#SOMETIMES IT SEEMS LIKE WE WON’T SURVIVE THIS DANCE. ˛ closed au. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

annerbhp · 2 years

Note

A while ago, i was postponing some work i felt insecure about and went on a little the walking dead binge watch. I combined it with day dreaming about ginny harry post apocalypse, like that fic idea you had. It was excellent. Safe and fun thoughts to be in. After witch i did the work and i am now reaping the first rewards. Just sharing what a happy place your blog is for me, even the smallest posts. :)

Amazing how something so dark can be comforting and help reboot our energy and mindset. Glad to even tangentially be part of you taking excellent care of yourself. And great job going back and getting that work done!

In reward, have the first chapter of the hinny zombie apocafic that I'm not sure I'll ever finish. but sometimes taking a break from something before going back to it if we can is a great idea!

Wasteland

Harry wakes in a world that has completely changed. Forced to learn the rules of this new reality as fast as he can in order to survive, he comes across someone more than capable of teaching him. If she would just stop threatening to shoot him long enough to answer a damn question. (harry/ginny, zombie AU, post-apocalypse, magical!harry, muggle!ginny)

warnings: death, suicide, blood, gore, violence, viral pandemic, apocalypse, general end of the world unpleasantness and tragedies

Chapter 1

“It is just about time, I think,” Dumbledore says, voice calm and unhurried as he inspects a silver pocket watch hanging from a frankly ridiculously long fob.

Harry shifts his gaze from the gleaming metal to Dumbledore’s face. With his white beard and robes, he’s hard to pick out against the blindingly white background.

“Time for what?” Harry asks, feeling like maybe he’s forgotten something.

In answer, a train glides silently into the terminal. Dark silhouettes move behind the curtained windows, soft sounds like laughter and voices just far enough out of reach to be indecipherable.

People, waiting to greet him.

“Will you board?” Dumbledore asks, knees dancing up and down under his palms as he taps his toes rhythmically against the ground in what feels like childlike wonder.

A question with an obvious answer, because isn’t this train exactly what Harry’s been waiting for? It feels like it’s been a long time that they’ve been sitting here. Waiting for something. And here it is—warmth and welcome and calm. The kind of calm he’s rarely experienced in his life. At least not that he can remember.

A door on a compartment slides open, golden, warm light pouring out like a path across the empty space.

Before Harry can get to his feet, he registers a peculiar feeling in the pit of his stomach. Like a quiet tug, like something has snagged the back of his robes and won’t let go.

“You are free now,” Dumbledore says.

Yes, Harry knows this. He is free of something that has long held him down. But this is somehow different. Something of his own. He could shrug it off, he knows. He just kind of doesn’t want to.

“I think maybe I’m not quite ready,” Harry realizes.

“If that is your choice,” Dumbledore replies, and Harry can tell he’s pleased, though not without worry as the train door slides shut.

“What is it?” Harry asks.

Dumbledore’s head tilts to the side. “As you know, death is just the beginning. That is even more true in the world you return to than it was before.”

This seems overly cryptic, even for his old Headmaster. “What do you mean?”

Dumbledore smiles. “I’m sorry. Not all things could I foresee.” He gets to his feet, and Harry does as well. “Just remember, Harry. Remember that to live, you must remember what it is you live for. Let your heart guide you, as always, and I have no doubt you will find your path.”

He touches Harry’s cheeks, eyes warm and full of pride as he looks down at him.

“Now wake.”

* * *

Harry wakes with a gasp, the echo of the last question the mediwitch asked him before he closed his eyes still echoing in his ears.

“You don’t feel anything?” she asks, smile friendly from beneath her wimple as she pulls the now-empty flask away from his lips.

Sirius, the arsehole, is smirking over her shoulder at him.

Before Harry can get the word “no” past his lips, he’s out.

It was all hazy after that. Vague passing words and images, more likely dreams than rooted in reality. Was Dumbledore there? No. That makes no sense. His long-dead Headmaster probably had not kept him company while his soul repaired itself after an experimental procedure.

They’d promised it wouldn’t hurt, he remembers. Maybe it hadn’t, but now as he struggles to open his eyes, his head feels like it’s splitting in half. Not an unfamiliar feeling, to be honest, but this time not accompanied by the usual flare of emotion or vision of Voldemort doing something particularly nasty somewhere. It’s just a sharp endless ache.

And maybe that means something. Maybe it actually worked.

With a groan, he cracks his eyes open, his brain having a hard time making sense of the sight in front of him—dark and irregular patterns of what it takes him a moment to realize is the ceiling above him. It wavers unhelpfully, though he assumes that is just his vision and not the stone that is shifting.

His hand gropes blindly to the side, bumping against a flat rock with his glasses folded neatly on them. Slipping them on after a few aborted attempts, he notes that they haven’t helped his vision all that much.

He licks his lips. “Sirius?” he asks, the word coming out as little more than a croak.

There’s no response.

All he can hear is a trickle of water somewhere nearby and the moment he identifies the sound, it triggers a deep, ragged thirst in him. Harry rolls to his side, body heavier and weaker than he expects, knees and hands hitting the rocky ground as he falls to the floor. He crumples, limbs shaking. Reaching out with his forearms, he drags himself towards the sound of water, reaching the edge of a small pool. He scoops water to his mouth, heedless of the cold water slopping down his chin and neck and soaking his shirt. He drinks and drinks like he may never find the end of his thirst, his arms tiring before he does.

Flopping over onto his back, he lets his arms fall wide. The irregular rocks of the ceiling tell him he’s in a cave, not the monastery. The sacred grotto, he assumes. As he stares up at the ceiling, it isn’t clear if the moss is glowing, or the rocks themselves. He closes his eyes against the pulsing light.

See you on the other side, Harry. The last thing Sirius said to him.It isn’t exactly proving true. They hadn’t been sure, though. How long it might take for him to heal. If Harry would even survive the attempt.

Apparently, he has.

Reaching for the ledge of the platform he’d been lying on, Harry drags himself to his feet, one hand braced on the rough wall as he tries not to trip on the cloak twisted around his body. He looks for any sign of his wand or shoes, anything other than the thin bedclothes he’s wearing under a brown woolen cloak of sorts. There’s nothing though, the space empty of anything other than rocky walls and ceiling and the trickling pond.

His legs are shaky, his head still pounding, but as his vision clears, he can make out a square of white light in the distance. He stumbles towards it, very much hoping it’s the way out.

His legs start to feel more solid as he goes, like his body is beginning to adjust, muscles slowly remembering how they work. Approaching the square of light, he’s very relieved to see that it is the cave entrance.

There’s slight pressure across the front of his body as he passes through what he assumes is a ward of some kind. Hopefully one that will trigger a warning and send someone down to look for him.

He steps outside, the rush of sound and light and wind hitting him all at once. His head spins, hand tightening on the rough stone wall as he fights off a wave of nausea.

Slowly the world around him settles, eyes adjusting to the searing brightness. He’s on a narrow ledge, the rock dropping steeply away towards the sea. Waves pound against the rocks, a faint spray of mist and salt against his face helping to further clear the muddled mess in his head.

Harry retreats, hoping to duck back into the cave to get out of the wind and bright light, but the entrance has disappeared, more likely carefully obscured behind a ward again.

“Dammit,” he mutters.

He slides down against the rough wall, sitting on a rock. It’s freezing, though his cloak does seem to have been set with some sort of warming spell. In the light, he can see the flash of runes along the hemmed edge. That doesn’t keep cold from seeping up into his sock-clad feet.

Hopefully someone will come get him before he freezes to death. Huddling down as far into the cloak as he can, he settles in to wait.

He’s too miserable to sleep, and eventually boredom and curiosity set in, Harry looking around for anything of interest, or just anything to distract him from his discomfort.

There’s a shallow puddle on a large curved rock next to him, collected from a recently passing storm. Leaning over it, Harry sees the grey sky reflected on the surface. His own face slides into view as he shifts closer. It’s hard to make out, the planes of his face almost feeling foreign. Bracing one arm on the rock, he leans closer, brushing his hair back from his forehead. For a second the skin looks smooth, untouched.

Like maybe it’s actually gone.

Wind ripples across the puddle, Harry’s face fracturing and obscuring. He rubs his fingertips across his forehead, finding the familiar spot, and he feels it, just the faintest ridge, like a scar finally healed and beginning to fade.

He closes his eyes, reaching out for that hated, vile connection he spent so many years learning to block, to keep Voldemort from manipulating his mind or emotions.

There’s nothing there. Just the continual sweeping rush of the wind and the nearby roar of waves beating against the cliffs.

He is completely alone. Perhaps for the first time since he was a year old.

Leaning back against the jagged cliff, he feels the unexpected press of tears.

It worked. It actually fucking worked.

Just as Sirius promised. And, maybe, just maybe, this means he doesn’t have to die. That the sacrifice he’s been so carefully trained up to accept in the name of ending this war, stopping Voldemort, maybe it won’t be necessary after all.

Maybe he actually gets a future.

“This will work,” Sirius promises, hand firm on his shoulder. “We’ll get that bastard out of you and then we’ll finish it. I swear to you. All you have to do is survive. Do you hear me?”

Harry opens his eyes, the swelling sea stretching out in front of him. Had that happened? Has Sirius finished it? Or does Harry still need to play his part? Does he need to kill Voldemort himself? His heart thunders away in his chest, a solid reminder of the life ahead of him. But also the stakes of this war.

It’s time to find out what’s going on. There’s no more room for waiting. It’s time to end this.

Getting to his feet, he looks up the narrow set of stairs hugging the cliff face.

At least the climb will probably help keep him warm. Wrapping the cloak tighter around his body, he starts to climb, swearing each time he jams his toe or steps on a sharp pebble.

It seems to take an eternity, but he finally crests the ridge and gets his first glimpse of the monastery, very much hoping to see people already moving towards him. Maybe a nice warm bowl of stew, or a massive mug of tea with more sugar than will properly dissolve.

What he sees instead is the lonely stretch of rolling heath and a crumbling stone ruin tucked in between a few scraggly trees. Lancet windows empty of glass and complex vaulting fallen in on itself.

Harry blinks, wondering if his brain has been damaged in some way, his eyes not able to make sense of the sight in front of him, nothing like the memory he has of this place from what feels like only moments before.

The building looks to him what he imagines Muggles looking at it have seen for the last 300 years since the magical religious order was forced into hiding with the Statute—a crumbling series of medieval arches and cloisters.

Is that what this is? Did whatever they did to his brain when they removed the horcrux…is he somehow now a Muggle? Is he going to hit a Muggle Repelling ward and wander back off into the distance without even realizing it?

Only one way to find out.

He reaches one of the outlying buildings first—the groundskeeper’s cottage, if he recalls. It’s burned down to the foundations, a haphazard pile of singed beams and a partially collapsed chimney the only clue to what the space might have once been. Not a recent fire, either, Harry thinks, kneeling down to touch the hearthstones. Not just the lack of heat and smoke, but the green plants and moss starting to take over the ruin telling him months rather than days or weeks. Maybe years.

Years.

If this is somehow real, if he’s not imagining it. What the hell could this possibly mean?

What happened here?

Harry knows the monastery to be lively with a branch of magical brothers and sisters, the last of an order set in place to be caretakers of the very cave he woke in. An ancient magical site with healing properties. But now it is a true ruin, scorch marks on the stone, windows broken, beams fallen.

For all the violence of the scene, it is eerily peaceful.

Harry walks the perimeter, passively noting the pattern of fire damage through the pounding in his head. Though hard to see with the growth of green over the scars, it’s somehow too regular, too controlled. As if it were magical. Done on purpose. But why?

Around the back, the brother’s garden is overgrown, various plants gone to seed or brown and shriveled. A row of trees along a tumbled stone fence bears small apples, probably not quite ripe, but at the sight of them Harry is too hungry to care for such trivial worries.

He plucks a few apples from the tree, immediately eating them. They’re hard and tart and he forces himself to stop after two, knowing he will pay for that if he doesn’t, but picks a few extra, shoving them in the pockets of his cloak as he moves to finish his circle of the property.

It’s a harder task than it should be, Harry tripping and falling in his distraction.

“Fuck,” he says, wincing at the pain in his hip as it smacks solidly into some sort of a branch or bar. Clearly he’s even weaker than he realized.

Pushing back up off the ground, his hand closes around something that it takes him a moment to realize is a bone. In a pile of bones. A nearby skull gapes back at him.

A human skull.

With a hoarse cry, Harry scrambles back, wiping his hand on his leg.

The meager bites of apple roil unpleasantly in his stomach as he stares down at what is clearly the remains of a person, the tattered remnants of fabric and some dried hardened bits of flesh. Like they’d fallen on this spot and weren’t buried. Felled by the killing curse and left to be eaten by wildlife.

He scans the rest of the space, horrified to see at least another dozen similar piles.

Had the war come here? Had the Death Eaters tracked him down? Was this all to get to him? Did Voldemort win?

Harry’s entire body prickles with sudden awareness, adrenaline thundering through his veins. Forcing his squeamishness aside, he searches through he remains, needing a wand in his hand now. He finds nothing, reminding himself that the monks and nuns here did not wield wands, invested as they were in the old magicks.

“We have no such need for parlor tricks,” the head of the order had said with a serene smile full of faith.

Only now he, along with the rest of the order, is more than likely dead. An order that managed to hide and maintain themselves for 300 years. Wiped away completely.

And Sirius—

Harry squeezes his eyes shut, refusing to even entertain the idea that Sirius is somewhere in this pile of anonymous bodies.

Right now, he just needs to find a way to fucking survive. Because if the war with Voldemort isn’t done, he’ll finish it. The way he was always supposed to.

Forcing himself to his feet, he shifts through the rest of the remains, not finding a single wand. But he does find a fairly intact pair of shoes. He also loses the small amount of food he managed to eat, gagging and throwing up during the process. He keeps going though, making a complete circuit of the building, aware of the sun shifting lower and lower in the sky.

Back around at the garden, Harry is forced to realize that he isn’t going to find any answers here. He also doesn’t have the slightest form of protection. Can’t make fire, doesn’t have a way to light his way, or build shelters. He has no food and no water.

And no one is coming.

He digs up whatever he can from the overgrown garden, a few gnarly carrots and a handful of underripe apples. On impulse, he also grabs a moldering old rake with metal spikes on the end, using it more as a walking stick, but feeling mildly better having it, for all he knows it isn’t going to protect him from shit, let alone a Death Eater if one should come across his path.

He sets off in a southerly direction, vaguely knowing the location of the monastery, and hoping to come across a road or a Muggle village at the very least. He eventually finds a game path worn into the grasses, leading him over mostly treeless hills.

As the sun dips lower and lower, slipping below the horizon, Harry makes out what could be the silhouette of a fence far in the distance. He keeps on as long as he can before he starts tripping on things in the dark. He finds a tree among low shrubby bushes.

He spends a miserable night huddled at the base of the tree wrapped in his cloak, burrowed into the bushes in search of any sort of warmth. He dozes in and out, never truly falling deeply asleep.

Ignoring the lingering ache in his head and body, the constant gnawing thirst and hunger, Harry pushes on as the sky finally lightens.

By midday he’s at the fence line and follows it to a dirt track that slowly widens. It doesn’t look like it’s been driven on in a while, but it’s still a sign of civilization which will mean water and food and some way to make contact.

He ignores the fact that it will likely be Muggles. He can’t exactly be choosy right now. Or worry about how he will explain wandering in from a place the Muggles don’t even know exists.

He comes across a sheep carcass first.

It’s a lot like the bodies back at the monastery, scattered bones and lingering bits of flesh. Must have died and been eaten by some sort of scavenger.

Harry shudders at the thought and keeps moving.

Movement on a distant hilltop catches his eye. Another sheep, he imagines. One luckier than this one. But it’s hard to tell at this distance.

He finally spots a building a few hours later. He stands on a hill watching it, trying to catch any movement of people, but the chimneys are clear, no sounds covering the distance. The adjacent paddock is empty of animals.

As he gets closer, a low stone wall lines the gravel lane, enclosing a yard with a few sparse trees. The door to the whitewashed stone outbuilding creaks as it listlessly shifts in the wind. A car sits in the yard, a tire swing hanging from a tree, other toys strewn about the yard.

The main house is built of dark stone, white casing windows on the top floor. Neither of the chimneys on either end of the gabled roof are giving off any smoke.

Weeds have grown tall up across the doorway and windows on the ground floor.

“Hello?” Harry calls out, his voice feeling unnaturally loud in the silence.

There is no response.

Crossing the yard, Harry steps up to the front door. He knocks, the sound echoing loudly. He waits, but there is no answer. He glances back at the car, the empty paddock.

Reaching out, he grasps the doorknob, cautiously easing the door open. “Hello?” he calls again as he steps inside.

The interior of the house is musty and dark, sunlight barely penetrating the dirt-darkened windows. From the shaft of light falling through the open door, Harry can see that dust has settled across every surface. A collection of chairs and couches sit around a fireplace, black soot streaking up the whitewashed walls.

The whole place smells of rot and decay.

Harry crosses over to a phone hanging on the wall, lifting the receiver. He’s greeted with silence, tapping the cradle a few times, but there’s no dial tone. Not that he’d know who to call anyway.

There’s a tin of biscuits sitting out on the counter and Harry can’t resist pulling it open and shoving one in his mouth, his stomach rumbling painfully. He nearly gags at the taste. They’re horrible—irredeemably stale, more sawdust than anything—but he’s hungry enough to force it down.

A dragging sound from upstairs has Harry spinning on his heel, the tin lid hitting the ground with a deafening clang.

“Hello?” he calls again, not keen on having to explain trespassing and helping himself to food, no matter how old.

There’s no response, just another low scraping sound. Feeling an inexplicable need to maintain the pressing silence, he eases up the stairs, placing his feet carefully. The stairs still creak mournfully underfoot.

At the top is a long hallway, two doors leading to rooms along the front of the house, one of them with a trunk pushed across it. At the end of the hall is what appears to be a loo. But it’s the long white wall on the rear of the house that catches his attention. Someone has written on it with what looks like dark paint.

forgíe us the wrangs we hae wrocht

th’ de’il sunder us

Harry feels his heart thud away in his chest, wondering why someone would write that. Turning to the first room, Harry opens the door. It’s a bedroom, a double bed taking up most of the space with a wardrobe on one wall. In the corner near the front window is a chair. In the chair sits what was once a person, a shotgun still in what is left of their mouth, the spray of blood and brains on the wall behind dark with age.

Harry slaps his hand over his mouth, nearly doubling over as hot nausea burns at his throat. He stumbles back into the hall.

The scraping sound has only become louder, the second door listlessly pressing out against a chest that has been dragged across the doorway. The door hits the chest and then falls back. Again and again.

“Hello?” Harry asks, his voice shaking as he moves closer.

With the chest in place, he can’t really see inside the room.

“Is someone in there?”

There’s no answer, Harry leaning down to pull the chest away from the door enough to peer into the room.

A hand emerges through the widened crack, flying out at Harry with alarming speed. He stumbles back, tripping over his own feet and falling hard against the wall behind him.

He doesn’t think he’s hit his head, but there is also no way he is seeing what he thinks he is seeing. The arm is pale, grey skin stretched over bone, the tattered remains of cloth hanging from it, slimy and grasping.

Harry gropes for his wand, finding nothing but air.

The scraping escalates into an insistent thud as someone—some thing—pushes harder and harder against the door, something like a growl echoing out into the hall. The chest scrapes along the floor, a face emerging after the arm. Harry barely gets a glimpse of a desiccated, decaying face, mouth wide and gaping—one ratty ribbon hanging from what might have once been a pigtail—before he recovers, kicking out with his feet, slamming the chest back into place. Rolling back up to his feet, he puts both hands on the door, shoving it hard. He rams it against the grasping, insistent arm over and over before it finally pulls back into the room, the door shutting with a solid click.

“What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck,” Harry pants, shoving the chest firmly against the door before turning on his heel and thundering down the stairs.

He doesn’t stop running until he is back out in the yard. He spins around in a circle, having no idea where to go, what to do.

His eyes land on the car. He rips the door open, sliding into the driver’s seat. Groping around, he finds keys still dangling in the ignition. He grasps them, twisting them, but the engine is dead, the ignition just clicking and clicking, and Harry knows next to nothing about cars except that this is a very bad sign.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he says, banging the palms of his hands against the steering wheel.

He rests his head down against it, his breath thundering in his ears.

He must have imagined it. There is no way he just saw what he thinks he did.

Turning his head to the side, he sees newspapers spread across the front passenger seat. Pushing off a hand-addressed envelope from on top of a copy of The Scotsman, he peers down at the date.

March 23rd.

2004.

Harry curses. More than three years after he went under the procedure at the monastery. And this paper doesn’t seem recent either, to judge from the way the edge crumbles under his fingers, how it’s browned with age.

There’s a larger broadsheet underneath, this one a copy of The Herald.

STAY IN YOUR HOMES

The headline covers nearly the top half above the fold. Harry sits up, carefully unfolding it. Still no explanation of the strange hemorrhagic fever sweeping through London.

Harry skims the article, most of it speculation about the disease’s origins. It maybe came from France, perhaps originally from China or the Americas. Spread by blood and bodily fluids. Do not go to the hospitals, even if you suspect you have the disease. Isolate in your homes and wait for help.

Harry looks back up at the house, thinks about the body he saw, the decayed nature of it. They’ve been waiting a long while from the looks of it.

But not the thing. Not the other…person. That looked dead, but was still moving.

An Inferi? In a Muggle house?

Harry closes his eyes and he’s instantly back to the last time he saw an Inferi: in the watery cave with Dumbledore, the army of bodies rising up out of the lake to protect Voldemort’s locket-horcrux. The swirl of fire from Dumbledore’s wand driving them back despite his weakened state.

That was the night so many things became so crystal clear. Above all the understanding that Harry himself would have to die, just as Dumbledore did, body falling, falling, falling from the top of the tower. Snape standing and watching it happen, long before Harry would finally learn of his true loyalties, loyalties that would get the potions master killed less than a year later.

That was Harry’s last night at Hogwarts as a student before he went on the run with Sirius, his godfather endlessly focused on finding any other way to defeat Voldemort. They’d looked for years even as they destroyed every other one of Voldemort’s horcruxes they could get their hands on.

Each minor victory had only moved them one step closer to the inescapable fact that as long as Harry lived, Voldemort could never be defeated. Harry would have to die. Even Dumbledore hadn’t been able to see a way around that.

That didn’t stop Sirius from searching, even as the war grew around them, not a loud, concussive battle, but one played out in politics and laws and Muggles and Muggleborns disappearing with barely a ripple.

Maybe it’d been selfish, taking the alternative procedure Sirius found rather than just facing Voldemort like the prophecy always said he would need to. Maybe that shortcut is what lead to this, whatever this is. The wrongness of this world that has been here from the moment Harry woke, no matter how much he tries to ignore it.

He leans forward, resting his head against the steering wheel.

He’d much rather think he’s woken in a nightmare. That maybe he’s still under and this is all an elaborate hallucination? Or that he’s just cracked under the pressure of prying out that intrusive fragment of Voldemort’s soul entwined with his.

Is he imagining all of this? It’s the only thing he can think of, and yet everything in him is screaming that this is real. No matter how implausible, no matter how horrible. This is real.

He rubs at his forehead, an old habit. He feels cut off, almost wishing, for a second, that he could still reach out and steal glimpses from Voldemort, that he could know what the hell is happening. Where he was, what he was doing. Where the fight he spent too long running from is happening.

The lack of connection is haunting, mostly because he can’t know if that means he’s just no longer a horcrux or if Voldemort is gone too. If what’s happened in that house and is written on the cover of the newspapers, is this Voldemort? Has he finally achieved what he always wanted? The complete obliteration of Muggles? An endless army of Inferi to conquer the world?

And what could Harry do about it even if it were true? He has no wand. He doesn’t even have proper trousers for fuck’s sake.

He looks at the house.

Gathering the tattered remains of his bravery, Harry opens the car door, stepping out into the yard with its abandoned toys. He walks back to the front door, hesitating slightly before pushing it open and stepping inside. He listens carefully, and all he can hear is the slow rhythmic thumping of a body against a door.

Near the front door is a peg board hung with coats, scarves, and the like, most of them large but a few in the small scale of child. A dusty jumper is hung carelessly across the back of a chair in the kitchen.

Harry reminds himself that no one in this place is in need of any of this anymore. Beating the jumper free of as much dust as he can, Harry pulls it on over his head. He kicks off the worn, ill-fitting shoes he took from the abbey and tries the various pairs of boots by the door until he finds the ones that fit best.

What he’d really like are some trousers. Maybe a blanket. He looks up the stairs.

Thinking of that thing upstairs in the bedroom, he picks up an iron poker from the fireplace before easing back up the stairs.

Up in the room with the body, Harry finds a pair of corduroy trousers, some thick woolen socks, and after another moment of hesitation, pulls a blanket off the foot of the bed. He tries to ignore the soft, incessant thumping coming from the next room.

Stopping in front of the body, Harry considers taking the shotgun. But even if he could face trying to get it free, he has no idea how to fire a gun, has never even held one in his hands. He’s probably more likely to shoot himself. In the end, he decides to leave it where it is.

“I’m sorry,” he says to the body. “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

Whatever this is.

Passing back by the loo, he roots out some painkillers from the medicine cabinet before going back down into the kitchen. A quick search turns up a tin of beans and a jar of some sort of preserves. Harry takes a spoon and a can opener and heads out to the yard.

Getting back in the car, he pulls the door closed, locking it for good measure. He eats the tin of beans, flipping through the paper for any more clues, most of the pages disintegrating as he moves them. Partial, crumbled muggle faces look up at him.

Once he finishes with the food, he curls up in the backseat of the car, pulling the blanket over himself and closing his eyes.

He sleeps fitfully, and once the sky starts to lighten, he eats the jar of what turns out to be some kind of pickle, filling the empty jar with water from the yard pump.

Going once more into the house, he finds a rucksack, filling it with his meager haul of another two tins filched from the kitchen, a pot, a box of matches, and the blanket with the jar of water carefully wrapped in it. After a moment’s consideration, he picks up the iron poker.

Turning away from the house, he looks down the long winding road. He needs to press on. Needs to find another person. Needs to figure out what is going on.

He starts walking.

#wasteland #zombie apocalyse #hinny #annerb fic

87 notes · View notes

startanewdream · 3 years

Text

Tipsy

Summary: Lily and James find themselves in need of a more private location — and there's nothing like having a whole place for them...

For the Anon who asked exactly for this.

Rated M, so mostly below the cut!

_______________

James’ mouth is hot over hers, demanding with a urgency that Lily hasn’t felt in a while. She can’t fault him; amidst all their worries — war, prophecies, fighting to survive — they haven’t had time to rest for a while. This is their first time out in months.

Maybe he longed for a moment of tranquillity too; maybe it’s all the alcohol they’ve consumed so far, in a silly attempt to play drinking games with Sirius — last seen over the dance floor, so attached to a blond that it felt nearly explicit, though Lily won’t fault Sirius this time. James had interpreted Sirius’ dance just as another drinking game and had decided to snog Lily in the middle of that nightclub as if his life depended on it.

Well, not exactly in the middle of the club. But he had taken her to the darkened halls leading to the bathrooms and ignoring the bored look of the security guards and the amusing looks of anyone who passed behind them, he had proceeded to pin her against the wall and snog her senseless.

Later, Lily will blame the alcohol for that very public display of affection, but for the moment she can’t really thinking in anything else than the way James’ tongue is dancing with hers, his hand everywhere — at one point holding her neck, burying themselves in her hair as if he wants to pull her even closer; then moving over the front of her dress almost distractedly, hand casually sliding over the swell of her breast as if he didn’t even notice what he was doing; or tugging at the edge of her dress, climbing over her thigh —

There is a cough, and they break away as little as they need, breathing hard, equally guilty and wanting looks on their faces.

‘So, you come here often?’ he asks, lips curved into that lopsided grin she loves so much.

‘Pick-up lines at this point, Potter?’ she asks in answer, watching his lips swollen, glasses crooked, all signs that his pick-up lines were not needed at all.

‘Back to using surnames now, are we, Evans?’

Lily giggles. Yes, she is more than a little tipsy.

And yet this supposed innocent sound makes his eyes flash darkly and she knows the look on his face — Lily is rather familiar with the expressions on James’ face before he moves to kiss her.

‘Hey,’ she stops him, putting her hand over his lips. It’s really hard to keep a chain of thoughts while he kisses her fingers, so obscene, but she must try. ‘Maybe we can take this somewhere else?’

‘Ohhh,’ that picks up his interest, eyes glistening with desire. He approaches her to speak at the base of her ear. ‘Back-alley?’

It’s also hard to think with the shivers his voice sends down her body.

‘I was thinking somewhere more private. I don’t want to be interrupted.’

‘Ohhh.’ He takes his time, breathing slowly, and Lily knows the prat is just enjoying the reactions he is causing over her skin. ‘My place is empty tonight.’

‘Your place?’ she repeats, amused.

‘I share with others sometimes,’ he answers without losing a beat. She laughs. ‘What do you say?’

‘Only if we can share dessert over the kitchen table,’ Lily replies boldly, and this makes him break apart to stare at her.

‘Merlin, I love you.’

‘Now, now, James,’ she places a chaste kiss over his lips, lingering long enough to make him crave for more. ‘That’s what you’ll say after.’

_______

They shouldn’t have apparated home, because drink and apparating don’t mix, that’s what James said more than once, stern...

But he can’t think right now, vodka and Lily twirling his brain into blissful oblivion as they land inside the house, all parts intact, thanks Merlin. He’ll deal with the consequences of all the vodka tomorrow morning, because for now all his concentration is focused on Lily, on the way her hands scratch his scalp and her legs wrap around his hips as he raises her, putting her carefully on the table of the kitchen, pushing the tablecloth away.

A glass falls to the ground — ops, maybe he thought he was being careful —, not breaking but making enough sound to echo in the darkened kitchen, but James can’t bother with it now. His hands are busy finding the zipper in the back of her dress, face buried in the cleavage of her dress, desperate for the moment he will finally kiss her breasts as he wanted ever since she first showed up in that dress, way too short and way too tight than he had seen her wear in a while.

She doesn’t help him with her dress, instead fighting a battle of her own with his shirt, opening the buttons there with easy expertise before moving to open his belt. Her hand slide down the zipper of his trousers just as he does the same if her dress, his hand brushing her skin and making goosebumps arise in the trail — though he knows she can’t be enjoying this as much as him, not with the way her warm fingers are enclosed over him, making him whimper — that’s okay, he tells himself, he will make her feel good too —

The lights turn on.

And for the first time in his life, James actually appreciates fighting two wars, because his reactions are very good. He jumps back, hands closing his trousers, just as Lily jumps from the table, her face impossibly red while she tries to close as much as she can of the zipper of her dress.

To their luck — or not, considering how occupied they were — Harry enters the kitchen rubbing his eyes, without his glasses, which gives them even more time to fix themselves — as long as their son doesn’t notice James’ shirt is buttoned all wrong…

‘Mum? Dad?’ he asks sleepily. ‘I thought you wouldn’t be back until dawn.’

‘I thought you wouldn’t be home, Harry,’ James answers, exchanging a look with Lily. It’s the week before Christmas and with Ginny and Hermione back for the holidays, Harry should be there spending time with his girlfriend and friends.

‘I was going to stay at the Burrow, but — Mrs Weasley places the weird charms —’ he blinks, seeming to realize he is oversharing, and he flushes, suddenly interested in looking at the ground. ‘Sorry, I just heard a noise here, I’ll be back to bed.’

‘Yeah, you do that.’

‘Night.’

‘Night…’

Five more seconds and they will be safe… Then Harry’s eyes find the glass on the floor and his gaze follows a path to the table, all messy, and then back to the ground, where there is a belt laying.

Harry’s eyes widen, and James feels suddenly old when he realizes his 17-year-old son understands what this means. Merlin, they grow up so fast…

‘COME ON!,’ Harry cries, pulling James away from his reverie. ‘Really? We eat at this table! Why?’

‘We are drunk,’ James says, and while this seemed like a good reason before, a part of him wonders if he should have admitted this to Harry.

His nostrils flare. James wonders if Harry knows he uses the same anger expressions as Lily.

‘Drunk? And you apparated home? Merlin, you KNOW you cannot do this! What if you had splinched yourselves?’

‘We are fine, Harry,’ Lily points out, crossing her arms and rolling her eyes. ‘We just got caught.’

‘Yeah, by our son,’ James agrees under his breath, though everyone seems to hear it. Neither seems to find this amusing, though. ‘It’s not like he has never interrupted before.’

‘What?’

‘Harry, Harry,’ James grins. ‘Remember that time you caught us in your mum’s office and I told you I was just helping her take the potion out of her blouse?’

‘James —’

‘DAD!’ Harry backs away, looking properly shocked, his hand twitching in the direction of his wand as if he just wants to obliviate himself. ‘That’s it, I’m out. Locked in my room forever.’

‘We’ll place Silencing Charms next time,’ James promises, and this doesn’t seem to comfort Harry much.

He is still shaking his head as he vanishes in the stairs; James looks at Lily. There is a beat — then they break into a fit of laughter.

Yep, mostly tipsy yet.

_______

The next morning Harry makes sure to set the breakfast in the dinner table they never use, handling them a Hangover Potion without meeting their eyes. Lily notices he didn’t put the mint leaves to ease the flavour.

Well, they deserve it.

Notes: (Part of my Eyes Glistening - Jily Lives AU, which I didn't mention before to keep the twist a little! Anon asked for Harry to interrupt James and Lily, since Lily already interrupted Harry once - The Talk 2.0 | The other talk)

#Jily #Jily Fanfiction #Jily Lives AU #James and Lily #don't drink and apparate

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thetorchwoodarchive · 4 years

Text

Gwen Focused Stories as Submitted by the Mods and Users of the Torchwood Archive

Everyone! Thank you so much for your submissions! Recs are under the cut!

As always, please mind the warnings and ratings listed on each individual story.

Feel free to reblog with additions!

Something Beautiful by Cyus (Gen | complete | 4,500 | PG)

After Torchwood, after Jack, Gwen lives her life, even as Jack comes back.

Domestic Disharmony by thirteeninafez (JackIanto, GwenRhys, Gwen&Ianto, Gwen&Jack | complete | 3163 | G)

In which Jack and Gwen get stuck in the Archives and discuss green milk, thermostats and Ianto Jones.

Side Note by Aliciajazmin (Gwen&Ianto | complete | 1027 | T)

A few months after her best friend's funeral, Gwen runs into Rhiannon while grocery shopping. Ianto's sister has some questions and Gwen has some things she needs to say to her.

Inevitability (and other hard truths) by violetmessages (Gwen&Ianto | complete | 1236 | T)

There's a clock ticking down at Torchwood, and Gwen realizes she's the only one who hears it.

All Around Me are Familiar Faces by gwendolyncooper (Gwen&Ianto, JackIanto, GwenRhys | complete | 2602 | G)

Gwen Cooper wakes up in Jack Harkness' bed. Ianto Jones wakes up in Rhys Williams'. And they find themselves in each other's bodies. As close as they are, this might be a level too deep in their friendship.

Blueberry Knees by Violetmessages (Gwen&Ianto, JackIanto, GwenRhys | complete | 3878 | T)

If Ianto thought about it, the way Gwen’s illness progressed was rather like falling asleep. Slowly and surely, but then all at once.

He hadn’t noticed it at first - he still loathed himself for not recognizing that something might be wrong. But he hadn’t, no one had, so it slipped through, like little crumbs falling between the crack of their ancient sofa.

And there was nothing to be done about it.

Power Struggle by Prochytes (GwenTosh, Gen | complete | 1416 | T)

How Gwen ended up in charge by the start of Season Two, based on the premise that one should never assume Jack Harkness is joking.

Bad at Communication by engagemythrusters (JackIanto | complete | 1740 | G)

In which Gwen visits a hospital, where Jack and Ianto, respectively tired and high, are complete idiots.

The Hands on the Clock Keep on Ticking by Violetmessages (Gwen&Ianto | complete | 10235 | M)

They all knew it could happen to anyone. They’d all seen the proof. Even if it happened to a miniscule amount of the population, it was still a possibility.

But they had grown complacent. They had forgotten that they too were also at the mercy of the Rift, that the Rift did not make an exception for those who knew its existence.

They had forgotten until they were faced with it themselves.

In which Gwen and Ianto get sent back to 1969 by the Rift.

Pastries, Avoidance Tactics, and a Bottle of Scotch by pocky_slash (Gwen&Ianto, GwenRhys, JackIanto | 6220 | G)

In which Gwen said something she regrets, Ianto makes a poor dinner choice, Rhys offers sound advice, and Jack has a key. A different sort of "Meat" post-ep.

Children, Daleks and Mopeds: How Gwen Cooper Got Her Groove Back by paycheckgurl (Gwen&Jack, GwenRhys | complete | 9603 | T)

Following a disastrous shopping trip that put her at the center of an explosion, Gwen finds a little alien boy.

Or: The series of events in which Gwen acquired another child, had a much needed conversation with Jack, bought a moped, defeated a Dalek with a boxing glove, and learned that loving yourself and saving the world don’t need to be mutually exclusive.

A coda to Revolution of the Daleks where I explain why Gwen has a son all of a sudden.

I Don’t Know What to Think by aliciajazmin (GwenTosh | complete | 2637 | T)

Gwen and Tosh travel with the Doctor through time and space, taking a break from Torchwood. Gwen decides to bring along her pet rat Owen (not to be confused with Human Owen). Also, Gwen and Tosh are desperately in love with each other.

Lost Inside by Xennon (Gen | complete | 36,642 | T)

The team go in search of some smugglers.

A Vision Too Removed to Mention by Pocky_Slash (Gwen&Ianto | complete | 13920 | T)

In which Ianto is stuck in a time loop that feels more like hell.

Club Wales by Pocky_Slash (Gwen&Ianto | Series | 69,530 | G-T)

In the wake of Jack's disappearance, Gwen finds comfort in a new friendship with Ianto. Gossip, bonding, and other hijinks of understanding ensue.

To the Waters and the Wilds by Violetmessages (GwenTosh, JackIanto | complete | 13190 | T)

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Tosh whirled around. She’d thought she was alone, she’d expected it.

Then she locked eyes with the most beautiful woman she’d ever seen, a woman who seemed to radiate an ethereal glow, a woman that emanated an otherworldly light.

Cold Pizza by Eberesche (GwenRhys, Gwen&Ianto | complete | 4767 | T)

With Jack missing and the Rift running the team ragged, Gwen's plans for a single night in are foiled.

Safe by DinoDina (GwenToshRhys, GwenRhys | complete | 1191 | G)

After the cannibals, Gwen doesn't go home with Owen. She rides back to Cardiff — back to Rhys — in an ambulance with Tosh.

Dead on Arrival by violetmessages (JackIanto, GwenRhys | complete | 13582 | M)

Ianto Jones wakes up. The only problem is, he's certain he was dead.

You Won’t Be Seeing Us Today (You Won’t Be Seeing Us in Hell) by Beleriandings (GwenRhys, JackIanto, Gwen&Ianto | complete | 11141 | T)

One day, Syriath took Gwen's voice. She should have realised Gwen wouldn't stand for that.

Girly Night In by Mathemagician (GwenTosh | complete | 1088 | T)

The girls and Ianto have a night in. Gwen figures something out about herself.

For the Torchwood Femslash Fest prompt "Sexual Identity"

This Earth is Empty Without You (But the Grave is Not) by violetmessages (Gwen&Ianto, GwenRhys, JackIanto | complete | 1036 | G)

Ianto Jones' funeral happens on a perfectly sunny day. Gwen hates every minute of it.

In a Polaroid Picture by innocent_until_proven_geeky (GwenTosh, GwenRhys, Gwen&Jack | complete | 2176 | G)

Gwen finds a photo of her and Tosh, and remembers.

Exit Protocol by Beleriandings (GwenTosh | complete | 6139 | G)

Not long after the deaths of Tosh and Owen, Gwen gets a message from an unnamed user on the Hub system. That really shouldn't happen. And yet, there it is.

To the Sticking Place by zephyras (JackIanto, GwenRhys, OwenTosh, MarthaMickey | complete | 96433 | M)

The end justifies the means. Failure is not an option. There is always a choice, except when there isn't. These are the phrases Ianto Jones lives by and he refuses to allow anyone, even Captain Jack Harkness, to change that. Jack/Ianto, AU, Torchwood One Agent!Ianto.

These Happy Days by Violetmessages (GwenRhys, JackIanto, Gwen&Ianto, GwenJackIantoRhys | series | 16,777 | G-T)

A series of non-chronological stories in which Ianto miraculously survives CoE in some fashion and Torchwood Three (plus Rhys and Anwen) settle down near the seaside.

Piece it Together by Beleriandings (JackIato, Gwen&Ianto | complete | 3442 | T)

Gwen realises that for all they talk, she's never asked Ianto about how he and Jack got together before. The answer is a lot more complicated than she was expecting.

Respite by Beleriandings (Gwen&Ianto, JackIanto, GwenRhys | complete | 2590 | G)

Even by their usual standards, Gwen thought it was absolutely fair to say it had been a rough week.

Dancing in the Midnight Garden by Fionn_sgeul (Gen | complete | 17660 | G)

In which Gwyneth the Maid and Gwen Cooper are the same person, Jack meets someone else whose life was completely turned around by the Doctor, and Torchwood is invaded by garden gnomes

Don’t You Know For Years You’ve Haunted Me by Virtualsilver (GwenRhys, JackIanto | complete | 12083 | T)

Gwen has inherited a recessive trait that has lurked in her ancestors' blood for generations: she is prescient. She can see flashes of where the timeline is heading and can feel when something - or someone - changes it.

She tries to use her foreknowledge to change events for the better, but securing the outcome of her interventions proves to be a challenge.

He Really Loves That Coat by DracoPendragon (JackIanto | complete | 585 | G)

It was quiet when Gwen entered the Hub that Monday morning. And the sight that greeted her was not one she’d expected, but wasn't one she minded seeing.

Sink Your Feet into the Mud (and I’ll Return) by violetmessages (Gwen&Ianto, GwenRhys, JackIanto | complete | 3404 | G)

What if she could bring Ianto back?

It’s a dangerous idea. It’s got the potential to be catastrophic. But Gwen is all out of options. She’s surrounded by the graves of the people she loves, abandoned, save for her husband, and she refuses to let her best friend go without a fight.

Painted in the Sand (To be Washed Away) by moonlightrhosyn (Gwen&Ianto, GwenRhys | complete | 1992 | T)

Gwen could still see their bodies every time she closed her eyes.

This is Me Trying by gwendolyncooper (GwenRhys, Gwen&Tosh, GwenOwen | WIP | 2524 | T)

“Sometimes you do stupid things to try and cope, to get a sense of normalcy, to make all this chaos and the Rift and space and aliens and the things we see make sense. Stupid, horrible things that should never have happened, and they come back ‘round to bite you again, and--” “What happened, Gwen?” Tosh’s prodding is soft and careful, but it speaks the glaring truth they both know - Gwen is stalling, talking around the issue at hand. Verdant eyes flash upwards with a startling intensity now, wide and filling with unshed tears again, the special agent’s plush lips pressed into a trembling line as she attempts to retain a semblance of control over her emotions. “I told Rhys about Owen.”

Fourty-Eight Hour Stand-Down by pocky_slash (JackIanto, GwenRhys | complete | 2740 | G)

"You and Ianto had a domestic," Gwen guesses. Jack scowls at her. In which Jack is kicked out, Gwen just wants a night off, Rhys buys milk, and Ianto clears table space.

Ret-comp (Retroactive Compensation) by reiley (LisaIanto | complete | 499 | T)

The phone. The one that could call any place or any time in the whole universe. The one Jack had locked away and warned them all that it was never to be used.

Any Other Day by Amand_R (JackIanto, JackGwen, GwenRhys | complete | 84055 | complete| NR)

Hey, this one time? At Torchwood? Gwen and Jack switched bodies and everything went pear-shaped.

Space Tripping (in spaaaaace!) by Princessoftheworlds (JackIanto, IantoOther, GwenRhys, Gwen&Ianto | complete | 5115 |T)

Gwen and Ianto road trip across space - space trip, get high, shop, have a light existential crisis, face grief, and get massages - not all necessarily in that order.

Empty Chairs by princessoftheworlds (Gwen&Ianto | complete | 412 | G)

Gwen tends to Ianto's wound.

Forever, And What Comes After by Violetmessages (JackIanto, GwenRhys | Complete | 10028 | T)

“Hm, imagine if they did,” Ianto said. “Torchwood would have to come out of retirement.”

In which Gwen and Ianto relax at a spa, Jack and Rhys attempt bad science, and Anwen is just along for the ride.

One In The Same by Violetmessages (Gwen&Ianto, GwenRhys | Complete | 1638 | T)

Ianto, Gwen thinks. Her best friend would never turn her away, and maybe she can sleep on his couch for the night. Perhaps by the morning she’ll be okay again.

Wastin’ Away In Margaritaville by Paycheckgurl (Gwen&Ianto, JackIanto, GwenRhys, Gwen&Jack | Complete | 1419 | T)

Jack’s bad coping mechanism is agreeing to be a surrogate for an alien spawn baby. Gwen’s is at the bottom of a bottle.

Big Finish: Expectant from Gwen’s POV

#event:gwen party #character:gwen cooper #mod:nik #chartrope:bamf gwen

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imgoingtocrash · 3 years

Photo

Made of Iron, Born of Fire: The Fanmix

by @imgoingtocrash

Listen on Spotify and 8tracks

Read the series on Ao3

AKA: A labor of love for @savvysass’s birthday!!!!

What can I say that hasn’t already been said because we’re both incredibly sappy people in our Author’s Notes? Writing this series with you has brought me so much joy in the last two years, and I never could have hit over 100k words without you. Here’s to whatever we write next in the series...and all of the WIPs we’re working on right now...and only god knows what’s next for us personally and professionally...and most importantly, to you on your Birthday. Thank you for being such a good friend, in both fandom and outside of it. I’m so, so thankful to know you and love you. 🥰

Director’s Cut Below, because we all know I love talking about this series, and yes, that does extend to why I picked these songs. (And also maybe because these song choices only make sense in my brain and hopefully Savannah’s?? Who knows! Feel free to ask questions if you want but let’s be honest this series and fanmix are most importantly for us, because we love the series so dang much.)

My Wildest Dreams by Ron Pope

I spoke in riddles and in rhymes, but my time with you has taught me to simplify, you’re not quite what I pictured you would be, you’re better than my wildest dreams.

We’ve talked about this one before, and I’LL TALK ABOUT IT AGAIN!!!! Ron Pope is so good imo, and this song wowowow the father-child feels, but especially with Tony and newborn Peter a la A Foreign Feeling and A First Time For Everything.

Big & Scared by Raleigh Ritchie

I want to be better for you, let me do that now, you’re my favorite human, so you should be prepared, I’ll help you get through it, when you’re big and scared

We’ve mentioned Tony’s thoughts about legacy multiple times by now, and I think this song really represents Tony looking forward to the person Peter could be become and that “breaking the cycle” mentality of supporting Peter even when he’s not a perfect father.

Legacy of Sadness by Ron Pope

irrational as it may seem I guess I’m sorry, even though I know that none of it’s my fault, it is easier for me to count my blessings, than to cry for every single thing we’ve lost

I have 0 shame putting these two songs by Ron Pope almost back to back because they’re the opening and closing of an album dedicated to his child like...it’s so perfect for Tony and this theme of reflection on who he is and who Peter will become/is becoming and all that entails.

this is me trying by Taylor Swift

They told me all of my cages were mental, so I got wasted like all my potential, and my words shoot to kill when I'm mad, I have a lot of regrets about that

I wrote something...very sad but also soft recently??? and this is for That it’s about pre-CW Pepperony being separated and the road to them trying to come back together including Tony working on himself and I love it!!! It hurts really good!!! This whole song is perfect for it and I can’t wait until people get to read it.

Be Good When I’m Gone by Four Year Strong

I'm sorry I can't stop to listen, but I've got so much to do and I've got some place to be, the house looks like the aftermath of a hurricane, I hope it stays that way

Tony being a busy parent but doing his best to make time for Peter in his life and making that time count has been something super important to illustrate to us, especially the transition from being a CEO to being a superhero and how that changes how Peter sees Tony’s absence over time.

I Won’t Back Down by Johnnyswim, Drew Holcomb & The Neighbors, and Penny and Sparrow

Tony puts on the original version by Tom Petty in Home Is Where The Heart Is, but I think this cover has a very slow, emotional undertone that’s really great too. The interludes, if you didn’t catch it, have all been featured in a fic previously.

Let It Matter by Johnnyswim

So if it matters let it matter, if your heart's breaking let it ache, catch those pieces as they scatter, know your hurt is not in vain

Pepper in Never Tell Me The Odds ALL DAYYYYY. She’s the emotional rock of that fic (and of our Ironfam TBH) and it’s all because she allows herself to feel her feelings and encourages the Stark boys to do so as well.

Simmer - Acoustic by Hayley Williams

And if my child, needed protection, from a fucker like that man, I’d sooner gut him, cause nothing cuts like a mother

Post-Home Is Where The Heart Is...y’all know Pepper’s not that mad about what happened to Obie. Also just Pepper when someone hurts her family?? I always write it as her sort of putting all of her emotion into something she can control and doing it well, so, this song is all about that.

Tightrope by Nia Hendricks

one step after another, keep holding on to each other, don’t look back, move on and let go, that’s how you walk on a tightrope

Pepperony trying to navigate their relationship and the insanity of superhero stuff and also co-parenting. It’s all excellent, I love them so much, I enjoy writing it so much!!!!

Dancing With Your Ghost by Sasha Sloan

Never got the chance, to say a last goodbye, I gotta move on, but it hurts to try, how do I love, how do I love again?

This song is tilted towards romance, but if you’ll remember, we’re a Pro-Tony Survives Endgame AU series, so it’s not about THAT...but well...Infinity War sure will hit something fierce for certain non-romantic relationships in this series, huh?

The Bones by Maren Morris

Call it dumb luck, but baby, you and I, can't even mess it up, although we both try, no, it don't always go the way we planned it, but the wolves came and went and we're still standing

Post-Endgame Ironfam!!! Tony and Pepper married with their kids, their family and HAPPY...THIS IS WHY WE DO ALL OF THE ANGST...FOR A FAMILY...WE LOVE THEM

Carry on Wayward Son by Kansas

Considered Pepper and Peter’s ‘song’, as it’s referenced multiple times in the series, and was one of the bigger solidifying moments of their mother-son relationship as a whole.

Mundane by Hardcastle

And I’ve been sinking into silence, dwelling on my thoughts, and in these months, I haven’t felt that most conversations have left me anything but blue

Peter’s selective mutism was something very special to us when we originally had the idea, and making sure we talk about it and utilize it in the right way is something we’re still working on, particularly with the Therapy Fic we’re brainstorming atm.

survivin’ (One Eyed Jack’s Session) by Bastille

What can I say? I'm survivin', crawling out these sheets to see another day, what can I say? I'm survivin', and I'm gonna be fine, I'm gonna be fine, I think I'll be fine

Spoiler Alert: Peter’s not fine, like, a decent amount of the time. But he’s sure trying, and we love him for that.

Jacob from the Bible by Jake Wesley Rogers

Mama, don't worry, it took me years, to say I'm sorry, to see your tears, Mama, forgive me, I grew up too fast, but it's not on you, it's in the past

Mostly part of Peter growing up to become a hero and realizing what his parents--particularly Pepper--have gone through for him to become the person he is today, but that sometimes he still doesn’t feel like he’s making them proud enough.

Compassion Is a German Word by To Kill A King

Don't be so arrogant, you ain't no different to anyone I've met, we're all the heroes in our own film, or maybe the villain in someone else's

Spider-Man being an excellent superhero boi!!! Being kind and good!!! We love it!! Also, I put a TKAK song on...a LOT of my playlists, because I think they’re great.

brutal by Olivia Rodrigo

And I'm so sick of seventeen, where's my fucking teenage dream?, if someone tells me one more time, "Enjoy your youth", I'm gonna cry

I mean...this song is such a Teenage Mood...I had to do it...

In The Wee Small Hours Of The Morning by Frank Sinatra

So, I had this cute little scene in my head that went with this song for SO LONG but there wasn’t really anything for it to fit into so...yeah that’s part 2 of Savannah’s Birthday Gift, a little soft Baby Peter drabble. Fluffy Goop from top to bottom. That can be read here.

Home by Phillip Phillips

Just know you're not alone, 'Cause I'm gonna make this place your home

...I know it’s not original, okay? It’s found family, it’s great, I don’t care!

Comes and Goes (In Waves) by Greg Laswell

And this part was for her, and this part was for her, this part was for her, does she remember?

This song is good family angst in general BUT these specific lyrics made me think of Mary and that they never forget her in their lives despite the other stuff going on (because we refuse to let them).

I Have Made Mistakes by The Oh Hellos

I have made mistakes, I continue to make them, the promises I've made, I continue to break them, and all the doubts I've faced, I continue to face them, but nothing is a waste if you learn from it

No one in the Ironfam is perfect, but they all do their best to try and grow even when they’re scared they’ll never be able to. The ups and downs are all par for the course of this series to us.

Easy Days - Demo by Bastille

Cause I don’t wanna fall back again, back into the easy days, everything was so simple then, little fires burned away

Strife is a part of life, and the family in this fic growing through their loss and struggles and moving ahead as a unit to get to a better place is super central to making the fic what it is...but it’s easy for them to remember the old days before being superheroes and wishing it was simple again.

North by Sleeping At Last

Let the years we’re here be kind, be kind, let our hearts like doors open wide, open wide, settle our bones like wood over time, over time, give us bread, give us salt, give us wine

The way Tony went from feeling so alone to having an entire built family that’s so full of love and everything he never dreamed of...*screams into my pillow* I love this series so much thank you and good night!!!

#made of iron born of fire #irondad #ironfam #fanmix #savvysass #this series just makes me burst with content i can't describe it #also doing the graphics was a fun experiment!!!#mine #mine: marvel

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fairymadnessyeah · 4 years

Text

BNHA Ship to Finish the Year

FuyuSei (Todoroki Fuyumi x Iida Tensei)

Canon

I think that they would either meet by Shouto and Tenya or at the hospital.

If it was at the hospital, it would be a chance meeting. Fuyumi is visiting her mom, and Tensei is going to physical therapy. They meet in the lobby and start talking.

Present Mic and Nemuri are the ones who encourage him to ask her out. -PS: None of them knows she is the daughter of Enji yet.- After he does and they date for a few weeks, he shows them a picture, and the two almost have a heart attack. They don't know how to tell him, until Shouta comes along and says it.

If they meet by Shouto and Tenya, it probably would be at a Sport Festival or Cultural Festival. They would start talking, and Nemuri would ask Fuyumi out for him. She says yes, and they exchange numbers.

Imagine if Natsuo is there: "I got the snacks. What's that?" "Oh, a phone number. I have a date this Saturday," "I- I left for five minutes!"

I feel like he would stop by her school every time he can and her students know him as wheelchair boyfriend.

And speaking of wheelchairs, Tensei sometimes feels like he is not enough for Fuyumi. He can't take her dancing or ice-skating.

Fuyumi doesn't care about it. He loves Tensei for who he is, and that is enough for her.

On her birthday, he takes her to see the Winter Illumination events, and even takes her to see ice-sculptors at a festival.

He likes to carry her on his lap and then accelerate with his quirk. He especially does it when the sakura trees are blooming, so it's more romantic.

Also, she sits on his lap when it's hot, since she is always cold.

I don't want to break anybody's bubble but these two one hell of an age gap.

Like Tensei is 31 and Fuyumi is 23.

He is eight years older than her. That's more than Shigaraki and Toga have on each other.

Am I the first one to notice this?

I feel like it should be a big deal. Like when Tensei was eighteen, Fuyumi was ten.

I feel like his parents would make fun of him for that. Calling him a creepy old man.

I also feel, since Tensei appeared in vigilantes, that he has a lot of vigilante friends, and one time, they all meet Fuyumi.

I feel like they would like her more than her boyfriend.

Also, he likes her cooking much more than anything else he has ever eaten before. But don't tell his mom.

Family

There is only one rule that all Todoroki men share and respect: Fuyumi needs to be protected. They don't give a crap if the guy is a retired hero, or the brother of a friend, or in a wheelchair, they won't let him hurt Fuyumi.

The first months of dating, Tensei doesn't feel safe. Like someone is staring at his back with murderous intent. He can't pin-point which Todoroki is, but his money is on Endeavour.

Actually it's all of them. They take turns keeping watch. One time, they all ended doing it at the same time. It was awkward at first, but they found a way to make it work and not kill each other.

Every single Todoroki has threatened him.

Dabi, with the help of Toga, cornered him in an alley and placed him on the floor and stepped on him.

"If you hurt sister, I'm going to finish what Stain couldn't do..."

Natsuo did it during a family dinner. He smiled and at first appeared very polite, but when Fuyumi wasn't there, the smile was gone.

"I am a doctor, you think I don't know how to get rid of you and make it look like it happened naturally?"

Enji went to meet him at his apartment. He knocked on the door asked him a few question. Tensei went along, answering everything politely, and then got the message by the last question.

"How much heat will it take for that wheelchair to melt with you in it?"

Shouto was more surprising. He called Tensei with his brother's phone and only said one thing before he hung up.

"I don't care if you are Tenya's brother's, if you don't make my sister happy, I will end you,"

I feel like Rei wouldn't be okay with the idea until she sees that Tensei is defensless in a wheelchair.

I know it's a bad thought, and Rei knows so, but after everything she went through, you can't blame the woman for it. Her daughter is with a HERO. At least, if he is in a wheelchair, she can do better to survive.

Tenya loves his new sister. He hasn't seen his brother so happy since the accident, and he always wanted a sister.

The Iida's love her.

She is an angel in their eyes. Their son is in such good hands.

I feel like they would have two kids. First a girl Iida Fubuki, a girl, and then Iida Kaen, a boy.

Fubuki has blue hair with white highlights. Her name means blizzard in Japanese and her quirk is that she has engine pipes on her wrist that shoot dry ice.

Kaen has blue hair with red highlights. His name means Flame Thrower in Japanese and his quirk is that he has engine pipes on his ankles that shoot flames.

Neither of them become heroes. I feel like both families give them enough reasons not to follow that career.

Fubuki becomes an ice skater, using her quirk for presentations and speed.

Kaen becomes a musician. A hard, metal punk rocker and uses his quirk for shows. He was closer to Dabi than his sister.

AU - Fantasy AU

So, Fuyumi is a princess. Because, of course, she is.

Tensei is a knight, and he comes from a long line of knights.

One day, her life is threatened by a new rogue called Stain, who is killing off noble families and royals.

Tensei is tasked with protecting the princess at all cost. But it's a harder task than he originally thought.

His job was to stick by the princess side as much as he could, but on his second day, he lost her.

He found her later on a hut on the countryside, teaching young girls how to read and write and other basic knowledge. She wears a disguise, so others don't recognize her. With a tattered dress and a spell to make her hair black, she is unrecognizable.

Tensei doesn't stop her from doing it when he finds out and instead helps her sneak out and helps with the angry sexist man that come around.

It all goes well until Stain attacks.

He ambushes them on the road, and the only reason that they survive is that Fuyu shows Stain she is not like other royals.

As Tensei was trying to protect her and getting in the way, the rogue was going to kill him. But before he can, Fuyumi gets in the way, pleading that he lets Tensei live.

Stain leaves and Tensei and Fuyumi are alright.

When they return to the castle though, Tensei is looked down with dishonour by the rest of the court. He is fired from his job as a knight with the princess, but Fuyumi then hires him back again.

The two continue to spend time together, and all seems happy. But then, Fuyumi is betrothed.

Tensei tries to handle it with dignity since he is only a knight and knew in the back of his mind, that Fuyumi would get married one day. But he is a jealous mess when the fiance arrives.

He follows them around, stops them whenever they get too close and intervenes whenever the man makes a move on her.

Fuyumi, though grateful, has to ask him to stop. Because even if she would prefer it was him, she is marrying, if he angers her fiance, they are going to behead him.

They don't have to worry about it though, because, before the wedding, the lost prince Touya returns and takes the throne.

However, even if Dabi, now the new king, breaks her marriage off with her betrothed, Fuyumi doesn't like how much he is ruling.

The two get in a fight, and Dabi tells her that if she doesn't like it, then she can leave. He won't stop her.

The next day, Fuyumi starts packing. She tells Tensei that he can stay if he wants, he doesn't have to follow her.

Tensei confesses his feelings for her and then starts packing.

They leave a week after and they settle on a farming land where Fuyumi opens a school for girls and Tensei hunts and collects stuff to sell.

Fanon Oponion

So, again, I can't see these two having sex.

I just can't.

I don't know why. And AO3 seems to agree with me since I found 3 where they have sex, and it's not just mentioned.

One was a Fuyubowl, the other was a crackfic, and the last one traumatized me.

For the most part, they are a background couple.

And not in the way Hagakure and Ojiro are a couple where you might find more than 10 fics about them, but as 'we don't want Fuyumi to be alone, so in this fic she is with Tensei.'

I feel like they are underappreciated, especially Fuyumi.

Girl is still holding on after the shitty situation she is in. She is the only sane Todoroki in here.

And poor Tensei. He didn't deserve what happened to him. Stain didn't have a very clear objective.

There's also the fact that not much is known about them.

Like Tensei has not been mentioned since the stain arc.

They are just there...

But people love making next-gen kids with them.

#bnha #mha #fuyusei #todoroki fuyumi #iida tensei #bnha headcanons #canon #family #fantasy au #fanon opinion

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chimswae · 4 years

Text

BTS Caretaker CH35

Summary: She may think she has Bangtan Sonyeondan wrapped around her fingers. She may think it is easy to love the members equally without hurting any soul. She may think the boys wont fall head over heels for her. She assumes it is okay to show a little love and affection towards the boys, what if she gets it all wrong? What if it only brings more complication to her already complicated life? Can she survive their charms? Will she be able to resist them? What if they just wont let her go?

- Pairing: BTS x Oc ( Yoongi x OC, Jungkook x OC)

- Genre: Fluff, Slight Angst, Romance, Idol!au

- Word Count: 3, 685

- Author Note: Hi update update! :DDD

Previous | Next

Chapter 35

It was a good day to drink only if you choose a perfect companion as your drinking buddy. Fortunately for Jimin, Seul had time to spare today. As soon as he finished his practice, he went straight to Seul’s workplace to pick her up.

They chose to drink at the top of the hill near her place. It was the best place to drink according to Seul, yet it did not disappoint him. Taking a sip from her coke, she glanced at him “What are you going to do about it?” she warmed up.

“About what?” Jimin feigned innocence. Rolling her eyes in response, Seul nudged his shoulder lightly “You know what I mean” she whispered.

Jimin scratched his head with a shy smile “Can you stop making fun of me? I told you I will deal with it discreetly. Don’t make it sound so scandalous” Seul curled her lips into a slight pout.

“So, are you going to give up on him?” she asked out of curiosity.

“Seul, listen.. I care for Jungkook and I love him, but it won’t change the fact that it is impossible to pursue him. I am comfortable to love him this way, as time passes the feelings that I have will be washed off completely. I will no longer have this romantic feeling for him, so I can return to where I start. I want to keep Jungkook close to me. I don’t want to ruin what we have now, it is precious” Seul nodded with a soft hum.

“Understandable. I am with you till the end. Follow your heart Jiminie, don’t be pressure. About your feelings for Jungkook, let the time decides it for you. As for now, live your life as it is”

“Thank you. As for now I am not thinking about serious relationship” he squished her hand, smiling brightly.

“So, should I introduce you to a girl?” “Ji Seul!” he poked her forehead using the tip of his finger causing the latter to giggle.

Jimin was having a hard time to deal with her little tease now she’s planning to add more it, what an ignorant girl. “What? Now, that you find I am unfit to your liking. Shall I set you up with someone? There is my best friend Hwasa” grinning like a fool, Seul wiggle her brows, followed by a small dance.

“Are you playing matchmaker now? Wow, you do have a lot of time in hand” he cringed at her absurdity.

“Hey, I am being helpful. Is Hwasa okay for you? She is loud and a little rough though, but that doesn’t matter since you survive Yoongi I am sure you can survive Hwasa!” Jimin was losing his word when he barely started this banter that he’s about to have with Seul.

Scoffing in disapproval, Jimin shuddered at the thought of dating Seul’s best friend “I am sure your friend is as crazy as you. Pass” the girl jabbed the side of his torso with a nasty glare.

“Yah! Do I need to remind you that you used to like me? Tsk, ungrateful brat” she crossed her arms and made a sour face. “Do you have someone in mind?” Seul gave him a questioning look.

“I have someone in mind” it will always be Jungkook, his subconscious argued at the back of his mind.

“Oh my god who?!” she deadpanned. “Is it someone that I know? An idol perhaps? Don’t tell me you like that girl from the previous rumour. I can’t recall her name, but she is pretty” it was Seul got a little dramatic over Jimin’s statement.

His eyes grew wider as he showed his protest “Hell no, not her! I am gay Ji Seul please” he shot Seul an ‘are you kidding me’ look.

“You used to like me; you are bisexual dude” Said Seul with a pout clearly offended by his remarks.

Jimin let out a soft giggle “Well, I am sorry if it is offending you. That was to cover up my gay ass” ruffling Seul’s hair in process, his eyes literally disappeared into crescent moon when he smiled.

“There is a letter that I receive from fans” his voice faded away in process. She really could not fathom the idea of Jimin falling for a stranger through a fan letter.

“Are you saying that you like a fan?” she gawked.

“Can’t you tell that I am changing the topic here? Everything that come from your mouth worth the gossip, goodness” he pinched her lips together earning a death glare from the annoyed girl.

Seul swatted his hand and frowned deeply “You are asking for it. Tell me about this mysterious fan, do you happen to know her personally? Have you ever meet her in any of your fan meeting?” she brought her knees to her chest, looking all excited to hear his story.

“Tsk, look at you. Nosy much. No, I don’t know who this person is personally. I receive her fan letter every month, and the things that she wrote in the letter inspired me” he bit his lower lips and expelled a deep sigh.

“You are falling for her writing? I don’t know you are this soft Park Jimin. She is your fan then?” Seul blinked.

“No, she is Jungkook’s fan”

“Yah, are you trying to steal his fan!” she looked up with a puzzled frown on her face.

He glowered “It is not my fault, she mixed up my name and Jungkook’s face. The first letter that I received from her had my name written on it. I thought it was meant for me until I received another letter. I realized she meant to write it for Jungkook” the content of the letter could not be forgotten easily, that was by far one of the genuine letter that he ever received from anyone.

“How can she mess it up until the end, when you are shorter than Jungkook? There was an obvious difference between both of you” she mumbled.

Jimin eyes widened disagreed by her teasing “Ji Seul! Do I have to remind you few years back, I used to be taller than Jungkook!” he puffed his cheeks, pouting away the last line.

Seul giggled kneading Jimin’s fluffy cheeks. “The story doesn’t match the situation, spill the beans” she demanded.

Annoyed, he really hated her sharpness, can she not be so on point over everything. It seemed impossible to lie to her face. “I stole the letter from Jungkook. One day, she sent another letter to me and Jungkook. She apologized for mistaking me as Jungkook, and that was the last letter that I ever received from her. Ever since she got her bias name right, she had been sending her letter to Jungkook correctly” Seul raised her brows in amusement.

“And that letter never reaches Jungkook right? Aren’t you sly like a snake? How long have it been?”

“About two years?”

“Yah are you insane?! You are not her ultimate member, it is Jungkook. And I thought you have bro-code even when it comes fans” she reasoned. If people think Taehyung is weird, wait till they have their first-hand experience with Jimin. This little mochi can be quite handful sometimes.

He retorted sarcastically “That is why I stop looking for her, because it is impossible to find her in the ocean full of Armys. Recently, she wrote something about her attending Wings Tour and one of our fansign during You Never Walk Alone promotion” she places her hand over her chest dramatically.

“Does it mean you keep your eyes on Jungkook’s fans during your fansign?” he moved his head slowly, scratching his not itchy head.

“I can’t help it don’t blame me. I don’t see any sign of her though, I wonder if she ever come” she snickered in response, letting out a small giggle.

“You don’t even know how she looks like, yet you pretend as if it is the biggest mission on planet” Seul teased.

Jimin simpered, looking pleased of his own decision to track down the mysterious fan “It is worth the try. I still have to apologize to her for not delivering her letters to Jungkook” Seul sent a bewildered look at his way.

“And you continue to steal her letter from Jungkook” she stated sarcastically.

“Jungkook won’t know unless you open your big mouth” Jimin squished her cheeks together messing it up a little, mimicking her action few minutes ago. She slapped his hand whining over Jimin’s unnecessary affection towards her, it spelled ‘Bullies’ on his forehead.

“Are you going to find her till the end?” his simple nod earns a loud cheer from the small girl.

“Yes, only because she is a true fan, and I want to thank her for the letters that she wrote few years ago which comfort me. I was in a rough phase when I first read her letters which she mistakenly addressed it to me. Not gonna lie, her words were just so genuine, I was comforted by them.”

Seul smiled softly, caressing his knees “You will find her one day. Update me once you find her!” Jimin took a sip of his drink and laughed at her silliness.

“Can we stop talking about me? What about you? Have you made up your mind? About Jungkook or Yoongi hyung?” her face turned sour as soon as he brought up the topic.

She grimaced “I..gave up on Jungkook” Jimin eyes shot opened as guilt consumed her. “Seul if this is about my feelings for Jungkook..You know.. you don’t have to do this” he sighed deeply.

“It is not about your feelings for him. I don’t deserve Jungkook, he deserves better than me. He is still young, and there is another amazing person out there who deserves him better than me. Don’t worry, I am not doing this because of you.” Seul gave her assurance that her decision will remain unchanged.

“But..Jimin..after learning the truth about your true feelings, I cant just go behind your back and date him when I am aware about your feelings. That is selfish. You and Jungkook are still possible” she giggled at her own remarks earning a dissatisfied glare from Jimin.

“How thoughtful” Jimin responded bitterly. In all honesty, he loathed the ideas of forging her own feelings for him when she’s free to love and be loved especially with Jungkook. Again, he knew stubborn Seul would not let anything to jeopardize their friendship. She guarded Bangtan’s friendship with all her heart.

“How are you planning to tell him?” Jimin could imagine the pain that the maknae had to bear when the truth is out. Neither Seul nor Jungkook could be blame in this matter, like she said love is about you loving someone. Your mind can’t choose who you’re going to fall in love, because your heart does all the work.

A soft sigh escaped from her lips “I have to do it even it hurts” he felt his arm wrapped securely around her, making her lean against his shoulder. “Jungkook and you can handle this. We can’t please everyone, that is life. Does it mean you are choosing Yoongi hyung?” suddenly thinking again, she falls into deep silence.

For some reason her silence made him fear her decision. Seul deserved to be loved and to be in a relationship, Jimin knows how much his hyung loved this girl. Hell, if anything happens to her he would be the first one to be by her side without fail. That’s the beauty of Min Yoongi when he’s in love.

Seul smiled indulgently “Yoongi is a great man. Do I deserve him? He is too good for me” she doubted herself. Jimin noticed the uneasiness in her voice, so he got the idea who is in her heart.

“It is Yoongi hyung then” he chuckled softly.

Her face turned fifty shades red as she shook her head frantically “I didn’t say anything about choosing him!”

“But there are only two choices to begin with, it is either Jungkook or Yoongi hyung. Now, that you have explicitly rejected Jungkook, shouldn’t you be choosing hyung? Or do you have another guy in your mind” he looked unfazed by the idea of Seul liking someone else who isn’t Bangtan.

There is Jin. Seul hated herself for opening the chances for Jin.

Was she trying to be caught in another messy love web? She barely escaped Jungkook yet she’s making it hard for herself to decided when it involved Jin. Another thing was that, Jin had never mentioned his feelings openly. Was it safe to assume Jin only see her as a good friend?

This was confusing her.

She liked Yoongi, but there’s Jin.

“Drink up, I need to go back in a bit. Mother is alone since Hoon is in Daegu. Shouldn’t you be home by now? I heard you have a long day tomorrow for your comeback show” Jimin frowned when he noticed the latter tried to chance the topic. Maybe it is best to stop talking about serious thing like this and moved on to lighter topic.

“Yes, Mnet. Will you be able to come? I can get a ticket for you” she took a big slurp from her drink before opening a new drink for her to savour.

“I am sorry, I have to work tomorrow and accompanying mother for medical check-up. We finally get a donor that suit my mother, hopefully she is able to go for the surgery by the end of this month” her eyes glimmered in happiness.

Jimin clasped his hand together in delight “Really? Ahjumma finally got the donor! Seul-ah, that is good news! Let me know how it goes, I am happy for you and ahjumma” she tucked the strand of hair behind her ears.

“Thank you Jiminie. I will let you know how it goes okay?” Jimin was satisfied by the news and now that both of them had finally spent their first alone time as a friend together, it was even precious. They stayed for thirty more minutes finishing their snacks and non-alcoholic drinks since Seul couldn’t really take alcohol, the reason why they ended up drinking sodas.

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

She pushed the password to her apartment and made her way inside hurriedly. To her dismay, she was welcomed by the sound of her mother’s shout from the living room which sounded like she’s having a huge fight with someone.

Seul kicked her shoes hastily approaching the loud sound only to be welcomed by a horrifying sight. Her mom was pressed against the wall while she threw a fit, meanwhile a man dressed in grey suit probably in his mid-fifties had his hand wrapped around her mother throat.

“I should have killed you ever since you decided to keep the baby” he snarled.

Seul took a moment to digest the situation and without wasting any more time, she lurched forward pulling the man away from her mother. Using her strength, she pushed the man against the coffee table and went to aid her mother. For a man that twice her size, she sure was quite strong to be able to push him without help.

“Mom, are you okay?” her mother coughed and panted heavily. The man dusted his clothes, standing up from his feet “Finally, the princess is back” Seul glared furiously at him, while helping her mom regaining her balance.

“Who the hell are you? Get out before I call the cops!”

“Jihyun you never told her about me, don’t you? I am hurt” he stretched one of his hand out for a handshake “Let me introduce myself, I am Lee Wonsuk, your fa-“ Mrs Hwang blazed in fury stopping the man before he could finish his word.

“KEEP YOUR FILTHY MOUTH SHUT!” the older woman outburst surprised Seul leaving the girl in daze. She was desperate to know who this man in front of her for her mother is to be this furious.

The man raised his hands with a mischievous look in his eyes “Alright, we will not talk about this tonight. You know Jihyun, you can’t keep this secret forever. I will come to claim what is mine soon” his eyes then landed on Seul, making the girl feel smaller under his gaze. It sent chill down her spine.

“Nice to see you Ji Seul” dumbfounded by the situation, Seul watched the man disappeared from their vicinity and turned to face her mother.

“Mom, are you alright?” she held her arms, sitting her down on the couch. “Are you sure we just let him escape? You almost got killed!” Mrs Hwang shook her head weakly, leaning her back against the couch.

Seul went to get a glass of water and returned almost immediately by her mother side “Who is he? He seems to know you” the older woman smiled meekly, placing the glass on the coffee table.

“He is not important Seul, forget about him. He is just an old man with rage” displeased with her mother’s ambiguous answer, Seul did not stop her interrogation until she got the answers that she wanted.

“I don’t believe you, no- I choose not to believe you at all. Enough with secrets, this is your life we’re talking, what if he returns and hurt you? For once, can you treat me like a real adult, I can handle this!” Seul sighed lightly.

There was a long silence between them for a moment. “Are you going to make me wait?” she grew impatient. No matter what happens, today is the perfect day to learn the bitter truth, even it is hurt at least she’s no longer living in the dark.

The older woman muttered lowly finally unravelling the secrets that she kept for years from Seul. “Twenty-two years ago, a month before my wedding with Hoon’s father, I was raped” Seul stared at her in utter disbelief, shaking her head.

“By who?” she squished her mother’s hand, giving her strength to continue her story.

“Lee Wonsuk, he is your father’s best friend. And there was another man with him that night. I received a call from Wonsuk, that Hoon’s father got into a fight and was badly injured. I went to his place and the last thing that I remember was seeing his face in front of the doorstep. Then I blacked out. The next morning when I woke up, I saw two naked bodies beside me” she started to sob.

Seul swallowed the knot on her throat, weary with the weight of her mother’s grief. She wondered how she could bear the pain alone all those years. She embraced her mother tight, “I am sorry that you have to go through that pain alone, mom” her tears finally cascaded down swallowing all the pain at once.

Mrs Hwang held her lovely daughter close to her “That…man..is he my father?” praying hard inside, Seul really hoped the things that came from her mother contradicted to what she had in mind.

Expelling a long sigh, she looked empty and worn out. Seul gulped down a huge breath of air through her mouth, because she was afraid to hear the truth. Even though, she realized it was not something that she can simply deny knowing they were sharing the same blood.

“I don’t know.. I couldn’t remember that night, I was drugged. He came to me out of the blue and claimed that you are his. I…dont want to trust him.. You are mine, my daughter. Even though, if he is your father, I will not let him come near you. Seul, stay away from him. He is planning to take you away from me” she said, her voice containing a hint of panic.

“I won’t let him take me away from you, I promise. You and Hoon are the only family that I have. Mom, don’t stress yourself. You are not well, we will talk about this later. You need to rest” she took her cold hand in hers, stroking it gently giving a little heat to the freezing hands.

“Are you alright?” Mrs Hwang asked worriedly. She was concerned of her daughter’s mental health though Seul had stopped taking medicine for her depression, still it could relapse.

Seul glanced over at her mother, secretly wiping her tears “I will be fine, don’t worry about me” she gave her a reassuring smile. The pain that she felt was nothing if she were to compare it with her mother, it was best to keep it to herself.

She pressed once more not convince with Seul response “Seul-ah, don’t keep it to yourself, cry if you want to cry, scream if you are angry, that is what normal people do” she caressed her cheeks softly in hope Seul would say something about her resentment. To her dismay, she remained stoic.

“It is okay, I am fine” Seul left a soft kiss on her forehead before stood up from her seat.

“Where are you going Seul?”

“I need some time alone, I won’t be late. Get some rest alright? Don’t wait for me” her weak smile was another way to indicate ‘no, im not okay please go after me and save me’ . In this situation, Mrs Hwang tried to find a solution more like somebody to ensure she would not do anything stupid.

She quietly grabbed her purse and made her way to the door leaving her mother who seemed about to lose her mind seeing her only daughter disappeared beyond the door. Pushing herself up from the couch, she grabbed her phone and scrolled through her contact. Hwasa or Wongeun were the best choice that she had, Seul needed someone by her side.

In fact, Mrs Hwang knew her daughter would not express her pain openly to anyone even with her, she was very conscious of what she’s about to say. To see how she fought back and recovered from her depression back then was a miracle.

However, that doesn’t mean it wont come back to haunt her.

Her eyes stopped at that one name in her contacts, the exact person that could be another miracle in Seul’s life. Without further ado, Mrs Hwang pushed the green button and waited for her calls to be answered.

“Yoongi-ah, it is ahjumma. I need your help..It is about Seul..”

#bts fanfic #bts fic #bts fanfiction #kpop fanfiction #bts x oc #jimin x oc #jimin fanfic #yoongi fic #bts fluff #bts romance #jungkook x oc #yoongi x oc #suga fanfic

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outroshooky · 4 years

Text

no halo | kth

⇢ genre: oneshot (brief angst, fluff, smut) (exestolovers!au)

⇢ pairing: kim taehyung x reader, bestfriend!min yoongi x reader

⇢ word count: 5.3k

⇢ audio: brockhampton’s ginger album

⇢ warnings: brief angst (it’s exes to lovers, what do you expect), a smoking mention, some varied cursing; implied and explicit smut (soft!! body worship). there’s a happy ending, i promise.

⇢ a/n: i sat down at my laptop today, turned on no halo by brockhampton, and started writing. six hours later, i cannot believe that i managed to smash a brutal writer’s block by churning this out in literally one day. i hope that this is a bit of bright light for you, dear reader, in a time where nothing seems to be going your way. you will make it through no matter how messy or uncertain life seems to be, and you will come out on the other side all the more stronger for having survived it.

Believe it or not, it’s the pair of battered red Converse slung over his shoulder that tips the whole thing over the edge.

It’s inexplicable. Perhaps it’s the memories attached to it, knotted and strung through metal rivets scuffed with night rides and hard asphalt. Tastes like cigarette smoke and ashen dreams wafting from the driver’s side window, but there’s something more bitter there. Heartbreak veins, like you’d expect them to pulse with anything but. They say love doesn’t last when it’s not built on something solid, but somehow, heady summer nights and network love aren’t enough to pass the time.

“What exactly do you think you’re doing with those?” It bites, thickened with venom. Somewhere far-off is a headboard banging, curses of those stupidly thin walls of the motel complex.

“They’re mine,” Yoongi says. Which they are. Unfortunately. “I need them to like, go outside and stuff.”

“Fuck you,” you fire back.

“A ray of sunshine you are,” he remarks. “Any particular reason you feel like biting my head off in this shitty hotel room?”

The silence explains absolutely nothing. What he doesn’t know is that it’s not his fault. It’s right there in the middle of the dingy carpet, cracked and bleeding, privy to one and one alone. You’re too stubborn and he’s too good and here you find yourselves, locked at an impasse. He doesn’t know how good he is, how he’s patched your wounds up with wind in your hair and sand between your toes. He tries his best; it’s better than anything you would allow yourself, a luscious pleasure in such a stark world. So you settle for what you’ve got, and he shakes his head.

“You know you can come to me, right? About what’s on your mind?”

You finger the fraying tear in the bedspread, the cotton crumbling between your thumb and index.

“Look, I’m not good at this feelings thing and you know that. But you’re my friend, and I care about you, and I want to hear you out, okay? Whatever you’re thinking about. You’re not gonna hurt me; it’s not like I haven’t been through the ringer myself. You’re not so different, yeah?” Yoongi’s eyes search your own for acceptance. Defeat. Anything at all. “You’re not some kind of lost cause because one asshole in particular who shall not be named made you feel that way. Maybe it was two assholes. Whatever. Your worth isn’t dependent on their opinion of you.”

It feels like rambling but burns like an iron, sears through the darkness hovering over your consciousness, casting shadow. That thing twitches, bent and broken deep inside, staining down the bedsheets and spilling onto the beige carpet. He’s hit home, and Yoongi knows it when the defiance in your brow drains, floodwater evaporating against the creamy popcorn ceiling. He’ll forever hold that he doesn’t have a way with words; you’d kindly argue the opposite.

“I’m sorry, Yoon.” You look up at him for the first time since you’d woken up on opposite sides of the same bed. Something about childhood innocence preserves moments like those, in spite of years gone past since the last time you shared a bed like that. Nothing dirty about needing companionship in the form of a brother you’d had since you’d skipped stones down at the pond in grade school. He knows you intrinsically, like the scars that cross his knees and the freckles that dot his neck, no better and no less. “You deserve better than the way I’ve been treating you. Because you’re right, you know. But right now, it hurts.”

“Hurt doesn’t make you any less human. It’s a part of life. And it’s okay to hurt sometimes. Just don’t let it consume you till there’s nothing left.” He readjusts the shoes tied together by one string, sitting on the narrow angular of his shoulder. “Breakfast ends in an hour. I’ll grab you something and bring it back, and then we’ll figure out what to do next, yeah? I don’t have work till Tuesday, so we don’t have to be back for a few days more.” He pauses in the doorway. “Oh, and for the record, fuck Kim Taehyung. I’ll knock his teeth through his ass for the shit he put you through.”

The small smile you crack brings a toothy grin to his own visage. “Excellent advice.”

There’s a wry fondness dancing in the deep russet of his pupils, burning umber in the low light. “I try.”

Fuck Kim Taehyung. The exact advice you needed to hear, and the exact advice you decided to act upon, in exactly all of the wrong ways.

It’s the number that is stamped on your brain like a fifty-dollar tattoo— not necessarily the most tasteful, a pain in the ass to remove. Unfortunately, it is the tattoo that your thoughts like to trace with gentle fingers, rubbing at the lines, blurring the edges. Laser removal takes time and patience, but the contrary nestles in the form of stupid decisions and late-night mistakes. Like a dead battery on your Wrangler at 1am on the back streets, a useless cell phone, and three weeks of time to think.

Grief gave way to rage gave way to kindling coals of sadness, burning low but bright enough to light your way. Gone were your attempts to fan them back into the roaring bonfire those motel walls once contained, but here were your best efforts to cradle them close, nurture them that they might die out on their own, and most of them had. Moving on tasted ginger-sweet and minty-bitter, the chill in the air as the leaves tumbled and crunched underfoot, ignited with reds and yellows and everything in between. A summertime flame left for the autumn rain.

Pour the rain did, leaking rivulets down the windshield as you sat in the driver’s seat, staring at the dashboard. In times like these you’d call Yoongi, but he didn’t get off work till the morning and an impossibly timed dead zone did nothing to help your wireless suffering. Nighttime meant comfort for souls like yours, an escape into the quiet of dusk when everyone else sought the dreamy confines of sleep. Unfortunately, it meant that everyone else sought sleep while you were cursedly awake and stuck in the downpour. No place to go, no one to find.

You let your head fall forward and hit the steering wheel with a thunk. Fuck.

Knock knock.

It’s a glance to the left, out the driver’s side window that reveals a silhouette framed in darkness, wrapped in a thick coat, peering through the glass. Hand raised to brow and you can’t help the involuntarily yelp that leaves your mouth from the sheer proximity of the stranger. The figure flinches back in response, and you can’t help the immediate pang of worry. You can’t afford to miss a chance for help, but you also can’t roll down the window, and thus you’re opening the door and squinting into the rain as it blusters through the open gap. “Hello, I’m sorry, my cell phone isn’t working, is it possible for me to borrow yours so I could call somebody to pick me up?”

“Wait, what?” The stranger hunches slightly, peering through the watery onslaught. “Is that who I think it is?”

Oh god.

Oh god no.

The sheer absurdity of the situation isn’t lost on you, not like the way relief is wrapping that thick timbre around yourself like a familiar blanket. The irony of your car happening to die only a few blocks away from that little blue two-story, the coincidences of such a familiar stranger going out for a stroll in the middle of a fucking rainstorm. Of course he had to.

“Unfortunately,” you can’t help but grimace. “Taehyung, what the fuck are you doing out here in weather like this?”

You can hear the hint of a smile in his voice. It almost aches. “Are you saying this isn’t ideal weather to take a walk and enjoy the fresh air?”

“No,” you reply bluntly. Infuriatingly positive he is, always has been. “Ideal weather isn’t a fucking thunderstorm.”

“Mm.” The momentary quiet, save the rainfall, hints at what goes unsaid. “So what are you doing out here?”

You bristle. How to formulate a response that would not warrant help, but also warrant help? “I was out taking a late-night drive and stopped to take a break. I was getting drowsy and I prefer to be a responsible driver, so I pulled over to make sure I was awake enough to drive home.”

“What a considerate person you are!” Taehyung trills, and you’re almost positive it is completely unironic. “How are you feeling then? Do you think you’ll be able to drive home?”

“Uh, yeah. I’ll be fine.” A tight smile. Polite. It takes every ounce of will to not study him deeper, all of the curves and edges hidden snugly in the darkness. “Thanks.”

“Are you sure? It’s raining really hard as well; you won’t be able to see well even if you aren’t feeling drowsy.” There’s genuine concern in his tone, warmth bubbling from his throat like liquid sunshine. Maddening. But he’s right; he’s shining a bright light through the flimsy veil of your lies and you’re pinned. Even more maddening.

“Taehyung, it’s—” you clamp your mouth shut because in a slip of the tongue, you were that close to letting anger seep into your tone. That close to losing your stance as the better man, but the line of who exactly is the better man is smudged beyond sight in the downpour. You take a deep breath. Start again. “I don’t want to be a bother.”

Lightning flashes, jolting the clouds and cleaving them in two. The very world could be coming down in tatters around him and Taehyung wouldn’t think twice about being his everyday self, annoyingly cheery and maddeningly gentlemanly. You swear you see a flash of teeth, a boxy smile despite the water dripping from his umbrella, striking the pavement with an irregular heartbeat. Not your own, of course. “Nonsense! We can’t have you left out here to soak like this. Come on, you can drive us home!”

Oh my god, he certainly has not disappeared quicker than the very implication left his mouth. He is not shaking his head like a dog shedding wetness, nor opening the passenger’s side and hopping in, pausing to fold his umbrella in the gap before pulling the door neatly shut. You are not seated in your dead Wrangler with your ex-boyfriend at one-thirty in the morning in the middle of the very heavens coming apart with a religious fervor.

Taehyung brushes his wet hair out of his face, dribbling water down his cheeks. For all of your expectations, he looks no different than when you saw him last, standing on the curb with all the world’s joys flickering in his pretty almond eyes. The shadows cast his profile in a gaunter light, sweeping down the hollows of his jawline, his cheekbones; your fingers tighten around the door handle. Apparently, three weeks might not change much after all.

“Oh sorry, did I rush you?” He opts to ignore your blank-eyed stare of shock, reaching out to you before pausing, his hand outstretched to touch you. “I didn’t mean to rush you if you’re not ready to drive yet. We can sit here as long as you’d like! There’s no rush for me to be home. I just wanted to get out of the rain; it was starting to soak through my umbrella!”

For all of this, you can manage a brief: “Yeah.”

“Let me know when you’re ready to go!” The optimism in his voice is painful.

“Taehyung.”

“Yeah!”

“I lied.”

You don’t need to look at him to know the way his forehead will furrow. “What?”

“Gah!” You can’t help pinching your brow between two fingers. “I can’t fucking believe this—”

“Believe what?” Blinking doe-eyes, long lashes wet and thick in the dimness.

“Taehyung, my car battery died three blocks from your house and my cell phone isn’t working, and now I’m sitting here with my ex-boyfriend in the passenger’s seat and I have no fucking idea how I ended up here.” You sigh. “Do you not see the irony in this?”

He blatantly ignores the gesture towards the massive elephant basically perched on the center console. “No wonder your car is off! We’ll walk then.”

“Taehyung, please just make it easier for the both of us and l—”

It’s no use. Dear god. How you had ever put up with him, shared a bed with him is currently escaping you, but regardless of this, he is already out of the car as the words punctuate empty air. Weighing options is impossible when you have none to choose from.

“-use my phone to call somebody to pick you up!” The driver’s side door opens and he’s there, right there, not across the console or the bar or whatever. Right there. “Come on, we don’t have time to waste!”

“Kim Taehyung, for god’s sake, I am your ex-girlfriend!” The exclamatory stops him in his tracks. Finally. “Why are you helping me?”

The rain pours rivulets down his black slicker, drenching his hair and bunching along his shoulders and running down his arms. And yet, he brushes the water from his brow with a swipe of his thumb, peers at you, sneakered feet planted firmly in the asphalt. He raises a finger to the sky, smiles— not a half-smile, lopey and lop-sided, but a true grin, squared and gummy and full of wonder. “Ideal weather.”

“Kim Taehyung, you are absolutely ridiculous—”

“Ideal!”

“So let me get this straight,” Yoongi grits as you sit across from him, your frame molded into the plush of his second-hand loveseat. “Your car died on the back streets, coincidentally three blocks from Kim Taehyung’s house, who is— just to double check— the asshole who shredded your relationship, and he happened to be out for a walk in the rain and stumbled across you in your car, and offered to take you back to his house and let you stay there till morning until you could get me to pick you up?”

“Yes.”

“What the actual fuck.”

You gesture at him with your free hand, the other occupying a mug of steaming tea. “Join the club.”

“Just to double check, we’re talking about the same Kim Taehyung. The dude who you officially dated for a solid four months but fucked around with long before that. That guy, right? That Taehyung?”

You release a deep breath; the steam rising from your mug winds away. “Yes, it’s the same Kim Taehyung.”

Yoongi looks like he is about to spit nails. “I hope you took the chance to kick him in the balls.”

“Yoongi!”

“Just saying.”

“It could’ve been a lot worse, actually.” Your companion raises an eyebrow. “He gave me his umbrella when we walked back.”

“Ah yes, because giving you his umbrella once undoes six months of emotional damage—”

“Yoongi, chill. I did what I had to do—”

“Which is good, because survival skills are important.” He searches your face for any hint of something other than stoicism. Forgiveness, maybe. “And it doesn’t have to be any more than that.”

“I didn’t say it was,” you affirm. “But even if I don’t like him, I owe him credit where it’s due.”

Yoongi frowns. He knows not to push, but curiosity pecks his bones, nips his intuition. “For the third time— why didn’t you call me last night when you got back to his house?”

You sip at your tea. Flaxen sweet, mild on your tongue. “You were at work and I didn’t want to bother. Paying rent is more important than saving my sorry stranded ass.”

“You’re neglecting to mention the Kim Taehyung part.”

He rubs a fine nerve, one push too far. “Yoongi, what are you so worried about?” You sit up, place your mug on the fold-out table. “It’s not like I’m suddenly pining over him just because he happened to be there when I needed help. It’s not like I had any other options; I can handle myself. Taehyung and I broke up a month and a half ago; I’m not as… broken as I was before.”

It’s written on Yoongi’s face that he doesn’t like it, but protectiveness wins out over stubbornness. It always does when it comes to you. “I just don’t want you to get hurt again.”

You soften. “I know.”

The tension drains from his hunched figure. “I know you can handle yourself when it comes to people like him. But I also know how hard you cried over him in a shitty motel all those weeks ago.” The corner of his mouth twitches. “I don’t want you to feel like that again because of someone. Fool me twice, you know? You deserve better than that.”

Your eyes flick to his. Steady, warm, weighing justice by the tawny flecks that glint in the raven black of his irises. “I do. And I don’t doubt that. It won’t happen again.”

His own mug clacks as it meets the wooden tabletop. “You know, you never told me what exactly happened between you two that ended it. Like, I know the rough idea, but not play-by-play. If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s fine, but…” He trails off, leaving the gap.

“Ah.” A remark, neutral in sheen but bitter in taste. Like biting into the shell of a crisp apple, only to find that it’s not as sweet as once hoped it to be. “Sure.”

So Yoongi listens.

It’s strange how someone so vivid in nightmares, so seemingly real as the pen between your fingers or the breath in your lungs, can fade away so quickly by daybreak. Before you ran into Taehyung again (for better or for worse? For worse), he loomed as some larger-than-life figure in the back of your consciousness, spewing traumas and terrors like a river gully. But there he was in the passenger’s seat, no larger or smaller than before. Just Taehyung. Terrifying in premise, in rationality, on the contrary.

With that in mind, it was hard to not wonder if you had, perhaps, not given him credit where it was due. The Taehyung you met in the pouring rain was the same Taehyung whose hair you brushed sand from and temple you kissed and sides you pinched to get him to squeak when he laughed. Memories you tried to stuff away, filter through a new lens with every flicker in your mind, like a crackling film reel. But there he was, and here you were, and you weren’t quite sure who you were running from anymore.

Is it easy to run from someone who your lips know the taste of, fingers know the feel of? Is it easier to run from yourself when you strip away the miscommunications, aches and pains?

Yoongi knew the full story now. Terrifying to admit your fault, any measure of it, because you never liked to show him what being broken looked like. Some measure of personal freedom exercised, but with the wrong heart in mind, because he would never judge anything you had to say and instead, simply listen. He was always an older soul than you ever tried to be and he knew it, rugged wisdom at its finest. But ultimately, he only knew what he was told or taught, and there you were, spilling the unmangled truth to him on a Wednesday morning over two cups of chamomile tea.

Coming to grasp with imperfections is part of the cursed struggle of being human, of embracing those little nicks and dashes that make us who we are. It does not mean we are loved any less, but loved because of them; none of us are angels. These messes are our measures, our faults and our pleasures. How terrifying it all is, being ourselves. Being raw and vulnerable and attacking those thoughts that weigh heavy on our consciousness, day after day.

And it is easy to wonder if you matter through all of this, through the chaos of that inner dialogue. It’s moments like these that put those perspectives into frame, click them like camera shutters pausing time to breathe and think. To look at the white-framed ink is to rewrite tangibility, printed blurry on those transparent rolls. Nothing is so unforgettable when it is angled just so.

In the evening, in the comforts of your apartment, you uncork a Polaroid from where it is hidden behind some cheery optimistic phrase you stole off of tumblr. Bullshit for the purpose it serves, painfully ironic for the task it demands. A picture of a boy with cherry-red hair and a boxy grin on his face, arms wrapped around you with all of the comforts and ease of home. There’s mirth in your eyes, sheer joy and laughter. No alcohol involved, just two people who found it easy to slip into each other’s company just-so. A jasper gem for you, polished to perfection and printed right underneath your fingertips.

Anxiety clenches at the base of your jaw, massages your throat with the cruelest intentions. You swallow it back.

The phone rings once.

Twice.

Crackles to life.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Taehyung?”

His voice melts through the receiver like buttery chocolate, smooth and warm. “You still have my phone number! Hello! I thought I’d never hear from you.”

“I-I’m sorry, what?” You blink in confusion, then shake your head. “Never mind.”

“I thought I’d never hear from you. That guy who picked you up didn’t seem to say much, but I figured you’d call eventually to say that you made it home safe. So I guess you did! And I’m glad.” You can hear Taehyung smiling through the phone, easy inflections of speech.

“Yeah.” You fidget, playing with the edge of your sleeve. Now or never. “Taehyung, I owe you an apology.”

This is the first time he falters, hints at something deeper. “What for?”

You take a deep breath. “You were kind to me. And I didn’t recognize it for what it was at the time, so I was a complete asshole to you. And I’m sorry for that. You didn’t deserve that.”

“Oh, don’t worry about it, it was the least I could do! Nobody deserves to be stuck in the pouring rain—”

“I’m not talking about the rainstorm.”

He stutters. “I-I’m sorry?”

“Taehyung.”

He’s quiet. It is terrifying.

“Taehyung, both of us know what I mean.”

You momentarily wonder if the line has gone dead. Perhaps it has. A saving grace, and then that deep timbre crackles to life on the other side. You nearly miss what he says.

“I want to hear you say it,” he whispers.

“You were kind to me,” you stutter. “Kind to me; so, so kind. And I didn’t recognize it for what it was w-when you gave it to me. And I was a complete asshole to you. I’m sorry.” You wait for something, anything, but he gives no intention, and you continue. “Taehyung, you were the best thing that ever happened to me, and I was so terrified that I stuffed it away into some far-off corner and tried to pretend that it wasn’t happening. I turned so much outward onto you that you didn’t deserve because I didn’t know how to be good enough for someone like you. I took you for granted, Taehyung, the exact opposite of everything I should have done. You glow like the literal fucking sun, and I’m a little cloud drifting through the sky. I should’ve let you shine through me, but instead, I just blocked you out. And I’m sorry,” you confess, the tension in your shoulders collapsing. “I’m sorry.”

For the first time in weeks you wish you could see him in front of you, gauge his reactions like barometric pressure, but instead he’s across town and you are here, feeling ever-so-small in spite of yourself. It was easy to read what he was thinking, painted across his face in swaths of joy and sadness and everything in between, but here, he gave away nothing.

Please say something, Taehyung. Please say anything.

“Ideal weather,” he murmurs.

“W-What?”

“A sun without clouds in the sky shines blindingly. Clouds temper all that light; certainly we don’t need all of it.” It sounds so cheesy, some Shakespearean verse he quotes from off the top of his head, but it is the closest thing he’ll phrase to acceptance, and you swallow down a relieved sob. He calls you by name then, lets it ring warm and sweet, the way he used to say it. With life, energy, everything it lacked simply because it rang from all the wrong mouths till then. “Everything happens for a reason. You did the best you could. It just didn’t work out at the time.”

“Taehyung, it’s okay to blame me. It’s okay to say that I was the one who fucked it all up, not you. For god’s sakes, you never did anything wrong. It was always my insecurity, my mistakes—”

“You’re only human. You did the best that you could, just as I did. Who could blame you for that?” Taehyung’s words seep heat into your bones, calm your trembling fingers. “I couldn’t. Nobody could. I certainly don’t think any less of you for it. None of us are angels; we did our best with what we had. And that’s alright.”

You can’t help but laugh, dry, monosyllabic. “You handled this so much remarkably better than I did, god.”

He’s breathy with amusement. “It took a little while.”

“I could imagine.”

He hums. “Is there anything else you want to talk about?”

Your index finger finds the edges of the instant photo. His smile catches in the light of your desk lap. “There’s another reason I called.”

“That wasn’t it?”

“Believe it or not, no.” You trace his shoulders, the planes of his chest. “I just wanted to say. I have a Polaroid of us from July, from that bonfire that Jeongguk had with like fifty people down at the beach. I kept it, selfishly. It’s been pinned up on my bulletin board behind another piece of paper. But I took it out today. And I think I might pin it up in front now.”

“Oh, the cherry red hair.” The fondness seeps through the receiver. “I loved that night.”

“Me too,” you admit. A beat of silence. “Goodnight, Taehyung. Thank you.”

“Oh, you’re hanging up already?”

“What?” You nearly sputter.

“I haven’t gotten to talk about the Polaroids I kept, too.”

There are two ways to fundamentally seduce Kim Taehyung: make his coffee exactly how he likes it, or play with his hair while he’s lying on your chest. Both of which you achieved, and both of which led to your current predicament.

But we’ll rewind a bit.

That phone call, the first of many, lasted into the early hours of the morning, that sacred time that you both hold dear. It tasted like nostalgia and fondness, feelings you corked and bottled out of fear of what might lie on the other side. But in this case, the other side was a friend and more, a living history book for all of the cracks in between. And he simply adored filling them in.

That lazy afternoon where you planned on having a date at the park, but it had poured rain nearly as intense as the day you reconnected with him. You danced in between the raindrops instead, bare feet on the gravely asphalt, wishing you could touch heaven and so you kissed the boy whose cheeks were between your palms. The spontaneous road trip you took to the next big city over, five hours away, simply because for the first time in so long, you had nowhere to be but with each other. Hands held between library shelves, firelight’s glow on faces untouched. Sharing a tuft of blue cotton candy with sticky fingers, talking about everything and nothing under the moonlit, cloudless sky. For every instant photo saved were memories tenfold that he plucked from that mind of his like stars placed in the breadth of the cosmos.

One phone call became two, became four. Became texting over a break at work, FaceTiming over dinner. Became meeting each other for a late breakfast, studying at the cafe for an early afternoon cup of espresso. Depth and understanding, and Taehyung is slotting into your life without a second thought, as easily as you’re slipping into his. You let him this time, so much smoother than before. You want him to.

Neither of you can deny what it is happening, but neither of you can find a complaint to lodge. So when he asks you out, fingers entwined over the metal arm of the park bench, a bouquet of sunflowers tucked next to you, he already knows what your answer will be.

Indeed, there are two fundamental ways to seduce Kim Taehyung, and as a master of both of them, it is only a matter of time before you find yourselves at the foot of your bed; he pulls you closer to press his lips to your own. He tastes like cappuccino and chocolate and you’re humming into the kiss, shuddering underneath him. He still knows your body, every divet, every edge. He never stopped loving it— never stopped loving you.

He worships the way he loves— selflessly, giving every ounce of himself without abandon or question. When he eases himself between your thighs, the look in his eyes is nothing short of sinful adoration, seeking out every secret to your pleasure. It’s ingrained in his memory, the way you gasp or grab his hair when his fingers dance along your skin; he couldn’t forget it even if he tried. It is worth every wince as your digits tug at his scalp; he swallows down everything you give him and begs for more, more, more.

And likewise you lavish him, devoting minutes to dot his heaving ribs with kisses, stroking comforting palms down his sinewy thighs. Taehyung is every work of art you have wanted to see in a museum, living, breathing, merely mortal but so much more. So vibrant, so raw.

And afterwards you lie together, unable to tell where he begins and you end. Breathing in the heat, piecing each other together in the silent din. Clothes are tossed about the room; you can’t find it in you to care. You turn to him, caress his cheek, run a thumb over his lips. “Stay here tonight. Please.”

He smiles and your thumb brushes his teeth, boxy and exposed through the gap of his grin. “Was the overnight bag not enough?”

“How did I not notice you packed an overnight bag?” You sit up, wrapping the blankets around your torso, scanning the room to spot his duffel.

He pushes himself up on his elbows, wraps himself around you like a human koala. “I’m very good at being sneaky.”

“Mm, I noticed.” There it is, against your dresser. Your heart swells, fit to burst.

“Come to bed,” Taehyung hums, gritty, a little seductive. It sends a chill down your spine. You don’t think it’s meant to. Your fingers find his own and knit together over his knuckles.

“I’m right here, sunshine.”

He kisses behind your ear, the gentlest of intentions. “I love you,” he whispers. “Come to bed.”

You squeeze over his hand. Everything left unsaid, in the space of a breath. Two. “I love you too,” you whisper. “And I will always be here, loving you, with everything I could possibly give you. Every ounce of my heart. I love you.”

He squeezes back, wraps the blanket around your frame, tucks you in tight. He kisses your shoulder with lips of silk, and you roll on your side to get comfortable, his arm draped over your waist.

Against the far wall, propped up on his duffel, lies a pair of Converse sneakers, as scuffed and beaten as they were saturated with rain, on the day you fell in love with Kim Taehyung all over again.

#btswritersnet #bts #bts fluff #bts smut #taehyung fluff #taehyung smut #kpop fluff #kpop smut #exes to lovers au #outroshooky

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leigh-kelly · 4 years

Text

I’m Saving All My Love For You

Some 80s AU

As much as Santana hates the snow, she thinks it’s possible that she hates the rainy winter even more. Everything is cold and damp and she feels like she just can’t get warm ever. The cold seeps into her bones and every night when she gets home from work, she crawls under as many blankets as possible, just trying to feel better. It’s been months since she’s spoken to her parents, her mother hasn’t tried to call her since the incident with Brittany and instead of feeling anxious about it, Santana is just calm. Her stomach doesn’t hurt thinking that they might call to stop over, her head doesn’t ache remembering the cruel words that have been said in her presence.

It’s one of those cold, rainy nights that January and February of 1985 seem to bring and Brittany is working late. Santana sits upstairs in the office, poring over her ledgers and sipping a glass of wine. The sound of rain in the roof is oddly comforting and she relaxes in her chair, feeling the most at peace that she has in a long time. When she hears footsteps downstairs, she smiles, knowing that Brittany is home, knowing that it’s Friday, knowing that they’ll have three days to spend together since Monday is President’s Day and the bank is closed.

“Hey.” Brittany peeks in the office door, hair dripping wet from the rain. It’s an odd sort of feeling, but suddenly, in that moment, Santana feels something shift in her very being. It’s just a ‘hey,’ it’s just a smile, but Santana feels this sense of knowing deep within her chest.

“Hi.” She smiles back, her eyes crinkling softly. “You’re home.”

It stays with Santana all through the weekend. She’s shaken by the feeling that the simplest thing, Brittany dripping wet and standing in her office doorway, brought out in her, but it’s there, and she knows that there’s no going back. So she plans. She thinks. She obsesses. She talks to Mercedes when she goes back to work on Tuesday and she knows that it’s going to happen. Mercedes agrees to meet her after work on Thursday at a store way out in Brooklyn, a store in a place where no one will know her and she can feel safe doing the biggest thing she’ll ever do in her life.

“So this is real?” Mercedes asks when Santana gets out of her cab.

“It’s really. It’s crazy, I know...and I don’t even...I don’t even know what she’ll say.”

“You know what she’s going to say, I think you’ve known it from the first day you met her.”

“The first day I met her, I never thought I’d do this. ‘Cedes, I didn’t even think I’d do this three months ago. It’s crazy.”

“You keep saying that it’s crazy.”

“It is, I know it is. It’s just like...everything us stacked against us.” Santana sighs. “My parents, the world. But all it does is make me want to do this even more.”

“You really love her.”

“She changed something in me. It’s like...my chemical makeup is different ever since I’ve known her. I’ve never known what joy was until she brought it into my life. She looks at me and the fear and the shame and the hate I feel for myself just fades away. When I’m with her, I feel whole in a way I never have before. And she just...she doesn’t ask for anything from me. She understands me and accepts that as much as I’d give her the world if I could, there are some things I just can’t. And she doesn’t expect I’ll ever do this, but that’s why I want to. I want her to know all that she means to me, I want her to have this one normal thing in a world of things that aren’t right and aren’t fair. I...I just want her.”

“Then let’s go do this.”

Though Santana is so nervous the whole time she’s in the store with Mercedes, the trip is a success and she breathes a sigh of relief on the cab ride home. Brittany is working late, she’s been teaching a 7:00 class and she won’t say no to doing it, wanting to give Carl every reason to promote her when her year is up. Santana goes home and she puts her purchase away before changing into her pajamas and settling in on the couch. She has some work to do, but she’ll leave it for another night. The day was emotional for her and she knows the next night will be even more so, so she just wants to veg and watch TV and get in bed with Brittany when she comes home.

“That was the longest day ever.” Brittany kicks off her shoes and leans back against the door. “I’m so glad to be home.”

“I’m glad you’re home too.” Santana smiles and moves over a little on the couch, knowing that Brittany will want to sit. “Charles in Charge is on.”

“Ugh, good.” She stops in front of the couch to kiss Santana’s lips, then sinks down beside her. “I’m all sweaty.”

“Do you want to shower and then relax or are you good?”

“I just want to hang out with you for awhile. I hate hating my job.”

“What can I do?”

“Build a time machine so the year goes faster? No, but really, nothing. Just being with you makes me feel better.”

“I feel the same way, you know.”

“I do.” Brittany grins, resting her head on Santana’s shoulder. “And tomorrow is date night.”

“It is, and I’m really excited about it.”

“You’re cute, you know that?”

“Britt...”

“You are. I like looking at your face.”

“It’s not going anywhere...”

They spend the night relaxing and when Santana gets into bed, she feels butterflies in her stomach. Everything feels so big and intense and she just kind of breathes, trying to center herself. For the first time though, she doesn’t feel that throbbing in her stomach. The butterflies are good, they’re a reassurance that the way she feels is real. Brittany falls asleep first and Santana just watches her, loving the rise and fall of her chest, loving the sound of her breathing. It’s late when she finally falls asleep and she knows the next day will be long, but then it’s the weekend, then she’s with Brittany.

The next morning is rough. Hudson screws up big time and Santana spends hours fixing his mess. She wants to fire him so badly, but she’s scared. No, more than scared, she’s terrified. It haunts her that he might know something about her, might suspect by the way she defends Kurt. It’s an awful feeling, but there’s nothing she can do. Sometimes she wonders if she should ask Mike to come to a work function with her, draw away some suspicion , but she doesn’t know him well enough to ask something like that of him and...she feels like she would be betraying Brittany if she did.

It’s pouring again when Santana leaves work. She’s in a bad mood, but she doesn’t want to be. Once she sees Brittany, she’ll be better, she knows she will. Date night will be a quick dinner and a movie, that’s what Brittany said she wanted. Santana would have done something fancy, but she knows that Brittany prefers simple and that she’s been dying to see The Breakfast Club, so that’s what they’ll do. Brittany still isn’t home when Santana gets to the house but she sheds her work clothes and changes into jeans and a cashmere sweater. She wishes the rain would stop, give them one night of reprieve where they don’t have to fight for a cab, but it seems unlikely.

“I’m late, I’m late, I’m late!” Brittany cries out as she bursts into the house. “Give me ten minutes, I’ll take the fastest shower of my life.”

“It’s fine, Britt, the movie isn’t for two and a half hours, we’ll have plenty of time to eat.” Santana stands up and gently kisses her lips, feeling those butterflies again.

“Are you okay? You’re like...weirdly calm.”

“I’m good.” Santana smiles. “Go shower.”

Once Brittany is ready, they decide to just go to the diner. Santana is really in the mood for Chinese, but after Brittany’s stint at Chang’s, she hardly ever wants to eat it and Santana gets it. Brittany tells Santana that she’s half-starved and inhales her burger while Santana just smiles and eats her club sandwich. It’s a good kind of date night, Santana decides. It’s the kind where they’re just relaxed and comfortable and Santana thinks it’s a good lead up to later.

After the movie, Brittany is positively buzzing. Even Santana enjoyed it and since the rain stopped, they walk home. Santana feels a little like she’s going to throw up, but she knows she’ll survive. She’s with Brittany, everything is better with Brittany and she just keeps telling herself that as they walk.

“You’re weird tonight.” Brittany comments, echoing what she said earlier. “Did you have a bad day at work?”

“I’m fine, I promise. I’ve just been...thinking a lot. Mostly about how I acted at Mike and Artie’s wedding.”

“Santana, that was months ago. You don’t have to hold guilt in all this time.”

“It’s not guilt...it’s...just. I didn’t understand it, you know. I’ve spent my whole life listening to people talk about when I’m going to marry a man, when I’m going to have children, when I’m going to stay home from my job. My parents...marriage never looked like love to me. It looked like something you check off a list. Then I met you, and I finally knew what people were talking about when they talk about love. But the thing is, for the first time I could reconcile marriage and love, the whole world is against it. Britt, there’s a lot I can’t give you. I don’t think I’ll ever be out like you are and maybe that makes me a coward, but I can’t do it. I can’t give you children. I could give you the house in the suburbs, if you really wanted it, but I’d feel like we’d have to hide what we meant to each other even more. But there are some things I can. I can promise to love you for the rest of my life. I can be your greatest supporter, the one you lean on in good times and in bad. And I can give you what Mike and Artie had, I can stand up in front of my friends and promise to love you in sickness and in health. I can dance with you at Holly’s. I can give you this.” Santana reaches into her pocket and slides out the ring box, carefully opening it. “I can be everything to you that a wife should be, if you just say yes.”

“Santana.” Brittany gasps. “Are you...oh my God.”

“I’m asking you to marry me, Britt, because all I want is to spend the rest of my days with you.”

“You don’t have to do this...”

“I’m not doing it because I have to, I’m doing it because I want to. I don’t care if it’s legal or not, I want you to know that my heart is yours forever. But if you—“

“I want to. I so want to.” Brittany doesn’t even bother to wipe the tears from her eyes, she just lets them fall. “Yes, yes I will.”

Santana feels like she’s looking at the sun, looking into Brittany’s tear filled eyes and her heart flips in her chest. Right in front of her is the one thing she never thought she’d have, the thing she never thought she deserved to have. She knows she’ll spend all of her days trying to be good enough for Brittany, trying to prove that she’s worthy, but in this moment, everything feels good and right and real. She gently slips the ring onto Brittany’s finger and Brittany launches herself toward Santana, pulling her close and kissing her.

“I love you.” She whispers against Santana’s lips. “I love you.”

After Brittany spends a good ten minutes staring at her ring, she insists on taking Santana to bed. For Santana, everything feels different, good different, and afterwards, she lays with her head on Brittany’s chest just taking it all in.

“You okay?”

“I am.” Santana nods. “Just...hoping I’m enough for you.”

“You’ve always been enough, Santana. What I want most of all is for you to be enough for you. You’ve had so much hurt in your life, you deserve so many good things.”

“I’m not going to see them anymore, you know.”

“I won’t hold you back if you change your mind. I’d understand.” Brittany promises.

“I won’t. I’ve wanted them to love me for so long...”

“I think they love you, I think they just have a terrible way of showing it.”

“They love who they think I should be. And if they knew about us...I’m so scared all the time.”

“I know.” Brittany runs her hand through her hair and sighs. “I wish I could take that away.”

“Do you think it’ll ever be any different? Do you think there’ll ever be a day where I can just be me?”

“I...don’t know. If I could, I’d promise you that some day I could walk into a work party with you and you wouldn’t lose your job, or we could spend Christmas with your parents and they wouldn’t shun you. But I just don’t know. The one thing I do know though is that I’m always gonna be right here. When you have a bad day, I’ll hold you in my arms until you fall asleep. I’ll kiss you behind closed doors. I’ll love you until the end of time.”

“I never thought I was lucky until I met you. Everything I have, it came from hard work. I’m a Hispanic woman In a world of white men, but I’ve worked a hundred times harder to get where I am. But you...you made me think that luck exists because I’m so lucky to be with you, to know that you want us to last forever.”

“I don’t need a big spectacle, just so you know. If you wanted this to be it, for me to wear this ring and to know that we’re married, that’s okay. No one else has to watch.”

“No, Britt. You deserve more than that and I want more than that for both of us. We’ll make plans, we’ll have everyone here if that’s okay and we’ll stand up in front of them all and vow to love and cherish each other. It won’t be a wedding like my parents had, but it’ll mean so much more.”

When she falls asleep, Santana feels calm in a way she never has. Being in Brittany’s arms, touching her left ring finger, it just fills her up. She knows she’s not permanently cured from being terrified all the time, but in her home, she feels so much love that it makes all of the outside stuff feel bearable.

She’s so glad the next morning is Saturday so she can wake up and not rush out the door. Brittany is still sleeping so she gently kisses her forehead and slips out of bed. Because she can’t bear to stay in her pajamas, she washes up and gets dressed and she goes into the kitchen. She’s surprised to find Millie standing over the counter with a bottle of bleach in her hand, but then she remembers that she’d taken a day off earlier in the week and wanted to come in to finish up the house.

“Morning, sunshine.” Millie smiles, putting down her sponge. “I don’t think I’ve ever known you to sleep this late.”

“Millie, can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

“If I had a wedding, would you come?”

“You know I’d be there with bells on.”

“Even if...”

“No matter who you were to marry, I’d be there.” She nods and Santana’s breath rushes out.

“I asked Brittany if she would marry me.” Santana whispers, knowing this is the first time she’d openly acknowledged it to Millie.

“That’s just wonderful. Come give the a hug.”

Millie opens up her arms and Santana steps in. Before she knows it, she’s crying in big ugly sobs and Millie just squeezes her a little tighter. It’s a cathartic release, she thinks, feeling that embrace after she’d confessed something that scares her so much, so she savors the physical contact and keeps right on crying.

“Are you alright, honey?”

“It’s just...you mean so much to me and to know that you support this. My parents...”

“They don’t deserve to be part of it if they don’t think you’re something real special.”

“When I was little, I used to play wedding with my grandma. I always thought when I got engaged, they’d be the first ones I told, but it’s you, you’re the one who’s always supported me.”

“Blood doesn’t necessarily make a family. The way you’ve been good to me and my Marley, I consider you like a second daughter.”

“Really?” Santana wipes her face and sniffles.

“Really. And if I can be frank, I think you and Brittany both got really lucky. I can’t imagine how hard it is.”

“It’s easier for her, I think. She is proud to be who she is and I’m just...everything is behind closed doors.”

“I don’t think there’s a right way to be you. I tell Unique this all the time. I know she has a hard time of it, having to pretend to be Wade all day, but until the world changes, you all have to do whatever feels right to survive.”

“Some times I feel like I couldn’t do it without Brittany. She came into my life just when I needed her most.”

“She’s good for you.” Millie nods. “She helps you relax a little. You were always so high strung and had every reason to be, but you’re softer now, like you feel safe.”

“That’s the thing, I do. I get to come home and feel like...I don’t know, I’m protected from the world. I don’t want to do anything to mess it up.”

“I know we’ve never talked about it before, but I can see by the way that girl looks at you that it’d be pretty hard for you to mess up.”

“Thank you, Millie. Just...thank you.”

“I’ll get everything done quick so I can be out of your hair.”

“It’s alright, stay as long as you want.”

By the time Brittany wakes up from their late evening, Millie is long gone but left Brittany’s favorite banana bread in her wake. Standing at the counter, Santana cuts two pieces and brings them over to the table with her fresh cup of coffee. Brittany is just marveling down at the diamond on her finger, twisting it in the light, and Santana can’t help but smile. Seeing Brittany so happy just makes her want to make her even happier every day for the rest of her life.

“Do you want a ring?” Brittany asks, looking up from her diamond. “I can’t afford something like this, but if you want something, I’ll get it.”

“I...” Santana bites her bottom lip, thinking hard on that. “I think when we’re married, I’d like some kind of simple band. Nothing that...I’m sorry...”

“Nothing that makes the people at work ask too many questions, I totally get it babe. And if you didn’t want to wear it out of the house, that’s okay.”

“I do. I’m going to be married to you. I don’t need to share my personal life with anyone. They can make their assumptions about the gender of the person I’m married to.”

“You’re really brave, I hope you know that.”

“I never feel brave.” Santana shakes her head. “I feel like a coward.”

“Don’t ever say that again.” Brittany frowns. “You’re not a coward, you’re practical and I get it. You have to keep yourself safe.”

“I’m so proud to be yours. I really just...need you to know that.”

“I do. I promise, I do.”

#brittana #80s AU

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qiankunfics · 4 years

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KunTen Masterlist Part 3

AO3

1. La danse des masques (The dance of the masks) by skymoonlight

Summary: A month full of balls that all the princes had to attend and, to make it worse, Kun had to host them all in the palace, being forced to endure that odious Thai prince who seemed to enjoy making his life miserable. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

2. Turbulence, and then none by pyakpyaknation

Summary: Soulmate au where the first words your soulmate says to you are written on your wrist and while A has an absolutely unhelpful 'Hey' written on them, B has something very unique and weird. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

3. hearts like drums by lovelight (Delenaley)

Summary: Ten's completely and utterly fucked, he can't even confess without straight up insulting his crush. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

4. must cry out loud by andnowforyaya

Summary: He wanted to shake himself apart. In pieces, maybe it wouldn't hurt as much. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

5. Boxing Day by violetpeche

Summary: Christmas: for all the superficial, capitalist hell it stood for now, Kun rather liked that time of year. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

6. yesterday, today, and until the end of the world by rowenabane

Summary: He is still searching, though. He won’t stop until he finds it. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

7. Come Back (Nightmare) by NovemberSuns

Summary: After disappearing for four years, Ten comes crashing back into Kun’s life. Kun doesn’t know what to make of this stranger he once called his best friend. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

8. needlepoint by fairyslush

Summary: in which ten is a fashion designer, and he decides to embroider their little family of four onto his neurosurgeon husband's labcoat. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

9. flavour you by mikararinna

Summary: Ten sacrifices his staff meal for a chance at an Americano, Kun waits for Ten to bring in his favourite flavour. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

10. go the distance (a new chapter with u) by borntovixx

Summary: Alternatively: YouTube chef Kun shows off his boyfriend to his followers. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

11. ursa major by lowkeyamen

Summary: "It's a star map." Ten let out a little breathy laugh; it was pretty obvious Kun had no idea what this was. "It's a snapshot of what the sky looked like the night you first told me you loved me." Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

12. Family Planning by eggboyksoo

Summary: Starting a family is hard. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot Trigger: unaccepting family of teen pregnancy?

13. not even you could destroy your shine by jeannedarc

Summary: Kun closed his eyes and prayed for something exciting to happen to him. Anything. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

14. people say (we're so weird) by sayounarahitori

Summary: In which some WayV members know more than they'd like, some know less, and nobody has a crush on Ten, okay. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

15. Stamped by Lertsek

Summary: There is one soul mark in particular that Ten treasures, one that appeared when he passed the audition to train under SM Entertainment. It's that of a little dancer, looking up, face not visible but hands in the air, ready to jump. Rating: Mature Status: One-Shot

16. The Retreat by andnowforyaya

Summary: Kun begrudgingly attends a week-long relaxation retreat at his friend (and business partner) Johnny's behest. There, he meets Ten. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

17. You have weird taste by princessgongjunim (MyOwnCharacterInEverything)

Summary: In an universe where you can taste what your soulmate is eating. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

18. in limine by florulentae

Summary: Kun goes to sleep in New York and wakes up in Madrid. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

19. A Lotus in Bloom by Crucified_To_A_Star

Summary: Ten is the Mogwai that bought Kun's soul; set to protect and elevate him until the contract's time runs out, by any means necessary. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

20. Happy Home by taeyongseo

Summary: Kun is doing just fine on his own. Being a single father at age twenty-one isn't easy, but he has the lines of his life clearly drawn. That is, until Ten comes in and blurs them all. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

21. come and find me by sayounarahitori

Summary: Ten comes home. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

22. to the moon and back by staryukhei

Summary: ten is a good parent. he just can't say no. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

23. You Get Me Closer to God by dustysadderdaze

Summary: There was nothing Ten adored more than defiling angels. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

24. No Manners by SenpaiJecho

Summary: “You’re such a fucking asshole” Kun murmured against Ten’s skin, his hands wandering all over his body, desperate, needy. He was furious with him for fucking him up but, at the same time, he wanted to consume him completely. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot Trigger: Cheating

25. 家 (jiā) by moonfleur

Summary: “Missed you,” is all he says and Kun smiles, all knowing and more than a little fond. Ten sighs, squeezing his eyes shut in an attempt to control the shaking in his voice. “Miss you all actually.” Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

26. It Starts with a Wish by nu-exo (Nekohime)

Summary: The man lowered himself to a knee before Ten, reaching out a hand to tip Ten’s chin up with a finger. “You ask for a lot, little prince. You have a dragon’s hunger.” Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

27. The Anatomy of Change by vinylcherry

Summary: Kun and Ten meet at three points in their life, but circumstance always seems to pull them apart. Will this time be any different? Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

28. silk and snakeskin by fairyslush

Summary: ten is a lamia who eats the hearts of those who love him. kun is a reaper who collects the souls of the devoured. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

29. to lost by mikararinna

Summary: It was initially Ten's idea to go on a road trip, Kun was just there to execute it. He didn't really expect to get lost in the middle of it. But it was better than losing each other. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

30. Exit Strategy by cobalamincosel

Summary: That is until a stranger named Ten makes his way into Kun's oasis and suddenly, Kun doesn't have only himself to worry about anymore. Rating: Teen Status: One-shot Triggers: Zombies

31. Tease by dojaefairy

Summary: Ten looks at him and briefly considers answering “dick”. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

32. heaven is a place on earth (with you) by storytimewithme6

Summary: a look into kunten's married life. Rating: Mature Status: One-Shot

33. Face to Face by winterofouryouth

Summary: Ten had been thinking about it for a long time but his thoughts had been extra loud lately. He didn't know why, but something about the stale heat inside the tent and Kun's slow breathing next to him made him feel like this was the right moment. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

34. That's What Friends Do by tensfilm

Summary: “We were just cuddling.” Rating: General Status: One-Shot

35. now or never now by sayounarahitori

Summary: Ten can always be too much, but today is a new high even for him, especially considering Kun is live on instagram. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

36. face to face by andnowforyaya

Summary: Ten said, "Sir's traveling. He couldn't make it back in time for me. Of course I'm a little sad, but he promised he'll make it up to me. Plus, I've got all of you to keep me company, right? And since you're here, I should be good to you, too." Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

37. prayer from an angel by seolay (speos)

Summary: Kun is a succubus who doesn’t want to seduce humans for food. In the process of finding other ways to survive, he alerts the attention of an angel who might be willing to help. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

38. Elbow Rub by speckledsolanaceae

Summary: Qian Kun has bumped into you! the app announced, and Ten tapped the notification on impulse. Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

39. In The Morning by devinemoon

Summary: On a Sunday morning, with the sun kissing his loved one’s skin he realizes he loves him. And he wants to stay like that forever. Based on “Kissing in cars” by Pierce The veil. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

40. the bigger the hoops, the bigger the hoe by johnrens

Summary: kun got dragged out to the club when he’d rather not be there, but the man with the hoop earrings from across the club changes his night for the better... Rating: Explicit Status: One-Shot

41. same deep water as me by sayounarahitori

Summary: Kun cared too much. Ten, unfortunately, cared even more. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

42. creation myth by madhoney

Summary: Kun’s eyes narrowed as he watched Ten float through the soiree. He moved like fluid, drenching everything and everyone in his path with hunger – not that anyone present needed any further persuading before succumbing to the haze of lust that clouded the expansive villa. Rating: Explicit Status: One-shot

43. let me help you by loudqueen

Summary: Sometimes it got too much for Ten to handle, and sometimes he couldn’t get out. But Kun always managed to guide him through it all. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot Trigger: Mentions of depression

44. annoying is kind of my type by aprofessorstale

Summary: Ten and Kun are baristas at a cafe and they can't stop insulting each other because they definitely have crushes they don't want to admit to. Rating: General Status: One-Shot

45. The Crimson Flower by muffincollection

Summary: Ten, a rich businessman is sent to the city with little income to ‘teach him a lesson.’ Upon his job search, he meets a young and philosophical artist Kun— who is more than displeased of his presence. Rating: Mature Status: One-shot

46. the seven ways i love you (and the seven ways it kills me)

Summary: Ten and Kun have a high risk of dying any second, but that won’t stop them from making each other’s lives impossible. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

47. Perfect Little Family by oonymay

Summary: In which Kun and Ten find a crying child in a forest and naturally decide that raising it in secret is the best option. And therein begins a battle with languages, the meaning of home and feelings. Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

48. Ten, Kun, and the Cat by thesunflowerchild

Summary: “No, Kun, he’s my son!” Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

49. instagram? by mooniesuhs

Summary: “What if we made an Instagram for Louis and Bella?” Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

50. i take care of an eldritch creature w my bf (NOT CLICKBAIT!!!!) [1080p]

Summary: four times yangyang almost reveals himself as an eldritch creature (and two times he definitely does) Rating: Teen Status: One-Shot

#kunten #kun #qian kun #masterlist #part 3

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maladaptive-ninja-returns · 4 years

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It’s The Avengers (03x04)

Loki x Reader Avengers The Office AU (Slowwwwww Burn)

Season 3 Episode 04: She Who Seduces

Series Summary: Living in the Avengers facility post-apocalypse in a better timeline Tony Stark has decided to capture every moment by pulling The Office on the Avengers. All of housemates are pretty used to the idea except for you, who had just come here to finish her degree, and the newest member- Loki.

Warnings: wow! lots of stuff you guys want but at the same time aren’t gettin’ any

Word Count: It’s a weird feeling to be tagged as an essential worker, but not be made to feel like an essential worker? I mean I feel I’m not one. But if I am being forced out of my house, being exposed to the possibility of catching the virus, being ignored by corporate, media and the govt as humans, I have to wonder why am I even sitting here. I get the doctors and nurses and no amount of verbal praise can even come close to what they are doing right now. But if me and my colleagues have be ignored and made to work at large, I’d rather we do it from the safety of our homes, man. (Just when I had started to get better on my own)

MASTERLIST in bio, darlings. Tags are open (check bio)

The camera focused on a blue egg the colour of sky lying in the dirt, zooming in on it a little before jolting back as the egg moved. The camera did the entire cycle once again before a fluff hand tried to smack that egg like a cat curious about this unexplained cute atrocity in front of them.

“Lulu!” a voice called from somewhere in the distance in the midst of a mixture of all sorts of noises- like the ones experienced in your neighbourhood local market. But the camera did not budge till it recorded the sky egg crack bit by bit before a pair of blue eyes popped out on a little white head. Those gorgeous cute eyes looked at the camera, blinking out of coordination before looking at the little golden fuzzy arm slowly coming towards its head. Blinking again- this time with curiosity- the blue eyes froze on that snail-paced extension of a husk behind the camera before a tiny void opened under those innocent eyes to take that husk arm into it and bite down with an audible crunch.

Javier’s camera swiftly turned to Lulu’s cries, finding him far behind in the crowd of aliens trying to knock something away from his arm.

The little husk- screaming and howling like a little dog in pain- was rescued by pale fingers catching hold of the round head that was too stubborn to let go. A little squeeze and those surprisingly vicious teeth let go, breaking the remnants of the eggshells to let out white paws attached to the tiniest legs.

“Scram,” Loki ordered the white alien- who ran away as quickly as possible- before turning towards Lulu, “what were you trying to do with that beast? Have it for breakfast?”

Lulu chirped, nodding before slumping a little into the ground.

“Yeah, good luck with that while you’re in Y/N’s care,” he stated, getting and turning to look at the judgmental zoom Javier’s camera threw on him. “What. You want her to keep another alien as a pet?”

“Guys, I found a restaurant,” your voice called out of the frame, making Loki look in your direction, “OH MY GOD YOU GUYS! THERE ARE REAL LIFE SAILOR SOLDIERS IN HERE!!”

Loki looked at the camera, ageing a thousand years more. “Please tell me it’s not one of those mangas she keeps talking about.”

When Javier spelt it out for him from behind the camera, Loki’s eyes closed and he let out the heaviest sigh he possibly could

Loki: *with a very serious face* the prospect of me having died before being teleported here does not seem so bad. It looks fantastic now. *camera zooms in on his face while you scream in delight in the background, “I’m sitting with real-life Sailor Soldiers!! Aaaahhhh-”*

The Lounge

"Where's Stark?"

One camera panned in on Bucky's face as he came out of the dorm with bed hair while the other looked at a mildly surprised Scott drinking orange juice from a crystal wine glass.

"He said he'll come in twenty. He's gone for his weekly therapy session," Scott replied, swirling the juice in his glass with his pinky out while observing Bucky from head to toe. "You should try that sometimes. It's really good."

Bucky sat down on the sofa with a stare filled with judgemental questions in Scott's direction. "Me? Therapy? That stuff's for looneys."

Scott furrowed his brows at Bucky, pause all moments for a second before bringing the glass ever so slowly to his lips. "Okay, Boomer."

"What?"

Bucky: I don’t need therapy. *mocks a laugh* Shuri made me better than ever in Wakanda. All I need is exercise, healthy food in my stomach and a good amount of sleep. *nods in satisfaction*

*camera zooms out to reveal Scott sitting next to him, shaking his head lightly in mild disbelief*

Scott: *softly* Now I know where that attitude in this present world comes from.

Bucky: *turns to look at Scott* *shifts uncomfortably in his seat while shifting his gaze between the camera and Scott*

*silence erodes the room before Bucky finally breaks*

Why are you looking at me like that? I haven’t killed anyone recently.

Scott: *furrows brows in confusion* what?

Bucky: *stops mid-way and looks away from Scott towards the camera* Nothing

Scott: I never said about killing anyone. *pitch grows higher with every word* Bucky, I never said about killing anyone. Bucky, did you kill someone?

Bucky: *shakes his head with disinterest* mm-mm.

Scott: *mouth opens wide in disbelief* *hands go into his hair on his head* OH MY GOD YOU KILLED SOMEONE!!!

Bucky: NO! I DID N-

Fifteen Minutes Later

Bucky: *softly* So I’ve decided after...a lot of thinking that I should go talk to a...a therapist.

Scott: *nods and smiles at the camera like an encouraging wife*

Bucky: *gives a forceful smile*

Scott: And I too will be going to see a therapist.

Bucky: *nods* *presses lips*

Bucky and Scott: *look at the door, forcing the camera to turn and land on a somewhat irritated Natasha glaring at them from outside the door with arms crossed across her chest*

Back In The Lounge

Wanda walked into the living room space where Bruce was working on some calculations on his laptop while another camera discreetly caught Bucky and Scott giving each other the stink eye.

"You should take a break, Bruce," Wanda stressed while placing a mug of hot tea on his table. Bruce half-looked at the mug before turning back to it, pulling it close and smelling it. "Since when do we drink so much tea?"

Wanda shrugged. "Since Loki and Y/N came into our lives?" She was unsure but that's what all things pointed at. Bruce went with it too.

He rubbed his eyes and shut his laptop. "Yeah, I guess we can take a break." He yawns and gets up. "Loki seems to have everything under control anyway, so…"

Wanda seemed to wince very quietly, her expressions showing no surety in Bruce’s words; or a reflection of an upset stomach.

“I mean, Y/N is being a levelheaded person too. It’s not all Loki.”

A scoff came from the other side of the room where Bucky stood, all eyes and camera turning to stare at him, his crumbling confident posture trying to display reason. “I mean...she hasn’t been to space before. She does not know what’s out there as well as Loki.”

“So, what you are trying to say is she won’t be able to survive if it wasn’t for Loki?” Scott stretched his words to make sure Bucky heard every single one of them.

“Of course she wouldn’t survive out there. She is a kid.” A very sweaty Clint walked into the lounge and went straight for the orange juice inside the fridge. The camera caught the muted gasps coming out of Wanda and Scott for the men in the room not having much faith in your survival skills.

“So are you,” a very sweaty Natasha acknowledged Clint’s words as she grabbed the juice bottle from Clint’s hand, “but you survived the Infinity War without your family. Oh, wait. You didn’t really survive. You just turned into a whiny little bitch and started killing the first thing you saw.”

Wanda looked at the camera with her eyes wide and her lips pressed tightly to stop her from screaming at the burn. Bruce, on the other hand, whispered ‘oh shit’ and tried to disappear in his mug. Scott sipped his juice like the best tea he had been served in a long time, all the while smirking like a content goofball.

“That was so below the belt, Nat,” Clint protested, his hands resting on his hips as he watched her gulp down half the bottle of juice before handing Clint the rest and smacking her lips in satisfaction. “Y/N is in outer space with a frost giant. And so is Javier. But I don’t hear any of you mention him in this conversation when it comes to surviving on one's own?”

“Javier is a-”

Bruce paused before finishing his sentence as he realised the error of his words right before they came out. “Nice guy?” He finally breathed out, his lungs not being able to take the torture. “He is also in danger, of course. That is a given. I was in danger too when I was stuck in space. Thor can vouch for me.”

Thor: *standing on a cliff while the Asgardians celebrate in the background around a fire* *yells over the sound of waves crashing in on the rocks below* BRUCE WAS SO MUCH FUN ON SAKAAR! WE HAD DRINKS AND DANCES AND SO MANY GIRLS OGLING AT HIM! OF COURSE, THAT WAS WHEN HE WAS THE HULK. WHEN HE WAS BACK TO BEING A BORING OLD SCIENTIST ALL HE SPOKE WAS OF HIS PHDS AND HIS HOW MUCH THIS ONE GUY HERE WAS ALL OVER HIM! I THINK HE LIKED IT. HIM! HE LIKED HIM. IF THIS IDIOT WASN’T STUCK ON BORING OLD NAT THEN I WAS BETTING ON THEM DOIN’ IT. YEAH!!! *pauses and smiles his widest smile* *blinks into an invisible void in the distance* PLEASE DON’T TELL NATASHA I CALLED HER BORING. OR-OR OLD.

Bruce gulped where he sat. “Maybe he can’t vouch for me. He was too trippy throughout his trip to space anyways. Maybe the lack of oxygen did it to him.”

The silence grew uncomfortable by the second as he exchanged a look with a camera while Clint just shook his head and let out a defeated “dude”.

Space Place

“Hey, where’s Loki?” you asked Javier while Lulu climbed up the bar stool in the small inn right by the farmer’s market that you had just passed. “Right behind you?” you looked past Javier before walking towards the way he had come- “but he’s not he-”

Your words were cut short by something you saw from the window, forcing the camera to shift on seeing the concern cloud your face towards the scene outside the window. Outside, four buffed up aliens stood surrounding Loki while he raised his hands a little like a white flag.

Instinct took over and you stepped out of the inn but stopped on the porch as Loki yelled, “No! Do not come any closer!” without making eye contact.

One of the buff guys did step closer, his face breathing down right into Loki’s. And Loki? He chuckled at the alien. “One more inch and I think we’ll be kissing, Kronk.”

Kronk the big boulder looking guy hissed at him. “You stepped on the wrong planet, Silvertongue. Hudon wants your head or your body. And he will make sure you pay up your dues.”

Loki tried to increase the distance between him and Kronk, moving back a little; enough to stop smelling his breath on him. “Wow. Looks like someone had a lot of raw Siluji fish today. Hehe. And I thought Hudon was on Myscul. Anyways. How about I talk to Hudon and offer him something that he cannot refuse. And both of us can get back to our respective business.” No matter how much he smiled, Loki did not seem to be getting through that guy.

“Hudon does not want to talk to you. He knows how you work, trickster. He will cut his ears off before he listens to you.”

Loki wanted to contradict the guy but shut his lips to be on the better side of this guy. “Okay. Fine. I will meet him in two hours then? I’ll even bring some good sushi for you.” Loki started to walk away from them when one of Kronk’s men caught hold of him and slapped black handcuffs onto his wrists.

“You are coming with us, traitor.”

The camera recorded Loki being dragged away in broad daylight while no one even batted an eye at the incident. You walked to the end of the porch- the end close enough to watch Loki being taken away as his brows reflected concern in your direction before disappearing behind the nearest stall of berries.

“Javi,” you uttered softly, your eyes still looking for Loki, “I think Loki’s in trouble. Oh, God. I think we are in trouble.”

The Foreigner’s Inn

The camera settled on the window sill and a pair of hands moved away to reveal Javier sitting back in the seat of the corner table far away from the bustle of the inn. You sat opposite him, nervously biting your nails and moving your leg under the table while Lulu sat right in the middle, facing the camera, drinking some green concoction you bought him with a few talons from the ones Loki handed you once you had landed on this planet. Javier’s blue eyes scrutinised the place before coming back to you. He tapped your hand for attention before signing something.

“Yeah,” you acknowledged with a nod, “a plan. We need to come up with a plan to save Loki. But we don’t know where they took him. Oh, shi-should we have followed them? Ah fuck! Now, we won’t know where they went. Maybe we should ask someone. But we don’t know what kind of guy Hudon is. What if he’s got eyes everywhere? Then if we ask someone about him, we’ll be the ones walking right into the lion’s den. And we’ll be the ones who will need saving. Okay okay okay okay okay okay. Right right right right right right.”

Javier knocked the table to get your spiralling conscience back to him, directing you to stop, breathe in and breathe out. And you did, pausing for a moment before things got worse in your head. “Right. We need to think this with a clear head. Um...what would Mr Stark tell us to do.”

With your back straight you looked right at Javier. “He would say stop, take a breather. Make sure that you are safe first. It’s fine to worry about Loki but he is a great strategist. He will definitely find a way out of trouble. But that does not mean we do not go look for him. No one gets left behind. Not even that ugly gourd. Help is always around. All you need to do is ask. And never forget that I love you no matter what. Now go save that son of a bitch.”

Javier stared blankly for a second before breaking into silent applause. “So, we need to find something or someone that can give information about that guy holding Loki. Where can we get someone who would know that and help us, complete strangers?”

Lulu, who, all this time had been swinging his bushy bottom from the chair, suddenly stopped, put the drink from his hand on the table and pressed his belly with a click.

[Hippie Sabotage’s Righteous starts playing]

Lulu got down from his chair and moved towards the door of the inn. You called after him but he did not stop and so you and Javier followed with the camera.

Lulu’s camera took in the boots stepping into the inn first. Then the ripped pants, going up to the open shirt revealing perfect abs. Then came those familiar faces carrying their smouldering looks with them still.

Javi’s camera recorded your expression of surprise followed by a hint of something schemy going on in those eyes. A smile was all that you gave them though. “Never thought I would see you guys again.”

The camera swerved to the rainbow k-pop donning shades that were being taken off as slowly as possible. White turned to look at you, the smoulder still holding strong on his face. “And leave you to fend for yourself, princess. Not on my watch.”

You: Yeah *mildly disgusted* I forgot how clingy he is.

“I need your help.”

Sky jumped where he stood and clapped his hand before slipping behind Mauve and blushing.

“Loki’s in trouble. I need to help him es-”

“Say no more,” White whispered while bringing his pale finger on your lips, which you smacked away. “But before we go on the adventure together, my beautiful princess, I urge you to imagine going on another adventure. Just you. And me. And planets with no one but us.”

“And me,” came a faint whisper from behind Mauve.

“Oh, my G-is there anyone of you who is a normal one?”

“I don’t know about normal,” Green came forward and tucked at the edges of his shirt, “but I can take him away from you and help you save your…”

You waited for him to finish his sentence.

“Boyfriend?” he sounded as unsure as the uneasy lines on his face. Before you could say anything to contradict him, White gasped and Sky whimpered. “Boyfriend! He is your boyfriend?! Oh my stars,” White cried, “what are the odds that fate made us meet when you were already someone else’s.”

You stood there, blinking, questioning whether it would be a good decision to tell him the truth. “So, because I have a boyfriend, you will stop pursuing me?”

Sky sniffled, White sighed in defeat and Orange clicked his tongue at the lost opportunity. “I am a creature of code. I would never even think pretty thoughts about someone else’s queen,” he assured with a weak vibration in his voice.

“Cool,” you exclaimed, “Loki is my boyfriend! And I am Y/N, hi. And you are…”

“Call us whatever you like,” Green replied with a smile. “We don’t have names. Just voice notes as a way of identification. Now, let’s get to work.”

“Oh my God,” Mauve groaned audibly and rolled his eyes under those shades, “finally. She definitely needs that work.”

You and the cameras looked at you, wondering what was so wrong to have blunt judgement thrown at you out of nowhere. “Why would I need work?”

Green gestured to you to move up the stairs of the inn with them. “You mentioned Loki being captured by the alien named Hudon.”

“Never mentioned that.”

“He is a classic brute,” Green continued, like he never heard you, as you walked next to him while Lulu got himself lifted into your arms, “who owns all the brothels of this base. He trades in creatures who can exploit their own bodies for what he pays them. The fact that Loki was taken away by his men points at the possibility of trade between them gone wrong.”

You gasped at the sudden revelation that was dawning upon you. “Wait. So, that could mean he wants payback from Loki. Does he want payback in...in cash or...in kind?”

Green’s eyes reflected sympathy for your situation. “Let’s hope, for you and Loki, that it is cash.”

“But wouldn’t that mean he has to sell his body?!”

Green nodded. Lulu’s camera caught White murmuring to Violet, “do you think that furry thing is their child?”

“We have something that might help you. And for that-” he stopped in front of a door of one room at the far end of the corridor, twisting the knob and clicking it open for you to enter- “we would need your help.”

“Okay,” you nodded before confusion took over your face and Lulu purred while rubbing against your shoulder, “what kind of help.”

Mauve sighed loudly, pushing you away- gently- to enter the room first. “We would need your help to do something about the drab that you humans call fashion on your planet,” he nearly puked while looking at your clothes.

“Hey! This shirt is really comfortable. So are these leggings and boots!”

Mauve screwed his face at you. “Oh, they better be! Because that hue-combination is a disaster,” he stressed.

You felt your head go back a little. "Just because I don't have much interest in fashion, I'm gonna let that pass. But I am pretty sure the Queer Eye won't stand for that insult."

"The Queer Eye would've made you into a walking weapon had they been in your vicinity darling," Mauve mentioned matter-of-factly and walked towards the lone dresser and dragged out the chair before tapping it. "Now sit your ass down and let me show you how it's done while Mr Green fills you in about everything."

You looked at Green. He nodded jovially. White on the other hand went and plopped on the bed. Violet went and splayed himself on the sofa, Red went for the window sill to go and brood there. Sky took the foot of the bed and made himself comfortable to look at you for the next two hours. Orange took off his shirt and trousers and went into the bathroom.

"Hey, Lulu," White called out from the bed, "put on a sexy getting-ready song."

Lulu got up on the dresser and pressed his stomach to play Rachel Bloom’s Sexy Getting Ready Song.

“Wait. Hold on,” you called out, making Mauve and Green stop in their tracks and Lulu pausing the song, “I...I gotta poop. Please get that orange pervert out of there?”

Hudon’s Whorehouse

A hush, beginning from the entrance, fell as the eyes followed the figure. A sweet yet strong melody seemed to follow that black-clad creature, stirring both fear and excitement in the witnesses; who completely missed the two companions walking on its either side.

Never feel too good in crowds With folks around when they're playing

The clack of those pointed heels seemed to be a pound at the doors of the devil himself and every minion that walked in the path she walked, only stopping in the room fit for a queen; nothing less. A seat was taken on the gold-framed sofa, legs spread in comfort and defiance of the one in charge, arms rested on the armrest while popping a grape in the mouth with lips painted red as the blood that flowed in her veins.

A creature with the body of a human- except for the extra pair of hands- and the head of a furry with antlers entered the hall, sitting opposite you. “Welcome to the house of Hudon!” he greeted, the gold on his antlers jingling like bells on Rudolph, “the finest whorehouse you would find in this system.”

“I will evaluate the ‘fine’ myself, Hudon,” you stated quite indifferently, your attention taken by a golden strawberry resting in your fingers, “how old is this rotten blasphemy.”

The anthems of rape, culture loud Crude and proud creatures baying

It was easy to get that accent on your tongue. The tone was smooth enough to show not much effort was being put to talk while the words were spoken like a dagger stabbing the listener with every breath.”

Hudon directed his men to take those old fruits away and to replace them with new ones. But you had already lost interest in them. Sitting straight up, you let your arms go back on the headrest, your suit jacket revealing the skin underneath, the acne on your chest from the sweat and dust revealing itself in full glory. Hudon nearly feels himself blackout with the sheer audacity of a human woman walk into his house and sit there as a client while making him- the one who runs the sex business- make him feel things that were quite transparent in his gaze.

All I've ever done is hide From our times when you're near me

“Here I am, out on a vacation from my boring home, looking for some fun and adventure when someone suggests to me your name and business,” you mutter loud enough for him to hear. “Hudon the hoarder. The one who has everything you can ask for. Anything out of your fantasy. You name it, he has it for you.”

“I do,” he agreed with a smile, interrupted just as he is about to start listing his merchandise.

“Oh, but I don’t think you do, Hudon.” You leaned forward, your legs still spread apart in those black trousers, your frame bent enough to reveal more and still reveal nothing at all, making Hudon’s eyes linger there far longer than he expected them to. “I don’t think you do. What could you possibly have that could seem human enough for my taste and yet not human at all, Hudon? What could you possibly have that could meet my demands, unlike the men on my planet? One who is not meant to be ruled and yet-” your voice turned to a whisper, and Hudon’s eyes were stuck on the hypnotising moment of your lips under that netted veil covering your smokey eyes- “he bends under my commands like a good dog because he knows he will get a treat if he behaves.”

Hudon gulped and blinked.

Honey, when you kill the lights and kiss my eyes I feel like a person for a moment of my life

“I am not here to have some cheap fun, Hudon. Nor some sloppy seconds. I want a challenge that I can smother between my thighs, making him question how he ended up there, under me. And then make him question how he can get under me, again.”

A silence proceeded your laced words. A long lingering silence which would have stretched even more had one of Hudon’s men not brought that shook fur-face back to the present.

“I I I I I think I have the perfect specimen for you, miss…”

“Lady. Lady...Morticia Addams,” you declared, blinking at Javier’s camera.

You: *cringing* I did not think this part through. But I did come up with a nice personality? *does a weak thumbs up*

“I will send for him immediately, Lady Morticia,” Hudon declared, getting and taking a bow, “and if he is not able to satisfy you, I will humbly present myself to you as a sacrifice.”

You: *deadpan* Pervert.

“If your specimen does not satisfy me, then mark my words, Hudon, you won’t find any piece of him in your excuse of a brothel.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied with a weak voice, walking out and scolding his guards to get him ‘Silvertongue’.

You noticed the two guards still in the hall by the door, looking at you and your companions. Javier moved from his place by the fireplace to the door, to let the tiny camera- courtesy of the rainbow k-pop- strapped to his chest take in the patient steps of the man of the hour; at the same time, directing with his hands to Lulu to resume his score.

But you don't know what hell you put me through To have someone kiss the skin that crawls from you

Loki, bare-chested and in chains, was walked towards your hall with four guards- two on front and two on back. This was the first time any of the cameras had seen so much of his bare skin. Neither had they seen so many muscles on that body that seemed so lean on the outside with the clothes on. The raven hairs snaked around his shoulders while his eyes were set at the goal in front of him: you. And if you did not know any better you would have thought those peach curtains were flying right and left to get a one-touch, one whiff of that God.

To feel your weight in arms I'd never use It's the god that heroin prays to

You almost choked on the juice you were offered on seeing Loki like that- in just his pants. Like a healthy supermodel straight out of a pin-up hidden in your childhood drawer. Quickly recovering and changing into the persona created for this place you leaned back on the sofa to admire the view when all five men came to a halt in front of you.

It feels good, girl, it feels good It feels good, girl, it feels good

“Hm,” you muttered, your eyes going up and down an apparently tight-jawed Loki, “decent. Where did you catch this fish?”

“Caught him fresh in the market today,” Hudon’s henchman answered, surprisingly in an Australian accent, “owed our master for quite some time. Will finally pay his debts now.”

It feels good, girl, it feels good Oh, to be alone with you

The laugh that came out of the prude was murky. You got up and nonchalantly waved your hand to make the guards stand away from the merch, letting you get a good three-sixty view. Loki could feel your eyes on him even when you stood behind him, carefully studying these marks on an otherwise flawless skin that ran all over his back and some did on arms, right down his wrist.

A wave of emotion washed over you on seeing them, which you hastily veiled for the sharp eyes lurking in the background. Clearing your throat, you took out your silver hair stick from the bun at the back and walked to face the frost giant.

There are questions I can't ask Now, at last, the worst is over

“Sit,” you commanded.

Loki’s eyes grew dark. The camera recorded the silent change of roles for a quick moment before Loki finally obeyed, getting down on his knees.

See the way you hold yourself Reel against your body's borders

You took a step to his side before looking at the guards still standing there. “What. You want in on the show as well?” Your raised-up brow was judging them hard at this moment.

The guards stood there looking at each other before one of them finally spilt. “We are not allowed to leave him alone with you till you sign the contract and make the payment.”

“Hm. Well, if that is the case-” you took another step to stand right behind Loki- “I will inspect this...merchandise before I make the payment.”

I know that you hate this place Not a trace of me would argue

The hair stick in your hand made its first contact with the bare skin on Loki’s back, promptly making his muscles move underneath that pale skin. A smile found its way to your lips. “Sensitive to touch, I see. I prefer virgin skin.” You dragged stick all the way from one end of those shoulder scales in the back to the other, taking light steps to move towards the front.

The camera zoomed in on the shadow of something brewing inside Loki’s eyes while his lips stretched ever so slightly with a thought only he knew. The stick came to the collar bone, travelling up his neck to land right below his chin, lifting it up to watch your tongue in between your teeth, peeking out for a look.

Honey, we should run away, oh, someday Our baby and her momma And the damaged love she made

“Say, boy,” you asked softly, letting the stick dig into that chin to raise it up further, “what does that mouth do.”

A chuckle rose in Loki’s chest and burst out to close his eyes before they could look at you in a new light. “They do things you wouldn’t want to know.”

But I don't know what else that I would do Than try to kiss the skin that crawls from you

Questioning- or pretending to question- his audacity you responded with a sly ‘uh-huh’ before getting down on one knee, letting both your arms rest on the other. “Well, it better-” your voice grew duskier by the minute while that thin stick landed on his lips, circling them- “do things unspeakable. Otherwise-” you gently pushed the stick in his mouth, and he took it in, wrapping his tongue around it- “what is the point of that pretty pretty mouth.”

Then feel your weight in arms I'd never use It's the god that heroin prays to

Javier could not help but record the drooling and uncomfortable faces of the guards standing by the door, half of them looking at each other, other half stuck on the hypnotic movements happening between the two of you; all of them standing with their hands hiding their bulges in those leather pants.