#Cloud understands the assignment and knocks it out of the park every time | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

leon-scott-kennedy · 4 years ago

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Frostbitten

Chreon, Rated-T

Read on Ao3

Leon had barely kicked off his unbroken-in boots and flopped face-first on his bed when his phone rang. He groaned. Getting called back to the training field might kill him. Every inch of his body ached and throbbed after taking a literal beating for the last ten hours; he couldn’t be bothered to change out of his sweaty clothes, let alone shower. USSTRATCOM training was tough and the instructors tougher, but this was precisely what he had signed up for, a chance to help people, to make sure that Raccoon City never happened again.

The handset slid out of the cradle when Leon smacked it in his blind search. It hit the floor with a clunk, half suspended by the cord.

“Shit.”Leon grabbed the phone and rolled onto his back. “This better be important.”

“Rough day?”

Leon sat up, a lump forming in the back of his throat. “Chris?”

Weeks ago, Leon tracked down Chris long enough to send an email warning him that Claire had gotten herself into some deep shit and needed a hand, and then handily tacked on his new number in a hastily added PS. But, unfortunately, Leon himself was a bit busy with his so-called new job, which so far consisted of him having his ass handed to him on a regular basis, and he hadn’t been in contact with Chris or Claire since Raccoon City two months ago.

Honestly, Leon had hoped the Redfield siblings had found each other and were off chasing Umbrella and saving the world together, but apparently not. Coupled with Leon and Sherry having seemingly disappeared off the face of the planet for weeks, Chris had been a little desperate when Leon finally managed to send an encrypted email.

“How’s it going, rookie?”

Leon snorted and flopped back on the mattress, tucking his free arm behind his head, his fatigue melting away. “Oh, you know.”

“That good, huh. I know you can’t tell me what’s going on, but are you okay?”

Always with the tough questions. Leon sighed, but his stomach gave a funny little flip. “I’ll have to get back to you on that.”

“I definitely owe you one.”

“I think we’re about even.” Leon wasted nights alone in bed thinking about the night he spent buried against Chris Redfield’s chest, arms wrapped protectively around him as he fell apart when Raccoon City was still a smouldering ruin on the horizon. Leon yearned for that level of comfort and warmth. “Did you find her?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I found her. But, we lost someone.”

Leon’s chest ached. How many people was that now? How many people had they lost in this war that they hadn’t even been aware they were fighting. Umbrella destroyed so many lives; hurt so many people. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too.”

Condolences - apology, solace, commiseration - hung thick in the air between them, so many words left unsaid. I’m sorry I couldn’t help you. I’m sorry I left, that I abandoned you when you needed me; I wish you were here.

“How’s Sherry?”

“She’s good,” Leon lied. His stomach clenched painfully at the thought of the little girl he and Claire had managed to save from the city. The one thing Leon had done right.

Except, the first thing the government had done was take Sherry from Leon, separated them, interrogated him for days until they finally held her life above his head like a guillotine. His visitation remained few and far between, but she was alive and well taken care of, and that’s what mattered. Even if she’d traded one lab for another.

“Good. That’s good. Listen, Claire and I are back home getting things in order, but we both want to see you. Without you, I wouldn’t have found her.”

“Chris, seriously. It was nothing. I just passed on the information I had.” Leon twirled his finger absentmindedly in the phone cord. “I couldn’t get to her, but knew you could. I’m glad you found her.”

“You’re in DC, right?”

“What? Yeah. Listen, Chris-” Leon tried.

“We’re going to drive down for the weekend before we fly back to England next week. We’re putting together a team, but Claire really wants to see you. I want to see you. I need to thank you.”

Leon scrubbed his hand across his mouth and stared helplessly up at the stucco ceiling. Chris wasn’t going to take no for an answer, not that Leon wanted him to. On the contrary, he wanted to see them as badly as they wanted to see him.

“The weekend should be fine,” Leon said. “I usually have them off unless they decide to airdrop me into the center of a national park with nothing but a combat knife and a flask. I mean, no guarantees, but, you know.”

“Jesus Christ, Leon. What have you gotten yourself into?”

Leon grimaced. “Unfortunately, that’s classified.”

“I sure as hell hope you know what you’re doing.” That made two of them, but Sherry’s life hung in the balance.

Chris and Leon hashed out tentative plans for the weekend. Claire and Chris would drive the nine hours down from Franklin County on Friday, which Leon found insane. Nine hours trapped in a vehicle with their sibling for a dude they barely knew, only to be met with disappointment because Leon wouldn’t be whatever they expected. All the same, he’d let them crash at his place for the weekend, and then they’d fly out of the Dulles International Sunday evening.

Warmth blossomed in Leon’s chest; hope. Things weren’t ideal. Yes, he’d been coerced into the service of his country, but he wanted to do what he couldn’t in Raccoon City; save people, make Umbrella pay for their crimes. Maybe he could have done that alongside friends, allies, or Chris. Instead, the acute loneliness tingled in the back of his mind, a constant reminder that he had been abandoned. Not on purpose, no, but his naivety showed weakness.

The call ended with a promise, like their last separation, a reluctance to part, but a promise of companionship, of warmth, of friendship that was almost destined to end in grief. Leon couldn’t help the anticipation that bloomed.

Leon noisily clattered the headset back into the cradle and took stock of his tiny bedroom cluttered with dirty clothes, plates, a half-empty glass of water, and first aid supplies. “Fuck.”

Cleaning the apartment wouldn’t be so bad considering his severe lack of possessions, and he had three days before visitors arrived. Not that either of the Redfield’s would care about the clutter and shortage of furniture. If anything, they would understand. So much had been lost the day Racoon City disappeared in a mushroom cloud. Still, he tidied every moment he had between beatings, lectures, and exams.

Friday morning, the apartment was shockingly spotless except for the freshly used coffee mug in the sink. Loading it into the half-empty dishwasher wouldn’t have been all that difficult if Leon wasn’t already running behind schedule. The commute to the training center took twenty minutes on a good day if he obeyed all traffic laws.

Today likely wouldn’t be one of those days since he was due for roll-call in seven minutes, which seemed pointlessly ridiculous as he was the only agent in training. But the government liked to make him jump through hoops, literally.

Each course they had him run became increasingly complex and ludicrous to the point that Leon failed more than ninety percent of the time. With each fall, one instructor that he didn’t know the name of, only called Sir, yelled “dead” as if it wasn’t already abundantly clear that one mistake would be a death sentence in the field. Something he probably knew that better than the assholes pulling the strings. None of the big wigs had lived the hell he lived, seen what he had seen, and relived what he relived every night alone twisted in the sheets of his bed.

By the time Leon trudged through the front door of his tiny apartment, two hours later than planned, his entire side was mottled blue and purple from the fresh thrashing at the hands of his close combat instructor. His hand to hand had improved the most over the last month with the help of his natural flexibility and agility that earned him a few jokes about how he should have joined the circus. But they were impressed.

Nothing about his training was normal, even he knew that. Nothing like the Anti-Umbrella Pursuit and Investigation Team had been formed before, people had never been reanimated from the dead by a virus before, and they were trying to prepare him for the worst. A nightmare they had never experienced themselves, but he had.

The phone rang. Leon groaned, staggering as he pivoted where he had been about to face-plant on the couch, and headed for the phone in the bedroom.

“Hello?” Leon said, almost certain it was Agent Benford with a new brutal assignment. He sagged onto the bed in relief, curling onto his side when the increasingly familiar greeting of ‘hey, rookie” rumbled in his ear. “Chris.”

“Thank god. Where have you been? This is the fourth time we tried calling.”

“Sorry, sorry.” Leon groaned as his side twinged. “Got, uh, caught up at the... office.”

“You sound like you’re in rough shape.”

Leon hummed. “Been worse.” A sad truth.

“We were calling to say we’re an hour out, but now that’s more like ten minutes,” Chris said, and Claire shouted something unintelligible in the background. “Oh, right. Remind me to give you this number. Claire made me get one of those Nokias so she can keep track of me.”

Claire screeched indignantly, and Leon snickered. ��I’ve got a pager,” he offered as consolation. All that much easier to be at the government’s beck and call, but if Chris ever needed him, or Claire, or Sherry.

Leon rattled off a few quick directions to get the Redfield’s to his place, then hung up the phone and rolled out of bed to shower. The hot water stung the fresh bruising, his muscles ached, but he felt human the more he scrubbed away the sweat and grime.

The buzzer for the front door rang as Leon eased a fresh t-shirt on over his head; his shoulder twinged, but he limped over to buzz them up.

A few minutes later, since the building’s elevator took years because of the ‘historic’ value as the real estate agent had put it, someone knocked at the door in a frantic staccato. Leon swung the door open, hair still damp, and was immediately tackled in a hug.

Fight or flight kicked in, Leon’s brain came back online in fits and started in time to hug the small woman hugging him tightly rather than throw her over his shoulder. Claire’s mouth ran a mile a minute. Apparently, he had been missed, and Claire didn’t appear to want to release him anytime soon if the creaking of his ribs were anything to go by.

Leon stared helplessly over her head at Chris, who laughed, but pried his sister off Leon so he could drag him in a hug too. Chris enveloped Leon in a bear hug. That level of high alert that itched in the back of his mind for months ebbed, not disappeared, but faded enough that Leon enjoyed the moment, squeezing Chris back just as tight.

“Come in,” Leon said as he stepped back and waved them into his tiny apartment. “It’s not much, but, you know.”

Claire and Chris shucked their shoes and jackets and wandered into the apartment. Claire scrutinized every little detail or lack thereof. Decoration wasn’t exactly at the top of Leon’s priorities. Nevertheless, he had what he needed: a couch, a TV, a coffee table that doubled as his kitchen table, and a mattress in the bedroom. No bedframe, but he wasn’t picky. Clean sheets and a blanket, and he was good to go.

“It’s, ahh...” Chris trailed off as he glanced around the sparse room.

“What are you, a squatter?” Claire cut in. She stood in front of the mostly empty closet she’d opened.

“Okay, I was going to say it’s a bit Spartan,” Chris said. He slapped a comforting hand on Leon’s shoulder. “Can’t be easy to start all over from nothing, again.”

Leon rubbed the back of his neck, shoulders slumped. “I did warn you guys. Not much to do.”

Chris hummed, his hand dropping from Leon’s shoulder as he wandered off to the kitchen. “You got beer?” The fridge was stocked with two six-packs of cheap beer, a bottle of ketchup, a carton of 2%, and eggs.

“I’ll order food,” Claire said, glancing around, but the phone wasn’t in sight. Leon directed her to the bedroom, where his mattress sat on the floor against the wall. “Jesus Christ, Leon, is that a milk crate?” Clearly, she’d found the bedside table with the phone and takeout menus.

Groaning, Leon sank down onto his couch and buried his face in his hands. The cushions sank beside him as a much larger body sat down. Leon peeked out from between his fingers at Chris, who smiled sadly at him.

“If you need anything-” Chris started.

“I’m fine.” Leon ran his fingers through his damp hair and slouched so his elbows rested on his knees. “Not a lot of time to do much these days, you know, between the daily ass kickings and memorizing a million and one protocols.”

Chris mirrored Leon’s posture. “You could always come with us.”

Leon shook his head.

“Leon-”

“I can’t,” Leon snapped in time for Claire to walk out of the bedroom.

For a second, Claire paused, eyes bouncing between the heavy tension that hung between them. “I ordered Chinese. Did I miss something?”

“No,” Chris and Leon said at the same time.

The food didn’t take long to arrive. The delivery guy, already familiar with Leon’s apartment, joked that he had company for once. The restaurant had even thrown in some free spring rolls for one of their best customers. Sad, considering he’d only been in DC for a little over a month.

The three of them settled on the couch together; Leon squashed in the middle of the sofa, pressed against Chris because Claire had claimed one end with her feet up and tucked her toes under Leon’s thigh. They’d settled for a cheesy action movie they found flipping through channels, something with a bus that couldn’t stop, but ignored it in favour of light conversion, mostly Claire. Neither Chris nor Leon were much in the way of conversationalists. Still, Chris offered a tidbit here and there, and Leon hummed along, nodding when need be, and occasionally offered the occasional dry joke that had Chris and Claire in stitches. Chris nearly snorted beer out his nose when he made an off-the-cuff remark about the first day always being the easiest.

Pleasantly buzzed from a few beers and noodles heavy in his belly, Leon began to nod off, his head helplessly bobbing with the weight of fatigue.

Distantly, Leon heard a chuckle. His head plopped down on the closest shoulder, broad and warm, and the last thing he remembered was Claire wiggling her toes under his thigh and giggling.

When Leon woke up to his bladder screaming, the apartment was dark. For a brief second, he panicked when he discovered his mobility restricted, but his foggy mind pieced together the clues to form a complete picture. He was still on the couch, curled into Chris’ side, nose pressed into Chris’ neck. The arm slung around Leon’s shoulder held in him what couldn’t be mistaken for anything other than a secure embrace. They were barely covered by what Leon quickly realized was the thin comforter from his bed because Claire, curled up on the other end of the couch, had stolen most of the blanket, leaving Chris and Leon with a tiny corner.

Leon eased himself out of Chris’ protective hold and slipped off the couch, tucking Chris back under the blanket so he could escape to the safety of the bathroom in what was becoming a pattern. Wake up cuddled with a man he barely knew, panic, then flee.

The moonlight through the clouded window lit the bathroom enough for Leon to piss and wash his hands without hitting the light. He stood, hands braced on the edge of the sink, staring at his reflection in the mirror. The bags under his eyes were lighter, and his hair was a wild tangle after falling asleep with it still damp. Even if he looked less tired, he was exhausted. He shivered. DC winters were colder than he was used to.

Shuffling back into the living room, Leon found Claire stretched further out on the couch, having used Leon’s absence to steal the very little room Leon had occupied beside Chris. “That seems about right,” he said, then jumped when Chris’ head popped up from where it had been stretched out against the back of the couch. “Oh! Sorry, I can just...” Leon waved vaguely back down the hall towards his bedroom.

Chris lifted his corner of the blanket in invitation.

“I don’t want to be a bother,” Leon argued, rubbing his arm. “I can just sleep in my bed.”

“Isn’t this your blanket?” Chris asked.

Leon shivered in the cool December chill. “It’s not that cold.”

“Leon.”

Leon slunk back to the couch under Chris’ watchful gaze and tried to find space, but Claire’s sprawl left no room for Leon to squeeze back into. He hovered for a moment, uncertain of how to proceed, but the choice was taken from him when Chris grabbed him around the middle and hauled him down over his lap. Leon squawked, slapping a hand over his mouth. His butt nestled between the arm of the couch and Chris’ thigh, his legs thrown over Chris’ lap.

For almost a full minute, Leon stared at Chris open-mouthed, unable to do anything but blink like a startled owl while his attacker shook with silent laughter.

“Cat got your tongue, rookie?” Chris snickered.

Never one to back down from a challenge, Leon snapped his jaw closed, pursed his lips and purposefully flung an arm around Chris’ shoulders before wiggling until he was burrowed tightly into the warmth of Chris’ side like a kitten. Still, it took a few minutes for Leon to relax enough to sink into the heat of the body beneath him, Chris grinning a challenge to him. Leon rolled his eyes and stuck the cold tip of his nose into Chris’ neck.

“Christ, Kennedy,” Chris said as a stilted shudder ran through him, but wrapped Leon in an inflexible hug like the first night they met, the night Leon’s anxiety and doubt demanded the comfort of another person, the night he still dreamt about. “What are you? Part snowman?”

“Popsicle, but thanks for asking,” Leon mumbled.

Tucked under a small corner of the worn comforter he found in a thrift shop his first night in the city, Leon tilted headfirst into the satisfaction and comfort of Chris Redfield. Most men would have balked at even the idea of cuddling with another man, but Leon had never been like other men. He’d learned early in life to take comfort where he could because kindness was often isolated incidents of empathy.

The smell of coffee tickled Leon’s nose. He was hot, a little too hot, and a little sweaty, but he was comfortable, safe. He pressed into the warmth, groaning quiet contentment when the heat squeezed back until a sharp snort and a giggle shocked him into alertness like a splash of ice water.

Leon’s eyes snapped open. Claire grinned at him from the far end of the couch, legs pulled up to sit cross-legged, hand curled around a steaming mug of coffee. “Morning.”

Ao3

#chreon #leon s kennedy #chris redfield #claire redfield #resident evil fanfic

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minghaoss-archive · 6 years ago

Text

of hues, of blues - m

summary ↯

wherein heartbreak teaches you to love again.

pairing ↯

xu minghao x fem reader

genre ↯

oneshot, angst, smut

and just a smidge of fluff hah!

word count ↯

6.811 words

alternative universe↯

friends with benefits to lovers, hanahaki disease.

warnings ↯

blood, vomiting, explicit sexual content.

author’s note ↯

idk this is absolute filth + a little attempt at poetry. im so sorry this is abysmal.

Surprises are not Xu Minghao’s cup of tea.

He realises this at a very young age.

When he’s riding a bike for the first time, schooling himself to grow accustomed to the unsteady glide of the vehicle. Looking out of the corner of his eye like this, a myriad of colours begin to collect in his peripheral vision. He can smell the freshly cut grass, see the enlarging manicured bushes lazing out in dusted gold, bathed in morning dew, the sight of his parents sat out on a picnic mat and he thinks he’s almost made it - just a little longer. He smiles and then grins and laughs and giggles, feeling as if he had grown wings. Then the world spins in a whirlpool of chartreuse canopies and he falls.

When he grows up, however, surprises are less dramatic but not quite different in proving to be a great displeasure to him.

When he’s 22, for starters, surprises are Seokmin’s ear damaging ‘Happy Birthday!’, a room full of people he can’t seem to recognise and an obligation to stick around talking absently about nothing when all he was planning to do was curl up in bed with a freshly minted copy of an unread book.

At 22, surprises are red coloured bars which tell him he has failed his painting course when he was sure he’d aced it.

At 22, surprises are finding catharsis for his sour mood in giving into Mingyu’s constant nagging requesting his rare presence at a stupid college party.

You arise from a blur of crimson lights and sweaty strangers. Like a newborn phoenix. A mere haze of dark clothes; a stark contrast to the vibrant tints pulsing around you, press a cool beer can to his chest and press a sloppy kiss to your mouth, as a consequence of a childish game of spin the bottle.

It’s right then that he knows that this is comprised of nothing but carnal desire. This isn’t what Minghao wants, he knows this, he wants something everything to mean something more but he just can’t help himself. The aching loneliness in him demands to be fulfilled, by something, just anything.

He shouldn’t follow you upstairs. In fact, he shouldn’t follow you anywhere. He shouldn’t press your back up against an unfamiliar bedroom door and push the hem of your outfit upwards.

Or hiss when you touch him.

Or rut his hips into yours. Or listen to the quivering moans billowing past your chapped lips, Or slide his fingers around your throat,

( a loll of your head, a sigh, his name tumbling from your lips.)

But he does anyway. He wants to.

The next morning, Minghao wakes up to a head splitting hangover. And a very, very empty bed. He kicks off the piss yellow sheets and glares at the cracked paint on Hansol’s ceiling.

When was the last time someone was in this room? Had he made you up? Definitely not.

The imprint of your body, a ghost, begs to differ. He reaches out and smoothes it over. Whatever. Minghao isn’t in the best mood.

Surprises are not his cup of tea.

....

The next meeting is at the college fair.

“You want a flower?” You lean your head to the side, hunched over the stall and he tells you a meek yes, “Those..ones.” gesturing to the pretty blues around which your hair curls.

Minghao may not know a lot but he knows it would be something ridiculous to miss, the gentle graze of your fingers against his ear when you place the pretty ring of blue atop his head.

“They’re called..?” He trails, running his finger along its slender stem. Maybe it’s the rings around your eyes or the way you bite the inside of your mouth, the subtle quality that of being peculiar makes him want to look at you longer than he should. It piques his interest.

“They’re hydrangeas.“ You supply. Minghao nods. Observing the way your nose crinkles and how you purse your lips when you think.

“I’ve never properly introduced myself.” smiling your endearing smile, you snap him right out of his thoughts. The kind of jolt one feels when they dream of falling. Mischievous eyes. Wondering eyes.

“We should..” You pause, swallowing down a chunk of words. Gaze downcast. It takes him awhile to understand that you are anxious, bashful even. Interlaced hands. Clammy. But sharp eyes. “We should do it again sometime.”

Your dealings with Minghao are so frequent that thinks he can’t quite imagine what his life would be like without it happening again.

By now he can tell your silhouette apart from everyone else’s. If he spreads his palms on your lower back and sucks on your neck, you hum and groan. If he wants, he can tell you exactly where every mark, indentation, valley and curve on your body is.

He’s been staring at an empty canvas for a while now, ideas jumbled, colours appearing together behind his lids and turning to a confusing mix of everything and nothing at all.

He’s listened to Chopin to a point where he’s convinced he can compose the andagios and allegros all by himself.

He's looked for inspiration in between violets and the cerulean sky and poetry, of course.

But it’s no use.

At the end of the day, Minghao only drowns in a sea of unfinished assignments; wallowing purposelessly in the tangerine glow of his makeshift studio, heavily caffeinated.

You coax him out the day Mingyu calls you. Dramatising his best friend’s state with a kiddish pout and flailing arms.

Minghao follows you around like a lost puppy. Resting his chin on your shoulder when you cook him a proper meal, fingers dancing along your apron. Distracted. It’s moments like these that truly confuse you; the care with which he kisses your cheek and the roughness with which he undresses you after.

What do the spaces between these differences, the oceans and hills, the softness of his sighs and the harshness of his grunts, even mean? Whatever. You haven’t fucked in a week or two.

The easel stems from the floor and curls around his primed canvas like a rose plant, thorns, pointed leaves, soft, blushing petals and he feels like he’s looking at his own reflection, devoid of ideas, faceless, empty, spotless.

Then suddenly, sighing, with a loll of his head, Minghao glances back at the bed, your bare body; streaks of rosy dusk splattered on your thighs, oranges and yellows smudged along your cheeks, the subtle rise and fall of your chest with every breath you take. A sliver of the rising sun. Summer air.

He touches his paintbrush after weeks and refuses to let go until all he can see is a waltz of reds and blues, a spin of everything he feels when he touches you. Your face. The gaps between your ribs.

He thinks, if anyone asks, he could talk about it for a good few days.

Minghao passes the semester with flying colours.

This is what happens, Jeonghan’s car grumbles, the air conditioning isn’t working and Minghao is too tall to sit with two other people at the back but he doesn’t mind because your knees are touching.

The wind blows your hair back in messy tufts. You’ve cut it shorter, upto your neck. He decides he likes it better that way.

There’s an Air Supply song playing in the background. Hansol smiles knowingly, glancing at you from the corner of his eye, his palms pressed firmly against the steering wheel. “That’s our song.” He says.

Then the car is still for a second. But suddenly you kick off your sneakers, bare feet on leather seats.

You giggle and giggle and giggle.

Tips of your fingers smudged of acrylic clouds. Patches of trees melting away into the amethyst sky. The sun sinking back into a blonde horizon. You’re singing loud. Laughing. You haven’t laughed this hard in a long time. The kind of laugh gives you a stomach ache. The kind of laugh that you think about for days.

Minghao thinks you’re beautiful like this.

He shouldn’t.

It’s not right.

He takes a photo.

...

We are only as remembered as long as we want to be found. Breadcrumbs. We are only remembered if we leave something behind.

The art of disappearing is something Xu Minghao is a master of, perhaps. Sometimes he turns off his phone and lies on park benches and tries to think of ways he could fit the world in his palms, mold it out of acrylic and entrap it in a picture. He is a sorcerer of sorts and magic only brews in solitude. In secret. When no one can hear him say his incantations. It’s a secret between him and the universe.

He leaves not a trace during these periods of artistry. No texts. No confusing social media applications. No boorish human beings. No hindrances.

Minghao doesn’t leave the studio for days. Not until all he sees is black and white. A monochromatic world. When bursts and explosions of platinum lightning have oozed out of the grey sky.

He rushes over to your apartment. Chasing thunderbolts. Desperate. A rainy day. A yellow bus. A knock. Two knocks. Three knocks. He arrives always. In search of colours.

You press your mouth to his before he can step foot into your room, words said between frantic kisses.

“God, where were you?” You say and he thinks you almost sound angry. His duffle bag drops with a soft thud.

He pulls your stringy dress off with a harsh tug. Hands skimming over the curve of your waist, your breasts, your skin. Goosebumps all over.

He tugs you closer by the heels of your feet. Hunching forward. Kissing you. Greedy fingers leaving you bare, shivering and craving in their wake.

A trail of sloppy kisses from the curve of your ribs to the slope of your stomach. Minghao’s fingers rest on your inner thighs, sucking in a multitude of colours. Fingers curled inside of you. Lewd squelch. Lewder whispers. Loud whines filling the room with each passing second.

He has you whining, sweaty underneath the rough pads of his fingers. Teeth scraping along the bend of your throat. Angry crescents. Minghao’s kisses on your tummy. Your fingers in his hair.

“Look at me.” He commands, holding his fingers up. Your eyes widened, glazed over. Lustful. Mischievous eyes. Wondering eyes.

If it’s you, if it’s like this, if this all you’ll ever be, wants to leave his trace, wants it to mean something, he wants to be remembered.

“Hey, stop that.” You say, covering your face with your hands. As if he hadn’t memorised it already.

Minghao’s pencil comes to a screeching halt. He’s on his stomach. Bare. Basking in the rubscent sunshine. Your sheets kiss his body, accentuating the slender shape of his waist.

Then the boy glances back and smiles. For a moment, you forget this isn’t love. This isn’t love. This isn’t supposed to be love.

Truth be told, Minghao isn’t good at sketching, he never was. He has never been quite fond of it. Minghao always imagines the world in vibrant colours. Never, in his mind, is beauty in black and white.

But in spite of his bitter exchanges with shaky borders and strange strokes before; now, he seems to excel at putting you on paper, be it in the form of ash pencil lines or splatter of colours, colours and colours, he can never seem to wrong your beauty. “Okay.”

He says and lays on his back. Wondering. Marvelling.

Your chin placed on your folded hands.

He pushes a rogue strand behind, one which always seems to keep falling over your eyes. Somehow every time you’re together, you end up like this. Craving. Touching. Never more. Never less. Can it be less? Can it be more?

No.

He shouldn’t say say or think or want something of that sort. Thinking is wanting. Wanting is saying. Saying is craving.

It isn’t right.

“Stop thinking so much.” You whisper, looking up at him with a look in your eyes that he doesn’t want to understand. Something which says more than what’s told.

Stop. He doesn’t quite stop. Minghao thinks and wants and craves. He mustn’t. Your face fits in his palms, you lean into the touch like a love starved kitten and he craves again. Wants again.

If you were a colour and not a million Minghao thinks you’d be blue.

Change. Change is strange. Sometimes you wonder how the world is frosted over, crystallised, whitened with snow and in a blink again, flowers bloom, spring comes and so comes hummingbirds. Change is strange. Sometimes you wonder how all you two share turns from mere lust to profound conversations of everything and nothing at all.

Minghao possesses a kind of intelligence that is unparalleled, he’s quick to understand thoughts and quicker to word it. You’ve been doing that quite often; talking and talking without meaning to stop. Change is strange.

“Do you believe in love?” Your voice is a low, broken thing, words barely there, airy.

"Yes.“ Minghao gazes at the sky, littered with more stars than there are in the city; the soft glow of silver lights his face up in an unusual way. A way about which you could write a thousand villanelles about.

Stars. Dim and twinkling. You wonder how many of them must have aligned for you to have found each other. Incomplete. Your half said words hang in the air. This comfort is peculiar.

Silence has never been an unpleasant thing before. You’re laid down with your arms and legs spread apart, gaze upcast.

Between the two of you, the wet patch of sand feels like a dried ocean, deserted. Lonely. The foamy sea lilts and sings and calls you to her; but you only lay silent, unmoved.

Minghao reaches out and interlaces your fingers. Hope is a funny thing. Desire is a funny thing. He doesn’t understand what it means to say a lot but speak no words at all. His hand tingles from where you rub your thumb. It’s the first time you’re together. But unbare.

This comfort is peculiar.

He’ll always remember; your shoulders erecting to mountains. Your eyes red and swollen, portions and bits of a conversation about a lost lover. The first time he saw you. Hansol’s piss yellow blankets. Seven minutes in a closet. Heated kisses. Your heart in shambles.

Minghao wonders what it means to love like that. Love that stays even when people don’t.

The sky is suddenly darker than before; mighty ravenous clouds seem to have gobbled down constellations after constellations. It’s going to rain again.

“Do you?“ He asks and you almost look, Minghao thinks, like you’re about to cry.

He wonders why it bothers him, why it makes him want to reach out and pull you to him. But he doesn’t, of course.

He shouldn’t.

It’s not right.

Something in your eyes is forlorn. Tight lipped. Sometimes he wishes he had a stethoscope to hear your thoughts, the ones you don’t unveil, despite your much fabled bravado.

You sit back, glance at him and smile briefly. Strange. Undercurrents. Tempted to trace your lips like it were brail. He wants to know what it means, the downward tilt of your mouth.

You’re insolent, an offensive girl, insulting every pretty scenery around you with your very strange beauty. Messy hair, moonlight kissing up your naked face, circles around your widening eyes and closing, parting mouth , like you’re trying to remember something or rather forget. He wishes his camera were with him.

"I can’t.” You say and the pain in your voice startles him.

"You can.“ Minghao corrects, sliding closer you. Toes touching. Bumping into each other. How one could think they can’t be reduced to the foolishness of a lover is beyond his understanding. Everyone can be a fool. In their own ways, of course. Everyone can fall in love. They just choose to. They just choose not to.

“Of course you can.” He says, sounding slightly injured by your ludicrous comment. Always flared up and cross. You rest your head on his shoulder. Stifling a laugh. It’s moments like these that truly confuse you, the gap between your bodies and the yearning to close it.

Believe in love;

You can.

You do.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

Sometimes love lasts forever. Sometimes love gives you reason and makes you believe. Sometimes love is soft whispers, never wilting roses. Sometimes love is forever and always. Sometimes love is the tranquil sea. Sometimes love is comfort and trust. Like the first touch of spring.

Such was not true for Yuta and you.

Yuta fell in love with you one winter morning and fell out every other.

Sometimes you wonder if he had been a phantom. If you were touching air. If you had imagined him all along.

You remember tracing your finger along his back, bumps and drops of his spine, trying to find the man you loved once. You remember kissing him, touching him, undressing him, aching for him to look at you the way he did. To tell you he loved you back. To mean it when he did. You should’ve seen it coming.

When it happens it happens so unsurprisingly. When it happens it happens so surprisingly.

You get off class early. A trail of clothes at your feet. It’s a funny thing, watching someone take away everything you love. It’s a funny thing watching someone give away everything you love.

“Get out.” You say to him with a straight face.

You want to stop him.

“Fine.” Yuta shrugs, sighing, running a hand through his hair. You wonder how many times he’s held her with those hands. Has he ever thought of you when he fucked her? Did he feel sorry for you every time you kissed him? Did he have a good laugh when you weren’t around?

He looks back one last time; as if to say you can pull me back and tell me you love me. You can drag me back and tell me it’s okay. You can forgive me and we will go back to bed. Like nothing ever happened.

Your mouth parts. Words pleading to escape. I love you. Was I not enough?

"I never want to see you again.“ You grit out instead. The door shuts with a soft thud.

You don’t stop him.

...

Minghao hisses when you drag your tongue down his abdomen. Your hair entangled between the gaps of his fingers.

You meet his eyes, watery and widened. Taking him in. “Fuck.” A sight you’ll never share. Afraid someone will steal it from you. A sight which only belongs to you. His brows knitted together, mouth parted in a silent moan.

He cums with a groan and you wipe the corner of your mouth clean, lean on your palms and say, “Happy birthday.”

...

You don’t understand Minghao.

Sometimes he calls you his darling and takes you to his bedroom. Undresses you with care and care and care.

And other times he walks past you like you don’t exist.

...

Nasty wet trails travel down your spine like liquid serpents. They bite your clothes, twist their heads around your lower back and cling onto your skin like they would swallow it whole. It’s summer and your mouth is very dry.

“Hold still.” He scolds. Tapping your bare thighs so you stop moving it so much.

Minghao’s head is in your lap, face shielded from the lurid orange sun. Shaded by a reddened poetry book which says Robert Frost. Your face invisible. Only a hint of your eyebrows. He pulls it back.

“Hey!” You exclaim, trying to seize it but he tucks it away, under his bum. A complacent grin breaking out on his face. All teeth and no shame.

“I hate you so much.“ You say, sighing and brush away a few strands from his face. He’s pretty like this. Skin aglow, brown eyes suddenly an astonishing liquid gold. Honey.

You’ve been falling.

Minghao sits up suddenly, solemn look on his face. Amused no longer. He presses his mouth to yours. Beating heart and clashing teeth. Fingers holding your jaw in place. “That’s not true.” He says, swiping his thumb over your swollen lips.

You don’t understand Minghao.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

He’s drunk.

Minghao rests his head against your chest and draws circles into your stomach. Falling. You might be falling.

It scares you.

"I’ve got to go.“ You say suddenly. Body cold as the warmth of his own slips away. He’s sitting up on his bed.

He is the prettiest tonight.

Face still rubicund. Pitch black strands gone rogue,falling over his eyes. He swallows thickly. Adam’s apple bobbing.

He’s had too much to drink.

“Stay.” He says, pulling you back, looking up at you with big doe eyes. He tugs you closer. Ear pressed to your tummy. Arms looped around you.

If he doesn’t hold on tight, the whole world starts to spin. He wants to hold on tight. He always has.

“I want you to.” He whispers with such sincerity, you think you might turn to liquid.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

Minghao doesn’t remember.

He stares at you. Your body pressed to his. The bend of your spine and your eyes clamped shut. Your hair always unkempt. His fingers yearn for a paintbrush.

His memory is a haze. A swirl of blurriness. A gaping cavern. How did he even get here? In your arms, your lips parted, face buried in his chest. The soft beating of your heart.

You’re awake. He knows.

He can tell. You only tap your feet when you’re awake.

His body slides away from yours.

“We’re late.” He says, his voice all garbled, like the sound was hindered by a rock lodged deep inside his throat. “What happened last night?“

Words seem to be a foreign thing to you for a minute. You look to him and pretend. How do you tell him?

You think of his ear pressed to your stomach and his beautiful eyes, a magnificent ebony looking up at you. You think of thinking. How you’ve been doing too much of it. Minghao elbows you, demanding an answer.

“Nothing.” You say and are surprised by how true it sounds.

You don’t want to be awake

⊱ ────────── ⊰

Melancholy has a peculiar way of coming. Sauntering away in her bluest gown. She meets you often. When you’re drowning in midnight ruminations. When you listen to the most sublime tunes humans have ever crafted. Today she comes suddenly, when you’re watching a movie you’re not watching. Feet propped up on Junhui’s lap. She comes in her bluest gown.

See you’ve been talking for an hour and your jaw hurts.

Junhui and you sit in a discomfiting quietude. He’s been your best friend through thick and thin. Through untamed pigtails and pubertal bacne. Through bad relationships and good. He’s known you long enough to know when you’re lying and when you’re not.

“You know.” He gulps. Looking at his hands. “The way the way you talk about Minghao…like you’re ready to take a bullet for him…it’s..”

“Is that a bad thing?” Your head snaps in his direction, you look annoyed. He winces. “No.” Nervously, he keeps tapping his foot. “Not if you love him.”

“Do you?” He nudges you. Then you tilt your head back and think of nothing and everything.

Your head weighty, inundated with thoughts of him. You keep thinking of Minghao’s smile. You think of his giggles.Stay . His smile. I want you to .

It isn’t until Junhui touches your face, a flick of his index, a tender thing; do you realise you’ve been crying. “I’m scared.” you say, leaning into his touch.

The older male smiles knowingly, passing the bucket of popcorn to you. Junhui is patient. Wordlessly taking your hand in his. He looks so unsurprised it scares you.

"I know.” He says, with no rancour or judgment. As if he has been looking at the insides of your head for long now.

When you were little you doubted the sweet voiced boy had the superhuman power of reading your mind. Knowing when your mum scolded you. Knowing when you wanted to cry and when you wanted to laugh. When you wanted an extra gummy bear. What if he knows now? What if he hears you think he doesn’t love me back? What if he hears you think I am in love with him, I have never been in love like this, what if?

"Let go.“ Junhui suggests, meeting your eyes with a kind of warning which perplexes you. A grand affirmation of all your fears. “It’s not good for you.” He gives your hand a gentle squeeze.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

It’s dark outside and you’re lying on his arm, listening to his pulse. Bodies flush against each other.

When you look up; Minghao is staring intently at the ceiling fan, mouth parted, eyes widened, he’s looking at one thing and seeing a million. You wonder what he thinks so arduously about. Then you lean over and press your lips to his. He hums and smiles and laughs against your mouth, “I love you.“

It’s a tragic thing, the quickness of these words falling off of your lips. Minghao stops smiling. You think he stops thinking too. He sees one thing now. “It’s late. We should sleep.” He says suddenly, clearing his throat. As if words had clogged up inside.

Inside your chest, something turns to smithereens.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

It isn’t his fault. It’s not your fault.

“Don’t go.” You whisper to Minghao, a reiteration, a lost memory you’re trying to relive. He sighs and glances briefly at you from the corner of his eye.

"We aren’t supposed to do this.“ It’s more of a thought than it is a suggestion, an idea he renders just to catch your reaction.

For a second, it’s so quiet that he can hear the soft plops of raindrops against your windows. Home. Suddenly he misses Anshan. Feeling rather uprooted when you unlace your fingers from his.

Minghao thinks summers are beautiful, he thinks sunflowers are yellow and that you shouldn’t date.

The words feel deafening to hear. But you’ve always been good at hiding your feelings. Phenomenal, actually. So you ignore your aching heart with no difficulty. “You’re right.” You say, “We shouldn’t.”

Sometimes we find things we aren’t searching for, sometimes we’re told things we don’t want to hear. Minghao thinks it’s the price we pay for not speaking our minds.

“Oh.” He says, sounding a little disappointed.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

It’s funny how it’s so aggravatingly sunny outside.

In your head, it only rains when you are in pain. A reflection of your sorrows. The whistling wind. The hissing thunder. The ugly lightning. Inner storms.

But today, it rains not a drop. Despite you feeling like you’re being torn apart.

Has anything in your head ever been real? Have you conjured up the very idea of Minghao? Is he only an outline of a person you’ve filled in with imagination? A skeleton fleshed out of your pet desires?

Maybe.

Today his thrusts are sloppy, he groans into your skin and you hold onto him like you’re about to let go any second, like you’re losing him.

“I gotta go.”

He studies your face intently, finding that you have something to say in response. Maybe it’ll be a scold. Maybe it won’t be a scold. Whatever. He doesn’t expect you to look at him the way you do. With a kind of spark in your eyes which begins to die out.

“We should end this.” You sigh and Minghao waits for you to say more. For the mischievous glint. For you to say you’re just kidding. Like you always do. For you to say something, anything at all.

“Is it..is it about last night?” He queries, pausing.

“Because..I..” you look at him with a sudden sharpness, something that says stop me, please stop me. But he says nothing. He forgets that words are a thing at all. You look away.

What is unsaid tastes like blood on his tongue. Like blades. Hurtful. He’s trying to touch your shoulder, to see if you’re real.

You sink into the mattress.Looking rather defeated.

“No.” You lie. You sound like a different person. Someone who is brave. Someone who isn’t you.

He kneels between your legs, tugging onto your shorts, sighing. Hopeful eyes searching your face over and over again. “Don’t come back.” You say softly. Not meeting his eyes still. Afraid you’ll give into the temptation of retracting the previous demand. You can’t look at him.

“You always want me to come back.” He whispers, voice heavy. As if he were clinging onto it for dear life. A dying tree to its roots. A sinking ship to its broken anchor.

This isn’t love, this isn’t supposed to be love. You remind yourself again.

Only this time it sounds like an excuse, a poor attempt at concealing the awful pain inside your chest.

“Not this time. This time you can go.”

Your sheets still smell like him. Your shirts still smell like him. Minghao has managed to entangle himself in every aspect of your life.

You wonder how long it’ll take for you to get rid of him. How many washes, detergents and days, months, years.

“Okay.” He says, nodding.

Let go. Junhui’s hand in yours. I love you. Minghao’s involuntary giggle when you say something witty. His bare body on your mattress. It’s not good for you.

Minghao turns into a dot of charcoal against the firmament. The groaning motorbike of his now soundless.

You don’t stop him.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

Something like this was bound to happen. It was waiting to happen from the start. It was waiting to happen from the end.

You arrive late at Wonwoo’s party and Minghao’s shoving his tongue down some other girl’s throat. The bottle’s been spun in unfortunate circles, a turn of fate.

Your friends say nothing. Speaking of this and that, anything but how Minghao’s probably fucking someone else’s brains out upstairs. You feel stupid.

“You okay?” Mingyu asks suddenly, you're surprised.

He’s Minghao’s best friend after all. Does he pity you this much? To traipse through restricted territories, comforting you in the most comforting way there is? You decide friendship and pity are parted only by the thinnest line.

Mingyu is your friend too.

“Yeah.” You reply, smiling briefly.

A soothing hand on the small of your back. A reminder of how you’re real and this is real, definitely not a nightmare.

Across the room, with the booming music ricocheting off pasty walls, a background of sweaty strangers and twists of neon, Junhui is looking at you.

No, that’s not right.

He’s looking through you.

You want to throw up.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

You think about sunlight caught in his eyes. Sunflowers in his hair. The way he shivers you when kiss his throat. You think of him once and twice and three times. You can’t stop. You mustn’t.

“What are you doing?” Junhui’s voice echoes through the bathroom. “Are you okay?“ He watches his dearest friend lean over the toilet seat.

You don’t know what to say. You’re looking at a ring of hydrangeas, afloat in a pool of your own blood and bile. And suddenly you know this means something, this always has.

...

Minghao catches your glaring eye and he’s surrounded by a thicket of roses,they are a kind of pink that is more orange than pink. He is painting. Birds warble and the wind hits his fringe to provide an unobstructed view of his face.

The next morning you spend an hour cleaning blood out of your sink. The same soft petals circling him, accompanied by vicious thorns. And you think it’s worth it, to die like this, to die for love.

...

He thinks of your smile often. Tries to commit the curve to his memory like he’ll forget it otherwise. Perhaps that is what he fears. Forgetting you. Your face. Your smile. Your voice. He fears to never be able to paint you again. Perhaps if he had forgotten, you’d cease to exist.

“I can’t do this.” He says to the nameless girl, her lipstick smudged.

It’s not right. It doesn’t feel right.

He yearns to run his fingers through your unkempt hair; he can’t stop thinking about you, your roaring laugh and your poetry, your heart, your fingers. Your imperfections. The bend of your spine and the slope of your neck.

Minghao searches for you in other people and finds only a gaping hole.

...

Minghao keeps having a recurring dream, one dream amongst thousands. He’s had it since he was a child.

He’s swimming at first, halving sapphire water with every stroke; whilst the sun shines above him. A spotlight.

He’s alone one moment and then he isn’t. Then he is in a meadow, a green meadow, a brilliant green that is too green to be just grass and not shards of emerald.

He’s lying down, head rested on his folded arms, the sky is cobalt, not a cloud in sight.

Peculiarly enough, in his dream, he knows he is in love and it is with someone who lies with him.

The first time he has this dream, he is 13. It teaches him to touch a paintbrush. To flirt with paint and fall in love with colours. Passion no longer latent. At 13, his lover is faceless.

Now, he lies in the same meadow, he looks to his beloved, anticipating the same blank outline he always has seen

and finds your smiling face instead.

...

Junhui swears at Henry James often. Unable to decipher whatever the hell the author drones on about. One time he flung his copy of The Wings Of The Dove and watched it tear into two miserable halves of stupidly sophisticated words.

But you understand him. You pick up the torn pages and glue them together. You understand Henry James.

The Turn Of The Screw. Horror in places that aren’t horrific.

A kiss of autumn. The commencement of reds, darker browns and crunchy leaves. Not horrific. Minghao is looking at you, vines of steam from his coffee, brick red beret. He’s looking right at you. Not everything around you. Not autumnal beauty to catch inspiration from and spill it on his canvas.

...

Minghao used to love someone once.

A rattling thing inside his chest. He was young, too trusting and a blatant stranger to the jolting ache of unrequited love which comes when she quickly turns him down.

He promises to never love like this again.

Fast and unsteady. Without reason. Without logic. Unconditionally.

He thinks of your fingers, smaller against his. He thinks of dusk laying atop your body. He thinks of the rings around your eyes. The curls of your eyelashes. He thinks of blue.

(Minghao has never been good at making promises.)

⊱ ────────── ⊰

It’s past midnight and you’re waiting for melancholy to visit like she always does. But she never comes. Never in her bluest dress. Never anymore.

You haven’t been coughing up flowers for a few weeks now.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

Nervous is a laughable understatement.

There’s an elephant in the room and its squeezing Minghao’s throat with its trunk, crushing the poor thing to dust.

The café is anything but silent. Soft music. Buzzing with teenagers. Loquacious couples. In between all the unspeakably loud bustling, Minghao is surprised to find that he can only hear Junhui’s tapping foot. The tings of Joshua’s phone. Hansol’s low humming. Minghao clears his throat. “I think .. I’m in love with her.” He says, sitting straight suddenly. He blurts it out like it’s a grand revelation.

Junhui silently sips his drink. He’s only decided to see the younger male because he was offered brownies.. Minghao investigates silently, eyes darting all over his friends’ face. Hansol nods. Joshua says nothing but offers a huge grin. Unsurprised. He was expecting a parted mouth at least, if not dropping jaws.

It’s only Junhui who breaks the obnoxious silence. “You’re the last to find out.” He says finally, narrowing his eyes. Minghao frowns.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

He’s wearing the same shirt that he wore the first time you saw him. Baby blue. Sheer. Smiling. It doesn’t reach his eyes. Then your stomach twists. Finally, in your head echoes a delirious laugh. How foolish it was to get one’s hopes up.

You wonder what it will be this time, perhaps lavender, perhaps a water lily, perhaps wisteria.

But nothing comes.

You only find your own reflection, staring back at you, gaping eyes emerging from dirty ash toilet water. Then you try the sink.

Nothing comes.

"When were you going to tell me you were dying?“ You jump,turning and finding him leaning on the door frame.

Arms crossed. Minghao has the audacity to look offended.

“When were you going to tell me you’re in love with me?” You say instantaneously, frowning. If nothing comes now. If nothing comes for weeks. No thorns. No flowers. It means what you think it means. You’re glancing at him from the bathroom mirror. He shuts the door. Just the two of you.

Craving and Wanting. Thinking.

It isn’t wrong.

Wanting you isn’t wrong.

A ring on his little finger. He rubs his nape. Sheepish smile on his face. “I was hoping now.. isn’t a terrible time.”

You’re sitting on the ceramic ringlet of the sink, feet dangling. Like a child, you jut your lip out “It is.“

See you don’t mind the way he comes to you. Standing in between your legs. Foreheads pressed together. Fingers entwined. The oceans and hills. The gaps between your bodies. The tear in your heart. Forever closed.

“You're trying to seduce me.” You frown, and he’s laughing and giggling, fingers tilting your chin upwards.

“Am I not succeeding?"

You shake your head a no. Toying with the hairs dropping over his eyes. "Failing miserably.” He recognises your jests in an instant. Mischievous eyes. Wondering eyes.

Then he kisses you, soft and lingering. Muffled words pressed against your lips.

“I love you.” He says, breathless. Eyes widened. Lips swollen. He thinks you’re driving him a little insane now. Searching your face for an answer. “If I didn’t love you back…” You say, nails painted a kind of wine red that never should be unsweetened, “I wouldn’t be dying.” Thank you for saving me. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for saving my life.

You tug Minghao closer by the ends of his outgrown hair and kiss him a little dizzy. He thinks you’ve been driving him insane ever since you’ve met him.

⊱ ────────── ⊰

A cream envelope in hand, velvet under his fingers, a present amongst many presents. You’re wearing his shirt. The fabric reaching right below the curve of your bum. Speed Hunter scribbled on in chalky white. “I’ve tolerated you for an entire year.” You say and press your mouth to his. A tingly sensation in his tummy. It almost feels as if he’s swallowed a jar of butterflies.

Surprises are not Xu Minghao’s cup of tea. Seokmin’s screams still scare him, he falls off bikes and still fails courses sometimes.

But still, he, too, unwittingly, finds himself falling in love with a villanelle called Stars.

Your name inscribed underneath.

3K notes · View notes

maandags · 5 years ago

Text

Eidolon (Angel!Keith x Demon!reader) {part v}

*goes into hiding for 23455 years*

– – –

Summary: Keith is an angel, and he’s completed mission after mission for the Upper Hand, the organisation controlling all of the Above. He’s only failed a mission once: when he was assigned to kill you, a surprisingly charismatic demon. He roamed Earth–Middle Ground–for years before he was caught by the Upper Hand again, and things quickly go south.

Genre: angst YEEEET

Word count: 6.2K

Notes: masterlist - {previous} - {next} -- me: *doesn't update for 67 years* *updates* *doesn't update for 67 ye

– – –

And when I fall to rise

with stardust in my eyes

In the backbone of night, I’m combustible

~ King of The Clouds, Panic! At The Disco

– – –

“I got you caramel popcorn.”

You look up from where you’re tying your boots and raise an eyebrow. “Beg your pardon?”

A plastic box filled with the sticky treats lands on the couch next to you. “Caramel popcorn. You like it, right?” Keith runs a hand through his hair and plops down too, giving a small wince. He’s trying very hard to hide the fact that he’s still feeling pretty beat up, but he’s not very good at it. Or maybe you’re just very skilled at reading him.

You cautiously take the box, pop off the lid and pluck one grain from its siblings. “I do like it.” With a flourish, you stick it in your mouth and smile at the sweet taste. “How’d you know?”

Keith looks down. “You probably mentioned it while I was… out.”

Your fingers, halfway down the box already, freeze. “Say what now?”

He shrugs stiffly, the shirt draped over his lanky frame only barely moving with him. He’s lost so much weight while he was sick, and it’s affected him more than he cares to show. He still tires easily, needs a lot of sleep. He gets nauseous faster, and gets dizzy when he stands up too abruptly. Over the past few days he’s been getting better, staying up with longer intervals between naps every time but he still isn’t quite back to normal.

And it’s bothering him. You can tell it’s bothering him. He tries to help you in any way he can, though those aren’t many. You’ve had him buy groceries a few times so you could come straight home from work–but that was often quite late in the evening, and you right now you’re just about to leave for work.

“I keep getting these flashes of memories that aren’t mine. And–well–you’re the only person I’ve talked to for about two weeks, so I figured they were yours.” He gives a nervous laugh. “Well, practically the only person. I’m guessing it wasn’t the grocer who leaked some of his memories into my brain.”

“No. ‘Cause that would be weird,” you say, carefully removing your hand from the popcorn and placing the bucket on the low coffee table in front of you. Suddenly you feel cold again.

“Look,” he starts, and you firmly keep your eyes on the bowl of popcorn, not wanting to meet his, “I don’t know what you did or who you went to for whatever it is that cured me. But I do know that you saved my life, and I’ll forever be in your debt for that.”

“Keith–”

“No, seriously. I don’t need to know everything. That’s completely fine. But I don’t want you to get hurt because you were trying to help me.” And he sounds so sincere, like he means every word, and you look away and purse your lips and tug at your shoelaces because he’s really not making things easy for you.

Whenever you think you finally have your thoughts out in a row, Keith swoops in and says a line like that one and makes everything foggy again. He could have drop-kicked you in the stomach and you would be less confused. Stupid, stupid, stupid. You wonder if he’s doing it on purpose–if he knows you’ve been tasked with a mission that’s nothing short of impossible.

Not impossible in the literal sense of the word. In fact, it would hardly be a challenge at all; Keith’s still weakened and even without your knives you could overpower him in half a second. No, the impossibility of the task lies in a more complicated and nuanced territory: your morals. Your feelings towards him, to be exact, and how much you can ignore them. If you even want to ignore them, and up til now that’s not looking very likely a possibility.

The portal pass Prince Lotor gave you sits untouched in a locked drawer in your nightstand. At night, when the only sound filling the air is the nightlife of the city, you can feel it pulsing beside you, beckoning to be used. It’s tempting you, whispering for your touch, begging to return home. As far as you know, portal passes don’t have expiration dates, but you’re still hoping that the call will eventually weaken until you don’t even notice it anymore.

No, giving Keith up to the Below isn’t an option. But he’s growing stronger every day, and at one point he’s going to leave. He’ll leave, and you won’t be there to protect him anymore, and that means he’ll be fair game for any Bounty out there who caught word of the prize his capture will grant.

And really, you just want him to stay.

You want him to stay because your life has been infinitely more interesting since he showed up. You want him to stay because you took care of him for a week while he was dying, and you’re the reason he’s here, alive, in the first place. You want him to stay because you’ve grown to like him–and because he understands you in a way no one else can.

“I’m not hurt,” you assure him. Your fingers ghost over his briefly before you pull them back to your lap. “I won’t get hurt. I promise.” He gives a tentative smile and you zip your hoodie up over your t-shirt. “Let’s focus first on getting you all healed up, all right?”

“I’m fine!”

“Keith, you tripped over your own shoelace and immediately knocked yourself out. You almost threw up after going out onto the rooftop.” You tug a soft hat over your ears and, after a small moment of hesitation, grab a last small handful of caramel popcorn and cradle them in your palm. They really are good. “I’ll be back this afternoon. If anything’s wrong, call. I might not pick up right away but I’ll call back.”

He sighs, tugs at a strand of dark hair. “Okay. Bye.”

You snatch up your keys and open the door. “Take a nap,” you smile over your shoulder. You don’t stay to see his reaction.

– – –

The day goes by as most work days go by, and you huff out a breath when you sink onto a chair around lunchtime. “I’m taking my break,” you tell Emmie–the real Emmie–and she nods. It had been pretty weird to see her and the others for the first time after the whole Bountyhunter fiasco. You were pretty sure none of them noticed how you stiffened when they’d greeted you first thing in the morning, and even if they had they would probably just think you had a rough day or something.

Your phone buzzes and you jump. Before picking up, you glance at the caller ID. “Hey. What’s up?”

“Oh, did I get it right? I always forget when you have your lunch break,” Allura says.

“You got it right. I’ve literally just sat down.”

“Fabulous. It’s the hospital, you know. Messes with your perception of time.”

“I’ll take your word for it. I wouldn’t know.”

“Nah, you wouldn’t.”

You shake your head, but a smile tugs at the ends of your lips. “Did you just want to chat or did you need anything?”

“Nah, I just wanted to chat. We haven’t talked in ages! And also you won’t tell me what you’re doing or what’s going on or who is staying in your apartment… you know. Breezy stuff.” Her tone is light, but you can tell she’s a little pissed at you for ghosting her, and you honestly can’t blame her.

“Allura… I’m really sorry about that. My life’s just been really messy for the last two weeks or so. I’m working on it, I promise.”

She sighs, and you imagine the way her lips purse as she glares out into the distance. “You know,” she says suddenly, “I think I’ve been a pretty good friend so far.”

It takes you aback, and you choke out a startled laugh. “You have been. I mean, you are. You’re the best.”

“Then why won’t you tell me what’s going on? Maybe I could help.”

You lick your lips, lightly kicking at an empty cardboard box on the floor. “It’s hard to explain. I–it’s–it’s complicated.”

“Right.”

“Listen, I want to explain it. I do. You deserve to know what’s going on, but… I’m afraid of what you’ll think if I do tell you. And I’m afraid–” You only just manage to cut yourself off and swallow the words about to tip from your tongue. You let your head fall back. “Okay. What if we meet up tonight? After work? And I’ll explain what I can, okay?”

She’s silent for a moment, then says, “Fine. Okay.”

Silently, you let out a breath you’d been holding. “All right. Uh, how about the park? Let’s say half past eight?”

“Sounds good to me.”

You switch your phone to your other ear. “So, uh, see you then? I guess?”

“Okay. Bye.”

“Bye,” you say, but she’s already hung up. You growl, squeezing your eyes shut and raking a hand through your hair before rubbing your temples. “Fuck.”

Is this whole ordeal worth jeopardising your friendship with Allura? No. But then again, how much of a choice do you really have? What are you going to tell her? Oh yeah, I’m actually demon, and I kind of saved an angel that I then later learned is on the lam so now I’m harboring a fugitive. It just doesn’t ring very well.

But you’re going to have to tell her something. She’s starting to get suspicious–she has every reason to. Maybe you’ll just have to improvise a bit.

A glance at your watch tells you that your break ends in ten minutes, and you haven’t even had your lunch yet. You stand up and make your way to the snack dispenser, logging in a coin and, with a fair amount of shaking and punching the already-battered sides of the machine, plucking out a pack of raisins and a chocolate granola bar. Not much of a lunch, but oh well. Keith would have your head if he knew these were your only nutrients of the day.

Then you shake your head and frown. Since when do you care what Keith thinks?

As you nibble on the granola bar, you contemplate your phone that you laid on the coffee table in front of you. Part of you wants to call your home phone. Just to see how Keith’s doing. What he’s been up to (in the whole five hours that you haven’t seen him). Stupid, you tell yourself. Stop it. He’s fine. He’s a grown angel, for Hell’s sake. He can take care of himself.

Really, you just want to hear his voice. It’s comforting. He has a nice voice.

But you mentally scold yourself. Just because you decided you won’t turn him in doesn’t give you an excuse to get all cuddly with him. So you lick the last of the chocolate from your fingers, straighten your blue work shirt and stuff your phone in your back pocket. Tony allows phones in pockets as long as they’re switched off, so you make sure you do just that before you push the door open and resume your shift.

“Keith?” You shout his name before you even properly entered your apartment, and you’re greeted with an irritated hum from where he’s half passed out on the sofa. “Have you just been sleeping the entire day?”

“Hm.”

“Good for you. Wish I could get more than four hours’ sleep a night.”

He cracks open an eye. “You only get four hours’ sleep a night?” Oh. Not as unconscious as you thought.

“No, no,” you quickly lie, “nah, I was exaggerating. I get plenty of sleep. Don’t worry.” You kick off your shoes and drop your keys in their little box. “But you sleeping is good. It means you’ll feel better soon.”

“Hey, hey,” he says, suppressing a yawn and rubbing the sleep from his eyes, “don’t change the subject.”

“Keith. I told you I’m fine. Drop it.”

“No.”

You raise an eyebrow.

He looks at you, squinting with fatigue, but his eyes are determined and glint. “You look like crap. You’ve been working your ass off when you look like you can barely stand on your feet. I didn’t want to say anything because–well–I figured it wasn’t my place to tell you you should rest,” he adds, a bit awkwardly, but voice still firm.

“It’s not,” you say, eyebrow still raised and feeling your shoulders stiffen with ever word falling from his lips.

“But you should. Rest, I mean. I don’t know why you won’t take care of yourself, but I don’t want–” He catches himself before the end of his sentence, and when you narrow your eyes you think you can spot a faint blush dotting his cheeks. “Anyway. Just… be careful, okay?”

“Sure.” For some reason, it’s easier to be curt when he’s worrying about you instead of the other way around. Though you don’t think you’ll actually stop being worried about him until he’s a hundred percent back to normal, but him reaching out and voicing his concerns about you has your emotional walls immediately shoot up.

Up until now, you hadn’t realised how much you’d started to let them down.

You grab a cup and fill it with water, leaning against the doorframe to the kitchen as you gulp it down. Keith’s gaze is still fixed on you, and you pointedly direct yours at the floor.

“Y/N–”

“Keith. Drop it. Seriously.” You set the empty cup down on the kitchen table, maybe a bit more forcefully than necessary. “I’m actually going out tonight.”

He frowns, and again there’s that flash of concern that has you resist the urge to roll your eyes. “I’m just meeting up with a friend. I don’t know when I’ll be back, but you don’t have to wait up for me if you want to go to sleep early. God,” you add with a scoff when he purses his lips, “don’t look so disapproving. What are you, my dad?”

“Y/N–”

“I’m going out.” Your voice is quiet but icy, and you can see Keith knows he won’t change your mind.

He closes his eyes briefly. “At least eat something before you go.”

“I’ll get takeout on the way or something.” You turn on your heel and, after a split second of internal debate you pull your scarf from its place on the coat hanger and wrap it around your face. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

You don’t even wait to hear his answer.

Allura’s waiting for you on your bench, her purple scarf pulled around her cheeks and her hair piled atop her head in a bun. She looks up when you approach, then shifts a little to the side to make room for you. Her eyes are narrowed, though you suspect that’s due more to a mix of fatigue and a protection against the cold wind than it is anger against you.

“Hey,” you say, sinking onto the bench next to her.

“Hi.” She crosses her ankles and looks away briefly before focusing her gaze on you again. Her brows furrow slightly. “What happened to you?”

You freeze. “What?”

“I mean, why do you look like that?”

A hesitant laugh rolls past your lips. “Like what?”

“Like you haven’t slept, eaten, or seen sunlight in a week. No, don’t even–hey, look at me.” She grabs your wrists and forces you to look her in the eye. With every second she scrutinises your face the worry in hers grows, and she reaches out to tentatively touch the tender skin beneath your eyes. “Have you been overworking yourself?”

“No,” you say, deflated, though it comes out more like a whine.

“How much sleep have you been getting a night?”

“Allura, stop it. I feel fine.” It’s a lie, and she doesn’t look convinced. “I don’t need you fretting over me as well.”

She leans back. “What do you mean, as well?” Her lips purse and she takes your hands in hers. “Y/N, what is going on?”

You sigh, cursing yourself and this entire situation internally. You have to think very carefully about what you’re going to say and how you’re going to say it. You bite your lip, and after a moment of silence you say, “Remember when I called you a while ago about that fever?”

She nods slowly. “And I told you to sweat it out, and you said that wouldn’t work, so I told you to go find my uncle.”

“Right. Well, I did,” you sigh, thinking back to the strange excursion that was the trip by Coran’s shop.

“And did you find what you were looking for?”

“I did.” She raises an eyebrow, rolling her hand in a Go on gesture. You exhale, fumbling with the words in your mind before speaking them out loud. “It wasn’t for research purposes. I needed it because… a friend of mine–well, he’s more like an acquaintance, really–was very sick. And no, I couldn’t take him to the hospital,” you add quickly when she opens her mouth to say something.

She frowns. “Why not?”

You cringe slightly. For some reason, you don’t think He’s not human is going to cut it. “I just couldn’t, okay? Please just–just trust me on this. Listen,” you say, lowering your head into your hands, “there’s some things I really can’t tell you. I just can’t. But I’m trying my best.” Your voice catches and you’re surprised to find your eyes sting. You angrily wipe the forming tears away.

“I’ve known him for a while,” you continue. “But we never really… talked before. Because we come from… different places.” What a way to simplify it.

“So he’s, like… some kind of famous, rich, bourgeois-esque guy? Is that what I’m picking up here?” She’s trying to lighten the mood, you know she is, but the laugh you manage to grit out is bitter anyway.

“That’s one way to put it.”

It’s silent for a while, and the tension that cloaked the air before starts to fade. Allura can be quite hot-headed sometimes, but she doesn’t always manage to stay angry for long–though in this case, she would have every reason to. You’ve been avoiding her, even if you had a good reason.

Then she sighs. “I’m trying to understand, Y/N.” You glance at her, keep your mouth shut. “But it’s hard. And I’m not sure if this is just you being your mystical self, or if there’s something really weird going on, but I don’t like it. At all. Not if this is how it makes you act and feel.” Again she shoots a pointed look at your face. “But you’re asking me to trust you, so that’s what I’ll do.”

Your eyes, that narrowed as you looked down at the ground, snap open and you turn your head around fully to look at her. “Seriously?”

She nods. “Yeah. Seriously. And I don’t like it,” she repeats, shifting to sit on her hands and glaring out into the darkening evening streets, “but I trust you to not do anything stupid. Or, well, anything very stupid.”

And it makes you feel good. A huge weight seems to fall off your shoulders and you breathe a relieved sigh. “Thanks, Allura.”

“Well.” She sits up straight and hooks an arm over the back of the bench, turning fully to you, her mouth curling into a wicked grin. “Now that we worked that out, you’re going to tell me about this guy, because I want to know who you’re risking our friendship for, God damn it.”

Your head tips back. “Allura. Please. Don’t.”

“Nuh-uh-uh,” she tuts. “None of that. You owe me this. Fine, I’ll start easy. What’s his name?”

You slowly roll your head until you’re looking her in the eye. “Keith.”

She nods, grin turning smug. “Where’s he from?”

You flinch. “…Somewhere up north.”

“Ah. Touchy subject?”

“Eh.”

“Fine,” she huffs, “then answer this one. Why would he come to you now if you’ve never even spoken before? You made it sound like he was in serious trouble.”

“He was. And, well… I guess he came to me because he had nowhere else to go.”

Allura hums. Then, “You sound like you care about him.”

You start. “What?”

“You know. You took him into your apartment, you stayed home from work for a week to take care of him, you almost fucked up our friendship for him… that’s not just because you felt sorry for him.” She says it so breezily, the words more a joke by now than anything, but you still wish she hadn’t said them–if only because they ring so true.

“I barely know him,” you protest weakly.

“But you want to. Get to know him, I mean.”

“Fuck, Allura, I wanted to talk, not for you to tell me how to lead my love life,” you groan, sliding along the backrest.

She wiggles her eyebrows. ‘Who said anything about love?”

“Oh my god.” You jump up, dusting off your coat and giving your scarf a vigorous tug. “I’m gonna go now. Again, the coming days–weeks, maybe, I don’t fucking know–might be weird. There’s a bunch of stuff Keith and I need to sort out. I’ll call you eventually, but it might be smart if you kind of stayed out of it? I’d appreciate that. As a personal favour.”

“Uh, sure,” she says, looking equally taken aback and somewhat smug by your sudden flustered and rambly state. “Why’s that?”

“You know. I was already manipulated into thinking you were being tortured to get information out of me, so. I’d rather that doesn’t happen again. You know what, just pretend you don’t know me until I call you, all right?”

She freezes for only a fraction of a second, then scrambles up and grabs your sleeve.“Say what now?”

“Don’t worry about it. It’s no big deal.”

“That absolutely is a big fucking deal, Y/N.”

“Figures. I’m really sorry you got sucked into this mess, Allura. You deserve better friends than me.”

Her lips purse, and before you know what’s happening she’s pulled you into a hug. “Please be careful,” she whispers into your shoulder.

You wrap your own arms around her and squeeze. “I’ll try.” Welcome to my shitstorm of a life, you think wryly, then you gently free yourself from her embrace. “I’ll call you when this is all over.”

She nods, and you’re about to walk back to your apartment when something occurs to you. You spin around again, mindlessly rubbing your forearm. “Hey, one last thing.”

“Yeah?”

You bite your lip, hesitate. “Your uncle Coran. He might be able to answer some of your questions. He’s… a special guy. I think he knows more than he lets on.”

Allura gives a small smile, then nods. “I’ll think about it.”

Your living room windows are dark, and that should have been enough to make you suspicious. Keith doesn’t put out the lights until you’re home.

But your mind is still occupied with everything you told–and didn’t tell–Allura, and you’re just feeling good that everything went the way it did. You won’t have to worry about her getting hurt anymore, and the light feeling of maybe everything will be okay after all is the reason you don’t notice anything’s wrong until you turn the keys and open the door to be greeted with darkness.

You freeze. “Keith?” No answer.

Slowly, you flick on the light switch beside you, blinking hard to force your eyes to quickly get used to the light. Nothing. The sofa looks eerily clean and made up. The blanket you gave him sits neatly folded on one armrest. Your heart speeds up, and you make your way over to the kitchen. The fridge’s contents have been rearranged. The tub of caramel popcorn is in the cabinet where you keep your sweets. He’d put it there before leaving. It’s a small gesture, but one so sweet and innocent and final that it makes a fist clench over your heart.

Somehow you sense that this is it; he’s not coming back. This isn’t one of his impromptu errands. He cleaned up after himself, made sure everything looked exactly the way it did before he even set foot in your apartment.

But it doesn’t feel right anymore. It’s empty.

Keith was never much of a presence. He wasn’t loud or brash or in constant need of attention, but he would quietly come sit in the armchair next to you when you were reading on the sofa, or he’d join you at the kitchen table and doodle on a notepad, one foot tucked under his butt and the very tip of his tongue peeking out from between his lips. His company made your apartment feel that little more alive.

Made you feel that little more alive.

And it’s not that you can’t handle yourself on your own. You can do that just fine. But you’d be lying if you said you didn’t enjoy having him in your home. Another presence like you, to remind you that you’re not alone.

And it just feels weird. Why would he leave so suddenly? Without even giving you a warning? Without saying goodbye? It doesn’t make sense, and you sink down onto the sofa, fingers absentmindedly trailing over the fuzzy blanket. The room’s too clean for him to have been kidnapped or murdered; that would have looked way messier than this. No, he went by choice.

It’s late. It’s late, it’s dark, and if Keith really doesn’t want to see you again you don’t stand the slightest chance to find him in the nightly streets.

And yet, half a minute later you find yourself–all the while cursing and scoffing at yourself under your breath–outside once more, narrowing your eyes against the chilly evening wind. You hesitate for a moment, not quite sure of where to go, then you decide to just make your way to the nearest underground station and figure out where you’re headed from there. Keith knows this city, but you know it better.

So that’s how you end up in the underground at half past ten P.M, brain working at a thousand miles per hour, looking for a runaway angel that you know you have a very slim chance of finding. The cart is surprisingly crowded, and you have to crane your neck to find an unoccupied seat. You plop down beside a reading student.

The grind of the track below you makes it hard to think, so you let your head tip against the backrest of the seat and close your eyes with a sigh. A hand comes up to rub your eyelids. “What am I doing,” you whisper to yourself. The student casts you a half-curious look, but wisely doesn’t say anything.

If Keith doesn’t want to be found you doubt you’ll find him–but what if someone else does? What if someone who knows about the price Lotor fixed on Keith’s head finds him and recognises him? He’s in no shape to fight. He can barely stand upright for more than half an hour. He’ll be handed over to the Below, and then… You don’t want to think about what might happen next.

So you have to find him. You don’t know where to start, don’t know if you even can, but you have to at least try.

Your gaze flicks up to the screen where the route is all stippled out. You’re almost halfway, with four more stops to go until the final destination. None of them ring any bells at first, but then one catches your eye. You bite your lip, leaning slightly forward.

It could be. It would make sense.

You could be wrong, of course. But there’s a feeling in your gut. You’re jittery and fidgeting with the buttons on your coat and when the train slowly stops to a halt you’re the first through the doors. Your destination is clear in your head and you round corners without looking, confident that your feet will carry you where you want to go. After all, you’ve walked this route more times than you can count.

The factory is as silent and still as it was the first time you slipped through its broken gates and between its walls. You can hear faint voices coming from a room on the ground floor; laughter, music, chattering. Probably just a private friend get-together. Keith won’t be there.

It feels weird to retrace your steps from that night. The room where your painting still gleams proudly against so many others–an angel and a demon, red wings dripping from their backs. The painting makes your gut twist in a funny way, so you don’t stay very long admiring it. Then there’s the hole in the wall behind it leading to the staircase. You hop through, start climbing the steps at a leisurely pace, keeping as quiet as possible.

Only then do you start to think about what might happen if you do find him.

Up until now, you had only thought about the possibility of not finding him. But what if you do, and he explains why he left and tells you to go away? Or what if he doesn’t want to talk to you at all? Would you be able to let him go that easily?

You almost stop and turn back. Almost. But there’s something about him. Something about him that makes you feel a certain way, and you’d tried to push it down and ignore it but you don’t think you can do that anymore. And with every step you take your heart beats faster until you’re running the last feet up the stairs, taking the steps two at a time.

You half expect to see him as soon as you walk through the doorway, but of course that doesn’t happen. You slow to a halt, unsure of where to go first. You take a step forward, and the hollow sound echoes in the hallway. You clear your throat before calling out. “Keith?”

Maybe not the smartest move if you were going for discretion, but you threw caution into the wind when you stepped onto the dark top floor. He’ll be here or he won’t, and you’ll figure out what to do then.

Another step, and you peek through the first doorway. “Hello? Keith?” Nothing. You steel yourself. You’ll go by all the rooms. You won’t leave until you’ve combed through the entire floor.

And then you hear him softly say your name behind you, and you whip around. He’s leaning against a doorway, a faint smile tainting his lips, sweet and genuine but a little sad, too, and all you want to do is run to him and wrap him in your arms and press your lips against his–

But you don’t. “Keith. Hey.”

“Hi.”

You’d wanted to be a little less forward, but just the relief of seeing him caused your verbal filter to completely disappear. You step towards him, your hand reaching for him despite him standing too far away. “Why are you here?”

He raises a brow. “I could ask you the same thing.”

“What–I came to find you, obviously,” you scoff, the words coming out sharper than intended. You screw your eyes shut, your shoulders bunching around your ears. “Sorry. Sorry. I’m just–I’m glad I found you. I was worried.”

He looks down, fingers fiddling with the hem of his shirt. “Right.”

You bite your lip. “Keith.” His eyes meet yours, and you hesitantly close the distance between you until he’s a mere step away. “Why’d you leave?”

A shrug. “Don’t know.”

“Don’t believe you.”

He sighs. “I just–I feel like I’m being a burden. You’re looking more tired and sick every day and I’m just so useless.”

You start, recoiling slightly out of pure shock. “Excuse me?”

“I’ve noticed it, you know.” His jaw sets and his eyes grow cloudy. “How you try and leave the room every time I’m there. Or how you work overtime to make sure you have to spend as little time with me as possible. Or how every smile you give me is forced. They never quite reach your eyes.” His fingers twitch. “But I don’t blame you. I get it.”

You throw a look over his shoulder. The room he chose is empty bar a filthy pillow that looks like it came straight out of the trash and a blanket in the same state. “So you’ll just live here instead.” You kick an old, empty beer can out of the way. “Real homey.”

He shrugs again. Then he shivers, and it’s that small gesture that completely shatters you. Tears form in your eyes. “You wanna know why I did it? Pushed you away?” You don’t wait for an answer. “Because I actually like you way more than I should. And I was scared of what would happen if I let myself get close to you. I still am. But,” you add, nudging his arm, “that doesn’t mean I want you gone or living in a dump like this.”

“So you came to look for me.”

“Yeah.”

Now he smiles, rubbing his eyes. “You found me pretty quickly. That’s rather embarrassing.” With a sigh, he lets himself drop to the floor and props his elbows up on his knees. “Can’t even run away right.”

You scoff, sliding down the wall next to him. “Don’t sound so disappointed. I, for one, am glad I found you.”

His fingers ghost over yours. “Me too.”

And it might just be that you’re very tired because you’ve been on your feet since six A.M, or that you’re so happy and relieved to see him in one piece after running through all the possible horrible scenarios in your head. Whatever the case, you figure that if it isn’t clear now that he’s more to you than just an inconvenient guest, it might never be, so it wouldn’t mean anything if you were to take his hand in yours.

So you take his hand in yours. He stiffens for only a split second, then relaxes. After a while, he whispers, “How’d you know I was here?”

You hollow out your cheeks. “I didn’t. I wasn’t sure, I mean. But… I don’t know. I had a feeling, I guess.” You shoot him a pointed look. “You’re not gonna get sick again, are you? Last time we were here you almost died. I’d like to not have to try and find Coran’s shop again, ‘cause that was a complete disaster last time.”

Keith giggles. “I wasn’t planning to.”

You shove his shoulder with yours. “Moron. Don’t scare me like that again, all right?” The insult is kind of cancelled out by the fact that you’re still holding hands.

“Okay.” He bursts into a coughing fit and you throw him a sideways look, letting go of his hand to awkwardly pat him on the back.

“This is exactly why you need to come home,” you scold softly. “You’re not better yet. Come on.”

He casts you a look, hesitancy painted across his features. You raise your eyebrows slightly. “What?”

But then he shakes his head and pushes himself up again, holding his hand out for you to grab. “Nothing. Let’s go.”

You take it and let him pull you up, and then you’re face to face. Close. Closer than ever before. For a second you’re just standing, holding onto each other’s hands like it’s the only thing tethering you to earth. You want to kiss him. You want to kiss him. Your eyes flick down to his lips, ever so briefly. You want to kiss him.

“Let’s go.” Pulling your hand out of his feels so wrong, but you do it anyway. Reluctantly. You shove your hand in the pocket of your hoodie to hide its trembling. “We’ll take the underground.”

The ride back is not awkward. You wouldn’t call it that, but there is a kind of tension hanging in the air between you and him and you decide that you don’t like it. Another part of you whispers that it’s probably for the better. The tension means you won’t make any rash decisions. It means that you’ll think about the words you say and the things you do, important or not.

Maybe it won’t make a difference in the end. Maybe it will. At the moment it doesn’t really matter, because it’s late and Keith is half asleep in his seat, and you only allow yourself a brief moment to look at him–really look at him, study the little details of his face that would normally be clouded by lines of worry or fatigue. When he sleeps he looks so peaceful, without a care in the word. His skin smooths out. His mouth hangs open ever so slightly. He snores a little. He looks younger and, somehow, free.

But then your stop is announced over the loudspeakers and you startle as the train slowly grinds to a halt. You nudge Keith with your foot. “Wake up.” He groans, blinks a few times before hoisting himself up, softly muttering under his breath.

Your apartment looks exactly as you left it–which is to say, eerily clean and tidy. You pull a face and immediately march over to the sofa, where you shake out the neatly folded blanket and deposit it on a heap in a corner, after which you give the cushions a good shake. Keith stands in the corner of the room, hands in his pockets, a bemused smile on his lips. You crinkle your nose at him. “It felt too… orderly.”

“Because you’re not orderly.”

“That’s right. It didn’t feel like home. Like some unwanted cleaning lady came in and reorganised my entire apartment. I hated it.”

“So you’re mad at me for trying to tidy up your house?”

You roll your eyes. “Not mad. Not about that. If anything, I’m mad because you fucking ran away, but that’s forgiven and forgotten. Look, I’ve made your bed.” You point at the rumpled sofa and try to hide your mounting grin.

Keith shakes his head, laughs, and it’s a sound you will never grow tired of. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

There’s a silence, but this time it’s not awkward in the slightest. The tension’s still there, but along with it is a kind of quiet understanding. A little sad, maybe. A little longing. But it’s something you’ve both accepted as impossible, and at the moment, that’s okay.

Because he’s back. And he’s okay. And really, that’s all that matters.

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headoverjojo · 6 years ago

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Hey Tri :3 ʕっ•ᴥ•ʔっ You know what? I really need to know the continuum of Risotto’s Secret Garden, sono debole 😂 soooo... is Granny Tosca the Don of an enemy group? Will Prosci really kill his beloved nephew? Will Risotto cry? I need the DRAMA 💚

Esteeeeeeeee ⊂(･ω･*⊂) A H, I loved it so much 💖 And I fear you’ll throw at me many boots after reading this aaaaaa gomenasaiiiiiiiii 😂 It’s a bit looong, but I hope you’ll like it! :3

Here’s the first part!

Risotto’s secret garden: second part

(Under the cut for length!)

After that day, Risotto talked even lesser than usual. Prosciutto wasn’t around, busy with his mission, and no one dared to ask him what was in his mind. No one aside Gelato and Sorbetto, the only ones, with Prosciutto, who knew how to deal with Risotto when he was in an awful mood.

“Hey, novellino.” Sorbetto greeted, entering his office without knocking. Just he and Gelato had the right to call the way taller and buffer man “novellino”, rookie, as they had been his mentors and, by now, it was more an affectionate nickname than anything else. Risotto, instead of huffing, as he always did when he was called so, just glared at the older man, silent. Sorbetto sighed, sitting on one of the chairs in front of his Capo’s desk, looking at him for a while, in a calm and patient silence. Risotto, after a little, went back to ignore him and scribble on his papers, hoping that, seeing that he didn’t want to talk, he would have gone on his merry way.

Alas, Sorbetto knew better. He knew how to deal with his pupil, he knew that he needed time. And, lucky -or unlucky- for him, Sorbetto, when he wanted, was a really patient man, as Gelato could confirm.

As he had predicted, after a while, Risotto put down the pen, lifting his gaze on his mentor. His eyebrow was twitching, Sorbetto noticed, before looking again without fear in his red eyes. He never was scared by his almost demoniac appearance nor that he could use Metallica on him. Sorbetto knew Risotto wouldn’t ever have done it.

“So, Risotto? Ready to spit it out?” he asked, crossing his leg. Risotto grumbled and Sorbetto had to chew back a smile. It was like having to deal with a Risotto barely come out from puberty and not his feared and mature Capo, sometimes…

“I’ve nothing to spit out.” at his words, Sorbetto rolled his eyes, What was he thinking, that he was stupid or what?

“Sorry to contradict you, but even an idiot would notice that there’s been something wrong with you, in the last days. It’s about Prosciutto’s mission?” Sorbetto’s black eyes sharpened, seeing the slightest unpleasant twitch in Risotto’s mouth. Ah, so it was so…

“C’mon, novellino. You know you can rely on us.” his voice was slightly gentler, as it was something that evidently was bothering Risotto really a lot. And the things that bothered Risotto to this extent were really, really few and usually really serious.

Risotto sighed, heavily leaning on the back of his chair, closing his eyes for a little while. Why was it so difficult… but Sorbetto was right. He was letting this thing to chew him from inside and how could he lead his group, in such conditions? Maybe talking about it would have helped him for real. And Sorbetto was a discreet man, he was sure that not even a syllable would have left the office.

And so, the Capo told everything. From his first meeting with Tosca, to the warm affection he felt for the lively grandma, how he loved her as she was really his grandma, how she and the group of old ladies grew to be so important to him… and, then, he told him about Tosca’s grandson and that he was the target assigned for that mission.

Sorbetto stayed quiet and silent for a while, absorbing Risotto’s words. Now he was understanding… a really horrible situation indeed. Fate could be really a bitch, uh?

“What do you think to do, when Prosciutto will be back? Avoiding Tosca at all?” he asked, finally breaking the silence. Risotto sighed, looking at him, tired as Sorbetto rarely had seen him. This situation really was a heavy burden for him…

“I don’t know. Her grandson will be surely dead by now and this was a target related to a rival gang. I don’t even know if Tosca suspects this… how would you react knowing that your just dead grandson was a gangster while you were thinking he was a good boy? The shock could even kill her. And… and I can’t let her know that her grandson died because of me, that it was my fault.” he answered, grimacing. He could bear anything, but not the hate of the few people he loved, such as his team and, now, Tosca. Sorbetto slowly nodded, thoughtful, swinging a little his foot, as he always did when he was lost in his thoughts.

“But it’s not your fault, Risotto. We are just executors. And no,- he said, lifting a hand, blocking Risotto’s protests before he could even speak- we can’t just not execute Boss’ orders. You perfectly know that doing it would mean certain death for insubordination, so it’s not something negotiable. It has been a simple and terrible casualty, nothing more. And, in my opinion, right now what Tosca may need more is a friendly presence near her, in a so hard moment. Having you near may help her to face the mourning and get over it quicker than if she was alone.” the man pondered, in a quiet voice. Risotto listened in silence, sighing, after a while. Well… Sorbetto was right. As almost always, in the end; he was his mentor for a reason, all in all. Taking another deep breath, he nodded, earning a small from the usually serious man, before Gelato, after knocking, peeked inside, announcing Prosciutto’s return. Risotto’s heart sank again, knowing what this meant.

It was time.

Two days after Prosciutto’s return and after reading again and again his detailed report, Risotto found the strength to go again to the park. His teammate’s report didn’t leave space to doubts: Tosca’s grandson was dead. At least, as he demanded him, Prosciutto ended his life quickly and painlessly. An incredible small comfort, but better than nothing.

It seemed like time was submerged in a molasses jar. Every step was heavy and difficult, as guilt was burdening his heart. To be fair, he didn’t really think he would have found Tosca at the park, not after such a news. He had to change his mind when he saw, on her usual bench, Tosca. She was sitting on the edge, all flopped on herself, as a heavy rock was standing on her shoulders. Risotto’s heart clenched painfully, seeing her like this. It was like he was feeling her pain, it was like feeling the same pain he felt after his cousin’s sudden death. It was so heavy and overwhelming that he was feeling like he was suffocating.

Tosca lifted her head a bit, hearing Risotto approaching. A small, sad and grieving smile bent her lips, making Risotto’s heart even heavier. How much he would have given to not see her like this…

She lightly patted the spot near her, as she always did, and Risotto sat near her, silent. The clear blue sky was slightly covered by white, fluffy clouds that, when they passed in front of the sun, casted the park in a fresh shadow. The birds were chirping, the wind was gently ruffling the leaves, as always. It seemed like everything was as the same, as nothing bad just happened and Tosca, in a moment, would have asked him to hold the skein while she separated the threads… but both of them knew that that day wasn’t like others.

That was a day of mourn and gloom. And that day was time to throw away all the masks.

“I’ve heard about your grandson. I’m sorry, Tosca.” Risotto murmured, finally finding again his voice. How curious, he absentmindedly thought, that he had no problems to face the worst criminals of all Italy on daily basis, following his Boss’ orders, but now… this was the most difficult thing he had ever done, staying near to this old woman grieving for her grandson. He felt like he was dying as well.

“Thank you. But, you know… I was expecting it, soon or later. He too. With the life he had…” she trailed off, sighing. Risotto frowned, hearing those words. What…? She knew, so? And she was so tranquil knowing it?

Seeing the confusion on his face, Tosca smiled again, still sad, even tired. For the first time, Risotto saw on her all the years she truly had, the old lady hidden under her usual gleeful attitude.

“Are you asking yourself how I knew about it, hm? I know a lot of things, Risotto Nero…” Risotto froze, hearing her calling him with his full name. He… never told her his surname. How could she…?

“It’s time for you to know, my dear… but please, don’t let it make you forget the splendid friendship we have, ok?” she said in a hopeful tone. Risotto sighed, nodding, even if still wary. He couldn’t deny her this, after taking from her her grandson. In any case… in the worst case, he would have been ready with Metallica. But just as very last option.

“I know what my grandson did for living ‘cause I was the one who gave him orders, my dear.” she explained, quiet, looking ahead. Risotto, for the second time in few minutes, froze again, completely taken aback. No, wait… this meant that she…? No, it couldn’t be. He couldn’t believe it…

“As you have understood, by now, I’m indeed the Boss of the gang your Boss want to eradicate. Or, better, to absorb, as a big company does with smaller ones, eliminating who opposite to this.” she said, quietly, folding her hands on her lap. Risotto stayed silent, to give her time to explain properly. He didn’t know how he was feeling… so many upsetting news all together. He needed a bit to elaborate it all.

“My grandson was a fierce opponent of this fusion and he payed for this. I am against it too… so I guess that soon or later my turn will come, uh?” another sad smile bent her lips, as she watched Risotto. As she did many times before, she gently patted his hand, squinting at him, making Risotto’s heart hurt even more. Even with her glasses, Tosca’s eyesight was pretty poor, but she always joked about that…

“I’d like you to take the mission on you, when your Boss will give it to your team. I know it’s… a hard request… but please, my dear. You’re the only one I can trust to do this. I know you’ll be… as merciful as possible.” every word seemed to plant a red-hot blade in his heart. He lowered his head, gritting his teeth. How could she ask him, among all people, something like this…? How could she ask him to kill her, the person he considered, by now, his grandma? Did she really think he would have been able to kill her?

Would he be able to do it, all in all…?

Yes, he thought, after a while. He would have been able. Even if only to give her the most merciful and fastest death she could hope to have.

He had to be the one to kill her right because he loved her so much. He owed her it. He owed her a fast and dignified death, as she deserved. If the Boss would have sent Cioccolata and Secco, she would have suffered unbearable hours of pure pain, before finally meeting the sweet release of death. He couldn’t allow it to happen.

For her and all the love and happiness she gave him in those months, he had to overcome his pain and do it. This was her last desire: he had to fulfill it.

“I don’t want to do it.” he said, anyway, quiet. Tosca smiled again, brushing his cheek with her knuckles, as she always did, understanding what he really meant.

“I know, my dear, I know. But you have to. I know how things work, in your organization… if you don’t do exactly like the Boss says, he gets ridden of you. Risotto… you’re still so young, you have many years in front of you. Who knows, maybe one day someone will dethrone your Boss and a new era will start. You have so much time to live… you have time to even find a person you could love with all your heart. You have time to have a family. I have lived many happy years… I’m an old lady, Risotto. I’m tired. But I want to go with the same dignity as I have lived with.” Tosca replied, with a soft voice. Risotto’s lips quivered, as he was trying with all his might to hold back a sob, even if his eyes were dry as a desert. In order to not betray himself, he just nodded at her words, earning a slightly brighter smile from the old woman.

“Thank you, my dear.” she said, before getting up and, as she always did, kissing his cheek in that way that kids hated but that, instead, Risotto found so reassuring. Then, she left, leaving him alone with his thoughts.

He got up just when dusk was falling and slowly come back to the HQ. No one dared to talk to him or ask what he had done all the time he had been out, not even Ghiaccio, who was never scared to speak up, surely tamed by one of Gelato’s famous glares. Risotto, on his own, didn’t say a word and just closed himself in his office, sighing. He felt… empty. So empty, so tired…

He sat down, sighing again and closing his eyes. How much he wished this all to be just a bad dream…

A ping from the laptop broke his thoughts. Risotto opened his eyes, checking the mails, paling a little when he saw it was from the Boss. The Boss usually contacted him just for one reason…

His hand was slightly trembling, when he moved the mouse to open the mail. His heart broke and his eyes stung for tears never shed, when he read the message.

“Next target: Tosca Verdi.”

#jjba #vento aureo #la squadra di esecuzione #risotto nero #granny tosca #risotto's secret garden #part two #scenario #sfw #estellea

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stars-and-rose · 6 years ago

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lacrosse and starbucks

alternately called: band au shenanigans? band au shenanigans.

really, i was planning on updating cursed kingdom this weekend. or heart point. or both.

but my phone (which contains all my notes for both aus) had other ideas.

it died. i don’t mean the battery is out. i mean, it is completely done for.

so, until i get another phone (which should be very soon) and can recover my notes, it’s gonna be a little hard to update those aus. i’m currently rewriting my cursed kingdom notes in a notebook because my trust in phones has died.

in short, shit has hit the fan, and to make up for that, I found a drabble (whoops it’s actually almost 2k words) it wrote for my band au. soooooo here we go! it managed to become pining prinxiety and logically and I'm not sure how

Fandom: Thomas Sanders/Sanders Sides

Pairings: Highkey pining Prinxiety, and Logicality

Summary: Junior year is almost over... the concert is in four days time, and at that concert, leadership position's will be announced. So what is Virgil doing? Practicing? no. Sitting at his c- friends lacrosse game and getting coffee? yes

Word Count: 1908

Trigger Warnings: Cursing and Implied parental death (brief, mentioned in a single sentence)

Virgil could list a thousand other things he could be doing at the moment. He could be finishing his sociology report. He could be practicing his solo for the concert, which was less than a week away. He could be helping the younger members of the school's poetry group finish their writings for the slam coming up.

Instead, he had his back against the bleachers, his dark jean jacket hanging loosely off his shoulders and his eyes focused on the puffy clouds in a blue sky. He had been focusing on the game, but the opposite school had called a timeout and they were taking too long.

He wouldn't have been watching the lacrosse game if it weren't for the fact that one of its chief players was both his ride home and his best friend. Virgil looked away from the sky and back to the players, spotting Roman by his number. The honey blonde was twisting around his lacrosse stick, eyes focused only on the opponent. Roman got always got like this, it didn't matter if it was a lacrosse game, an audition or a friendly debate with Logan, another one of their friends; Roman’s mind was set on 'win' and it was a one-track mind on that setting.

The ref blew his whistle, and the game started back up. Virgil didn't exactly understand how the game worked, but he still sat in the stands, cheering when someone in blue and gold made a goal. No matter how hard he tried, however, he couldn't focus on any player that wasn't Roman for more than ten seconds. It didn't help his cause that Romans ass look particularly good in the lacrosse uniform-

Just as the thought caused Virgil's cheeks to tint pink, his phone began to vibrate in his pocket. He pulled out his phone and noticed the caller ID- 🌸DAD🌸

It wasn't Virgil's actual father- rather, it the last member of their quartet, Patton. Virgil has been waiting for this call. He stood, his jacket falling off as he walked down the bleachers, apologizing to anyone he knocked into. After getting a decent way away from the game (so he could hear over the shouting and the clashing of sticks), he accepted the call.

He blinked as a pixelated image of Patton's face filled the screen. The brunet smiled at him, "Hey kiddo! How's the game going?"

Virgil snorted, "Bold if you to assume I understand how sports work. I think they're doing well though- Ro hasn't thrown a fit yet. But that's not important- how did your interview go?"

Patton twisted a loose piece of his hair with his free hand. "I'm honestly not sure. Mr. Sanders was smiling the whole time and he seemed to like my answers, and I kept the right time during the conducting section-"

"Patton, I heard the whole interview from the library. You did stupendously." Patton flushed and turned the camera a bit to show Logan, whose eyes were on the road and his hands were on the steering wheel.

"Yeah, Pat, I bet you did great. If Thomas doesn't give you Drum Major, I'll be really pissed. Who else is going for it? Zia Macintosh? If she gets it I'll riot, because she's a huge bitch." Virgil commented

"Don't be mean." Patton scolded, but the smile on his face contradicted his words.

Virgil rolled his eyes. "What are you guys doing now?"

"I'm treating Patton to ice cream for successfully completing his interview," Logan said, fingers drumming on the steering wheel.

"I cone not believe how nice he is to me." Patton smiled, eyes soft and a bit unfocused. Virgil laughed as Logan groaned at the pun.

"Alright you two, I'm pretty sure Princey's game is over, so I gotta go. Who's doing rides tomorrow?"

"It's my day!" Patton grinned. "Meaning we're gonna leave early and get breakfast at Lottie's!"

Logan let out a groan. "We always arrive at school late when we go to Lottie's!"

"Then we'll get take-out." Patton decided.

"That will suffice. Virgil, make sure you tell Roman to be ready on time."

"I'll make sure the beauty queen is ready," Virgil promised. "See you guys tomorrow."

Virgil hung up, and walked back to the bleachers, looking for his jacket. When it wasn't there, Virgil freaked out a bit. He was just about to climb under the bleachers when he felt the cold material draped around his shoulders. Virgil spun on his heels and almost fell onto Roman.

The blond threw his hands up in mock surrender. "Hey, hey Virge, just me!"

Virgil huffed, blowing a lock of dark hair out of his eyes. "You gave me a heart attack. Why did you take my jacket?"

"I saw that you left it up in the bleachers and grabbed it for you. Ready to go?"

"Do you have your keys?"

Roman rummaged through his letterman (which he wore all the time; Virgil only wore his own every once and a while) and pulled out his keys, which rattled against the various keychains attached. "Mmhm!"

"Then let's go Princey- I want Starbucks." Virgil speed-walked towards Roman's Jeep, ignoring the other boy's protests.

Roman caught up to him as Virgil reached the black car. "Why am I taking you to Starbucks?"

"Because I have a sociology report I have to finish and you have to finish your creative writing assignment and neither of us can function without coffee."

"I hate that you're right," Roman grumbled, before opening the passenger door for Virgil and walking around to get into the driver's side. Virgil considering banging his head on the car- Roman should not be allowed to do chivalrous and kinda cute things like opening doors and buying him coffee.

Instead, Virgil slipped into the car, breathing in the familiar scent of the sea-scented air freshener. Roman started the car and leaned back against the seat. "Hey emo nightmare, can you see if you can find my chapstick?"

Virgil rolled his eyes at the nickname but rummaged through the glove compartment until he found the vanilla chapstick that Roman was obsessed with. He passed the lacrosse player the chapstick and tried not to stare as Roman applied it. When he was done, Roman dropped it into his lap and began to pull out of the school's parking lot. "You're lucky it's on the way home."

"You'd do it even if it was on the opposite side of town." Virgil couldn't hear Romans's response, so he plugged his phone into the radio jack, settling on Pray for the Wicked. When 'Roaring Twenties' started to blast through the speakers, Roman let out a laugh and began to sing along.

By the time they pulled into the Starbucks drive-through, Virgil was wheezing as Roman started singing at an impossible octave. He was still snorting as Roman started to order.

"One iced caramel latte and one iced white chocolate mocha, both venti," Roman ordered as Virgil attempted to contain himself.

Virgil grabbed his drink as soon as Roman brought it into the car. "The white chocolate messes with your whole emo aesthetic."

"Fuck you, white chocolate is amazing." Virgil took a sip of drink to prove his point.

Roman laughed again, taking a sip of his drink before driving along. "Did you get a call from Patton and Logan?"

"Yup, Logan was taking Pat out for ice cream after what he said was a successful interview."

"When are they going to get together?" Roman complained.

"I know! They've been pining since sophomore year!" Virgil was being a hypocrite, but that was irrelevant.

"It's crazy that we're going to be seniors." Roman sighed dreamily. "But senior year is gonna be a blast! I'm going to be a head section leader, you'll be equipment manager, Logan will be running the library, and Pat will be Drum Major."

"We won't know until the concert when Thomas announces leadership positions. If it happens, we'll have basically taken over the band," Virgil noted with a grin.

"It's because Thomas loves us. And we're crazy good players."

"Take the ego down a few notches, Ro."

"Roman laughed, then stopped the car in front of Virgil's house. "It looks like your moms not home." He commented.

Virgil looked; his mom's Toyota wasn't in the driveway. "She probably got called in." Virgil unbuckled, then remembered what he was supposed to tell Roman." Be ready early tomorrow; Pat's doing rides and we're stopping to pick up breakfast at Lottie's."

"Sounds great. See ya tomorrow Virge."

"See ya tomorrow, Ro." Virgil stepped outside, shut the car door, and walked up to his house, fumbling for his keys. After he opened the door, he turned and waved as Roman drove off. He closed the door behind him and noticed the note hanging from the corkboard his mom had hung in the entryway years ago.

Vee- Hope you had a good day at school, and at Romans game! I got called into the hospital, I swear they crumble without me there. I was able to make dinner before I got called, you should just have to heat it up. Text me when you get home, and don't stay up till three in the morning! <3 Mom

Virgil smiled. His mom was an emergency physician, and her irregular hours often left nights like this. It made him treasure the days she had off more. He hung up his jacket on one of the hooks, sipping his drink.

As Virgil headed for the kitchen, his eyes flared to the photograph on the wall- his mother standing with a smile, holding himself as an infant. Hugging her was a stranger in a military uniform that Virgil knew was his father.

Virgil found the food his mom had made and threw it into the microwave to heat it. While it warmed, Virgil perched on the counter, opening the various messages on his phone. Most were just streaks, so he flipped through them without paying attention until he opened the streaks from Roman.

The picture was of Virgil. He has his eyes closed and his face was frozen in laughter. It looked like Roman had snuck the picture of him while they were in the Starbucks drive-through. Roman, ever the artist, had added purple swirls around the edges.

Virgil let out a laugh, "Dork."

After eating his dinner, texting his mom. and scrolling through Tumblr, he went upstairs and sat at his laptop. As it booted up- which usually took forever, the little shit, Virgil noticed an old poem laying on his desk. His mom must have been cleaning and found it. When he had written this? Eighth grade?

The poem was dark; it described feeling out, being on the outside looking in. Virgil has to admit, his old works were pretty cringe-worthy. But then again, eighth grade had not been fun.

Who would have thought a three-day band festival could be the catalyst that would change the lonely, sad boy who didn't know what was wrong with him to a boy who knew how to cope with his anxiety and was happily surrounded by friends?

Virgil pushed the poem off his desk, watching it fall to the floor slowly. "Don't worry." He found himself mumbling. "It gets better."

With that, Virgil opened his report and began to finish up it, a new poem idea swirling in the back of his mind, along with his improv solo playing as background music.

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mononoavvare · 7 years ago

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trickster spirits don’t get to have names.

ONE FOR SORROW,

the sparrow is nine years old when it cuts down its brother.

the old man says, fly. it leaps. he says, kill, and it gives chase. all it takes is one. one hour, chasing him down like a dog, one shaky, it’s okay. you can live, one neat slice of a blade. one head, delivered like a trophy.

they call this a graduation. it feels the noose tighten.

TWO FOR JOY,

it learns:

i. the roar of the wind in freefall, delirious from the force of it pushing the air from its lungs, the adrenaline rush. a high it doesn’t want to come down from, even as it’s caught in still clumsily drawn ink-claws, thrown once more only to be caught on its creation’s back instead. the sparrow doesn’t return to the earth for hours, until its chakra whittled to nearly nothing. nobody asks where it has been.

ii. for hours it watches a troupe of children dance one afternoon, the waves of laughter and music lulling it into some kind of contentment. it pulls out the scroll, the brush, and inks their forms down in quick sketches. so it doesn’t forget. late at night, it animates them, tries to copy the movements from memory, adds its own twists and hops, dances with the tiny ink forms into the small hours of the morning.

THREE FOR A GIRL,

she isn’t right.

the old man calls her, my dear, and his hand in her hair is a farce, an impersonation of tenderness, and still she leans into it. he is grizzled, and frail, but his hands do not shake when they reach out to her. she thinks, maybe, she hates him. she knows she would die for him.

little bird, the swordswoman calls her, knocking her down with the flat of her blade. this is a kindness rarely afforded -- most of the instructors aim to hurt, to cut deep, claim they learn better that way. the swordswoman teaches her to flay flesh from bone with one neat stroke, the advantage of speed, of silence. she tells her, you are a little killer, sneaks her bits, and odds, and ends, the occasional treat. she disappears one day, and no one mentions her again.

he calls her sweetling. his hand is on her knee. she will be glad to kill him later, feels satisfied at the gaping hole where his tongue used to be. she’s never taken pleasure in a mission before now.

FOUR FOR A BOY,

he cuts his hair. few things change, but it’s a start.

it looks ugly, patchy, cropped so close to his head, like an ugly case of mange. he can’t stop running his fingers over the spots where he’d cut too close to his scalp with the kunai, the scabs take forever to heal. he feels lighter.

the recipients of the message he brings call him ‘it’. they call him an ugly little monster, his face hidden. on his return, his fingers shake when they touch the bare spots on his scalp. he asks his bunk mate to even it out for him.

handsome little devil, aren’t you? the old woman says it at least once a day, ruffling his hair. he never speaks, but he supposes she doesn’t need him to. she thinks she has pulled a feral little stray in from the cold, perhaps believes he will speak in his own time, doesn’t mind it taking a while as long as he eats the food she cooks him (too rich, it makes him sick at first) and helps her into town to do old lady things. she doesn’t know he’s here to kill her. he doesn’t understand why he has to. she is old, she cannot be a threat. he has not seen her move faster than a snail’s pace at anything other than knitting. he tells them so, and they want him to kill her anyway. he says no, but still she dies. he does too.

when he is sixteen, they send him for another undercover assignment. the first thing he does is steal a bottle of oil, scented like dragon’s blood. he never uses it, but he keeps it on a shelf, hidden behind some books. sometimes he takes it out just to hold it, or to twist off the cap and smell it.

FIVE FOR SILVER,

under the pale light of the moon, he sees.

the team is out late, and the chill of winter is creeping in. the captain had dropped a cloak on his shoulders when he’d started to shiver, and he thinks the clouds from their breathless laughter glitter brightly in the night like their own stars, nebulas forming in front of them from the sheer force of their joy. he tugs the cloak closer, if only to hide the smile tugging at the corners of his lips.

the healer with the scarred knuckles sweeps her hair back one night and the moonlight catches on a glint hanging her ear, shaped like a teardrop. he cannot tear his eyes away, leans closer, and her hands are gentle when she cups his face and holds him there. she tells him they were her grandmother’s, that she only wears them when she’s sure they’re safe. he tells her they’re beautiful, earnest in the face of her honesty, and he cannot say for sure, but he thinks she blushes.

he and the hunter with the lightning blood spend a long night in tense silence sitting next to a hospital bed. they only speak in the small hours, the older man not looking away from the slow rise and fall of the chest occupying the bed, and he cannot look away from the way he blends perfectly with the rest of the monochrome of the hospital. the hunter says, if you pick up this habit of being a self sacrificing idiot, i’ll make the rest of your short life extremely painful. he says, yes sensei.

the hero, a man bursting with determination enough to be considered a human sun, pulls his shirt off with a muttered curse. his hair, the whites of his eyes, the eyeteeth that poke out from the edge of a smile are all washed with the same shade, seemingly glowing. the creature that is no longer a sparrow catches a glimpse of a silver chain, leans forward to follow the trail to the pendant at the end of it. his hand settles, palm flat against the warm skin of his chest, pinning it between them. the hero puts his hand over his, closes his eyes, and sighs out the weight of the world.

he bums a cigarette off the captain once -- catches him chainsmoking outside a bar, placid like an inland lake, tells him the healer would be pissed if she knew. only shuts up when he decides to share. the moon is full, but the night is clouded, leaving only the faintest light for them to see by. he thinks the captain looks tired. the smoke slips from their mouths like the breath of a dragon, dissipating in the darkness. they finish the last two in the pack in silence. he says, these are nasty, gets a gentle swat on the back of the head, and a laugh, and they go their separate ways.

SIX FOR GOLD,

in the burning, inescapable light of the sun, he loves.

he sits up one night with a name on his lips, dead longer than he has lived. shakes himself apart, sweating and grey until the first light peeks through his window, creeping across his bed like fingers, reaching, stretching. he shuts his eyes against it, but the light reminds him he has places to be.

in the heat of the day, he lays in the grass, bruised to the core and panting. the fighter is humming, kneeling forest-green and bubbling next to him, fingers working out of sight. when he finally sits up, a crown of dandelions is bequeathed to him, and he takes it with great dignity, and places it on his head. the answering smile is stunning.

the malady haloed in purple pulls him from his desk at midday, linking their arms and insisting he take the rest of the day off. once is all it takes before he’s convinced, but he pretends to think about it, if only to hear the other man come up with increasingly outlandish and hilarious bribes. they were going somewhere, but between point a and point b they get distracted, end up tangled in one another in a park under a bridge, kissing the day away like a couple of horny teenagers, touching each other’s faces, stealing each other’s breath.

several hours pass with them lounging in the shade of a massive willow tree. the virgin mumbles things, sometimes they make sense, sometimes they don’t, and sometimes he responds. his head rests on the man’s thigh, their fingers tangle together, and for a while they know peace.

it’s evening, the summer sunset leaving the wolf washed in all the colors of the dying light. they’re pressed close for warmth on the edge of the roof, kicking feet hanging over the edge, chopsticks waving wildly in the air for emphasis. every burst of laughter is a victory, every soft brush of their shoulders weathering away the burrs on his soul. they are kin. they know one another.

the quiet hours of the morning leave him perched in the dragon’s lap, nose to nose with him, sharing breath, and secrets, electrifying kisses. he presses the man into the bed and leaves him breathless, again, and again, and again. he wants the moment to last forever, can’t look away from him for fear of missing a single, perfect detail, for fear he is blowing smoke.

SEVEN FOR A SECRET, NEVER TO BE TOLD.

there are things he holds close to his heart, things he will not let go.

i. he will never heal,

ii. all their tender hearts

iii. there is no such thing as freedom

iv. they all deserve a little bit of faith, forgiveness, redemption

v. love is only a weakness if you let it be so

vi. the sway of hips to an imagined tune

vii. he loves them all.

EIGHT FOR A WISH,

it takes him a while to get the hang of things.

when the sun sets, he imagines a light in the darkness to guide him. he has been wandering so long, and he thinks, perhaps, it is time for him to find a home.

on an assignment to the land of grass, he spends a majority of his watch one night observing a band of coyotes nip at each other as they rip apart the carcass of a deer, until there are nothing but scraps. in the dawn, the crows descend upon the rest.

an ancient crone with milky blue eyes grabs him by the wrist one day, her grip so strong it feels like his bones are being crushed into dust. she beseeches him to remember what he is, and no one around him reacts at all.

he walks until his feet bleed, once. just to see how far he can go, ends up somewhere in the land of whirlpools, sits at the edge of a cliff over a raging sea just to feel the spray, and then walks back. there isn’t a single comment on his absence, and eventually the scabs turn to scars, and then those fade too.

a stray dog follows him home one night, nothing but skin and bone. it vomits up any food it receives, curls up and dies in his lap some time in the night. he can feel it when the ribs stop shifting, but he doesn’t stop stroking its nicked ears until well after the sun has risen, just because he doesn’t know what else to do.

there is a duck pond a few minutes’ walk from his place, and he spends an hour there every morning for three months, just to see what it’s like. the ducks start to know him, he feeds them rice, and chopped lettuce, tiny, carefully sliced grapes. he goes on a mission for three weeks, and when he comes back they are weary of him once more. he doesn’t go back.

he ages.

it seems like death lurks around every corner, her bony fingers lingering in his peripheral vision. he is no stranger to being hunted. he is not afraid. he just doesn’t want to go. and so he will not go easy.

NINE FOR A KISS,

there are some things that matter, even if he doesn’t remember all of them.

his mother, in an uncharacteristic fit of tenderness, lays a kiss upon his brow before he is pulled from her grasp. she dies quietly, a hand stretched out for him, the knife that had been used to cut his umbilical cord buried in her throat.

his tiny body is dying of a fever, shaking apart at the seams in the cramped ROOT dormitory. most of the children hiss curses at him, and these are the ones that survive. a girl with blood red hair holds his hand, and a boy with a halo of silver brushes sticky black strands back and kisses his crown gently. confesses it’s something his mother had done, once, he swears he remembers it.

he’s eleven when he’s roaming the streets. slipped his leash, so to speak, and the crowds are bustling. he bumps into a girl half his size, knocks her to the ground, freezes when she shows him her bleeding hand. you have to kiss it better, she says, so imperiously that he can’t not obey. he returns to the compound with a tiny smear of blood on his cheek, but he manages to swipe it away before anyone notices.

there are blonde strands between his fingers, a familiar smart mouth pressed to his own, leaving the skin he touches aflame. it’s something terrible, possessive, wild. it’s a promise neither of them are sure they can (or want,) to keep.

she’s pulled her gloves off, puts her hand over his mouth to see if he’s breathing. he blinks his eyes open, blearily, opens his mouth to make another smart comment. her hand clamps down even as she laughs, and she doesn’t pull away when he licks her hand, just leans down to peck a kiss on the corner of his eye.

this one is a fight, the gnashing of teeth, bloodied lips and harsh breath, the hot slide of fingers between his legs, and then a tongue. there’s nothing gentle about it, and it leaves something howling and cold and aching in his chest. he takes as much as he can get.

there’s a predator laying kisses on his eyelids. he’s laughing about it, and that is his life.

there are several, bone breaking blows landed on his torso. his heart stutters, but does not restart. lips brush his, salty with tears, coppery with blood, desperate because they love him. his lungs inflate, and deflate, and his body remains still. rinse. repeat. it doesn’t work.

a pale hand settles over cold stone. his name would be engraved here, if he had one. the granite will not take the one they called him, remaining smooth and polished no matter how many chisels try to break it. lips brush the crest, a sentimental gesture that brings no comfort. they leave white lillies in the grass in front of the headstone, and they do not return to the empty grave.

TEN FOR A BIRD, YOU MUST NOT MISS.

when he goes, he goes hard. clawing, snarling, bleeding and cursing.

it hardly comes as a surprise to him. his days have been numbered since he came into this world, blue in the face, umbilical cord wrapped around his neck. he can only put death off for so long, dodging her cold, skeletal fingers with nothing more than a little grit, and determination. he is freezing, and he is alone, until he is not.

he loves you. he’s sorry.

#content warning /#hi this is the one that i said would take me a few days! it's been four hours. im going to bed.#// drabbles

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themurphyzone · 8 years ago

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Secret Santa Ch 6

Sorry about the wait! I went home for Thanksgiving and we just got the Internet back!

So yeah tons of cuteness in the last chapter. Headcanon that Bradley is totally a cat lover! Also Pepper’s original name was Ashley but then I thought Bradley already had a name that ends with -ley and it looked too similar. Besides, salt and pepper go together!

Ch 6- Bradley

“You’re picky, aren’t you?” Bradley asked. Pepper mewed and turned her nose up at the white cat bed Bradley pointed out. “Do you want a darker color?”

Pepper batted at the air in front of her.

“This one’s too big,” Bradley said, kneeling to look at the items on the bottom row. “And this one’s expensive.”

He set Pepper down so he could look at the price tag of a brown, circular bed. The fleece was soft and fluffy, and had room to spare as Pepper grew up.

“What about this one?” he asked, his heart sinking when he realized Pepper hadn’t answered like she normally did. “Pepper?”

It hadn’t been a week and he’d already lost track of his kitten. She couldn’t possibly get into trouble. No, there was no way she could waltz out the door and get chased by stray dogs or hit by a car or be buried in a landslide-

Bradley inhaled deeply, though it didn’t help calm his heart at all. He walked through the aisle twice, but there was no sign of a dark gray kitten anywhere.

“Bradley!” An all-too familiar voice shouted. “Hey! What are you doing here?”

The last thing he needed with this disaster of epic proportions was the epitome of catastrophe himself.

“Milo,” Bradley said flatly. “Go away. Weekends are my breaks.”

“Well, I can’t leave Diogee behind!” Milo cheerfully waved to Diogee, who was behind a large enclosure with a group of five other dogs. Diogee barked at the acknowledgement. “Also, Melissa’s the assistant teacher!”

“Assistant teacher for what?” Bradley asked.

“Oh, you didn’t know?” Milo asked. “Diogee teaches ACL. American Canine Language for short. This pet store lets them use the space on Saturdays at noon. It’s really nice of them to do that.”

Melissa put a fluffy Pomeranian down, opening the door a crack so she could join the conversation but not let the dogs out. “Between you and me, I have no idea what they’re saying. I’m just here to pet some pooches,” she whispered to Bradley.

Bradley pulled away, quickly turning his back on Milo so he didn’t see his cheeks heat up. Of course he’d been thinking about Melissa’s gift, but he only thought about it during school since Pepper wasn’t distracting him. Not that all distractions were bad of course. “If you’ll excuse me, I have to go find Pepper.”

“Did you lose her?” Milo asked. “I can help you look. It’s no trouble. Maybe I can get Diogee to sniff her out for you.”

“Yes, I lost her,” Bradley snapped. “And keep your mutt away.”

No amount of telling Milo to keep out of his business was working, so Bradley had no choice but to let Milo follow behind him. In that timespan, three shopping carts overturned and a large bag of dog food split open, the entire back half of the store now filled with the sounds of crunching kibble and barking dogs.

They checked the bird aisle, the toy section, the aquarium decorations, and the grooming services, but they still couldn’t spot Pepper anywhere.

“It’s hopeless,” Bradley muttered. “We’ll never find her.”

“Don’t give up!” Milo said. “I’m sure she’s fine.”

Bradley scoffed, folding his arms. “And how do you know?”

“Because she’s right next to your head,” Milo replied. “Hi, Pepper! You had us all worried!”

Bradley whipped around, but before he could scoop Pepper up, she turned tail and settled into a black cat bed, curling in on herself and yawning.

“I can’t believe she was napping the entire time,” Bradley said, taking the cat bed off the shelf. “I’m not hanging around longer than I need to. I only came in here to buy her bed.”

Milo nodded. “See you on Monday then! Bye, Pepper!”

“Keep your voice down! She’s asleep!”

Pepper adjusted to his house quickly, so he was able to focus his attention on his gift to Melissa.

She was intelligent, but often forgetful. Bradley had seen her weak throwing arm, so sports equipment was ruled out.

Safety equipment? She was almost always in the splatter zone.

But Melissa never hesitated in telling people off when she thought they were being too paranoid around Milo. In Bradley’s opinion, there was little paranoia in fearing for his life when ‘anything that can go wrong’ did not exclude dying.

He liked to think he had good self-preservation instincts, a skill which many kids at Jefferson County Middle School sorely lacked.

Maybe a second opinion wouldn’t hurt. Girls were complicated after all.

Bradley deliberately hung back while the other kids crossed the street to get to the bus stop. Since there were currently only four functioning buses due to circus elephants stampeding through the parking lot at the main district office, the buses wouldn’t come around for another fifteen minutes.

That was plenty of time to chat.

“Elliot, I have a question for you,” Bradley said.

Elliot was still shaking his fist at Milo. “And if I even see you trying to cover your arm with any bracelet that’s on my prohibited list, you’ll be sorry!”

Bradley rolled his eyes. “Do I want to know why you have a prohibited list for bracelets?”

“Not just for bracelets. Also includes any other pieces of jewelry that can potentially get caught on water heaters, streetlamps, or luggage carts,” Elliot replied. “Always good to help educate a student on safety protocol.”

“No, that was a question formulated out of disbelief,” Bradley sighed. “Say, hypothetically, there was a pretty girl at school and a Secret Santa exchange is coming up in less than a month. What would you get her?”

“Oh, that’s easy,” Elliot said. “Matching safety vests! That way you can walk home at night and the color is bright enough so people can see you! Except make sure the girl in question isn’t also a regionally acclaimed skateboarder. Wendy didn’t like it that much when I gave tickets to all the other skateboarders at the state competition for violating basic safety principles. It totally wasn’t my fault. They deserved those citations for not completely wearing a protective bubble wrap layer while skateboarding along the half-pipe like any sane person would.”

Bradley wouldn’t be caught dead in one of Elliot’s overly saturated safety vests.

He walked to the bus stop with nine minutes to spare. “Thanks for nothing. I have no idea what I was thinking asking him for help,” he muttered.

“Why don’t you ask Milo?” Mort suggested. “He hangs out with Melissa all the time. He’ll probably know a lot of things that she likes.”

Bradley tapped his pencil in irritation and tried to focus on the assignment in front of him. “I am not asking the Boy Blunder for help. I’m not that desperate.”

Mort raised an eyebrow. “You say you aren’t desperate. But your aura is a deep purple like you’re afraid of what will happen in the near future should you fail to procure a suitable present.”

“Don’t try to read my thoughts,” Bradley snapped. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“And there’s a hint of green mixed in there too. Usually it stands for disgust,” Mort said.

Bradley shrugged. “In my defense, they were serving meatloaf for lunch.”

He was not going to regret this. He was not going to watch what little dreams he had crash and burn before they even got off the ground.

“I need help,” he said.

He fought the urge to scream, run, and live like a hermit for the rest of his life. Getting Melissa a present took precedence over his disdain for Milo. It was a constant internal struggle.

Milo gasped, a sickeningly bright smile taking over his face. “Sure! I’d love to help! I don’t know what you might need it for, but consider it accepted anyway!”

As he stood up in excitement, the open water bottle on his desk tipped over, spilling liquid all over the nearby electrical cords. The cords sparked and they quickly moved away from the small fire that sprung up.

He was definitely starting to regret this decision.

Looking around to make sure Melissa wasn’t in the vicinity, Bradley beckoned Milo closer, though he made sure there was an arm’s length between them. “What does Melissa like?”

“Lots of things!” Milo exclaimed. Apparently he never learned volume control, Bradley thought. “Good grades, friends, Diogee, music, risk-taking, bets, and puppies. I’m guessing puppies are kinda out of your budget though.”

As much as he wanted to disregard Milo, he had good ideas sometimes.

Only sometimes.

“Maybe not every kind of puppy,” Bradley said. “Does she like stuffed animals?”

Milo nodded. “She doesn’t really buy them herself. They’re usually gifts. And you can tell which ones were from me, because there’s always a leg or eye lost between the time I buy them and when she receives them. One time I knocked over the shelf where she displays them and now she has caution tape around the perimeter.”

“That’s all I need to know,” Bradley said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have somewhere else to be.”

“Where?” Milo asked.

A perfume cloud suddenly enveloped the classroom from a girl’s spilled bottle, causing the people in the back to cough as their senses were overwhelmed.

“Anywhere that doesn’t have an ocean mist scented perfume cloud,” Bradley replied, gathering his things and leaving the class so he didn’t get stuck with the scent all over his clothes. “And don’t think for one minute that asking for your help is going to be a regular occurrence.”

He found himself in the stuffed animal section of a toy store, looking through all the plush dogs on the shelves. They had just about every breed of canine imaginable, and Bradley belatedly realized he didn’t ask Milo about the breeds Melissa liked.

He tried to picture Diogee in his mind, though he had no idea what kind of dog he was. He appeared to be a corgi or dachshund though. It was probably the stubby legs.

After some debate, he picked a small Shiba Inu plushie complete with Santa hat. It wasn’t anything extravagant, but he hoped Melissa would find it cute anyway.

He was sure the plushie could never be as adorable as Pepper though.

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house-of-ocs · 6 years ago

Text

ANIME- Bungou Stray Dogs

GENDER- Female

AGE- 22-23 yrs old

DATE OF BIRTH- March 13th

ZODIAC SIGN- Aquarius ♒️

BIRTH STONE- Aquamarine

FAVORITE COLOR- Cherry red

LOVE INTEREST- Chuuya Nakahara

SPECIES- Human

CAREER- Chuuya's partner and Akkata's subordinate of the Port Mafia.

LOOKS-

Nina is a tall, curvy, (A/N: Like think her hips are kind of big and she's a little on the thick side but not all that much like thick enough to have stretch marks in some places and for her thighs to touch think hourglass figure) woman that stands at about 5'9 (175cm) with flaming red hair, and emerald green eyes and soft peach skin.

PERSONALITY AND QUIRKS- Nina has a sweet and loving motherly personality, but she also has a sadistic side that only comes out when the moment calls for it. While Nina's personality allows her to be sweet, when she's on the battlefield she shows no mercy she's very strong and likes to make good use of her strength. Nina isn't known to get angry very easily it rarely ever happens, but fair warning to anyone who does get her completely angry, watch out!

BACKGROUND- Nina grew up in Yokohama and despite her parents being in the Port Mafia she had a generally normal childhood she went to school like every other child did and acted like a normal child at least until her ability started to show when she turned twelve then her parents started training her. Nina actually liked training with her parents they grew closer and she got stronger it was a win, win. The night she met Chuuya she was fifteen and her training just started so she wasn't really good at using her ability yet. She had been walking home from a trip to the park when she was suddenly pulled into a dark alley by a group of rough-looking men. Nina put up the best fight she could but the men managed to pin her down and she couldn't activate her ability because fear was clouding her mind so she couldn't concentrate she was trapped. Just when they started to remove her clothes a figure appeared at the entrance of the alley.

The thugs turned to look at him they apparently knew him from the way their faces paled and before Nina could blink all of the men surrounding her were on the ground knocked out. The figure offered her his hand she took it and he helped her up. Before Nina could completely think about what she was doing she flung herself at him wrapping her arms around his neck and mumbling 'thank you' over and over again as tears ran done her cheeks. he patted her back whispering words of reassurance into her ear. When she composed herself she pulled herself away from him though her arms never left his neck she thanked him again and he offered to walk her the rest of the way back to her home she obliged and the pair trekked back to her house. When they arrived she thanked him one last time before going into her house and closing the door then it dawned on her that she never learned her savior's name.

As she opened her door again hoping to catch him only to see that he wasn't there. It was at that moment that Nina decided that she needed to work harder to harness her ability so nothing like that ever happened again. A few months passed and Nina was still looking for her savior but she could never find him. She eventually gave up deciding that their meeting was just a one-time thing, but she promised herself that if she ever saw him again she'd thank him properly. Fast forward six years into the future Nina has finally joined the Port Mafia and she was already assigned a partner she was both surprised and happy to see it was the same man from six years ago Chuuya Nakahara.

POWERS- Nina's ability Dragon Heart allows her to summon dragons her ability showed up when she was twelve and after training, she's been able to summon dragons on her own ever since. But her ability can also be extremely dangerous when she gets extremely angry or she goes into "survival mode" her body will change and have some of the same features of a dragon. She will grow horns, her teeth sharpen, she grows dragon wings, and a tail and her pupils will become slit like a dragon's she can't control herself in this form and doesn't remember anything past when she transforms when she turns back to normal. She'll only go back to normal once she tires herself out or when she calms down.

Nina's ability sometimes reacts to her emotions more specifically her anxiety when Nina gets anxious sometimes her dragon features will show up, but it depends on how nervous she gets. But anxiety and survival aren't the only reasons her dragon features show up sometimes she'll be at home and they'll just come out, she doesn't understand why this happens but she has learned to just accept it.

TALENTS- Nina is extremely strong as shown when she once carried a large, heavy desk through the Mafia headquarters all while humming a happy tune. Nina also has the uncanny ability to never get drunk no matter how much alcohol she consumes it's both a good and a bad thing for her. Nina can also write extremely fast and still have beautiful handwriting. She is an amazing singer, and loves showing it off.

FEARS- Small enclosed spaces.

LIKES- Summer, bath bombs, DIYs, when someone does her hair, music, flying on her dragons, and smoothies (preferably banana peach)

DISLIKES- Being left out

#text post #my ocs #bungou stray dogs #Nina Franchesca

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i-would-rather-be-a-fairy · 6 years ago

Text

Nina Franchesca

ANIME- Bungou Stray Dogs

GENDER- Female

AGE- 22-23 yrs old

DATE OF BIRTH- March 13th

ZODIAC SIGN- Aquarius ♒️

BIRTH STONE- Aquamarine

FAVORITE COLOR- Cherry red

LOVE INTEREST- Chuuya Nakahara

SPECIES- Human

CAREER- Chuuya's partner and Akkata's subordinate of the Port Mafia.

LOOKS-

Nina is a tall, curvy, (A/N: Like think her hips are kind of big and she's a little on the thick side but not all that much like thick enough to have stretch marks in some places and for her thighs to touch think hourglass figure) woman that stands at about 5'9 (175cm) her hair is flaming red, her eyes are emerald green and her skin is a soft peach.

BACKGROUND- Nina grew up in France, but after her parents joined the Mafia she moved to Yokohama and despite her parents being in the Port Mafia she had a generally normal childhood she went to school like every other child did and acted like a normal child at least until her ability started to show when she turned twelve then her parents started training her. Nina actually liked training with her parents they grew closer and she got stronger it was a win, win. The night she met Chuuya she was fifteen and her training just started so she wasn't really good at using her ability yet. She had been walking home from a trip to the park when she was suddenly pulled into a dark alley by a group of rough-looking men. Nina put up the best fight she could but the men managed to pin her down and she couldn't activate her ability because fear was clouding her mind so she couldn't concentrate she was trapped. Just when they started to remove her clothes a figure appeared at the entrance of the alley.

FEARS- Small enclosed spaces

LIKES- Summer, bath bombs, DIYs, when someone does her hair, music, flying, and smoothies (preferably banana peach)

DISLIKES- Being left out

#my ocs #text post #curvy #my writing

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rainsonata · 8 years ago

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Play Date

Fandom/Pairing: Elsword; none Rating: K Word Count: 5,805

Summary: The school knew Mastermind by first name for Arc’s bi-monthly trips to the principal’s office because of “boredom.” That changes when Arc makes a new friend. MMLP Modern AU developed with @blazingsnark, where MM and LP are single dads to AT and PT.

Note: Rest of MMLP Modern AU can be found here.

Mastermind placed his morning coffee mug inside one of the cup holders close to the driving stick and took a bite out of a bagel before wrapping it in napkins and placing it in the other cup holder. He too cheerfully fiddled his hands at the steering wheel while waiting for Arc to get in.

Arc grumbled as he took the lunch bag from Mastermind and climbed into the car, sticking his head out of the window as the car engine roared to life. His legs dangled from his seat and he closed his eyes as they backed out of the garage and onto the streets, car jerking to the side when Mastermind made a sharp turn too soon. A white backpack with purple outlines lay sandwiched between his legs, surely to smoosh the books and snacks packed inside if he wasn’t careful. He toyed with the cat keychain attached to one of the zippers when he opened his eyes to peek and saw that they were minutes away from school.

Mastermind commented at a stoplight and glanced to see the bulging backpack. “Are they already giving you lots of homework?”

He shook his head, “No, they’re books I borrowed from the library.” Arc scrunched up his eyebrows to mirror his father, “So I won’t be bored.”

“Third grade might be different,” Mastermind said, but didn’t believe a single word of it. “You might make a friend.” The unimpressed look Arc gave him was telling that he didn’t believe it either. Phone calls home and parent-teacher meetings a few weeks into the year were enough evidence that not much has changed from the year before.

“It’s the same kids from last year,” Arc complained.

Mastermind sighed, already seeing where this was going. Already a preteen, Arc was too old for arranged playdates and was never enthusiastic for them when he was younger. He was more than aware that there weren’t a lot of options for Arc to make friends when they were already familiar with most of the children and their parents after years of sharing classes and teachers. There were exceptions of course, but if there were, he didn’t hear a word about it from Arc.

“If the teacher calls me in again this week-“

“She called because she didn’t like my writing,” Arc protested.

“You wrote that she liked to pick her fingers during exams,” Mastermind reminded him.

“How can I pay attention if she keeps doing that?”

“Arc,” Mastermind sighed.

“You can drop me there,” he pointed at the sidewalk when Mastermind drove into the parking lot crammed full of other parents dropping their children off. Arc grabbed his backpack and threw it on his back with lunch bag in hand, “Bye, Dad!”

Mastermind planted his face on the steering wheel for a few seconds and groaned. Stupid, Masi, he scolded at himself at the failure to talk to Arc about making friends. Flashbacks of being told who he could befriend and locked in the house to do extra homework haunted him even as he looked up to drive his car out of the parking lot. He didn’t want Arc to go through that. What was he doing wrong? Arc was given more freedom on what to do, outside of academics and a few extracurriculars, and yet he never brought a friend home once. What if Arc became friendless like him?

He grabbed the coffee from the cup holder beside him to take a sip and inhaled the fragrance of the drink. Today was going to be another long day.

Fiddling with his pencil for what felt like the millionth time that day, Arc looked down to his paper with a hunched back, the teacher’s voice droning in the background. When he looked around the classroom to see that half of his peers were hardly paying attention like he was, Arc leaned in his seat with a quiet sigh. This was so boring!

On his lap and underneath his desk was a book he brought with him to class. Every now and then, after checking to make sure no one was looking, he would scoot his chair back to read a few lines before looking up again and pretended to be interested in the lesson. His notebook was on his desk with some notes written down, but most of it was occupied by cats and cubes. Ever since Mastermind taught him how to draw cubes, he couldn’t stop drawing them. It was more fun than listening to his teacher talk about stuff he already knew. He tried playing tic tac toe with himself, but it wasn’t fun if his pretend opponent kept blocking all his moves with x’s.

Arc pulled his textbook out from his bag, something he should have done at the beginning of class, and flipped over to the page to glance at the math problems set before him. “What number?” He asked his neighbor with reluctance.

“Ten,” his classmate replied.

Arc thanked them and drew a line below his notes to mark his paper for the new math problem. It only took him a few seconds of adding them up and carrying the numbers over to get his answer. Was that all?

He went back to his book to read a few more sentences, but held his breath when it was the scene where the kids were caught in a misfire by the people chasing them. Turning his head around to see what his classmates were doing, Arc saw that most of them were still writing in their notebooks. He returned to the book to where the kids were trapped underneath a lake and there wasn’t much time to escape, the older character wasn’t going to make it…

“Did you already finish?”

“No, I’m only halfway through-“ Arc looked up to see the teacher standing over his shoulder. He slid the book underneath his desk, but knew she already saw it on his lap. Aw nuts.

“Meet me in the principal’s office after school,” she said quietly.

Luckily for him, this teacher was not one to cause a big scene. She didn’t raise her voice when she waited for Arc to hand her the book and tucked it under her arm. The teacher smiled, but he could tell she wasn’t pleased. Arc held his breath.

“All right, now who wants to solve the problem on the whiteboard?” The teacher asked.

Arc sighed, burying his face into his arms and squeaked when he accidentally knocked his pencil off his desk. Bending over to grab the rolling pencil, he stopped when he caught the stare of a student sitting next to him. What was he looking at?

Crossing the soccer field later that day at recess, Arc ran to the area furthest from the classrooms, the one close to the fenced gate facing the streets. He dodged a flying ball and scurried over to the big oak tree, sitting down happily with his legs crossed. Arc tried not to think too much about being called to the principal’s office after class. It didn’t bother him sitting with the principal – in fact, it was easier to talk to him than some of his peers - but he wasn’t looking forward to listening to the teacher and his dad talking about him.

“Hey, you’re the kid that always gets his book taken away in class!”

Arc looked up to see a boy running up to him, panting to catch his breath. With the wind blowing, his messy white hair made him resemble the fluffy clouds above them.

“So?” Arc scowled at him for stating the obvious. Hugging the other book he brought with him to school, he turned his head in hopes of driving the other guy away with his display of disinterest. What did he want?

The boy grinned, “That’s the new book that came out, right? How far did you get?”

It took Arc a few seconds to realize that the boy wasn’t joking because he was jumping up and down in excitement. There was no way anyone could fake that kind of enthusiasm, not if they were this happy to be talking to him at a speed that was almost impossible to understand.

“Arc, right?” The boy stuck out his hand and beamed, “My name’s Psych! Nice to meet you!”

“I knew that,” Arc lied. He couldn’t recall the boy’s name because he never had a class with him until this year, but Psych didn’t need to know that. “Why are you here?” He wanted to get through a few pages before the bell rang, where he would soon have to face his dad.

“You’re always by yourself,” he whined. “So I thought I should join you!”

Arc look up to get a better look at his classmate. Dressed in a black hood and a pair of jeans, there was nothing extraordinary about him, but his ever-smiling face made the sun behind him pale in comparison. Oh yeah, they’ve been sitting next to each other all year. They even did a few in-class assignments together. How could he forget?

“Don’t you have something else to do?” Arc looked over at the children kicking the soccer ball around the field, watching it fly several yards over their heads before landing into the grass to be passed around.

He shrugged, “Not really.”

Now that Arc thought about it, he never recalled seeing Psych talk to a lot of people around him either. He sometimes saw Psych playing tetherball by himself at recess, but he thought the boy was waiting for someone.

“So did you finish reading it?” Psych asked him again.

“Not yet,” Arc admitted. “It’s a big book.”

Psych nodded and stage whispered, “I got the book yesterday, so don’t spoil it for me!”

Arc rolled his eyes at how dramatic the boy was, but he didn’t complain.

“Want to go see my new Lego set?” he asked. “They have the characters from that book, and I didn’t open it yet.”

“Now?”

“It’s at home,” Psych shook his head. “I can show it to you if you come to my house?”

Arc shook his head, “Can’t.”

“Oh, right, principal’s office.” He laughed, “You go there a lot, don’t you?”

“You have no idea…”

“How about this weekend?” Psych laughed again. “Can’t be in the principal’s office on the weekends, right?”

“Sure,” Arc wasn’t sure if he should have taken Psych’s comment as an insult or not, but he didn’t dwell on it when the bell rang and groaned.

Psych took him by the arm and pulled - nah, dragged - him across the soccer field to line up at the classroom and waited for the teacher to open it for them. As they rushed to their desks to grab their bags, Psych dropped a paper ball at Arc’s desk and gave him a wink as he exited the room. When Arc unraveled the paper ball and smoothed it out with his hand, he found Psych’s address in messy handwriting.

Pride rose inside Arc’s stomach at the realization. He made a friend.

It was a quarter past two in the afternoon when Mastermind looked up at the sound of his name. For once, he wasn’t bombarded with assignments at work, so he dropped by the coffee shop across his workplace to grab something to drink before having to pick up Arc from school. It had been the barista calling his name, so Mastermind clicked his phone shut and walked up to grab his coffee.

“Heeeey! Long time no see!”

He turned to see Elesis behind the counter in her barista uniform with a bright expression. Resting her arm against the counter, she had her red hair tied into a high ponytail and winked at him.

Mastermind snorted. “We see each other every day.”

“Which is sadly not enough.” She feigned a teary look and ignored his rolled eyes. “Very tragic.”

Mastermind shook his head at the dramatic display and laughed. “I’m going to guess it’s slow business today.” He sometimes wondered why didn’t she go into theatrics when they were college students. She always seemed ready to dish out bizarre one liners and entertained him and their other friends with her antics.

“Hey, don’t be hasty,” Elesis waved off his comment. “My shift ended with your drink.”

“As always.”

“That’s because you live here,” she teased.

“If only.” Mastermind laughed.

“So what is it today? No phone call from the school?” Elesis hopped over the counter and followed Mastermind to sit with him at the table closest to the window.

“Not yet.” Mastermind tried to smile, but it felt like a herculean effort.

Her eyes softened. “I’m sure Arc’s okay.”

That’s not what the teachers tell me, Mastermind wanted to say, but he kept his mouth shut. He knew Arc wasn’t a bad child, but he was worried thinking about the kind of trouble his son may come into because of his mouth. Of course…that was partially his fault. From physical looks down to his favorite food, Arc inherited a lot from Mastermind, including his sharp tongue for better or worse. Usually it was for the worse when talking to people.

“He says he has no friends,” Mastermind ran through his roots with one hand. “His teacher asked if something was going on at home. She said he never talks to other children. I told her no, but what if I’m wrong? Maybe it was something I said or did wrong.”

“You’re not the only one taking care of Arc,” Elesis snapped at him. “What about me? Blade, Elsa, my husband?”

His phone vibrated in his pocket with irritation with a song he was too accustomed to playing in the background. Mastermind stared at his coffee cup for a split second before fumbling through his pockets. He almost dropped it when he found it and clumsily pressed to answer it.

His heart dropped in recognition of the phone number flashed across the screen, his breath hitched and his hands shook at the sound of the woman’s voice. Arc’s teacher greeted him on the other side with the same tiredness he had, but her voice remained restrained as she told him the news. No, he didn’t correct her again when she was trying to teach new material to the class. Arc was caught reading a book in class and was sitting in the principal’s office, waiting for Mastermind to pick him up.

“I understand,” Mastermind’s senses grew numb. There was a short pause on the phone before the teacher asked if he had any questions. “No, I’ll pick him up. Thank you.”

Elesis’s face was serious when he hung up the phone. “His teacher?” she asked.

Mastermind nodded, “It’s nothing serious.”

“Doesn’t look like it,” she said. “You look like you haven’t slept.”

“I’ll tell you more about later.” He stood up and gave Elesis an awkward wave with coffee in hand. “Thanks for the coffee.”

Mastermind turned to sprint out the door, but squeaked when he bumped into someone and tumbled backwards. His eyes widened when his coffee spilled over the person’s shirt and cursed to himself for his damn luck. He didn’t even get past the halfway mark for that drink! Rubbing the back of his head, Mastermind looked to see who it was.

The person was a man with the face of a thug, or at least that’s what Mastermind thought. He wore a collared shirt like Mastermind did, so he must have come out of work too. He had his hand on his hip and scowled when Mastermind lowered his head to apologize.

“Sorry,” Mastermind said sheepishly. “I can help you with that.” He backpedaled to the nearest table, flicked some napkins out of the dispenser, and held them out to the man.

The man grabbed the napkins and wiped the brown stains off his shirt (Who wore purple?). He patted it several times until it was all soaked up, then rolled the napkins into a ball and tossed it into the trash bin from across the room.

“I can pay for your coffee,” Mastermind mumbled when he saw the man still glaring at him as if it was all his fault. Okay, maybe it was, but he wasn’t sure on what else to do or say in this sort of situation.

The stranger sighed, “Forget it, it’s just a shirt.” He turned to face Mastermind with brows relaxing to reveal the man was around the same age as him. The man’s hair stuck up on one side like the wind blew in one direction.

“All right,” Mastermind wasn’t convinced, but let it slide. That person was a stranger after all, no need to make a big deal out of it. He opened the door to leave the coffee shop, but couldn’t stop from looking back to see the stranger again. The man’s hair was white.

Arc swung his legs in his chair, watching them dangle over the carpeted floor with a bored expression. His textbook was opened to a page, but he couldn’t concentrate long enough to remember what the question was. The eraser at the end of his pencil was almost all gone from erasing his writing for every time he misspelled a word. He ended up drawing the neighbor’s cat he ran into this morning, and was giving it stripes when the door to the principal’s office opened.

Shifting in his seat with discomfort, he peeked from behind his book with worried eyes, half expecting the person to be a teacher or another parent. Arc squeaked when he saw it was Mastermind. He shuffled his stuff together and tried to make himself presentable as possible, textbooks stacked with one opened on his lap and papers lined up with his pencils. Arc gave Mastermind a cheery smile, but shrunk when he received dead eyes from him. Oh no…what did the teacher tell him?

His mind and heart raced at the worse scenarios he could imagine. Did the teacher say he talked back at her again? Or was it because he corrected her on a math problem? Could it be from the time he turned in a three-page book report when the rest of the kids wrote one page? Arc watched him walk into the office with the usual formal greeting, stuff adults did, but he noticed that Mastermind looked more tired than usual.

“Mr. Grenore,” the principal greeted him. “We’re glad to see you could make it today.”

“You were lucky to catch me on a day with light workload.” Mastermind laughed, but it was a hollow one that didn’t suit him.

Arc mentally groaned at the petty talk between the adults. Why did they do this all the time? He tuned out their conversation to look at the reading passage he has been stuck on for the past minutes or so, but sometimes looked up to pretend he was paying attention.

“Must be tough with those assignments,” the principal said sagely.

Mastermind shrugged, “It’s something you get used to, but I managed.”

“Arc was caught reading in class again,” his teacher interrupted the small talk.

Arc almost pushed his book onto the floor when he rested his elbow on it. He caught the book from falling over and stopped himself from fussing when his pencil left a mark on the pages. Arc rubbed his eraser on the pages, careful that the pages didn’t crumble and hoped that it was enough to take out the marks.

“Yes, as you told me on the phone,” Mastermind crossed his arms. “Is there anything else I need to know?”

“He keeps disturbing the class and correcting me last week,” she rambled. “I’m trying to teach the material to my class and he’s making them question me.”

“Well that’s the teacher’s job, isn’t it? If they ask you questions, then you should answer them so they can learn.” Mastermind looked down to ask Arc. “Did you finish your work before reading?”

Arc, who had his arms on the chair’s arm rest and looking up between the adults, was relieved to see his dad finally talk to him instead of the teacher. He meekly replied, “Yes.”

“I don’t see the problem then.” Mastermind closed his eyes. “If there’s nothing else to talk about, then we’ll be leaving.” He went to gather Arc’s books and said, “You ready?”

Arc threw his books and pencil into his bag and pulled the zipper to close his backpack, eager to grab Mastermind’s arm to pull him away from his teacher and the principal. Finally, they were leaving!

When they sat in the car, he was at the front seat as always with Mastermind at the steering wheel, but why weren’t they starting the car? Arc hugged his backpack and looked at Mastermind to see that his dad wasn’t angry, or at least he wasn’t frowning or scolding him. Not yet.

Mastermind tapped his finger on the steering wheel without looking at Arc, closing his eyes and breathing in to calm himself down. Arc blinked and looked down. There was no familiar coffee cup at the front of the car, was that why Mastermind was tired?

“Are you mad at me?” Arc broke the silence.

“No,” Mastermind said, without an ounce of anger in his voice. “Arc…this is the second time in the office this month. I know you finished your work, but this teacher isn’t as forgiving as last year’s.”

“She doesn’t let any of us have fun,” Arc grumbled, but low enough so that Mastermind couldn’t hear it. He said out loud, “Guess what, Dad? I made a friend today!”

He waited for a response from Mastermind, who straightened his back and turned to give Arc a wide-eyed look in disbelief. Arc grinned when his dad asked, “Who is it?”

“His name is Psych,” Arc said with excitement. “He invited me over this weekend to see his new toys. Can I go?”

Now that he earned Mastermind’s full attention, Arc bounced in his seat, waving the crumbled paper with the address to show to him as proof. The writing was messy, but he read it out to Mastermind and said, “He doesn’t live far from here.”

Mastermind rubbed his forehead, “You’re still in trouble for being in the principal’s office.” He saw Arc’s smile waver and said, “But…I’ll let you go only if you promise not to get in trouble again by the end of this week.”

He knew Mastermind was disappointed in him for the trouble he caused, and he did feel bad about it, but it was hard to control himself when it felt like his teacher and most of his classmates were ignoring him. But still, all he had to do was keep his mouth shut this week. That’s all it took. Arc crossed his fingers, promised, and prayed that this week would be over already.

True to Arc’s promise, there were no phone calls from the school for the rest of the week, earning Mastermind more downtime, although the habit of checking his phone for every notification was tiring. Without the need to wake up for class or work on Saturday, it was a lazy morning where they could finish breakfast at a table for once. Mastermind smiled when Arc eagerly reminded him what day it was.

“Come on, dad!” Arc had on a t-shirt, a pair of jeans, and a backpack again overstuffed with books and toys. “Let’s go!”

“Psych’s house isn’t going to run away from us.” Mastermind chuckled at his son’s impatience.

Mastermind wondered if he was being too lenient with Arc. While he thought the reasons for his son landing in the principal’s office were stupid, he still had to be the responsible parent and at least remind Arc not to get in trouble. He thought he was being fair about it. Arc wasn’t allowed to touch the TV or even his books until he was done with homework and chores throughout the week and had to sleep earlier than usual. Mastermind made sure of that and kept an eye on him despite the complaints he received from Arc. Going by that reasoning, it wasn’t wrong for him to go play with a friend on the weekend, right?

They had trouble finding Psych’s house because of the messy writing, with both trying to decipher the letters and a few occasions of Mastermind missing turns or taking the wrong street. Even after finding the right neighborhood, it took a few minutes of them searching for the house. Mastermind was ready to give up when he heard Arc shout.

“Dad, I found it!” Arc pointed at the address number lined down from the side of the house with happiness. It matched the address from the paper they were looking at for the past half hour or so. He waited for Mastermind to catch up to him before ringing the doorbell with anticipation.

Mastermind looked down at Arc to see that his son was bouncing on his feet. He hasn’t seen that bright eyed look from Arc since the first day of kindergarten, a sight that made him feel a mixture of happiness and sadness. What if it turned out that Psych didn’t like Arc or something happened that this would be the only time they meet up? His muscles tensed the more he thought about the possibilities.

His son made a few friends in school, but they weren’t long lasting friendships like he would have hoped for. They were “invite all the classmates” scenarios, not mandatory, but might as well have been because parents did it to avoid making a child feel left behind. It felt like invitations out of pity and that didn’t sit well with Mastermind. They weren’t personal, and he had learned over the years that they didn’t mean much to the children themselves when they had their closer friends to be with. They usually ended with the children sticking to their close friends and leaving Arc sitting by himself.

“They’re not answering,” Mastermind frowned. Were they at the wrong house? Could it be that Psych gave them the wrong address? It was autumn, so the driveway was covered in leaves when he went to see a car parked outside. He sneezed when a small leaf fell on his face and snorted.

“I’ll try again,” Arc refused to be discouraged and rang the door a couple of more time before knocking. The door opened midway through one of his knocks. Arc nearly fell over, but was caught by Mastermind.

Behind the door was a child that managed to be shorter than Arc, who was small for his age. His white hair was a mess and grinned when he saw Arc and waved.

That must be Psych, Mastermind thought when he noticed that the child was still in his pajamas – purple ones with cat imprints on them and a pair of cat slippers to match.

“Who is it?” An older voice floated out of the house, and a man came to the door.

Mastermind did a backtrack at what he thought looked like an older version of Psych. This man looked like he had just rolled out of his bed. Like Psych, his white hair was in disarray, standing up all over the place, and he wore only a tank top and a pair of boxers. The man rubbed his eyes when he squinted at them. Mastermind’s breath grew short when he got a better look at the man’s face.

It was the guy from the coffee shop!

Wait, he was Psych’s dad? Mastermind couldn��t take his eyes away from the man’s face, shocked to see how young he was from the typical parent. He couldn’t be more than a couple of years older than him.

The man yawned, “You’re here early.”

Mastermind glanced at his cell phone’s clock and bit his lip from blurting out, It’s 10:41 in the morning.

He gave Mastermind a tired expression as if to say, Yeah, but it’s Saturday, dumbass, but acknowledged them with a nod and ushered them into the house, closing the door behind him.

As they walked in, Mastermind saw the living room was well lived in. Stacks of books sat at the coffee table with notebook paper laid out to reveal a child’s drawing that was hard to identify under the dim light. Occupying at the front of the room, taking up almost half of the wall was a big flat screen TV with the plastic tape still applied to the frames. A video game console behind the TV cabinet had video games lined up next to it. He didn’t miss the bookshelf sitting in the corner of the room, many of the books worn out from the binding when Mastermind examined them from afar.

The man blinked as if he finally noticed the mess and said to Psych, “Why don’t you go change clothes while I show them where to sit?”

Mastermind stared at the sofa cushions on the floor and the blankets sprawled across the wooden floor, “Sit where?”

Perhaps he was too tired to respond to the sarcasm, but the man went to grab the pillows, tossing them to the sofa and folding the blankets to place it in the storage box that doubled as the coffee table. Gathering the loose-leaf paper to form into a neat stack, he waved his hand, “Psych and I were up last night trying to finish a game.”

Had this man and his son slept in the living room? Mastermind was starting to wonder what kind of person let his son stay up late to game, but nodded in understanding. Once the area was cleared, which didn’t take too long, he and Arc sat on the sofa with the man sitting at the far end of it, opposite of where Mastermind was.

“Oh, I forgot to introduce myself,” the man gave him a lazy grin. “I’m Lusa, Psych’s dad. And you must be Arc!”

Arc, who was busy looking at the bookshelf crammed with books with interest, but jumped in his seat when realizing he was being talked to. He looked up to nod his head at Psyker and turned pink in embarrassment.

“He’s shy,” Mastermind excused his son. “He’s-“

“Let him talk,” Psyker stared at him. “He has a mouth, doesn’t he?”

Mastermind felt the heat traveling up his face and through his ears. Try as he might, he could not will himself to avoid his cheeks turning pink and looked away. Who was this guy to interrupt him like that? He was trying to justify Arc’s actions, wasn’t he? Or was that wrong and he should have let Arc speak for himself? Arc was eight years old after all, old enough to be trusted with many things. He didn’t have to look at Psyker to know that he was being judged. What was the other thinking?

“Hello,” Arc said in a quiet voice, gripping on the backpack straps, but made eye contact with Psyker with a small smile.

“Hopefully it won’t take long for Psych to get ready,” Psyker said. “We didn’t think you would come here before noon.”

Mastermind nodded, recalling that the paper did say to meet up at around noon. Arc wanted to come earlier, but Mastermind also wanted to come along to see what kind of house Psych lived in.

“I’m here!” Psych popped from behind the sofa with his face in between Arc and Mastermind. The small child wore a t-shirt with a popular video game character that looked like a yellow rabbit (or was that a mouse?) and a pair of shorts going down to his knees. However, his hair remained spiky and stood up to make him appear taller. He went over to grab Arc by the arm and laughed, “Let’s play!”

“Not until you eat first,” Psyker chided lightly. He turned to Mastermind, “Masi, right? Join us for brunch.”

Mastermind looked at him in surprise at the sound of his own name being said by a stranger he had just met minutes ago. He and Arc had breakfast earlier, but he knew that wasn’t the right answer. Psych pouted on the side, but was happy when at the sound of him and Arc joining them for brunch. Mastermind felt guilt for ever considering that Psych would try to trick Arc into being friends. What was he thinking?

“How do you know my name?” Mastermind asked.

“You spilled your coffee on me,” Psyker said. “Your name was on the cup.”

Of course.

Mastermind forced himself to stop blushing from embarrassment. It wouldn’t hurt to stay, right? He wanted to see how Arc would get along with Psych too. The look Psyker gave him was understanding, as if he knew his internal struggle, but that was ridiculous. He slowly nodded.

“Great!” Psyker grinned. “I’m going to go change. Be sure not to break anything while you’re here.”

Mastermind couldn’t tell if this man was joking or not.

Arc thought it was funny and giggled at Psyker’s comment. Well, at least someone found this entertaining! Mastermind rolled his eyes and started to question if it was a good idea to stick around.

With Psyker gone, Psych and Arc were quick to start a conversation and were talking to each other, something about a new video game. He saw Psych’s animated eyes move around as he reenacted something from the game with exploding sound effects. His expression softened when Arc took out a book to explain something to Psych, eager to share with the smaller boy. Much to his surprise and relief, Psych shared the same enthusiasm, with both talking back and forth at a pace that was hard for Mastermind to keep up with.

When Psyker came back, it was in a t-shirt with the logo of a company and a pair of jeans. Like Psych, his hair was spiked up. Compared to Psyker, Mastermind felt like he overdressed with his collared shirt and vest.

He saw Mastermind sitting by himself and approached him. “Hey, I know we didn’t have a good start today.”

No kidding, Mastermind thought about the spilled coffee or seeing Psyker half-dressed at the front door.

“I feel bad about you losing your drink,” he scratched the back of his head, a peculiar behavior that was hard to ignore. “Want to grab coffee sometime?”

Really? He looked at Psyker for confirmation, but the other gave him a bright expression, lighting up when Mastermind took his invitation and nodded again. He tried not to dwell on the idea too much, his ears grew warm again and it was difficult for him to think straight. Mastermind pretended to be interested in joining his son and Psych in the kitchen to help set up the table while Psyker went to prepare the food.

A coffee date didn’t sound too bad.

#elsword #eltag #Add (Elsword)#elsword fanfiction #my writing #Mastermind #Lunatic Psyker #Psychic Tracer #Arc Tracer #Elesis (Elsword)#blazing heart #hi there I'm still alive after finals #my need for mmlp parent au is very strong #thinking of writing more one day if I'm up for it #on the other hand I'm also very distracted by p5 right now #let the tracers be happy ;;;;#modernmmlp #mywriting

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chimchimchoo · 8 years ago

Text

Paper Cranes :: 2

Genre: Fluff/Angst

Word Count: 1,920

Pair: Jimin x Yoongi

Chapters: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (of 7)

“Every Monday, Park Jimin would come into his white, sterile hospital room and leave a small paper crane at the end of his bed.”

The day was dark; the Sun was hidden away behind a blanket of thick, grey clouds. The birds outside were quiet and the wind was still. If the temperature dropped any lower, it could snow outside. Yoongi never had the opportunity to go outside and see the snow, as he always spent time in the hospital or locked himself in his bedroom, focused on writing music.

He thought about what it would be like, to bury his hands into the fluffy, white substance, to see his own nose turn pink and watch the fog come out of his mouth whenever he exhaled. He daydreamed about a snowball fight, or building a small snowman with a rock for a nose instead of a carrot.

Instead, Yoongi sat in his bed, sipping hot peach tea with the soft whirring of the oxygen machine beside him. A small knock interrupted the silence but he didn’t flinch. He was used to nurses coming in and out to check his vital signs and make sure the machines functioned normally. Yoongi kept his eyes on the window, ignoring the sound of light footsteps until he heard the dragging of a stool and a familiar, high-pitched voice.

“Min Yoongi, it’s really cold outside today.”

He turned his head to see the beaming pumpkin haired boy with pink cheeks and a thick, green scarf wrapped around his neck. He peeled off his winter coat, revealing a dark brown sweater that contrasted with his hair and light skin. Yoongi glanced away, concerned that he may have been staring too long. “You do realize this is a hospital, right? People tend to be alone so they can recover.” He muttered.

“But it doesn’t mean that they enjoy being alone.” Jimin responded, pulling out a thick book. Yoongi could have sworn he felt his heart flutter for just a moment, but forced himself to ignore it. He was wrong, very wrong. Yoongi enjoyed his time alone; he preferred it than having worried visitors that drained his energy. Right?

“Um, what is that?” Yoongi peered down at the book, gesturing it with his eyes while setting his tea down.

“Min Yoongi,” Jimin dropped the book down on his lap.

“Yoongi. Just Yoongi.” He flinched at the sudden heavy weight on his leg. How many pounds was this book?

“I found this in the library today, it’s a textbook of music and lyric writing. You were struggling with lyrics last week so I thought this would give you some inspiration.”

Yoongi didn’t have the heart to say it, but he was actually touched by the kind gesture. Since he could never leave the room to find inspiration, Jimin bought it to him. Why hadn’t he thought of that? “I might give this a read, maybe it’ll…kick me out of writers block or something. Thanks.” He tried to hide the admiration while flipping through the pages, skimming over the different terms he saw. Already, he came up with the next line of his composition.

“Do you have any siblings? Any family members that come to visit? Should I not come during certain times?” There he went again with the questions. That boy never stood a change to give Yoongi’s brain a break.

“I don’t get visitors often, actually. They visit once in a while, but it’s rare. My older brother is studying abroad and my family has jobs that restrict them from coming. I get more phone calls than visits.” He regretted saying some of these words, Yoongi wasn’t one to share about himself easily, but something about Jimin’s presence makes him feel like he doesn’t have to hold back much. “What about you? What brings you to this hospital?”

“Oh,” Jimin twirled the stool around, staring at the ceiling with a smile. “My dad is in Room 602, I visit him every Monday after class to keep him company.”

“He must enjoy that.” Yoongi responded, growing dizzy just from watching Jimin spin.

“I hope so.” Jimin replied.

Yoongi’s eyebrows furrowed. “What do you mean? He can’t possibly be unentertained with that blabbering mouth of yours.”

“He’s in a coma, for 11 months and 9 days now. But he will wake up soon…I know it. His vitals are getting better each day.” Jimin stopped himself, giggling from the dizziness and used the chair to steady himself. Yoongi only watched with a frown on his face. He couldn’t understand how that boy always had a smile, what kept him so optimistic? Yoongi couldn’t imagine having a family member of his own in a coma, especially for that long. Just the thought of it was too painful.

Jimin dug into his bag and pulled out some more papers and a pencil bag, scooting himself closer to the small desk on Yoongi’s bed.

“What are you doing?” Yoongi asked Jimin carefully spread out his papers on the empty side of his desk. “I have homework to do.” He beamed and ran a hand through his hair, pulling the pumpkin colored strands out of his eyes before focusing on the task.

Yoongi’s eyebrows rose as he watched, confused. He didn’t know if he should be annoyed that some kid barged in to do his homework, or comforted by his presence and the fact that he took time out of seeing his father once a week to be in the same room as Yoongi, someone he barely knew.

Realizing that Jimin was actually quiet for once, he turned his eyes away from staring too long, put the black headphones over his ears and continued making his music, occasionally skimming through the book. Every now and then, he would also peek over at Jimin, whose eyebrows furrowed in frustration over the math problems, not noticing that there was a small smile across Yoongi’s face.

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

With a deep, raspy sigh, Yoongi peered out the window, taking a short break from writing lyrics for a few hours and thought of the snow again. It looked like powdered sugar when he saw it in movies, did it taste sweet? Or was it bitter like the salty ocean? Did it crunch under their shoes or melt into liquid?

A light knock was heard as a nurse walked in with a tray in her arms. “It’s time for another checkup Yoongi, today I need to draw some blood-oh, Jimin! I see you’ve made another friend.” She smiled as Jimin lifted his head and twirled his pencil. “I don’t know how you do it, getting to know everyone in this hall. But I’m sure they appreciate it the company, don’t you Yoongi?”

Yoongi didn’t respond as the nurse set the tray on a small table beside the bed.

“I like Min Yoongi the best though.” Jimin, you literally just met me last week, Yoongi bit his lip and held out his arm toward the nurse. “He’s around my age so I can talk to him more comfortably.” Jimin smiled as the nurse wiped Yoongi’s arm with a small cotton ball.

She picked up a needle, carefully searching for a vein before piercing it through his skin. Jimin didn’t flinch at the sight, as he must have watched the procedure hundreds of times with his father whereas, Yoongi’s eyebrows furrowed in pain, looking away. It must have been obvious how uncomfortable needles made him because he felt a warm hand on his free arm and glanced at Jimin.

“Hey, do you like the beach or the forest?”

“What?”

“Just answer it.”

Yoongi thought over it for a few seconds and opened his mouth. “Forest.

“Breakfast or dinner?”

“Dinner.” He replied quickly. “I’m not a morning person.”

Jimin smiled at his comment. “What’s your favorite thing to eat?”

“Lamb skewers.”

A flash of surprise appeared across his face. “You know, there’s a famous restaurant just down the street from here that sells lamb skewers. It’s supposed to be the best in this city! Let’s eat there, you will love it-” The nurse looked up and slightly shook her head toward Jimin, silently telling him he couldn’t leave the hospital that easily. “Or, I’ll just bring it to you!”

“You don’t have to bring me any lamb skewers, I can survive just fine on hospital food.” But Yoongi mentally wished he would do it one day. The thought of eating lamb skewers made his mouth water. He was sick of the bland food they served at the hospital.

“There we go.” The nurse muttered, covering the puncture with a Band-Aid and neatly set the tubes of his blood samples on the tray. “You’re all finished and it looks like your oxygen flow is steady as of now. I will be back later with your medication.” She smiled before quickly exiting his room.

“You’re not a fan of needles are you?” Jimin finally took his hand off of Yoongi’s arm and picked up his pencil. Yoongi realized he distracted him the whole time and forgot the nurse was even drawing his blood. He sighed in relief and silently thanked Jimin.

“No, no I’m not. I don’t like pain.”

“No one does.” Jimin chuckled quietly and continued his homework.

Just a few minutes later, the nurse showed up again with a small bag, hooking it over Yoongi’s bed before attaching an IV needle to his arm. To his rescue, Jimin shared a story of how he almost got kicked out of the dance room the first time he snuck in and had to clean the bathrooms for a week as a punishment. A faint smile appeared across Yoongi’s face as the nurse collected her things and left for good.

While Jimin focused on the last few pages of his assignment, Yoongi’s eyes wavered toward him, watching him erase a mistake on the paper. What about Jimin? Had he seen the snow before? Did he know what it tasted like? Did his hands go numb after having snowball fights for hours without gloves? What was it like to build a snowman with him?

“Min Yoongi,” The soft, high-pitched voice interrupted his thoughts. “Visiting hours are almost over, I still have to see my dad.” Just for a split second, Yoongi felt his heart sink, but he understood. His father was much more important after all.

“Hold onto that book until you finish it. I’ll pick it up when you’re done.” Jimin scrambled his papers into a notebook and shoved it in his bag. He made his way to the window next to Yoongi’s bed and checked to see if it was shut and secure. “Make sure you dress warm, there’s cold air leaking into the room.”

Jimin smiled, wrapping the green scarf around his neck and hung the winter coat over his arm. “I think my father will like you, you’re both really alike. Maybe he’ll have the honor of meeting you when he wakes up.” He gave Yoongi a small wave before skipping out of the room, leaving the door opened a crack behind him.

Yoongi couldn’t help but smile, but it went away as soon as he realized the room was empty again. All he heard was his oxygen machine and pacing steps of nurses rushing down the hallway. Perhaps Jimin was right. He may have been alone a lot, but did he actually like it?

Before Yoongi flipped a page of the book Jimin lent him, he spotted a small object from the corner of his eyes. Sitting at the corner of his bed was a small, delicate paper crane.

This time, the color was white, like snow.

#bts #bangtan sonyeondan #bts scenarios #bts fanfic #bangtan fanfic #yoongi x jimin #angst #fluff #bts imagine #yoongi fanfiction #jimin fanfiction #paper cranes #alli fanfic

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ecotone99 · 5 years ago

Text

Spun Golden [MF]

Spun Golden

Rupert waited in his squad car on the top of the mountain. The night was dark and the fog was so thick he could barely see the large rancher he had been staking out the week prior. He felt cramped and restless waiting for his backup.

The HEAT wagon pulled up behind him and the team got out in an ordered frenzy. They went up to the door of the rancher and knocked. The lead commanding orders for the door to be opened only to be met by silence. The HEAT lead kicked in the door, breaking into two. The team hurried in and Rupert could see flashlights through the darkened windows that pierced through the fog.

“All clear, you should come in and investigate,” said a female voice over the CB Radio.

“What’s the M.O.?” asked Rupert.

“Looks like another O.D., we also found a grow room but not more n’ that, looks like the house is trashed too, an ambulance was called, should be here shortly.”

Rupert looked around the house for evidence, the inside of the rancher was filthy. The rancher had stacks of newspapers since the seventies gathering dust, containers of half-eaten food, rotting, and gathering mold in the sink. He walked carefully to the backyard, which was grown over with weeds, grass growing up to his knees, which wasn’t saying much considering Rupert’s height. In the middle of the yard was a greenhouse, which looked to be surprisingly well kept compared to the rest of the house.

He opened the thin mesh door to the greenhouse and found rows upon rows of grow boxes. The grow boxes were full of straw, out of this straw grew a flower that resembled a poppy, but instead of red, it was a deep golden color. He was struck by the heady perfumed fragrance that lingered in the air, small trails started to form in his vision, and he felt drowsy. He left immediately letting the fresh, humid air hit his lungs and clear out his senses.

“That is certainly another grow operation for Spun,” Said Rupert.

The officer shook his head, “It seems like every time we find one, two more crop up in its place.”

“I know, but we have to keep fighting the good fight,” Rupert sighed as he massaged his temples.

Spun was short for Spun Golden, a genetically modified plant. The plant had hallucinogenic and addictive qualities, and it was ravaging small towns along the I81 corridor. The plant was an opioid, a poppy that had been crossed with the hallucinogenic properties of belladonna. It grew best out of the soil that was aerated by straw.

Senior Special Agent Rupert Stiltskin of D.C. area DEA was assigned with finding the kingpin of drug ring for Spun, but every time he got a lead, by the time they could legally throw a raid, the suspects were either dead or long gone, this was another dead end.

Frustrated Rupert drove down the mountain a few hours later, the fog turning into clouds as the road wound down into Castle, Pennsylvania, the nearest town. His ears popped and his head was pounding, no doubt from with withdrawal of Spun. He was in his mid-forties, balding with a hooked nose, he had a small potbelly from too many donuts. Although his body was past its prime, his mind remained sharp, at least he hoped it would be sharper in the morning when the fog cleared away. He got to his home and his wife, Norma, greeted him.

“You look awful, hon,” she said.

“It’s this case, every time I get close, it just slips away from me, I’m trying everything I can.” “Shh,” she kissed him. “I made you a casserole, it’s in the oven, why don’t you have dinner and a beer and meet me in bed?”

“I don’t think beer is the best idea right now, but thank you, I don’t know how I’d remain sane without you.”

“Never you mind, hon.” She gave him another hug and headed off the small bedroom in their modest house.

After dinner he peeped into the door next to his room, his son, Caleb, was now nearly thirteen. He was long and lanky and snoring soundly. Rupert thought about all the time he lost, he was out looking for drug dealers while Norma took him to recitals for school plays, he made a note that he was going to take a day off for the next show, and quietly shut the door.

He curled next to Norma and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep

Rupert got up at 5 am in the morning to the sound of his neighbors’ rooster. He walked out of bed quietly and took a quick shower. He saw Caleb in the kitchen next to the coffee pot.

“You’re up early,” said Rupert.

“School starts early, Pa,” said Caleb. “I made you some coffee.”

Caleb fixed him a large thermos of blonde coffee. “I can make you some oatmeal if you like, Pa, I learned a magic trick with cards, look, I can show you,” said Caleb.

“I wish I had time, but I have to be at the station early, DEA stuff; look, Caleb, when this is over, I promise, well I won’t promise, but I’ll try to be there for you, I know you have a game next Tuesday.”

“It’s all right,” said Caleb, “you’re out there catching the bad guys, and trying to catch whoever is making Spun Golden, one of my friend’s brother died from an O.D.”

“Hang on there, what was your friend’s name?”

“Paul Willeck.”

“His brother would be Tom Willeck Jr.”

“Yes sir,” said Caleb.

“Dad, just don’t tell them I told you, ok?”

Rupert frowned. “I understand” Rupert kissed his son on the cheek and grabbed his coffee and a donut from the box on the counter.

He made his way down a winding mountain road into the town of Castle. The mountains divided Pennsylvania from Maryland. Criminals would often get away by crossing through using Ball Road as a way to jump the state line before being caught. The federal government called in the Washington Division of the DEA to cover this case in the tri-state area. Rupert started as a deputy in Castle and applied to be a DEA agent when he saw the small mountain towns being torn asunder by the opioid crises, many of the drugs legally prescribed by doctors and being sold by the patients on the black market. Spun Gold only exacerbated this existing problem.

The thick green trees and winding roads cleared to farmhouses, then to shopping centers, then to the colonial row houses, brick and pavement of the town proper. He made his way downtown to the Sheriff’s office, parked his car in the small lot, and entered the building.

Ralston was manning the front desk. Ralston was a young African American man of a wiry disposition. He had left his precinct from Baltimore to live in peace and quiet, only to be landed in the middle of a drug epidemic. In Baltimore, he had to deal with gang war fair, in Castle, and the land outside of it, it was more grow houses and vicious rednecks. Families that hoarded guns and prepped for the end of the world. Men who hated him for his skin color and would call their hounds on him in a moment’s second. They thought of themselves as nobility, and why not, a drug Barron was still a Barron and turf was still turf city or county. Ralston resolved that people sucked everywhere, city or country and he had enough of it all.

“How you doin’ Rupert?” asked Ralston.

“Doin’ ok, Rawls, here to see the boss, I got a lead.”

“On the Spun case?”

“Yeah, back at the middle and high school.”

“Damn, kids, that’s a shame, they get them hooked young they have a customer for life.”

“Sad but true, but I got a tip of an overdose from Dalton High School.”

“Yeah, the Willeck case?” asked Ralston.

“Exactly, that might be the lead that we need to investigate.”

Rupert went to the back office and grabbed some over-brewed coffee in a Styrofoam cup. He waited for Chief Ellis at his desk. Chief Ellis was in his 50s with salt and pepper hair, an athletic build, and a gruff disposition.

“Stiltskin, you’re on your last legs with this investigation, the raid last night was a fiasco, another grow house but no one left alive and no leads to the source of Spun.”

“I found another lead, Sir, Tom Willeck overdosed on Spun a week ago.”

“And we investigated, sent moles into the High school, no one’s talkin’.”

“I have a lead, my son, he was friends with his little brother, Paul, I can interview his family, as a family man myself.”

Cheif Ellis shook his head and sighed, “Go ahead, if we can just find a good lead, we have plenty of evidence from the grow rooms but not a lead on how it’s getting from the houses to the community, the growers all OD before we can ask them anything.”

“I think we might be able to find something from Willeck’s, I’ll interview them as soon as I can.”

Rupert looked up the address for the Willeck house before he left the station. He went to the local flower shop and bought a bouquet of white roses with a card that read: “Our condolences.” He drove from downtown to a newer housing development on the outside of Castle. It was upon a small hill that overlooked the town. The Willeck’s lived in a gray two-story house with white shutters, the house was in a cul-de-sac near the woods. He remembered how Caleb would talk of how he and Paul had built a fort in the woods and how Tom would sometimes have paintball gun battles with them, much to Norma’s chagrin.

Rupert nervously rang the doorbell and a middle-aged woman answered. She had blonde hair cut at bob and was wearing leggings and a long tee-shirt. She looked very tired.

“Hi, I’m Rupert Stiltskin, an investigator with the DEA’s office,” he said.

“I’ve already spoken with the DEA, I’ve told them everything I know,” sighed the woman.

“Ma’am, I understand, I’m also a parent myself, I’m Caleb’s father, he’s friends with Paul. If you don’t want to talk, I get it. I just thought I’d leave you these before I left.” He gave Mrs. Willeck the bouquet.

“Come in,” she said wearily, “can I get you some coffee?”

“No ma’am, the stuff from the station already burnt the hair off my tongue.”

“Caleb is a good kid, he got Paul to get off his computer and leave the house. Those two would play in the woods for hours, king of the hill, capture the flag.”

“Paintball?”

“That too, I’m Sharon, nice to meet you.”

“Yeah, when… when we lost Tom that hit Paul hard, if I can do anything to help catch whoever gave him this poison I’ll help, but I’ve already said everything.”

“That’s alright, the boys, they played a lot out back, Caleb said that there was a fort back there.”

“Yeah,” said Sharon, “and a treehouse, you know, they never thought to search there.”

“May I?”

“Of course, anything to help, I’ll go with you and show you where it is.”

Rupert followed Sharon on a footpath through the woods. About a quarter-mile back there was a wooden structure and above that a small treehouse with a rope ladder. Rupert gingerly climbed the ladder followed by Sharron. On one of the walls, there was a heart carved into the wood. It read Tom + Mazzy surrounded by a heart.

“Did Tom have a girlfriend?”

Sharron touched the heart, “Not one that I knew of, I never met Mazzy, the police are still going through his cell phone records, they might have found something.”

“I’ll check back with them and see if I can find anything, do you remember his behavior changing suddenly.”

“A couple of weeks ago he became more distant, more withdrawn. He was away from the house more, I thought he was going to work.”

“Where did he work?”

“Just at the local barbeque place, Up in Smoke, at the other side of town.”

“Great place,” said Rupert, his stomach growling at the prospect of ribs, “I might have enough to go on here. You’ve been a great help.”

“Thank you,” said Sharon.

Rupert left the house and went back to the station to Ellis’ office.

“I need to have Tom Willeck’s phone records, we may have found a lead, he had a girlfriend.”

“Lots of teenage boys have girlfriends, doesn’t mean it’s a lead.”

“His family didn’t know anything about her, he had no reason to keep a relationship secret.”

“Maybe the kid just wanted privacy.”

“If I could just look at the records, I might be able to find out, his parents signed over permission.”

“Fair point, Ralston, take him to the evidence room.”

Rupert had to sign some paperwork and found the phone in the evidence locker, it was barely charged, he plugged it in and opened it. He checked the photos there was girl with bright pink hair and heavy makeup next to him in most of them. Under the photo was the name Mazzy.

He then checked the high school yearbook and found a similar picture; the name underneath was Chrystal Miller.

Chief Ellis had already had a mole sent out to Dalton High school to look for Chrystal Miller, she had stopped attendance nearly a week ago, they checked with her father, Silas Miller, and he said that she had run away from home.

Rupert was familiar with Silas Miller, when he was deputy police for Castle, he was called out on separate occurrences of domestic abuse. His wife, Ruby Miller, eventually had the courage to leave and was somewhere in upstate New York. They had two daughters, Chrystal and Goldie.

Goldie had been accepted with a full scholarship into the University of West Virginia, Morgantown, as a biology major and had not been seen in Castle for the last couple of years. Chrystal was still in high school, and had instances of truancy, drinking underage and shoplifting. She had spent six months in Abraxis detention center. She had missed her last parole hearing and had disappeared two weeks ago; the same time frame Tom Willeck had overdosed on Spun.

Rupert searched further into Chrystal Miller’s case; they found her parked car by a lookout near the Appellation Trail. Her cell phone was in the car but wiped clean and after a few footsteps on the trail, all traces of her were gone. He decided to drive up to the lookout and do another brief investigation.

He drove up the winding road to the lookout and it was dusk by the time he got there. There were a few hikers perched on a large flat Cliffside. They were eating their trail mix and enjoying the sunset. Among the hikers, he saw a slight young woman with piercings, magenta hair, and a stocking cap. She was wearing jeans and a gray W.V. State sweatshirt. She was quietly watching the sunset but sat by herself, away from the other hikers. Rupert sat by the young woman.

“Chrystal Miller?” He asked.

“I don’t know who you’re referring to,” she said, “did you lose your hiking party?”

“Would it be better if I called you Mazzy then?”

“I think it would be best if you stop asking questions,” she replied warily.

Rupert took out his badge, “I think you owe us some information.” Mazzy started to tremble and tears poured from her jade green eyes, “Please sir, don’t make me go back there, don’t make me go back home, he’ll kill me or worse, I can’t go back!”

“Shhh,” said Rupert calmly. “It’s all right, who are you in danger from?”

“I can’t say, I really can’t, please, can I just go.”

“Look, I just need to ask you a few questions about Tom Willeck.”

“I don’t know nothin’ about Tom.”

“Look, you can go with me and ask a few questions, if you work with us we might even be able to get you some safety or I can bring you in on a parole violation.”

Her shoulders slumped and she started crying but obliged. Her face looked thin and she was shivering as she entered the back of the squad car. Rupert decided not to cuff her and on the way down he stopped by Up In Smoke.

“They’ll see me here!” She said.

“I’m just going for the drive-through.”

He pulled the squad car through the drive-through and Mazzy shrank up into a ball to avoid being noticed. He ordered two pulled pork sandwiches with coleslaw and two large cups of cherry coke. He then rode back to the station. He brought Mazzy back to a room with a long table and gave her the coke and sandwich. She ate it ravenously and her shivering stopped.

“Are you feeling better Miss Miller?’

“Is this some good cop bad cop act?”

“There’s no bad cop here unless you count the Chief, but even he’s not so bad, just a hard ass. Look, I’m DEA, an older investigator, not really into the raids and stuff. I’m just trying to find a lead on the Spun Gold case, if you have any information that lead to Tom’s death it would help greatly, I could even work a deal with the courts and have your parole violation mitigated. Hell, if you fear for your safety, I might even work out a deal to get you into a group home. You might even be old enough to qualify as an emancipated minor.”

“The only way I’ll say anything to you is if I can be put in the witness protection program, they’ll find me and kill me and make it look like an accident.”

“Who will find you?”

She started shivering and crying again. Rupert removed the badge in his pocket and draped his jacket over Mazzy. She was only a few years older than Caleb and clearly afraid for her safety, he wondered how far down the rabbit hole this young woman was.

“My father, Silas, he’s a grower for the Kingpin, look he has my sister and my nephew, I can’t have you putting them in trouble.”

“So, he has your sister, Goldie, he took him from your father and is holding her for ransom?”

Mazzy started sobbing, “No sir, my daddy sold my sister to him. She was checking in on him after the divorce, the king took her son when she last visited and is holding him ransom so Goldie works for him. She was going to school for science or some stuff, she knows about genetic coding, CRISPER technology, she invented Spun to get her son back.”

“Do you know who the Kingpin is?”

Mazzy shook her head. “Daddy never talked about him in name.”

“How did your father come into contact with him.”

“Promise you’ll help me, not let anybody know that I’m here?”

“I’ll do what I can, but you’ll have to work with me.”

“My daddy is a Proud Boy, I don’t believe in that stuff, never did, part of the reason I left, but that’s how he met him,” she sighed and rolled her eyes, “they met online, the kingpin was running guns, my daddy said that Goldie knew science was really good with plants. She was into Four H and horticulture growing up, that stuff. Anyway, dad said that he was really upset with mom and he just wanted to see Goldie and his grandson. Goldie knows where mom is, she told me when I got out of Abraxis that we could all go there and be safe, then dad found the conversation between us. He gave Goldie’s son to the kingpin and sold her to him, I thought he was going to make her do things, like sell her body,” she broke down and started sobbing, “but Goldie is smart, real smart, instead of her body she offered her mind, said she could create something that would make them all rich if she could just have her son and leave, but she’s still there, she’s been there nearly a year.”

Rupert gently patted her shoulder, “what you told me was very brave, and I’m gonna do everything in my power to make sure you stay safe. Do you know where the kingpin is?”

“Daddy wanted to take me up there to party with the king, I told him I had a boyfriend and I wasn’t that kind of girl. He found out who Tom was and now he’s gone, it’s my fault Tom’s dead, I should have just left and not said anything.” “It’s not your fault, it’s not your fault that bad people take advantage of kids, what’s important is you told us this now, we have a lead to catch the bad people. You sit tight, we’ll find a place for you to go.”

Rupert left the room and went to the back room on the other side of the glass. Chief Ellis was sitting there with a note pad.

“Poor kid, but I think we have enough information to get a stakeout, if the stakeout works, we’ll get a warrant,” said Ellis.

“What about the girl?” asked Rupert.

“Well, Stiltskin, I can work with juvenile services to make sure she stays safe if she agrees to testify. There’s a retreat called Mountain Manor that can keep her safe until it’s all over, then she can stay with her mother and older sister.”

“Mountain Manor is a psychiatric facility.”

“She’ll be safe, and get the treatment she needs, I’m sure the petty crimes were from stress. It’s an optional choice, but it’s safe and they treat their patients well there.”

“We should leave the choice to her.”

“True, but she’ll take the Manor given the choice, it’s a safe place until this all blows over, anyway it’s “Girl Interrupted” not Trans -Allegheny asylum. She’ll be well cared for, have talk therapy, treatment for PTSD, hell they even have horseback riding and camping trips for the less troubled patients. She hangs out for a few weeks, sings Kumbaya around a campfire, we raid, get the kingpin she and Goldie to testify in court and bam, no more Spun issue.”

“Is the state at least going to take care of the bill?”

“It’ll be part of the witness protection program; she won’t have anything to worry about.”

Chief Ellis went into the room and Rupert to could see him talking to her. Instead of the intimidating police chief, he seemed gentle, even fatherly toward Mazzy. Rupert saw the girl nodding profusely and even hug him. A few hours of paperwork later a car with a middle-aged woman came and took the girl away.

Chief Ellis then assigned both Ralston and Stiltskin to run a stakeout of Silas Miller’s house.

“Chief,” said Ralston, “Silas Miller is a Proud Boy, a White Supremacist, do really think it’s the best idea to put me on surveillance detail?” “It’s a stakeout, you just have to observe and remain inconspicuous.”

“In all due respect Chief, it’s not exactly easy to remain inconspicuous when you’re a brother heading up the Grand Dragon’s house.”

“We’ll have a mole from Dalton High School, his name is Carson, he was caught dealing on campus a few weeks ago, we cut him a deal if with the court if he would help us out.”

Rupert remembered Carson as the source of the raid a few nights ago, he was surprised the kid was still alive at this point.

“We need you to start at 2100 tonight,” said Chief Ellis.

“All I ask is that I go home to my family and get some shut-eye, it’s gone to be a long night.”

Rupert came home and held Norma close, he apologized for not calling and explained the incident with Mazzy, he trusted that Norma would not say a word to anyone.

“I was just worried about you, hon, these are dangerous people.”

“I understand, I’ll try to keep in touch more.”

“And the girl, is she going to be all right, she’s not much older than Caleb.”

“She’s going to be just fine, she’s in good hands.” He kissed her, “after this is over I’ll spend more time with you and Caleb, I have some leave I can take.”

“Caleb’s school is premiering Frankenstein vs the Horrendous Goo, Caleb got the part of the chemistry teacher. He’d be happy if you could come and see it.”

“I think we might be raising the next James Dean.”

“More like Jack Black, “Norma chucked, “He’s very funny, you’d see if you were around more, still thinks fart jokes are hilarious though.”

“Boys never grow out of that,” said Rupert, “just fair warning.” He kissed Norma and went to his bed. If crude humor was the worse that they’d have to worry about from Caleb, then he and Norma seemed to be doing pretty good.

At eight in the evening, he met Ralston and Carson at the station. Carson was wearing blue jeans a plain black tee-shirt and a beige jacket. He had long dark hair and was wearing jeans and a tee-shirt with a red and green marijuana plant printed on the front. Carson was on probation but smelled faintly of weed.

“You know marijuana isn’t legal in West Virginia, right kid?” said Rupert.

“Dude, relax, I’m going to go in and get the little golden flowers for you man, then you’ll have evidence to bring this asshole down. Marijuana never killed anyone, not like Spun man.”

“Kid has a point,” said Ralston, “in the city, I’ve seen deaths from Smack, Coke, Meth and all manner of street drugs cut with rat poison, I never really had an issue with pot. It’s been decriminalized in states around and will probably be legal eventually. We just need to pick our battles. Now you were caught selling pot and mushrooms at Dalton, and you knew Tom Willeck.”

“I knew him, and yeah, I sold some shrooms and pot, but nothing like that Golden shit, dude, I only sell natural stuff, nothing from a lab man.”

“Spun Gold is a plant,” said Rupert.

“Yeah, but like some GMO genetically hybridized bullshit, not anything that grows naturally.”

“Spun Gold is a poppy that was genetically modified to have the properties of Belladonna, making it hallucinogenic and extremely deadly. But both Belladonna and Poppies are plants that grow out of the ground, hell cyanide comes from peach pits,” said Rupert.

“Dude, I just want people to be relaxed and happy, I don’t want them to die or some shit, you’re not a good salesman if you kill your customers, man.”

Rupert shook his head.

“Anyway, are we about to run this?” said Ralston irritably. “I’ll be the driver, you get the evidence and Stiltskin will make the report and call the Calvary when we need it.”

“Sounds like a plan, dude,” said Carson as he got into the back seat. They were in Rawlston’s Black Range Rover. It was dark enough to remain undercover at night but nimble enough to keep up with suspects on winding mountain roads. Ralston drove out of town and to a field by the side of the mountain. He turned off on a dirt road and drove down sloping hills past an old red barn and cow pasture.

They then saw a mobile home the color of dust with small windows. On the front door hung a Rebel Flag. Ralston parked the Rover about a quarter-mile from the home, thankful for the cover of night.

“All right Carson, you know the drill,” said Rupert. He gave a small microphone to Carson, Carson then put the bug into one of his many pants pockets. “Now this is a dangerous person, give us a yell if you feel you’re in danger.”

“Dude, relax, I called Silas ahead of time and arranged a hangout, I would sell weed here all the time, yeah, he’s a crazy asshole but if you keep your mouth shut and just sell or buy from him he won’t cause trouble.”

“All I know is I ain’t going up there,” said Ralston.

“Probably for the best my dude. Guy’s a racist asshole and one of those preppers for the zombie apocalypse, he has all these crazy theories,” said Carson, rolling his eyes.

Carson then opened the back door and rolled out of the back seat. He walked down the dirt road into the darkness. Through the microphone, they heard dogs barking and a man yelling “Go on, git.”

“Do y’all have the stuff?” asked Silas.

“Yeah, I have a pound of Purple Kush man, will that work for two ounces of Spun?”

Rupert wondered where Carson had kept the pound of weed, probably in one of the hundred ding dang pockets on his pants.

“All right, let’s keep this quick,” said Silas, “there’s a lot of talk about how the feds are on this, you can’t be too careful, especially after Tom got himself killed.”

“Totally bro.”

There was a rustling sound and then the dogs started to act up again.

“I said, git!”

Then there was a sound of a gate slamming and then silence.

Ten minutes later the back door opened to the Rover and Carson piled in. He fished through his pockets and found a small bag of yellow powder.

“I stashed the bug in the house, Silas was a little too jumpy to notice,” said Carson.

“It looks like we got the evidence,” said Rupert, “now we just have to wait.”

And wait they did, Rupert and Ralston kept an eye on the house for any sort of activity but not much happened the rest of the night. During the next morning, they saw Silas feeding the chickens in the yard and yelling at the dogs under the porch, they were in a wooded area on top of the hill, enough to hide the Rover out of sight.

Over the radio, they heard various snoring and news broadcast. Closer to evening they heard a WWE match on the television. Rupert pulled some binoculars.

“Look there in the distance,” he said.

Ralston took the binoculars from Rupert and saw an old trans AM pulling on the dirt road toward Silas’ house. The door opened and a large bald man in a suit got out and went into the mobile house. There were several loud knocks.

“What in the hell do y’all want?” yelled Silas.

“Is that any way to address your boss?” asked a low, smooth voice on the other side.

“Sorry sir, be right there.”

Silas opened the door, he was a man with a potbelly, a mustache, and a red ball cap.

“Come on in,” said Silas.

“I’d rather not, have you found your other daughter, Crystal?”

“She’s out running around somewhere; she’ll be heading back sometime soon.”

“We can’t afford to have witnesses; we need to find her and employ her.”

“She’s not smart, not like Goldie.”

“There are other uses for her.”

“Look, she ran out, she probably headed to her mom’s house. She doesn’t have any friends and we took care of her little boyfriend; I will find my ex-wife and take care of them both.”

The bald man sighed, “the King needs you at the base, it’s about distribution into the area, we need to discuss expanding our market into I 81, down into D.C.”

“I don’t want to step on anyone’s turf, there’s a bunch of gangs down there that I don’t want to deal with, that and Baltimore, no thank you.”

“We’re missing on a huge market share, and the King wants bigger business Silas, if you’re considered a block to the market he will remove from the equation,” the bald man purred.

“All right, I’ll go, just let git my truck.”

The Grand AM took off, followed by an old F-150. Ralston waited a good minute or so and took off after. They followed them down a dirt road into the mountains, the dirt then turned into gravel and the road was pitted and uneven. They followed the F-150 up winding roads and steep inclines, the trucks stopped by a yellow gate and parked. Ralston parked the rover back towards the bottom of the hill undercover.

“I’ll get out here,” said Rupert. “You and Carson head back toward the station and present the evidence, I’ll follow on foot and report back.”

“You sure Ru?” asked Ralston. “It’s dangerous, really dangerous.”

“I grew up in these woods all my life, I know enough to stay out of the way. By the way, don’t call me Ru, it’s Rupert or Mr. Stiltskin, now I need y’all to call the Calvary, I’m going to try to find Goldie and make sure she’s safe.”

“Be careful my dude,” said Carson.

“You too, my dude, and stay out of trouble,” said Rupert.

Rupert got out of the rover and waited until the Silas and the bald man got out. Rupert followed behind enough to just see the silhouettes in the night. He walked softly trying to avoid making too much noise. A tree branch broke under his foot and he froze in fear. The two men in front looked behind and Rupert held his breath.

“It’s only a deer, they’re everywhere out here,” said Silas.

A light shone back and Rupert ducked behind a bush and stayed very still.

“I suppose you’re right.”

Rupert let out his breath as the two men started to walk forward again. He followed for about an hour when he saw an oblong house out of the side of the mountain. It was large and mostly windows, the floors cascaded under one another down the side of the mountain, and a large swimming pool was tiered over a large garage. The two men took off toward the mansion and Rupert gingerly followed them, they made their way to a gate in a large stone wall.

Rupert sighed and went further back into the woods, when he was out of earshot he called on his phone, the signal was very spotty and the call cut off. He managed to send a text to Ralson, stating the place was large, rich and had security. He looked around and saw cameras placed every few feet along the walls. In order to get a better vantage, he decided to climb a tree to see into the yard. Now it had been several years since he had climbed trees with Caleb in boy scouts, but not so long ago he forgot how.

He found a sturdy walnut tree and pulled his heft onto the larger branches. Catching his breath, he was now high up enough to see into the yard. There were cameras everywhere, except for one corner, in this corner was a large greenhouse, probably where the Spun Gold was grown. He climbed down off the walnut tree and looked for another tree closer to where the greenhouse would be. He found a maple, not quite as strong as the walnut but he would have to take his chances. He huffed and puffed but managed to find purchase on the lower branches. He pulled slowly climbed toward the higher branches when he heard a snap. He quickly found purchase on another branch and it slowly bent over the wall. He let go and tumbled the remaining five feet. He felt the ground skin his knee but that was the only damage he had, thank God.

He opened the door to the greenhouse and the pollen hit him immediately. He got out before the head rush would come. He then saw a woman with blonde curls and a gasmask holding him at gunpoint.

Rupert held his hands up.

“Goldie Miller?” The woman didn’t respond and still trained her gun on him. “I’m here to help, but only if you let me.”

The woman took off her gas mask, she had a pretty face, similar to Mazzy’s and jade green eyes.

“You a cop?” she asked.

“DEA,” said Rupert.

“You don’t have a warrant, or you wouldn’t be climbing trees to get in here.”

“Look, I’m here to help, I saw your sister, Mazzy, or Chrystal, she said you’re being held here against your will, I’m here to help.”

The woman lowered her gun. “You’re right, I’m Goldie, you saw Chrystal? Is she ok?”

“Yeah, she’s someplace safe, they can’t hurt her.”

“Thank God!”

“Look, she told me they have your son.”

Goldie looked tired and nodded. “Yeah, his names Bobby, he’s only two.” A tear left her eye. They said I could have him back when I filled this room with flowers. Of course, they told me that after I filled the first two. They keep asking for more and more and the houses they just keep getting bigger. They’re asking me to work with CRISPR and come up with other combinations to get people high. He’s working on designing GMO drugs to take over the market.” She was near sobbing.

“Who is this person?”

“The King, that’s all I know about him, my father had a debt to him and he wanted me and Chrystal to pay for it. I’m just glad she’s safe.”

Rupert texted on the phone that he found Goldie. A few minutes later a helicopter flew overhead and squad cars moved up and surrounded the mansion. Flash grenades went off blowing in the windows and agents dressed in black raided the mansion. There was the sound of gunfire exchanged when the King came out with a small blond boy as a sheild.

“No!” yelled Goldie.

The King was just an average looking middle-aged man in a suit, nothing remarkable. The large bald man stood beside him; a semi-automatic aimed at the troops.

“Come out with your hands up!” Chief Ellis’ voice boomed over a megaphone.

“One step closer and I’ll kill the boy,” said the King.

“Enough is enough, you ain’t killin’ my grandson,” said Silas.

“I own you and your family, Silas,” said the King.

Suddenly Ralston came behind Silas, he was wearing full tactical gear, he gave Silas a hard shove.

“Never forget I was the man that saved your sorry redneck ass!” said Ralston.

Ralston then pulled the pin on a flash grenade and threw it towards the King rolling back with the toddler in arms. The flash grenade went off, setting the King ablaze along with the straw in the greenhouse, burning it all down to the ground.

Rupert, Ralston, Goldie, and the child ran away from the chaos and made it to a nearby ambulance. An EMT took her and the child as well as looked over Rupert. He had some minor burns but would survive. The squad took both Silas, the bald man, and several goons out in zip ties, stuffed them in a large, black police van, and took off.

News of the raid traveled through the town of Castle quickly. The King was actually named Albert Kingston and was a former engineer for a chemical plant until he got involved in the drug trade, he made his living through the opioid crisis and managed to stay hidden, most of his sales came from rural areas and he used white supremacist groups as his lackeys and guard dogs. In his memoirs, he said, “hate makes men easy to control.” Silas got sentenced thirty years to federal prison but was knocked down to fifteen when he crowed like a stool pigeon on the trade.

Goldie Miller was let free by the courts as she was held under duress. She retrieved custody of her son Bobby and went back to Morgantown University. She married a professor a year later, presumably Bobby’s father, and later became the head of the biology department.

Mazzy aka Crystal Miller testified by the courts and received full treatment at Mountain Manor, she recovered and graduated high school, after which she moved to Hilton New York to live with her mother, Ruby Miller.

Ralston decided to become a federal agent and travel, seeing everywhere he went there was always going to be some sort of drama, so he might as well go everywhere.

Carson moved to Colorado and was doing quite well working for a legal dispensary.

Rupert Stiltskin took leave after the paperwork and court hearings were done with. He and Norma went to the theater of Dalton Middle school to see Frankenstein vs the Horrendous Goo, featuring Caleb Stiltskin, and it was the greatest show he ever did see.

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