#OR ed is just trying to get a fish way of in the distance

[random-weirdo]

I can imagine all that shit going on at Spanish Jackie’s den(? Pub?), and then like, way off in the distance, Ed is just sleeping on a little fishing boat, with his little blanket, and then is all of a sudden awoken by explosions of a bunch of ships and shit in the distance, he looks up, sees everything, the exploded ships, the cannonballs flying everywhere, and just muttering under his breath “oh.. shit.”

[just-my-latest-hyperfixation]

Congratulations on 1k! It's impressive how many different genres your AUs have covered with such fun stories

For the ficletbuild a prompt game, perhaps F "Where's your sense of adventure?" + 🧜‍♂️Just add water? Vibes and item are dealers choice :)

Thank you so much, I love trying new things and exploring different universes and themes. Hope you like what I've come up with, I've been wanting to write this for a while. 🧜‍♂️❤️

Night swimming

Rated: T

Words: 1,000

Tags: Established relationship; mer!Steve Harrington; sexually explicit language; nudity

Notes: Bonus drabble to Just add water

“Okay, not to sound ungrateful,” Eddie mutters, huddling deeper into his flannel. Summer is well and truly over and the nights are getting chilly, especially out here on the water. “I appreciate this whole three-month anniversary surprise date, I really do. But couldn’t you have gone for dinner and a movie perhaps?”

“Nah,” Steve smiles. He stops rowing, pulling the oars into the boat and leaving them floating on the surface of the moonlit lake. “It had to be here. This is where I fell for you, where we first kissed. First made love. C’mon, where’s your sense of adventure?”

“Back at the shore, probably.” Eddie pretends to shiver, even though his face has gone hot at Steve’s casual mention of their first time. “Where all of that stuff actually happened, by the way, so I still don’t get why you needed to row us out here. Now where’s that surprise you promised me?”

“Patience,” Steve scolds, leaning closer on the rickety bench so that he can press a kiss to Eddie’s lips. “I'm getting there.”

Then, without further preamble, he starts stripping.

“What the-” Eddie blurts as Steve’s sweater hits him in the face. “No way, forget it. We're not fucking in the middle of the-”

“Get your mind out of the gutter, who said anything about fucking?” Steve rolls his eyes, shrugging out of his jeans and underpants. “We’re going for a swim.”

And then, before Eddie has a chance to stop him, he dives headfirst into the dark lake. Eddie yelps and clenches his eyes shut as the boat rocks. When he opens them, Steve is just emerging again. He laughs and shakes the water from his hair, happy like a fish in the water, which … okay, yeah. That's actually an apt comparison, considering the giant, glistening tail and the fucking fins that have taken the place of his legs.

You'd think that after three months, a guy would get used to his boyfriend being a real-life mermaid. No such luck, apparently, because Eddie still finds himself as dumbstruck as the first time as Steve swims closer and casually rests his arms on the edge of the boat. The patch of scales on his temples shimmers in the pale light.

“Not coming in?”

Eddie grins, trying to ignore the way his heart hammers against his ribcage.

“Nuh-uh, fish boy. Don't wanna freeze to death. You have fun, I'll take care of the food.”

He has just bent over to retrieve the huge picnic basket from the hull of the boat when Steve says, “Oh, you thought that was for you?”

Eddie whips his head up, mouth already open around a question- … which turns into a garbled half-scream when he sees what has appeared beside Steve.

A gleaming pair of eyes, each roughly the size of a saucer.

Eddie blinks. The eyes blink back. There's two pairs of lids on each, the inner one a thin, translucent membrane.

“She's been dying to meet you,” Steve smiles. “Say hi?”

“Hrrrrrrgh,” Eddie says.

The creature makes a sound - a long, high-pitched trill. Steve chimes in with a laugh of his own, and wait, do they think this is funny?

Steve sees the scowl on his face and tilts his head. “C’mon, Eds, don't be like that. You've seen her before.”

“Yeah, from a distance,” Eddie squeaks, finally finding his voice again. “Not like this. Jeez, warn a guy! What happened to meeting the family first?”

The creature makes an affronted sound and Steve pets her large, arrow-shaped head.

“Of course you are family, he's just a bit confused,” he tells her. She grumbles and he turns to Eddie with a chuckle. “Uh-oh, you'd better apologize.”

Eddie stares. Steve’s eyes flick down to the picnic basket.

“Ugh, alright,” Eddie mutters. He reaches down to flip the lid open, steeling himself for the sight of slimy fish heads, only to be met with… “Fruit? She eats fruit?”

Steve shrugs. “She's an ombi- … obvy- … she eats everything, really. Oh, give her the watermelon, she loves those.”

Eddie obeys, because why wouldn't he? If your mermaid boyfriend tells you to feed the friendly lake monster a watermelon, you feed the lake monster the goddamn watermelon. It's only logical.

The melon is about as large as his head. He lifts it, and a long neck comes curling out of the water, until those eerie eyes are level with his - and then higher still, so he's looking up at them. It's a weird feeling, being face to face with this creature who's so much older than him - older than the lake itself, maybe - holding out the fruit to her like an offering. Awe, he realizes. He's feeling awed in the truest and most original sense of the word.

And then she bends down and plucks the melon from his hands. Something crunches and Eddie shrieks in surprise and disgust as a shower of juice and seeds descends on him. The creature swallows, blinks her glowing, double-lidded eyes at him one last time, and then she's gone, slipping back under the surface of the lake with barely a ripple.

“Huh,” Eddie exhales a shaky laugh. “That went pretty-”

The world tilts.

His scream turns into a wet gargle as he hits the water, but Steve has him under the arms and is pulling him up to straddle his tail before he can go under. He sees Eddie’s shocked face and laughs, gently combing dark strands soaked in lake water and melon juice out of his face.

“That went fantastically,” he says, grin wide and brilliant and incredibly proud. It makes Eddie’s heart kick in his chest, just a little. “She really likes you!”

Eddie spits out a mouthful of water.

“What, really? Is it just her or do all of your family members have such an odd way of showing it?”

Steve hums, a bit nervously perhaps, and pulls Eddie's shivering body closer to his chest.

“Well, wait until you meet my mom.”

More celebration ficlets

[pullhisteeth]

you try to keep up boundaries with your best friend Eddie but you just can't help yourselves <3 cw 18+ smut (minors dni), fem!reader, bondage (ropes), wax play, lots of tension hehe [565 words]

you have A Conversation with Eddie. it goes something like: we're friends, best friends; we're both horny, like, all the time, but there's this line we can't cross with each other, surely; what if we do, and it's weird? what if we can't come back from it?

but he likes to rile you up, because he's Eddie and it's in his nature. he flirts at every possibly opportunity, hovering hands on your waist, pet names and pull-out jokes, plays the well if you're not going to let me see you naked at least give me a kiss card whenever you're getting high together.

and then you move away for college. he's on the phone with you three, four times a week, talking to you about nothing in particular and listening to you do the same. you like these calls, particularly the ones that go on for hours, the ones that make your legs ache from standing at the phone in the hall of your dorm for too long (maybe there's another reason, one you deal with, alone, in your room after dark).

one night he's especially devious. you can hear the way his words curl in mischief, slipping out of his mouth and through the receiver, into your ears and straight down, between your thighs. the aching is bad tonight, made worse by the way you can't help but rub them together, wriggling to ease the tension.

"you know," he growls down the phone, voice crackling and gruff, "I'll live with you not wanting to have sex with me, if..."

"if what, Eds?" you're playing coy on purpose, trying hard to get him going, because even though it was you who decided sleeping with your best friend would be a bad idea, you think that it's probably also you who wants it the most.

you hear him groan at the nickname and the sweet cadence of your voice.

"how 'bout when I visit, next week, we try everything but."

he catches you off guard and it requires all your strength not to moan into the phone.

twirling the cord around your index finger, you prod the beast. "what d'you mean?"

"y'know, all the kinky shit, just without the sex. ropes, cuffs, candlewax, whipped cream. the works."

this pulls the moan out of you like a fish on a line. you hear the way his breath picks up, and spend the next week thinking about the suspicious rustling of denim you heard before he bid you good night softly, as he always does, and hung up on you.

six days later, after he's set up camp on your bedroom floor knowing all too well he won't be sleeping there, he's got you on your bed, stripped down to your mismatched cotton underwear. there are ropes tied in pretty knots up your back, holding your fists and feet in place by your ass. you're on your knees and he's standing over you, shirtless in just his jeans, dripping wax wherever he pleases. each drop rolls a short distance: down the dip of your collarbone, between your tits, across your stomach.

the three rules you made - no sex, no kissing, no mouths anywhere - were apparently made to be broken because, before you can protest, he's biting a bruise into your shoulder. with his mouth by your ear, breath hot and skin tacky, he says: "good girl."

[possessingtheproperspirit]

Hellooo Cer, BTS for the way you left me and heart of glass and Time After Time for about 5 years after the end of FMN ❤️💕 please and thank you so much !! Xx

Kit <3333 thanks for sending this!! I'm going to answer this in two parts, because that's the sort of rebel that I am 🤘

BTS for the way you left me / heart of glass first of all, under the cut...

Okay, for the way you left me I chose the scene at James and Remus' birthday party, because ouch. I mean, the whole thing is ouch, isn't it, but there was something about this scene in particular that when I thought of it, I was a bit gleeful about getting to dig into the hurt.

It was important for me throughout the fic not to have James be this bitter, hateful ex - not least because that's just not his character, but also because I didn't see the fun in that. Isn't it much more painful for everyone involved if he's trying his bloody best to be okay with the woman he loves, standing there with someone else's arm around her? The way he can't quite look away from Ed's hand on her hip, and she knows it, feels hyper aware of everyone's attention on them: Sirius and Remus a bit on edge, perhaps, waiting for the fallout; James trying not to react in any way; Lily trying to hold herself together. Ed is a bit clueless in this scene, he's not trying to rub it in James' face, he just doesn't know how hard it is for Lily because she hasn't talked about it.

I have a few favourite bits from this scene:

foreshadowing as Ed says "beginning to wonder if I'll ever see you in a white dress, Lil" - you poor thing, Ed, you have no idea

the idea of Sirius helping James out with his workout regime, and the line "body by Pads"

that ultimately, it's Mary who goes after her when she makes her escape; James knows he can't, and Ed doesn't realise he needs to

Meanwhile, over in heart of glass...

My favourite scene has to be the one at the hospital, James telling Lily he's 'graduated' from the memory ward. It wasn't in my original plan, this scene, but I felt like it needed something more between them before we see them together again - an addition to the gentle reforming of their relationship, a bridge between James finding out she's not engaged anymore (which, by the way, it felt important not to have her tell him, but for him to sort of figure it out himself and ask Remus for confirmation) and them finally back together.

James had been feeling hopeful again earlier in the story, feeling like he was mending, and this is a continuation of that. He can also finally see that she feels hopeful too - he can read her like a book, read her long silence as she takes in the fact that they won't have an excuse to see each other around the hospital anymore. He offers up a new excuse, the pub night, knowing they both need it, this final push that will get them back to being a fixture in each other's lives.

A few favourite bits from this scene:

that James insisted on a graduating certificate, and that the doctor had lovely penmanship

this line: '...combined with the distance in her eyes, as if she were already calculating the time they wouldn’t spend together from now on and felt the hours stack up, relentless and empty'

he wants her to know it's not just because buy one get one free makes more sense with four people than it does with three; it's important to him that she knows that

two for one fish and chips - hello, that's an incredible offer

[rjzimmerman]

The moose did not eat my family (Washington Post Op-Ed)

There are hundreds of moose, grizzly bears and black bears in Denali National Park, but given that the park covers 9,492 square miles, the likelihood of encountering a moose or bear is pretty low, according to the National Park Service. The sparse distribution isn’t a result of hunting or disease; it just takes a lot of land to provide enough food and habitat for such massive mammals.

I’m with my family on a summer vacation, including a roughly 40-mile bus tour into Denali National Park. The scenery is spectacular, and, as our guide suggests, maybe it’s just as well not to get our hopes up about seeing a moose or bear, because our visit has coincided with the time of year those animals are typically in an aggressive mood.

Apparently, the bears like to eat moose calves, and right around early June, the surviving calves become fast enough to evade the bears, leaving the bears hangry. Moose mothers, having lost a significant portion of their young, can also be bad-tempered by the time June rolls around.

Moose aren’t carnivorous, but they’ll charge at, kick or stomp anything they deem a threat. If you encounter a bear (a real one, not just an internet meme), you have several self-preservation options — try to make yourself as big as possible, create a lot of noise or play dead. With a threatening moose, the advice from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game is “run and get behind something solid, like a tree.” Our guide says that, just the week before, she and her dog encountered an agitated, massive moose — they can weigh well over 1,000 pounds — and eventually had to hide in a neighbor’s greenhouse.

Believe it or not, the fish and game department warns that more people in the state are injured by moose than by bears each year. In Alaska, moose outnumber bears 3 to 1, and they injure between five and 10 people annually, mostly in vehicle accidents. That’s more than grizzly bear and black bear attacks combined; thankfully, most people have the good sense to keep away from bears.

On the bus tour, we technically see Dall sheep and a golden eagle. I say “technically” because to the naked eye, they’re specks in the far distance, although our guide has a video camera with an impressive magnifying lens. We also see a fox, but big deal — in our neighborhood in Fairfax County, foxes are so commonplace that they snatch hot dogs off under-supervised backyard grills.

My wife and two teenagers are itching to get out and experience stretches of Denali on foot, so we get off the bus. We’re about two-thirds of the way up the Mount Healy Overlook Trail when my younger teenager announces he needs to pee. I figure I’d better not let him get out of sight — not a matter of precognition so much as thinking it’s best to keep an eye on anyone who goes off a trail in the wild. The ground is soft and spongy, because of the permafrost, absorbing the sound of footsteps.

And then, a few moments after my son begins his business, I see it, about 40 feet away and moseying in our direction: a moose. Or, as some people apparently call it, a “murder horse.” It has no antlers, so it looks like the Black Stallion on a rigorous steroid regimen.

We’re no more than 20 feet off the trail, have been off it for barely a minute and, despite the long odds, have just run into wildlife that absolutely dwarfs me, and I’m 6-foot-2. I can’t tell whether this is a female moose (I guess the absence of antlers means it is), and thus more likely to be dangerous at this time of year. It doesn’t seem agitated or angry, but I’m not a moose psychologist.

Now, before our guide’s moose-awareness talk, I would have been more fascinated than worried, and probably cracking Bullwinkle jokes. But now I know my family and I are having a close encounter with an animal that our guide — someone who’s also run into grizzly bears several times — seemed genuinely worried about.

I call out to my family, my voice about one octave higher than usual. It’s less primal fear than a sudden, intense realization that I cannot control what happens next, and the odds of an angry-moose incident are suddenly greater than zero.

My son and I retreat to the trail. Our massive moose friend comes out, too, and then turns down the trail, headed toward the four of us. It doesn’t seem angry, but it is clearly aware — and not the least bit intimidated.

[adzeisval]

A Curse is a Curse

Chapter 5: Consequences. Izzy learns another rule. Also on AO3. Check out my curse is a curse tag for previous chapters here on tumblr.

Izzy looked at the sky and watched as the clouds didn’t move. Dreaming. He was dreaming. He didn’t know what awaited him in the dream and wasn’t exactly sure what he was going to try to do. 

He’d been trying to save Ed in any way he could think of but in every dream Ed did something and he died. Or in some of the dreams Izzy himself died in an attempt to save Ed. Or Ed killed the crew. Nothing Izzy did seemed to make any sense. 

There was one thing he hadn’t tried that he didn’t want to try. He hadn’t tried to kill Ed. It couldn’t be what he was supposed to do but he had to test everything. And he had seen Ed die in dream after dream and he knew it was a dream. 

Izzy looked at the sky again. Nothing was moving. 

Ed was standing at the wheel looking off into the distance with a frown on his face. Izzy had a loaded pistol and his sword of course. He didn’t know if he could use either on Ed. Izzy needed to rule it out  though. 

Ed shifted at the wheel and from where Izzy was at he could easily shoot Ed in the head or chest. Izzy’s aim was excellent; it would be easy to shoot Ed through the heart. Izzy didn’t want to…he’d already seen…

Izzy took a shaky breath and looked at the sky yet again. He was dreaming, he was certain. He raised the pistol with a shaking hand. 

Just a dream. 

Izzy fired. Ed went down. Izzy thought he might vomit but he went toward Ed anyway. Ed was taking shallow gasps of air as blood poured from his chest. Izzy knelt and took Ed’s hand. 

“I’m sorry Eddie,” he said. 

Izzy stood as soon as Ed was dead. He waited for something, a sign of some sort and when none came he sighed in relief. He wasn’t supposed to kill Ed. 

“Izzy what the fuck.” 

Izzy looked down at the crew, Ivan and Fang looked about ready to kill him. Well he supposed it might as well happen, once he was dead in the dream he would wake up in reality. 

“It needed to be done,” Izzy said and the words felt horrible coming from his mouth. 

“Why?” Fang asked, close to tears. 

“I…I don’t know,” Izzy said. 

“Well that’s what you need to figure out, boss,” Fang said. 

“Figure out why I would kill Ed?” Izzy said. 

“Figure out why you’d turn on him,” Fang said. 

“I don’t think I would,” Izzy said. The crew looked a bit disappointed and for a few moments no one did anything. 

“Well I suppose for now we have to kill you,” Fang said. 

Izzy walked down and stood with the crew around him. He just wanted the dream over and didn’t care how painful it was to get out.  

The crew beat him to death and he woke up. 

Another day, another raid and sometimes it was only looking up at the moving sky that made Izzy certain he wasn’t having a nightmare. 

Izzy was in the store room taking stock of all they took. Plenty of treasure and not enough food but they would make do. 

“I think we might be able to take two ships tomorrow,” Ed said. Izzy somehow managed not to jump and turned around to face Ed. 

“Sure,” he said. 

“You don’t sound excited, I thought this was what you wanted, Izzy.” 

“I…I don’t know anymore,” Izzy said. 

“You serve Blackbeard you said.” 

“I will do my job,” Izzy said, “Speaking of I need to dump some of this bad meat over or have Fang go fishing with it.” 

“Some of it might do,” Ed said. 

Izzy shook his head, “I’m not giving this rot to the crew. We can make do.” 

“Refusing an order?” 

“Oh fuck off Ed, that’s not an order,” Izzy said. He pushed past Ed to leave the situation before he blew up. He didn’t want to deal with the aftermath of that. He’d wait until Ed was busy doing something else and dump the gross food over. 

He did just that and went about his day. He had a few repairs to make and everything seemed to be going well, as well as it could under the circumstances. 

In the evening Ed called Izzy to the Cabin and Izzy figured it was about the planned double raid the next day.

“Izzy.” Ed looked a bit…blank. Not angry per say but not very present. Izzy didn’t want to upset him. He didn’t want to get into a fight. He just wanted to go to bed really but he didn’t want the dreams. 

“What can I do for you Captain?” Izzy said.

“I thought we had an understanding Izzy,” Ed said. 

“We do.” 

Ed shook his head, “You didn’t follow my orders. Disobedience is a threat.” 

“It is also my duty to protect the crew. Feeding them rotten food before a double raid is a good way to get people killed,” Izzy said, “Including you and me.” 

Ed sighed, “Take off your boot Izzy.” 

“What…” Ed couldn’t mean…this wasn’t a dream, he knew it wasn’t a dream. He’d thought that Ed wouldn’t…

As Izzy stood frozen and confused Ed got up, knife in hand and attacked. Izzy fought back for a few moments but once Ed got the boot off Izzy knew it was no good. Ed made quick work of Izzy’s toe. Izzy cried out in pain and tried to wiggle away from Ed but soon found Ed holding the toe in front of his face. 

Izzy choked it down and once that was done Ed stood up and went back around the table to sit. 

Izzy sat up and cupped his hand over the bleeding stump. He tried to keep quiet and look steadily at Ed. 

“Captain?” 

“You’re dismissed,” Ed said. Izzy nodded. He got up and managed, somehow, to get his boot back on and limp out of the cabin. 

He could feel blood filling the boot and wanted to get to his room right away. He met Ivan just before he went below deck. 

“You alright Izzy? Thought I heard you scream,” Ivan looked down at his foot. 

“I…I’ll be alright,” Izzy said. 

“Seem kinda messed up lately mate.” 

“I…nightmares,” Izzy admitted, “I…something happened and I feel like I’m getting them for a reason. I am getting them for a reason.” Izzy kind of felt stupid for saying it outloud, but he also felt a little relieved at the same time.  

“I’m sorry mate,” Ivan said, “Just, I know you can figure it out right? You’re a tough bastard and we’re all in this together.” 

“Thanks Ivan,” Izzy said. He wanted to talk a little more but his boot was filling with blood and he needed to take care of his wound. He took his boot off and looked at the bloody mess. He was going to have to wrap it so that he could wear his boot the next day for the double raid. 

Izzy groaned in pain as he wrapped the stump. He wanted to drink and pass out but he was quite certain the dreams were not going to spare him because he was hurt. 

Izzy looked at the unmoving clouds and sighed. Dreaming again. And fuck him if his foot didn’t hurt even in the dream because of course it did. Why wouldn’t it? Fuck. 

“That was a wrong move Izzy.” 

“What was a wrong move,” Izzy said. 

“Telling Ivan about the whole situation,” Ed said. Izzy wanted to tell Ed just to tell him straight what he meant but it wasn’t really Ed was it? It was the bracelet or the curse or whatever that was speaking through Ed in the nightmares. Fucking stupid, it was all so stupid but Izzy couldn’t deny it was happening. 

“I’m not sure Ivan really believes it, and it’s not like he can really help me with it can he?” Izzy said. 

“This is yours to figure out Izzy,” Ed said. 

“Fine. I won’t say another word.” 

“Too late,” Ed said and promptly shot Izzy in the head. 

Izzy woke up and groaned. Well at least the nightmare had been fucking brief. It was still early, not quite dawn but Izzy wasn’t going to be able to get back to sleep. Not with his foot throbbing the way it was. He was going to be lucky if the damn thing didn’t get him killed. 

The first raid went well, but left Izzy feeling a bit shaky and his foot throbbing in pain so bad he could barely hide it. He didn’t want to draw attention to himself, didn’t want the crew turning on him for being weak. Didn’t want Ed to decide to just get rid of him. 

Was that what Ed wanted? To get rid of Izzy, to kill him? Fuck Izzy didn’t know anything anymore. 

As the crew was storing the treasure, with once again not enough fucking food, Izzy went to his room to deal with his foot. He poured blood out of his boot and rewrapped it. 

The second ship was well guarded and Izzy had a bad feeling about the whole thing. He looked around the crew. They were tired, they were all tired. 

Izzy jumped on board the ship and started fighting. Instinct took over at first as he tried to ignore his aching foot but then everything just blended together. 

Izzy heard a shot and then Ivan crying out in pain. Izzy turned to see Ivan fall clutching his arm as a soldier tossed a pistol aside. Izzy made for Ivan, moving as fast as he could with his foot the way it was. 

The soldier pulled out another pistol.

Izzy was almost there. 

Ivan tried to get up but slipped a little. 

Izzy was so close. So close. He landed wrong on his foot and saw stars as pain ran all the way up his spine. He stumbled. He tried to recover, tried to get his sword in the right spot to cut the soldier’s hand off before he could…

Too late.

The soldier fired and Ivan collapsed. Izzy ran the soldier through and shoved him to the ground where Izzy slit his throat for good measure. 

Izzy crashed down beside Ivan and surveyed the damage. The soldier had good aim, blood was pouring from Ivan’s chest. Ivan was struggling to breathe, choking on blood. 

“Fuck,” Izzy put his hand under Ivan’s shoulders and lifted him slightly hoping to ease his breathing just a little. There wasn’t anything else to do. It was a fatal wound. 

Ivan was still semi conscious and looked up at Izzy. 

“I’ve got you Ivan,” Izzy said. 

The fight was dying down around them so Izzy could focus on Ivan. He just wanted to make sure that Ivan knew he wasn’t alone. Thankfully it didn’t take long. Izzy kept hold of Ivan even after he’d gone limp in his arms. 

Izzy remembered the previous night’s dream. How the dream had told him telling Ivan was a mistake. And now Ivan was dead. 

Izzy had been trying to figure out the dreams, mostly to get them to stop, and to save Ed and the crew, but now it seemed there were further consequences to the whole fucking thing.

[daryl-dixon-daydreams]

Words: 3,753 Pairing: Daryl Dixon x Reader Reader pronouns: she/her Era: the quarry Warnings: language, alcohol, intoxication Summary: After a birthday celebration the night before, Y/N notices the archer is acting particularly icy toward her. A/N: This came out a bit different than I thought it would, but I hope you will all love it! Also, fun to write "good" Shane before he starts the downward spiral.

Your name: submit What is this?

You woke up with your head absolutely pounding. Sunlight was just striking the left side of the tent and beginning to warm the light to gold—wait a minute. This wasn’t your tent. You were looking up at sky blue synthetic walls and your tent was green. You pushed yourself up in a sitting position. Any movement and your heart throbbed, not to mention the somewhat queasy feeling in your stomach. Ugh… last night was a bad idea. Why had you drank so much? You blamed Rick and Shane.

It was your birthday the day before and as such, your brother Rick and of course Shane, who you’d known since you were all kids, had insisted on having as best a celebration as one can have in a zombie apocalypse. A fish fry and carefully procured jugs of moonshine put everyone in a good mood. Shane apparently thought it would be hilarious to continuously make small speeches and repeatedly have everyone lift their glass to you, resulting in endless “Cheers!” accompanied with shots of moonshine. And soon you were entirely too drunk. You hadn’t even had a chance to open anything from the small but respectable pile of assembled presents everyone had gathered for you. They were charmingly wrapped in bits of newspaper and burlap and you’d been curious as to what the heck could be in them…

The party had continued quite late and you couldn’t really remember going to bed. You vaguely remembered looking up at the night sky from the flat of your back on top of Dale’s RV. The stars were spinning and so was your head. Someone had helped you climb down.

You also had a vague recollection of some argument between two of the men. Ed and Shane? No… Shane and Rick? That didn’t seem right either. You clutched a hand to your head and glanced around at the unfamiliar tent and bedding. There was an olive-green duffel bag in one corner and “WALSH” was embroidered on it.

Oh. Okay, you were in Shane’s tent. You stretched and sighed, glancing down and seeing that you were still fully dressed in your clothes from the day before. Your boots were sitting side by side near the tent entrance. It must have been easier to put you to bed here rather than try to get you all the way to the other side of camp in the dark. Your tent sat down at the far end, closer to the Daryl and Merle’s small makeshift camp at the edge of the tree line.

You pulled on your boots, shivering a little as you left the blankets behind. You unzipped the tent flap and looked out into the morning light. Camp was still quiet and you ran your fingers over your hair to smooth it down. You drew in deep lungfuls of fresh air. It seemed to quell the churning of your stomach. But you needed something to eat and some damn water ASAP. You stepped outside and were zipping up the tent when you heard the sound of boots on gravel. You looked up to see the back of Daryl’s broad shoulders. He had his bow in hand like usual but seemed to be in some hurry, moving away from you through the maze of tents and campfire rings.

You watched him disappear into the distance and then started making your way over to the water jug. You searched out and filled a cup that had previously been filled with moonshine, gagging a little at the smell and dumping the contents out on the ground before rinsing it clean and filling it to the brim. You were downing your second glass of water when you looked up to see Shane heading your way. He gave you a wide smirk when you caught his eyes.

“You’re up in the land of the living. I wasn’t expecting you to be conscious until this afternoon,” he said with surprise. “You didn’t puke in my tent, did you?” he joked.

“Ugh. Don’t say ‘puke’. And if I did, it would be mostly your fault,” you said. “Why did you make me drink so much?”

Shane leaned back on the RV and shook his head at you. “Make you? Nobody made you do anything,” he drawled. “You were having a hell of a good time until Merle started making passes at you.”

You squinted at him and strained your brain. “Ohhh yeeeeah…I kind of remember him trying to get handsy now that you say that. Is that who had an argument? Merle and someone?”

Shane nodded. “Yep. I got into it with him after I saw him trying to wrap his arm around you. His hand was on your hip but I don’t think he planned on keeping it there very long.”

You put a hand up to your face and sighed. “Ugh. Thanks for that…”

“Of course. You were wasted. Wasn’t long after that I just put ya to bed in my tent. Rick was grateful. He was worried about you getting into trouble,” Shane said with a laugh, his expression lightening.

You rolled your eyes. “Thanks. He’s always worried about me getting into trouble.”

“Hell of a birthday party for an apocalypse,” Shane said and you nodded before downing some more water. “I think your presents are still in the RV. You’ll have to wait until Dale is up.”

“No rush,” you said. “I feel like crap. I’m gonna get something to eat in hopes this hangover eases up.”

Shane chuckled at your expense and you thanked him again and waved before heading back toward your own tent. You were about to duck inside when you caught another glimpse of Daryl, this time emerging from the woods with a couple squirrels on his game stringer. You caught his eyes and gave him a small smile, but he seemed to just duck his head and continue on his way. You tried not to feel hurt by being brushed off—sometimes Daryl was difficult to read. He hadn’t hung around long the night before. Almost as soon as people had started to get a little boisterous you’d noticed that he’d slipped away. You had felt a little hurt about that… you’d been hoping to spend some more time with the handsome archer. You always felt drawn to him and had definitely felt sparks of attraction on a few occasions. But you also knew that Daryl was a bit of a loner and he definitely wasn’t a fan of Shane, who had been in rare form the night before.

You slipped into your tent and pulled on some clean clothes before washing your face and dragging a comb through your hair. You checked your reflection in a cracked mirror you kept in your bag and sighed. You looked tired and your eyes were definitely a little puffy. Ugh. Stupid… Again, why did I drink so much? Well, admittedly, it was nice to have a bit of normalcy for a while and just forget about the current state of the world.

You stepped back outside and saw a thin column of smoke rising from the fire circle by Daryl and Merle’s tents. You wandered over, shoving your hands in your pockets, and found Daryl sitting on an upturned log, starting to clean the squirrels he’d just returned with. The fire was burning low, freshly stoked with a few sticks, set on a thick bed of coals. He glanced up at you as you stepped close to the fire and warmed your fingers but his blue eyes immediately returned to his task and he stayed quiet.

You bit your bottom lip a little nervously and took a seat on a camp chair nearby. “Hey,” you greeted him softly. His eyes flickered up to you for a moment and back down again. “I—I missed you last night. At the party, I mean,” you explained, feeling a little heat rise in your chest.

“Hmm,” he hummed in acknowledgement. “Didn’t seem like it,” he drawled. He flicked a bit of fur from the knife he was using to skin the squirrels.

You gulped. His tone was a bit tense and you wondered if he was pissed off that you’d all been so loud. “Well, I did,” you said in mild confusion. “I’m sorry if we were a bit much. Things got a little ridiculous with the booze,” you laughed a little wryly. “I’m definitely regretting drinking so much this morning.”

Daryl froze for a moment, his hands stilling over the carcass in front of him. You thought you saw the muscle in his jaw tense as he ground his teeth together. But he simply lifted the next catch and began to clean it. “Regret it?” he drawled. There was an extra gruff quality to his voice. “Ya seem like ya were plenty well taken care of.”

You gave him a puzzled look, your brow drawing low over your eyes. His tone was so different from usual, and you couldn’t get past the fact that he wouldn’t look at you.

“I mean, shit—” he punctuated the phrase with a sharp flick of his knife. That flinty edge of his voice was still pronounced and you felt like it was cutting into you. “—Shane couldn’t keep his damn eyes or hands off ya. And ya certainly seemed… fine.”

You heart started to race a little faster. You felt your mouth drop slightly open and the lines between your eyebrows deepened as you stared at him. “What?”

He finally looked up at you and his eyes were narrowed and sharp. He stared at you for a long moment and the air between the two of you felt heavy and thick, despite the fact that it was still cool and the dew had yet to evaporate from the grass. He finally tore his eyes away from your face, leaving you more confused than ever and seemingly without a breath in your lungs. “I saw ya. Comin’ outta Shane’s tent this mornin’. In the same clothes ya were wearin’ last night. Like I said,” he drawled, getting up abruptly and grabbing the remaining squirrels yet to be cleaned, “seems like ya were plenty well taken care of.” But this time you heard something else in his voice; hurt and vulnerability.

“Daryl—” But he was already disappearing again, leaving you standing there confused and a little flabbergasted that he seemingly believed you’d fucked Shane and furthermore, he seemed not only pissed but hurt about it. You were frozen for a moment, just staring at the spot where he’d disappeared. You actually weren’t really sure how long you’d been standing there but someone touching your shoulder snapped you out of it. You jumped and let out an embarrassing squeak of surprise, only to turn and see your brother laughing at your reaction and giving you a kind smile.

“Hey,” he said with a grin. “How’re you feelin’? Shane said you were hungover as hell. I’m not surprised with the way you tied one on last night.”

You rolled your eyes at him and crossed your arms over yourself. “Yeah, like you weren’t encouraging Shane by laughing at every fucking thing he did. You’re part to blame for this!” you said, pointing a vehement finger in his face.

He held his hands up defensively. “Take it easy,” he said with a laugh. “I just wanted to come tell you that we’ve got some breakfast ready. You better eat something.”

You nodded vaguely but found yourself glancing back over your shoulder, eyes scanning the trees for Daryl again.

“Hey,” Rick said, gently grabbing your shoulder again. “Everything okay?”

You tried to snap yourself out of it. “Yeah. Yeah, fine. Let’s go eat,” you said, conceding as Rick affectionately draped an arm over your shoulder and led you back to where some of the others were now stirring. Breakfast came and went. You weren’t the only one hungover and together you all quietly nursed your headaches with some leftover fried fish and biscuits Carol had made in the big cast iron skillet. You found yourself distracted though, constantly looking for the archer to show up back at camp, when you realized Lori was trying to get your attention.

“Geez,” she laughed, her arms full of the presents that had been stashed in the RV. “You are hungover,” she teased you. “Come on. Open your presents.”

You gave her a smile and accepted the packages. A new multitool from Shane. Fishing lures from Andrea and Amy. A warm flannel-lined jacket from Lori and Rick. You were genuinely grateful, but your buoyant mood was damped by the earlier encounter with Daryl. Later that day, when the sun was climbing to its apex in the sky, you finally caught sight of him having some small argument with Merle at the other end of camp and you made up your mind to go set the record straight.

The arguing stopped as Merle caught sight of you approaching over Daryl’s shoulder and his attention fixed on you. “Well, look who it is. The birthday girl! Didn’t get enough last night, darlin’? Come to see ol’ Merle to put the icing on that cake for you?”

Daryl spun and looked straight at you as your face contorted in distaste at his brother’s words. “Merle, shut the fuck up!” Daryl growled at him. He glanced back at you, clearly wondering why you were standing there.

“Daryl, can I talk to you?”

Merle whistled and let out a loud laugh. “Well, I did not see that comin’! You got a thing for little Darylina?” You shot him a glare before Daryl shoved him hard in the chest. Merle stumbled backwards, still laughing and finally drifted away.

You gulped and moved closer to the archer, a little unsure how to begin. God, this was fucking awkward.

“What?” Daryl prodded you. You caught his blue eyes again. Better just to dive in…

“You—you think I slept with Shane?” you said. Daryl looked struck by the bluntness of your question. “That’s what you meant earlier, isn’t it? You think I had sex with Shane.”

Daryl stared at you for a moment and then ducked his head, chewing on his bottom lip in apparent agitation. His blue eyes lifted again to meet yours. “I know what I saw,” he drawled. He sounded vulnerable again. His tone had softened.

You crossed your arms and cocked your head a little, unable to prevent yourself from staring at him in frustration. “You saw me come out of Shane’s tent. And you think you saw him… all over me last night?” You rolled your eyes. “I was drunk and rather than try to corral or carry me all the way back over here last night in the fucking dark, Shane put me to sleep in his tent. Alone. I don’t know where he slept but I’m guessing he crashed in my tent.” The muscle in Daryl’s jaw twitched. “Look, I’ve known Shane since Rick and I were kids. We grew up together. He’s more like an older brother than anything. He’s always been protective of me. There is nothing going on between Shane and I. I just—wanted to set that straight.”

Daryl shifted a little anxiously and seemed at a loss for what to say for a moment. “Why? Why do you give a shit what I think? Ain’t nothin’.”

You felt your cheeks grow a little warm. “I don’t want you reading that situation wrong. I’m not interested in Shane. He was just looking out for me.” You wanted to confess right then that you were interested in him, but your reservoir of courage seemed to have dried up just from the walk over.

Daryl considered you again for a long moment before he ducked his head and nodded. “Alrigh’. ‘M sorry for bein’ a dick. Ain’t none of my damn business anyway. I—” he broke off suddenly and nestled his thumbnail in between his teeth, chewing on it nervously for a moment while he was gathering his thoughts. “Can ya just wait here a second?”

“Yeah,” you nodded. You watched curiously as he disappeared into his tent and returned with two small packages in hand, each wrapped tightly in some wrinkled brown paper.

He held them out to you and you gave him a questioning look. “Happy birthday,” he drawled. He looked suddenly boyish and bashful. You accepted the packages with surprise and a smile grew on your face, lighting it up to the corners of your eyes.

“You got me birthday presents”

He nodded. “Yeah, uhh—I was gonna give them to ya last night but ya were busy with everybody and—I dunno,” he trailed off.

You cocked your head at him. “I’m never too busy for you, Daryl.” You looked back down at the gifts. “Thank you. You really didn’t need to do this.”

He rubbed his hand nervously over the back of his neck and hummed a noise of acknowledgement.

“Can I open them?”

He shot you an amused look. “No, keep ‘em wrapped up forever.” You smirked at him and one corner of his mouth twitched up. “Yeah. Duh. Go on.”

You grinned at him and tore into the first package. There was a flimsy cardboard box inside and when you lifted the top your eyes landed on a combat knife, the blade sharpened to perfection on what you guessed was probably his whetstone. This was so Daryl. Practical and thoughtful.

“I know ya lost yer other one, like yer always losin’ shit, and nobody should be without a knife these days. A badass like ya should have a badass knife,” he drawled. You thought his ears had turned a deeper shade of red and your smile widened.

“I don’t know about badass,” you laughed, “but I will definitely keep this on me at all times. It’s perfect. Thank you.” He waved you off before tilting his head at the other yet unopened package in your hand.

“This one is—well, it’s—” He shrugged. “Well, you’ll see. It’s different. Just open it.”

You gave him a curious look and finished snapping your new knife into its sheath before you broke the paper on the second gift. It was a rather small box and you were really struggling to think of anything that tiny that Daryl would give you, so you eagerly lifted the lid and your lips fell open. It was a delicate silver chain and you knew just what it was for. You were positive your eyes were a bit round as they met Daryl’s again… and probably a bit glassy.

He seemed frozen for a second with you looking at him like that, the chain dangling from your graceful fingertips. “I noticed ya used to wear that locket all the time—with them pictures of yer folks in it… and, uhh, then I noticed ya weren’t wearin’ it no more. I asked Lori about it and she said the chain broke. So. I just… looked for one. In Atlanta.” He shifted his weight anxiously, trying to decode what was going on behind your wide eyes.

“You noticed that?”

He gave you a weird look. “O’ course I noticed that.” He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

You ran the delicate silver through your fingers again, fighting the lump of emotion in your throat. “Daryl, I don’t even know what to say.”

He shrugged. “Ya ain’t gotta say anything.” He memorized your expression for a long moment. He called to mind how fucking angry he’d been when he saw you leaving Shane’s tent, thinking Shane had taken advantage of you being drunk, thinking he’d waited too fucking long to tell you how he felt, that he’d missed his opportunity. He wasn’t mad at you. He was mad at himself. He knew how goddamn good you were; charming, smart, funny, caring, and not bad to have around in a fight. Not to mention how his heart jumped when he met your stunning eyes and watched your lips curve in a smile or a laugh. You were beautiful. You didn’t seem to fit with the ugliness of this world now. Of course someone else wanted you.

But now he felt like a death row prisoner who’d gotten a stay of execution, and he was goddamn sure-as-shit not gonna waste it. He found his voice somehow.

“You’re way too good for Shane,” he said suddenly. “And I know it ain’t like that… but ‘m just sayin’.” He hesitated, his heart pounding. He pushed a hand back through his hair anxiously. “Hell, you’re too good for me…” he murmured. “And I know the timing bites, everything goin’ to shit, but—"

He was stopped by your lips crashing against his and he almost stumbled back in surprise at first, but like some deep instinct, his arms drifted around you and pulled you in closer, and he kissed you back—a little hesitantly at first, his mind whirring with too many thoughts, and then more confidently, more hungrily, everything else going silent. When you broke the kiss and looked up into his blue eyes, he felt off-balance in a way he never had before. But in a good way.

“So, you, uhh—” he had to clear his throat because his voice came out a little strained, from disbelief or shock maybe. “You like the presents?” he said.

A laugh bubbled up and out of you and his heart jumped like it always did at the sound. “Uhh… Yeah. I like the presents. But—I like kissing you more. And if I’m allowed a belated birthday request, I’d like another one.” Daryl’s fingers tapped nervously on your lower back. “Now. Please,” you said with a widening smile.

Daryl was bewildered how he’d gone from wanting to punch a concrete wall to such unexpected heights so quickly, but hell yeah he was going to hang on to you as long as he could. He gladly granted you your request.

[lettersfrombeyondthegrave]

I think Oswald just refuses to use guns in most cases.

First, all the knives. boy got an obsession. I'm not even gonna mention the killing galavan political enemies rampage with a surgery knife bc I already said that, idk when but I did

He uses shotguns specifically, more than once if he finds one

Which is kind of... very theatric? Like showing off with that whole thing almost the same height as him

Like realistically speaking you're this kind of gangster type beat criminal, your opponents tends to be bigger in like size to you and stuff and yet you're determined to bring around blades in any shape or form Instead of a fucking gun, when shooting people from a distance is way safer then just trying to slice their neck

Then again, the times he uses shotguns. I think maybe a few times wee see him with one,once or twice, when him and his group are preparing to do something,

I can remember with no checking the first time he tries to kill galavan I think he had a shotgun but I'm not sure, then in the season 4 finale, the time he killed that old couple- which, they were in his club.

Like okay your retrieved the shotgun from earlier but you don't have a fucking pokemon inventory system, it's impossible there was no other weapon choice and shotguns, from what I heard, just... Make a mess. They can be pretty destructive, but they're not a very "clean" method. And having to clean that type of thing since you did it in your club- that's a hassle. Why would you do that if not for pure fucking enjoyment or theatrical touch or a bit of both.

There are few times he uses a gun, one time I think he takes if from barb hands and kills a random guy, there's the time a gun is involved before Ed becomes an ice cube but that was more part of the situation and maybe he used one a few other times I don't recall rn

Or

He just... Brings no other weapon. he literally brings nothing to a gun fight. Even if he perfectly knows there's gonna be one. He's like "my guys got guns" like it's not 100% sure they're gonna live and like, be able to protect you. Most fucking times they don't. Did he try to shoot fish in season one? I think he had a gun while following her but lost it? But I'm not even sure

Surely there's the space for at least a small one in all the pockets his intricate fancy dandy outfits got.

So I just think he refuses to use one for whatever fucking reason.

Like when he gets a literal fucking, guns and ammos factory he uses it to shot in the air and that's it. When he get the brace leg thingy he's like "put a knife in there" like okay I get it maybe in some circumstances somehow hiding a knife is better but

My point still stands. He actively refuses to use them if he can.

[championashley]

I've been thinking more about ofmd S2, and I realized that...I don’t think we ever found out what happened to Ed’s original ship. Ed took the Revenge as his own by the end of S1, but we don’t know what happened to the old one.

I think it would be a great idea that if for S2, Stede and everyone he picked up managed to find and captain Ed’s old ship, which would offer up LOADS of opportunities in story and character development.

we could get more backstory on Ed’s time as Blackbeard, maybe how he and Izzy met, help propel Stede’s arc in captaining a much more (from what little glimpses we’ve seen) conventional pirate ship making him once again a fish out of water, and will help Stede in fully understanding and accepting ALL parts of Ed, not just their similarities. and if things go smoothly, and when Ed and Stede inevitably fully get together, they can co-captain both ships. merging both the good and the bad of their lives. 

just think of the symbolism: Ed, right now trying his best to forget Stede, to think Stede doesn’t love him (cutting off toes even though Stede found the concept disgusting, getting rid of Stede’s things, taking the Revenge) all to put as much distance between each other as possible. because he thought Stede didn’t want him.

and yet...Stede, not just shows up, but on his original ship. which would mean that Stede now knows what he’s done, what he was like before him, all of the ugly terrible things he did and was like. and yet there he is, coming for HIM. 

im not asking for that to be the end of their potential conflict, for Ed to instantly forgive him if that were to happen. but in terms of coming to the table to talk, I can’t think of a better way to make an entrance then that. 

[bimsha]

All of Our Stars (Sano Manjiro x Reader)

"You're on the other side

As the skyline splits in two

Miles away from seeing you"

Song - All of Our Stars by Ed Sheeran

“And you all have to read the next pages…” The voice of your teacher droned in the background as he repeated the homework for which it felt like the trillionth time after starting the period. Your eyes wandered aimlessly along the Sakura trees which were bare against the melancholic nature surrounding them. Winter break was close at hand, nature was getting ready to welcome the coldness.

You collected your things as the bell rang snapping you off from your daydream. Students rushed out of the classroom, grateful that another exhausting school day was over. Everyone was getting ready for the upcoming exams which were close at hand. You didn’t care much about them. You’re a third year middle school student and everyone in the class was already choosing high schools while you knew you wouldn’t be able to choose yourself. It’s already chosen. You’re moving with your parents to America next year. Your mind was occupied with different thoughts as you took the stairs, finding your way through the crowd of students heading home.

Your eyes wandered to the gate when you noticed him standing there as usual, but he was in his casual attire, not the school uniform. “Skipped school today?” You asked, walking to Mikey. It had been a whole year since you two started dating. It was almost as if when you two are together, time accelerates. You could recall every precious memory like a vivid polaroid. Your first Christmas together, the games at the arcade, and the things you went through when the world of delinquents suddenly crashed into your safe bubble of love. It was beautiful. Every scar, every memory was beautiful.

He stood up straight, no welcoming smile. “You didn’t tell me, Y/n, Why?”

Your smile faded, he knew. You averted your gaze to the ground, absentmindedly poking the sole of your shoe against the ground. “I found out a couple of days ago. It was a sudden decision” You sighed, “So they say”

Mikey stared at you for a moment, “Y/n, what do you want to do?”

You shook your head. That was the question you had in your mind for days. What do you want to do? You didn’t have any idea whether long distance relationships actually worked. Sure, you could visit when it’s a holiday but what about the rest of the days? “C’mon” Mikey took your wrist, guiding you out of the school. You two walked in silence as he slipped his hand to yours, entangling your fingers. A small sign of reassurance. Mikey was good at subtle affectionate gestures. That’s how he loved you, subtle, but affectionate.

“Y/n” He rubbed his thumb across your skin, his eyes looking at the fallen leaves making a thick carpet of red and orange under your feet. “I don’t want to end this”

You smiled, it was obvious, neither did you. “Same here.”

He seemed to consider this for a moment. “We could try long distance.”

“I know…” Your voice trailed off, “But Mikey, what if you-” You stopped, the question was obvious. What if you find someone else? Someone better? You shook your head, “I don’t know”

Mikey tipped his head backwards, looking at the blue sky, heavily covered with clouds. It would be a matter of weeks till snow starts to cover the streets. “I had the same thoughts.” He admitted, turning to you. Both of your fears were valid. Human hearts are fragile and needy. You didn’t know what the future held. “But” He started, “Then I thought of something else. Come, there’s something I have to show you.”

Suddenly, both of you were running across the streets, passing people who were busy with their phones and groceries. Cold wind brushed against your cheeks as you two dashed past annoyed people groaning about youngsters'' manners these days. You didn’t even know the destination until you both stopped in front of a wall filled with graffiti. You knew the place well. Mikey and you came here for your first date. Your eyes instantly reached the bottom corner where Mikey’s messy handwriting was. Written in black ink, contrasting against the patch of white was just one line:

“All of these stars will guide us home”

It was an inside joke between you two. A comfort song of sorts. “Remember here?” Mikey crouched down, his hands softly running over the words. Just underneath his messy writing was your own neat handwriting.

For you and me, and for a future with us together.

Just the first date, but both of you had high hopes for each other. It was rather naive to hope for a future when it had been mere days with you two together. It was precious nonetheless. “You screamed at me that day. Called me out on vandalizing the walls.” He smiled, reaching out a hand to you. You took it and sat down beside him, leaning against the wall, icy cold but holding a vague sense of comfort. This was the first place you two planted an icon of your love together.

“Then five minutes later, I was vandalizing the wall myself” You finished. “You’re such a bad influence, Mikey”

Mikey raised his brow, “I think you’re the bad influence, Y/n. I didn’t beat the crap out of guys with only my shoes.”

You huffed, offended. “First, they were trying to harass me. Second, my heels were the only good weapon I had in my hand. Third, those guys were crap at fighting.”

Mikey shook his head with a laugh, “When I came to the scene, it was all over. I wanted to play the knight who saved the princess, but you didn’t let me.”

You nudged his ribs, “You played the knight several times, Mikey.”

He turned to you. You breath catching against your throat as he reaches for your hair, tucking a stray hair behind your ear. You could feel his breath against your cheek as he held you in his arms, clutching to you as if you were his lifeline. You didn’t blame him. He lost so many people in his life, you knew how much he loved the people around him. Toman wasn’t his treasure. The people in the gang were his treasure. “Where to, next?” You asked, your voice muffled against his black jacket.

He pushed away, “To a certain street sweet shop”

Ah right, you thought as he started walking towards the busy streets of Shibuya. Both of you looked around, taking in the busy lifestyles around you. There was that feeling again, you were detached from the world when you’re with him. It was just him and you, and your hands brushing together as you walked by. You’re going to miss this. You stopped in front of the shop. The pleasant aroma of different types of street food caught your nose. Your mouth waters at the smell. This was the best shop.

Taiyaki sizzled loudly on pains, turning into a golden colour. Mikey’s eyes were firmly planted on them as he ordered two fish shaped cakes, handing one to you. “I will never get sick of this” He spoke through a mouthful of his own.

You kicked his shin playfully, biting into your own. The soft cake melts inside your mouth. “Of course you aren't going to. You stole mine one day!”

Ironically, it wouldn’t be wrong if someone said Taiyaki brought you two together. You two met at this shop. He with his delinquent friends crowded around him, you with your school squad with you. It was a summer evening and there was only one Taiyaki left. You ordered first, but he being the spoiled brat, took it from the man, dropped some coins and dashed out of the shop. You would’ve let it go, but it was your Taiyaki. You dashed after him, ignoring the cries of your friends and the grins of his friends. You chased him down to the river bank where he stood, chomping down on the Taiyaki like a madman.

“I took it first and I paid for it.” He countered, snapping off your thoughts. “I own it, Y/n. I’m no stealer”

“No” You find yourself childishly arguing back, “I ordered it first. You stole it.”

“It’s not stealing when you pay for it.”

“And how are you coming to that conclusion?” You chomped down on your own Taiyaki furiously, getting drowned in crumbs as the crispy sweet crunched at your harsh actions.

“It’s a thing because I say so” Mikey grinned with satisfaction at his argument.

You frowned but kept chewing harshly, as if to offend him. It was a thing with Mikey, you can be childish and at the next moment you could act like mature adults. “You look like you want to bite my face off” He commented, finishing off his and dropping the paper slip into the trash bin.

“I’m afraid I would '' You countered, imitating his actions and looking dusting your hands. The crumbs fell to the floor.

“You’re a messy eater, Y/n” He said, reaching his hands and wiping the corner of your cheek, your eyes lingering against each other for a second longer. “Usually I’m the messy one. Good to have a change of roles” He dropped a kiss on your hair, nuzzling his nose on your head.

“You lovebirds are blocking the door!" the shop owner yelled. But the smile on his face was inevitable. They were regulars at his shop and he had seen both of them grow into lovers from rivals to friends.

“Sorry!” Mikey called out with a slight wave as they both exited the shop. It was like a walk down memory lane. From one thing to another. Shibuya was your love story. Everywhere were scattered memories of your love. “Remember that bench?” Mikey said, gesturing towards a metal bench under a bare Sakura tree.

“We shared my lunch together under that tree” You said, tilting your head as a slight flush reached your cheeks.

Mikey grinned, “You accidentally came to school on a Saturday.”

“Shut it” You huffed, marching to the opposite lane. You knew where you would end up if you just continued to walk. It was another place you made memories. The place you made most of your memories. Mikey skipped a few steps before reaching you.

The river bank was colder than you expected it to be. The wind rushed through your hair as you breathed in the cold air around you. Mikey sat down, patting the grass beside him for you to sit. You slid to the ground and drew your knees to your chest, looking out at the water, overlapping with waves in a soundless muttering. This is where you two came when you needed to talk. The time didn’t matter. You two had midnight talks with each other spilling the insecurities. Somedays, it was just to stay in silence. Nevertheless, this was your happy place. It was the same from all the dangers or reality. A place lost in time.

“Shibuya is going to be a nightmare after you leave” Mikey was laying on the grass, a hand dropped behind his head as he stared into nothingness. “Everywhere I go, it’s memories of you and me. Tiny specks of moments we shared.”

You hummed, “America is going to be even lonelier. No memories. Everything is going to be new and foriegn. Even the people. I’m kinda scared, maybe even terrified, Mikey”

He turned your head and stared at you, “I don’t want to break up, Y/n.”

It was getting dark, you noticed. The sun had already set through the horizons. The stars, one by one came into view, sliding away the darkness with a speck of comfort. The lamp posts on the streets glowed in a healthy yellow breaking through the black night. “Even if we’re going to be away, we’ll be staring at the same sky, watching the same stars each night.” You were talking nonsense, but you did not want to stop. “Mikey, let’s try. I don’t want to let you go either.”

His lips quirked upwards into a soft smile, “Yeah, we should try. You can always come home to me, Y/n. If things get tough out there, you always have a place right here” He said, tapping his finger against his heart. “Don’t be scared. Just be the badass girl you are, they’re going to be terrified”

You let out a surprised laugh, “Terrified enough to send me back home?”

He shrugged, “Worth a try” There was that, his childish tone you adore. You loved him for the man he is. The childish yet mature person. The one you can confide all your secrets to. The one who holds out his hand for you when things get tough. There was no way to let go. You were committed, both of you were. That was love for you. He sat down and turned to you. His dark eyes are watching you intently. “Call me?”

“Every night, I promise” You assured, taking his hands. “Wait for me, Mikey. I’ll be back. If you can wait-”

“I will wait.” He said, cutting you off. He drew closer to you, “There’s always a home with me for you. I promise”

You closed your eyes as you felt tears threatening against them. Love was a series of promises and words. It could be the simple moment you shared with him tonight under a sky filled with stars. For you, love was him and him alone. “I love you” your whispered words were carried by the wind into the night.

“I love you too, Y/n” He said, connecting your lips. Your lips danced together as he pulled you close. The world didn’t matter. His warm hold, cocooning you in mattered more. Your arms held him tightly, lips exploring each other’s warmth and comfort. When you pushed away he pressed his forehead against yours. “I’m going to miss this. I’m going to miss you, Y/n”

You nodded, unable to form words. You’re going to miss this. You’re going to miss him. Your universe. Your guidance to your place called home.

"But I can see the stars from America

I wonder, do you see them too?"

[lady-divine-writes]

Good Omens - A Corpse, Cake, and a Cuppa (Rated NC17)

Summary: Aziraphale is Death and Crowley is the serial killer who keeps murdering to catch a glimpse of the ethereal being he fell in love with. (1714 words)

Notes: Written for the above Halloween prompt from @new-endings/M.A.D.#8943. Human Crowley au. It’s kind of gory, I’m not going to lie.

Read on AO3.

“Jesus Christmas!" Aziraphale yelps, tiptoeing through the thick pool of red coagulating on the concrete. Threads of it cling to the soles of his shoes when he lifts his feet as if trying to drag him down. Aziraphale has seen a great deal of blood in his time. None of it has been pretty. But this is especially gruesome.

He wonders if that’s for his benefit.

"Look at... look at this! Look at all the… !” Aziraphale takes a pause and breathes in deep, pressing the thumb and forefinger of his right hand to his forehead. Tension causes a vein to distend and throb - quite the feat since, as a non-human entity, he shouldn't be able to experience this kind of pain. Or so he thought. In the thousands of years he's roamed earth reaping souls, he's finally found the one mortal who can give him what humans call a migraine. And he doesn't like it. Not one bit. “Could you please just… stop already?"

Crowley grins, thrilled giddy by the arrival of his intended audience. “No,” he replies, shoving the slicked head of his filthy ax deeper into the severed spine of the fresh corpse at his feet.

Aziraphale grimaces as the blade lands with a resounding slap. 

That ax of Crowley's gets on every one of Aziraphale's nerves. It's effective for its purpose but positively unsanitary. It makes his skin crawl every time he sees it.

Crowley lifts it slowly, eyes Aziraphale menacingly.

Eyes his nice, clean coat, Aziraphale realizes.

“Crowley!” he warns, putting both hands up in defense. “Don't you dare... !”

But Crowley doesn't let him finish, hoisting his ax higher with part of the dead man's torso attached. He doesn't need to do anything after that. The torso falls from the blade and splashes down in the pool, accomplishing what Crowley set out to do.

“Holy... GAH!” Aziraphale leaps back to avoid the spray. He frowns at his clothes when he sees he wasn't quick enough. "Look what you've done! You’ve made a mess of my coat!”

“Improved it, I’d say,” Crowley snarks. “Given it a pop of color.”

“I've had this coat for ages and hadn't collected a single stain! Not one! And look at your shoes! Ruined!" He gazes down at Crowley's feet in despair. "I actually liked that pair.”

“Really?" Crowley tilts his head, batting his eyes innocently. "You didn't tell me that.”

“Yes, well... " Aziraphale busies himself fishing a handkerchief out of his pocket. Praying he’s swift enough to save the fabric, he pats at the specks on his sleeve "... it’s not my place to tell a homicidal maniac that he looks fetching in snakeskin, is it?”

Crowley pouts, his lower lip jutting out, making him look comically childish despite the streaks of blood running down his cheeks. 

Aziraphale’s brows pull together. He glances around, trying to work out what's wrong. "What? What is it?"

"You're being mean."

"How am I being mean?"

"You're calling me names."

"Accurate ones, yes."

"You sound disappointed."

"You think so!?"

“B-but... but why? I took your advice!" Crowley argues. "I changed me m.o.!”

“I didn’t give you advice! I said you should stop killing innocent people!”

“I did! This guy?" Crowley plants the heel of his sopping shoe into the dead man's crooked neck for emphasis. "He weren’t innocent! He was a serial killer, too! He just happened to be shite at it!”

"I can see that." Aziraphale peers into the vacant eyes of the man on the ground, spirit buzzing beneath his skin, waiting to be reaped. But Aziraphale is in no rush. In the choice between filling out paperwork and shooting the shite with Crowley, surprisingly, he chooses Crowley. 

Or maybe not so surprising, Aziraphale muses, biting his lower lip and indulging in a private chuckle. He rolls his eyes in disgust at himself right after. What are you doing? Stop that!

"Besides, I'm doin' you a solid!" 

Aziraphale scoffs, snapping back to his senses. "How do you figure?"

"You're Death, ain't ya? I'm keeping you in business!"

"I don't know if you've read the papers lately, dear boy, but humans are dropping like flies thanks to their own stubbornness and stupidity. You're slap in the middle of one of the worst pandemics in history, but instead of doing what you can to stay safe, you lot spend your time arguing over petty b.s.! I won't wear a mask! It's against my rights! I'm not taking the vaccine! It'll make me sterile! There is no disease! It's all a big conspiracy! Meanwhile, in the states, some orange lunatic has everyone drinking bleach! Believe me, I hardly need your help doing my job!" 

“Oi! Don’t lump me in with those prats!”

“Why not? You’re not wearing a mask, I see.”

“Don’t have to. I got my shot. And I keep me distance.”

“But you’re covered in blood! Did that man you dismembered have the virus!? You don’t know!” Aziraphale cringes at words that sound far more like concern than scolding. Which he should be doing. Scolding and ridiculing, and possibly calling the police.

But he won’t.

If Crowley were thrown in prison, it would be harder for Aziraphale to find an excuse to see him. Aziraphale has yet to decide if that’s something he wants, but either way, he’d prefer it not be at the expense of another life.

"Fine. Whatever. If that's the way you feel about it... " Crowley grumbles, letting what remains of that statement die as embarrassment rises to his cheeks, settling beneath the red already there. He crosses his arms over his chest and turns his face away. 

Just like a child, Aziraphale thinks. 

And as with a child, Aziraphale should have nipped this in the bud much, much earlier - like when Crowley realized that he could summon Aziraphale whenever he wanted by upping the frequency of his murderous antics. 

This, to date, is his twenty-seventh kill.

Aziraphale doesn't know how Crowley spotted him. He's pretty adept at avoiding human detection. But after victim number eight, Aziraphale turned around, scythe in hand, and there he stood: tall, gangly, bizarrely besotted, dressed in black and wearing sunglasses at one in the morning. Aziraphale thought Crowley was a run-of-the-mill psychopath looking for attention, seeing Aziraphale as a hapless dolt to play cat-and-mouse with, not knowing for one second who he was dealing with.

Not only did Crowley know exactly who Aziraphale was, but he had taken a considerable shine to him.

Aziraphale humored the man when their paths crossed so he could get on with his work, never for one minute considering the consequences. Thinking back on their past interactions, Aziraphale can pick out the hints Crowley had been dropping.

Aziraphale played right into them, and he could kick himself over it.

"We have to stop meeting like this," Aziraphale quipped dryly after Crowley had beheaded some poor, down-on-his-luck fool. "I'm going to start thinking that you have a thing for me."

"Finally!" Crowley tossed his arms in the air. "At this rate, I was going to have to murder half of London and spell out the words ’Will you go out with me?’ with their bodies. Do you know how time-consuming that would have been?"

Aziraphale had written that comment off as a morbid attempt at humor. 

Now he feels like an imbecile.

He’s going to get an earful from Gabriel if he ever gets wind of this. Aziraphale has been able to cover up the increase in London deaths by blaming the pandemic. But once people get their acts together and things calm down, he’ll have to come clean.

There’s a serial killer roaming the streets that has a serious crush on him.

Aziraphale lets out a heavy sigh as he comes to a decision.

A bad decision.

He's going to regret this. He knows he's going to regret this. 

But will he really though?

Aziraphale looks Crowley over, still moping with his nose in the air. He examines him at depth - his sharp features, his debonair style (hiding beneath a litre of blood), his devil-may-care attitude, his rowdy sense of humor. If he were another angel, or even a demon, Aziraphale would have asked him out already, body count or no. 

So what is he waiting for?

It’s not entirely unheard of, an angel dating outside their dominion. And as for the moral issues of dating a murderer, well, Aziraphale is an angel. He has a responsibility to bring sinners to the light, help them see the truth. That can be done anywhere, not just in church - on a street corner, in a diner…

Back at his flat.

Besides, he and Crowley have a lot more in common than Aziraphale did with his last paramour, an angel he had dallied with solely for the fact that he was guardian of comestibles.

It seemed like a match made in Heaven, so to speak.

Far from it.

“Look - if I let you take me out for coffee, will you stop the gratuitous bloodshed?”

Crowley all but gasps when that question leaves Aziraphale’s mouth, the grin growing on his face transforming, becoming less maniacal and more… normal if that makes any sense. "One cup of coffee. That's all I ask."

"Then come along. Here… “ Aziraphale snaps his fingers, cleaning Crowley thoroughly before he takes his arm. “If you're good, I'll let you buy me a slice of cake.”

“That’s very generous of you.”

“I’m glad you think so. I’m a very slow eater. And I figure the longer I stay with you, the more I can keep an eye on you."

“Deal. But, you know," Crowley starts, his tone so filled with teasing he’s on the verge of giggles, "if you, say, spent the night at my flat, you could keep an eye on me for hours. Think of all the people I wouldn’t be able to kill.”

Aziraphale smirks, amused that they both had a semblance of the same idea. “You don’t say?”

“I do.”

“That’s blackmail.”

“More so than you bartering human lives against a cuppa and cake?”

Aziraphale shrugs, but he doesn't relinquish Crowley's arm. He does, however, relieve him of his ax so he doesn’t get any ideas along the way. “Fair point.”

[mhaccunoval]

this piece of lovely fanart + this post about pacing have got me thinking about about the concept of ed and stede reuniting in, say, 2.04 after several episodes of sending messages in bottles...

yeah, it’d be impractical (especially because i doubt they have paper, ink, OR a bottle on the marooning island) and improbable (via currents and if the newly reformed blackbeard crew sails out of sight from the island) but like. the show is already impractical and improbable so. It’s Possibly By Proxy Of Universal Mechanisms.

stede knows that the dinghy he came to the island on could catch up to the revenge eventually, as much as taking archimedes’ principle into account with trying to fit all of his crew in AND maintaining a velocity at which they could catch up and not leave any men or risk sinking. but seeing a bottle nestled in the sand sparks a better, and less worrisome idea, and searches around for any scrap of paper the crew might have on them, realizing that a bottle in the water would displace less volume and, by way of being a smaller object than a dinghy, would travel faster in the direction of the ship, therefore reaching ed faster. the scrap he finds is small and the only ink he has is probably natural pigment from crushing up plant matter, writing with a discarded seagull feather, but it works well enough because he’s not sure what to say to begin with, other than whatever amount of an apology he can fit onto the paper. and with sending the bottle into the water, he sends all of his hopes for rectification and making things right again.

on ed’s end, he’s glad izzy doesn’t immediately smash the bottle as soon as it’s fished out of the water but in the a flare of anger, he wants to himself; finds it unfair that stede is writing him now, instead of when he didn’t show up at the dock, and still hasn’t explained what in the hell happened, albeit this time because he didn’t have the space. so, in response, he writes something to the effect of ‘apology not accepted’ purposely short and sweet, knowing stede will take all of the extra space below the sentence/paragraph and on the back of the parchment to ramble, assuming he has the ‘ink’ to. gives it a day, not knowing whether he’s actually going to send it or not, feeling too many emotions and none at all simultaneously enough to make him unsure. caves and sends it the next night on the presumption the revenge hasn’t floated too far away from the island yet and the bottle will find its way ‘home’ like a homing pigeon. 

and it keeps up like this for. a week or more. it’s turbulent waters to be charting— quite literally. roach and buttons’ stomaches are still growling to eat the swede; everyone’s terrified and tired of drinking seawater. they have trust in their captain (same as everyone but izzy back on the revenge) but they’re also ticking time bombs, so they need the reconciliation to hurry up or come up with a game plan to get away to safety, because being sitting ducks as the captains long distance talk it out Is Not It. but finally, ed concedes and sends word that the crew can come back to the revenge— at their own risk (and to izzy’s dismay). everyone sighs in relief and stede has his fingers crossed that they’ll be able to sit down first thing to talk it out, but he stays en his garde (i apologize) for a sword fight or any other peril that’s a sign all isn’t actually forgiven. but he’s optimistic nonetheless because he desperately needs a shave (a beard doesn’t suit his face as well as it suits ed’s) and, more importantly, to have ed back in his arms to love on him.

BUT. this is just one loose train of thought, and incredibly unlikely, so we’ll see 🤷‍♂️

[hello-im-not-a-possum]

14. Smoke

Tom tries to get his voice to sound less humiliating by picking up an old vice of his; smoking. The Ink Demon does not approve. “N-not because I CARE about him, you idiots!” He just thinks Tom’s new voice is too funny to destroy with smoke. (Set in the FIFE AU after Tom’s Bargain, AKA: “If it bites, curses, claws, and hisses, It’s very unwise to ask it for wishes”)

The Ink Demon glared at the wolf disapprovingly as he grabbed the lighter.

“You know, Allison’s gonna be soooo heartbroken when she finds out you picked up THAT old habit again…”

Thomas rolled his eyes and reached for the notepad, only to be betrayed by it as it was too full of his concepts for an ink proof prison to hold Sammy in and keep him from escaping. There wasn’t even a single bit of space left for a single word for him to write.

“Well, c’mon big guy! Use your mouth-words!” The Demon crossed his arms, looking like a mother scolding a child. “If you’re gonna go through alllllll the trouble of SUMMONING A %@^&ING DEMON LORD WHO’D KILL US ALL WITHOUT HESITATION BEHIND OUR BACKS, you might as well use the fancy new voice box he gave you!”

“I down't wawnt tuwu tawk wight now.” Thomas growled as he saw the demon smile in that way where it was obvious he was holding back laughter out of the corner of his eye, only to snap back into his angry/disapproving pose when he turned to look at him. “i'm nowt in the mood fow iwt.”

The mechanic grabbed the pack of cigarettes and walked out of the house, hoping to put enough distance between himself and the nagging demon to actually hear himself think.

When he thought he’d walked far enough, he leaned against the graffiti-covered wall, took a cigarette out of the pack, and lit it up.

-----

Smoking with a wolf’s muzzle was weird and kinda hard, especially since he wasn’t used to doing it. He was half expecting to accidentally swallow a few as canine instinct mistook them for food. He was definitely expecting the coughing fits, and was expecting them to be bad as since he was a cartoon, his actions and the ways the environment interacted with him tended to be exaggerated at times that he felt were inconvenient.

“Fuck uwu Sammy Wawwence…” He grumbled under his breath as he lit up his sixth one. “Fuck uwu, youw dewusions of gwandew, youw stupid, god awfuw shape-shifting abiwities, youw cowawdwiness, awnd whatevew the fuck awwowed uwu tuwu be capabwe of doing ovew hawf the shit uwu've done duwing this… nightmawe!”

“HEEEEEY TOMMY!”

The wolf gritted his teeth as he heard the sound of a large inkwell rolling towards him at high speeds, and was tempted to punt it away when it rolled around in a circle and landed upright, but the exhausted looking cartoon demon popped out of there *just* has he had his kick ready and primed for it.

“I…*huff* finally found you! Jeez Louise, would it kill ya ta hear a guy out before storming off?! Oh that’s right! It will.”

The wolf raised an eyebrow.

“Look, smoking as a human’s bad and all that jazz, smoking as a toon is also technically bad, but only in the sense we only show villains smoking so when you smoke, you’re saying “Look at me! I’m a terrible person.” get yourself some cigarettes made of ink and you’ll get some glares, but nothing worse than that. As for smoking normal, non-ink cigarettes meant for HUMAN consumption’s even worse for you as a toon! Look at yourself, you’re made of INK! You’re flammable as *%#@, the only reason why you haven’t sentenced yourself to death by being fired up from the inside out is because you got lucky!”

“Nice twy asshowe, uwu cawwed 'wowf' too many goddamned times, how duwu I know if uwu'we tewwing the twuth ow nowt?? I suwe as heww can’t!”

“Well, I’ve been HELPING everyone as much as I can!” The demon clenched his fists. “I get it! I’m ‘Drew’s demon-son’ and ‘we’re just two sides of the same *@#^ing lying coin’ and all that $#*!... But unlike Drew, I’ve been trying to make this right!”

“Uwu duwu know thawt uwu'we the weason why I was despewate enough tuwu gow tuwu him in the fiwst pwace, wight?”

“Huh?”

“Inky, I twied tuwu awsk uwu fow my body bawck, whewn uwu wefused, I asked fow a body simiwaw tuwu my owd owne, I wouwd've settwed fow being a cawtoon if I stiww wooked somewhat human wike Susie does! Heww, I wouwd have settwed fow uwu juwst giving me my VOICE bawck! But duwu uwu know whawt uwu did instead?”

“...What did I do then?”

“Uwu said no tuwu aww of thawt awnd instead of coming fowwawd with the twuth uwu juwst made excuses at evewy tuwn awnd couwdn't even wook me in the eyes whewn uwu made thewm. Awnd duwu uwu know why? Because uwu awnd I both uwu thawt uwu wike seeing me wike thiws: as 'youw cweation'...” The mechanic got up in the demon’s face and jabbed his finger into his chest. “Inkweww Bendamnin Dwew, uwu'we nowt doing thiws because uwu wawnt us tuwu be bettew, uwu'we doing thiws because uwu wawnt us tuwu be YOUWS instead of JOEY’S.”

“I... Well... you’re ri-” The demon’s shocked and somewhat guilty expression fell into a frown. “If I’m such a ‘Joey Drew 2.0′, then why would you turn to SAMMY *%#@ING LAWRENCE of all people!? I’ll admit that this whole reformation thing was a lot harder than I thought, but Sammy hates your guts and I’m convinced the only reason why he doesn’t try to kill you is because he think’s death’s too good for you or something!”

“I didn't know thawt thawt was Sammy's summoning ciwcwe, wituaw, whatevew. I didn't even make the connection thawt the cocky, weiwdwy fwiwtatious, cannibawistic fish demon thawt wiked tuwu wiwe me up because he couwd was the same entity as the masked woony ink monstew thawt wouwd apowogize tuwu a stwangew if they pouwed soup own him.”

“...I’m Sorry...”

“Huh?”

“Everything you said about me was right,” The Ink Demon fidgeted with his gloves nervously. “I was being childish and greedy and I’m sorry that I hurt you when I was only thinking about myself and what I wanted from this new situation. I was so focused on the fact I was making new bodies so that people wouldn’t be suffering in their current ones, I never once stopped and asked myself if the bodies I made made them happy too.”

“Wow...” The wolf stared at the demon in a subtle mix of pride and awe. “Thawt's actuawwy weawwy matuwe of uwu tuwu say. I down't even think thawt joey wouwd even get those fiwst two wowds out of hiws mouth, wet awone twy tuwu expwain whewe he went wwong.”

“But don’t forget that YOU *#@$ed up here too!” The Ink demon jabbed Tom in the chest twice as hard as he did to him. “The reason why everyone in the crazy inky town hates your guts is because in addition to your involvement with the ink machine, your whole ‘lone wolf’ thing makes you impossible to work with! Allison TRIES to get other people involved in her ‘lets kidnap a mentally unstable searcher’ plots, when she’s here, she interacts with the people around her! You just lock yourself up and do things behind everyone’s backs! Can’t you at LEAST run some of your ideas through someone else before doing them? I’ve seen the blueprints for your torture machine/prison and I gotta say, even if I was still an excellent super villain demon lord at the time of seeing that $#*!: NO. That’s WAY too far! I don’t even think that’s the slightest bit ethically sound and it’s 100% a violation on privacy, even for a creature that’s in a hive mind. Seriously: Talk. To. Other. People. You. Edgy. &!*^#.”

“...In hindsight; I shouwd've at weast asked Buddy whawt he summoned in the studio awnd why he did thawt instead of juwst bwindwy doing dangewous shit awn my own...”

The wolf grumbled as he blew out a puff of smoke.

“That’s the spirit! Now come with me, I think I know a way to get your voice deep and gravelly without you turning yourself into smoked wolf brisket.”

[angelic-writer]

Polyblank’s “death” (2/3)

Polyblank’s POV

Peace. That was all he felt when he lost consciousness. He didn’t feel pain, he didn’t feel dread. In fact, he felt... happy. Relieved. He got the files, so he completed the mission, at least. In just a few minutes, he will arrive back at Darlington Station and the Director will give him another objective to complete. He didn’t get to see everything in the corporate building. He was in just such a hurry. Oh well, I’m sure the next mission will be much easier. Who knows, maybe he’ll go to the Kai Tak Resort again. Maybe this time, he won’t need to dress up as a girl.

He began to feel a floating sensation. It felt like he was being lifted up by something. He looked around, but there was no one carrying him upwards. No strings attached to him or anything. His positive emotions turned into confusion. What...? What is this...? It was supposed to be a simulation. What was happening? Is the Missionyl still in effect for him? If it was, it was beginning to feel too real.

Suddenly, he heard someone playing a piano from somewhere. He would call it a peaceful melody, but a few of the keys were broken, giving it a touch of dread. What the hell? What is going on? Polyblank was really confused right now. Is this still a simulation? Where was he? Why isn’t he back at Darlington?!

“C’mon, Poly, stay with me. You will not die on me, alright?”

That voice... Ed?

He was suddenly outside the Tokyo corporate building. He could see two men carrying a stretcher with a familiar person laying on it. Beside the stretcher was another familiar man, having an uncharacteristic look of fear on his face.

Wait a minute. That’s Polyblank in the stretcher. That’s the Editor beside him. And that’s two of his henchmen.

His mind now had a sense of clarity. This isn’t a simulation. This is real. He’s actually dead. At that moment, a calming voice began to sing.

Ah, that’s it. It all came to this. He died doing his retrieval mission and his nemesis was over his body, worrying his fancy suit off. Though, he was still confused. Why was the Editor begging him to stay with him? He was supposed to be an antagonist for the Syndicate. A cold, heartless kidnapper and murderer. He was the one who kidnapped the Director in the first place! He had no idea why the playboy would be worrying about him at all.

A warm hand was placed on his shoulder. “It’s time to go, Polyblank. It’s time for you to rest.”

He nodded and closed his eyes. The feeling of being pulled up was felt again. He started to walk up a long staircase. He could see a bright light in the distance. If he could just reach that light, everything will be okay.

“Don’t be afraid, Polyblank. Nothing will hurt you anymore. You’re safe.”

Nothing will hurt me anymore...

His life began to flash before his eyes. Some of them are standard memories of his childhood, his earlier missions, and him getting to know the Director. But his most recent ones were of the Editor.

They played golf, gravy boat racing, even some VR tennis. While Ed proved to be quite a cheater at the first game, Poly couldn’t help but think he at least had a bit of fun. Especially when he had the chance to inflate his ego just enough for him to literally pop him like a balloon.

Even though he should be feeling nothing for this man, he couldn’t help but feel sad. Here he was in one of the memories, introducing himself to Polyblank. The way he spoke just felt right to him. The line “I swear, I’d marry you if I wasn’t such a playboy.” was enough to make his heart flutter. He knew nothing about this man. Well, he knew him enough to know that he was an antagonist, but he shouldn’t be feeling infatuated with him. No, it wasn’t that. It was love.

Unconditional love. It took him an entire pufferfish to realize that he loved him. He loved this dastardly young man who kidnaps and murders people for fun. Well, that and he makes potpourri, but still. The way he looked at him, the way he smiled at him, even the way he talked to him felt... strangely right.

He suddenly felt apprehensive. He was almost at the border. He had a decision to make. Should he step in or should he go back?

Eddy...

The Editor’s P.O.V.

“Poly! Goddammit, Polyblank, open your eyes!!” The Editor shouted at him as the goons wheeled him to the medical room. The nurses began tending to the spy as the henchmen started to pull him out of the room. They hooked him up to some devices, one of them a heart monitor. Polyblank had already went through decontamination so the only thing the nurses had to worry about were his vital signs. And by the looks of it, they were not good.

His heart rate and breathing were slow. Almost 20 minutes had passed since the toxin had been in Polyblank’s body. They need to act fast or else...

The Editor felt himself start to shake, not with fear, but with anger. Who... Who do they think they are? They think they would just surprise attack Poly with fugu fish?! Whoever they are, they are dead! If he dies, he will kill them!

“Sir, calm down. Nothing will be gained by you losing your cool.” The henchman by the name of James said.

“Oh, I am keeping my cool. I’m just thinking of ways to murder whoever did this to Poly!”

“Look, can we just step out and try to-” The other henchman by the name of Wally started to talk before the Editor snapped his icy glare at him.

“Listen here, I don’t have time to be standing around talking to you idiots! Instead of that, why don’t you go and track down whoever tried to kill Poly?! If you can’t do that and Polyblank dies, I will go to hell and back to make sure they pay! Now, I won’t tell you this again. Go track down whoever tried to do this to my nemesis, you understand?” His usual aloofness was gone, replaced only with an anger that can only be described as terrifying. The two henchmen both nodded and ran out of the room.

At that moment, a rapid beeping started emitting from the monitor as Polyblank’s heart rhythm began to change. The nurses immediately prepared to shock him. Ed could only stand in horror as they tried to revive his rival. This... This isn’t right... There is no way... There is no way he’s dying here. He went through more dangerous stuff before. Well, okay, this is dangerous, but-

*Beeeeeeeeeeeeep*

“..........No........”

The nurse looked somberly at the Editor. “I’m so sorry...”

“No... No, no, no, NO!” He scrambled over to Polyblank’s bed. “No, you will not die on me! Do you hear me, you bastard?!” He started doing chest pumps. He did not know what he was doing, but he was not going to lose him.

The nurse tried to pull him off, but he pushed her away. He glanced over at the monitor and saw he was flatlining. Okay, what do you do if someone’s flatlining? Whatever the Editor was doing is something you should do. You shouldn’t shock them when their heart’s not beating- Ah-hah!

The Editor swiped the bottle of adrenaline and a syringe that was sitting on the table and filled it up. He hoped it was the right dose. He jabbed it into Polyblank’s chest right where his heart is. He killed enough people to know where the heart is. He continued to pump his chest until the monitor detected something. Poly’s heart finally started beating.

Ed sighed and stepped back. He’s okay... He’ll be okay... Thank god...

The nurse led him out of the room as the others began to tend to him again. Polyblank may be alive now, but he is still not out of the woods yet. He still had to get his stomach pumped and monitored until the toxin’s completely out of his system. Until then, it was just a waiting game to see if he pulls through.

In the mean time, Ed is planning on having a little visit with this red-haired fiend.

[octoberobserver]

I saw where someone else had made a post about that vine video where the one guys wakes the other up but then a 2nd guy was in the bed as well and no one knew. yea that for adult reddie

Hi nonnie, so sorry for the late reply on this! Thanks for this fun prompt, I had a blast. It ended up being 60% Hanbrough tbh, but I had fun with it ^_^

Read on ao3 Wake Up Call for Mr Tozier

Richie and Eddie weren’t subtle.

They were handsy.

And flirty.

And drunk.

But for someone able to concoct such elaborate stories (albeit with horrible endings) and create beautiful sentences (albeit among gore and horror), Bill Denbrough wasn’t always what the Losers would call…intuitive. At least not when it came to badly-kept secrets.

Common sense isn’t all that common, Eddie would shrug.

Dumb as a sack of hammers, Bev would reply.

King of the Himbos, Richie would conclude.

Which was how, on the eve of their second annual reunion, when all the Losers, (plus Patty, Don and Adrian - all officially new members) eventually retired to bed, where they were staying with Bill and Mike in his giant, seven-bedroom L.A. home, he failed to notice Richie and Eddie’s sleeping arrangements.

He watched, bleary-eyed, as the two ‘helped’ each other up the stairs, each as drunk as the other, doing more stumbling than anything, like two hammered Bambis. Suppressing his chuckle, Bill wound an arm around Mike’s waist as leaned in close, following his eye line.

“Did we put enough pillows in the guest room for Eddie?”

A slow smile spread across Mike’s face as he watched dumb and dumber stumble on the stairs, giggling like the two perpetual middle-schoolers they were.

“Something tells me he won’t need ‘em, Bill,” he murmured before planting a kiss to the side of his boyfriend’s head.

Bill frowned, turning to Mike, opening his mouth to ask why not.

“Come to bed.”

Bill’s mouth snapped shut, transforming into a grin.

~*~

Like with endings, (at least the literary kind), mornings were not Bill’s forte. But it had to be said, waking up next to Mike Hanlon, definitely helped.

“Wakey, wakey, eggs and bakey,” a deep, low voice mumbled into his ear, a huff of breath causing him to shiver.

With a groan, he turned over and snuggled into the furnace-like warmth of the man beside him, burying his face in his shoulder, a pleased hum escaping his lips as he felt a strong arm wind around him.

“Do we have to make breakfast for everyone?”

His question was muffled and more than a little sulky, but Mike laughed all the same.“

We wanna be good hosts, don’t we?”

Bill groaned again, his head making its feelings known on that last shot of tequila he downed because Richie had dared him. (Maybe he was still a bit of a middle-schooler too.)

“I guess so.”

“That’s the spirit.”

Mike’s tone was warm, teasing, and alluring enough that Bill just had to look up and kiss him, right on the lips, morning breath be damned.

“Don’t talk about spirits,” he mumbled against his mouth, “my head hasn’t forgiven me for last night.”

Mike raked his palms up Bill’s sides, squeezing his hips. “No sympathy,” he grinned, eyes twinkling, “all self-inflicted.”

With that he gave a hearty smack to his ass, beginning to push him out of the bed. “Go on, you go wake up the kids. I’ll get breakfast started.”

Bill moaned, and not for good reasons.

“I hate having to wake Richie. He’s like a bear in the morning.”

Mike swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood up, stretching, his sleep-shirt riding up and revealing a sliver of the very tantalising skin above his belly button, making Bill freeze mid-step.

“I feel like it’s my duty to remind you on Richie’s behalf that he is not a bear, he’s a...sea lion?” Mike paused, scratching his stomach, “No, that’s not right. An otter? Beaver? I don’t know man, something that swims, I think. Adrian was trying to teach me all the different kinds of gay—mmph!”

Bill cut him off with a kiss, leaning up and dragging him down into it.

“I love you, you giant, sexy nerd,” he grinned as the kiss broke, running his thumb under the hem of Mike’s sleep-shirt.

“I love you too,” Mike winked, smacking Bill’s ass again, “but don’t think it gets you out of waking the Losers. Start with someone easy, like Eddie.”

There was something in Mike’s voice, in his smirk, that had Bill’s suspicions flaring, but he sighed, pecking his jaw before resigning himself to his fate. Out of all of them, Eddie was one of the earliest risers, usually. It was a tie between him, Ben and Stan, most of the time. Ben, a frequent morning jogger, and Stan, an avid bird-watcher. So really, Bill knew Mike was right, starting with him.

Shrugging nto his slippers and robe, he dragged a hand through his bed-head and shuffled down the corridor, making a bee-line for Eddie’s room.

“Eds?” he called out quietly as he knocked. “Mike and I are making breakfast if you’re interested?”

Silence rang out. With a frown, he turned the handle and gave a quick glance around the door, eyes falling on the empty bed, so neatly made up, it looked like it hadn’t been slept in. Huh. Eddie must already be up. With a shrug, Bill closed the door with a snap and decided that it was best to just rip the bandaid off. Richie was going to be the one that gave the most pushback, so he may as well start with him. If he was his usual grumpy self, Bill could always move onto everyone else then loop back around.

With Richie though, he’d have to try a different approach than with Eddie. Something loud and annoying to get back at him for his part in Bill’s hangover. Quickly, he got fished out his phone from his robe pocket, turning to the guest room where Richie was staying, directly opposite Eddie’s. 

Counting down from three in his head, he hit record and flung the door wide open, spotting Richie asleep in one of the twin beds. Stifling his laugh, Bill switched on the light and yelled, “Wake up, Sleepyhead!”

He watched gleefully as Richie, with a serious case of bed-head, jumped, grumbling something like, “Whoa, what’s goin—”

“The fuck, man?”

Bill blinked as Eddie suddenly popped up from behind Richie, his arm very noticeably thrown over his hip, both men very, very shirtless. The three friends stared at each other. A beat of silence passed.

Two.

Three.

Shock shot through Bill, his brain scrambling to make sense of this picture, a borderline hysterical laugh escaping his throat. He found his brain vividly flashing back to various moments, touches, shared smiles between Richie and Eddie and…oh. Then, with exactly zero input from his brain, his feet turned him around and led him right back out the bedroom door, a louder laugh bursting from him and carrying down the corridor, no doubt enough to wake the rest of the Losers.

Good. That gave him time to spill the beans to Mike.

Richie and Eddie blinked at the closed door that their friend had just bolted through.

“Well, that’s one way to tell him,” Eddie sighed, letting his head fall back onto the pillow, his arm tightening around Richie’s waist.

“Yeah, you popping up all Whack-A-Mole-style and scaring the crap outta him was one way to go, Eds,” Richie chuckled, turning around to face him and kissing him on the forehead.

“The man fought a murderous space clown. Twice,” Eddie grumbled into his neck, “I think he can survive seeing us in bed together.”

Richie snorted, settling a hand on his lower back, pulling their bodies closer together, he already in danger of falling out of the far too small bed.

“You know there’s a double in your room, right?” he murmured into Eddie’s hair. “Remind me again why we ended up squeezed into this tiny twin bed?”

Eddie poked him in the chest, prompting him to lean back to look him in the eye.

“Rich, we were so drunk, we’re lucky we didn’t end up trying to make these into bunk beds and sleeping in them, or something worse.”

Richie smirked. “That tub was looking appealing last night, not gonna lie.”

“And besides,” Eddie poked his chest again, softer this time, “I wanted to push the beds together to make a double. Like we did in middle school. But, you know, the tequila—”

“Ahh, the tequila,” Richie sighed wistfully, before leaning down and pressing their foreheads together.“Guess the cat’s outta the bag now, huh?” 

Eddie rolled his eyes before letting them close.

“All the others already know. Bill was just being slow on the uptake as usual.”

Richie bumped their noses.

“Told you, Eds. He’s a himbo.”

“King Himbo, I think you said.”

They shared a laugh before closing the short distance, their lips meeting in a gentle kiss. Richie hummed into it happily, (still tickled that Eddie apparently wasn’t as opposed to morning breath as he thought), brushing his tongue along Eddie’s bottom lip, the kiss deepening. Just as things were getting good, far too good for two people who were just called for breakfast, Eddie stilled, pulling away, his cheeks flushed, lips plump, and his eyes wide.

“Wait, was he recording us?”

[wilwywaylan]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Stand Still Stay Silent Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Lalli Hotakainen/Emil Västerström Characters: Emil Västerström, Lalli Hotakainen Additional Tags: Canon Compliant, end of Adventure One, everyone is stranded and Emil is thinking, Just some stupid thing, stupid as Emil Series: Part 1 of Picture book Summary:

For days, Emil had been pondering about a certain fashion point concerning Lalli.

Béta-ed by @a-tehta and @paon-de-jour

--

For the past three hours, Emil had been sitting near the tiny house, on a grassy hill scattered with small, golden flowers. Elbows firmly planted on his thighs and head in his hands, gazing into space. Or maybe not really into space. For now several weeks, he had been pondering a question. No, not just a question. A Question. A Very Important Question, that had been turning at the back of his mind for days now. Since they had left Mälmo, in fact. Crossing the snowy plains had left him with many hours to think about it, without landing on a satisfying answer.

At the other edge of the camp, Lalli got up from where he was sitting and walked to the small fire, sniffing whatever mixture Mikkel was boiling in his pot. He grimaced at the smell and walked to the clothes hanging on a string, patting one of the sweaters to check if it was dry. Emil's eyes followed closely. There laid the crux of the problem, the center of the Question. The thing that had been torturing him, and kept tormenting him day after day, hour after hour.

Who, in their right mind, had found appropriate to provide Lalli with those boots ?

Because their uniforms, as thrifty as they were, had been designed by someone who had at least some idea of what they needed. They were different, tailored to their missions : Emil's was thick, strong enough to protect him from the falling rubble and the heat created by his flamethrower. It didn't catch fire easily and was warm enough for the weather. Mikkel was mostly the same, maybe not as fire-resistant, but comfortable and protecting him against hits. Sigrun's was lighter, less insulated, but more flexible, adapted to fast moves and quick attacks. And of course, Lalli's tunic was short as not to hinder his movements, light and airy to let him breathe, and a hood to block out all annoyances.

And those boots. 

There were gloves, too, Emil knew it, he had felt their contact enough times not to forget them. But they were incidental. They didn't even deserve a mention. Not when one was focusing on the boots. 

On a rational plane, Emil understood. Lalli had to be able to cover a huge distance in a short time, to run fast on all kinds of grounds, and pass any kind of obstacle without being impeded by anything. In his line of work, being even slowed down a little could very well mean death, by troll or even worse. Emil didn't know what was more awful, getting torn apart, or being incapacited by a wound and slowly die of cold or starvation. Both were a horrible way to go, and the mere idea of Lalli suffering such a fate was enough to make him want to lock the Finn inside and never let him outside ever again.  

Lalli had grown disinteressed with the laundry, or maybe displeased, and was currently looking at the sea, his gaze focused on the waves as if he could bring the ship coming for them by the sheer force of his glare. He was standing at the extreme edge of a rock, his whole body tensing, standing on his toes like he was ready to jump at the slightest hint of a boat. The position did nothing for poor Emil's nerves. Perched like that, it was extremely easy for one's eyes to be dragged to those damn boots again. 

Because he knew, they needed to be sturdy. They needed to hold around his legs and move with him and bend and crease and not chafe or anything. He knew that. But still. Did they need to be so... so... evident ? Did they have to be so shiny ? Because they were, even after weeks and weeks spent trudging through the snow and dirt. Mikkel's vigorous cleaning could have something to do with it, but Emil knew that leather didn't stay that spotless after  so much time in the field. And still, Lalli's boots were still as shiny as if they had just be made, the light tracing zigzags following the wrinkles around the knees. Black and shiny and just so, so smooth. The leather did have a grain, Emil had felt it more than once, but from there, it looked perfectly sleek, almost liquid. 

But even worse that this glossy appearance that seemed to call for his hands, was that they were very, really, extremely form-fitting. They followed every curve of Lalli's legs, hiding nothing of their shape. The shine didn't help, glossy lines underlining the muscles of the thighs, the curve of the calves tensing to allow him a better vantage point, running down to his feet, so delicate for someone running so much, like Lalli had dipped his legs in a vat of ink. Even the laces only served to make his ankles look even thinner, so thin that Emil felt he could have broken them by squeezing them too tight, like a handful of sticks. Of course, it was just an impression. As delicate as Lalli was, and Emil knew what he looked like under those boots, his legs were way sturdier than they looked. Strong and muscular, almost wiry....

Emil shook his head, mussing his hair, trying to dispel the thoughts starting to form and push them back down where they should remain. And still, even with his best efforts, they were starting to peek through, slowly coming to the surface like some kind of marine creatures from the depths, at first some vague shadows, quickly gaining weight and presence. Just some bubbles of thoughts piercing through at first, the slope of the calf, the leather creasing and cracking with a sharp twist of the foot, tight across the top, the light in small lines... And his fingers sliding on them. That one was quickly gaining traction ; his fingertips at first, slowly passing over the arch just above the sole, climbing over the ankle and the laces crossing over it. The foot moving a little under his touch. And now, his hand following the curve, flat against the leather, higher and higher. Passing the knee, and stroking the larger area of the thigh... 

Emil swallowed hard, trying to soothe his suddenly very dry throat. The mere idea was enough to make his heart race and his breath come short. And still the image kept coming, his hand on the shiny leather. Reaching the top of the boot, the white fabric slipping up to reveal the pale, shivering skin under... The fingers, slowly, very slowly slipping the boot down, inch by inch...

(Emil knew very well that Lalli's boots weren't that easy to get down. He had to do it several times the past few days, and there was way less seductive stroking and way more swearing and pulling with all his might, but his brain was kind enough to not dwell on it.)

In his mind, the boot was now past Lalli's knee, unveiling the small scar across the bone, the leg so white under the black material. His fingers itched to feel, to stroke, and they touched the skin, very lightly....

And something fell just beside him, almost crushing his hand. He barely had time to save his fingers. Lalli may be barely heavier than a moderatly-sized chicken, but it could still hurt. The Finn glanced at him, and Emil suddenly realized that his cheeks were burning, and he was probably very, very red. But Lalli didn't say anything (not that Emil would have understood, his Finnish was still very, very basic) or poked his face. Instead, he patted down Emil's curls until they were all in order again. Once satisfied, he sat back down, mimicking Emil's pose, elbows on his knee.

- Food, he sighed, and pointed at the sun in a short curve.

It took Emil a long moment to understand what he meant. From what he could gather, Lalli was complaining about how long it was taking Mikkel to cook something for dinnertime. Not that he minded ; judging by the smell covering their makeshift campement, it would probably be something based way too heavily on stale canned fish and the leaves he had found around. But it would be warm, at least. And it would keep his mind out of those weird ideas. But they were coming back with a vengeance, because Lalli was sitting close. So close, in fact, that his leg was touching Emil's. His leg, encased in this damn boot. Emil wanted nothing more than forget about all those ideas before they started become... noticeable. But it was damn hard with that leather shining in the sun just under his eyes.

Lalli suddenly poked him sharply in the shoulder. Emil turned to glare at him, rubbing the skin - those fingers were pointy - but Lalli didn't let it faze him.

- Wrong ? he asked, pointing at the boots.

Of course Emil did follow his gesture, cursing himself for it. He was too busy keeping his face in some semblance of normalcy to answer, and Lalli poked him again. He was surely going to have a bruise there. 

- Wrong ? You look. What wrong ? he repeated. 

To better convey his meaning, he extended a leg, and would have put it directly on Emil's lap, had he not abruptly stood up, almost knocking Lalli down. He babbled something that the Finn certainly didn't get because it was barely Swedish, turned tail and ran away as soon as he could. Yeah. He was entirely, thouroughly, perpetually fucked. Because of boots, and the one that wore them. Damn them.

(He didn't get very far. In his hast of getting away, he hadn't really checked where he had been going, and ran head first into the nearest tree. The hit had the nasty side effect of leaving him with a hideous bruise on his forehead and of being made fun of by Sigrun while Mikkel was tending to him. But at least it got the boots out of his mind. For now.)