#I feel like that wouldn’t be a thing bc fire hazard

[dreams-in-daylight]

Quick question, are there clothes dryer machines that use an open flame heating element? Should I be seeing flames behind a little square access door???

[cyborg-franky]

Are you still looking for sfw requests?? Can I get some angst with Law where reader is upset bc Law won't open up to her and she's frustrated about it because she doesn't know about all the things he's been through?

AN: This is set probably before Punk Hazard time so if you haven't seen it then like spoilers probably -jazz hands- Law x Reader [didn't use any pronouns sorry I know you asked for fem!] ANGST word count: 869 Suggested listening: [song that got me in the vibe for this fic]

I'm The One - Static X I was crawling Always falling You don't know what I have lived through.

Another nightmare swept over Law like so many waves in the ocean. The doctor sat bolt up right in bed, sweat clinging to his body as he gasped, gulping in air and blinking his eyes in a panic, his heartbeat so fast he could have sworn it rattled around in his ribcage. You sat up soon after, groggy and worried about the man, he tried to slow his breathing, bringing his legs to sit on the bed cross legged. Elbows perched on his knees he took slow breaths to calm down his erratic heartbeat.

His face was buried in his hands, trying to center himself, chasing away what was real and wasn’t from the blurry edges of his dream that met reality. He exhaled slowly, rubbing his face and you frowned. It was common for Law to have nightmares but this one seemed especially bad. You gently placed your hand on his clammy skin, rubbing his shoulder softly just to be shrugged off.

“It’s nothing”.

“Law…” You withdrew your hand reluctantly from his personal space. He turned away from you now, throwing his long legs off the side of the bed, still with face buried in the palms of his hands.

“Doesn’t look like nothing…”

Law sighed and sat up slightly, letting his hands fall between his legs as he glanced half heartly over his shoulder at you. His tired eyes telling you more then his words ever could. The heart pirate hadn’t had a good night sleep since he was young, another thing you could tell unaided.

“Was it about Cora-san again?” you ventured softly, he tutted in response and shook his head. You knew Corazon was someone who was dear to Law and had died way before you met him, that was it though.

He idly itched at his skin, eyebrows furrowed and looking straight through you. You knew he didn’t do it out of spite, he often disassociated after a particularly bad nightmare. “Law, I wish you’d let me in.” You tried to move closer to him but he pushed himself up from the bed, going to make himself some coffee, done with sleep and the shadows it cast over his subconscious.

“Are you even going to respond to me?” You couldn’t help the snap in your voice, there was a limit to your understanding when he wouldn’t let you into his heart entirely.

“It was a nightmare” Law said simply, turning around and working the small fire for hot water. You threw up your arms with a loud sigh, flopping back into the soft embrace of your pillows. “Thank you, doctor, damn”.

“Why do you need to know?” He sat at his desk, watching the water boil, eyes narrowed in thought. “I- I don’t need to know Law… but we’ve been together what, a few years now? I know your new at feelings, but we are meant to share our troubles with one another, it’s what couples do!” You decided you were past trying to sound understanding, flustered he seemed as closed off as the day you met him.

Law leaned back in his seat, turning it to face you, his hands clasped together under his chin, he seemed to take in what you had said but said nothing, rubbing the hair on his chin calculating what he should reply with. “It’s bad enough I repeat it in my dreams” Law shot a look over at you “It isn’t going to change anything if I tell you, it certainly won’t make me feel any better”.

You blinked at him, this was more then he normally liked to divulge to you when it came to the negative feelings his nightmares conjured inside of him. “I don’t need anyone’s pity or sympathy that also won’t change anything”

“So, what, you are just going to keep it all in?”

“Until the day I die, more then likely” God Trafalgar Law was the most stubborn bastard you’d ever met in your entire life, you loved him but he could be the most insufferable prick.

“It won’t matter soon”.

You furrowed your brows at what he said, he focused his attention on making himself some coffee, watching the steam from the water fill the dim light of the cabin. You didn’t like how that sounded “What do you mean Law?” there was a tremble in your voice.

“What are you going to do?” you pressed him, sitting up right to watch the pirate captain, how he stared at the flames, a look on his face, one of deep thought, a determined look in his eyes. “I’m going to get him back for all the pain”.

“W-who?”

He shook his head and leaned back in his chair once more, coffee in hand, the look he’d had just moments ago soon replaced with a tired, exhausted expression. You sighed inwardly, your heart sinking. Let me in….

Don’t let this darkness sink you.

You felt tears pricking your eyes, your heart ached for your partner, you were so sad, frustrated, you could tell he was falling away and yet you were grasping at the slowly dwindling end of his rope.

[god-of-entropy]

sorry this is my first time doing a req, but since you like iida tenya, i was wondering if you had any knight iida tenya headcanons?

So I was re-enacting a bakuiida hurt/comfort scenario I made up for exactly 2 hours since I started during 10:00 pm and it is 12:00 AM

gist of it: bakugou’s inferiority complex acts up and so he doesn’t take care of himself bc he’s too busy training and iida tells him how much he (Katsuki) means to him, (Tenya) and that there aren’t enough numbers that exist that could tell him (Katsuki) how much he (Katsuki) meant to Tenya

and then I remembered my tumblr account and one of the asks I got was “do some knight Iida Tenya headcanons this is my first time doing a req” and I was like oh wow I am v blessed that I am the person who took anon’s req virginity so here we are

CW: few times of cursing, mention of me talking about a car kink

Knight Iida Tenya Headcanons

Part of the King’s guard no I do not. Take criticism

If he isn’t he’s most likely in a very high position of knight rankings in the fantasy AU

His chivalrous spirit could rival canon Kirishima’s

But since Kiri’s a dragon hybrid here,,well

Did I mention

He’s TALL

Like. Bumping his head on every single fucking doorway kind of tall

He is a staggering 6”6

HES TALLER THAN MY BEDROOM WALLS JSJSJ

anyways so like bc he’s so tall he learned the very hard way (literally) that you should not wear a metal cone hat while sliding down ladders

Was this inspired by that one (1) video on YouTube where this guy’s character slid down a really long ladder wearing a golden metal cone hat

I will not agree nor will I deny this accusation

So bc he’s so tall he grudgingly cannot wear a fancy Iida helmet from the prestigious and noble Iida family line

ofc his brother was a knight before him, it’s so obvious

(Speaking about Tensei, his brother wore it anyways even though his brother is taller than him because he was always on horseback anyways, but having to patrol the streets of the kingdom on a daily basis trailing after the King or Prince or whatever he can’t let a helmet hinder him from going after people

Anyways so like because he is So Tall people often make jokes about his height and how rectangular his body was

So poor bby got insecure about his height and prefers not to talk about it, stays silent when someone thinks he can’t hear them whispering and making jokes about his bulky stature

speaking about bulky things his canon costume is lightweight in design because if speed and leg strength makes up 100% of your quirk you can’t have stupid accessories and additional weight.

But of course since what he’s going for (the Ingenium title) is pretty much set in stone, there’s a heavy emphasis in visuals (in canon) so like 90% of his fucking costume is for Decor

And I hate him for that

Because TENYA FOR THE LOVE OF GOD YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE 100% INGENIUM YOU CAN BE YOUR OWN INGENIUM

Even if you were put the pressure on yourself to become like your brother, don’t feel burdened to make sure your hero career is 100% like his

OK I kind of swerved away from topic but since we’re talking about hero costumes and knight armor

Since this is fantasy and most fantasy-ish things are set in a European medieval style because of fucking Hollywood and not in a more traditional Japanese style since apparently fire spitting dragons are cooler than Kitsunes with ten tails, power over nature elements and are literally considered deities—

Knight armor is made of metal, right?

So in that case..his armor would really weigh him down.

But because this is FANTASY and science and physics can go fuck themselves here,

It’s possible that there’s a chance magic could make his armor more lightweight, like Uraraka’s quirk

but like there’s a chance that his armor is ALREADY lightweight because again, canon Tenya really went after the design of his brother’s costume

And his brother’s costume was inspired by his parent’s and grandfather’s own costumes, which kinda looked the same since it had the white modern accents and holes in the helmets kinda aesthetic

SO ASSUMING THAT THE IIDA FAMILY LINE IS V NOBLE AND FAMED FOR BEING IMMERESED IN THE KNIGHTHOOD SHITE FOR A V LONG TIME

And his brother did copy whatever his parents and ancestors’s armor was or whatever

And they’re noble, right—so they’re rich. Because magic exists, plenty of wizards mages and other magic people for hire also exist

Enchanted lightweight metal armor

there’s a reason why you shouldn’t trust knights in shining armor and that’s because if their chest plate is too pristine, that means they’ve never went to battle

Here’s a rule for all you y/ns: don’t trust a knight in shining armor if it’s not enchanted

what I’m saying is if you wanna date Iida, the knight in shining AND enchanted armor, go for it bestie TT

Also His Boots

Assuming he doesn’t have his sexy engines on his calves in this AU

(Or perhaps the sleek, modern looking engines are replaced with steampunk ones O.O)

OK SO WE’RE GOING WITH THE STEAMPUNK MUFFLERS

Because holy shit that’s such a cool fucking concept??

Oh you bet your y/n messy buns that steampunk iida hcs are next

so since fantasy usually goes with at least one (1) “primitive” tribe with their own kind of technology centered around weapons and battle

And that one (1) “”tribe”” that’s an entire fucking kingdom/city like the Carja in the game Horizon Zero Dawn

Speaking of Horizon Zero Dawn, the “primitive” tribe with their own kind of technology centered around battle and more battle are the Banuk

They’re hardcore fam

They give me Bakugou Katsuki vibes because those people would literally rather die than say a challenge is too big to overcome

again going back to the topic: Steampunk

In “”fantasy”” medieval AUS there’s always that one steampunk inventor that’s a Mei Hatsume ripoff (Tangled The Series I’m looking at you)

And of course the Support Students need their time to shine too, so like — Steampunk City let’s gooo

(The closest Horizon Zero Dawn’s “tribe” got to steampunk is whatever the hell the Oseram are doing.)

So now Tenya has sexy, sexy steampunk mufflers that are very well taken care of

<SKIP THIS PART, I TALK ABOUT RANDOM EVENTS AND BAD CHOICES I MADE IN MY LIFE>

god I’m so sorry but me talking about mufflers like they’re a full course meal is reminding me of the time where I joked to my friends that I had a car kink

and not that I had a kink to have sex inside the car, but to be fucked BY the car itself

like your ass being just wrecked by a fucking shalon poofa

if you get that joke get off this site

one of my messages was very specific

It read:

“I eagerly lick car-senpai’s oil of his exhaust pipe”

And Yeah

unsanitary and a health hazard

While discussing about simpable men one of my friends were like

my man has a CAR your man, Tenya Iida, doesn’t

And I just stared at her

Because bitch MY MAN IS THE CAR

anyways if you actually read this may god have mercy on you

<DON’T SKIP THIS PART BECAUSE I CONTINUE>

Because I make the rules

Wouldn’t they be a hindrance to him bc of his metal boots?

So Let Me Tell You A Story

you know the Ingenifoot (the boots in canon Iida’s costume)

It’s special since it has holes punched into it for the mufflers to retract out of

Who says Ingenifoot can’t be steampunk as well?

I DON’T

But it can’t be steampunk bc this is a Knight Iida hcs and not Inventor Steampunk Iida Hcs

:<

So it’s plain boring white carved steel or smth with a small section where a part of the boot flexes for the mufflers to stick out

Speaking of carved steel, Knight Iida’s armor def has intricate details and shite on it

Maybe even his family crest

OK so it is 12:45 AM rn I am gonna sleep

Goodnight

[unsaidjulie]

helloo

fairy lights for juke pls :)

(good luck with these prompts and your WIPs btw!!!)

thank you bby <33 i went with canon-compliant with this one bc the idea popped into my mind and!! whoop it’s set at some point after unsaid emily, but before the finale. i hope you enjoy this!!

the prairie on the wall

Julie gets fairy lights. She’s wanted them for a while and Ray finally took her to the store and got the nice, purple set. He offers to help her put them up, but it’s something Julie wants to do alone.

She’s always imagined putting them up, what it would feel like to step back, turn off the big light, and turn on the fairy lights. In her dreams, it’s where the magic begins. 

She doesn’t count on Luke appearing out of thin air, joining her in standing on the bed. ‘Fairy lights are a thing?’

Julie falls off the bed, hitting her head on the floor a little bit. ‘Luke! How many times do I need to tell you to stop doing that?!’

‘Sorry,’ he says, and gives her a hand. ‘I just thought you heard me enter. I knocked,’ he adds, wagging his eyebrows as if that’s supposed to mean anything. 

‘I didn’t hear you, so please announce your presence when it’s not an inch of my face.’

She’s back on the bed and Luke shoots her a grin, pushing the fairy lights up on the ceiling bit that’s too high for her too reach. ‘Noted.’

Julie sets her hands on her hips. ‘Luke.’

‘Mhm?’

‘Wouldn’t you at least ask before doing this instead of me?’

‘What?’ He turns around with a frown on his face, but lips tilted in a slight smile. ‘I thought you could use a hand.’

‘I was doing it alone.’

‘Oh. My bad. You want me to leave it?’

‘Yes, please.’

‘Okay.’ Luke steps away and spreads his arms like a kid, as if calling her to see him be a good boy. He jumps off the bed and falls into her chair, watching her climb back up and start doing it herself (struggling a lof more than he did.) ‘Did I ever tell you I basically invented fairy lights?’

Julie gives him the infamous side eye, stepping on the tips of her toes to attach the lights to the ceiling. ‘No you didn’t.’

‘Yes I did. I had the most rad bedroom ever.’

‘No you didn’t.’

He frowns and she bites her lips from forming a smile. ‘I’ll show you.’

And with that, he’s gone. 

Julie spends the next fifteen minutes finishing up the fairy lights. It’s a bit more taxing than she expected it to be, and she’s a little out of breath, for whatever reason, but it’s done. When she steps off the bed and turns off the light, she sees it in all its glory -- and it was absolutely worth it. 

Luke poofs into the chair in that very moment. He looks the same as before, albeit a little more ecstatic, with hair a little more ruffled. He jumps off the chair and onto the bed, grinning. ‘I found it! Nice lights, by the way. So this is my old bedroom.’

Julie sits down on the bed and takes the photograph from him, and he sits next to her -- close enough for her to know she would’ve been able to feel him if he weren’t... 

She stares at the photo. There’s Luke, at fifteen or sixteen, with braces and the worst haircut she’s ever seen. Behind him are stacks of books and records, and there’s a very prominent light coming from definitely not safe Christmas lights propped up on the walls and around the shelves. 

‘That’s a safety hazard,’ she says. ‘You could’ve set your house on fire. Also, you look ridiculous and I’m never letting you take this back.’

‘Julie!’

She’s laughing, but all she can think is this: he went back home to look for this. For me. 

They bicker for a few moments and Luke makes a weak attempt at chasing her around the room, but they both know there’s nothing he can do. In the end, Julie just hands him a polaroid camera. ‘Take a photo of me with my lights.’ She pulls up the photo of him and says, ‘That’s your reference.’

If she could bottle up the way he’s looking at her in this moment, Julie thinks it would smell like a prairie. Like daisies, and fresh air, and the feeling that everything is possible. 

He takes the photo, and Julie puts it on her wall. When he doesn’t see, though, she puts his own photo right underneath it -- so she can always have him, hidden, but there. Behind her. Guarding her. (Just like he always is.)

send me a word/phrase + ship + canon/au and i’ll write a short drabble!

[qhazomb]

I keep pinballing between monster Gordon designs in my head, and the most common contenders have been and owlbeast form like from The Owl House (bc him fluffy), that one humanoid design where his hair is super long and floaty and full of eyes, or a spiky dragon with near geometric scale spikes (bc the irony that his monster form is all sharp and pointy but his human form and personality are so soft and cuddly)

Bubby is usually the fire type of the group, so i always imagine monster Gordon with magma or plasma? Plasma maybe better, fits a celestial theme.

ooooh, that’s neat! i like the idea of monster gordon with plasma and lightning powers might have to incorporate that with the one i’m picturing. imagine electricity arching between his mane tendrils and whiskers and stuff, which signifies that something is about to get plasma breath’d also OOPS THIS PROMPTED ME TO SHARE A LOT OF THOUGHTS SO THIS GOT LONG, putting the rest under a read more ha ha

another thing about the monster gordon au i’ve been thinking about is that he’s not a straight-up cosmic entity like i picture benrey being, but more of just an alien from another dimension, like the critters from xen (he’s not from xen, though. whole ‘nother place entirely!) in this au, i still have gordon and benrey having known eachother as children, only this time gordon was the lil monster kid living in the woods, of course. and also, kid benrey actually saw his monster friend get carted off by black mesa! he saw the company’s logo on a vehicle or equipment or something, and never forgot it. benrey and his folks move to new mexico when he’s like, 13, and ends up befriending their new neighbor- a twenty-something guy named tommy. eventually, benrey learns that tommy’s working for this lab called black mesa, and when he sees the place’s logo he’s just !!!!!! and immediately decides he needs to try and get in that place. he doesn’t know shit or fuck about science, so trying to get a scientist job there is out. but maybe they’re hiring for like, a janitorial or security position? he’s pretty fit, and knows how to mop a floor and shoot a gun. so he goes for that. gordon still completely forgets his human childhood friend, though, awww. though that might be partially blamed on some of the experiments conducted on him. speaking of his time as a research specimen, he actually had it a tiny bit better than benrey did. didn’t take until he was in his teens before a much more caring scientist showed up to make sure he had good mental, emotional, and physical enrichment. and instead of that scientist being tommy, like for benrey... for gordon, it’s coomer. dad coomer momence :) they find gordon much more willing to cooperate after he imprints on coomer, too. and also take note of how active his curiosity is, with the alien asking so many questions and looking for so many answers for about how things work, especially when he hits his teens. somewhere along the line, some ‘mesa higher ups decide to let this xenoguy indulge his apparently scientific mind, and give him a job (he’s still required to check in for tests on himself, and not allowed to leave the facility, though). even tho he’s not an eldritch horror, he’s still got shape-shifting powers, and takes on a human form, both because all the spaces he’d work in were made with humans in mind, and to reduce the number of weird looks from literally everyone outside of sector E. and because he looked human, benrey didn’t recognize gordon at all, but also couldn’t shake this weird vibe he was getting from him. vibe increases after he sees this guy heading to do a dangerous test without one of the fancy hazard suits (being near-indestructable, he doesn’t need one). just before they get to where the test chamber is, and benrey asks him again why he doesn’t have a HEV suit if he’s really supposed to be here, gordon yells “BECAUSE I’M NOT FUCKING HUMAN, OKAY?? Now will you PLEASE let me go do my fucking job, I’m running so god damn late, christ...” the “not human” part is emphasized by gordon briefly showing a glimpse of his true form. which benrey instantly recognizes. ...aaaand then feels bad about the “i need to make sure you’re nice or not, everybody here’s afraid of you” thing. in this case, some of the other employees in sector C were afraid of gordon, as they knew what he was. benrey was a new hire and didn’t (obviously) and didn’t get why some of the scientists and guards were acting nervous around this seemingly friendly (if short-tempered) guy. but now he does. as well as why gordon looked a little self-conscious about it when benrey brought it up. whoops. even though monster!gordon doesn’t wear a HEV suit, he still has trackers that the military use to hunt the science team down. the trackers are just, y’know, in him. and unfortunately, nobody on the team knows exactly where they were stuck in him, and he doesn’t wanna just go clawing himself open everywhere to find the damn things. so the betrayal still happens, though benrey is def not feeling it as much, cause like, he JUST found his old alien friend and was gonna bust him out!! which obviously he can’t do if the fuckin’ military gets a hold of him. but then, he also can’t bust gordon out if he himself gets killed by the military... so turning gordon in is the lesser of two evils. turn him in now, and then try to free him again later. that’s the plan. of course, the bootboys ambushing gordon aren’t at all prepared. they weren’t properly informed on everything about gordon, and for about this whole time, gordon’s been taking on a human form. said form being considerably smaller than his true one. gordon does not black out and get tossed in (the wrong part of) a trash compactor. he does still get pissed at bubby and benrey, though. but this time, he forgives benrey first, as the guy gets way, WAY more emotional over this all than gordon’s ever seen from him. showing off a ton of genuine guilt and regret over it, and also explains why he did it right away (even tho gordon’s still convinced he and benrey never met until the test). bubby mostly just seems scared shitless, oops. but gordo does forgive him before it’s all said and done. they still run into coomer clones and less-than-stable bubby prototypes (which are now just clones as well because reasons). bubby’s not a genetically engineered perfect organism, but a regular/realistic ‘test-tube baby.’ he’s still got a bionic heart, though. coomer’s still a cyborg, too, but not really a super-powered one. his robotic limbs are just advanced in that they’re as dexterous as his old natural limbs, and have artificial touch receptors. they’re also made out of materials that are sturdy as all fuck. they’re just a couple of dudes, as far as physical abilities go. their clones, however? still very fucked up. possibly a little bit more fucked up. this au is also another “not a game” one, and there’s a different reason for why coomer’s clones seem to have a weird connection with gordon/gordon’s brain. bubby’s do, too. those clones aren’t just clones, but also results of genetic splicing experiments. i’ll let you guess where the other non-coomer/bubby genes that were spliced in came from. go on. guess. i haven’t thought about what happens when they get to xen too much. probably just that they fight the nihilanth, since i headcanon that it was indeed still the cause of the xen portals, but benrey ate it to steal its sick boss arena. gordon however wouldn’t do that, as he doesn’t get pissed at any of the team to, y’know, wanna go final boss on them. still gotta be the big hero man (even when he’s not technically a ‘man’). after they get back from xen, tommy prob manages to convince his dad to convince his employers to NOT lock gordon up in a lab again, as it would both mean a lot to his best friend benrey (who is like a little brother to him), and because he’s become fast friends with gordon himself and thus cares about him. i’m also trying to decide if i still want mr. coolatta to be an eldritch being or make him human, too. kinda leaning towards letting him stay non-human, though this time tommy doesn’t have any of the ‘buffs’ i say his adoptive dad gives him in my other not-a-game aus. aaaand that’s all the thoughts i’ve had on this thus far!

[clumsyclifford]

hi i have some continued thoughts about the gif set i made earlier but i’m just thinking about like baby boys writing nothing personal and jack just like feeling really down on himself one day bc he doesn’t know what he’s contributing and alex tells him he named this song for him bc he is so important i don’t know there are so many THOUGHTS TO BE HAD why are they like this

hi paige i don’t know if this was supposed to be a prompt but i took it as one because i’m me hope that’s okay <3 (also here is the gifset in question, warning for max damage)

read it here on ao3

-

“Hey, where’d Jack go?”

Flyzik looks up from his laptop and glances around the control room. “I dunno,” he says. “I thought he was here.”

“I leave for two minutes,” Alex says, sighing exasperatedly. “We need to put a bell on that kid.”

“Believe me, if I could, I would,” says Flyzik, returning to the all-important task of probably talking shit on Twitter or whatever he does when he’s taking up studio space. 

Squire, whose playing had been arrested upon Alex’s re-entry, starts the guitar line from the top. The unfinished track fills the small room. Alex considers handcuffing him just so he’ll stop playing that one fucking guitar part.

At this rate, he’ll be sick of the song before it’s even released.

“I’m going to find Jack,” he announces, not that anyone cares. In a halfway attempt at defiance, or being annoying, or whatever, he snatches Flyzik’s coffee mug off the table.

“Hey,” Flyzik says half-heartedly without looking up. “Give that back.”

“You’re fired,” Alex informs him.

“Joke’s on you, I quit this morning,” says Flyzik.

Alex rolls his eyes and leaves the control room.

There’s really only one place Jack is likely to be (okay, two places, but Alex has just come from the bathroom and he’d been the only one in there). Alex heads for the lounge. The TV is on, playing a commercial for mattresses. Occupying the entire length of the couch:

“Jack,” Alex says. “Where’d you go, man, I thought we were working on the song.”

Jack makes no indication that he's heard Alex at all.

“Dude,” Alex says, coming into the room and facing Jack. The way Jack is slumped into the cushions, it looks like he’s been lying here all day, not for two minutes. “Were you just waiting for me to go to the bathroom so you could bail?”

Jack shoots him a glare, but again says nothing. Alex frowns.

“Are you good?” he asks, sinking to the floor with his legs crossed. He sets Flyzik’s coffee on the table at his side. “Is something wrong?”

Jack groans. “Can you leave me alone?”

“Hey,” Alex says, hurt. “What —” He breaks off. Obviously Jack doesn’t want company — or at least not Alex’s company, which stings — and if Alex doesn’t want to be a dick, he should leave. 

Except Jack is already kind of being a dick. So.

“Dude,” Alex says again. Jack keeps his eyes on the TV over Alex’s head. “Can you at least look at me?”

“I’m just taking a break, what’s the big deal?” Jack mutters.

“The big deal is you were fine five minutes ago when we were tracking the guitar,” Alex says irritably. “I leave for two seconds and when I come back you’re gone? ‘Taking a break’?”

“Yes, Alex, I came to jerk off in peace,” Jack snaps. “So can you piss off?”

Alex huffs. “Stop being an asshole when I’m just trying to understand what’s wrong.”

“Nothing is wrong, dude!” Jack finally looks at him, though it’s clear he would rather not be. “You don’t need me to finish the song, okay? You have Squire to do the guitar, and if he can’t do it then you will, so I’m just gonna sit this one out, alright?”

Alex stares at him. “The fuck do you mean, we don’t need you to finish the song? You need to learn it. And Squire’s just doing the demo track anyway. Meaning technically he doesn’t need me for it, either.”

“Alex, you wrote the fucking song.” Jack crosses his arms. “It wouldn’t exist without you. Unlike me.”

“You…would exist without me?”

Jack glares at him, again. “No, the song would still exist without me. And it would have a guitar part, without me. I know my role in the band, Alex, I’m not getting any ideas, okay? I’m the one who makes inappropriate jokes on Twitter and collects bras during shows. I don’t contribute in the studio.”

The gears in Alex’s brain grind loudly to a halt. “You don’t — what? What?”

Jack draws his knees up to his chest and looks back up at the TV. “Am I wrong?”

“Uh, yes?!” Alex says emphatically. “Extremely wrong, what the fuck? Since when is this a thing? You really feel this way?”

“Oh my God, it’s not a big deal,” Jack grumbles. 

“It’s a big deal to me,” Alex retorts. “You think you don’t contribute when we’re in the studio? You’re, like, the reason most of these songs get made. If you weren’t here we’d still be on our first record.”

“You don’t need to therapy me,” Jack says dully. “I’m fine with it.” 

Which is obviously not true. Jack’s shuttered expression and bitchy attitude don’t exactly communicate ‘fine.’

“I’m not trying to ‘therapy’ you,” Alex says, making air quotes. “Whatever the fuck that means. I’m trying to tell you something you should already know.”

Jack sighs wearily. Somehow he seems to sink deeper into the couch, like whatever’s weighing him down is only getting heavier. “Alex, it’s fine.”

“Stop saying it’s fine,” Alex says sharply. “It’s not fine. Did someone say something when I left? Is that why the mood whiplash?” There’s no way. Squire would never, and Flyzik hadn’t even been on the same planet. Not that Flyzik ever would, either, but then again, they make a lot of fucking jokes around here. Sometimes the kind of joke that hits a little too close to home. Call it an occupational hazard of living and working with a bunch of guys in their early twenties; none of them really know when to stop.

It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt. 

Jack’s gaze flits between Alex and the TV, which has really been playing commercials for far too long. He seems to realize he’s not going to escape this conversation, and with an almighty sigh grabs the remote and hits mute.

“No one said anything, okay?” There’s a pause. Alex waits patiently while Jack gathers his thoughts. “It was just that, like, you were there, and we were joking around, and then you left, and like…Squire kept playing the part, Flyzik was still on fucking MySpace or whatever, and, like, I don’t know. It just felt like if I left it wouldn’t matter, so I did.” He barks a humorless laugh. “And I was right. It didn’t matter.”

“It mattered to me,” Alex says. “I came back and you had abandoned me with Squire and Flyzik. You think I want to be stuck with them?” 

One corner of Jack’s mouth pulls up, barely, then drops down again. “I’m fine,” he says a third time. “You can go back and finish tracking the lead. Just call me when you need me for something.”

Alex considers this. “You know, I could use a break, while I’m here.” He takes a sip of Flyzik’s coffee, which is absolutely disgusting and also room temperature at this point. Jack frowns at him.

“You’re in the middle of demo-ing a song,” he says flatly. “‘Best Friend Knows,’ right?”

“Well, as you so eloquently pointed out, Squire can track the guitar,” Alex says. “And in fact is tracking the guitar. And has been for half an hour. He doesn’t need me for it, either.”

“But that’s not the fucking same and you know it. You wrote the song.”

“Yeah, so what? It’s not that great of a song. Anyone could have written it. I bet Andrew has fifty better songs in his back pocket.”

“But Andrew isn’t in the band,” Jack says. “The whole point is they’re your lyrics that you write for your band.”

“And you play the guitar,” Alex counters, raising his eyebrows at Jack. “Yeah, there are a billion songwriters and guitarists in the world. Anyone can play guitar, but there’s only one All Time Low guitarist, and it’s you. You’re our guy, Jack. You brought the band together, you keep it together, and you keep us moving forward. So what if you’re not writing lyrics? There’s way more to being in a band than writing the fucking lyrics. I promise you, man, without you we’d still be playing the fucking Dulaney Talent Show. We’d be fucking nowhere. We definitely wouldn’t be in L.A. recording our second full-length studio album.”

Silence falls as Alex’s words hang in the air. They’re both quiet for a moment. The Red Bull fridge buzzes in the background, and even more faintly comes the sound of Squire relentlessly playing the same lead part for what has to be the millionth time. 

“If you say so,” Jack finally says, although he doesn’t really seem to believe it. 

“I do,” Alex says firmly. Jack is the heart of the band more than anyone else, the beating pulse that keeps them alive no matter what shit gets thrown their way. When they were traveling from venue to venue in a shitty van, Jack was the one who kept spirits high. In their earliest days, Jack had held them together like glue, as if he could tell that something really special would happen as long as he didn’t let them go.

And he’d been right. There’s no All Time Low without Jack. That’s always been obvious to Alex.

“I think it’s an awesome song,” Jack quietly adds, as an afterthought. “No one else could’ve written it, so take that shit back.”

“Mediocre at best,” Alex says. “But there’s still time to make it better.”

“I like it,” Jack insists. “It’s cool. You’re a good songwriter.”

Alex waves a hand. “All the good lines are from Squire.”

“Well, I don’t know any of the words,” Jack says, a hint of his usual dry humor making a comeback. “But I bet that’s not true. All the best lines always come from you.”

“They’re meh. There’s not even a good line for a title. ‘What Your Best Friend Knows’ is just the most repeated line, but like, I don’t know. It’s boring.”

“So just call it something else,” Jack says. “The title doesn’t have to come from the song. You might have heard of a little album called From Under The Cork Tree? It’s by this super underground band, I’m not sure if you’ve heard of them.”

Alex laughs a little. “Yeah, okay. I guess.”

Another pause fills the room. Finally Jack says, “If you want to hang out, you can, but stop trying to therapy me.”

“I’m not trying to therapy you! It’s called being your friend, you dumbass.”

“Well, cut it out,” Jack deadpans. There’s the Jack Alex knows. 

Alex smiles at him, even though he knows it makes him look very sincere, more sincere than Jack probably wants from him. “You made your band bed,” he says. “Now you have to lie in it.” He half-stands and clambers onto the couch, and Jack stretches his legs over Alex’s lap. “What are we watching?”

“I don’t know,” Jack says, reaching for the remote. “It’s been commercials since I got here.”

“Jesus Christ, don’t these people have anything better to do than advertise all day every day?” Jack unmutes the TV. An episode of a show neither of them know is playing. Alex rolls his eyes. “Which channel is playing Lost reruns, do you think?”

“Only one way to find out,” Jack says, raising the remote like a wand. “Hope you brought a board ‘cause it’s time for some channel surfing.”

“Oh my God, you’re so lame.”

Jack snickers. “Maybe there’ll be a line you can use for the song title. Like a ‘Nobody Puts Baby In A Corner’-type thing.”

“In Lost?” Alex says skeptically. 

“Maybe, you don’t know.”

Alex highly doubts Lost will have any cool one-liners that could double as song titles, but it’s not a bad idea, pulling an iconic movie quote the way Fall Out Boy did on Cork Tree. The gimmick isn’t really the All Time Low style, but there’s a first time for everything.

Besides, Alex thinks, glancing over at Jack, whose attention is trained on the TV, I think I know the perfect movie.

—

“What?”

They’re back in the studio the following day. After yesterday’s minor emotional hurdle, Jack seems to be doing much better. Right now his eyes are wide in surprise as he stares at Alex.

“‘Keep The Change’ —”

“I know the quote,” Jack interrupts, a smile stretching over his face. “That’s the name? Of the song?”

Alex grins. “Has a cool ring to it, don’t you think?”

“Are you fucking kidding me? This is the best day of my life,” Jack enthuses, beaming. 

Alex shrugs. “Well, someone gave me the great idea to use a movie quote for a title. This felt fair.”

“Alex, I literally love you so much, you don’t even know,” Jack says. “Just for this, I’m giving you my firstborn.”

“If you ever have children, God save us all,” Flyzik says dryly from the far side of the room. He’s not wrong, but Jack doesn’t even act offended, still caught up in the excitement of the song title. 

“Hey,” Alex says in a low voice, kicking lightly at Jack’s leg. “For the record, I’d never in a million years have thought to use a movie quote title.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Jack says.

Alex gives him a meaningful look. “That’s my point, man. Next time you think you’re not contributing, just remember this, alright?”

The shadow of realization passes over Jack’s face, and he shakes his head incredulously. “You are such a piece of shit,” he says, although he doesn’t seem upset. “This was just to make a point?”

“I didn’t do it to make a point,” Alex says. “I did it because it was a good idea. But it does make a point, because you thought you weren’t contributing in the studio, and this is proof that you are.”

Jack sighs. “Point taken.” A little bit of humility colors his expression. “Thanks.”

Alex gives him a cheeky smile. “You are welcome,” he says airily, and throws an arm over Jack’s shoulders. “And now I think we both have some guitar parts to learn, am I right?”

“Yup,” says Squire, as if he’d just been waiting for his cue. “Jack, you wanna track this?”

Jack glances over at Alex, who grins. “Yeah,” he says, stepping forward and taking the guitar out of Squire’s hands. “I’d love to.”

[adorable-american]

So... I rewatched otgw and started looking at fanart and was reminded of bipper... and I've spent the last day and a half looking at #billdip help.

Also, I have an idea for the billdip mafia au, so course

(Mostly a human au)

(Edit: ok so, I had no idea what was happening until I typed it all. I was gonna mostly put the idea and hope a more experienced writer could take on the challenge bc I don't feel my mafia expertise is good but... well... I ended up typing some story bits so sorry if the third person/ first person switches are random and difficult to follow along with)

.

.

.

Bill is a criminal kingpin and afraid of nothing and no one, he is married to Dipper but since Dipper is almost a hazard for his line of work, he keeps his marriage secret. You cannot find a record of their marriage since Bill has the judge on payroll, Dipper (now older) uses his real name, Mason Pines-Cipher instead of the old childhood nickname. So, if anyone hears Bill say "'Pinetree' or on rare occasions 'Dipper'" they just figure he means another random thug. Mason, is completely oblivious to the nature of his husband's true work (because he wouldn't approve) and lives a very normal life as a doctor. He has seen Bill's office which is the front for his true dealings. The office is a nice space at the top of a skyscraper in Seattle. The business front is actually a realtor firm, where he takes advantage of the information and uses dilapidated/condemned/empty houses and buildings for his private matters. But because of Mason's odd work/call hours he often has long shifts and stays tired so he hardly notices the shady things that happen around their home, or the coming and goings of strangers at the wee hours of the morning.

Bill is also a very loving husband who brings his favorite doctor lunches and sits with him during his breaks so that with their crazy schedules they know and still make time for each other.

The only people who know about Mason is a very small circle, it consist of 2 people actually. Bill's chauffeur and another doctor that Bill pays extra to watch out for Mason at work. And because Bill separates the two lives so carefully no one can figure out his weaknesses and use it against him.

Until... dun dun dun!

Bill is kidnapped by a rival!

Mason sitting at the hospital cafe he waits for his husband to bring him their lunches but when he doesn't show Mason becomes irritable, mostly because he is hungry and never carries his wallet out of routine, but also because Bill will not answer his phone and he is stressing out about it, to the point he calls the realtor office and checks the ER. After his shift at the office he quickly drives home and searches the house and goes to the police to file a missing person's report (he forgets to eat and gets highly cranky with the officers.)

After leaving the police station, a black unmarked car follows him home. He is taken in the middle of the night while asleep, he wakes to find some smelly thug in his face and that he is strapped to a chair. (Still wearing his scrubs because in all his stress and overworked body he passed out before changing or cleaning up.) The thug smacks a crowbar against his palm. Threatening to Mason before telling him that he better answer their questions or he'd get the 'crow'. To which the thug steps back and Mason can now see the man standing behind him, the rival mafia boss. "So, who are you?"

"M-mason.." he says, his heartbeat becoming erratic and his breathing quickening with panic.

"Last name?"

"Pines...-Cipher" he hesitates before adding the hyphenated portion. He wasn't sure why, but he was very scared to death.

"So, how do you know One-Eyed Bill?" The rival asks because no one knows Bill's real name.

Mason's face contorted in a confused manor having never heard the name before. And as he hesitates too long the thug brings down the crowbar, smashing Mason's knee.

As Mason screams and cries the boss asks again. "How do you know him?"

"A-are you talking about my husband?" Mason exclaims, chest heaving. The image of his loving husband, an eyepatch hiding the injured eye from long ago, the injury that caused them to first meet... Bill had been quite the charmer. Even after his eye was removed, he denied prosthetics in favor of his new aesthetic. He would visit the hospital and wait in the cafeteria until the handsome doctor showed up. Everyday he waited, until eventually he learned Mason's typical schedule/routine, then he would show up only for lunch and sit with the doctor. Until eventually Mason gave in to his former patient and accepted his request for a date.

The boss and thug give each other a side glance. The boss smiles, making Mason even more scared as he moves closer, getting very close to Mason's face. "You mean to tell me that the notorious One-Eyed Bill, is married to a very cute doctor and his real name actually is Bill?" The boss pinches Mason's cheek and spins the chair around. Behind him the whole time was Bill, his shirt was ripped to shreds, cuts, bruises, and bloodstains littered his body as he wore a masked expression upon seeing his husband now in the same situation as himself. The very thing he worked hard to prevent, being undone... by Mason searching for him.

Mason lurches forward despite being tied to a chair, he wants so badly to help his husband, to bandage him up and nurse his wounds. "Please, I'm no threat to you! Let me help him." The rival boss thinks for a moment, smirking as he has the thug retrieve Mason's medical bag. (Stupidly, they grabbed it with Mason thinking it was Bill's briefcase) The thug dropped the case in Mason's lap and untied him. "Alright, but you have to get to him yourself." The rival said, leaning against Bill's chair and watching as the doctor with a smashed knee crawled with the heavy bag over to Bill. Tears rolling down his eyes in pain. Bill gives him an "I'm sorry" look, his own mouth tied shut with a handkerchief. Opening his bag Mason searched for something to sterilize the open cuts and bandages to cover each one. He pulls himself up into Bill's lap and sets to work. The rival boss unties the gag and questions Bill instead, this time when Bill doesn't answer or tries to lie Mason takes the punishment. Him being yanked by his hair and thrown to the ground, dropping all the bandaging and sterilization wipes.

"Gag him and hold him." The rival instructs, the thug does as he says, gagging Mason and picking up the young doctor rather haphazardly, his large tattooed hand around Mason's throat. Slowly tightening until Bill gives up locations for his operation. He looks over to Mason who has tears in his eyes, letting his gaze drop Bill can read the disappointment all over his husband. By the time, the rival has Bill's locations checked out, Bill knows he has now lost fortunes in investments but that won't stop him from destroying this guy. Because as they agree to finally let them go, hurt, broken, and Bill disgraced. Bill can feel the old powers course through his veins. Its not until they physically knock Mason out that Bill can retaliate. His eyes begin to glow yellow, his pupil turning into a slit as blue flames flicker to life, burning the bonds around him. His body healing itself. He stands up. The rival and thug's eyes widen in horror. Bill snaps his fingers and the both of them burn alive in the blue fires. He was in fact a demon but no one knew, he even had been playing games with these humans for so long he had forgotten what it was like to be beat in his own game, and forgotten the feeling of his power.

After the two burned alive Bill wasn't with the decision to cut his loses and start over else where or cheat and wipe the minds of his rival's thug's. Looking down at Mason, however, he wasn't sure what to do. He pressed his hand gently over Mason's knee, healing the shattered bone before moving up to his head, he couldn't wake him like this, for the mind was much too fragile but, he could see inside his husband's mind. And repair the damage that way but again, he wasn't sure he wanted that either. So he scooped up the handsome doctor along with his medical bag and teleported them home. Dropping the bag onto the kitchen table he carried Mason to their bed laying him down and played his least favorite game, the waiting game.

Once Mason awoke he jolted upright in the bed, fear immediately consuming him as he looked around, screaming for Bill and quickly checking his leg.

Bill was at his side in seconds, calming him down and reassuring him they were safe now. Once Mason calmed down Bill had told him everything and told Mason his options. 1) they could runaway together and start over 2) Bill could fix it all with a snap or 3) They did the first option and Bill would force Mason to go with him should he decide that he wanted to leave him.

Mason raised his hands in defense telling Bill to slow down and let him process.

Mason ends up requesting number 2 but that they be a couple of nobodies who aren't missed and ditch town in favor of traveling the world in search of mystery and adventure.

[autumngracy]

in a Egyptian Pokémon region, the starters would be based on a snake, (the fire starter) a crane, (the grass starter) and a hippo. (The water starter) what do you think?

Ooh this is a really cool ask OP thank you

Here are my ideas for an Egypt based region:

Obviously we want some kind of wadjet snake pokemon and a crocodile and a hippo bc those are very prominent animals in Egyptian mythology, so right on with that. But I wanted to use animals that were sacred in a positive light (ones that weren't respected partly out of fear) as inspiration for the starter pokemon (because all of those above have certain negative connotations even if they also have good ones). So my choice of starters would be:

Jackal (fire/ghost)

Cow/ram/gazelle fusion (grass/rock)

Ibis (water/flying)

I had other starter ideas but unfortunately they were too conceptually similar to other extant pokemon (a cat fire type or a lion fire type; a primate grass type, a fire/flying bird of prey, etc.)

Stuff I would like to see in this region:

Camel pokemon (lankier than camerupt and rideable), maybe with some giraffe mixed in

Giant "Giza sphinx" type stature except it's based on the jackal starter bc originally what we know irl as the Sphinx of Giza was actually a jackal statue that got damaged enough on the head that they had to recarve the head into something smaller and without a long face (which is why it is so disproportionate to the body size)

Large desert areas that really push the player to their limit (the trickery of the desert area in SuMo comes to mind; sort of like ORAS but replace the water with sand) with beautiful oases dotting the map

Scarab pokemon

A fairy/water or water/ghost mirage pokemon that, similar to ditto, can appear as a pokemon it's not, but, like minior or mimikyu, drops its disguise after getting hit

Toad pokemon

Really hype up the legendaries for this region. Like really make their presence loom over the whole game so they don't feel like trophy hunting prizes at the end. Make them HARD to catch

Rhino pokemon

More puzzles! I miss puzzles!

Sphinx pokemon (maybe absol regional variant?)

Make me afraid of ghost pokemon again

Huge open marketplace area in late game major city areas

Aardwolf pokemon, or maybe a hyena one

Lots of hidden/secret areas--caves, mines, tombs, etc; a hidden oasis or one that's location/entrance constantly changes

A dark type pokemon with long ears and a split tail, based on whatever the fuck aesthetic Set was going for

Big river leading to delta and sea areas; a big contrast between this wet fertile landscape versus the arid desert it's surrounded by. Fun marsh areas with wading birds and water lilies, lots of reeds

An actual underground river maze beneath a pyramid/large tomb, filled with scary pokemon late into the game based on the hazardous initial journey to the afterlife and also the irl Colossus of Memnon maze/labyrinth and the maze of Amenemhet, which would lead you to a legendary. Would also have very strong giant water/dark snake pokemon in it (psuedo-legendary maybe)

SUCCULENT POKEMON

Bring back seasons and weather you cowards. It wouldn't be as hard to implement for a desert region!!

Crocodile/lion/hippo fusion pokemon based on Ammut (water/dark)

Large irrigated fields with different crops that attract different pokemon (special grass and tall grass, like how there are special flower colors for bushes)

Make incense more prominent like give it uses as a field item, such as attracting specific pokemon types, instead of it just being a hold item

Have berry trees you can plant at the oases. Make it big again like in ORAS. You could create an incense crafting mechanic that uses them, along with use in the cooking minigame they're introducing in gen 8

Softshell turtle pokemon

Touchscreen drawing game where you replicate glyph patterns to activate or unlock certain things

More interesting water pokemon that are viable competitively

Quail pokemon

More cool pokemon that hide in the sand like lizards, spiders, snakes, desert foxes, etc.

Return of rideable mudsdale

More unique *plant* pokemon that aren't just animals that have, like, some leaves taped to them

Bring back sky battles

Area in the sea similar to Cleopatra's sunken palace with ruins to explore using dive

More new cat pokemon (QUADRAPEDAL PLEASE)

GIVE US SOME NEW POKEBALLS!! And make other pokeball designs more easily accessible!

ELECTRIC JERBOA POKEMON

Boat and chariot/ride pokemon races!

BRING BACK MEGA EVOLUTIONS

All different temples dedicated to different pokemon/themes

Make it a point to reward the player for not robbing people's graves. Reward the player for respecting the dead/the native culture and making offerings at the various temples. You could make it so that giving offerings to different temples gave you different temporary bonuses like how O-powers worked. Hell you could have one that just increases your luck both in battles and encounters.

MAKE THE VILLIAN TEAM A BUNCH OF WHITE COLONIAL/IMPERIALISTS ASSHOLES THAT ARE TRYING TO STEAL AS MANY CULTURAL ARTIFACTS AS THEY CAN. And/or a doomsday cult sort of like the one in The Mummy, with a corresponding small organization dedicated to stopping them

Pokemon from previous regions that should make appearances in this Egyptian region:

Litleo line

Unown

Shuppet line

Girafarig

Absol

Fletchling line

Sigilyph

Petilil line

Hippopotas line

Minior

Oshawott line

Skorupi line

Stunky line

Drilbur line

Vullaby line

Yamask line

Venipede line

Grookey line

Feebas line

Skiddo line

Duskull line

Seviper

Zangoose

Nincada line

Spiritomb

Baltoy

Lunatone

Solrock

Cosmog line

Cubone line

Mew

Psyduck line

Totodile line

Cottonee line

Mawile

Shinx line

Lotad line

Dunsparse

Togedemaru

Doduo line

Sandile line

Trapinch line

Sandygast line

Chatot

Abra line

Ekans line

Bulbasaur line

Salandit line

Floatzel line

Exeggcute line

Rattatta line

Mareep line

Blitzle line

Zorua line

Duckling line

Mudbray line

Charjabug line

Rufflet line

Sandshrew line

Fenneken line

Litwick line

Dedenne

Wingull line

Froakie line

Tynamo line

Cutiefly line

Weedle line

Combee line

Riolu line

Swoobat line

Gible line

Axew line

Dratini line

Rockruff line

Gastly line

Darkrai

Sableye

Numel line

Squirtle line

Purrloin line

Meowth line

Noibat line

[split-n-splice]

So this chapter got longer than expected. I hate long chapters though, so I cut it in two rather than shortening it bc I like saying words. There's not much dialogue in this chapter. I swear I make up for that in the next.

[Chapter Guide]

2. Hospitality – 1 

The batteries in her walkman had died hours ago, and the ambience of the drive was close to driving her mad. The radio was mostly white-noise in face of the ugly weather conditions, and did nothing to break the lull. It was almost enough to make her un-ban I Spy and 99 Bottles.

The peace and quiet and hypnotic stretch of highway didn’t help the state of awareness of the bullheaded driver who’d been refusing to give up his position all night. The blue man’s fatigue was indisputable, but the only one denying it was him. Shego made an attempt to convince him to forfeit the wheel. There was no reason for him to drive tired when he had three henchmen to do the work, but he was still averse to the idea. She chalked it up to a pride thing.

The deciding factor came when Dr. Drakken drifted across the fog line while side-eyeing her, about to object once again, but the jarring vibration of hitting the rumble strip made him grit his teeth instead. He gave a grunt of annoyance as he pulled over, and rudely ordered the most wakeful of his henchmen to swap places with him.

The hairs on the back of her neck rose. It didn’t sit well with Shego as the blue man threw himself into the seat just behind her. A deep-rooted paranoia rose from her gut to remind her that he had pulled a gun on her just a couple nights ago. Having him sit directly behind her in the dark where she couldn’t keep a good eye on him simply didn’t appeal to her.

She shot a sharp look over her shoulder at the henchman sitting in the center, and gave him a curt nod that conveyed all he needed to know. The goon in red understood the jerk of her head, quickly moving his butt out of her way even if it meant waking the last henchman by clambering over him to avoid confronting the boss.

Shego had climbed between the seats and was sitting in center by the time Dr. Drakken was buckling himself in. She took up far less space than the average henchman, so the dirty look and grunt of displeasure he gave her felt unwarranted, and almost warranted a punch in the shoulder to give him a reason to dislike her as a neighbor. If he had any real complaint about the new arrangement, he was too tired to voice it.

Of course she was tired too – it had been a long boring ride – but she wasn’t so tired as to simply slump back and nod off like him. Not to mention she was reluctant to let her guard down in the presence of four felons. Keeping that in mind certainly put her on edge and rang a wakeup call in the back of her head whenever the drowsiness got to her.

Just as soon as she began to wearily second-guess her qualms and the risks, she inwardly berated herself. Falling asleep was a bad idea, plain and simple – for a number of reasons, just one of which being heightened vulnerability. She couldn’t fight in her sleep.

Shego’s head was starting to pound. She carefully wrapped her arms around herself as she slouched back and crossed her legs, the position making her belly ache enough to return some wakefulness to her, although not much.

A bed to curl up in was the last thing she needed on her mind. And besides, even if she wasn’t surrounded by thugs, she couldn’t fall asleep here. She didn’t have her special sleep aid to keep her powers suppressed. She’d be a fire hazard now if she dozed off, and that wouldn’t do. Unconsciously activating her glow was about as likely as sleep-talking for her, which wasn’t comforting. All it would take was a nightmare – and she had more than enough fuel.

Letting her eyes shut would be begging for trouble, so she forced them to stay open. All the while, she envied the alleged villain asleep beside her and his henchmen, only one of which was awake now to keep them on the road.

It was dark, dreary, boring, and a center seat had no right being so comfortable. Exhaustion was to blame for her inhibitions not being quite up to snuff.

With rest was out of the question and the to-and-fro swish of windshield wipers too reminiscent of a mesmerist’s pocket watch, Shego let her focus wander to the next thing to pique her interest. Which happened to be the strange blue man beside her.

First it was just a knee rested against his leg, and then picking some lint off his sleeve. She almost hoped he’d wake up and make a scene just to ease the monotony as she slowly came to lean against him, but she found herself not terribly opposed to feel of his shoulder under her cheek, even if he didn’t make a very good pillow.

For just a second, Shego lazily kindled a soft glow in her palm to shed a little light to study him, but the green fire reflected off his glasses and the windows, giving away her proximity, and she hastily extinguished it before the driver’s eyes could flick to her in the rear-view mirror.

Her face heated, but she wasn’t completely deterred. She lit a much dimmer glow to take her curious inspections lower, hopefully out of immediate sight of the henchman behind the wheel.

The blue man’s arms had fallen limp to his lap, his hands the only thing of interest there until a seedy curiosity she almost snickered at crossed her mind, which she quickly forbade henceforth. His hands were enough to sate her boredom anyway, and with nothing better to do, she honed in on them.

Shego picked at a cuff, waiting for him to wake, and snuck her fingers beneath it to find his wristwatch and give the knob a twist to offset the time just to spite him before tugging his arm carefully closer for easier access.

Dr. Drakken didn’t have the rough grubby paws of a mechanic by any means, which she would think would come with the territory of working with machines. Instead his digits looked better cut out for delicate detailed work, yet little blemishes and broken nails showed he’d been putting them to use, even if they were fairly free of calluses to indicate any extensive manual labor.

With her non-burning hand, she tried to gently pry open his fingers for a better look at his palm, the drowsy thought of palm-reading drifting across her mind – but then he stirred and she sat back immediately, her glow snuffed out in the blink of an eye and hands tucked innocently under her arms.

Her heart thudded and her cheeks burned more than before, as if she’d been caught, but she waited for a tense moment before breathing easy again once she was sure she wasn’t about to face repercussions. 

Dr. Drakken hadn’t woken up to her poking and prodding, so the false alarm didn’t stick. Hell, maybe she wanted him to wake up. To entertain her, or maybe to suffer with her. She’d play innocent if he did.

Pushing her luck and abusing the opportunity, she was soon back to idly touching him, her fingers gingerly finding their way up to his mop as she waited on edge for him to wake. While he was obliviously out for the count and incapable of protest, she wove a few small loose braids into his shaggy mess of hair, shutting out her shame for allying herself with a mullet head with locks almost as long as her own. It was the last thing she could think of to busy herself and it came with no reward other than to serve as a fleeting distraction from the boredom.

Giving up, she decided with a miserable sigh that she’d have to think of new ways to press the man’s buttons when he was awake. She crossed her arms and slumped unhappily against him with a little more force than necessary, in much the same way she might rudely shoulder one of her siblings.

Staying that way had been a mistake.

She awoke uneventfully hours later, coming around slowly enough to remember where she was in time not to startle, her biggest concerns being her own morning breath making her nose scrunch and the longing for a hot shower. She was warm and sweaty and that didn’t bode well – but it was daytime now and the hot season hadn’t quite come to a close yet, so there was some hazy hope it wasn’t just her freak nature at play. She was still in her sweater as well, and she pawed at the black turtleneck she still wore from Thursday, but was too reluctant to expose the uniform beneath on the off chance someone reported a sighting of the ex-hero on the run.

She groaned blearily, and then a hand was on her shoulder, shoving her to make her sit upright, and she refused to give the man the satisfaction of a fluster when she realized she’d fallen asleep against the rogue doctor. “What year is it?” she grumbled, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

Someone made a quip about the year 2000, and so started day two of the cross-country road trip, and she still didn’t know where they were going. If three of the men hadn’t just been sprung from incarceration and she hadn’t abruptly decided to get the hell out of Dodge, she might have wondered why they hadn’t caught a flight instead. She might have hijacked a jet herself if she’d known it would take this long, but then she supposed Global Justice might have been hot on her trail with their own jets.

Jet lag and cramped space were a literal pain in the butt part of road trips, but it still beat another day in Go City.

Thanks to a couple wrong turns, it was turning out to be a much longer journey than anyone had anticipated. Someone gave her an idea of how much longer, but that was ever-changing depending on how many times the dunces got them lost whilst avoiding the freeway. Each henchman took a shift behind the wheel, and breaks were few and far between. Even Shego was ordered to drive eventually, which surprised her. She still wasn’t told where they were going, only instructed to follow whatever highway they were on for however many hundreds of miles. Against Dr. Drakken’s instruction, she exceeded the speed limit, but otherwise didn’t fool around, too eager to reach the destination so she could get out of the damn rig once and for all.

When the second dusk fell, she surrendered the wheel in favor of returning to the back with Dr. Drakken, her spirit to be a pest crushed like a bug on the windshield a thousand or two miles back. Even the classic, “Are we there yet?” lost its charm eventually, and she could think of nothing to do to show her resent beyond crossing her arms and huffing indignantly. Had she known a major road trip was in store, she might have come better prepared. The withdrawals and lack of facilities hadn’t made her a particularly happy camper today, but at least she wasn’t the only one in a funk.

Eventually, lethargy weighed her down once again, and she made the grievous error of dozing off for a second time as they drove through yet another painfully boring night. She’d never forgotten what a risk shut-eye was without her medication, but she accepted that unfortunate drawback of her glow and tried to stave off the drowsiness for as long as possible through sheer discipline, but no one was perfect. She could only cross her fingers and hope nothing terrible would happen when she inevitably fell victim to the vicious cycle.

Now wasn’t the ideal time for a bad dream to plague her unconscious mind, but she had no say in the matter.

Red wasn’t his color and it didn’t belong in his hair as her big brother lay face-down on the floor. Her little brother turned his back on her as her baby brothers wailed, asking where Sis was, but she was too far away to wipe tears from the twins’ chapped cheeks. Similarities ended at the face and the only one dead to her was a deadbeat mother.

Yet she became a little white lab rat, and like a rat, she ran. And she ran and ran and men in red she sought refuge among were nothing more than ruddy wolves waiting for her. Cries for a hero went unanswered. The only figure in blue merely stood by to watch the cruelty unfold.

The fever dream swamping her sleeping mind took the back burner in an instant as Shego awoke with a gasp. She drew back a hand in reflex, as if she instinctively knew where to aim before she’d even opened her eyes.

Dr. Drakken caught her wrist in the nick of time as she was mere inches from swiping him across the face with a hand glowing hot and bubbling with unchecked alien fire. He’d been standing outside the door, leaning in to shake her awake.

Her breath came in ragged gasps, sweat chilling her scorching skin yet not cooling her effectively enough as her body slowly relaxed. When she realized there was no immediate danger, her mouth moved as she struggled to apologize but not a single intelligible word came out until she’d taken a deep breath and swallowed the cotton in her mouth. “What…?” she managed to croak instead.

Rightfully wary, Dr. Drakken eyeballed her as he backed away slowly. “I said we’re here.” He gave her a wide berth, but then he blinked and shook his head and gestured a little too quickly at her, making her flinch at the movement, ready to go back on the defense. “What was that all just now? You were glowing – not just your hands. All over. And— oh please, Shego, not here—”

She was too busy stripping out of the singed top layer to fire a comeback, in a hurry to get the civilian outfit off before the polyester could stick too badly. If the rogue doctor was such a know-it-all, it shouldn’t be hard for him to figure out she’d been about to combust. The turtleneck and jeans she’d worn to hide her uniform the past few days had begun to melt and burn in her nightmare, and it was a smell she could do without.

The man had been quick to shield his eyes when she ripped off her sweater, and after a moment she heard him breathe a mutter of relief when he realized she wore something beneath. Thankfully that something was fireproof.

She was thankful now that she hadn’t changed out of her Team Go uniform – or worse, left the specialized suit behind in Go City.

Discarding the disguise gave her time to get her land-legs back – they’d been on the road for far too long – and as Shego stretched, she surveyed her new surroundings.

They were in warehouse of sorts, just large enough to be sufficient in serving as a hangar for a few gutted crafts in various stages of disassembly or repair. A fleet of half a dozen assorted vehicles parked along one wall, the individuality of which gave Shego the impression that they must belong to the crew of henchmen harbored here. The last of the three men they’d traveled with was already disappearing through a door way at the back.

Shego let out a sigh. “Well, I’m not gagged or dead yet,” she muttered reassuringly to herself, grabbing her go bag from the floorboard and following a few steps behind the blue man skulking after his henchmen. She raised her voice to test the acoustics, but also to let her discontent be known, “If I have to sit that long in a car again, it’ll be too soon.”

Dr. Drakken waved his hand dismissively. “You’ll get used to it,” he said, and gestured back to the jet junk pile. “Soon I hope to be cutting travel time in half and conventional vehicles will be a thing of the past. For the elite, that is.” He turned an optimistic grin back to her, as if hoping the promise would impress her.

It didn’t. She’d heard enough self-proclaimed evil masterminds boast to take it with a grain of salt.

More concerning was his grin. She wasn’t sure if she’d get used to the rogue doctor’s crooked smile and misaligned teeth. They may be befitting of a madman, but he needed to keep his mouth shut, she thought inwardly.

Keeping her remarks to herself, Shego shadowed him in silence.

The warehouse fed directly into sort of lobby furnished with a couple couches and a coffee machine in the back, along with a TV, sink, and a fire extinguisher. Two of the henchmen still lingered there, slurping on joe now and ceasing their chatter upon entry of the boss and his new recruit.

Scaling up an earthy back wall were stairs without railings carved into the rock, something Shego hoped wouldn’t be the norm.

She recognized the construction right off the bat. She’d snuck around lairs like this before. She knew the architect by name from reading the Global Justice file on him and had even faced him once in battle. The architect always got off scot-free, because there wasn’t much to be done about a contractor who chose to work exclusively for criminals.

As she followed Dr. Drakken deeper into the abode carved from stone, it became abundantly apparent to her that this was one of the cheaper lairs, which wasn’t encouraging. If she had to guess, this was Dr. Drakken’s first. She hoped he’d learn soon enough not to sacrifice structural integrity to save a buck, but hopefully that lesson wouldn’t be learned while anyone was inside.

The stairs lead to a long crooked hallway, metal support beams arching where necessary to hold up the rock ceiling. Sconces lit the way, some draped with cobwebs. As Shego kicked at pebbles on the dirt floor, she found herself glaring at Dr. Drakken’s back as he strolled ahead with hands clasped behind him.

“Hey,” she called, breaking the silence as she punted a small stone like a soccer ball. It skittered down the hall for quite a ways before clinking against a steel door at the very end of the hall, a small dust cloud left in its wake. “You said all your employees were guys, right?”

The stupefied sound Dr. Drakken made was weak, but then he squared his shoulders to put on his tough-guy front. “Yes? And?” he barked defensively, getting up in arms over her judgmental tone. He stopped before the only other door in the hall, located roughly halfway, and punched in a PIN code that Shego paid careful attention to as she hovered to peek past his shoulder.

“Oh, nothing,” she said airily as the steel door split open with gears grinding in protest. “I just hope you weren’t expecting a lady’s touch,” she sneered, folding her arms, “because I’m not a maid.” Contrary to what her family seemed to think.

He grunted but didn’t answer.

Shego lingered at the door, unsure about following Dr. Drakken into a dark room that sounded too vast for comfort, past a door with automatic locking and so far from any exit that could promise a handy escape route.

When fluorescents came on with an eerie resonating clang that made her jump a bit, she managed to steal herself against her nerves, setting her resolve and slipping in before the door could shut.

Tailing the man into the dim lab, Shego wasn’t about to admit her relief to find that although the floor here was still made of stone, at least it was immaculately clean. Polished, even. She felt more like she was walking on marble than dirt now, their footfall echoing sharply through the cavernous space.

The first thing to draw her eye here was a large round work table in the center, an equally large surgical light illuminating it as if to showcase a mess of steel, cords, cables, gears – robotics mumbo jumbo. It reminded Shego of the robo-toys she’d seen a boy tinkering with back at the geek lab she’d swiped tech from the other day, only on a much larger scale. As they neared it, she picked out a dismembered robotic arm, a metal head with the face missing, a spinal cord – and she concluded Dr. Drakken was building humanoid robots. He wouldn’t be the first, but it still made her skin crawl.

He cast a leery glance back at her as he swung by his workstation, and pressed a button under the table. The work lamp shut off and a curtain hung from a rim around the massive fixture came swishing shut, hiding his projects from view before she could get too close. As she passed, she couldn’t help an attempt at peeking through the veil, but he beckoned to her and called gruffly, “Keep up.”

She reluctantly obeyed him, choosing to believe that she’d have plenty of time to meddle later.

As she peered about, Shego came to the realization that this room hadn’t been simply hollowed out. It was a natural cave, with spires of stone hanging from the ceiling like fangs. It didn’t seem like the kind of place one would want to put a laboratory full of costly materials, but could she expect less from a madman? Not to mention, it was a cheap lair, probably utilizing whatever natural formations there were to save on digging and rubble removal. Braced against the walls were a few metal support beams, but they weren’t reassuring.

Dr. Drakken took the stolen goods she’d retrieved for him back in Go City to his computer desk, and Shego followed.

She crossed her arms and her lips quirked as she tipped her head back to examine an oversized twelve-foot-wide computer monitor. It reminded her of the one at the Team Go headquarters. She’d never asked what company produced such monstrous screens, but she’d gathered over her brief hero career that they catered frequently to villain hobbyists. It was an essential part of every villain lair. She should have expected to see one here. By the bulbous screen, it seemed dated though. Maybe even second-hand.

She couldn’t help narrowing her eyes at it.

It hardly resembled Team Go’s, but it still incited a memory of a time she’d once snapped at the older two of her brothers for using the multi-thousand-dollar device to play video games. Then she remembered abusing it herself to watch television. She remembered the supersized pixels had hurt her eyes.

Shego’s frown was torn from the quiet sleeping screen to the look of focus on Dr. Drakken’s face as he popped a panel on his desk to access the innards of his supercomputer, installing the stolen hard drive into a slot among several others. Staring at the dark bags under his eyes, she wondered idly how much time he spent in front of this stupid setup. Just how much sleep did the guy lose working in here?

In retrospect, nearly all villains she’d faced in the past seemed a little sleep deprived and a lot caffeinated.

Dr. Drakken snapped the panel back into place and spun around, leaning back against his desk. Shego shifted in place and adjusted the bag hanging from her shoulder as he surveyed her head to toe, and finally he scrubbed his face and grumbled, “I suppose we should get you taken care of.”

He scowled in the direction of a dark passage drilled through the cavern wall. “First door is a washroom,” he said, gesturing. “Three doors down from that should be your quarters. I ordered for arrangements to be made for you, so if they slacked off, tell me and I’ll take care of it. Stay on this floor. Now shoo. I have work to do.” He waved her off to dismiss her.

Shego adjusted her backpack strap and stalked off into what she imagined might be a trap. Paranoia nagged persistently at the back of her mind, even when she reminded herself that she’d made it all the way here without incident. She tensed for an ambush anyway.

It was a pleasant surprise there wasn’t one awaiting her, but she couldn’t bring herself to relax now that she was tiptoeing down a strange hall with intuition alone as her guide.

As promised, behind the first door was the washroom. Everything was so sterile white, she wondered if it had ever been used. She decided the facilities must have been for convenience or the off chance someone needed a quick wash in case of a chemical spill. That, or the cleanliness was due to this Dr. Drakken guy being a bigger clean freak than the lobby and entry hall let on.

Shego moved on down the tapering hallway to locate her designated room, finding the fourth door was ajar as if to tempt her to come snooping in. She ignited a hand to shed some light before she stepped inside. No booby traps were sprung, no goons jumped her, and no wires were tripped. Shego almost hoped something exciting would have happened.

She found the light switch and when it buzzed to life, she examined the furnishings. For now, there was only a simple twin bed with plain white sheets, and beside it was a small dresser and vanity mirror. Otherwise empty and twice the size of her room back home, with stone teeth hanging from the dark earthy ceiling, Shego’s stomach knotted with doubt she’d ever be comfortable sleeping in here. She’d have to put work into personalizing it with rugs and posters or something before it could be worthy of being called a bedroom. That was assuming she stuck around long enough.

All alone in this empty stagnant room, Shego became increasingly aware of something critical: she reeked to the high heavens. In her own humble opinion, anyway. The whole ride here, she hadn’t even noticed herself because the overwhelming man smell had overpowered it. As her face flushed and she dumped her bag on the bed, she wondered if anyone had noticed she hadn’t had a shower in days. Mortified was putting it lightly, but some things couldn’t be helped.

Few times in her life had she felt quite this grungy, and she’d been through some rough times in the past. She hastily dug through her belongings to gather a few essentials, hoping the facilities had been stocked with soap.

Once the bathroom door was locked behind her, she was tearing off her uniform. Top half of her suit discarded to the floor, she was unbuckling her belt when she caught sight of herself in the mirror and froze.

[roraruu]

wip: dead eyes & salty skin

tw: suicide ideation, injury some arranged marriage au bc i really missed faybin

“Just know that I’ve been caught by these hazards too.”

She laughs when he’s gone from the shoreline. There, washed in the moonlight and cool ocean water her voice fills the shore front. How could he be caught by these hazards? How could he possibly understand the pain she feels?

He doesn’t. It’s plain and simple. He protests that he understands her pain, even her mother had spouted some trash about a noblewoman stealing his heart and running away with it, but Faye doesn’t believe that one bit. Not with the proud badges and medals for killing civilians just wanting to survive. And not when she begged and cried to come along with them and they all refused—and he had turned his back on her.

Such a foolish thing that they were lawfully united now. In the eyes of the Earth Mother or whatever wills be. She doesn’t even remember the union, only the walk home when he held her hand so loosely, like he didn’t even care about her. 

But he doesn’t. And she did expect him to care. Only thing he cares about is her dowry—even though it’s little more than a sackful of marks, a cedar chest of lace sewing and a failing orchard. What a pitiful dowry and what a pitiful man for taking it.

She glances down to the brass ring in her hand. It’s plain and already tarnishing. Hers is just as plain and boring, no gemstone or engraving either. A farce, just like their marriage and their love. Could it even be called that? It was more distaste and contempt than love. Hell, did their vows even say anything about love? A word about them? She can’t remember a word of it.

For a moment, she sits in the ocean, mulling over these thoughts of her husband and what will become of their life together. Surely her parents hope for grandchildren, ones to help in the orchard; and no doubt that he wishes for them to go on and become knights of the new empire. And she still wants the commander, the boy who had saved her from enemy all those years ago.

Briefly, she thinks of sinking into the lapping waves. It’s deep enough, creating dark grey stains on the bust of her robe. It sags into the water, revealing the slip underneath, what she was supposed to show him tonight, as her Nana and Mother instructed. Get the job done right and soon, she thinks wryly and bitterly. She remembers the night Nana started making it. She didn’t know of the engagement until days later and it wound up on her dresser the afternoon he proposed. It was right underneath her nose and she didn’t see it for a second.

She laxes back further into the water, so that her crown of withered wildflowers can fall away and her hair soaks. She thinks about laying back and not raising her head again, about drowning in her wedding gown and holding rings and flowers. It would look like a melodramatic death and she’s sure he’d move on to another rich girl.

He would... wouldn’t he?

But the commander. Sir Alm. He’s still out there and her heart craves for him, yearns for him and his love. She could have it if she could just get to him... She’s tried before and gotten out of the village, only to be dragged back by her father. If she could just look at him, just utter the words “remember me?” he’d recall and they’d be married. And she’d leave the orchard, the village, her life, everything behind. She’d do it all for him.

And Sir Alm gives her the strength to pull sorry salt skin out of the water and trudge through the weeds with that ring in hand.

That ring... that ring. It could be something other than tarnished. And it gives her the will to wade through the pointed rocks and weeds and back to the cottage.

When she gets in, her husband is asleep in the front room, still dressed in his stiff uniform that was supposed to impress her. It made no impact to her, but to her family, they all marvelled at the medals he’d received for slaying his countrymen and fellow Valentians. He looks too big, pressed up against the window in a chair. She hates how small it is. Father had built it before their marriage. Actually, back when she was 15 or so, probably in preparation, just like her dress and that cedar chest full of lace and silk. It makes her stomach churn.

Her sloughs off the robe, leaving it to rot through the hardwood floor. A spit in the face for this marriage. Everything comes off—her pointed wedding shoes, the belt of the robe, gold and flower bangles given to her to weigh her down—until she’s in the slip and bare feet.

There’s some of her belongings in the bedroom. Only one. Another intent move to back her into a corner. She moves into it, little more than a mattress and a vanity with a washbowl. One dresser, four drawers. There’s an extra dress in one, long and pretty and meant for the cold, not the warm spring. She takes it, changing into it and finding a cloak in the closet. She steals his boots, they’re much too big and her feet slip and slide in them, but it’s better than nothing.

There’s no food in the cottage. Either a slip up for intentional, she’s not sure. She ties the cloak around her neck, pulling hood over her head. And the final touch—his ring which he willingly gave up in. A futile attempt to gain something from her, be it pity, understanding or giving up. She slips it onto her other ring finger, although it is much too big and hangs off her digit. Faye creeps through the cottage quiet as a mouse, she’s learnt to rely on the heels of her feet to avoid noise.

It’s not the first time she’s run away. Not the last probably either. If Tobin doesn’t come after her, her Father will. She’ll get the same lecture about duty and honour and her being the only one to save the orchard.

A sword. It was at the front door. They were out in the middle of nowhere, no one could tell when a wolf or terrors or brigands would show up. She knew a little of the blade, like how to wield it and block attacks; aside from that her experience was little. She mostly messed around with black magic, white made her feel ill. Her hand clasps around the hilt, it’s wrapped in a scabbard that belts around her waist. She attaches it and hears him grumble something. Nervously she looks over. He’s still asleep. She latches the belt around her waist and fans the cloak out over it. She pushes open the front door, and with an ear shattering slap, she’s gone.

—

Faye is barely into Ram Woods when some brigands find her. It’s beginning to be morning and she ran for almost a mile, as quick as his boots will let her go. The dress is covered in mud and dirt from all the times she’d fallen and her palms are scraped and scratched from bracing and picking herself back up from the ground. It’s not enough to make her stop though.

And the brigands she faces... she looks on with pure fury. She’s barely out of the village and here they come. Immediately, she draws her sword, making it known that she will not be taken without a fight. She gives them one, moving deftly in the boots and dodging their silly attempts to slash her and take her down.

But a horse’s neigh scares them off before she can sling fire balls at them. She dives for a bush, scratching her arms on twigs and leaves as the hooves come closer. Faye isn’t as quick as she likes to think, because his eyes are on her from atop that horse. The soldier with the dead eyes, and her husband.

Who is barefoot.

She snickers to herself. She stops when he leaps down from his horse, bow on his back. Without shoes, he is still taller than her and somewhat... domineering, not like the mild mannered man who chattered sweetly with her grandmother before their courting dates, or the one who almost hesitated to kiss her the day before. He’s stern and cold, not playful and warm. His eyes move from her face, down the cloak and long dress underneath and to his boots on her small feet.

“One of these things is not like the other.” He says with annoyance.

“I couldn’t runaway in good shoes.” She says. “You understand, right?”

“I’d like them back if you plan to bolt.”

She kicks them off. Tobin pulls them onto his feet, standing a little taller now. “Aren’t you going to run?” He asks, tone annoyed and tired. There’s dark circles underneath his eyes. Sleep has not come to him readily.

“You’ll just catch me with your white horse.”

“I could say you got too far off.”

“My Father wouldn’t like that.”

“I know you’re unhappy, but running away in the middle of the night?” He asks. “What did you intend to do?”

She shrugs. “Go off and find the king.”

“And if you didn’t find him?”

“Then I’d go to the Temple of Mila and pretend to be a widow.”

“How...?”

She holds up his wedding band. “You gave it to me after all. Makes our union dead as can be.” The word union don’t feel right on her tongue. But it’s what they are, united and wedded in the dead eyes of Mila. It’s not right, she had always read fairy tales about girls marrying their lifelong loves, their true loves; she can’t recall a story where a girl married a man she didn’t love. That never happened in fairy tales. The girl always married her one true love, never anyone else. No fairy tale has ever covered this, something so... abrasive.

And he has made it clear that she isn’t the one he wants, yet he’s here, coming after her. Perhaps its duty, or perhaps it’s because the orchard and her dowry haven’t been handed over yet.

“You know you’re the lucky one.” His words pull her from her reverie. It sparks fury in her. And she’s never been the one to run from a fight.

“I’m lucky?” She barks. “How?”

“You have an orchard, land and a good home. And you have family that cares about you.”

“They care about what I am, not who I am.” She says bitterly. “I’m only to be a daughter, a labourer, a mother, not someone. The second I have a child then I’m done, no good.”

“You’re lucky because if your father wasn’t dragging you back every time you ran away, you’d probably be dead or worse!” Tobin says, his voice growing deep and angry. It sparks fire in him, fury and anger as well. “But I’m not going to run after you again and again.”

“Then why are you here?! You could’ve let me go and I would’ve been fine!” She says. “I had those bandits!”

He frowns, biting back something to say to her. Silently, he holds out his hand. For the ring presumably. She drops it into his hand. He catches her hand, fingers grazing it as he turns her palm over. “You hurt yourself.” He grumbles.

“And?” She holds back a hiss.

“Back in the army, it would be a breeding ground for infection.” He pulls a round of graze from his back pocket. She tries to pull away from him but he meets her gaze with those dead eyes. She stiffens in fear. “Stay still.”

He holds her hand firmly and winding the wrap around her palm and then waiting for the next one. She lunges for a strike. “Did the cleric you fell for say that?” She snips.

“She was a pegasus knight.” He corrects, unbothered. He doesn’t look up.

She frowns as he reaches for her other hand, looking at the band on her finger. He softly scoffs at the sight. She only kept it on for show when—if—she made it to the Temple and they asked for proof. He wraps her other palm. “Come on.” He mutters.

“You’re going to take me back?” She asks, hoping that he would let her go.

“Would you prefer your father?” He retorts. He walks back to his horse. “Get up.”

She doesn’t feign ignorance, fear takes hold of her. She’s been around horses all her life, but she’s never been able to calm herself around them. They’re too big, too nerve-wracking to stand near. “Go on,” he repeats, gesturing to the horse.

Her brow furrows. “No, I’m not riding him.”

“You can’t walk, you have bare feet. It’s bad enough your hands are all scratched up.” He says. “The trails are rough so you’re not walking back.”

“I said I’m not—“ She stops mid sentence as he clicks his tongue. The horse kneels on it’s elbows in a slow arch. His arms find her sides, moving down her back and behind her knees, bridal style. The way he should’ve carried her home, rather than her feet dragging in the dirt as he held her hand. She thrashes, but not before she’s sitting side-saddle on the horse. “Are you fucking kidding me?!”

He clicks his tongue again. The horse lifts itself up, back to full height. She lets out a tiny squeak, grasping for life on the tack. It makes her palms sore.

“He won’t buck you off, he’s a good guy,” he says, taking the reins. With a swift movement, his feet are in the stirrups and he’s on the saddle. “And you can hold onto me if you get scared.”

“I won’t.” She tries to sound strong. It’s marred by the panic in her voice. The reins crack and the horse begins a quick trot. Her arms loop around his waist and she can feel him chuckle. As payback, she digs her long nails—still lacquered and filed from their wedding—into his skin, hearing him grumble as they trot.

—

They get back to the village and her father promptly comes around to greet the new couple with some food, a badly forged way to figure out why they heard hooves at dawn. Tobin comes up with a lie, saying that she wanted to meet his steed and they went for a ride to Ram Woods and came back. Then when her father asks if he can see her, he says she’s tired from the ride and will see him later.

Faye is sitting in the arm chair in the front room, pretending to sleep but watching him talk. There’s a certain confidence about him when he speaks to others, standing tall and making sympathetic faces as he speaks. She doesn’t remember ever seeing him like this when they were young. But she doesn’t remember much of him before now.

Maybe that’s why her parents had decided that he would be her husband. Of all the men in the village, and town for the matter, they picked him although his family name was unremarkable and he had barely a cent to his name.

When he does come back in and her father walks down the dirt path, she glances up to follow him. He appears at the doorway and she watches him as he meanders towards the kitchen.

“I know you’re awake.” He says. Her eyes shut after he speaks. She pretends to be still and then slowly wakes. When she opens her eyes, he’s standing over the arm chair. “You’re a bad actress.”

“Good thing I never ran away to an opera or theatre.” She says thinly.

“Own up to your mistakes.” He says. “And try to be a better daughter.”

“Don’t tell me what to do.” Faye orders sharply. He stays silent, holding her gaze for another moment. “Why did you lie for me?”

“I said I wasn’t going to be your husband, not that I wasn’t annoyed about this either.” He says tiredly.

“Because your heart was stolen?” She asks. He frowns.

“I already told you, you’re not the one I want.” He repeats. “Doesn’t mean I’m going to treat you badly.”

She feels a pang of regret. She brushes it away. “Tell me why you lied. Really.” She asks again.

He doesn’t answer, instead swiftly turning on his heel. “I’m going to chop wood.” He says. “Don’t runaway again.”

Like always, she doesn’t listen. The second he disappears towards the orchard to get an axe, she leaps out the backdoor and makes a run for it. She’s too loud and not quick enough. Tobin hears the door slam before he’s even close to the forest and starts back towards her, running faster than she’s ever seen.

Before she’s even off the property, she slips in mud and twists her ankle, crying out. He takes his sweet time coming to get her after that, a thin and annoyed smirk on his face as he comes upon his bride, barefoot in the dirt.

“I thought I told you not to run again.” He says. He’s tall and intimating again.

Faye is testy, biting back tears. “Thought you said you weren’t going to come after me again?” She snips back.

He shakes his head, not uttering a word. Instead he holds out his hand to help her up. She tries at first on her own, only to stumble back onto her bottom and cuss loudly.

“Didn’t know I married a sailor.” He jokes playfully. Faye frowns and takes his hand, helping her to her feet. “Can you walk, lady of the water?”

She tries to place weight on her foot but winces and stumbles into him further. She frowns, face on fire. “No.” She says, glaring at the dip in the earth, the one that wounded her.

“Fine. I’ll give you a hand.” He says, lifting her arm over his neck and holding it in place. His hand cups her waist, helping her hobble along back to her house. Her face burns hot as they hobble along and she wonders how the dead eyed soldier will lie his way out of this one.

—

Tobin doesn’t let her out of his sight for the rest of the day. Her palms throb and her ankle aches as she watches him work. She almost goes stir-crazy, thinking about all the ways she could get away. Eventually, the pain makes her give up and she watches him tiredly chop wood—finally getting a good look at all of him. Archery has made him strong as steel, toning him finely. At one point she stares too long that he eventually looks up and tells her to take up art.

She throws a rock at him and misses by only a foot.

When he’s done with the wood, he cleans what will be the backyard of their home. It looks out onto the rolling plains, stretching out to the rocky ocean. He marks off a section of land for a garden, asking her what she wants to plant and grow. She doesn’t answer. He clears old rocks, fallen twigs and cuts down too-tall grass and weeds all while keeping a watchful gaze on her.

Then, when the sun falls, he helps her into the cottage and sits her down at the little round table. He puts her bad ankle up on the other stool, saying something about keeping elevated. They don’t talk—he tries conversation a few times, but she doesn’t play along, instead staring off into nowhere and curtly answering him with thin yeses or bitter noes. He makes a stew of root vegetables and stock that her father delivered earlier that day. Funny, she’s always hated old roots, thinking them musty and plain—but this time the stew smells good, warm and enriching.

She sits at the kitchen table while he cooks, watching as he moves deftly through their empty kitchen. He seems to be a natural and secretly, she wonders what he’s not good at.

Well... being the one she wants is one of them. But that is too simple, too easy.

“Would you like a tea?” He asks, not turning around. The cookstove steams with boiling water.

“No.” He doesn’t listen, bringing her over a mug of bitter smelling brown tea. “I said I didn’t want it.”

“It’ll help with the pain. Old remedy.” He says.

She eyes him for a minute before taking a sip. It’s bitter and burns, but stops her ankle throbbing with pain. When he turns back around, it’s only to get a bowlful of water from their reservoir and a first aid kit from the cupboard. Then, he comes around to kneel beside her, in the same way that he did in the orchard when he asked for her hand.

In the fading glow of the sunset, she can see scars on the back of his hands, pink and shiny—new ones, not even a year old she guesses. Her stomach churns at the thought of how he walked away from so many battles with only earthly markings on his body, while others had been left to die. She wonders how many more he has.

“Give me your hands.” He says, more of an order than anything.

“Why?”

“I’m going to clean the wounds. I’ll be as gentle as I can.” He says.

She holds out her hands to him, same as she did when they were engaged, and looks away. He undoes the old gauze without a flinch. But he is so gentle and tender with her hands now. She feels as though a cleric or sage is tending to her scrapes, rather than a brutish knight. He washes away the crusted blood with a wet washcloth, unflinching as she winces and cusses dramatically under her breath. He has a little pot of something that he dabs at and then smooths into her soft hands. His are rough with callouses from bowstrings and arrows, but still treat her as though she’s a porcelain statue. The mixture—which she can only guess is an ointment—freezes her skin at first, then fades into a radiating chill that soothes her hot hands.

He catches her gaze for a moment and then looks back to the little pot. “Mana salve. From a cleric.” He explains.

“You must have been popular with women.” She remarks bitterly.

He scoffs softly. “Sure.” He says. “Let that rest for a moment.”

They sit in silence until he gingerly takes her hands and begins to wrap them in gauze again. She notices as his eyes focus on her wedding band, unmoved from when she ran away the first time. Why didn’t she take it off the second time? If she had, she could’ve gotten to castle town and taken up as a seamstress’s apprentice; there would have been no other markings of marriage on her.

His eyes shift again and he focuses on his work with a careful gaze until he pins the cloth in place. Her hands are like mitts, round and soft. He laughs a little as she frowns and closes her hand. She bites the wince on her lips.

“Finish your tea.” He says. “And then we’ll eat.”

“I’m not hungry.” She protests. Her grumbling stomach says otherwise. She can’t remember when she last ate.

He scoffs again before turning back towards the cookstove and serving himself a healthy portion of stew. He takes a second portion before her bitter tea is finished. And when it’s done, she asks for a bowlful of stew. He serves her with a twisted smile and watches as she finishes the bowl. Deep down, she hates that it’s delicious.

— — —

“I’m not hungry.”

Tobin can see her fingers twitch. Something he’s noticed that happens when she lies—no matter how small. Then her stomach growls loud and low. She can suit herself. He thinks, before serving himself a healthy portion of the stew he made. He eats it, savouring each bite and watching as her tea mug drains. Her mitten-like hands curl around the mug, lifting it to her lips every so often and her pretty face contorts every time she sips.

Quietly, he wonders how many helpings he will have to take before Faye’s tea is finished. He’s surprised when he’s getting a second portion that her mug is empty.

“Stew please.” She orders, bratty as a spoiled child.

But a deal is a deal, and he offers her a healthy bowlful. He watches as she finishes the bowl and asks for another and then another.

“You’re a bottomless pit.” He remarks, scraping the bottom of the pot for extras. It’s good that they were both hungry, otherwise it would have spoiled. He is too used to cooking for a large family and then an army. It will have to change, sooner or later, otherwise their harvests will run out sooner than later.

“I can’t remember the last time I ate.” She confesses. Lower she adds, “Mother made me lose weight for that stupid robe.”

“Why?”

“Better to be willowy than weighty.” She says, lifting the bowl to her lips.

He watches her intently as she eats. Her long hair is wavy and curled from the salty air. He doesn’t know what she did after he left her at the shore, save for the sopping wet robe that he threw out on the back porch to dry. Where she left it had begun to rot.

He’s been able to look at her often. But it’s different now, for she is not red-faced and crying or screaming at her father. He can take in all her features fully and readily. She’s got a sharp chin, thin and wily fingers and thinner eyebrows. And her eyes are not quite brown, they’re darker, almost black, but glinting with gold. Long lashes stretch out, ones he knows other women would kill for. Such a beautiful girl, such a waste she’s a child.

She finishes her stew, lips fighting a satisfied smile. She chews at the corners as he reaches out for her bowl. “Finished?” He asks.

“Yes.” She says.

He turns away to wash up the dishes and quietly she asks him another question.

“What will you tell my Father.”

He looks over her shoulder. She looks small in that chair, almost like a scared child being reprimanded by a headmaster. She even looks away, like she’s ready to hear him say that he’ll tell the truth.

But he won’t. She’s just as angry about this marriage as him.

“The yard is pretty rough.” He says, glancing out the back door. It’s dark but there’s still a reflection of the moon off the ocean. “You fell when pulling away weeds.”

Her dark eyes meet his. “My Father hates liars.” She warns.

“Well it’s not exactly a lie. The orchard is apart of our yard.”

He sees her bite back at that smile again. A smile tugs at his own lips as he finishes drying up their dishes.

“Why did you agree to this marriage?” She asks at last.

He doesn’t know the answer. He could have easily said no and told his mother that he wasn’t interested in marriage, that he would continue to support the family as a knight in service to the country. But at the same time... the thought of a home, no more hard ground to sleep on, no more meals that barely filled the belly, no more meandering through foreign lands wondering when he could go back to the castle... it comforted him. It offered a bit of solace to the hell that he had faced for almost two years.

He shrugs. And she scoffs.

“Seriously? Nothing. You don’t know?”

“Why did you agree then?”

“I didn’t have a choice. It was duty or die.” She says.

His brow raises. “I’m the only child my parents had. No one else. The orchard would be too much for one person and god forbid I don’t have children—“

“You want children?”

She blushes red. “Not now you idiot! And not with you!” She exclaims. “The orchard is my responsibility. It’s my inheritance and if there is no one to take care of it, it will die. It’s been in my family for almost a hundred years.”

“Put Ram on the map for it’s wine.” He says.

“I had little say.” She says. “I don’t know what would’ve happened if I didn’t accept your proposal. Nothing different probably.”

It sends a shiver down his back. Lack of consent, a bitter bride. “But you had a choice. You could’ve turned around to your mother and said you wanted another match, or that you were going back to the King.” She says. “And you called me the lucky one...”

He feels a tinge of anger now. How was he lucky? Was it the blood that stained his hands that made him lucky? The medals that made women swoon and love him for a brief moment? Or was it the white horse and bow that scared others?

He bites on his tongue, fighting bitter words. He doesn’t want to fight with her again. Mila knows they’ve fought enough today, and that tomorrow they may fight double. So instead, he puts away the dishes and asks if she needs help getting into bed. Like the child she is, she exclaims no and hobbles into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

—

Faye’s father asks for help in the orchard, just for two days. At least for now. Their home must be prepared and ready to grow their own food and to run effectively when they eventually work the orchard, as this marriage had fated them to do. Tobin obliges happily, ready to leave his childish wife behind and enjoy a day outside in the warm sun and fresh air.

Tobin knows very little about the orchard and growing. His family had a small patch of land to grow cabbage and turnips and good root vegetables in, but fruit is something he’s never worked with. Besides, his hands are more used to the callouses of a bow and arrow than of a hoe and trowel.

After the first day, he can see why Faye holds disgust over her inheritance. The grape plants—something that Ram is known for—have had a rocky growing season. First there was mildew that spread like wildfire and took out half the shoots. Then there was general bad weather and finally pests. Rabbits were the worst, nibbling at the fruit and it’s leaves until nothing remained.

The last day, before he’s left for the orchard, Faye is awake and sits at the kitchen table. She’s dressed and ready to leave. The day before she had stayed cooped inside, seemingly given up on running away and set to work stitching and sewing.

“Going to work for my father?” She asks, bitterness tainting her voice.

“That was an agreement of the marriage.” He says thinly. He’s still annoyed by their argument.

She stares at him for a moment before trying to force herself up from the table. Her ankle is still too sore to walk on and she stumbles a little. He lurches to catch her but she holds up a hand. “I want to go to the orchard with you.” She orders.

His eyes widen a little. “Really?” He asks.

“My Nana sits out there all by herself most of the time. I don’t like her being alone.” She says. “Besides, I haven’t seen her since the wedding.”

For a moment his brow furrows. Could it be a ruse for her to run away again? Would her grandmother try to help her escape? Or was she as militant about this union as the rest of her family? He doesn’t quite know, save for Faye’s furrowed brow and grasping hands.

“Alright. I’ll help you there.” He agrees and her eyes lit up for a moment before growing dim again.

Within the half hour, they’re at the orchard. When Tobin helps the limbering Faye in, her father assumes she’d tried to run again.

“She tripped when we were collecting firewood.” He lies quickly. He’s gotten too good at this. Lies fly out too easily for such an honest man. It doesn’t feel right.

He feels Faye’s hand tighten around his arm when he speaks. Her father buys it while her grandmother smirks and makes space for her to sit on a bench. She sits and watches him work the entire afternoon, talking with her Nana inconsistently and sewing up something. Every now and then he’ll look up from his pruning and stare at her for a moment. Save the messy hair and sprained ankle, she looks almost the same. He wonders how she can play it off so easily, so naturally. To hide her anger under layers of believable smiles and contagious laughs.

When it’s time to go, Faye holds onto his arm tightly as they say goodbye.

—

He jolts awake. It’s barely morning.

At first, he thinks he hears the front door slam and that she’s running away again. He quickly remembers that her ankle is sprained and she looks like she’d taken a bath in rose bushes.

He manages to catch his breath, his heart thudding in his chest as he sits up properly. He’s on the floor, which explains his aching ass. He grumbles, trying to pull himself together. Quietly, he repeats everything Silque told him to.

It was all a dream. Nothing truly happened.

His throat aches with hoarseness, the usual after a terror. They’re coming more readily than before. He’s thankful that they didn’t occur when he was living at home. If his siblings had’ve seen him after one, they would’ve been terrified.

Slowly, his breathing returns to normal and he tries to think what he saw. Was it Terrors this time too, or was it that thingin the temple’s basement? He can’t remember, it’s all a hazy blur.

He looks around, trying to survey what happened. The armchair is overturned on its side, some small scratches are made in the floor and the candle lantern, thankfully unlit, is shattered against the ground.

“Dammit.” He mutters, hurriedly collecting the shards and trying to stash the lantern. He’s not quick enough and he hears the door to the bedroom creak. He hides the shards by the large fireplace, hoping to god that her eyesight isn’t good.

Faye clutches onto the wall. He can only see her dim shadow and the pale straw of her long hair. It’s pulled back. “Tobin, did you fall?” She calls, voice quiet and almost concerned.

It’s the first time she’s said his name. It sounds... good. Well, in the end, anything is better than ‘him’ or ‘that man’ behind a crying voice.

He lies. “Dozed too far. Slipped off the chair. It’s fine.”

“I thought I heard something shatter.”

“Nothing did.” He lies again.

He can hear her disbelief in the silence that hangs between the two. Then she draws a thin breath. “All right. Sleep well.” She says, retreating back into the bedroom. When the door finally closes, he breathes again.

—

He doesn’t sleep well for the rest of the night, but it doesn’t really bother him. He’s used to having little sleep. She however, sleeps til mid morning, eventually pulling herself out of the feathers and sitting herself at the kitchen table, waiting for breakfast.

Neither really volunteers anything, and eventually he pulls the stool back out to the porch so she may sit and watch and rest while he returns to cleaning up the yard. Periodically, he looks up from weeding and clearing away things to see her eyes staring off into the distance. It’s almost as though she’s focusing on something neither of them can see... or want to.

Tobin notices a few things about Faye while he works. The first is that hollow, wandering gaze. He’s seen it before in the witches he’d had to shoot down, but he knows that she is warm with life, that her heart beats still. It wanders, sometimes focusing on him or his work, other times, looking at the piles of weeds that are scattered around.

Secondly, the heaviness in the air. He felt it when he mounted Orson and found her in Ram Woods. Her posture, her terrifying gaze, it looks like she was about call forth black magic. And the air held the same suffocating pressure that caused many a headache back in the Deliverance. He wonders if magic ran through her veins—he knows the marks of healers does, her grandmother had regaled him with tales of her mother, Faye’s great grandmother, who had been the first to begin the winery and offered the Earth Mother her wine in exchange for white magic powers. He wonders if Faye ever tried her hands at it, or if it had been forbidden.

Finally, the last thing he noticed about his wife as he worked in the yard, was that he knows very little about her. Funny, she’s to be his most intimate companion in life. He’s to tell her things that would be left unsaid had they not been united. The only things he knows about her is her stupid infatuation, that she is a blessing to her old and long-childless parents as their only child, and that given the chance, she will run.

This was arranged after all, so it does not come as a complete surprise. Yet the things he suspects a man should know about his wife elude him. And he doesn’t know how to word them let alone bring them up in conversation. So in his mind, he tries to pull things that he’s witnessed her do around their cottage in the short two months that he’s known her for.

Sewing is one. She’s very good at it too, he’s noticed many of the silks and stitchings in their cottage were made by her hands. Then the glow of magic around her. Perhaps, had things been different, she’d been a cleric or mage in the army. He doesn’t like to think about that possibility. He didn’t like to think about it for himself neither.

He’s seen her tend to her parents’ garden a few times. And the flowers from her wedding bouquet were collected and shortly pressed after they died. He found them under a heavy cast iron pan. Perhaps that was more duty or pressure from her parents. He’s not quite sure.

Magic user, loves flowers and plants. But there’s still not enough for him to say that he knows her. He catches a glimpse of her hands, carefully stitching something new now. Her left hand catches the light and sparkles for a moment. She hasn’t removed the ring from her hand, and he doesn’t know if she’s given up or...

He doesn’t finish the thought. Instead looking up from the stakes in the paddock and staring at her. “How old are you?” He calls at last. He pulls her from her flickering reverie.

“I turned 22 in Wyrmstym.” She says.

21 years old. Only a couple months on him. He was in the new year, in Flostym, the time of flowers and new life. She was in the time of the dragon, of slumber and death.

“What about you?”

“Flostym. And you have a year on me.”

She snorts. How cruel, the younger is the more mature of the two. And like he’s always done for others, he cares for her, making dinner for the two and washing the dishes when they’re finished, lending her blankets when she is cold, tending to her wounds.

Thankfully, he doesn’t have a terror that night.

—

Their cottage finally settles down enough for Tobin’s steed, Orson, to come live with them.

He had been by Tobin’s side for the latter, more bitter parts of the war. Lady Clair had speculated that he was an army horse too for sometime, judging by the deep grooves in hooves, the nervous gait and heavy weight on his back. He had been abandoned out in a field, or had run away from his previous master. Regardless, the commander had instructed Clair and Tobin to wade out and calm him down and bring him back. It wasn’t long after that Tobin was blessed as a bow knight.

Orson isn’t quite cut out for work in the orchard, not yet at least. He is still nervous and not yet has a home at their cottage. So on a sunny morning, Tobin gathers extra wood from the orchard and beings to build a paddock for his steed.

Half an hour after he’s started hammering, his wife is on their porch. Her injury has healed, allowing her to walk normally now.

“What are you—“ her voice is cut off by a loud gasp as Orson sniffs her ear. Tobin has knotted his lead against the porch post. “GODS!”

“Morning,” he calls, striking a stake into the ground and not looking up. Faye clambers away from the steed.

“Why is your horse here?” She asks, marching down to meet him. He rises to his feet.

“He’s apart of my family, so he’s going to live with us.”

“And you didn’t tell me beforehand?”

“You rode him before, you should’ve known he’d be joining us at some point.”

“Still... are you building a paddock?” She asks, looking at the large circle of stakes.

“He needs somewhere to live.” He says. “Your father is happy for a horse to help with the labour.”

“Of course he is...” She grumbles.

“You’ve met Orson, right?”

“No, you just threw me on his back and took off quickly.” She says thinly.

“Because you tried to bolt on me.” He says. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to him.”

“No, that’s all right.”

“He’s going to be living here for a while, you might as well get used to him.” He says.

She hesitates for a moment before sighing and watching him. “Fine.” She says.

He pulls off his work glove and holds out his hand. Hers is small and cold in his. They walk back towards the porch and Tobin clicks his tongue. Orson’s ears flicker and he turns around.

“Don’t be scared.” Her grip tightens around his hand. Tobin says softly as Orson’s feet pound against the earth. “He’s just as nervous as you.”

“I’m not seven feet tall and have hooves the size of my face...” She grumbles. He extends her hand for the horse to take in her scent.

“Orson, this is Faye. Faye, this is Orson.” He says softly between the two. Orson sniffs her hands once, then goes back to grazing at the weeds on the ground. “See?” He says to her. “Nothing to worry about.”

“How can you be sure?” She asks.

“He saved my life a few times.”

Her face grows sober as she nods. “Right.” She says softly.

Still, he expects her to stomp her feet like a child and demand that Orson lives somewhere else, but in the end she doesn’t. She just watches as he grazes at the grass and then leaves to go sew with her grandmother in the orchard again. That night when she gets home, Tobin notices her with a thick blanket, much too big for one or even two people.

—

Tobin wakes early one morning, aching from the bad support of the chair. He wakes Orson, taking off the blanket that Faye had sewn for him. He walks him out towards the shoreline so that he can stretch his legs and graze.

The rest of the village hasn’t quite woken yet, still sleepy and comfortable in their beds. He doesn’t mind the early mornings. It’s one of the things that have been consistent in his life. He’s always gotten up at dawn. Before the war, he used to do odd jobs in the early morning, anything to help his parents and ease their financial pains.

He still gets paid somewhat handsomely by the King. Although he’s not in active service—though he can be called to action if need be—he still receives wages as apart of his leftover pay from the Deliverance and wartimes. Part of it goes to his parents and siblings, and the other bit he saves for him and his new wife.

Orson grazes around, nibbling at the weeds and grass. His hooves are uneasy in the sodden ground, perhaps bad memories of Rigelian soil. Gods know his steed his just as scarred as he is from the war. Neither are truly comfortable yet in this life, too many changes that came too quick. Some nights, Tobin can hear Orson pace nervously back and forth against his paddock, as if waiting for the enemy to come and to be mounted for a battle at dawn.

But those days are behind them, at least for now. Alm could call him back to the army should they need it. Tobin hopes that it won’t ever come to it, but gods forbid it that he will leave Ram again.

Before he knows it Orson has wandered from his view. He clicks his tongue and the horse’s head raises from a bush of wildflowers. Strange, Tobin’s never seen them this close to the shore before. But then again, the last time he was at the shore was when he chased Faye to the water and fought with her.

He pulls Orson away from the flowers and picks a few out of his mouth. The heads are all gone and he throws them into the lapping waves. He kneels down and pulls up a few, not too many, just enough to fill his fist. Tobin leads Orson back to his paddock and then back into the cottage. He’s not surprised when Faye isn’t awake. He draws a bit of water from the reservoir and sets a mason jar on the table, placing the wildflowers in it.

Faye finds it later that night and breathes in their sweet scent. Her fingers graze the delicate petals for a moment before looking to him with a questioning gaze. He nods simply, turning his back to her and adding eggs to a hot pan. They sizzle loudly, almost cutting out her tender gratitude.

“Thank you.” She says. It’s the first time she’d said it and he can feel sincerity in her voice.

—

Gray is getting married. He sends the invitation to Ram and it’s signed with Clair’s beautiful cursive. Tobin feels an ache in his chest when the merchant arrives and hands him the letter.

Faye, now having to come back to the orchard for her expertise, glimpses over his shoulder. Her brow furrows in worry. “Is the King calling you back for service?” She asks nervously.

He doesn’t know why she’d be nervous. She’d be free then. He shakes his head, rubbing the back of his neck. He knew this had been coming, he knewit from the moment Gray said “so what do you think of Clair?”

And yet, it still hurts.

“There’s a wedding.” He says. “I’ve been invited.”

“Oh. I guess you’ll be going.” She says.

“Supposed to be best man.” Tobin mutters.

Faye’s eyes widen. “Who is this? Who’s getting married?” She cranes her neck to get a good look at the invitation. He can only guess when her eyes don’t recognize the invitation.

“An old friend.” He says. He glances to her. “You want to go? It’s in the capital.”

He realizes how big of a gamble it is. To take her so close to the commander and taunt her like his. She could easily turn her back on him and make a run for it. And being honest, he’d probably let her go.

“I’ve never been to the capital of the country... Continent.” She corrects.

“Then we’ll go.” He says tiredly, placing the invitation in his back pocket. It twists and turns in his stomach, what could happen. What Gray could say about his new wife—probably a jape about the idiot girl, maybe even a lashing for not inviting him—and what Clair would do, Gods...

But the voice of the archer in him tells him to shoot at the easiest targets. The closest ones. So he tells Faye’s father that they will be headed to the capital for a wedding and won’t be able to work the orchard for sometime. And when he says it, Faye holds his hand and she can’t help but think of how soft and small it is in his.

[ferreho-writes]

do Kirikami sads you FUCK (idk make one of them die, hurt me pls)

Girl you remember what you asked for when you read this bc I KNOW you’ll shout at me

WARNINGS: graphic descriptions of violence and death, character death, mentions of vomit

It was fair to say that their class had been given a really tough run of things. By the end of their first year alone each of them had been exposed to actual villains enough to know what that gap between being a hero in theory and being one for certain looked like. Some had more experience than others - ones like Midoriya, or Todoroki, or Iida, or…

Or Kirishima.

Kirishima, who never backed down from a fight when someone was in danger. Kirishima, who would throw himself into the firing line a thousand times over to save a single life. Kirishima, who faced villains with hard-eyed determination and the rest of the world with a cheerful smile.

He wasn’t smiling anymore. He was gritting his teeth against the pain he must definitely be in, attempting to keep his quirk activated in case another attack came.

Denki may not have had as much experience with life or death situations as the friends he had thought of, but he definitely had some. He, like the rest of them, had only been fifteen when he first came upon villains who were prepared to kill him for what they wanted.

Being fifteen years old and staring down his potential death had cemented his desire to be stronger, so he could face much more and be a strong and reliable hero.

He thought he was closer to it at nineteen. He was a year out of U.A. and a sidekick ready to start his hero career.

Kirishima had been thrilled to get started - his idol had started out as a sidekick like the rest of them. He had been so excited, deep down still that kid who adored Crimson Riot enough to take inspiration from him for his own hero name and approach.

They both thought they were getting the hang of this. They would be heroes in their own right in no time, taking the world by storm.

Except Denki couldn’t help him when it had really counted and now Kirishima couldn’t stop the bleeding.

It wasn’t like his hair; it was darker, thicker. The sight of it made Denki sick to his stomach because there shouldn’t be so much, not outside like this.

There was still a fight going on and there were still villains to take down and apprehend. But his whole world had narrowed down to the other boy on the broken stone floor who still struggled to stand, one hand clasped uselessly over his abdomen.

No one had expected the ambush - all intel had told them the place wasn’t rigged. Kirishima hadn’t been able to activate his quirk in time to protect himself from the damage. He had barely managed it in time to stop himself from being blown to pieces.

He had managed to move in time to shield Denki from the worst of the blast.

The sight of Kirishima only making it to his knees before giving out again spurred Denki into action, immediately running to his side and grabbing him before Kirishima could completely collapse to the floor. Denki didn’t lower him down, instead keeping Kirishima close to him as if he could keep the blood back where it should be.

It wasn’t working; he could feel it soaking through his own clothes, warm and sticky. The wound was too large; Kirishima couldn’t cover it all with his hand and even the glimpses Denki had gotten had made him feel like he was going to throw up. No one should have that much of them exposed, that skin and muscle and viscera should never see the light of day. But there it was, leaking from between Kirishima’s fingers and seeping into Denki’s clothes.

There were no healers around. Denki realised, almost absently, that this may very well be it - Kirishima may bleed out in the jagged remains of a battle he couldn’t win.

Fuck, no. It wasn’t supposed to go like this. They were only nineteen; they were supposed to become proper heroes together. They were supposed to do so much together, everything that they had talked about back in high school.

He didn’t know about forever; Denki liked to think that this was going to last because he really liked (loved) Kirishima (he loved him), but maybe that never even factored in because here they were pretending like he had a fighting chance and of everyone in the world Kirishima was so far down on the list who deserved to die.

“Dude, c’mon, you’re too young to be pulling this,” Because Kirishima had relaxed the hand against his abdomen, almost his whole forearm slick and sticky with blood.

“Nah, I think...I thought...shit, I can’t get up,”

“So I’ll carry you, but you gotta help me out here,” Denki’s voice was becoming slightly more desperate with each sign that Kirishima was giving up. That wasn’t like him, but neither was dying and this was so unfair.

Kirishima shook his head, attempting a small smile but his whole body was shaking with the effort of being alive and his eyes kept going out of focus, so Denki took everything into his own hands.

Because he was a hero, and heroes saved people. Because he did love Kirishima; had done since they were just stupid teenagers and he refused for everything to end out here.

He tried to move Kirishima upright, tried to keep something over his stomach partly so Denki wouldn’t have to see it, but Kirishima wasn’t co-operating. He was just getting paler and the air around them was thick with the stench of blood, so thick Denki swore it was clogging his throat.

And he wasn’t Midoriya, who always seemed to know how to skew the odds in his favour even just a little. He wasn’t one of the many others who could come up with plans in any situation, and he had no one to go to who could fix this.

It was an occupational hazard with being a hero. Each time you risked not coming out alive. During the height of All Might’s career, people seemed to have forgotten that.

He had forgotten it - had just assumed if it had to happen, it would happen to someone else. Not him. Not Kirishima.

“H-hey...at least...at least I got to save you, right?”

“Don’t do this,”

Kirishima was gasping now, like getting air into his lungs was the hardest thing he had to do. He was almost a dead weight in Denki’s arms and Kirishima had always been mostly muscle. It weighed more; would have made him difficult to move even if Denki had somewhere to take him.

“You’ll be okay,”

“What the hell makes you think that?!” Denki was fuming at the thought that he was going to be fine after this, like he could just walk away and forget everything they had or the way Kirishima died in his fucking arms.

“You...you’re strong, y’know? So you’ll be...okay…” The gasping became so hard that Kirishima stopped talking and all Denki could do was hold him through it, whispering broken affections so that at least his last words to Kirishima wouldn’t have been said in anger. He’d never forgive himself.

He barely managed to avoid throwing up when the body in his arms convulsed, but he couldn’t bear to watch it. This wasn’t how he wanted to remember Kirishima. He wanted to remember the bright, upbeat boy with an infectious smile and a can-do attitude.

He couldn’t hold the tears back anymore and frankly didn’t care what anyone thought at that moment. He didn’t care that he had all but abandoned the fight still going on.

Because this was how they ended. No amount of will or determination had kept Kirishima alive. Nothing he did even helped.

Denki wasn’t sure he could ever call himself a hero again, not when he couldn’t save the boy he had planned a future with.

[allthecanadianpolitics]

sinesofinsanity

replied to your photo

“Another protest against Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain Pipeline...”

Question for you: Preface: Pipelines are the safest way to transport oil compared to the only two other options comparable by volume: ship and rail. Feel free to dispute preface instead of answering question. Question: Is there any proposed pipeline project you support? Why / Why not?

Ok rant time because I’m tired of people like @sinesofinsanity​ using conjecture rather than fact on this topic.

Pipelines are the safest way to transport oil compared to the only two other options comparable by volume: ship and rail

Shipping oil by pipeline in general is safe for transportation but not when it comes to oil from the oil sands, as that oil is primarily shipped in a thick viscous fluid matrix called Bitumen:

Georgia Straight: Is it safer to ship bitumen by train?

Elizabeth May: The safest way to ship bitumen is by rail. Now, there are other things that you get doing it that way. There's probably more greenhouse gases in shipping it by rail. I think certainly there are. On the safety issue, on which they implicitly connect in our brains the notion of Lac Magentic and a fireball killing people in a small community, that accident, that tragedy, did not involve bitumen. We were talking not just crude, but Bakken shale. Bakken shale is bad stuff and enormously inflammable.

Bitumen, on the other hand, solid bitumen, you can try with a blowtorch to try to get it catch fire and you'll have no luck. And if you had [transport] bitumen [by rail, here's] how they do it: you have to heat up the bitumen because it's a solid. You can't pour it into the train. It's a solid thing. You heat it up enough to put it in a railcar. And then it cools down in that railcar. It's not going anywhere until it gets to its final destination when you have to heat it up again to get it out of the railcar.

So you don't mix it with diluent. You just heat it up. Put it in the railcar. And it goes solid again.

If that railcar were to catapult off a high place and crash into a brook below, it would make a mess of splintered and fractured railcar parts as it broke apart but the bitumen wouldn't be going anywhere. It would be sitting there as a lump. It wouldn't catch fire and it wouldn't blow up.

I don't think this is a smart thing to do. Why do we want to ship out raw product as fast as possible without getting any value added? But if you were going to do that for some reason, the safest way to do it is by rail.

Also when it comes to Kinder Morgan, the oil would be shipped by pipeline AND then by ship, so you’ve introduced 2 dangerous forms of transport to one of the most pristine environments in Canada. Not a smart move.

Question: Is there any proposed pipeline project you support? Why / Why not?

None of the current pipeline proposals I support for several important reasons:

1. Indigenous Rights. Canada claims to support the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous peoples which states:

This is from article 32, 2. of the UNDRIP:

States shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indig-enous peoples concerned through their own representative institu-tions in order to obtain their free and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utiliza-tion or exploitation of mineral, water or other resources.

To compound this, most First Nations in BC are not on treaty land. The BC and Federal Governments have no basis of claim to the land. The land is completely unceded. It was never given away.

So if you cannot get consent from First Nations and municipalities, a pipeline cannot be built, period. Pipeline companies should redirect the route onto land that is in agreement with the project.

2. Climate impacts:

The science actually says that if the world is to meet its climate change commitments to prevent catastrophic climate change, most of Alberta’s oil must remain in the ground:

85% of tar sands must stay in the ground to limit climate change to 2 degrees Celsius

Oil sands must remain largely unexploited to meet climate target, study finds

Most of Canada’s oilsands must stay in ground if world to limit global warming: report

This is inconsistent with the idea of large pipelines which are expected to be used for decades, and which will grow the oil industry in Canada.

Also I’ve seen no sign from oil companies on off setting climate emissions by carbon capture or investment in renewables to counteract the increased emissions from a growing oil sands industry.

3. Economics.

Oil pipelines are a huge waste of money when it comes to Job creation. They produce few direct, full time, permanent jobs.

Kinder Morgan’s pipeline will only create ~50 permanent jobs in British Columbia.

This pipelines costs are already estimated at over 7 billion dollars. Are we really convinced that we want to spend that amount of money for 50+ permanent jobs? All those other thousands of jobs that are bragged about are temporary construction based. After about a year, once the pipeline is built those jobs are gone.

Also all of these oil pipelines are export pipelines. They’re not going to create value added (refinery based jobs) in Canada. They’re just shipping raw product to other countries, who will then create more jobs refining the raw products.

I’d be more open to oil pipelines in Canada, if they actually created more permanent jobs here in Canada.

4. Oil Spill Risk

I’m opposed to oil pipelines like Kinder Morgan because the risk of a large oil spill is far too great, especially on the BC coast.

Bitumen oil spills cannot be effectively cleaned up and the main area this pipeline would end is Vancouver’s world renowned harbour.

Here are the risks from that:

5 Years Since Massive Tar Sands Oil Spill, Kalamazoo River Still Not Clean

The Cost of an Oil Spill in Burrard Inlet: $40 Billion…For Starters

Spill from Hell: Diluted Bitumen

Unique Hazards of Tar Sands Oil Spills Confirmed by National Academies of Sciences

Oil spill could cost Vancouver $1.2 billion: report

Study shows oil spill near Fraser River estuary could kill over 100,000 birds

New report adds billions to cost of oil spill off B.C.'s south coast

Pipeline called threat to B.C.'s tourism industry

And lets not forget that Kinder Morgan’s existing pipeline has already spilled several times. This company does not have a good track record:

WHAT IS KINDER MORGAN’S RECORD OF SPILLS?

Kai Nagata: CBC pretends Trans Mountain's 69 oil spills never happened

B.C. oil spill response times make Trans Mountain Pipeline 'a ticking time bomb'

[taakofromtaz]

taako fights a necromancy cult on candlenights

Summary: 

(alternately titled "how the necromancers stealing lup made the best candlenights ever")

“Really, fellas? On Candlenights? Don’t you have anything better to do?”

Notes: (transposed from AO3)

big thanks to the taz fic writers discord for giving me the initial idea and cheering me on!!!

this isn't my best work but i just wanted to post it before the year ended,

i did a little TOO much d&d spell research bc i love accuracy, also, hopefully these spells are all ones taako can actually use,

happy candlenights and happy new year's!!!!

[hopefully accurate use of d&d spells, kravitz was supposed to be here but he’s not, there’s blupjeanss but it’s in the background, taako’s a badass okay? i dont make the rules, TAAKO DOES A HIT, this has very little to do with actual candlenights actually,]

End notes:

ending kinda sucks but eh. que sera sera fuckit

Word count: 3065

[writing tag] | [Archive of Our Own] | [fic index] | [please consider donating!]

Tonight is going to absolutely perfect. Taako has spent the day toiling away in the kitchen—with the occasional help from Lup—to make the family dinner absolutely perfect. Everyone’s favorite dishes are present and even the latest of guests are set to arrive several hours before it’s time to chow down.

Lup and Barry and Kravitz have been in and out of their office in the Astral Plane the last couple days to finish any last night work that would even slightly disrupt their family holiday. There shouldn’t be any bounties coming their way for the next few days at this rate, Istus and the Raven Queen forbid.

Candlenights is going to be beyond perfect this year.

Lup is the first one home and after checking in with Taako in the kitchen, rushes off to her room to gussy up for the evening. Once she’s done, Taako will get ready, and by that point, the boys should be done wrapping up their paperwork and be back in time to help greet the first guests.

Taako is halfway out of the kitchen when a dimensional rift opens up beside Lup and Barry steps through, looking a little exhausted. “Just in time, Barold,” he says, smiling when Lup turns to give him a kiss. “Keep my sister company while I get ready, huh?”

Barry blushes and wraps an arm around Lup’s waist. “Heh. Not a proble—” Before he can finish, Lup disappears from his grasp, and the two of them are left staring at where she was in complete shock.

“What the fuck?” Taako rushes back into the room and waves an arm where Lup was standing just a second ago.

“L-Lup? What happened?” Barry’s eyes are blown wide behind his glasses and he’s frozen in place, shoulders stiff and arm slowly drifting back to this side.

“Barold!” Taako thumps him in the chest and Barry sucks in a deep breath, coming back to himself. “Come with me. I have a silver mirror in my room.”

“R-right. Right. We—we’ll find her. It’s okay, it’s fine.” Barry’s rambling seems to be more for his own comfort than anything, so Taako snatches up his wrist and drags him down to hall and into his disaster of a room. He shoves Barry to down to take a seat on the bed and digs around on top of the dresser for the silver hand mirror he knows he has.

Taako sets the mirror on the bed beside Barry and takes Barry’s face in his hands. “Hey,” he says, ducking his head to took him in the eyes, voice low. “We’ll find her. She didn’t leave.” The this time is implied. “She wouldn’t do that.” Not again.

Barry sighs and closes his eyes. Taako leans in and plants a kiss on his forehead. “What’s the plan, Taako?”

“I’m gonna cast Scrying. See if I can find her,” Taako says, stepping away and scooping the mirror back up. He clears a spot on the floor and sits down, cross legged, and focuses on the mirror. “I need you to go find her brush and bring me a piece of her hair. That’s the easiest way to do it.”

Barry nods and leaves the room. Taako closes his eyes and focuses directly on Lup, thinks about her laugh, her smile, the way she looks, the way she talks, and wills his magic to focus on hers. His ear flicks when Barry comes back, Lup’s brush in his hands. Taako takes it silently and concentrates the spell through it with one hand and the mirror with the other.

It takes a minute for the spell to find her, but it finally catches and he can see her in his mind’s eye quite clearly. There’s no way Lup knew he was going to look for her, but he can feel her voluntarily failing her save regardless. A second later, the room around him fades and he feels as if he’s with Lup, wherever she is.

Taako looks around, seeing and hearing through the scrying spell’s invisible sensor, and says, “Barry, if you can hear me, I found her. I’m gonna tell you what this place looks like.”

Taako can’t hear if Barry makes any sort of reply, but he feels a warm hand settle on his shoulder so he figures that the words came through. (Taako’s only ever used this spell once and he was alone when he used it, holed up in his room and getting drunk by turning water into wine like fantasy Jesus while he tried to find the man that wanted to kill him so bad he almost succeeded. He has no idea what it looks like from the outside or even if anything he said would come through. He’s glad that it does; trying to remember what this place looks like would be hell.)

The cave is dark and musty and full of weird, vaguely creepy artefacts that Taako doesn’t feel like describing. Bones and skulls of all sorts litter the floors and from Taako’s position, he can see Lup standing in the middle of a summoning circle, red cloak draped over her little black dress, arms crossed and looking extremely put out.

“Really, fellas? On Candlenights? Don’t you have anything better to do?” She sounds annoyed and not worried at all and Taako can’t help but feel relieved. “Didn’t we have to come break your shit up literally a week ago?”

That might be useful. Taako doesn’t know if Lup is being helpful on purpose, but he relates the info to Barry regardless. The hand leaves his shoulder and Taako tries to moves to catch it and only ends up moving his field of vision. Attempting to pull out of the spell only leaves him with a headache and ringing ears. “Barry? Where’d you go?”

The necromancers surrounding Lup say nothing, and she just looks progressively more annoyed. “So what now? You bring me all the way here and… nothing? No reaction?”

The necromancers start murmuring amongst themselves in Abyssal and Taako tunes them out, still trying to abort the Scrying spell before its ten minutes are up. The problem is that he doesn’t know how. His first attempt hadn’t been a success.

“Barry! Get back here!” Taako calls out, trying to move again. His vision merely shifts and he huffs out a breath, trying to stay calm. Nothing good comes from panic and his usual grounding methods are useless if he can’t move his physical body. “I’m about to freak the fuck out, Barry! Where’d you go?”

Nothing. Taako closes his mind to the vision of the inside of the cave and counts his heartbeats as he waits for the spell to end.

He hears the sound of fabric tearing and he opens his mind’s eye to see Barry step out of the rift, his Reaper glamor making him look like his lich form. “Asshole!” Taako screams, vision swinging as he makes to throw his arms out.

“Hey, babe!” Lup says, a huge smile lighting up her face. Taako wants to do a hit on Barry’s stupid face. “How’d you know I’d be here?”

Barry looks around, pulls something from his robe, and taps two fingers to the sides of his glasses. He sweeps the room again and locks eyes with what Taako can only assume is the Scrying spell’s sensor. “Huh. Neat.”

Taako huffs as Lup tilts her head. “What is it?” The necromancers are chanting now, something Taako is oblivious to the meaning of, but given the circumstances, it can’t be anything good.

“Taako found you with a spell. He can see us right now actually. Hears us too.” Barry gestures in the direction the sensor. Taako just wishes the spell would end already.

“Shit yeah!” Lup turns and smiles blindly in his direction. “Hey, Koko! These necro-fucks are real close to home! You know that cave that you, me, and Bare-bare checked out a few months ago? I think this is it!” Taako smiles even though she can’t see him. Lup is the best.

Barry sighs. “This is exactly what I was trying to avoid. We got this covered.”

“Aww, but it’s Candlenights!” Lup says at the same time that Taako yells out, “Suck it, Barry!” to his empty room.

“You two are chaos inca—” Whatever Barry was going to say is cut off the spell ending, throwing Taako back into his own senses and his quiet room.

“Lulu you’re the best sister ever,” Taako says to himself as he scrambles to his feet. He runs into the kitchen first thing and turns off all the heat he can and moves the dishes to safer, less fire-hazardous spots. (That could have been a disaster.) The next thing he does is jot down a note for Kravitz— “We had a situation but we’re handling it!” —and then he rushes back to his room for his cloak and component bag and the Krebstar.

It’s time to fuck up some necromancers.

 It takes Taako about ten minutes on Garyl to find the exact cave Lup and Barry are in. Taako doesn’t bother dispelling the phantom steed and as long as he stays out of the way, he should be fine. “Go in there and kick some ass, my man,” the binicorn drawls, voice low and smooth.

Taako shoots him finger guns and takes off into the cave, trying his best to be quick but quiet. The cave is suspiciously silent and Taako can’t imagine it means anything good for his family. Ahead of him, the cave opens up into an antechamber that’s lit with an assortment of candles an few enchanted lanterns.

There’s about a dozen hooded figures of varying shapes and sizes standing in a semicircle around where Taako can recognize as the last place he saw Lup. She and Barry are pressed back to back, hands clenched together, surrounded by what appears to be spectral cuffs. Lup’s mouth is moving but there’s no sound and Taako, if he’s being completely honest with himself, doesn’t care enough about the why to figure it out.

Conclusion? Lup and Barry are pretty soundly—or not, heh—trapped. No big deal.

The smart thing to do is try to pick these dudes off one by one and find a way to free Barry and Lup from the trap. The smart thing to do is to try and rescue his family and have them help him kick some ass.

What Taako ends up doing is firing off the most potent Sunbeam he can, taking special care to avoid catching Lup and Barry in its line of fire. Over half the necromancers fail their save and scream as the spell blinds them temporarily. The rest fall away from the line as quickly as they can. Not a single one of them is left unharmed.

“Just who the fuck do you think you are?” Taako steps out from his hiding spot, Krebstar raised, face drawn into a snarl. The necromancers left with their vision—about four of them, Taako guesses—look at him in what can only be stunned silence. “Really, fellas?” Taako asks, copying Lup’s line because it was just that good. “On Candlenights?”

“Run along, little wizard,” the nearest necromancer hisses at him, their voice low and grating. “You’re not who we want.”

Taako scoffs and hardens his glare. Little wizard? Sure, he must be a sight to behold with this hair in a messy bun, an apron thrown over and oversized sweaters with the sleeves rolled up, sweatpants and boots that are a size too big—not to mention his cloak of the manta ray and belt with his spell component pouch—but just because he looks like hot garbage right now doesn’t mean he’s not capable.

He’ll show these fuckers what for. They deserve it for underestimating him.

Taako gives a nasty smirk to the necromancer that spoke and aims the tip of the Krebstar at them. “Watch this,” he says, the casts Disintegrate.

The necromancer shrieks, briefly, and falls apart before the remaining hooded figures can make a move to stop him. Taako adjusts his grip. “Anyone else?”

A couple of the blinded necromancers fall over their comrades trying to move closer to him and one of the relatively unharmed figures raises an arm towards him. Taako quickly steps back into his hiding spot and casts Mislead, sending his double to go running deeper into the cave. He keeps his senses with the double until he’s sure of the path it can take then switches back to himself and sneaks, completely invisible over to Barry and Lup.

Barry’s eyes turn to him immediately and he barely stops himself from making an audible reaction. Stupid Barold and his stupid True Seeing.

Actually, this might be useful.

Thank you Istus, Taako thinks, raising his hands and signing out, ‘Trap?’

Barry blinks once or twice before grinning. The crew had all learned this sign language of sorts back in Cycle 27 when they came across a plane that left most the nonhuman members of their crew deafened—the cause being something that emitted a planetwide audio tone that only certain races and species were capable of hearing. It obliterated the auditory nerves of anything that could hear it, but the natives of the plane had already begun adapting, mostly by adopting more visual indicators for those affected by the strong noise.

‘Glyph,’ Barry signs out, doing his best to keep his movements small and subtle. Lup shifts against him and squints in Taako’s direction, so Barry shows her the name symbol they came up with for Taako. (Granted, it’s not the one Taako came up with, but the others convinced him that the gesture he wanted was a little too complex and obscure. He reluctantly agreed.)

‘Trap,’ Lup signs, confirming as well, looking off to the side. ‘Rock?’ She ends her second sign with a shrug, trying not to be too obvious about looking for the source of their magic cage.

Taako holds up a single finger, the universal ‘wait a moment,’ and switches his sense back to his double. Said double is deeper into the cave than Taako’s ever been and is physically wrecking every weird artefact it can while still keeping them mostly intact so the Reaper Squad can confiscate them. The double seems to be doing fine, making a mess of things while avoiding the occasional spell being flung his way.

Taako comes back to his actual self to see Lup pointing to a huge boulder close to the cavern wall.

‘Fake?’ she guesses, nudging Barry. He glances back at it and nods.

‘Check,’ Taako signs, sneaking over to the rock. He needs to be quick. The blindness seems to be wearing off of victims of his Sunbeam.

The rock is indeed somewhat fake. The front is illusory, a cover to hide a small, open spellbook covered in glowing arcane runes sitting on a much smaller rock. Taako grabs the book and snaps it closed. He doesn’t particularly care which type of trapping spell this is, but removing the book from the area should be enough to end the spell.

He tosses the book towards the cave entrance and watches as Lup and Barry grin and step away from the center of the summoning circle on the floor.

Taking advantage of his invisibility, Taako nudges past Barry and Lup. “Take a sip, babes,” he says, winking at Barry, and he casts Cone of Cold. Taako fades back into visibility as a vicious, icy wind whips up at his fingertips and blasts through the cave. The closest necromancers, still recovering from their blindness, fail to save—again—and several are frozen solid as their hit points drop to zero.

Lup is cheering, whooping and laughing as her brother annihilates the den of necromancers. Not all of them die from the attack, but enough of them do—Barry moves to collect the souls of the deceased as Lup heads further into the cave to get any stragglers.

Spell over and job done, he casually pretends to dust his hands off and waits for Lup and Barry to finish their reaping.

“Koko! That was fantastic!” Lup calls out as she runs up to him and grabs him in a big hug, lifting him up and spinning him around.

He laughs and hugs her back, striking a showy pose when she sets him back down. “Thank you, thank you, I know I’m amazing.”

“That was really impressive, Taako. Nice work,” Barry says, looking like himself again.

Taako turns to him and gives him a sharp smile. “You’re on thin ice, pal.” His eyes narrow and his grip on the Krebstar shifts. “You know why.”

Barry visibly gulps and Lup laughs. “Sorry I just. Left. Like that. I won’t do it again, promise.”

Rolling his eyes, Taako turns and starts to exit the cave. “Yeah, sure, whatever. I’m going home. This isn’t my job and I have to finish getting ready.” He looks back at them and points at them. “You better be home before seven or I’ll come back here and drag you back personally.”

Lup gives him a mock salute. “You got it boss! Come on Bare-bare. I’m sure there’s some gross junk in here that you’d just love to get your hands on.”

Barry waves at him as he shuffles off, following Lup to the cavern room that Taako’s double trashed.

Garyl is still waiting outside when Taako finally leaves the cave. “We done here?” the phantom steed asks as Taako climbs up.

“Yeah m’man. Take me home.”

 Somehow Taako makes it home before any of the guests arrive, which is just as well because he still has a lot to do. He makes to resume cooking and or reheat the food and rushes back to his room to change as quickly as he can. He comes back to the kitchen to see Lup standing at the stove.

“Go finish getting ready, bro.” She smiles at him. “I got this. Barry when back to the Astral Plane to drop some stuff off and drag your boy toy back home.”

Taako darts forward to peck her cheek with a kiss before running back to his. “Thanks, you’re the best!”

“No problem! And chill out! Tonight’s gonna be perfect!” Lup laughs after him and he smiles.

Best Candlenights ever.

[queen-scribbles]

Hell of a Birthday

Super duper last minute contribution to N7 day, bc I got conscripted to help my sister give her dog a haircut and my writing time got all chewed up. :P

This was not, Emily reflected morosely, how she thought she’d be spending her birthday. Kaidan being there was about right, but the trapped in prefab housing, being hunted by biotic extremists part was very much not.

“Thoughts?” she murmured to Kaidan, He was standing by the lone window and thus had a better handle on the lay of the land.

“I don’t know, Shepard,” he sighed. “There’s almost a dozen of them out there and they all look pissed.”

“They find our shuttle yet?” Emily asked, one hand tugging her ponytail as she counted thermal clips. Six. 

“Doesn’t look like it,” Kaidan replied. “But they’re alert enough there’s no way we’re getting to it without aa fight, so that’s a moot point.”

Emily paced across the small unit as she thought. “Am I the only one who wants to give a piece of my mind to whoever thought we’d have better luck on this mission than anyone else who’s tried?”

“We have fared well with biotics before,” Kaidan reminded her quietly.  “Unfortunately, I think some people forget we aren’t a hive mind.”

“Well, considering you and I are the ones it’s biting on the ass this time, I’m still annoyed.” She sighed. “Kaidan, I really don’t want to have to kill these people. It’ll further convince them we see them as the enemy and only want to exterminate them and whatever other delusions they’ve cooked up for themselves. i wish they would’ve just talked to us.”

“I know.” Kaidan shot her a sympathetic smile. “Me, too. But you more than anyone know that things don’t always go the waay we want.”

Emily nodded, tucking hair fallen from her ponytail back behind her ears. “I know.” She bit her lip. “What odds would you give us of making it to the shuttle if we just run for it?”

Kaidan peered out at the circling biotics. “Not great. Like i said, they’re pissed and out for blood. And there’s enough of them our odds of sneaking out are even worse.”

“How long d’you think before they find us?”

“Depends on how long it takes them to get tired of waiting for us to show ourselves and start actively looking.”

“But soon as they do that, we’re screwed anyway.” Emily gestured around the prefab unit. “I mean, unless one of us will fit in that toolbox, there’s nowhere to hide. I feel like we should run for it. There’s no environmental hazards to speak of, the air is breathable, so thee’s not a time limit on outdoor exposure or anything. We just both put up barriers and run like hell, I think we can make the shuttle.”

Kaidan shot her a questioning look. “That’s... kind of reckless for you, Shepard.”

“Not really.” Emily looked over at him. “Where do you think we have better odds? In a cramped prefab where they can’t possibly miss, or out in the open?” Plus, I really don’t want to spend my birthday in here.

Kaidan was still looking at her like he knew she wasn’t telling the whole truth. But finally he nodded. “I see your point. Do you think we should split up, make them divide their forces?”

Emily shook her head. “I’d rather face a dozen of them with you watching my back than half that on my own.”

“Again, see your point.” He studied the people outside for a little longer. “Okay, they’re walking circles, like a patrol. If we wait three more minutes and then hook out the east side of the compound before arcing back toward the shuttle, I think that’ll give us the biggest head start.”

She handed him three of the clips fro his pistol, slotting one into her own gun. “Got it.”

The two of them waited in tense silence for the time to pass and hole to appear in the patrol. When the moment arrived, Kaidan nodded, Emily punched the door controls, and they made a run for it. Emily didn’t pause, didn’t look back--even as she heard the hue and cry rise behind them.

“Just go!” Kaidan hissed behind her, grunting as something impacted against his barrier.

Concern for him almost made her turn around, but she was too worried about tripping on the rocky ground if she didn’t watch her feet. “I’m going!”

 She aimed her gun behind them and fired blindly at their pursuers. There was a curse and the sound of someone stumbling as one of her shots actually hit something.

That was lucky, Emily thought. She fixed her gaze on the hill she was barreling towards. She could curve around the far side of it, that would shield her from some of the gunfire and biotic attacks being aimed at them, and start her arc back to the shuttle.

Unfortunately, the extremists caught on to her plan. The closer she got to the hill, the more desperate;y they attacked. Finally, just before she reached a point that would have granted at least partial safety, a biotically enhanced bullet tore through Emily’s barrier and armor both. She yelped--more in surprise than pain--as it sliced into her side. The pain hit a fraction of a second later and took her to her knees. The resulting tumble made it hurt even worse.

She’d barely stopped rolling before she felt Kaidan’s hand on her ar, “Shepard, come on!” He pulled her up with one hand, the other shoving a wave of biotic power at their pursuers. In the moment that bought them, he recognized Emily wouldn’t be able to move fast enough on her own, and easily hauled her up over his shoulders before continuing to run for the shuttle.

It was in sight now, she could see it if she craned her head. They could make it. They could.

Emily pulled Kaidan’s pistol from its spot on his belt--she’d dropped hers when she fell--and started taking shaky potshots at what remained of their pursuit. Each recoil made her side hurt, but Kaidan had his hands full with her. It was only she ran defense.

“Almost there,” Kaidan reported through gritted teeth. His grip on her shifted as he punched in a command on his omnitool.

They were so close she could hear the hiss of hydraulics as the door swung up. Kaidan let her down gently as he could on the shuttle floor and slammed his fist into the door controls. Before it had even closed all the way, he as perched on the pilot’s seat, spinning up the engines and waiting for hte autopilot light to go green.

Emily dragged herself on one elbow until she had a good shot through the rapidly narrowing gap under the door and fired off a whole clip as deterrent. Focusing on something kept her head from spinning, and if she could ust keep it together a little longer...

Kaidan muttered something under his breath, then grunted in satisfaction and hit the autopilot. The engines whined as the shuttle went airborne, on course back to the Normandy. As it rose smoothly through the atmosphere, Kaidan pushed off the seat and knelt next to Emily. “Shepard, let me see.”

“It’s... not that bad,” she panted, shaking her head. The motion made him double and swim before her eyes, and her side spiked with pain, as if eager to make a liar out of her. “...ow...”

“Shepard? Shepard!” Kaidan was beyond worried, calling up his omnitool, working off her armor. “Shepard, stay with me!”

I’d love to... The thought circled in her head, but she couldn’t find the energy to actually say it.  Her vision started to darken and Emily blinked in an effort to keep awake, but it was a losing battle.

“Emily! Just hang on! A few more...”

The rest of what he was saying was lost as the darkness won.

<O>

She woke in the Normandy’s medbay, head and side both aching. “...Ow.”

“That sounds about right,” Dr. Chakwas said with a motherly smile. “Good to see you still number among the living, Commander.”

“Feels like just barely,” Emily mumbled.

“You’re not far off,” the doctor said. “If it wasn’t for Kaidan, you wouldn’t.”

“I know.” Emily rubbed her side, feeling the tug of fresh-set medigel. “Where is he?”

“Giving the mission report to Admiral Hackett. He promised to come down as soon as he finished. He’ll be happy to see you’re awake.”

“That’s an understatement,” Kaidan said, quiet but frank, as he entered the room.

“I’ll give you two a minute,” Dr. Chakwas said, slipping from the room.

Emily and Kaidan simply stared at each other for a moment, neither sure what to say.

Kaidan figured it out first. “Don’t scare me like that.”

“Much as I would love to make that promise, you know I can’t,” Emily said, picking at the sheets. “Not in our line of work.”

“Can you at least try?” he compromised, sitting on the edge of her bed.

“That I can do,” she nodded, reaching out with one hand to cover his. “Thanks for carrying me.”

Kaidan half-smiled, concern still lingering in his eyes. “I owed you one. For Virmire.” He turned his hand so he could hold hers and was quiet for a long moment. “So when were you going to tell me today is your birthday?”

“When we got back from the mission,” Emily replied, twirling a lock of hair with her free hand. “Figured we could spend the rest of the day watching vids in my cabin or cuddling or something.”

“I’m sure Dr. Chakwas won’t mind if you get bedrest in in your own bed,” Kaidan said pragmatically. “Sorry your birthday’s turning out not so great.”

Emily shrugged. “Still not my worst one. But let’s not worry about that and get back to making this one better.”

He hesitated the barest fraction of a second before smiling. “Okay. Any ideas?”

“Oh, a couple. Top of the list would be a good kiss from my favorite guy in the galaxy.”

“Well, okay,” he deadpanned. “I’ll go get Garrus, but I don’t know how he’ll react-”

Emily rolled her eyes and whacked his arm. “I meant you, you jerk, and you know it.”

Kaidan leaned forward and kissed the end of her nose. “Like that?”

She grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him back in so she could kiss the smirk off his face. “Like that,” she corrected.

“You’re right, that is batter,” Kaidan chuckled, hand cupping the nape of her neck as he came back for me.

<O>

When Dr. Chakwas returned, she was easily persuaded to let Emily rest in her own cabin, with Kaidan and her vid collection for company. So that’s exactly what she did. And, on the whole, it wasn’t a bad birthday. Sure, the first part had been a little rough, but the rest more than made up for it.

[pluviophile-imagines]

Ok but imagine there’s a blackout and it’s quarantine housemate style with Kirishima. You guys search around in the dark for candles and there’s fluffy moments of touching/bumping into each other. When you find the only candle you have, you sit it between the both of you and play never have I ever to pass the time until the lights come back on. It’s very silly and fun and there’s secrets shared and maybe kisses (definitely kisses)

Omg I love this? Djdksdjdnd you did it I got inspired so here’s a lil ficlet I wrote bc my muse grabbed me by the throat and told me to write. Anon, this was so cute lmfao. I had to put a read more bc I wrote too much 😳

Kirishima’s a chivalrous guy; when the power goes and the entire apartment suddenly becomes steeped in darkness, the first thing he does is run to ur room to make sure you’re ok, not scared or anything. He probably runs into your door in the dark lol. & yeah, you’re fine, but it is kinda unnerving so you two decide to hang out in the living room. You know you’ve got a battery powered lantern around but Kiri’s set on candles (he says something about tradition) and honestly it’s too endearing to say no so you help him hunt down some tealights and big mason jar ones.

There’s not a lot so you only set them up in the living room. Your apartment is definitely a fire hazard now with all the open flames around, but honestly he was right—all the candles have a nicer energy than the bright LED light of your lantern. You guys end up together on the floor with candles all around you.

You’re the one who suggests playing Never Have I Ever. He’s kinda hesitant, ‘cause every time he’s played it with his UA friends it’s ended poorly, but when he voices this concern with you, you just laugh and say that happens in big groups. It’s just you and him, though, so if questions make either of you uncomfortable you or he can just say so.

You learn so. Much. Shit about each other and each others’ friends it’s kind of insane. You’d been friends before (I think it’d be hard to be Kiri’s roommate and not become friends with him, he wouldn’t let you) but never really all that close. This definitely changes that. You sit there together for hours, talking and laughing and enjoying each others company. Somewhere along the line you gravitate towards each other until you’re basically half on his lap, legs all tangled up, covered by a blanket he’s grabbed from the couch.

That’s the position you’re in when your statement is, “Never have I ever had a decent kiss.”

Kirishima probably puts his finger down and is already thinking of his next one before his brain fully catches up and realizes that the point is to make the other person put their finger down and keep yours up, which would mean that…

“Wait, you’ve never been kissed well?”

He doesn’t really sound like he’s joking, and there’s genuine concern on his face when you look at him, like it’s a detriment to your health that all the times you’ve been kissed have been disasters.

“No, not really. I’ve only done it a few times and it was just… bad breath or gross slobber or biting my lip in a not sexy way.” You shrug. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Not a big deal? You’re like, a year away from graduating college and you’ve had—what did you say? Four boyfriends?”

“Two of those were in middle school, Kirishima. No kissing involved, though if there had been I wouldn’t expect it to be any good.”

“It’s still bullshit. I mean, you like a guy enough to want to kiss him and he just drops the ball like that? Doesn’t even bother to learn how to do it right?”

He’s getting kind of heated about it, like your only two real boyfriends had done you entirely wrong because the few times you’d locked lips had been objectively awful.

“It’s not like I was dating them just to physically be with them. I liked their personality and their intelligence and shit.”

“And shit,” he repeats, looking at you like you said you’d slapped your grandmother in the face. “That’s— I mean— a kiss is supposed to be a way of showing your affection. And there are so many kinds, like I can’t imagine you’d make out with someone if they didn’t know how to properly kiss.”

You wrinkle your nose. “Nah, no way, I don’t have the patience for that.”

“So you’ve never made out with anyone.”

“Nope.”

“You’re 21 and you just. Haven’t had a real kiss.”

“Hey!” You smack his shoulder playfully. “I put my lips against someone else’s lips because I liked them romantically, that’s a real kiss.”

“No, no, not if you didn’t like it. A real kiss is supposed to leave you wanting more—it’s supposed to, like, make you feel all giddy and excited, like you've gotten a fresh breath of air and released some tension but at the same time you’ve become addicted.”

You sit there frozen for a few seconds, unable to figure out how to respond. You settle on shaking your head in disbelief. “Well, let me know if you know a guy who can kiss like that so I can fix this apparent utter travesty in my life.”

“I mean...” he pauses just barely, eyes meeting yours before he continues. “I’m right here, if you wanna fix it now.”

That stuns you to silence. You’re not sure if he’s being serious but it still makes your imagination run wild. You’ve known he’s attractive (I mean, you have eyes), but honestly never thought the sentiment might be mutual.

Plus… the way he’s looking at you kind of makes you excited. You don’t think a guy has ever looked at you that way before.

“I’m serious. I could kiss you right now. D’you want me to?”

“I—“ you cut yourself off, trying to stop your train of thought in its tracks while it’s conjuring up images of him doing exactly that. Unfortunately for you, your eyes subconsciously fall upon his lips, and that does not fucking help in the slightest. Before you can fully think it through, you’re breathing out, “Okay.”

Kirishima sits up and turns so that he’s leaning back against your couch. Then he reaches toward you and gently maneuvers you to sit fully on his lap, straddling him. The blanket falls from your legs and lays forgotten in a heap next to the two of you. “Is that good?”

At your nod, he brings one of his hands up to your neck, holding you tenderly. It’s so big that his fingers reach past your nape even while his palm cradles your jaw. He uses it to guide you towards him and tilt your head the right way.

You thought he was being ridiculous when he described a good kiss. When he leans in to slate his lips against yours though, you realize what he was talking about. The connection does make you feel all giddy and excited—in fact, it makes your whole body buzz with adrenaline. Your eyes flutter closed on their own.

He guides you, a combination of his hand on your neck and the movement of his lips directing you through minute motions that do, in fact, make you feel like you’ve gotten a breath of fresh air. It only gives you a desire to delve deeper, and he obliges, pulling you closer by both the hand cradling your jaw and the one that’s resting on the small of your back.

The action makes you realize foggily that your own hands have moved; one clutching his bicep in an attempt to keep you mostly vertical while your body melts into him, the other threading through his hair (which is lacking product because he ran out two days ago, which he told you early on in your game).

He pulls back too soon, in your opinion. Again, his words from before flood your head; the kiss really has left you wanting more. You’re pretty sure you are addicted. And when you finally open your eyes to find him grinning at you, all you can think of when you see those pointed teeth is how well he might be able to use them next time.

“There.” Your eyes snap up to meet his as he speaks, tone more than a little satisfied. You suppose that you’re wearing on your face all the confirmation he needs to know that he has, in fact, fixed your little problem. He asks anyway, though. “Did I do it?”

You bite your lip. It’s subconscious, but you enjoy the way he gaze is drawn to it and becomes heavy-lidded at the sight. It’s all the confirmation you need as you draw you mouth back in a grin. “I dunno. I think we should try again, just to make sure.”

[booksong]

Fic Writers Week 2017: Day 1

Prompt: Words of Validation

First off, let me state what will be obvious to most fellow writers--I love literally each and every comment I get, knowing that someone was moved or excited enough about what I wrote to put that effort in.  Seeing that comment notification always makes my day brighter, whether it’s on my most popular fics or one with only a handful of hits.  If you are someone who’s ever commented on a fic of mine, know that I read it and loved it and appreciated it so, so much!

That said, there are definitely a few comments that go that extra mile, and become the ones that inspire you, comfort you, and that you reread so often you basically memorize them.  I’ve copied a few here below the Read More.

-There are few better moments in the fanfic writing life than when you participate in a fandom gift exchange, and your recipient leaves you a comment with their reaction.  From my Akisae fic Hazard Label:

i can die happily now thank you SO MUCH for writing this for me, this is so perfect and nbd but im gonna like, liveblog this while i read bc you deserve a long ass comment about how good this is. u deserve everything in the world for this fic, tbh

"Akiteru couldn’t imagine anyone being in charge of Tanaka Saeko" ok but same.... i love this line so much it's so in character im dead

WTF IM SO....... I CANT DEAL....... “You know, when Kei-kun blocked Ushijima’s spike that first time, I thought you were going to fall over the railing. I was seriously preparing to grab your jacket and save your life.” AND RHE NWXT PART??????

IM.... IM SO EMOTIONAL I LOVE SHY FLIRTING “And the first thing I thought, after I was sure you weren’t going to die, was that I really, really wanted to kiss you.”

also i love how akiteru is practicing with karasuno and playing with his brother... tbh that means a lot to me, and their relationship... god this is so good

“I keep telling you, I kinda like dating a girl who can kick my ass.” me too akiteru, me too. i love girls like that. they could kill me and i'd say thank u, honestly. saeko is rly high up on that list...

also YES I LOVE THE 10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU type, omg saeko actually reminds me of kat a bit, tbh... i can totally see it. i wanted to cringe at the pet names but it was so cute that i couldnt do it. its just. im dead now... i love u for this thank you so much i appreciate this

RIP Mairin (1997-2016) Cause of Death: this fucking fic

- I’ve been absolutely blown away by the positive reception to my first Daisuga fic, Add New Contact over the past couple years.  Here are just a couple of the many fantastic comments it’s gotten:

I have been grinning at my phone for the past ten minutes because this is so CUTE omg! Possibly the cutest thing I've read all year. Daichi is such a lovesick NERD and I love how he keeps trying to rationalize what he's doing. (In his defense though, I would break my phone to see Suga too.) And Suga sneaking into Daichi's phone may have made me laugh. I would say I want more of this, but it ended so perfectly! Thanks for sharing!

I reread this fic for the third time and honestly idk why but this time it makes me cry (r u even serious) it has been a while since i read haikyuu and them fics or doujin (since the Yuri on ice fever) and i've kind of forgotten how much i love these two. Think i cried just because now i remembered how cute those two are and GAHHHH I LOVE YOUR WRITING STYLE SO SO SO MUCH i can't even express how much i love this fic in words???? Like it wouldn't ever be enough to say how much i adore this fic gdi, yes daisuga has been my fav otp since who knows when, but this fic makes me fell A LOT MORE for daisuga than i have ever been. They're so in characters and all of the dialogues and inner thoughts are so sweet and just, reALLY REALLY THEM. your characterization is perfect and honestly if i should ask for more, then i really want more daisuga from you, 'cause really, your writing style. Geez. I LOVE IT SO MUCH. You make me ship them even more and ghhhhhhh this is surely one of my all time favorite fics in the universe. And no i'm not exaggerating at all. Please never stop writing stuffs. Thank u for existing and for making this fic exists love u bless u 

I've been having a really rough time, but this fic made me smile so big and so much, I could barely stand it, ahaha. Thank you so much for brightening my day with this adorable fic. You wrote every character so well, and it just solidified for me just how much I love DaiSuga. <3

Thanks again!

- Finally, comments that are given to my works that are more about character-study than shipping, or that I put a lot of personal feelings into, hold a special place for me.  I wrote Things We Forged in the Fire as a celebration of Morgiana, one of my favorite ladies, and reading that my characterization resonated with people really touched me:

This is absolutely perfect, you really capture the ferocity and gentleness of Mor, I'm a bit jealous of you. Also the alimor was divine, subtle and sweet, mutual respect is such a key component of their relationship, yet it's left out a lot.

Anyway this is going down under one of my favorite Magi fics (don't have ao3 account) Keep up the good work!

I love this story! I really don't leave comments in archive of our own because of the need to leave an email address but, this story just needed to be commented on how fantastic it is. I have just been reading Magi and I also believe that Morgiana is one of the most bad-ass character ever! And, you are also correct that there are not many stories that are dedicated to Mor (or to Mor and Alibaba as a pair) which is quite sad.

I like the way that you described Mor and Alibaba's relationship. It was not forced and I really appreciate that because even if AliMor (is this correct?) is my "ship", sometimes some stories just fail to capture the mutual respect that Alibaba and Morgiana have for each other. Also, grammatically, I did not find any mistakes (though I'm not an expert in that particular area) and your use of words was simple and understandable yet it also captures what you want to convey to your readers.

I really hope that you would be making more stories about Morgiana (she's such an under-appreciated character!) or about her and Alibaba (since this is my ship after all. Hahaha). Are you considering making a multi-chaptered story for them? (*blinks at you with puppy eyes). I would definitely read them. More power to you and may you write more stories for Magi! And, happy new year! :)

So basically, comments help keep us writers going, and we love your enthusiasm and excitement.  Never worry that your comments are annoying, too long or short, too full of caps lock, too ramble-y, or not detailed enough.  We love them all!