains holding the chandeliers vanished in the darkness. Gargoyles and statues embedded in the huge walls above him were in scattered locations. The darkness and years of dust draped the entire castle in an eerie atmosphere, but the history of the castle itself spoke more than a hundred ancient tomes.

"Hello!" Kai called, hearing his voice echo against the empty hallways. "Does anybody live here? Hello!" He called again. His own voice boomed around him, the only drop of sound among the room of silence. "I'm looking for my brother and sister! Hello!" He tried for the third time but still got no answer. Confident that the castle was indeed abandoned he turned to the left towards the first corridor. He started calling Nya and Lloyd's names, unable to shake the feeling that someone was watching him in the main hallway...

****************

"What on earth were you and Tox thinking, Jay?" The white and black-haired man in disappointment. He also had a goatee and black eyebrows that looked similar to Kai's. He wore a gray and tan robe-like attire with a leather collar and belt. Jay was currently lying on his back, atop the dining room table, since it hadn't been used in well over a century. Ronin was pacing around in front of them. Zane was in the other room talking to the castle's seamstresses to pay them any attention.

"I know! I know! I'm sorry!" Jay apologized but it was muffled by his hands covering his face. He sat up and braced himself on his arms. "Look me in the eye, Neuro, and tell me you could've left them freezing to death in the middle of a storm?" He asked as his dark blue orbs met Neuro's brilliant onyx ones. Neuro sighed, running a hand through his hair. The white and black wings he adorned in his Tengu form flexed and flapped in thought. Even long before he'd come to the castle, it was rare a single dark thought filled his mind or he wished malice on anyone.

The very thought of him leaving two innocents alone to fend for themselves and being able to cope with such a choice was nothing short of laughable.

"No, I couldn't even if I wished to." He sighed, turning his teacup in his hands. Jay slid off the table, and gulped down his cold tea in one gulp, hoping the mixture would ease the stress barraging his mind. Sadly, it did nothing.

"He shouldn't have been so harsh though; if he had only given me two seconds to explain..." The ginger-haired teen muttered as he gripped the table so hard his nails dug into the wood. Rising to his feet, Neuro placed and comforting hand on Jay's shoulder. He knew Jay blamed himself for what happened the previous night and felt guilty.

"I won't deny his decision was and is a dreadful mistake, but you know he has his reasons; he suffers more a day than any of us could ever understand." He said as Jay collapsed in a chair, and crossed his arms.

"Doesn't mean he has to be so harsh!"

"I warned you." Ronin snapped. "Didn't I warn you? I told you he'd react that way!" He exclaimed as he ran his hands through his brown hair and gripped the locks tightly. "What were you thinking, Jay! Bringing them inside is one thing, but what were you thinking! Changing their clothes, letting them sleep on the master's favorite couch, playing with the boy!" He ranted, voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Well, excuse me for trying to be hospitable!" Jay retorted. Neuro sighed in annoyance, doing his best to tune out the two boy's argument, if only for his own sake and sanity...

****************

In the other room, Zane had just finished speaking with the castle's seamstresses by the time Nelson burst into the room, wild with excitement. Nelson was a young boy around Lloyd's age with light brown hair combed to the side. He was wearing a purple sweatshirt with white printed on the back and light blue pants. The seamstress was in her true form, a stunning woman with elegant waves of bleached white hair tied in a bun. Her stunning sharp emerald eyes radiated fierce independence but softened when she saw Nelson.

She always had a soft spot for the younger members of the staff.

"Where are you off to in such a rush?" She asked, sweetly.

"Harumi, Zane, you're not gonna believe this!" Nelson practically bounced with excitement. "There's a boy in the castle!"

"We're aware of that, Nelson; he's in the tower with his sister," Zane responded, without taking his eyes off the clipboard.

"Not them, Zane!" Nelson corrected. "There's another boy in the castle! He's here looking for them!"

"Are you sure?" Harumi asked, eyes wide with surprise.

"I'm positive!"

"That's enough, Nelson!" Zane scolded. "We all have work to do including you; no time for stories."

"But Zane—"

"Enough Nelson!" The yeti snapped, but before Zane could say another word, another servant burst into the room with a wide giddy grin. It was a woman with long black hair that was tied back in a tall ponytail with pale, almost grey skin and violet eyes. She wore a dark purple biker outfit. Harumi jumped in surprise at her sudden entrance.

"Ultra Violet! You'll give me a heart attack!" She scolded her wife. Though Harumi and Ultra Violet were the same age, Violet always acted so much younger.

"What is it, Ultra Violet?" Zane asked, sternly, clearly not in the mood for any more surprises since the previous night.

"THERE'S A BOY IN THE CASTLE! AN ACTUAL BOY!" She shrieked, almost bursting with happiness. Harumi's jaw hit the floor. Zane's eyes bulged out of his skull.

"I told you so!" Nelson screamed with a glare and a wide smirk...

****************

Neuro's hand clenched the teacup and plate so hard it almost shattered. He gritted his teeth and closed his eyes in frustration, unable to decide if he should yell at the two arguing boys in front of him or drag them upstairs by their ears.

"I don't care if the Master is being unfair, that's already been established! Fact is you put them in danger!" Ronin accused.

"Well excuse me for trying to be nice!" Jay retorted meeting the man's angry gaze.

"Figures, the first two people to enter this fucking place in a hundred years, and we get them both imprisoned in a tower for the rest of their lives!" The troll snarled as he turned away and started pulling at his hair in frustration. Jay growled in anger. Neuro slammed the cup down on the table.

"Silence the both of you!" He scolded them both, causing both of them to turn their heads. They knew full well of the temper that was hidden behind Neuro's polite and stoic appearance, but it was still a shock when it surfaced. "If you two do not refrain from arguing this very second, so help me God I will—"

"Nya?" An unfamiliar voice suddenly echoed nearby. All three servants froze and bolted towards the source of the voice, their anger was forgotten. A flash of red passed the dining room entrance. Jay and Ronin met eyes before throwing themselves up and gripping the side of the wall. Their eyes widened and their mouths gaped in shock.

"It's a boy!" Jay announced.

"No, ya think?" Ronin retorted, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

"What is he doing here?" Neuro asked as he blinked in shock, bewilderment, and worry. A giddy smile crossed Jay's face, and he started bouncing up and down in happiness.

"I knew it! I knew it! Don't you see?" He explained dancing around a bewildered Ronin. "He's the one! The one we've been waiting for! The one who's going to break the spell!"

"Jay, we've been through this, you're optimizing again!" Ronin said extremely patiently and panicked as if he were talking to an insane asylum patient.

"And it's paid off!" Jay beamed before he suddenly bounced before dashing to catch up to their guest.

"Wait a minute! Wait a minute!" Neuro called, then cried out in shock when a purple dash crashed into him and another dove over him.

"Sorry, Neuro!" Nelson apologized over his shoulder. Tox bolted after her smaller friend in her naga form, before transforming back into her own human form without halting in her step. Before Neuro could voice a protest, several gusts of wind bolted past him, sending him to the floor again. The first one came from a small glowing pixie with purple wings and a familiar, giddy grin. She was followed by a stunning woman with long white hair, pointed ears, talons for hands and feet, and jade green feathered wings growing from her arms.

Another fairy and a purple naga followed closely behind her.

"Sorry, Neuro, we're in a rush!" The purple pixie, Ultra Violet, called over her thin, amethyst wings.

"What the hell is going on?" Neuro demanded.

"They're a boy in the castle!" The fairy paused in mid-flight to respond, before following the others. Neuro remained sitting on the floor, his jaw slacked in shock, and his eyes bulged with confusion.

"Has everyone lost their minds?"...

#The Flame and the Dragon #beauty and the beast #ninjago #ninjago zane #ninjago cole #ninjago kai #ninjago lloyd #ninjago jay #ninjago nya #ninjago ronin #ninjago harumi #ninjago nelson #ninjago fanfiction

4 notes · View notes

lady-divine-writes · 4 years

Note

I absolutely loved your Halloween fic for GO! Would you be willing to write another one just as sweet?

Hello, nonnie! I’m glad you liked it :) You asked for something sweet specifically, so I came up with a one-shot I hope fits that bill

Tricks or Treats (Rated PG13)

Lydia is about to pack it in for the evening, bid the trick or treaters adieu, when the oddest pair of Halloween revelers come knocking at her door. (1458 words)

Knock-knock-knock!

Knock-knock-knockknock-knockknock-knock-knock!

Lydia shuffles to the front door in her carpet slippers, bowl of candy in hand, rolling her eyes at that obnoxious knock. If she has to listen to another parent pound on her door in a kitschy, song-inspired rhythm, she’s going to start handing out scotch eggs instead of treats.

She swears to God she will.

Knock-knock-knock!

Lydia groans, but stops when, on the other side of the door, she hears a man’s voice say, “Quit it, angel! I’m pretty sure they get the hint. No more knocking needed.”

She smiles at that voice.

It’s smooth, attractive, dripping with sex appeal.

A man with a sexy voice and common sense. A rare commodity these days.

But then she remembers that he called someone angel, which means he’s married, accompanied by their gaggle of kids, and she groans again.

Halloween is definitely not the night to be scoping out hot guys, even if they come right up to her door.

She stops shy of grabbing the doorknob, debating whether or not she’s going to open it. It’s not exactly late – 9:15 at the latest. But considering the swarm she’d had to endure starting at five, she doesn’t think any reasonable adult would blame her for turning her lights out on whoever’s out there, plopping down in front of the tube, and holding her own private Doctor Who marathon while gnawing on what candy is left in the bowl.

She never had kids of her own. Never wanted them. So she never had to endure the yearly ritual of dressing them up like the latest popular cartoon characters and doing the rounds door to door begging for sweets. But for some reason, this year, doing her part by feeding the neighborhood rug-rats became too much too soon.

The urge to go through with Plan Hunker-Down-and-Hide becomes nearly overwhelming when she peeks a few feet to the right and realizes she can’t go through with it.

Not this time.

Not with this batch or trick-or-treaters.

Not because of some deeply invested sense of noble purpose.

But because she’s left her curtains open, and the people on the doorstep can see her standing there, contemplating life.

She only sees the parents – two men standing side by side. The older of the two (she presumes by his white hair) smiles brightly at her and waves. There’s something so wholesome in the twinkle in his eyes. A childlike glee. She doesn’t have the heart to blow him off. Besides, the man he’s standing next to – dressed all in black, tight-fitting jeans and flaming red hair, the perfect dash of sinister to the other man’s sweet – is a little too tempting for her not to see in person.

She squares her shoulders, clears her throat. She walks the two steps to the door and opens it. She smiles down at the two men on the stairs … but that smile sags a tad when she sees it’s just them and no one else.

Not a child in sight.

Normally, she would be thrilled, because that might mean the man in black could be available, but seeing as this is a holiday where the company of children is to be expected, these two men might be whackos.

Or serial killers.

The men are both handsome, but neither in costume. The older gentleman (not too much older than his companion, she realizes now that he’s no longer obscured by her dusty glass window) is dressed entirely in pale cream and sky blue. His well-worn velvet vest reminds her strongly of her nana’s favorite sofa and that puts her at ease. The man beside him, taller and thinner, is dressed like a rich undertaker: snakeskin shoes on his feet and a pair of dark glasses resting on the bridge of his nose she swears she’s seen in the window at Ferragamo, which means they cost way more than she’ll ever be able to afford in her life.

If she had to make a guess, she’d say they’re dressed as an angel and a demon.

She doesn’t know why, given she has no real evidence. It’s just a feeling she gets looking at the two of them.

The man in white holds out a wooden bowl filled to the brim with treats and declares brightly, “Trick or Treat!”

“My ... goodness!” Lydia replies with mild confusion. “Aren’t you two a little old to be trick or treating?”

“Halloween has no age limit,” the man in black says dryly, a line she’s certain his friend has persuaded him to say seeing as the wattage on his smile dials up when he hears it.

“I see ...”

“Here you go, my dear,” the angel (since that’s how she has decided to think of him) says, holding his bowl up higher. “Take what you’d like.”

“Oh! Uh …” Lydia appraises the angel and the demon, more confused than she’s ever been in her life. She’d think the two were playing at something except the angel seems so incandescently happy to be offering her treats, she can’t imagine he’s trying to pull anything over on her. “You’re … giving me candy?

“Yes! You’ve been handing out treats all night long. Don’t you think you deserve a little something?

“Why ... yes!” Lydia chuckles, both touched and bemused. “Thank you for the thought and all, but I already have more candy than I know what to do with!” She holds out her own bowl as evidence.

The man in black steps forward. He slides his glasses down his nose and looks up at her with yellow, slitted eyes. Serpent’s eyes. She bites her lower lip. She was right! At least, half right. He has dressed as a demon – costume contacts and all! “There’s Schnapps in there, too,” he informs her, tilting his head toward the bowl.

Her eyes light up. “You’re kidding! Oh dear God, I’ve been dying for a drink! And I don’t have a drop in the house!”

“You’re welcome to them then,” the angel says.

Lydia looks at the bowl in disbelief. There, lying on top, are five small bottles of Schnapps. But they weren’t there before. She doesn’t think they were. Granted, she only took a quick glance at the bowl when the angel first presented it, but she thought it was filled with chocolate bars, popcorn balls, and peanut brittle. She takes one bottle, but the angel nudges the bowl at her.

“Go ahead and have them all.”

“Really?”

“Absolutely!”

“Thank you!” she says, plucking them out quickly, trying not to appear too greedy in her gratitude. “Oh and they’re peach! Peach is my favorite! How did you …?” Lydia looks at the angel, then the demon, her head shaking slightly. “But you couldn’t have known, right? It’s a lucky coincidence.”

“The bowl knows,” the demon says, tapping his temple.

“That’s right,” the angel concurs. “The bowl does tend to know what people like best.”

“Right,” Lydia says skeptically. It’s a coincidence, she thinks. That’s all. It’s Halloween. And even though these men don’t seem dangerous, they’re probably messing with her a little. Still, there’s no harm in believing that they are what they seem to be – an angel and a demon, carrying a magical bowl from house to house, granting the wishes of tired housewives and maudlin single women. “Well, bless you! Bless you both!”

“You’re very welcome!” the angel says but the demon jerks back, shaking his head and pinching his lips as if he’s suddenly smelt something foul.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah …” He grabs the angel’s elbow and pulls him down the stairs. “Steady on with the blessing there. Enjoy your booze.”

“I will!” Lydia clutches her precious cargo to her chest, fully prepared to pack it in for the evening with no regrets.

“Oh, and enjoy your Doctor Who marathon, my dear,” the angel calls over his shoulder with a wink.

Lydia’s eyes pop. Her mouth drops. In the seconds that follow, she furiously scans her memories of their conversation, searching for the moment she mentioned that was what she was thinking of doing before she opened the door.

But before her scanning has finished she knows – she didn’t make a one.

“Nine has always been my favorite,” the angel continues.

“Really?” the demon says, offering the angel his arm as Lydia watches them start down the street. “I fancy Ten, meself.”

“Oh, no. No no no, dear.”

“Why not? What does Nine got that Ten doesn’t?”

“He’s a bad boy, as they say, with a heart of gold.” The angel chuckles, resting his head on the demon’s shoulder. The demon, for his part, gravitates toward him, his body bowing in the angel’s direction. “It’s my one true weakness, my love.”

#good omens #ineffable husbands #aziraphale x crowley #crowley x aziraphale #frankie writes

132 notes · View notes

fieryfantasybooklover · 4 years

Text

Halos And Hellfire - A Malec angst/sad fic

---------------------------------------------------

Long ago, when the universe was still new, 10 incandescent stars were exiled from the sky for their kindness.

The stars are cold beings that care for nothing and nobody. They burned entire worlds to the ground and enjoyed doing it. Because the primal energy of the universe was harnessed in the stars, and they decided there was no reason they shouldn’t use it. The stars could control all the elements, shift their forms, and teleport. And they used that power. Entire species met their ends in seconds, the last things they saw being terrible waves of fire and horrible all-powerful entities descending from the sky.

These 10 stars were born and they saw the universe for what it was - beautiful and worth saving. Those stars dared to dream, to have faith, to believe. Their thoughts were occupied by dreams of a better life. One where there was something beyond this - an endless stream of death and the cold void of space. These stars tried to save lives, save worlds. Their opinions were not shared by the other stars, so these brilliant entities that only wanted peace were cast from the sky. They fell in the form of gorgeous winged beings. And after falling for a thousand years, they landed.

At first, everything went fine. The star’s DNA altered to fit the environment. The planet was named “Earth” and it was perfect in nearly every way. It was lush and green, filled with water and even a native species to interact with. Half of the angels made their home in the sky, the other half in the underground part of the planet. Everyone lived in peace for some time, an era that became known as the Golden Age. But then there was a betrayal. An underground angel (as they had started to call themselves) clashed with an air dweller over the death of an air angel general. Both sides of the world blamed the other for the death. The force of the conflict nearly brought the planet to the ground.

Everything the stars had fought against for all their lives forced its way into their lives and brought fire and chaos with it. The war raged for nearly 100 years, nearly causing the angels to go extinct. Finally, peace was brokered… if both groups of angels promised to remain in their respective domain and only interact on earth, who’s residents were blissfully unaware of their existence.

As time passed, animosity grew and made itself at home. It grew to the point that the “dark angels” of the ground hated the “light angels” of the sky. The angel children of both sides were taught to hate the “enemy angels” from the time they were born. It remained this way for so long that all hope for happy coexistence seemed lost to the clouds.

*1000 years later*

“Do you have any idea what’s happening?” Catarina asked Magnus. Catarina and Magnus were best friends and high ranked soldiers in the Light King’s army. All the soldiers had been called to the courtyard for a speech from the High General, and were milling around while they waited. “I’ve got absolutely no idea. Maybe the General is finally letting us spruce up the barracks. Of course, me being my fabulous self, has still fought this topic despite the lack of help.” Magnus snarked at Catarina. “How long are you going to be mad at me for that? Just because I chose the improvement of the armory of the improvement of the barracks outward appearance doesn’t mean-”

Magnus shushed her as the General stepped up to his plinth. A hush fell over the crowd as General Charmeine stepped up and cleared his throat. “As you know, all of the soldiers have been summoned here for a speech. I am sure that you are all wondering why. I will not mince words, for as you are about to find out we have very little time.” The general paused and it seemed that every fiber of the world held its breath. “Our sensors have detected 10 bursts of pure undiluted energy emitting from an unknown source. And they are headed straight for this planet. These pulses are scheduled to arrive around this time tomorrow.” The general paused again. “To put it clearly, we have only a day left to live. Along with every single being on this Earth. I hereby release you all from your posts. You are free to live your last day however you wish.”

With that, the General took flight from the plinth, spreading his pale gold feathered wings and soaring off into the night, leaving chaos behind. Magnus stood there shocked, unable to process the devastating axe blow that was this news. Catarina did her bets to rouse him, but Magnus was lost beyond hope. Anger, pain, hate, confusion, and despair were cascading through him, mixing and leaving little room for Magnus to breathe. Moving like a robot, he spread his pure gold wings, a rare color among angels, and took to the skies. Not being able to stand looking at his home of 25 years, he turned to Catarina and spoke. “Caty. You were the best friend I could ever hope for. I wish you all the best in these last hours.” And with that, Magnus took off, flying as fast as he could in an attempt to forget everything he knew and wished he didn’t. That would be the last time he has his best friend.

The poor angels had no idea of the source of the power pulses. In fact, those stars that had once exiled the original 10 angels had found them. And decided to have a little fun. By blowing up yet another planet. Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the world a similar situation was playing out.

Alec spread his wings and took off without a second thought, not even hesitating for his best friend Jace. “How am I supposed to fucking deal with this? I’m told the world is ending and I’m released from my service? What do they want me to do? I’m sure as hell not going to stick around that’s for sure.” As Alec soared through the skies, he spotted a speck of gold on the roof of an extremely tall building in New York City. “Oh god, it’s an air dweller. Well, I have nothing left to lose anyway.” With that Alec began his descent towards the angel that would change his life, no matter how much remained of it.

Magnus stood on top of the building, surveying the skyline of the world that would soon cease to exist. It wasn’t until he heard the quiet swooshing of approaching wings that he realized another angel was approaching. Magnus turned and nearly lost his breath as the approaching angel landed. The angel was clearly dark, marked by the silver ebony runes spidering up his arms. The dark counterpart to Magnus’s silver runes. The angel was tall, dark haired… and unbearably smoking hot. He had breathtaking ebony wings that shimmered and shined with purple, gold, red, blue, and so many other colors. His skin was beautifully tanned and a pair of brooding deep blue eyes stared at Magnus with a thousand years worth of prejudice.

“Ummm… hello?” Magnus managed. “I am assuming you just got the news as well.”

“Yeah. And I don’t want to talk about it. We’re enemies and we always will be. I just don’t want to spend the last day of my life alone.” Magnus, shocked at the brief flash of emotion from this angel with a “Go to hell” attitude, just nodded. Both angels silently took off, with no particular destination in mind. They just needed to fly.

The existential dread faded as the angels soared through the sky, finding it in their hearts to be able to stand each other's presence.

The pair took turns choosing destinations, not even bothering to share names. They toured the Pyramids of Giza, flew over the Great Wall of China, and visited Tikal before finally pausing to rest atop a tree in the Amazon rainforest.

As they lounged, Alec worked up his nerve to speak to the golden vision that had suddenly appeared in his life. He rationalized that it was probably normal to want to talk, to experience, to feel. After all, he was only 25 and about to lose everything he had ever known. “Hey… what’s it like. What’s it like living in the clouds?” Magnus looked over, surprised at the question. “Well… it’s beautiful. Everything is made from white, gold, and silver. The sky is stunning and you get to see the most beautiful sunsets and sunrises. I love to stargaze… the sky is panoramic to the maximum when you’re up as high as we are. When I look at the stars, at the galaxies and the lights that fill the sky, I feel hopeful… but it’s also humbling. It reminds you how small we are to the universe. How much beauty there is beyond this world.”

Alec realized just exactly how beautiful the other angel was, silhouetted against the setting sun, ringed in gold. All of a sudden all the emotions Alec had been suppressing welled up inside him and he had to fight back tears. To stop himself from crying, Alec began talking. “I love living beneath the surface of the Earth. There’s so many mysteries down there that even we don’t know. We build everything from red and black colors, and it’s always warm. We can fly around the endless caverns we build. The kids play there and the teenagers sneak out there to make out. I love the earth. It’s grounding and it’s real. It keeps me tethered to reality.”

Silence echoed between them, but it was considerably more comfortable than it was before. Without a word, the two angels took to the sky to live out the remainder of their lives. Even if it was only 9 hours.

The two angels still did not share their names, even as they explored the catacombs of France, snuck behind massive crashing crystalline waterfalls, and explored the unmapped parts of the Sahara desert. They paused again at the top of Mt. Everest, when the talk turned to romance.

“Did you ever have a girlfriend or a boyfriend?” Magnus asked Alec as they gazed at the breathtaking Himalayas. “For me, it would be a boyfriend. And no, I never had a romantic partner. Us “dark angels” only marry once and it’s for life. I haven’t met that one person yet. What about you?” Alec inquired, gazing at Magnus with a surprisingly open and earnest face. “Well… it isn’t uncommon for us to have more than one lover. We don’t limit ourselves as we believe love is essential. We don’t marry as much, it’s more common to live with somebody and share a relationship and not be married. We don’t like to bind ourselves down with things like marriage.”

With those phrases, a passing on of knowledge to outsides, the barriers between them fell more. The pair took to the sky for the last time. They had less than an hour left to live.

The two angels landed on some unnamed beach. They stood there looking at the sun slowly lowering itself to set over the ocean. There was still no sign of the energy pulses set to destroy the world. As time ticked by and the world edged closer to extinction, neither angel said anything. There was nothing left to say.. Atleast not till they were sure nobody would live to repeat their words.

With under 10 minutes left to live, both started talking, talking over each other and talking like they would never be able to again. Which they wouldn’t.

“I hate the world. It’s full of hate and pain and anger and sometimes I think it would be better off to start over. To wipe the slate clean and hope that some decent race will rise from the ashes. That’s why I bolted when we got the news… because I was scared to admit that I thought it might be better. People destroy far more than they create and there is so much more bad in the world then there is good… and I just-- I GET SICK OF IT. BUT THERE’S NOTHING I CAN DO TO CHANGE IT. And I can’t discuss it with my people - they believe that the world is unconditionally good! And I just can’t see it. Maybe I’ve just seen too much.” Alec stopped his rant, gasping for breath as if he had just run a marathon. Magnus stood there quietly, not judging, agreeing, or disagreeing. It took a minute for Alec to realize that Magnus had started talking.

“I am in a constant never ending battle with the devils in my head. One’s that have never seen the light of day because we do not let people show weakness. Shadows and darkness scream that I’m alone, that nobody is truly there for me. I never had parents - they didn’t want me and I was left on a friend’s doorstep. I was bullied growing up because I was different. It got bad… so bad. But then I pulled myself out of it. I pulled myself out of that pit, that void, just to die young.”

Both of the angels, descendants of ancestors who hated each other, looked at the other in shock. They had just exposed demons to their sworn enemy… and they didn’t even know the other’s name. Silent words flew between them, words that didn’t lie words that told the bare ugly truth. Words that said “I see you I understand you I agree with you. You don’t have to pretend here. You’re allowed to be dark because the world is dark with much to dislike about it.” Words that said “Maybe if things had been different, we could have loved each other. Maybe if there weren’t so many factors stacked against us. Maybe. But we’ll never know.”

With a roaring growing in their ears, the angels decided that there was nothing left to lose, nothing left to prove, nothing left to deny. And in that minute, with crushing finality, their lips met. It was a kiss like a thunderclap, like a lightning strike, a kiss like a sonic boom. It was pure exhilarating freedom and a wild howling wind. A kiss that sounded like thousands of years of hate falling to the ground with roaring and noise. It was a kiss of anger and pain and like-minded souls. It was a burning kiss as Magnus tangled his hands in Alec’s ebony hair and Alec wrapped his arms around Magnus to pull him closer as he ran his hands up and down the golden angel’s back. It was a kiss that silently spoke of what-ifs and maybes and if onlys. It was a final middle finger to the universe and everything that told them what they’re allowed to be. It was a kiss of passion… a kiss of halos and hellfire as the world fell to pieces around them.

Darkness. Darkness and nothing and nothing and darkness.

#malec #magnus bane #alec lightwood #catarina loss #angst #minimal fluff #love #kiss #fire #angels #wings #destruction #stars #magic #megans writing

8 notes · View notes

bribe-the-door · 4 years

Note

If every song from hs2 was a color, what would they be?

[Track 1] Golden

so.... this is “pretty much on the nose” for what color it should be but I see it as sunset golden... except it’s the shadows of the sunset. you know how you try to take pictures on the beach at sunset and it’s all silhouettes? exactly. it’s bright and warm and golden but ALSO dark and an outline of what you’re trying to capture. your [person] is outlined in golden hues and a slight baby pink or bright orange if the sun hits the water just right on the beach... but you can’t see the faces of those in the picture.

[Track 2] Watermelon Sugar

care-free and bright pink. you’re on a beach [again.... sorry] and you’re sleepy in the sun. you have a pink drink in hand [a strawberry daiquiri maybe?] and are dulling the sunlight by way of huge sunglasses because the ocean in front of you is insanely bright blue like the ‘electric blue’ Crayola marker. it’s a song that feels drunk and dizzy and tastes sweet even on the darkest and moody of days. fight me on this. this is my happy song. it is laced with vodka or tequila and only to be thought of as a sunset song. NEXT PLEASE

[Track 3] Adore You

this one is all earth tones... a mossy green, a deep inland lake blue, some rich soil brown, all things to make up a spring-time island. there are slivers of grey and deep heather gray and an occasional metallic gold of sea life below the waters, but also hues of deep red-brown and turquoise (easily confused with black or gray under the ripples of water). it’s grainy like a vintage-film reel and smells of old books.

[Track 4] Lights Up

lights up? it’s dark, y’all. all of the colors are muted and murky, kind of like you’re drunk and trying to make out what is in front of you. it’s a deep green again, a very deep yellow or beige, despite the boldness of the sounds heard. it’s as if you’re trying to fight your way out of murky lake water and as the harmonies grow to be stronger, you’re reaching closer to the top [of the lake/pond/ocean/water]. you can finally take a deep breath of clear air once you come to the top... and it’s a clear pale blue. you made it, babe.

[Track 5] Cherry

this song screams early fall morning to me. it’s foggy, there is a hue over a big field of grey and a slight pink, but it’s too early to tell. soft colors; lilac, an olive green, so many hues of pink and white and the slightest tinge of ice blue. kind of like the most stereotypical farm/field-based Nicholas Sparks movie you can think of, but made it slow-motion and sad and also probably post-rainstorm. there is most definitely a cherry blossom tree in the background and also a small white farmhouse, too.

[Track 6] Falling

periwinkle. violet. a tiny bit of a mustard yellow. the cool hues outweigh the bright character of the yellow without fail but the yellow tries to peak out every so often, clearly outweighed by the darkness of blues and purples. it feels like the morning dew and sticks to you like the humidity of a late summer night before a storm rolls in. you feel clouded by the weight of the world but see an ounce of hope in the peaks of the harmonies, that goddamn yellow peeking though again.

[Track 7] To Be So Lonely

baby blue ONLY for the “little boy” mention. i will not take notes on this. also... this song screams groovy and crunchy colors like burnt orange and a vivid gold color, and also a nice cheery blue. kind of the sky blue you see in cartoons but also a navy blue, too. this isn’t color related but the diversity in instrumentals here is incredible, this song feels like a goddam rainbow, but muted. like a jewel-toned rainbow with some glitter. only because of the use of the phrase “an arrogant son of a bitch”. case closed.

[Track 8] She

smokey and deep red embers of a flame, somehow kept alive by a force unknown. there is a deep purple vibe to this song, too, almost confused by a black or the complete absence of color in the dark of night. there isn’t a single bright thing of this song, save for maybe a spark or fleeting ember from the fire in a blazing orange or yellow. maybe even a white [if things are hot enough]. this song is pink in nature but red in execution, only shown in the light with a deep hue of maroon and gold.

[Track 9] Sunflower Vol. 6

YELLOW! YELLOW! YELLOW! is this even an arguable POINT! it is yellow and orange and bright pink and all things HAPPY because sunflowers are warm and remind me of summer when things are okay and fine and LOVELY. also there is definitely a hint of bright green and blue and a little bit of rainbow sparkle.... but only a little. kind of like only around 1:28-:1:35... you know? it’s sparkly. get out of here if you say it’s not. the “boop boops” are also translucent like bubbles and that’s a FACT

[Track 10] Canyon Moon

transition of afternoon sun to a sunset... like dusk, but a color. oranges and yellows and the preparation that goes into a bonfire. also the golden perfection of a perfectly toasted marshmallow? crisp like the evening breeze... teal and purple with darkness but kept warm by the flames of the lasting embers of the flames in front of you.

[Track 11] Treat People With Kindness (THIS IS MY FAV)

it’s rainbow. don’t even try to fight me on this. this song can only be described as confetti cannons going off at all times. i wish i had more to say but i had too much fun jamming out to this song!!!!! it’s absolute madness!!!! I LOVE THIS SO MUCH!!!! IT’S SO BRIGHT AND NEON AND HAPPY AND I LOVE IT!!!!!!

[Track 12] Fine Line

this one starts as a very, very dark green. it stays that hue for a while but slowly transitions into a brighter blue-green as the song progresses. little glimpses into the future of the melody show itself with golden and pink rays but they’re drowned out by the green-blue until the peak of the song when things transition into “we’ll be alright” over and over and over. it’s like a sunrise after fighting your way through the foliage of a dark night and not sure where you’ll end up. but you make it though it all and finally find the sun... golden and shadowy like this album started as. the change between dark and like are so obvious during this song.

#harry styles #harry styles fine line #fine line #fine line album #harry styles music #music review #synthasia

8 notes · View notes

acraftedmistake · 5 years

Text

A Person Who Has Never Played MCSM Writes A Story About MCSM Chp. 4

Thank you all for your patience! I was so caught up with school stuff (then had to go a week without internet connection rip)! So with all my free time I wrote about double the amount of words I usually wrote per chapter (about 9 PAGES in google docs DANG)! It was gonna be even LONGER but I’m saving that for chapter 5!

Thanks again for your patience! And I hope you enjoy the chapter!! <3

It had been half an hour of walking It didn’t feel that long to Jesse and Olivia, who were too preoccupied with discussing their current situation, but Aiden and Rose felt every one of those thirty minutes. If they weren’t walking beside each other in an irritated, wordless manner, they’d start talking with each other, which would quickly develop into an argument, which would then result in them giving each other the silent treatment. From a bystander’s point of view, Jesse wasn’t necessarily sure if they were progressing or even reached an agreement at any point, but Jesse was hoping that the two of them wouldn’t act this way during the questioning--wouldn’t want that to be awkward. Jesse turned to his friend who was stressing over what had happened in the last hour; the shrine, the carving of the man, Aiden’s attitude, it all seemed like a lot for her at the moment. Olivia had been rambling incoherently, her words merging together as she spoke at a ridiculously fast rate. Jesse had tuned out Olivia’s maunder while observing her; Her eyes darted around as she tugged a lock of her thick black hair with one hand, gesturing with her other hand, moving it about so much that Jesse thought it’d snap off. “... Maybe I’m just overreacting but do you see where I’m coming from? Jesse?” Olivia quickly asked, her voice cracking a little. Jesse stared at her blankly, trying to recall what topic they were going on about, he looked down in embarrassment and opened his mouth, contemplating what to say when Olivia let out a defeated--and worried--whine. “Were you even paying attention?” “It’s not that--I’m sorry I was just keeping an eye on Aiden and Rose, I kinda got lost in my thoughts.” Jesse shoved his hands in his pockets as his ears turned red. Olivia folded her arms, hugging herself, she shook her head “No, don’t be. We’re both worried about this whole... Mess.” Jesse looked ahead, they were getting closer and closer to the town with each step, though it was quite a challenge to properly examine it. From what Jesse could make out, the town looked like a big, black rectangle with a vague gate shaped structure in front of it, a few tips of buildings were peaking above the structure, but that’s about it. The once colorful sky was consumed by hues of dark blue with white specs scattered about; the moon was full, bright and brilliant, acting like a spotlight for the four; had it not been for that, the town would be nearly invisible in the night’s sky. Breaking the moment of silence, Jesse spoke up, “Sooo... Any theories on where we might be?” he kept his eyes on the sky. Olivia tapped her chin and clicked her tongue, “Well, from what we’ve seen so far--and what we’ve experienced--there’s not too much to work with. At first, I thought we just entered a portal which lead to another temple in our world, but- OH JESSE!” she shrieked, Jesse’s heart stopped for a split second, Aiden and Rose stopped walking and spun around. Jesse felt Olivia grab his hand while he felt his foot reach out, landing on absolutely nothing. He brought his eyes down as the weight of his body leaned forward, mere inches from walking straight into a ravine. The fracture on the world’s surface seemed bottomless, the lava and waterfalls that spewed from the sides would keep running down till they were engulfed in the abyss which hid the ground of the chasm. And while Jesse couldn’t see it, his mind was filled with images of hundreds of monstrous spiders and rotting corpses roaming about, He heard desperate gasps--his own heavy breathing--as Olivia slowly pulled him back to her side, a few feet away from the ravine. Clutching his chest with his hand, he felt himself shake like a leaf, staring at what could’ve been his grave with wide, white eyes. “You okay?” Olivia asked, carefully placing her hand on her friend’s shoulder. Jesse nodded once and mouthed the word “thanks”, he took a couple more steps back before continuing their walk towards the town, remaining close by his friend’s side, the vision of the ravine’s drop still fresh in his mind. “Come on Aiden, we’re almost home.” Rose said; Aiden felt his body relax, his jaw unhinged. He was about two meters away from Rose, he must’ve started running--or at the very least, speed walked--to help Jesse, it happened almost on command; he didn’t even need to think about it, which might’ve been why he didn’t notice. “... Right.” Aiden hesitantly turned back to Rose, taking big heavy steps that’d hit the ground with a thud, not making any other sound. Rose, without even glancing at Aiden, asked “You still have some sorta soft spot for him?” in an unamused tone. He didn’t say anything at first, but soon grumbled “I didn’t want Jesse to die before he got back to our place.” Rose, not knowing whether Aiden was upset at himself or at her, decided not to ask anymore questions. Pushing her glasses up, the two of them walked in silence once again. ~~~~~ “JEEZ, that had to have been the eighth rivine we passed by tonight! It’s ridiculous,” Olivia’s head turned towards Jesse’s near death experience. “So- as you were saying?” Jesse attempted to ask in a casual manner, his heart still pounding in his chest, Olivia looked at him, bewildered. “You almost died and you want to continue our conversation?!” “Would you like to hear what your life flashing before your eyes is like instead?” Olivia hesitated, “Uh... Not yet.” Adjusting the oversized leather jacket covering her body, she backtracked and mouthed the bits of their previous conversation that she could remember until a lightbulb went off. “So there’s not too much to work with right now, but my best theory right now is that we’ve found another portal that lead to Sky City. That could explain bits of how Aiden’s acting, he wasn’t happy to see you but he didn’t... Want to... Stab you?” she shrugged uncertainly at her duff attempt at adding humor to the explanation. She glanced at Rose then back at Jesse, “And it’s the only way I could think of who Rose is and why she’s with Aiden. Maybe when everyone left Sky City and started their new life on land, the two met and bonded?” “But Aiden had Gill and Maya, those two would follow him everywhere like puppies. He wouldn’t ditch those two for someone else!” Jesse pointed out, “I know, but there are so many other possibilities, it’s hard to pinpoint an exact answer.” Olivia’s shoulders drooped as her fingers tapped against the leather sleeve quickly, producing a continuous pattering sound. “Maybe Obsidian Town will give us some answers.” Jesse suggested in an effort to give his friend hope. She chuckled, “I just hope they don’t wanna kill us on the spot.” “Alright you two, buddy-buddy time is over, we’re getting close to the town, we’re gonna need to hold your hands--arms again.” Rose announced, her voice echoing throughout the empty field, she leaned over to Aiden and whispered, “There HAS to be a word for the way we hold it.” “What, why?!” Jesse asked as he kept an eye on the girl with glasses, the moon’s light shining on her pale face, the broad man right by her side. “Because-” Before Aiden could start, Rose cut in, “Because unless you want to get an angry horde of people coming after you--OR make our lives much harder, you have no better option.” Jesse caught a glimpse of how far they were from their next location, and it was safe to assume they were only a five minute walk away from the town’s main entrance. He could make out much more of the place than he did before; a tall, dark wall stood proud and most likely surrounded the town, stretching on for--give or take--half a mile. Two, thin watchtowers were on both ends of the wall with dim lights shining from both of them, barely lighting their surrounding area. There was a large arch shaped gate made up of stone and wood; bits of houses and other buildings could be seen. He brought his attention back to Rose and Aiden, who were getting closer to them. Jesse felt himself instinctively take a step back as Aiden approached them. “Fine but,” he clasped his hands together, “Could you not hold it as hard as last time?” “If you make it easy for us, sure. And you know what?” Rose’s tone took a more optimistic, but clearly mocking, tone “If the idea of Aiden holding your sensitive hands bother you so much, I can do it instead!” Without giving Jesse a chance to respond, she forcefully spun him around and grabbed his wrists, her sharp nails digging into his skin. Jesse gritted his teeth and cringed, holding back the urge to say anything in fear that she’d only shove her nails even deeper into his arm. Aiden took notice of Rose’s little interaction but decided against the idea of commenting, not wanting to spark another argument. He turned to Olivia, who already put her hands behind her back, though her body was facing away from the tall man, her face was tilted ever so slightly to see Aiden from the corner of her worried filled eyes. “Alright, let’s go.” Aiden said as he carefully held Olivia’s wrists together; his grip loose enough that Olivia thought she could slip out of his hands--but that was just a thought. Jesse took the time to get a better look at the front of the town’s large gate, which appeared to be in perfect condition, almost as if it were never used. His eyes drifted towards the thick walls and let out a tiny gasp. The entire thing was made out of “... Obsidian...” he mumbled. He heard Rose make a snide comment under her breath. Brushing aside Rose’s commentary, he noticed that they were slowly leaving the dusky, grassy land, as two beams of bright light coming from the top of the gate--most likely from glowstone--shone down upon them. Jesse squinted, looking up at the top of the gateway, he was able to make out the silhouette of two people, but he was unable to decide whether those were guards keeping watch, or just people who happened to be hanging around. Admittingly, Jesse was looking forward to seeing Obsidian Town and its residents. “Put your head down.” Rose ordered, pushing him down with great force, not giving Jesse the chance to react. A bit of Olivia’s hat covered one of his eyes, he wished he could shift it to a more comfortable position, but all he did was sigh to himself as he stared down at the dirt path below them. Olivia, not wanting to get the same treatment as her friend, zipped her head to the ground. The dirt path ended abruptly at a wooden bridge underneath the gate that overshadowed them and hid the light; after that, the floor underneath them was concrete. Jesse could hear the footsteps of citizens roaming about, conversations in the distance, doors opening and closing. As they kept going on, there’d be the occasional “Hello!” to Aiden and Rose, they seemed to be pretty well known--even liked--in this town. No one had said anything to or about Olivia and Jesse, but he could feel all eyes on them, locked onto them like hawks, but there was nothing that could be done except to continue walking in shame like a criminal being escorted to jail. From what little Jesse could make out, the place gave off a friendly feeling; people out in the evening, the streetlamps giving the area a nice, calm lighting, hopefully him and Olivia will get the chance to explore the site. “I don’t think we took too long in there, did we?” Aiden asked Rose, who thought for a second before shaking her head, “Couldn’t have been more than an hour, maybe a little bit less if you exclude the walk to and from the shrine.” “Hopefully the others didn’t get worried and wander off,” he twisted his head at the gate, eyeing the flat land they had walked through.. She shook her head, “No,” she pushed up her glasses, “Gill, maybe, but I’m sure they’re still waiting. Now let’s hurry up, I don’t wanna-” Rose’s talking came to a stop as she let out a quiet, but elongated groan. “Great...” Aiden brought his attention back to the path in front of him and perked up, holding Olivia with one hand, he waved, “Oh, hey Radar!” Jesse froze, he felt his heart pounding in his chest, a weird sense of relief washed over him, thankful that someone who actually liked him was here. Footsteps approached the four, Jesse wanted to see his good friend, glasses and all, but he kept his head down, only able to see Radar’s black, oxford shoes. “Aiden,” Jesse heard Radar’s high pitch voice began, “Ro-” “We’re not on that level of friendship yet, Radar.” Rose stated coldly, adding an icy glare to complete the sentence. Halting for a moment, he folded his arms and continued “Sorry, Cassie... Rose. Moving on,” Radar kept talking, but his words blurred together, everything became muffled and Jesse felt his palms get sweaty. The nails digging into him no longer bothered him, his heart was pounding in his throat as the sound boomed throughout his head. Cassie Rose--a murderer who despised him--was holding onto him, they’ve been interacting this whole time, and he didn’t notice the red flags. His body tensed up, he wanted to rip his arms out of her grip and knock her down, maybe run, but he was sure that doing so would make the situation far worse. Jesse tuned back into the conversation, trying to take his mind off of the reveal so he could remain calm. “... I’m glad you two didn’t take too long at The Shrine of Eyes; when I heard that a green glow was seen, I knew something terrible had happened. What did you find?” what Jesse found peculiar about Radar was, despite sounding like the prelude of a flute, was very monotonic, never shifting from its flat tone. “We didn’t have a chance to see the portal activated, but we DID find these two kids who apparently snuck in.” Aiden nudged Olivia along and started walking, Jesse and Rose soon following behind, “We’re gonna question them with the others.” Radar got close to them, specifically close to Jesse, he leaned close to him, “Do you believe they’re--” Rose shoved the black haired man away, catching him off guard as his glasses slipped down his nose, “Nope. Not apart of the group. We gotta go now.” she gave Jesse a light kick in his ankle, making him speed up just a bit more, “Rose is right, see you tomorrow.” Aiden added, not looking back at Radar. “But how can you be so sure if-” “GoodBYE, Radar.” Rose ended sternly, leaving him behind as he watched them walk away, confused. After traveling roughly a block in silence, with both Olivia and Jesse’s minds racing all over the place, they began slowing down, approaching a three story house, its shape resembling an octagon. The walls were mostly made up of birch wood with spruce planks--probably--dividing up each floor of the house; double doors were front and centered, with small windows on each side. There was another large window in the middle of the house, a faint light from the room shone through the glass, with a couch and small table visible, but that’s all that could be seen for now. The third floor had a window in the center as well, but it was noticeably smaller and had no light source, looking more like a void than anything else. The roof was also made of spruce wood, parts of it hung off the edge, a cobblestone fence at the top. There was also a nice cobblestone fence that was surrounding a small portion in the front of the house, the front yard decorated with a small handful of tulips, lilacs, and roses. Two glowstone lamps were on each side of the house, a good 5 or so feet away, the group stood underneath the lamp on the left side, talking amongst themselves. “We don’t know who’s where in the house,” Aiden started, “Or who’s even there.” Rose added, “Right, so the best thing to do is to call everyone down and just break the news to them.” Aiden turned towards Olivia and Jesse, “I’ll signal you two when you can come inside, it shouldn’t take too long.” Olivia responded with a “Got it!”, while Jesse nodded, albeit a bit sceptical. Aiden and Cassie Rose began heading towards the front door, the redhead faced them, “Don’t move from this spot.” she pierced through Jesse’s eyes, “If you run off, we’ll find you.” she continued walking, but her eyes were still locked onto Jesse, unblinking. The two stood in front of the spruce double doors, discussing something as Olivia and Jesse watched in the distance, the redstone lamp feeling more like a spotlight than a street light. Jesse lifted his head to get a chance to look at a small portion of Obsidian town; most of the town was hidden in the dark, the lights barely illuminating the pathways, some buildings were much more visible than others. Across from Aiden’s house, there was a row of small businesses: A blacksmith, a general store, a place to enchant items, and a library in the middle of them all. What was peculiar about them was that they were all still open, bustling with activity, lights on or music playing. From what could be seen through the windows, people were talking amongst themselves, reading, maybe snacking, it was quite busy for an evening. “Weird that these stores are still open...” Jesse observed, Olivia shuffled a few steps closer to him, “Are we allowed to stop looking down??” “Oh uh- I just kinda- Stopped. Looking down.” he shrugged but immediately shifted focus, “Wait wait wait! What about Cassie Rose!? How crazy is that??” he whisper shouted. Olivia’s eyes went wide, “Oh my gosh- right?! Completely out of nowhere, I’m surprised she didn’t strangle us on the spot.” “Maybe it’s because Aiden was with us,” speaking of, Jesse looked back at the house, Aiden and Cassie Rose were no longer there, the doors were wide open, some of the lights from inside were released, dazzling the tiny garden. Olivia watched the door keenfully, she didn’t want to worry Jesse, but her mind had already raced to several different scenarios where the two of them would be attacked, kidnapped, held hostage--though that’s similar to kidnapping--she couldn’t see any good outcome to this situation. And though she hates to think it, she sort of blames Jesse for wounding them up here. She’s not exactly mad at Jesse, he’s a reliable friend, he’s always there to help out or be a shoulder to lean on, making sure his friends were never down, motivating them--but christ can he never seem to plan ahead. He might consider an option or think about a situation for a moment, but afterwards he’ll dally off to whatever piques his curiosity, or say whatever he feels is right for the problem, not thinking about the consequences. This has led them to getting in h multiple times, including this one. While cautiously keeping an eye on the door, she heard the murmur of a voice, but didn’t pay any mind to it. The voice came again, then suddenly, a hand placed itself on her shoulder and shook her. “Olivia!” Jesse said quietly, “Let’s go.” he motioned towards the doors, Aiden’s--well anything above his chest area--stuck out, his legs still in the house as he waved at them in a somewhat secretive manner. Olivia and Jesse speed walked to the front yard, making sure to avoid the delicate flowers as the sound of a bustling conversation grew more and more loud. Aiden quickly signaled them to “Stop” right before entering the building. He stepped into the house again, the once lively chat died down, a few hushes could be heard, the area fell silent, the faint background music barely filling in the void. Coming out again, Aiden nodded, “Alright, come in. Slowly.” adding a hint of emphasis on “slowly”. Olivia was the first to enter; a living room with two large, light green couches, an armchair to match, and a wall covered with bookshelves from top to bottom sat on the right side of the room, shrouded in darkness, none of the lamps turned on. The same couldn’t be said for the left area of the house, a kitchen with it’s own bar table shone brightly, the metal pieces of the kitchen reflected and glared, and the laminated maple wood floor was polished to the point where you could see your reflection. But the interior was not Olivia’s biggest concern when she looked at who was sitting at the bar table-- There was Stella, who was sitting on one of the tall, cool gray bar stools, her back straight, hands folded in her lap while her pure diamond--almost bleach-like--side cut, hair was resting by her shoulder, hanging about. Sitting next to her was Gill, who wore a t-shirt that faded from a dark blue to white; compared to his loose and comfortable looking khakis, the shirt he wore appeared clingy or tight, stretching/straining against his large build, giving it a more refined shape. He was balancing the stool on its two hind legs; his legs crossed and on the table, one hand on his stomach while the other was stroking his short, brown boxed beard, stubbles leading to his buzz cut hairstyle, which was a little fluffy.. Then there was Maya, who, unlike the other two, was sitting on the table itself, arms folded and legs dangling off the edge. Like Aiden, she had a leather jacket of her own, but it was noticeably thinner, the sleeves rolled up, each one having its own little, golden button, which complimented her hair clip and her black boots with gold colored straps. A bold colored shirt, collar being a bright yellow--along with the bottom--with the rest of the article mostly being candy apple red, helped the big, navy blue “E” stand out in the smack center. ‘Great. This is amazing. It’s not like these people despise me, or wanna throw me off a cliff-’ Olivia thought to herself, her breathing becoming unsteady as she kept opening her closing her increasingly sweating hands. The three stared at Olivia, slack jawed, their faces white as a sheet. Their gaped eyes focused on her, as if they encountered a ghost or some otherworldly creature. Olivia licked her lips, and let out a weak, cracky “Hi...”, uncertain whether or not she should say something to break the tension. Stella’s once stiff posture loosened up as she leaned over the table, as if inspecting the girl, her arms slowly moving out of her lap and onto the top, hands flat and stiff. Her mouth was parted, seeking out the right words to say, but nothing came. Gill almost stumbled out of his chair and--had it not been for his quick reaction--saved himself from falling off. He ended up stepping off and standing still, the bar acting like a border between his friends and Olivia. Maya’s eyes flickered, she scooted herself off of the table, stepping closer to Olivia, who stood as still as a statue, her eyes following the russet haired girl with her eyes. “You weren’t kidding...” Maya finally said, leaning close to the black, curly haired girl, who used Aiden’s jacket as a shell to hide in. Staring back at Aiden, who was leaning against the wall by the door, she continued “This is... ‘Shocking’.” Cassie Rose nodded, “We’re not entirely sure if she’s the ‘real deal’ or not, so don’t get too touchy.” “What??” Gill ran back up to the table--scaring Stella--and slid to the top in such an awkward position that the others thought he would fall off. “How could she not be real?! She’s right there! Right in front of us!” “Yeah, I know but,” Rose adjusted her glasses and turned to the front door, “We have some reasonable doubts.” Aiden rose, the two exchanged a look of agreement towards each other. Sticking his head out the door again, Aiden mumbled “Alright, come in.” to Jesse, who had been against the wall, next to the door outside, listening. Jesse mouthed the word okay as he took the green hat off and held it close to his chest, squeezing it tightly. He wasn’t sure what to expect, he could only make out bits and pieces of whatever was going on inside. He stepped in and the second he passed the doorway, he scanned the dumbfounded and dazed faces along with Olivia’s jittery expression. It felt as though a bomb had dropped in his stomach, a sickly, queasy feeling twisted his guts as he could make out Maya, Gill, and Stella, whose attentions were all on him now. Their once astonished faces shifted to a brief flash of confusion, anger, then finally, wrath.

#minecraft story mode #mcsm #mcsm aiden #mcsm olivia #mcsm jesse #mcsm radar #fanfic #fan fiction #APWHNPMCSMWASAMCSM #AU fic

19 notes · View notes

jamesbucksiclebarnes · 4 years

Photo

Rating: Mature: Language, VIOLENCE.

Chapter List: [1] | [2] | [3] | [4] | [5] | [6] | [7] | [8] | [9] | [10] | [11] | [12] | [13] | [14] | [15] | [16] | [17] | [18] | [19]

[AO3 Link] | [Fic Page]

Tag List: @crossbowking, @khaleesislytherin

SERIES SUMMARY:

"Not human. She was not human. They all knew it. Could almost feel it, but couldn't make sense of it. That was why they were afraid. Not because of what she used to be Before. But because of what she was now."

Having found herself serving as the right-hand to the Governor for too long, Synnove le Jacques does her best to make things right with the people of the Prison. Stuck beside her partner in crime, her irritatingly obnoxious and hideously problematic best friend, Merle, she does her best to fight back against the monster she has let the Governor become.

CHAPTER TITLE: The Harvesting of Gore.

After barricading the doors with the hideous lime green sofas we had found in the living room, the five of us decided it was best to scavenge through the place whilst we figured out our next move. I was pretty confident both the back and front entrances would hold quite firm against the biters gathered outside, especially if we remained relatively quiet. Sooner or later, they would lose interest, get distracted by another sound off in the distance somewhere. Either that, or Sasha would come back with help. It wouldn’t take her long to realise something had gone wrong. We were all pretty confident about that, which meant the most we could do right now was wait it out.

Ty and Michonne took the first floor whilst Glenn decided to try is luck in the large garage that connected to the western side of the building. Daryl and I ascended the rickety wooden staircase to scavenge through the second floor.

It didn’t take us long to realise there was little there in the way of helpful supplies. After all, most of the rooms upstairs were bedrooms, bathrooms, of a very sparse office space that was practically useless to us. Still, we decided it wouldn’t hurt to bring back some clothing, even some books from the study if we could.

The largest bedroom – besides the main – belonged to what I assumed were teenage sisters. Twins, by the look of it. Their clothing was all the same size, as were their shoes, though the aesthetic of which were practically polar opposite to one another. The sister whose bed rested against the north western wall of the room seemed to have an unhealthy obsession with the colour pink. A series of posters hung from the plaster beside her pink-duvet-ed bed, two of which were of a boy band of which I had some familiarity, and the other was from a fashion magazine. You could tell by looking from one side of the room to the other that these sisters had been vastly different people.

The second sister’s duvet cover was of a dark night sky, her pillows depicting what looked like a still image of a werewolf howling at the moon. Clothing was already scattered across her side of the room, all dark in colour, mostly black. The shoes were another story altogether. This girl had three sets of Goth boots. Three! I mean, power to her, but those shoes were like two-to-three hundred dollars a pair. She must have worked her ass off in order to afford three of them. Besides those, there were a set of runners I knew would likely fit Beth, and a pair of gumboots – or rubber boots, whatever you want to call them – that could come in handy.

I began to put everything together in one giant pile in the centre of the room. Everything I believed would be beneficial to bring back. It felt kind of weird rummaging through their underwear draw, but honestly? We needed them more than they did.

I was halfway through the first sister’s obnoxiously large collection of pink lace underwear when I felt Daryl’s presence in the doorway.

Turning in place, I held up one of the near-fluorescent magenta bralettes and gave him a wide grin. “Isn’t this just the perfect birthday gift for you? It’ll really bring out your eyes.”

Daryl snorted a laugh, leaning against the doorframe and crossing his arms over his chest as he watched me place the bralette on the ever-growing pile in the centre of the room. “Found anything?”

I gestured to said pile with a grin.

Daryl cocked a brow. “We’re gonna need a damn truck for all that.”

“Never doubt a teenage girl’s ability to overstock their closet,” I remarked with a breathy chuckle, stepping around the pile and moving toward him. “What about you?”

He shrugged one shoulder non-committedly. “Little bits. Ain’t much.”

“Better than nothing at all,” I remarked, to which he gave a nod that did not seem all that convincing. With a frown, I stepped closer to him, tilting my head slightly to catch his lowered gaze. “You okay?”

He nodded, but again, it wasn’t even remotely convincing.

“Hey. What’s wrong?”

His gaze slowly lifted to meet mine as his lips spread into a thin line. A muscle in his jaw tensed before he took in a long breath and blew it out through his nose with a shake of his head. “Ain’t nothin’.”

“Oh, it’s something,” I responded, stepping close enough to reach out and touch the bare skin of his shoulder. “Tell me.”

He sniffed before clearing his throat, swallowing back against something I couldn’t quite decipher. “Just… It’s a kids room, ya know?”

My expression softened and I closed my eyes for a fraction of a second before nodding. I understood. It was difficult sometimes to see the remnants of other people’s lives, as dead and splayed open as a corpse on the morticians table. The people that had lived here may well still be alive out there, but the truth of the matter was that the possibility was unlikely. It was never pleasant to think about the sheer amount of death and destruction that had been wrought by this world within the past year. All of the children that would grow up without parents. All of the children that would never grow up at all. My heart constricted painfully in my chest as I looked up at Daryl’s saddened gaze, fingers squeezing the muscles of his shoulder in an attempt to comfort him.

“Yeah. I know.” I took in a deep breath through my nose. “Want me to take it? You can go look through the master, I haven’t even touched that yet.”

Daryl shook his head, but I could in his eyes that he wanted to take me up on the offer. He just didn’t want to admit it.

“Daryl. Go to the master.”

He glanced up at me, slightly startled by the hard, commanding tone in my voice, but the way his expression softened – relaxed, even – at the realization that I was only doing this so he would wouldn’t have to admit being disturbed by the ghost of a child, made me smile.

With a solemn nod, he pushed himself off the doorframe and began to make his way down to the opposite end of the hall, at the pale white door behind which housed the master bedroom. I watched him until he disappeared inside before stepping into the hall myself, turning to look across at the open door of the child’s bedroom.

Something hard stuck in my throat, but I forced myself to swallow it back down as I crossed the hall and stepped inside, taking a deep breath through my nose. The distinct tang of plastic and stale air made me blink. The room was small, with dark blue painted walls and a single bay window that overlooked the eastern fields. A small single bed sat against the northern wall, covered by a dusty Toy Story blanket. The sight of it made me smile slightly, though it faded quite quickly when I remembered the what world we lived in.

Taking a deep breath, I moved further into the room, stepping over to the small wardrobe that had been pushed up against the southern wall. I pulled the draws open and began to rummage through the small clothing, pulling out a good handful and placing it on the dusty bed.

Judith was growing unnervingly quick. Soon enough, she would outgrow the clothes she currently had, and would need more. These toddler-sized outfits would fit her soon enough. Better to be prepared for the future, right?

I was partway through rummaging around in the toybox beneath the windowsill when I saw it. It had barely been a glance through the dusted windowpane, but the glimmering silver of the shed out in the paddock caught my undivided attention almost instantly. Even from this distance, I could almost clearly see the tractor sitting beneath the metallic awning, shielded from the mid-day sun, and the rotary blades that attached to the vehicles front.

The idea began to solidify inside my head before I even had the forethought to truly inspect how idiotic it was.

I closed the toybox and climbed atop its lid, balancing on my knees whilst I peered down, through the window, at the ocean of biters gathered around the base of the house. The distance between the edge of the crowd and the grassy expanse of clear ground behind them was… quite far. It would be a difficult jump, likely too far for a regular human to even dream of making. An Olympian athlete, perhaps, but just a normal, everyday person? No. Definitely not.

While I may not have been an Olympian, I was, in fact, not a regular human, either. I was quite confident I could make that jump.

Without taking a moment to really consider it, I reached out and unlatched the dusty window and pushed it open. All at once, the sounds of groaning biters flowed in through the open space, hitting me with enough force to make me pause in my plans.

During that brief moment of indecision, the sounds of meandering biters drew Daryl’s attention from down the hall. He came striding down the wooden floorboards, appearing in the doorway to see me kneeling by the open window.

“The hell you doin’?” he asked in a hissed whisper.

He closed the distance between us, reaching out to slam the window shut before I had a chance to even blink. The sound of the wooden window frame hitting the sill drew the attention of a handful of biters, causing a surge in attempt to claw their way through the front windows and doors. Thankfully, after waiting with bated breath for a moment, it became clear the barricade and glass were holding.

Daryl turned to look at me, one knee still atop the toybox, his hands pressed against the wooden windowsill. “The hell was that?”

I pointed out to the tractor. “See that?”

“What?”

“There. The tractor.”

“A’ight. Great. The hell do I care about a damn tractor?”

“It’s one of those spinny-death-blade tractors.” I grinned at him. “Think about how many biters we’d cut down with that thing.”

Daryl looked at me blankly for a moment before his brows furrowed. “It’s a what?”

“It’s got those rotating blades at the front of it, look.” I pointed toward it again, knowing full well he was already aware of where it was, and smiled wider. “I could get out there and hot-wire the fucker.”

“Hell no,” Daryl hissed, pushing away from the window and standing before the toybox with a deep frown. “You’ll get yourself killed.”

I straightened, turning on my knees to look at him. “Just think about how easily that thing will cut through the literal ocean of biters down there. We’d be out of here in a hot minute.”

“Ain’t worth it.” Daryl shook his head, staring down at me with a mix of concern and irritation.

I leant back against the heels of my feet, looking up at him with a pouted frown. For some reason, his instantaneous denouncement of my idea had struck me slightly off guard. I’d expected him to agree, to tell me to go for it. We both knew it’d be dangerous, but surely he trusted I wouldn’t attempt something that I thought I wouldn’t be able to do. But, then, it hit me. This was Daryl.

This wasn’t Merle.

Merle would have leapt on the idea, encouraged me, even. He would have told me how much he wished he had a damn video camera so he could immortally capture my stupid, gory shenanigans on film. The prospect of driving a rotary tractor through a crowd of undead would have excited him. He would have wanted to watch the entire thing from the safety of the overhanging eave, laughing the whole time as he yelled out stupid jokes and moronic commentary on my driving skills.

I felt my face fall before I had a chance to stop it. My gaze slid away from Daryl’s, down to the floor for a brief moment before I took a deep breath and turned in place to look back out the window, mostly to avoid him catching a glimpse at my sudden sorrowful expression.

I think he kind of realised my train of thought before I even had.

Slowly, he sunk down into a sitting position on the empty side of the toybox, turning his head to look at me with a sad frown. “I ain’t him.”

My eyes met his. “I know,” I said. There was no disappointment in my voice, only an undertone of thinly veiled grief.

“I ain’t gonna agree to somethin’ that dangerous just ‘cause it’d be cool to watch,” he continued with a sigh.

“It so would be, though,” I breathed, turning back around in order to sit properly next to him. My booted feet rested against the floorboards beside his, toes tapping against the wood. “I know you’re not him, and I’ve never wanted you to be. You know that, right?”

Daryl swallowed as he nodded his understanding, resting his forearms against his knees and leaning forwards. “I used to want to be like him. Followed him around like a damn dog.”

“Isn’t that just a younger sibling thing?” I asked, cocking a brow.

Daryl snorted, glancing up at me. “I don’t know. Is it?”

“The hell would I know?”

He straightened partially. “You ain’t got any?”

I averted my gaze, looking across the room to the empty doorway with small frown. “That’s… a complicated question.”

His lack of response drew me to look at him, seeing the question in his eyes before he even needed to voice it.

I cleared my throat. “I was, uh… I was adopted. My biological parents, they had other kids to other partners, but… Yeah, it’s hard to explain.” Which was true. The fact that my biological parents were as inhuman as I was made talking about them like the vocal equivalent to walking on black ice. I had to tread carefully each time I mentioned them – which, thankfully, wasn’t often. Most people that knew me were aware of my distaste for speaking on such things. In fact, I usually refused to talk about it in general, but, for some reason, it was oddly easier for me to say these things to Daryl than it was to anyone else.

I really didn’t want to ponder as to why that was.

“We ain’t got nothin’ else to do,” Daryl said softly after a moment.

“There are many things we could do other than talk about my clusterfuck of a childhood,” I stated simply, waving a hand to gesture toward nothing in particular.

“Like what?” he asked.

“Like… Like…” I lifted a hand, holding up a finger to indicate he give me a second to think.

The gesture made him snort a soft laugh.

“Like, play cards,” I said after a moment.

“Cards?”

“Cards. Or, alternatively, we could find some elastic and make a slingshot to fire random novelty items into the crowd of biters?”

“Again, I ain’t my brother,” Daryl responded, but this time it was more in jest than sadness.

“Don’t bullshit me, you’d enjoy that.”

We both laughed softly for a moment before taking near simultaneous deep breaths and sighing. The silence slowly blanketed the room, enabling me the ability to hear Michonne and Ty rummaging around in the lower level of the house. That, and the sudden, unexplained crashing sound that echoed through the house with enough volume to shake the walls.

Both Daryl and I shot up instantly, making short work of the distance between us and the doorway. We dashed down the hall to the railing that looked over the staircase just in time to catch Michonne and Ty bounding up the steps with a panicked Glenn a few paces behind. The sounds of biters filled the air, along with scuffling footsteps as they shuffled their way into the house from the direction of the garage.

I didn’t hesitate, grabbing Daryl’s arm and yanking him back down the hall toward the twin’s bedroom. Michonne, Ty and Glenn followed frantically behind. Once we were all inside, Glenn slammed the door whilst Michonne and Ty pulled the dark bed across to block the door. Barely a second after they’d pushed the bed in place, a resounding thud struck wood on the other side. Quickly followed by another and another, until the wood began to crack and the frame of the bed began to slide across the floorboards.

That was not going to hold.

Without another moment of hesitation, I snatched both Daryl and Glenn’s arms and began to drag them toward the window I’d entered through earlier. I could hear both Michonne and Tyreese following along behind me as I guided Glenn through the open window and onto the overhanging eave on the other side. Michonne followed quickly behind him.

The door began to buckle beneath the onslaught of the dead behind it, the force of it pushing the wooden posts of the bed against the floorboards with a sickening sound.

We all looked between one another, at a loss for what to do next. There was little room for us to fight as a unit. Michonne was just as likely to slice up one of us as she was to eliminate one of the dead with that sword of hers, given the close quarters.

I turned around in place to take in our surroundings, my mind running through a multitude of different scenarios at once, none of which ended in a particularly pretty way.

Until I spotted the window. The one I had climbed through no more than an hour ago.

Without hesitation, I latched onto both Daryl and Glenn’s upper arms and began to pull them toward the other side of the room, only letting go in order to unlatch the window and push it open. I shouted over my shoulder at the other two as I pushed Glenn none-too-gently out the now-open window, reaching out to do the same to Daryl. He pulled away, giving me a pointed look and waved his hand toward the window, gesturing for me to go first.

There was no time for this.

With an exasperated sigh out my nose, I turned to Michonne. “Go through, help Glenn.”

She, thankfully, did as I asked.

“See, it’s easy,” I remarked to Daryl, waving at him to follow along behind her. “Go.”

He ground his teeth but stepped through the window frame just as the doorway to the bedroom gave way. The wood split and crumbled, sending a wave of biters spilling out, onto the mattress blocking their way.

As quick as I could, I reached out and grabbed the back of Tyreese’s shirt, yanking him backwards and away from the undead. He stumbled slightly, but once I’d pulled him past me and toward the window, I steadied him with a hand on his upper arm.

“Go,” I instructed, using my free hand to pull a blade free. “Now. Don’t argue.”

He didn’t. It looked almost as if he wanted to, but he didn’t.

Daryl helped pull the hulking man through the window as quickly as humanly possible, all but pushing him aside in order to reach back through the window and grab my arm.

The dead were scrambling to get back up onto their feet, though most of them fell forwards once they gained their footing, unbalanced by the mattress. Those that had made it across the bed and onto the floorboards were more fortunate in their attempts.

I barely managed to slide across the windowsill in time to avoid being grabbed, though the momentum of the biters attempt brought it through the window alongside me.

My back hit the tiled eave. The biter came sailing through the window, angled to land almost perfectly on top of me. Of course, I’d thankfully read the situation almost perfectly and managed to raise my legs in preparation.

Once the biter landed on the soles of my boots, I launched it over my head, sending it sailing across the eave and down to the ground below.

Without another moment of hesitation, I rolled to the side, barely avoiding a second biter. Daryl reached down and helped me up onto my feet, pulling both of us back a few paces as a flood of biters began to slide through the open window and onto the eave alongside us.

Behind me, Glenn cursed.

I turned to Daryl, pointing up to the second story rooftop with the hand that wasn’t currently holding a knife. “Get up there.”

He pursed his lips in disapproval, knowing I planned to stay down here, but thankfully didn’t argue this time. Nodding to the others, Daryl tossed his crossbow up onto the roof before jumping and grabbing hold of the guttering.

Once he had hoisted himself up onto the second story rooftop, he reached down to assist Michonne. The two of them then offered their hands to lift Glenn up, leaving Tyrese and I on the first story eave.

One biter pushed through the window, able to wiggle itself free of the crowd that had basically began to plug the hole, toppling over onto the dark roofing brick. It was followed shortly by another. And then, another.

I didn’t waste any more time. The things were slow to get back up onto their feet, I knew that. Smacking Tyrese on the shoulder to get his attention, I lowered myself into a partial crouch and linked my hands together to give him a hoist. He gave me disbelieving look and shook his head.

I scoffed.

It was an understandable reaction, of course. I was a one-hundred-and-sixty pound twenty-four year old, that was true. But that weight was mostly muscle and my body clearly displayed that.

“Just fucking do it, big man,” I hissed, nodding toward my entwined hands.

He let out a sigh, gave me a concerned look, but reached up to grab Daryl’s outstretched hand as he placed his boot in my palms. The man was goddamn heavy, I’d give him that, but with Michonne’s help on his other arm, the three of us managed to lift him up onto the second story roof.

I didn’t get a chance to follow behind him. The biters from earlier had reached us mere seconds after Ty had pulled his leg back over the above ledge. Their outstretched hands reached for me, but I ducked out of the way quite easily, slipping past them until I was on the opposite side of the window from the others. More of them tumbled through the open window, climbing up clumsily onto their feet before shuffling their way toward me. A few of them miss-stepped, unsettling the tiles beneath their feet and sending their stupid asses sliding down, over the edge of the eave and to the ground below.

I continued stepping further and further back as the biters approached. Each step was careful, my inhuman instincts telling me that the edge was rapidly coming up behind me.

It was when I reached the corner and glanced behind me to make sure my feet weren’t going to slip over the edge that I noticed it.

The silver metal glinted in the noonday sun, striking with such a blinding light that my attention was immediately caught, gaze flicking over to its source. Over in the neighbouring field, sitting, alone, unloved, in that three-walled cage… was the rotary tractor.

I looked up at Daryl, who had been shuffling along the rooftop above in order to keep step with me. He saw the mad grin on my face and gave me a very pointed look.

“Syn,” he warned.

I only grinned wider, glancing back over my shoulder toward the farm shed in the distance. There was little in the way of obstacles, if I were being honest. Now that the majority of biters had been drawn inside, the grassy lawn that surrounded the farmhouse was practically empty. The fields still had a few stragglers, sure, but they were of little consequence to me.

“Syn!”

I ignored Daryl’s disapproving plea, taking off at a sprint, carefully placing my feet upon the rooftop tiles until I came to the corner of the next corner of the eave. Without hesitation, I leapt forward and into the empty air.

The ground came up fast beneath me. I expertly absorbed the impact, allowing my legs to bend and my body to roll along the grass before easily jumping back onto my feet and continuing my sprint in an almost fluid motion, turning in place to face the overgrown field between me and that shiny, shiny metal.

Above the wind cascading through my hair, above the sounds of gurgled biters, I heard Glenn let out a, “Go Syn!” and found myself laughing.

I ducked and slid beneath the biters dotting the lawn between the house and the fields, avoiding their outstretched arms with little effort. The fallen barbed wire fence glinted in the midday sun. I jumped over it and continued on in my sprint toward the farm shed.

A smile broke across my face, wide and unrestrained. God, it felt good to run. The wind in my hair, cooling the skin of my face, the sensation of speed as my legs carried me across the ground in long, rhythmic bounds. Even the feel of the long grass brushing against my sides as I cut through it like a knife, was almost euphoric. When had been the last time I’d run for the sake of running? When it hadn’t been for my or someone else’s survival?

Too damn long.

I reached the shed with little in the way of interference.

The tractor sat with its wheels behind wooden planks, the rotary blades connected by a long and admittedly complicated-looking attachment that extended from the engine. Its green paint was faded and flaking, the metal frame that acted as a guard above the driver’s seat was rusted almost entirely through, and the divots inside the tyres had actual spider webs spun within them. A moment of doubt made me pause and frown as I looked at this mess of a machine. It passed quickly and I stepped forward and began to remove the wooden planks from before the wheels, climbing up into the driver’s seat and letting out a breathy laugh.

This was going to be awesome.

If I could start the damn thing.

It took some fiddling. More than I would ever readily admit. But, eventually, I found the wires I needed, hidden away in the small gap between the barely-held-in-place bonnet and the long pole that lead to the driver’s wheel. Expertly, I used my knife to strip their ends and touched them tentatively together.

The tractor roared to life; the purr of its engine almost deafening. I let out a mad cackle before using the rusted metal of the guard to climb into the driver’s seat. The long gear stick slid into place with a painful amount of grinding, but once the thing got moving, it got moving. It was a bumpy ride, that was for sure, but I enjoyed every goddamn minute of it. Making my way through the long grass, I searched the dashboard in front of me for the right button to start the rotary blades. Thankfully, whoever had owned this block of land seemed to have the memory of a goldfish, if all the labelling on the dash was of any indication.

As I drew closer to the farmhouse, some of the biters came tumbling out of the front door, their attention caught by the deafening sound of the tractor’s shuddering motor. I waited until I had cleared the barbed wire to press the button clearly marked “Blades”.

They spun to life with a metallic purr, slowly at first, but gaining momentum by the second.

The first biter that stumbled in front of me was eviscerated so quickly, I barely had a chance to use my forearm to block my face from the spray of blood and gore.

I let out another mad cackle. “Fuck yeah!”

From that moment on, I drove around the farmhouse in a neat circle, taking out biter after biter with my spinning blades of death, and gaining quite the little tag-along crew behind me as I went. Above me, on the rooftop, the other three watched my antics with a mixture of expressions.

Daryl looked slightly concerned, though the expression was partially obscured by the small smile that had formed on his face. Michonne just looked straight up amused, whilst Tyrese seemed to be confused as to whether he should be disgusted or just happy I was willing to almost literally bathe myself in biter guts to save their asses.

Glenn, of course, was not shy in his blatant enjoyment. He and Michonne yelled out encouragements, pointed out biters that I may have missed from my vantage point, and laughed with each of my exclamations as my tractor and I tore through the undead like an oversized, portable blender.

Bits of biter were being thrown about in all directions, coating me in an immeasurable amount of undead viscera. Honestly, though. It didn’t even bother me. I was having way too much fun.

Morbid though it may have been, cutting through a group of bloodthirsty undead creatures with a rotary tractor was rapidly becoming the highlight of my entire year.

By the time I caught up to the back end of the train of biters following along behind me, the sun was practically beginning to set. I sped up a gear, using the open end of the dirt driveway to turn around, and began to run through the train of biters with increased sped. My mad cackling was almost louder than the tractor engine, though I had to stop quite suddenly as the spray of blood and guts was getting dangerously close to my open mouth.

Gross.

I was right at the end of the line of biters when the old tractor’s engine made a loud clanging sound and sputtered out of commission. A handful of biters were left, shuffling toward me at a very unimpressive speed. Half of them marched right into the exposed blades of the now-stationary rotary, impaling themselves. It was almost comical.

I reached out to grab either side of the rusted metal guard in front of me and pulled myself up, climbing atop the thin bonnet of the tractor. A few of the biters had managed to walk around the pointy thing and were now working on surrounding me. The first one to reach the side of the tractor dropped before they even had a chance to reach up for me.

Daryl.

I could see the lime green nock sticking out the back of the biter’s skull.

Drawing the blades from my belt once again, I slid down the side of the tractor’s bonnet, landing with one of my knives already imbedded at the crown of a biter’s head. I pulled it out and kicked the limp body, sending it sprawling into the three biters currently in between me and the front door of the farmhouse. They all fell backwards in a heap and I stepped forward, driving my blade into each of them one by one whilst they were on their backs.

Straightening as I pulled my knife free of the last one, I took a moment to look around. The dirt was stained almost completely red now, with pits of viscera and gore splattered about the once pristine lawn. Even the white wooden panels that made up the entirety of the farmhouse’s exterior was splattered with crimson.

I’d made a damn mess. And it was absolutely, disgustingly awesome.

Barely more than five biters were left. They milled about on the other side of the tractor, making their way diligently toward me. It took little effort to dispatch four of them, with Daryl taking the final one out with another arrow.

Once I had collected the two he had fired, I began to make my way toward the farmhouse door, sliding past the red car I’d unceremoniously parked by the stairs. I heard their footsteps as the three of them began to make their way back inside, through the upstairs window, whilst I cleared out the handful of biters that had remained on the ground floor.

Glenn’s voice echoed through the house as he reached the bottom stair, catching sight of me standing in the archway that lead to the living room. “That was awesome! You – Oh, my God. You look like a horror movie.”

I glanced down at my clothes, once black and grey, now completely covered in blood and small chunks of gore. Reaching up, I plucked what appeared to be part of an ear that had been caught on the edge of my jacket pocket’s zipper and flicked it outside. “Risk of the trade, my friend.”

I reached up to rub my hand over my face. My palm came away sticky. Gross.

“I do not want to know what my hair looks like right now,” I remarked with a grimace. Getting blood out of near white-blonde hair was a bona fide nightmare.

Michonne and Ty reached the bottom of the staircase next, coming to a stop when they spotted me.

“If Carrie were a sister,” Tyrese said, partially in disgust, partially in amusement. I don’t think even he knew how he felt about what he had just watched transpire. “You’d look like her right now.”

Michonne moved to the side as Daryl reached the ground floor, allowing him to pass by as I lifted the hand holding his arrows up toward him.

“That was stupid,” he grunted as he snatched them from my grip.

“But awesome.”

He didn’t respond, but the way his eyes lightened slightly, and the corner of his thin lip twitched upward told me he somewhat agreed. Without a word, he reached into his back pocket and pulled the red cloth he always kept there out, handing it to me.

“Good thing Hayden got the showers working,” Glenn remarked with a grin, stepping closer to me and running his forefinger along the sleeve of my jacket. It came away wet and crimson, which made his grin turn to a grimace.

I laughed, lifting Daryl’s cloth up to wipe some of the blood from around my eyes, lips, and beneath my nose. The smell was probably the worst part, worse than even the sensation of blood and gore on my skin. It was irritatingly sticky. The sleeve of my jacket would stick to the leather body whenever I moved, and my jeans felt extra uncomfortable when I walked. Still, the smell of rotting gore was not pleasant, especially not to an overly sensitive nose like mine.

“Come on,” Michonne said after a moment, stepping past us toward the front door. “We should load up the car and get the hell out of here.”

#the walking dead #twd #the walking dead fanfic #twd fanfic #the walking dead fan fic #twd fan fic #the walking dead fanfiction #twd fanfiction #the monsters among us #daryl dixon #michonne #tyreese williams #glenn rhee #biters #walkers #synnove le jacques #fanfic #fanfiction

7 notes · View notes