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five-rivers · 4 years ago

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Loved chapter 4

Written for Dannymay 2021 Day 3: Portal, even though the connection is sort of tenuous.

Bad things happened when Vlad came to Amity Park. For that matter, bad things happened wherever Vlad was. It was part of what made Vlad Vlad. Some part of his otherness, some twist of the shadow-fabric he was made of that left rot and ruin wherever his hem brushed. Of course, Vlad was never affected by this misfortune. In fact, he seemed to suck the luck out of everyone around him. Like a vampire.

Along with sanity. But that was a given for the others, even partial others, like Vlad. Or Danny.

But Vlad didn’t even try to hide or ameliorate the effects he had on people, didn’t try to keep them safe, to make their lives shine like the precious lights they were.

(Danny drummed his fingers on his chest and wondered, if, perhaps, it would feel less empty if Clockwork let him become a jewel box.)

But that was the way Vlad was, and Danny felt him enter Amity Park like nails on a chalkboard. His skin started to itch. His teeth hurt. Pressure pulsed in his head like waves of heat coming off asphalt. Being human, being real, was too tight, too heavy. It would be so easy to slip into the cool waters of the Dream and cut through them to wherever Vlad was.

No. He couldn’t. As shown time and time again, that would just exacerbate things. No matter what Vlad did, it would be worse if they fought, especially if there was anyone there to see it. Like what had happened with Jazz…

Danny was beyond lucky he’d been able to snap her out of whatever Vlad had done to her, but she still was quite right. The Vultures had actually apologized on Vlad’s behalf, after that.

(And wasn’t that strange, standing in the Dream on ground covered by bones and feathers, the Vultures on a dead tree, speaking as one. A thing of terror, apologizing for their ward. For pain suffered through Love. For lines crossed.)

Still. He had better… supervise Vlad, for a lack of a better word. Make sure he wasn’t getting up to anything. He’d go as a human – as himself.

He sighed and splayed his hands out on the table.

“Something wrong?” asked Sam, who had been making a complex sigil out of her fries and ketchup.

“Vlad’s in town,” said Danny. “I—”

The doors to the Nasty Burger were thrown open with a bang as Jazz came running in. She ran halfway through the store, to weak protests from the employee behind the counter, and skidded to a stop in front of their table.

“Vlad’s here,” he said.

“You saw him?” asked Danny, concerned. “Did he try—”

“No,” said Jazz. “I can just—It’s like he’s under my skin, and I—” She made a sound of frustration and gripped both sides of her head with clawed hands.

“Hey,” said Danny, gently, grasping her wrists. “It’s going to be okay. I’ll take care of it.”

“Okay,” said Jazz, breathing deeply. “Alright. I shouldn’t have freaked out like that.”

“It’s okay,” said Danny. He looked back to his friends. “Anyway, I’m going to go see what he wants, okay?”

“I’m coming with you,” said Sam, standing.

“Me too,” said Tucker. “Sort of. Halfway.”

“You really shouldn’t,” said Danny. “You know what happens when we get together.”

“Which is why we want to back you up,” said Sam. “As long as he stays physical, there’s stuff we can do.”

Unless Danny was prepared to do something incredibly inadvisable, there wasn’t much he could do to stop her. “Okay,” he said. “Just… be careful. If it looks like it’s going to turn into a fight, you need to leave.” He didn’t want them to get anymore spiritually messed up than they already were.

��We know, we know, you give us the spiel every time,” said Sam.

Yes, and Sam ignored it every other time. Danny shook his head. “Alright, let’s—”

Danny was promptly interrupted yet again, this time by his parents rushing in wearing… He could loosely call them clothes.

“It’s retro night, baby!” shouted Jack.

It was not retro night. There was no such thing as retro night at the Nasty Burger.

“I’ll take care of them,” said Jazz.

“Thanks,” muttered Danny, sliding out of the booth. “Come on, let’s go out the back.”

The alley behind the Nasty Burger was fetid in a way that made Danny’s shadow lift from the pavement and float on the air. Something that inhabited rats skittered in the corners at Danny’s presence and ran for a storm drain. He breathed shallowly.

“Which way?” prompted Tucker.

“He’s actually coming this way,” said Danny, frowning, debating facing him in this alley, just to see the disgust that would surely paint itself on Vlad’s face, paper-thin mask that it was.

Reality rippled, the surface tension that kept the Dream from bleeding in snapping. A miasma rose from the ground. Vlad stumbled into the alley, clutching at his face, which was melting. No, transforming. No, stretching. No, layering over itself a in dozen sickening ways, all the masks Vlad wore flickering over whatever truth he had all at once.

“Help me,” he grated. His words felt sick, diseased.

“Guys,” said Danny, fighting back the urge to vomit, “run.”

“No!” shrieked Vlad. “Help me!”

And sanity fractured like glass.

Whatever Danny’s parents had done to stabilize Vlad had worked, to a degree. It hadn’t fixed the underlying problem, which Danny could still feel slinking through the Dream. It also didn’t fix whatever he’d done to Sam and Tucker, although it had kept it from progressing further.

Danny took a slow, angry breath and ran a mental count of the lives stored inside his chest. They were there, all of them. Whatever happened to Sam and Tucker, they wouldn’t die.

But Danny knew there were fates worse than death.

His fingernails left half moon impressions on his palms as he clenched his fists. The Dream roiled with his fury, the force of it enough to keep Vlad’s diseased thoughts away.

“Daniel,” croaked Vlad. “Cure me.”

“That’s what Mom and Dad are trying to do.”

“Find a cure for me,” said Vlad, as if he hadn’t heard Danny at all, “and you’ll find a cure for your precious little friends.”

Danny stilled. “You did this on purpose.”

Vlad laughed. “Of course, I did, my dear boy. What value is a simple human mind compared to those such as we?”

Any rage Danny had felt up to this moment paled in comparison. The mirror over the sink cracked down the middle, never to show a true physical reflection again. He hated—

A concerned tug at Danny’s throat jolted him from his thoughts. Clockwork. Clockwork would know what to do. He turned, and without a second glance at Vlad, strode bodily into the Dream.

It took Danny even less time than usual to find Clockwork, and, when he did, he immediately found himself at Clockwork’s center, deep within the castle that was his metaphor. Dozens of Chains were fixed to Danny’s collar, each of them completely taut, holding him perfectly immobile, the embrace of a relieved but panicking parent. Clockwork’s emotions, too vast for Danny to fully comprehend, were transmitted directly through those chains, microscopic vibrations raising gooseflesh on Danny’s skin. A wordless noise both distressed and pleased wound its way from Danny’s throat, continuing to echo long after he’d run out of the breath to maintain it.

Clockwork’s avatar cupped Danny’s face in its hands, long fingers almost completely encircling his head. There was more of Clockwork in it that there usually was.

“Clockwork…?” asked Danny, weakly, confused and overwhelmed by the sudden flood of affection.

Poor little one, whispered the avatar, this is what happens when matters are not properly attended to. The Vultures should know better, should take care of him properly… It pressed its forehead to Danny’s, startling a squeak from him.

Danny, reflexively, brought his hands up to clutch at the avatar’s robes.

My poor child. What are they thinking, letting him run around so ill, so that he might infect other children?

Clockwork saw Vlad as a child, too. Not surprising, considering how ancient Clockwork must be, but good to know.

That emotion! It was only a shadow, and even so-!

“Emotion?”

Hatred, hissed Clockwork’s avatar.

The collar around Danny’s neck constricted, a tighter, more Loving, more comforting, hug. Danny gasped, although breathing here was psychological rather than physiological. The cloth of the avatar’s robes began to wind up Danny’s arms.

Even the pale, human shadow of it is not something you should experience, my child.

Danny didn’t like being that angry, but—

Even the concept of it is too much, too heavy. You should not have to bear it. I should not have overlooked it. The avatar’s hands moved to the back of Danny’s head, pressing his face against its shoulder. It must hurt you so,murmured the avatar, carding fingers through Danny’s hair. Fear not. I will excise it. All of it, even the idea of it shall not touch you, shall not sully your thoughts.

The avatar stepped away.

“Wait!” shouted Danny, panicking.

Not being able to hate? Danny had mixed feelings about that, but he doubted he’d be able to talk Clockwork out of it, not with how damaging Hate could be. In the end, it wouldn’t be that much of a loss. Not being able to understand that it existed? Not being aware of hate at all? Being unable to understand that, sometimes, people would go out of their way to hurt one another?

That was dangerous. That would render him unable to even begin to comprehend vast swathes of human history and humanity.

“If I don’t know what it is,” said Danny, “if I don’t know that it exists, how can I protect myself against it?”

A gust of wind blew through Clockwork’s sepulchral hall like the sigh of a giant. It is my duty to protect you, my child.

The sheer possessiveness of the words lingered on Danny’s skin. He wanted to lean into them but held his imaginary breath.

But very well.

Danny let himself relax, slightly, even as the avatar walked to somewhere he couldn’t see, its silent footsteps giving him no clue as to where it was. With only the constant, regular hum and tick of Clockwork’s gears to stimulate him, it was hard for Danny to stay vigilant. He found himself drifting, his thoughts wandering.

Did his hatred of Vlad cause him pain, as Clockwork said? What was it going to be like, to not be able to hate at all, rather than just not being able to Hate? Would he still be angry at Vlad? He hoped so. The man deserved it.

Two points of frigid cold touched the back of his head, contracted into a single point, and pulled. Danny felt something within him come free, and he sagged as much as the chains would allow him.

The avatar walked back into view, and Danny recoiled from the thing he was carrying, clasped in a long, silver pair of tweezers. “Is that,” started Danny, before he swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. “Was that in me?”

Yes, said Clockwork’s avatar, lowering it into a small, jeweled box. Danny felt relieved as soon as the lid closed on it and he was no longer forced to look at it. At the same time… Fear not, said the avatar. I could never destroy something of you. It will be remade into something more useful.

Danny nodded as much as he could and shuddered. He felt… dirty. Unclean. Just remembering what he’d felt, what he’d thought… It left a deep sense of wrongness.

Come, said Clockwork. I have just the thing for that. You are due for a bath. A cleansing, inside and out.

The metaphor of the chains fell away, leaving just the one, usual, slack one. Danny knew Clockwork could call them back at any time, that, in truth, they had not gone anywhere at all.

“What about Vlad?” he asked, twisting his hands around the hem of his shirt. “And my friends? Can you help them? Please.”

He felt Clockwork examine him appraisingly.

Perhaps the bath can wait for another day.

The mirror was a portal, tall and wide as a door, glassy surface gleaming with otherworldly light. The edges were crimped, filigreed, flared. Beyond the reflection, Danny could just make out the suggestion of movement.

It is not real, said the avatar, putting a hand on Danny’s shoulder, but a might-have-been.

“But I can find a way to fix things in there?”

The avatar did not answer. A prickling feeling rose up inside Danny, settling in his stomach. Somehow, this felt similar to when he’d eaten the mirror with the bad future.

It is,confirmed the avatar, briefly nuzzling Danny.

“Why?” asked Danny, just a little horrified.

Is it not satisfying to complete two tasks at once? I told you, back then, that our next task would be to remove those presents that seek to exclude you.

Danny didn’t understand.

You will. Clockwork’s avatar paused, as if thinking. This is what the Vultures should have done for young Vladimir, although they would have accomplished it differently.

“Oh,” said Danny, trying to wrap his head around that.

Clockwork’s avatar nudged him forward. Follow the chain when you are ready to come home.

Danny wasn’t connected to anyone in this might-have-been world. It was odd, watching every eye slide off him as if he wasn’t even there. If he wanted to interact with someone directly, he’d have to put a lot of force of will into it.

It was strange. Other than that, everything here seemed perfectly real. Not imaginary at all. The sun shone. People spoke to one another. The grass crunched under his feet.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison lay before him in all its questionable glory.

He’d have to find Vlad and his parents. They had rented a small lab space for their experiments with the Dream and research into the others.

Normally, he’d follow his connection to them to find them, or the disturbance Vlad made in the dream, but neither of those things existed, now. Not yet. Danny didn’t exist yet.

He could just wander, try to seek out questionable lab space, but the university’s campus was large. Normally, he’d ask for directions, but…

Yeah, the no one being able to see or hear him thing really didn’t allow for that.

But there was one other thing he could try to do, one other thing he could try to sense. Their experiments. They should send waves across and through the Dream.

He let his eyes drift closed and walked blind across campus. When he opened them, he was in a lab, watching his parents and Vlad working on a kind of magic circle, inscribed with runes.

A portal, intended to let humans directly access the Dream. A portal that had created Vlad, all because he leaned too close, watched too closely, seen too much, became something else, changed.

Something like anger stirred under his skin. After this, his parents had continued to experiment, continued to try to reach the Dream, to create a weapon against the others, and in doing so both doomed Danny himself and Amity Park by making what amounted to a highway for the others to come to the real world.

But they hadn’t intended to do that, he knew. They’d been trying as best as they could to fix things. Had been trying to defend the world the best they knew, portal or no portal. And speaking of the portal… If others could damage human sanity, if Danny, small and weak and almost-human as he was, could damage human sanity, then how much more could a direct link to the Dream do? Discounting, of course, that normal dreams could lead to the Dream… That connection was more tenuous. Filtered.

His anger was a distraction from what was really bothering him.

These people, they looked like his parents. They were his parents. But… they weren’t. There was no attachment there. Nothing. It was like looking at empty shells. No Love.

It was distressing.

He watched, waiting, making note of the symbols and the placement of the ritual objects and the technological enhancements. There had to be something here that would help explain why Vlad was having such a hard time, while Danny had transitioned to his present existence without much problem.

He leaned over his not-mother’s calculations, then his not-father’s, made note of the differences. Looked at the fire, the knife, and the carved cylinders. Some of them didn’t feel quite right. One of them had been nudged out of alignment by a soda can put down by not-Jack, shifting the circle, making it bigger. Could that be something?

Vlad leaned over to examine the circle, and, at the same time, not-Jack pushed a button on the tape player, which started chanting. Danny could feel the hole boring into reality before the first syllable was finished. They’d made the portal both too well and too poorly.

Danny reached for Vlad and pulled him back, out of the way of the opening portal.

Danny may have made a mistake.

He’d saved Vlad from becoming other. In doing so, he’d changed things, altered this entire make-believe world. The way the story was progressing was no longer the same as his own. Which meant that it might be useless for collecting clues for fixing Vlad, Sam, and Tucker. Mostly Sam and Tucker.

(He’d help Vlad if it wouldn’t hurt his friends, he didn’t hate the man, not anymore, didn’t desire his suffering. But his friends were, of course, his main concern.)

But he couldn’t just leave. He’d made note of all the flaws in the portal, but that wasn’t in any way conclusive, wasn’t a guarantee.

And, in the meantime, his not-parents and not-Vlad had continued working on the portal, which they hadn’t shut down, unlike in the proper timeline. Or had it been disrupted by Vlad? He didn’t remember the exact sequence of events. His parents had never been clear.

But the portal was on, it was working, and it was wrong. Everything was wrong. The portal was in a class of things that should-not-be.

Just like Danny, in this world. He… With the portal, and the way things were going, he shouldn’t exist here, the butterfly effect would keep him from being born, and he was becoming painfully aware of that fact. Literally painfully. It was starting to hurt, being here, a throb in the back of his head.

Or was that the portal?

Either way…

(He couldn’t shake the suspicion that he was breaking things just by being here. Everything was going wrong. So many little accidents.)

(Or was that the portal?)

He kept watching.

It had been… a while, now. It was easy to lose track of time like this, with no one to talk to. Days? Maybe? He’d been drifting, which should have been troubling.

Maybe he should go back. Cut losses.

(Besides, it was disturbing watching his parents flirting with each other. And Vlad. Even if they weren’t really themselves.)

Then his parents wheeled in a… What was that? He walked closer. This was about the same size around as the pillars that had done this to him.

Danny would never forget those, after all.

Something hummed inside him, picking up a kind of resonance between the active portal and the pillar.

The ground fragmented beneath his feet.

Reality followed soon after.

He found himself nowhere with nothing. Only nowhere and nothing.

Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no.

What had he done? He’d, he’d destroyed a world, he’d—

There was a gentle, but insistent tug on his chain. He followed it home.

He clung to Clockwork’s avatar, gasping, as if he was the only real thing in the world. His emotions were too much, too great, uncontained and roiling. They battered him like a stormy sea.

It’s alright, it’s alright, comforted the avatar. It wasn’t real, and now it never will be. All those worlds where you would not be. All gone.

No. No. No. Horror buzzed in his brain. He couldn’t have destroyed so much.

Never were,continued the avatar, Clockwork apparently oblivious. All disproven. Paradox. You could not be and yet you were. You were in the places you were not. So, now you exist, in all these places, in everywhere that could be, and always will. It stroked Danny, brushing away tears. Only one more to go, until you never were not, my beloved child, until you always were mine, as you were meant to be.

Danny keened into the robes of Clockwork’s avatar, distraught. Wind ruffled his hair.

Considering the point in time in which you were placed, said the avatar, Vladimir will be well again.

Danny looked up, hopeful for the first time in hours.

Mostly. The underlying cause has been removed. You should bring the rest to your… progenitors. They are at least competent in this area.

Danny nodded vigorously and attempted to extract himself from the avatar’s grasp. He was unsuccessful, although the avatar did adjust its grip on him.

You have had a difficult day, it observed. It then presented Danny with a cookie.

Confused, Danny took it.

A gift, said the avatar, Clockwork having evidently returned to his normal laconic mode.

“What’s it made of?” asked Danny, suspicious.

Love. What else?

“How do you feel?” asked Danny.

“Weird,” said Sam. “But okay.”

“What was it like?”

Sam shrugged. “It was like…” She waved her hand. “Watching a thousand different movies of my life, but they were all wrong. Like if they were crappy biopics done fifty years after I died or something.”

“Speak for yourself,” grunted Tucker. “I just got a lot of sand. So, so much sand. And sun. Do I have a sunburn?”

“No?” said Danny. “You look fine.”

“Ugh, I forgot you were white. You don’t know what sunburns look like.”

“I’d argue,” said Sam, “but you’re not wrong.” She fell back against her pillows. “I just want to sleep.”

“Same,” said Tucker. “I never want to see the sun again.”

“We’ll make a goth of you yet,” joked Sam, tossing a pillow at him.

“Okay,” said Danny, backing away. “Should I get the lights?”

“You don’t mind?”

“Sleep well,” he said. He hoped they would.

(Because he would not.)

#danny phantom #loved #eldritch abomination AU #dannymay #dannymay 2021 #dannymay day 3: portal

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piratewithvigor · 4 years ago

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I Have To Bake A Cake?

A small fic based on the above gif and the following recipe.

Assorted delishiousness and panic below

Kane couldn’t deny he was a little nervous. His experience with food had been sorely limited in the past. Hell, he still sometimes found himself eating like there were rats lurking in the shadows to steal what was his. But this wasn’t a case like that.

This was a cake. As ordered by Vince himself. Or at least through a couple dozen people who couldn’t give him a lot more details than the fact that he was supposed to bake a cake for Monday.

Okay, a cake. How hard could it be?

According to the recipes he dug up, very hard.

He was starting to get overwhelmed just by looking over the plethora of options. Every flavour under the sun, and that was just the cake itself. When combined with frostings and fillings and decorations, there were probably more kinds of cake than he’d had tiny pointless arguments with Daniel.

And that didn’t even change the fact that he hadn’t been told what the cake was for. All these recipes online seemed to indicate specific cakes for specific occasions, but what about when he had no occasion? No hints of any kind? What then, Pinterest mommy bloggers??

Even when he did find a recipe that seemed like it would work, it wasn’t like he had the ingredients for it. He and Daniel had made compromises when they moved in together. Kane could eat all the meat he wanted so he could get enough protein in his diet without having to resort to powders that made him gag, but in exchange, he’d put up with Daniel’s vegan substitutes for pretty much anything else. No animal milk and no eggs.

Which seemed to be the two staples for pretty much every recipe.

He was half tempted to just give up, retire and run away to parts unknown to escape the hellish task when a recipe offered itself. A plain chocolate cake. Nothing fancy about it whatsoever. Except for the fact that it offered substitutions. No animal based ingredients of any kind. And even shit he had. If he wasn’t so loyal to Daniel, Kane felt like he could have kissed the mommy blogger in question.

With Kane’s penchant for burning things, he usually left the more delicate cooking to Daniel. Baking was especially out of his wheelhouse, but he wasn’t one to let down whoever needed this cake. Nor whoever was supposed to eat it. It would just take a little remembering where Daniel kept everything in the kitchen and a little learning on the fly. No problem at all.

Step one was to preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Kane liked this recipe already. The little extra heat in the kitchen set him at ease. It was like a nice hug.

The stand mixer, on the other hand, was like a chihuahua on cocaine. It was loud, it was fast, and it made every ingredient he added to the bowl explode in a tiny cloud. Explosions were for the ring; not for a tiny machine that Julia fucking Child could use.

3 cups flour? Poof. 3 cups sugar? Poof. 1 ½ cups cocoa powder? 1 ½ teaspoons of baking powder and salt? 1 tablespoon baking soda? Poof, poof and a relatively underwhelming lesser poof (he later read the recipe more closely and noted that it said a ‘low speed’. Go figure.)

The 1 ½ cups of warm water (warmed literally by hand), ½ cup vegetable oil and 2 teaspoons of vanilla were much less exciting. It was starting to look more like cake batter and less like a slightly murky pile of powder, which set Kane a little more at ease.

But then came the chemistry.

Kane liked chemistry, usually. Liked reading about how different chemicals went together and caused what. The only difference was that he was usually in the wheelhouse of combustions. Making things explode. Making dairy-free buttermilk was not a combustion. And if it was, it wasn’t supposed to be.

He had the choice of 1 ½ cups of almond or soy milk as a substitution to be combined with 2 far-too-delicately added tablespoons of vinegar. The funk coming from the measuring cup within the next few minutes was… interesting to say the least. Not quite “Daniel’s casserole that was basically all sprouts” or “the time Taker wouldn’t say what he had barbecued” funky, but not something pleasant. How it wasn’t going to ruin the cake, Kane wasn’t sure, but the picture in the recipe looked delicious, so he’d have to trust the crazy mommy blogger for the time being.

The egg substitute made a little more sense. Eggs were gooey and yellow and so was the cup of applesauce he added. Plus it smelled a lot better than the buttermilk.

The second beating was a lot less exciting. No added mess onto himself and almost none onto the counter. Once the batter was smooth, all that was left was somehow getting it all into the pans he’d dug out of the cabinet.

Somehow, the sticky, gooey batter was going to have to make the seamless transition between stand mixer (fuck that thing) and pans that would move just out of the incoming dollop of batter like there was some kind of spirit just hanging around to fuck with him. He wouldn’t put it past the spirit. Wasn’t much to do in the afterlife besides fuck with the living.

A quick lighting of the incense stick Taker had given him seemed to do the trick. Or maybe it calmed his nerves and he stopped jostling the pan. Whatever the case, he made the successful transition from bowl to the three 9” pans and only lost a little batter in the process. They might end up a little wonky, but he planned to fix it with some of the vegan frosting Daniel kept in the back of the fridge where he thought Kane wouldn’t know about it (the man would buy and eat frosting for no reason other than to eat it and pretend immediately after that he’d never eaten frosting in his life, regardless of how much was still in his beard).

35 minutes later, the toothpick he stuck into the middle of each pan was coming out completely clean. Hardly even any crumbs.

He was pulling out the pans as he heard the front door open and Daniel walk in.

“Kane, you here?”

“In the kitchen,” he called back, kicking the oven door shut.

“Kitchen? Isn’t it a little early for dinn- what the fuck are you doing?” Daniel asked, blinking a few times as he paused in the doorway.

“Cake?” He’d been feeling certain about it thus far, but hearing Daniel’s confusion led him to wonder if the cake was supposed to be common knowledge.

“What’s the occasion for cake?”

“Dunno. Vince told me to bake it.”

“A cake?”

“Well… yeah, obviously a cake.”

“He told you to bake a cake?”

“He told John, who told Sheamus, who told Kofi, who told Big Show, who told-”

“Yeah, yeah, I get that, but what were the actual words?”

“‘On Monday, bake a cake.’”

“This Monday?”

“I think so.”

Daniel took a pause and inhaled deeply. “This Monday, when Raw begins at eight? As in, 8pm?”

It was Kane’s turn to pause and look towards his lover with a furrowed brow. “Are you telling me I spent the afternoon baking a cake that wasn’t actually needed?”

“Looking like it.”

Kane wasn’t sure if he wanted to laugh or drop kick the cakes. He settled for a scream into one of the throw pillows they kept on the kitchen chairs. One so eerie and heartbreaking that Daniel wasn’t sure if he should even touch Kane or what exactly was going to happen after he lifted his face from the pillow. Whatever he was waiting for, it certainly wasn’t laughter. Or a grin from underneath his mask with his eyes dancing.

“Break out the frosting, Danny boy, we’re eating good tonight.”

#Kane #Kane bakes a cake and stuff happens #Writing #this is total crack fluff #and I'm hungry

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missanthropicprinciple · 3 years ago

Note

WIP: Foxgloves please!

*hugs*

*screams* ok *breathes* haha well

I started writing this when I was about 17. Originally it was an homage to Olivia Manning's Levant Trilogy and a bit also to Frances Hodgson Burnett but it ended up being more Parade's End meets landscape literature. I participated in NaNoWriMo last year, finally completing a novel that's been in the works for nearly 20 years. I've gone through several phases of re-writes for this. In my 20s I beefed up what I had but not by much. It was still very naive and wasn't what I wanted. Something was missing. When I was about 30 I was talking to a friend of mine and I was saying how I couldn't write from the perspective of the little girl anymore and wasn't sure if I ever really could. So I changed it to the perspective of Marcus, the little girl's shell shocked older cousin. It ended up being the best move ever because after that my writing just exploded in the best possible way.

Logline, a thing I am useless at:

Returning from the front lines, Marcus attempts to return to his life of musical performance but finds that shell shock blocks his path; he withdraws to the Dorset landscape and the sea to recapture his life.

Excerpt:

He thanked the man and wrapped his strong gentle hands around the mug of tea and closed his eyes. It was not trench tea, weak, miserable, tasting of other things. It was really almost too much to be real and sweet and a little bit aromatic. He drank so deeply that he would happily bathe in it. Shoulders hunched, savoring every moment, he rested his bottom lip on the cup exhaling a long plume of steam into the cold air before him. A nurse looked at him as he walked past but he didn’t notice. He had reached a point where he could no longer remember how he got from one point to another. He was in the carriage sitting, arms folded or wrapped around himself or resting awkwardly in his lap. Someone passed him a newspaper. He thanked the man and read the columns, or rather read the same paragraph about six times before falling asleep under the pages. He didn’t look at anyone, felt himself shrink, folded the newspaper and set it next to him. Head on the cold glass pane. Hat fell to his feet, someone picked it up and put it on his lap. Dreaming. Mud. Rats. Lice. Tanks. Birds. Crashing. Groggy. Heavy. Talking. Muffled. Blood Sleep Waking Crash Black White Boom Crunch Scream Gas Talking Sleep Dreaming Heavy. Sleep was gigantic black wings, soft, warm and powerful. Cold air ruffled through his hair and he came to. His eyes burned. Shaking himself like a dog he got up and put his hat on. He was standing on the station. All he could feel was the cold air, and the warmth of his trench-coat. Everything was alarmingly clear, every detail defined. Sharp. He could see as far as the ticket booth and everything in it. The ink pad. The pen. A crumbled packet of cigarettes. A man checked his pocket watch a dozen times. A lady wiped her eyes with a man’s handkerchief. A little boy held his mother’s hand. The steam, noise, and somber chatter was muffled as if he was still asleep. There is so much color. No mud. The gray-green monotony was replace by red, blue, black, and purple fabric. People walked around him as if he was there. He felt immovable. He could move but he just stood there, not feeling compelled to walk forward or do anything. Are you alright? Excuse me. Pardon me. Sorry. Look out. Wings in his mind. The platform a solid block. People unreal. 0800. There is some thing he ought to do. Tea. Sleep. Confusion. Death. Tremble. You must go home. You must rest. Go. Stay. Words. Death. There she was on the platform.

My plans now are to 1) get a job so I can earn enough money for a research trip to England, 2) finish footnotes/endnotes and annotated bibliography, 3) make said trip, 4) complete editing and 5) publish

#personal #do not repost #my writing #WIP ask

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hunidlo · 4 years ago

Text

Call of Fire

CHAPTER 3 - The Decision

Rating: M

Word Count: 3K

Pairing: The Mandalorian x F!Reader

Warnings: slow burn fic, language, mentions of death, angst

A/N: I really enjoyed writing angry Mando parts for this chapter. Hope you enjoy them too.

Summary: Now that you know where your parents might be, you need to figure out a way to get out this planet. And the Mandalorian has a ship, doesn’t he?

Chapter 1 // Chapter 2 // Masterlist // Chapter 4

***

By the time you get to the village, the sun has already set and you are troubled by a number of questions. You worry about what might be awaiting you in the village.

Have the villagers come back? … Are the bandits still there? … Is the Mandalorian dead?

Then, you see light coming from the settlement. There is no turmoil, no clattering of weapons, no blaster fires—a good sign, you think.

When you get closer to the square, a heartbreaking cry comes from somewhere in front of you.

“No!” A woman is running towards you—Zullu’s mother. “My baby!”

She hugs the body that is being carried in your arms and weeps.

“S-she saved me.” You eventually say. “I’m sorry ... I couldn’t …”

Zullu’s mother raises her teary eyes at you and nods. She understands.

A couple of men from the village come and gently take Zullu’s body from your arms. Too weak to resist, you let them. One of them places a hand on your shoulder. “You should rest …,” he says compassionately.

Having a chance to look around now, you see dozens of torches lit around the small village, illuminating the rubble that used to be the square. You observe the people who are getting rid of the dead bodies, cleaning up the mess and going through the clutter that remained in the place of the barn.

Then, you see the Mandalorian. He’s standing on the front porch of one of the houses—his feet wide apart, thumbs tucked into his belt—his visor fixed at you.

So he’s still here.

“This ...” You tilt your chin towards the debris. “... his doing?”

“... Not his fault …,” the man replies. “One of them decided to blow the barn up with the Mandalorian in it.”

You turn your head to the man.

“They underestimated him,” he continues on when he notices your baffled look, “He killed them all ...”

“No, he didn’t,” you mutter to yourself, remembering the bandit you killed in the forest.

The Mandalorian’s gaze makes you uneasy but you do not have the strength to think about it—about him—any longer. You really need to rest.

You let your weak legs lead you to your hut. You head straight to the ‘fresher, washing the blood and dirt from your hands and body. You can’t stop thinking about what happened in the woods—the way the bandit’s body split in half because you wished it to do so, what Zullu said about your parents ... Zullu—you try to suppress a sob—you can’t believe it ... can’t accept it. Your limbs begin to tremble and you burst into tears again.

When you get out of the ‘fresher, you’re beyond exhausted.

You fall asleep as soon as soon as your body hits the bed.

***

You wake up early. The sleep helped with your exhaustion but it did not ease your mind at all. You look in the mirror to see your eyes are puffy, your cheek is swollen, and you have a split lip.

It doesn’t surprise you, the bandit hit you really hard yesterday.

Everyone is already up. They are still working on the repairs around the village. Some of the men are cutting down trees near the woods—for the funeral pyre, you realise.

You squint and see something shiny near the cart … the Mandalorian is helping the men load the logs ...

Why hasn’t he left yet?

It was sort of exciting seeing him on his ship yesterday—witnessing all the stories you heard about the Mandalorians coming alive. You remember how you laughed with Zullu when you ran away from him. But today … everything is different. Zullu is gone and you—despite knowing you shouldn't because it’s unreasonable—blame him as well. You blame yourself for not being able to save Zullu, and the Mandalorian for starting the fight with the bandits in the first place.

Lost in your thoughts, you walk to Zullu’s hut. You hesitate a little before you enter.

Zullu’s mother is kneeling next to the chest that belonged to her daughter—clutching to one of Zullu’s dresses—weeping.

You silently approach her and sit next to her on the floor.

She turns to you to hug you.

“I’m so sorry,” you let out on the verge of crying again. “I shouldn’t have—”

“It’s not your fault,” she says and pulls you closer.

“... She was so brave ...” You need to say it, you need to let her mother know that Zullu died honorably.

“I know.”

She reaches inside the chest and takes out a piece of clothing. “Here ...” She extends her hands towards you. She’s holding a light brown, slightly worn leather jacket—it’s Zullu’s.

“No.” You gently push her hands away. “I can’t take it. It’s her favourite—”

“She would have liked you to have it.”

For a beat you just stare at the jacket wordlessly.

“Thank you,” you say, not knowing what else to say as you take the jacket from her.

“Zullu said … you knew my parents.” You’re hesitant and it comes out more like a question.

“Yes,” she breathes out. “I was here when they brought you to the village.” And then, she tells you the whole story about the day when you were left with the villagers.

“... So my father stole something from the Empire and ran.”

“Yes, I don’t know what it was though … You have to understand that your parents left you here to protect you, spare you from the constant running and hiding.”

“I want to find them,” you say eventually, looking at the jacket that you’re clenching in your fists.

“No.” She shakes her head. “You have to stay here—safe—with us. Your parents didn’t want you to come looking for them, they feared someone might capture you, use you to get to your father.

“But I have no idea where he is …”

“The Empire doesn't know that … they would torture you.” She looks seriously worried now.

You want to push her, want to know more. Zullu said her mother knew where your parents were hiding. Yet … you can’t. Not now. Not on the day of her daughter’s funeral.

“You look tired … should get more sleep … be ready for the evening,” she says after a moment of silence. “I’ll see you on the hill.”

You nod and leave without a word.

On your way back you catch sight of the Mandalorian. He’s leaning against one of the huts—his legs and arms crossed—his visor following you as you walk by.

What’s his problem? You’re definitely getting irritated by him constantly gazing at you. Especially since you can’t see his face or guess what he’s thinking. Is he still pissed about the ship?

Even now—in what you imagine is a comfortable stance for him—he’s still threatening as hell. He looks like a bescar vulture that has spotted a womp rat and is now circling around it, waiting for the right moment to strike.

You consciously choose to ignore him and thus deny him the pleasure of seeing how nervous he makes you feel.

The tension is unbearable though. You can’t help but glance in his direction when you reach your hut.

What the …?

He’s gone.

“Creep,” you say to yourself, checking your surroundings before you enter.

***

Someone is shaking your shoulder. You wake up instantly.

Zullu’s mother is leaning over you. “It’s time …”

The sun is setting as you walk up the hill where the funeral takes place.

The pyre is prepared and Zullu's body is already lying on top of it. No one says anything. This is how it goes in your village—no speeches, no pompous ceremonies. Zullu’s mother lights the pyre and the whole village stands in complete silence, watching.

“One day, we’ll walk among the stars together,” you whisper as you raise your vision towards the night sky.

When you look down again—

He’s gotta be fuckin’ kidding …

The Mandalorian is standing opposite to you—behind the pyre.

That does it!

You can’t be sure whether he’s watching you or the pyre in front of him but you don’t care. You have to ask what his deal is. You need to know what exactly he’s doing on this planet—

“I’m sorry.” Zullu’s mother is now standing beside you.

“Excuse me?” You look at her with raised eyebrows.

“I shouldn’t have kept it from you for all those years. Maybe ... it’s really time for you to find them.” Her voice is quiet, eyes gleaming—reflecting the fire. “They might still be alive. You deserve to see them again.”

“But … h-how do I find them?”

“Go to the planet Hoth. There should be a Rebel base. If they are still on that planet, they would be there.”

“Thank you,” you say and lay a hand on her shoulder.

Hoth. You’ve never heard of such a planet. Your parents are most probably very far away, yet you feel them being closer than ever before. You’ve been trying most of your life to forget about them, accept the present and not dwell on the past. But now? Now when you know where your parents could be, you can’t continue living your life in the village, can you?

No, you can’t.

Okay, how do you get out of this planet …

Then it strikes you—the Mandalorian!

You look in the direction where he was standing.

Not again …

A group of men is standing where the Mandalorian was just a couple of minutes ago.

You rush towards them. “Um ... have you seen the Mandalorian?” you ask.

“No,” some of them say while others just shake their heads.

A little hand by your side tugs your sleeve. “He left,” the child says.

You lean closer to her. “Have you seen where he went?”

Your eyes follow a tiny finger pointing to … the lake.

He’s setting off …

Okay, don’t panic. First things first.

You sprint to your hut, take your backpack and shove a couple of things you think you might need in—some credits, food, water bottle, and clean underwear of course.

You put on Zullu’s leather jacket and run out of the village towards the lake without looking back.

***

It’s dark outside but the forest is even darker. By the time you get to the lake you can barely see a couple of steps ahead of you. You trip and fall several times before you get to the clearing. You breathe heavily, your hands and clothes are dirty, and you’re positive there is mud and little twigs tangled in your hair.

Phew! … The ship is still here.

Through the gap under the aircraft, you see two armoured boots. It seems that he’s doing some maintenance on the opposite side of the ship, meaning … he has not seen you yet.

You contemplate your options. Of course, you could approach him and ask him to take you with him. However, for some reason, you feel like he would not be compliant to fly you to Hoth. Moreover, there’s a good chance he’s still mad at you. So it’s decided.

Treading softly—as silently as possible—you sneak into the ship. Unnoticed.

There’s a little … thingy lying on one of the crates and it’s flashing rapidly with red light. You get to the weapons locker to see it’s open.

“Just in case …” You take one of the blasters and continue to the end of the hull.

Where could you hide?

Yes, the boxes and crates conveniently stacked up by the wall will do perfectly. You hide in the space between the crates and cover yourself with some sort of canvas that you found folded in one of the boxes.

Let’s hope he won’t find you until you are far away from this planet. Then you can figure out the rest.

Yes, let’s …

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

The Mandalorian finishes the work on his ship and is ready to hit the road. He walks up the ramp, puts his blaster in its place in the weapons locker—

One of the blasters is missing …

He quickly looks around the hull and notices the tracking fob on the crate is flashing.

He cautiously presses something on the side of his helmet, turning on the thermal vision. He can see you now—sitting on the floor behind the crates, curled up.

He takes his blaster from the cabinet and walks towards the crates to eventually stop in front of you. He raises his blaster, aiming at what he assumes is your head.

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

The canvas is abruptly pulled away and you blink at the armoured man standing in front of you. You could hear him coming and prepared your blaster, so you are now pointing your weapons at each other.

“You,” he utters but it sounds more like I knew it.

Obviously examining you, he tilts his helmet to the side, looks at the blaster in your hands, sighs, and puts his own weapon back in the holster.

“Take me to Hoth,” you command, suddenly emboldened by the fact that he is now unarmed.

“No.”

The lack of emotion in his answer and its bluntness shock you. You expected him to protest but you’re now struggling to find the right words to continue.

To your surprise, he … he relaxes—transferring his weight to one foot—clearly anticipating what you’re going to do next.

“I have to get to Hoth to find my parents.” You try to play on his—quite possibly non-existent—feelings.

“I don’t take passengers,” he speaks again, his voice raspy.

You’re losing your patience. “Y-you’re going to take me to Hoth or else—”

“You’re gonna shoot me?”

He’s taunting you ... You have your blaster aimed at him, trying to look as threatening as humanly possible, and he’s mocking you.

“Well … yes … I will shoot you and take your ship.”

“Try,” he enunciates slowly—leaning closer to you—his visor trained on your face.

He thinks, you’re not going to do it. After what you’ve been through in the past couple of days, you’re sure you could kill anyone who stands in your way, right? Right?

You put your other hand on the blaster too to steady yourself, and point the barrel at his chest.

An annoyed sigh comes out of the helmet. “You’re not stupid but you need to stop acting like you are … See this?”—he taps his chest plate with one fist—”Beskar … It would hurt, but won’t kill me … You want to aim at the gaps in the armour.”

Is he giving you advice about how to shoot him?

You lift your blaster so that it’s trained on his neck—covered only by his cape that is wrapped around it.

“Better …” he says. “Now shoot.”

What? Is he serious?

“I-I will …,” you warn but your voice deceives you, indicating you’re fucking scared right now, even though you are the one holding a blaster.

He takes a slow step towards you. As he moves closer, the barrel of your blaster digs into his cape until you can feel his neck pressed against it.

“Shoot me.”

You hesitate.

“Shoot!” he shouts.

Your whole body is quivering.

You … can’t do it. You can’t kill an unarmed man.

Your grip around the weapon eases and you slowly start to lower the blaster.

Before you can do so, his hand shoots up, catches your wrist and you can feel your finger being pushed against the trigger with his.

He pulled the trigger! He pulled the fucking—

But …

Nothing happens. The blaster doesn’t shoot.

“Next time you try to kill me with my own blaster, at least turn the safety off,” he grunts at you, ripping the weapon out from your hands.

“Wait …” you’re still trying to process what happened.

“Go home,” he says coldly and turns away from you to put the blaster back in the cabinet, grumbling something about an insult.

Before you can think of a better reaction, you push his armoured back with all the strength you can currently muster.

Considering how well-built he is, his chest moving by an inch at most came as no surprise.

Oops …

He stops and turns to look at you, slowly tilting his head sideways a little. Did you really just do that, the silent gesture says.

You are quite thankful that you can’t see his—most definitely furious—face right now. You would swear you can hear him grinding his teeth under his helmet. It was stupid … and you really don’t know why you did it. You’re perfectly aware that you are throwing a tantrum like a child right now.

And he treats you as such in return.

He grabs you by your upper arm, drags you through the hull and shoves you down the ramp, out of the ship with ferocious force. You have to make a couple of clumsy steps forward to prevent yourself from falling over.

He turns to shut the hatch.

“Please!” you hear yourself pleading to stop him, tears now flooding your eyes. It’s pathetic. “I … I p-promised her … promised her to find out wha—” You hesitate for a second. “I need to find my parents.”

He sighs.

“Look …” he says eventually, his voice considerably softer than before. “I’m sorry about your friend, okay? But trust me, it’ll be safer for you here.”

Oh no … the rage is back. “Trust you?” you cry out. “It’s your fault that she’s dead!”

“My fault?” He sounds genuinely confused.

“If you didn’t stalk us back to the village and play a hero—”

“Me? … I wasn't the one to spit in that guy’s face. If it wasn’t for me, you’d be dead now!”

“And she would live!” your voice cracks with grief as you yell.

He takes a couple of steps forward, grabs your shoulders, yanks you closer to him so that your nose is practically touching his visor, and shakes you in an attempt to knock some sense into you, “Do you think they would stop there, huh? Do you think they wouldn’t massacre half the village after that?”

“Well, if you had let me take that blaster instead of pawing me—” you snark at him.

He immediately lets go of your shoulders as if scalded and takes a step back.

“—I could have protected them ...” you finish.

“Yeah …,” he chuckles darkly, mocking you again, “… sure … I’d like to see you kill thirty armed men with the safety on ...” He turns and starts climbing the ramp back to his ship.

“Well, fuck you!” you yell after him. “If you won’t help me, I’m sure I can find another ship that would take me out of this planet!”

“Good luck with that,” he utters, his tone ice-cold.

Suddenly, a laser blast strikes the ground just a few feet from you. You duck and try to spot what caused it.

A small starship flies over your head.

Someone is shooting at you.

“… To the ship …” The Mandalorian shouts to you.

You quickly run into his ship and he closes the hatch. Before you can ask about what’s happening, he’s already climbing the ladder up to the cockpit.

You follow him.

He sits in the pilot's chair pushing various buttons as the ship rumbles and takes off.

“Sit down and fasten your seatbelt,” he exclaims without looking at you.

You stand behind him, gaping out the cockpit window trying to spot the attacking ship again.

“Who was—”

A laser beam hits the ship. You are tossed sideways and against the wall, knocking yourself unconscious.

The Mandalorian turns his head to look at you, growls and steers his ship so that it now flies directly against the little starship. He readjusts his hands on the control sticks and inhales deeply.

“This is more than I signed up for.”

***

Chapter 1 // Chapter 2 // Masterlist

#the mandalorian #the mandalorian fan fic #the mandalorian fan fiction #the mandalorian x reader #the mandalorian fanfiction #pedro pascal

5 notes · View notes

louiserandom · 5 years ago

Text

Play Games with Me

Pairing: Senju Tobirama/Uchiha Madara | Rating: E

A/N: Commission for the amazing @rookie-d💙💗 thank you so much! *hugs*

Read on AO3 or continue under the cut :3 Ko-fi and fic commission info in the header!

Tobirama SenJERK has never had sex in his life, Madara types, as always brimming with spite when it comes to his least favorite person in town. Maybe on the planet.

Rereading the comment and satisfied that there aren’t any typos or any hint whatsoever at some kind of hidden affection (which isn’t there, never was and never will be, Madara reminds himself firmly), he hits ‘Comment.’

“Take that, you dumbass,” Madara mutters under his breath, and really, this could be classified as childish, were he not completely in the right to take vicious revenge upon the fucking asshole who dared refer to Madara as ‘so idiotic it’s pitifully adorable’ on his last stream. Hah! Like Tobirama isn’t the less intelligent one of the two of them; Madara has watched enough of his Uncharted 4 gameplay to note that Tobirama took twelve seconds longer than him to figure out arguably the most difficult puzzle in the game. And although Madara’s sub count doesn’t quite reflect his superior intellect compared to Senju’sーnot that he’s checked in a whileーit’s likely a testament to the viewers’ total lack of taste, if anything else.

(Two thousand, nine hundred and thirty four viewer’s, to be precise, according to this morning’s stats and minus the handful of Madara’s fake accounts that he created just in case to keep up with his chief competitor. Admittedly, it might be a tad annoying.)

A notification pipes up.

Hm, I wonder how you’d know that, MaddyGamerboy? Are you stalking me? I must admit, I’m flattered.

Madara sputters at the reply. At yet another butchering of his perfectly adequate nickname. The fucking nerve of the guyーand people fucking wonder why Madara hates his guts?

(Madara knows it doesn’t really help his case that he’s touched himself to fantasies of the younger Senju more times than he’d care to count, but hate-fucking a thing isn’t it? Hate-masturbation must be too, he supposes. Not the healthiest outlet for negative feelings, but it makes him feel good enough.)

(Heavenly, to be precise.)

I AM NOT, YOU SELF-OBSESSED DUMBASS, Madara types, simultaneously taking care of the half-a-dozen typos that appear of their own accord.

No.

Deep breath. Stop fingers from shaking. Think about something witty to say.

Pff, he writes, for lack of any better word to express his indignant huff, like I give a shit about you. You’re dumb.

It did sound much better in his head, but Madara has spent over a minute writing the comment already, and he doesn’t want to appear as if he’s thinking too hard on it.

He posts his answer, not dwelling too match on the number of likes on Tobirama’s comment far outnumbering the hundred Madara’s garnered. Again, Tobirama’s audience is clearly not the best judge of character.

“FUCK. YOU. SIDEWAYS, SENJU!” Madara shouts at the reply that follows, consisting only of the words:

Thanks for the sub btw.

“You fucking piece of shit,” Madara hisses. “Like eight fucking fake accounts do anything to boost your stats, I don’t even like all your videos from each one of them, you ass!”

I DID NOT SUB DONT BELIEVE HIM

I’m happy to have another loyal fan ;)

HE IS FUCKING LYEING!!!

With seemingly every single person in the comments raving about how it’s about time MadGamer69 and admitted he admires FlyingThunderGod’s skill, Madara has to consciously restrain himself from smashing his laptop against the wall.

“You can just tell him you like him, you know.”

Madara startles, almost stumbling to the floor when Hashirama returns with their drinks and quickly put-together snacks, always the one to rummage through Madara’s kitchen because Madara hardly cares what edible and inedible things existed there or what to do with themーthat’s Izuna’s job.

“I do not,” Madara snarls, as Hashirama flops next to him on the couch, “like that stupid clusterfuck you call a brother!”

“Madara!” Hashirama whines, with that ever-present pout on his face. “Be civil.”

“Yeah, when he returns the favor,” Madara glowers, grabbing a milkshake from Hashirama’s hand. “Did you forget that he fucking started it? Do I need to quote his “pitifully adorable how so much stupidity can fit in such a short man” again?” Madara can’t help flailing his arms a little, though far too conscious of this habit now since the Tobirama has started pointing it out. He makes up for it with what he hopes is a deadly enough glare. “Did no one in your family bother to teach him manners? Did you?”

Hashirama only sighs. “And did you forget,” he asks, “how before that you abused my invitation over to our place to hide his Golden Youtube Gamer Tablet?”

Madara groans. “It’s called a Gold Play Button. Idiot.”

“Now you’re insulting me,” Hashirama grumbles, “and who cares? The point is, you’d be upset too if he hid yours.”

“Youtubers care,” Madara says, “and also, that’s irrelevant, that was revenge for him making fun of my perfectly adequate gameplay.”

“To be fair, you were dying quite a lot in that playthrough...”

“He took twelve seconds longer to figure out that puzzle in the game!” Madara growls.

Hashirama rolls his eyes. “Well, of course, because that Yellow Flash guy was flirting and distracting him in the chat.”

Madara blanches. "That good-for-nothing pipsqueak was what?”

“See,” Hashirama drawls, “you are jealous. Why would you be jealous?”

“I-I’m not!”

“Madara, you are so far in denial, that as your best friend,” Hashirama says firmly, slapping a hand over Madara’s mouth before he can muster another protest, “I cannot stand by and watch you suffer. Anymore, that is, because this has reached a breaking point. So, please, for me, I am begging you, just try politely asking if maybe Tobirama would like to accompany you for coffee somewhere tomorrow? Maybe brunch? I mean, come on, I know you guys don’t hate each other anymore. Seriously, you guys seem like you enjoy arguments, and hey, who am I to judge how people express affection?”

“Affection?!” Madara shrieks, shoving Hashirama’s hand away.

“And please stop pretending you don’t have printed out screenshots of my brother’s videos hidden under your mattress because Izunaー”

“Is a fucking snooping rat!” Madara hisses.

Hashirama sighs. “If it helps you feel better, maybe Tobirama might possibly not feel extreme dislike towards you but actually the opposite,” he says, smiling nervously as Madara blanches.

Because... what?

He blinks, running Hashirama’s words through his mind again.

“And how would you know that?” he asks, suspicious. “I swear if you dared tell him anything about my possibly nonexistent feelingsー”

“Possibly?” Excitement starts bubbling in Hashirama’s eyes. “That’s progress!”

“Definitely nonexistent feelings, dammit!”

Hashirama, the asshole Madara calls best friend for some reason, giggles. “Don’t worry, I didn’t. I promise, stop glaring or I will start pouting,” he threatens, and Madara schools his expression back into a light scowl to avoid the infamous Senju pout.

Like a curse, memories of said pout curling Tobirama’s lips spring to mind, and Madara has to physically shake his head to banish those thoughts.

“Listen, the fact that we’re not as... aggressive as we used to be,” Madara says, “doesn’t mean we suddenly like each other.”

“Madara, you insist on coming along every time we hang out,” Hashirama points out.

“I like hanging out with you.”

“Yet every time we do,” Hashirama presses on, “you’re hyperfocused on bickering with Tobirama instead of talking about wholesome stuff with me. Did you even notice that I brought Mito with me the past few times and it was literally a double date?”

“Was not!” Madara shoves at Hashirama with his shoulder and stands up to pace, because there goes the tell-tale sweating of his hands, the fluttering in his chest and stomach and the memoriesーof him and Tobirama secretly filming the other on camera when they do stupid shit, their almost daily Best Playground Insult Contest that’s been memed half to death on Twitter, the one time they got separated from Hashirama and Izuna in Disneyland because they’d got caught in their arguments so much it devolved into discussing their favorite games and an actual conversation that had Madara’s insides tingling.

No.

No, no, no. If anything, they were just gradually becoming something not unlike friends. And Madara’s occasional fantasies behind closed doors were nothing but a means to a pleasant end.

Not. Feelings.

No matter how much he’s grown attached to the site of messy, white-gray hair that he knows is soft to the touch from all the times he’s tugged on it to irritate him. No matter how piercing Tobirama’s unique red eyes may look. No matter how objectively hot his recent workout routine video wasーand Madara knows he’d only watched it so many times because he wants to improve his own routine, right?

Right?

Madara groans. “Why are emotions so fucking confusing!” He slumps onto the floor and wraps his arms around his knees, hitting his head over and over again on his kneecaps because, “I don’t even know what I want from him, okay?”

There’s a brief silence before Hashirama joins him and keeps him from abusing his head further. “How about,” Hashirama suggests, rubbing a comforting hand on his back, “you just ask? Listen, he’s my brother. And you’re my best friend. You two fighting less and at least making an effort to get to know each other better?” Hashirama brings out the puppy dog eyes. “That would mean the world for me.”

Madara glances at him before looking away again, focusing on a random photo of the wall. One featuring Tobirama right after his university graduation with a wide smile on his face. Quite the adorable face, too, and the unprompted thought makes Madara want to descend into oblivion. Preferably forever.

“That’s difficult,” he says lamely.

“But not impossible,” Hashirama says, “and hey, it’s better than waiting for the Yellow Flash guy to actually make a move on Tobi and start occupying all of his time. He’s a really big fan.”

“Fuck Minato,” Madara scoffs, “the guy just showed up and is just shamelessly emulating Tobirama’s style. That’s dumb.”

“Dumber than you claim Tobi is?” Hashirama prompts.

Madara thinks about it. “You know what? Yes.”

“As I saidーprogress!”

Madara can never go through with his impulses to punch his well-meaning best friend, and so grabs the nearest pillow from the couch and smashes it into Hashirama’s face to shut him up.

Tobirama returns home only to find Hashirama and Madara standing by the front door, frowning as they watched something that sounded like a tsunami of some kind.

“Listen, it’s gotta be one of those black holes or something twisting that vortex. Look how stuff disappears right into it!” is his brother talking, and Tobirama is already heaving a frustrated sigh.

Please don’t tell me you think there’s a black hole on Earth.

“There’s no black holes on Earth, idiot! The nearest one is way off, like near Pluto or something,” Madara says.

Ah. Even better. Tobirama chuckles under his breath, crosses his arms and leans against the wall, observing the two idiots he knows and loves.

He mentally kicks himself.

Well, one of them, he loves. Of course he loves his brother.

The other is... complicated.

“And besides, that could just be the Loch Ness monster or a cthulhu or something. See how dark the water is?”

“Or maybe,” Tobirama says, making them both jump, “it’s a natural phenomenon that’s a tad too difficult for both your brain cells to comprehend? I’m happy to explain though.”

“I’m happy to see you fuck yourself,” Madara greets him his usual way, scowling despite the exceptionally conspicuous blush painting his cheeks.

The contrast never fails to make Tobirama’s heart beat faster. He hates himself for it.

“Mm, Madara,” Tobirama teases, “not in front of my brother.”

As expected, Madara starts spluttering, and Tobirama is left wondering again how he avoids making a total fool of himself in each and every one of his videos. It seems Madara saves most of his flailing for the comment section.

“You,” Madara snarls, pointing Tobirama’s way, “are an asshole, Senju, but spending time with the better part of society might do you some good. So see you at brunch tomorrow and do not be late.”

And with that, Madara gives Hashirama a cursory wave and stalks off, leaving Tobirama frozen on the spot.

Did Madara just?..

Tobirama blinks, swallowing heavily as he feels his throat running dry and his heart rate pick up.

No fucking way.

He must have imagined it. Through his stupor of trying to figure out what the hell just took place, Tobirama vaguely registers Hashirama’s facepalm.

“Sorry for that,” Tobirama hears his brother speak through the rush in his ears. “He meant, uh, will you please join him for brunch? Tomorrow at 11 am, Eggspectation?”

Tobirama blinks harder.

“I,” he starts, “I don’t... Did you blackmail Madara into asking me out?”

Hashirama looks scandalized. “What? No!”

“Did Madara just ask me out?”

“Well, yes, Tobi.” Hashirama chuckles nervously. “You sure you’re feeling okay?”

Tobirama glares. “The idiot’s wake up text to me today was literally a collection of trashy limerick poems about how much I suck. Sorry if I’m a little skeptical.”

“You,” Hashirama says, wincing as a long-suffering expression settles on his face, “you guys send wake up texts to each other?”

A moment of awkward silence hangs in the air.

“Sometimes,” Tobirama says, defensive, although the damage is already done.

“And you’re still not going out? Tobirama, you do realize he’s in love with you, right?”

“Don’t say things like that, Anija!” Tobirama snaps, hoping the dim lighting in the corridor conceals the blush he can feel heating up his cheeks. Fuck. Now he’s turning Madara. “Yet, I mean.”

“I’ll save the celebrations until after your date then!” Hashirama sing-songs like the idiot he is.

Tobirama resigns to his fate. “I hate you.”

“You love me.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“You’ll thank me for this.”

“If it goes well,” Tobirama glowers though it’s ineffective, really, against his brother’s bubbling positivity, and the sheer awe still coursing through him from Madara asking him out on a fucking date is actually enough to make Tobirama want to hug him. He refrains. "Now, thanks, Anija, but I have work things to attend to.”

“Sure! Just don’t forget, 11ー”

“Eleven eggs and uh, no expectations, got it.”

“Wait, Tobi, noー”

With no time to waste, naturally, Tobirama bolts into their apartment and straight to his room to choose an appropriate outfit. And to mentally prepare himself for something he’s almost given up hoping for.

Tobirama cannotーwill notーmess this up.

Tobirama makes sure to arrive about ten minutes early. Not because he’s worried or nervous, of course; maybe just a little, but mostly just to get his bearings beforeーfinallyーa date with Madara goddamn Uchiha.

Madara, who’s been Tobirama’s stupid crush since high school, and just as in love with gaming as he is, only that didn’t turn out to be such a great bonding point between them, as Tobirama had hopedーbefore he actually got to know his Anija’s best friend.

Madara, who seemed to dislike Tobirama at first sight and only grew to hate him more over the years as they both found more joy in arguing than they did in talking.

Madara, who, despite this, blushes every rare time Tobirama genuinely smiles at him or drops a suggestive joke, who has an arguably unhealthy obsession with Tobirama’s ass which he always ogles when he thinks no one is looking.

Madara, whose plastered ass Tobirama had to drag home the other week, amid drunken speeches about capitalist injustice, some wacky conspiracy behind the disappearance of the dodo bird and... something quite interesting.

“Listen, Senju,” Madara was slurring against Tobirama’s shoulder, as the latter cursed every single nonexistent god that Hashirama had chosen that fucking day to go on a road trip with Mito, Toka and Izuna, leaving Tobirama in charge of this walking trash fire of a man. “Listen. Tobira... Tobi. Tobirama. You’re so hot.”

The words almost made Tobirama stumble.

“What, Uchiha?”

“And cute... So pretty, too, I wish you could see that...” Madara went on babbling. “I think you do. But still. Wish you could see me like I do. I mean see you. Like I do...”

“Tobira, you’re just, you’re unfair...”

“I hate you and I like you then I love you and I hate you again, why you’reー” A hiccup. “How do you exist...”

“I just want to hold hands and just... walk and talk and be together and...”

Tobirama watched in ever mounting confusion as Madara leaned completely into him, humming as he hugged Tobirama tightly and said,

“Is that too fucking much to ask...”

Tobirama stood, shell-shocked, with Madara whispering impossible nonsense in his arms, wondering if he was in a dream.

The next day saw Madara returning to his usual self insulting Tobirama at every goddamn opportunity, which left Tobirama... confused.

Confused, and conflicted, and sleepless for the rest of the night, thoughts held captive by the utter idiot whose ultimate goal seems to be to ruin Tobirama’s life.

It’s maddening.

Of course, he’d suspected that Madara’s flailing and constant blushing interspersed with screams and insults (the most creative ones, reserved only for Tobirama, it seemed) were signs of not so much dislike, as the complete opposite. Of course, Tobirama had tried flirting with Madara, just bordering right there on the edge of suggestive, only for his advances to be seen as patronizing or condescending. And hearing Madara speak to him this way, in a drunken stupor no less, when he’d probably have no causeーor abilityーto lie is...

Maddening. Annoying. Exhilarating. A tantalizing opportunity. Maybe a glimmer of hope.

And of course, Tobirama told his brother; they never really had any secrets between them. And of fucking course Hashirama had a hand in convincing Madara to change his usual behavior, which is nice and all, but doesn’t help the nerves wracking through Tobirama’s body, nor the crippling fear that he’s going to somehow screw this up.

But no. Deep breath. Exhale. And remember Anija’s advice.

Tobirama takes the last turn before he’s faced with their meeting place, surprised to find Madara already there.

Even though he’s usually always late. Sitting inside by the window, looking out onto the street with a slight frown, Madara keeps worrying his bottom lip and, apparently, trying to break a spoon.

It paints an endearing picture. Tobirama sighs, feeling a smile tugging at his lips.

This man...

Tobirama comes in, approaching him slowly, allowing himself a few moments to watch Madara needlessly fix his wild mane of hair, appraise his reflection in the spoon, try out several fake-looking smiles before settling on a scowl and going back to his nervous tics again. With another sigh, Tobirama takes the few steps left to his date, repeating Hashirama’s advice over and over in his head.

Just be yourselfーand have fun!

Just a few minutes into their date, it becomes obvious that Madara didn’t get the same advice from Hashirama.

Or just didn’t get the advice, period.

With their orders made and beverages served, they’re left to wallow in a less than comfortable silence, broken only by Madara’s... uncharacteristic attempts at conversation.

“Are you enjoying the tea?” Madara asks Tobirama with all of the softness of a brick wall.

Tobirama isn’t used to the man being eloquent, much less polite, and he has yet to have at least one conversation with Madara that doesn’t devolve into a pissing contest. So theoretically, Tobirama should be enjoying this.

But it only seems wrong. Annoying. Not them.

He tries to recall if, maybe, their first meeting was an adequate exchange? Tobirama thinks to the day Hashirama first introduced them. Only flashes of spilled milkshakes and jibes at intelligence run through his mind, and of course that was the very first time he’d called Madara an idiot pipsqueak, receiving quite the lame ‘stuck-up dandelion’ in turn.

Unsurprising.

“Yes,” Tobirama says, taking another sip as he eyes Madara struggling on the other side of the table. Struggling to do what is the question: either sit straight, or assume a more relaxed posture, or reach towards his own drink, or avoid eye contact, even though he keeps glancing his way when he thinks Tobirama won’t notice. Tobirama does, every time, and that just makes the whole ordeal more awkward. “Nice weather,” Tobirama says, with about as much enthusiasm.

If Madara wants to play this stupid game, Tobirama will indulge. Just to see how long it takes for Madara to break and return to his blustering status quo.

“Yeah...” Madara clears his throat, eye twitching as he manages to hold Tobirama’s gaze for a commendable three seconds this time. “Hate the sun. I meanーI mean I love the sun. Ugh. It just, uh. Burns.”

It’s both saddening and funny to see Madara visibly deflate.

“Skin too sensitive, huh?” Tobirama starts small. “Just like your ego?”

Madara’s jaw clenches and his nervous look shifts into a glare before he looks away again, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath to calm himself down before he flashes an unnaturally cheery smile.

“Heh, nice,” Madara grits through his teeth, “nice joke, Senju.”

Tobirama raises his eyebrow as Madara flinches at his own words.

“I’m glad you appreciate my sense of humor,” Tobirama says, barely reining in a smirk.

“Sure! You’reーyou’re funny.”

“And?”

“And what?” Madara frowns, confused.

“And what else am I?” Tobirama demands, feigning thoughtfulness. “A recent assessment of yours was that I look and act like a self-obsessed dumbass, I think.”

“No-no,” Madara blurts out, looking much a cornered animal, “I think you... you are... you look not at all so terrible today?” he finishes with a nervous chuckle, running a hand through his hair.

Tobirama wants to scream from the agony.

No. This won’t do, otherwise he might as well leave.

“Can you just call me a stuck-up asshole like you always do or recite one of those horrible limerick disses?” he demands.

Madara actually yelps. “What? No! I mean, wait.” He narrows his eyes. “Why?”

“Because you’re acting weird.”

“We’re on a date, if you were too stupーpreoccupied to get my invitation, Senju,” Madara says, jaw still clenched as he doubtless refrains from swearing, “and I’m being civil!”

That’s the advice he must have gotten from Anija, Tobirama thinks.

What a tragedy.

“Madara,” Tobirama implores, leaning his eyebrows on the table and meeting Uchiha’s gaze, “have you considered thatーI prefer it when you aren’t?”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, thank fuck!” Madara slams his hands on the table, heaving a massive sigh as Tobirama laughs in relief. “I was ready to fucking die, you piece of shit! How does your brother stay so fucking kind all the time, it’s fucking torture!”

Tobirama rolls his eyes. “It’s a talent, naturally. Just like your talent at embarrassing yourself and mine at being awesome.”

“You’ve got it a little backwards, Senju,” Madara sneers, “but it’s excusable, given your level of intellect.”

“Twice as high as yours?” Tobirama parries.

“Twice as little.”

“That’s more like it,” Tobirama says, grinning despite himself, “I thought you were a decoy or something. You’ve told me to fuck off every single day since we first met and this was getting worrisome.”

Madara’s laugh is sudden, melodic, sending those irritating tingling sensations through Tobirama’s body. He makes an effort to appear outwardly calm.

“Maybe because you managed to piss me the fuck off every day that I’ve known you,” Madara scoffs, “but you’re all right sometimes. I guess.” He shrugs, feigning nonchalance even as he keeps nervously fixing and running his fingers through his hair.

A stupid, tantalizing habit. Tobirama imagines carding his own hands through the messy locks, tugging Madara’s head back toー

He forcefully aborts the thought process before he’s faced with a problem of the harder kind. “Oh, I’m sure we’ll try to strangle each other when we game together.”

“We’re playing today?” Madara asks.

Tobirama tilts his head to the side.

“You haven’t planned one gaming session after our date?”

“Um,” Madara says, blinking rapidly, “why should I be the one with the plan?”

“Because you’re the one who invited me,” Tobirama deadpans. And anyway, Madara is always the one to egg Tobirama on to gaming, which would usually only ever lead to semi-playful brawls and their fighting making Hashirama cry.

And without Anija there to assault them with his antics, Tobirama wonders what their play-fighting might lead to... and promptly shuts off those thoughts again. Control, dammit.

Madara opens his mouth, then closes it, sighs explosively and says, “All right, fair enough. But you’re the strategy pro here. And my thing is RPGs.” He smirks. “I can improvise.”

And Madara does, in fact, improvise, leading Tobirama on what he hopes is a satisfying daylong adventure. It’s strange, walking by themselves around Konoha without anyone else with them (not that they’ve taken to ignoring Hashirama and Mito anyway on their most recent group outings), free to talk about and do anything they want. Strange and perfect, the way Tobirama switches between poorly concealed bashfulness and his usual confidence, as their jokes and jibes at each other, every little prank they pull never fails to make them both laugh.

It’s perfect.

Just like Tobirama’s smile is, directed at him without any pretenses as they set off to explore the lush, gigantic forest surrounding the city, rumored to be home to mythical, many-tailed creatures. And that’s followed by their forays into an abandoned chemistry lab; the scares they get in the woods from intermittent growls coming from the shadows are nothing compared to the horror Madara feels when Tobirama insists on touching broken vials and experimental equipment, and going through doors with dilapidated ‘DANGER. CHEMICAL HAZARD’ signs.

“If we’re infected by some deadly and insidious poison,” Madara whispers as they explore the lab’s tunnels, “I’m going to fucking kill you before it does. Painfully.”

“It’s for science,” Tobirama says. “And trust me. We’re safe. I got a degree in this.”

“Youtube is practically your full-time job at this point. What the fuck else do you need?”

“The satisfaction of discovering something cool?”

“And deadly.”

"Unlikely.”

Madara groans, cursing his life, as well as his inability to say no to hisーapparentlyーnew boyfriend.

The boyfriend who’s just discovered another hidden pathway to a deeper level and has scurried off towards it like an excited five-year-old. Despite himself, despite his intent to keep complaining, Madara can’t hold back the grin tugging at his lips.

Still perfect.

Just like their lunch date which turns into a picnic by the Naka river, where Madara remembers meeting Hashirama way back when. Just like the first time Tobirama grasps his hand, fingers gently massaging it as he laughs at Madara stuttering to a stop from whatever rant he’d been on, heart in his throat and mind suddenly focused on whether his palms are too sweaty or not.

His mind goes blank. Eyes focus only on the man in front of him, whom he yearns to strangle just as often as he craves to tackle him onto any surface and ruin him completely. And it should feel wrong, it should be, only Madara hasn’t quite felt so right about anything in a long time, and with every minute they spend with their familiar bickering, just with a layer of something more behind it this time, it becomes harder and harder to deny how good being near Tobirama makes him feel. Happy. Complete.

Madara winces. Oh, gods. He’s waxing poetic now.

All worries about that fly out the window when Tobirama, without so much as a word of warning, leans in and draws Madara by his collar into a kiss.

Surprisingly, he doesn’t spring up to awaken alone in his bed like he always does, after dreams like these.

And, unsurprisingly, it turns out to be Madara’s best kiss to date.

Maybe he’s exaggerating, if just because he’s been craving this so damn much. Tobirama’s lips are hot, gentle, and welcoming against his, a curious tongue darting out to coax Madara’s lips open and deepen the kiss. The delightful drag of his tongue, his hands, rough and demanding on Madara’s chest, waist, thighsーit’s not long before he’s dizzy with it, barely holding back moans of pleasure for fear of sounding too desperate.

“Fuck,” Madara gasps as they pull away for breath, lips still touching as their eyes stay locked and he’s treated to Tobirama’s downright ravenous gaze. “That wasー”

Tobirama cuts him off with another kiss, then another, and it’s not long before they find themselves tangled in a mess of limbs and loose clothing. The hard ground presses against Madara’s back as Tobirama settles on top of him, ravaging Madara’s mouth with a passion that soon has his pants feeling too tight.

Fuck.

He groans, hips thrusting of their own accord and feeling Tobirama's own erection through the fabric.

Madara makes an immense effort to pull away, stifling a whine at the loss of contact.

“Bed,” he says, mortified at his own crudeness far too late after the word comes out. “Fuck, I meantー”

“Yes,” Tobirama growls, capturing Madara’s lips in another open-mouthed kiss before he hauls him up to start gathering their things. “Your place or mine?”

“Yours? Izuna,” Madara rasps, head too clouded to explain more in-depth, but Tobirama seems to understand.

“Anija shouldn’t be back for a while,” Tobirama says, a devastating grin on his face, “lots of time for us to play.”

Gods.

Madara scrambles to his feet fast enough to stumble, and for once, Tobirama has nothing to say about his clumsiness.

They all but crash through the front door, not even bothering to lock it as they rush through a cursory check to make sure Hashirama is out like he said he’d be.

“Fuck, thank the gods,” Tobirama sighs in relief before dragging Madara back into liplock.

Madara can’t hold back a moan this time, heat ratcheting up between them as he wraps his hands around Tobirama’s neck, pulling him closer as they stumble to the couch. Madara ends up straddling him just so that their cocks brush through too-rough clothing, kiss growing urgent and sloppy, as wandering hands touching every inch of uncovered skin.

Clothes fall away, leaving them both shirtless, and Madara needs a few moments to take in the miles of pale skin, so soft to the touch, toned muscles rippling as Tobirama squirms under him, gasps and groans escaping his lips in answer to every one of Madara’s touches. He leans in to mouth Tobirama’s neck, sucking bruising kisses onto the soft skin there pleasure flaring at the base of his stomach each time Tobirama moans and arches against him.

“You’re so sensitive,” Madara whispers, with a hint of incredulity. “That’s... fuck.”

“Yeah,” Tobirama rasps, eyes unfocused, “because... just get on with it.”

“If I knew this is what it took to finally get you to shut up,” Madara chuckles, “I would have tried this a long time ago.”

If he weren’t so sure Tobirama genuinely despised him. Butー

“I fucking wished you would!” Tobirama snaps, though the irritation rings hollow with the breathless tone.

Madara blinks in shock.

“You did?” Madara asks, moving lower to lap at Tobirama’s nipple, sucking the hardened nub into his mouth and eliciting another delicious whimper. “You thought about this? About my hands on you, touching you?”

“Yes!” The desperation in his tone only adds to Madara’s mounting confidence, one that he so rarely ever feels in Tobirama’s presence.

“My mouth on your cock,” he continues, heart hammering against his ribs as he trails kisses lower and lower, “would you like that? While I finger you, getting you ready to take me?”

“Yes, yes, yes,” Tobirama’s hips jerk, making them both moan at the friction.

“Off,” Madara grunts, tugging at Tobirama’s pants with one hand as the other works the belt off his own. They scramble, a bit awkwardly, until they’re both naked and sprawled on top of each other, and Madara all but drools at the sight of Tobirama’s cock, hard and straining, beads of precum already leaking from the tip.

Perfect.

It’s tempting to just let go but Madara decides to take his time. Strokes Tobirama’s sides and chest, fingers his nipples, kisses every inch of skin he can reach, sucking bruises and biting slightly. He marvels at every little keen and groan he wrings from Tobirama, relishing how needy he grows with each second, how he moans Madara’s name, curses him and urges Madara to touch him, sliding his dick against his and huffing when Madara doesn’t do anything about it, before finally devolving into pleading.

Just what Madara’s been waiting for.

“Madara, please,” Tobirama’s whines, a soft, desperate sound that makes Madara groan in turn.

“Please what?” he asks, knowing he’s being a tease and enjoying the hell out of it.

Tobirama musters a pretty non-intimidating glare. “Just... fuck.”

“Tell me.”

“Fuck you.”

“Is that what you want?” Madara raises an eyebrow, making sure to wet his lips, letting his tongue gently graze the head of Tobirama’s cock. “I can bottom. I don’t mind.”

“Fuck!” Tobirama squeezes his eyes shut, heavy breathing interspersed with desperate whines. “Just... suck me off. Please. Now.”

“That’s it, Tobirama,” Madara drags out the syllables of his name, a smirk tugging at his lips, “when you ask so nicely, how can I refuse?”

He wraps his lipsーfinallyーaround the head, licking at the salty fluid gathered there, ears ringing from the heady feel of Tobirama’s cock against his mouth, his hands tangling in Madara’s hair, the sounds slipping from Tobirama’s lips that are borderline fucking obscene. Madara takes a breath to brace himself and takes Tobirama a few inches deeper. His length is hot, stiff, and heavy in his mouth as Madara presses the flat of his tongue against the underside, sucking hard, wringing another delectable whimper. Tobirama’s thrusts up, cock hitting the back of his throat, and Madara chokes for a moment, his own dick jerking at the sensation.

“Madara,” Tobirama breathes, “Madara, gods, you feel amazing.”

The words send another rush of pleasure through him, and Madara takes himself in hand to release some of the unbearable tension, stroking himself slowly as he relaxes his throat and sinks down to take Tobirama to the base.

Tobirama’s moan is a sweet, drawn-out melody. One that Madara enjoys making louder and louder as he starts moving, setting a fast-paced rhythm, uncaring for how debauched he may look, drool leaking out of his mouth and coating Tobirama’s cock, throat constricting around it as he takes him deep, lets him stay there, tongue gliding along his shaft. Tobirama soon devolves into barely coherent pleading, until ‘please’, and ‘more’, and Madara’s name are the only words coming out of his mouth.

It’s intoxicating. Overwhelming, far too much. Madara gives up stroking himself, the pleasure ramping up far too quickly, too soon, though Tobirama isn’t doing much better. Madara draws his lips up along his length, lapping up more precum gathered at the head, even as Tobirama’s hips jerk again and the hand in Madara’s hair tightens, urging him back down.

“Madara, please,” Tobirama keens, “I need...”

Madara has a pretty good idea of what he needs. He swirls his tongue over the head, descending again until his nose is pressed against Tobirama’s stomach. Madara swallows around him once, twice, a third time before he feels Tobirama nudging at his shoulder in a warning he doesn’t pay heed to, starting to bob his head again, wrapping his fingers around the base of Tobirama’s cock, using both his mouth and hand to bring him to completion.

“Fuck, Madara, Iー”

Madara lets out a muffled groan once he feels cum spilling against his tongue, swallowing rapidly as Tobirama’s cock pulses, again and again, through an orgasm that has him writhing and and trembling underneath him, hands tightening in Madara’s hair enough to hurt with the kind of tantalizing pain that only adds to the pleasure.

“You feel so fucking good,” Tobirama pants, watching Madara through white lashes, eyes dark and hazy as another shudder runs through him, “fuckーI want...”

Madara releases him with a wet pop. “Want what, Tobirama?” he whispers, voice too hoarse for him to speak properly.

Tobirama grips his shoulders in lieu of an answer, directing Madara to turn around so his back is pressed against his chest.

Then Tobirama’s hand wraps around his cock andーoh.

Madara has pretty much forgotten about his own pleasure, too focused on not coming too soon and making sure Tobirama was enjoying himself.

“My turn,” Tobirama murmurs against his ear, tone still breathless but with a commanding edge to it now that makes Madara shiver, “and lemmeーlet me hear you, Madara.”

Gods. He groans just from the sound of Tobirama’s voice. The feel of his teeth nibbling at his earlobe, his hand setting a quick, harsh rhythm that builds up the pleasure to impossible degrees. Tobirama’s heated skin pressed against his back, his thighs, the fingers of his other hand carding through his hair with a gentleness that contrasts with his harshness before.

It’s too much.

“Go on, Madara.”

Tobirama’s fingers swiping at the precome gathering at the head of Madara’s cock, smearing it over his shaft. His voice, a muffled whisper coaxing Madara to let go, to come for him, to say Tobirama’s nameー

“Just like that, Madara,” Tobirama grunts, “louder for me, come on.”

Madara thrusts into his grip, all but fucking into Tobirama’s fist at this point, moans his name as the heat grows unbearable the closer he gets to release.

“To-bi-rama...” He comes with a broken groan slipping from his lips as cum spills all over his stomach and Tobirama’s hand, each pulse coming stronger than the last, leaving him dizzy and boneless in Tobirama’s arms for however long it takes for his orgasm to abate.

Feels like forever. Probably a lot less. Time does seem to slow down, though, both of them collapsing against each other onto the cushions, breathing raggedly and curling into each other as Madara turns to bury his head in the crook of Tobirama’s neck.

It still seems unreal. Too perfect. So right.

They lie there for a minutes, coming down from the high, limbs tangled and lazy kisses exchanged here and there. Tobirama looks so peaceful, like Madara’s never seen him before: eyes half-lidded, hair messier than ever, sticking in every direction, skin still flushed and marked, all over, with hickeys and teeth marks, the mere sight of which has Madara’s dick stirring in interest, recent orgasm or no.

“You know,” Madara says, hands running over Tobirama’s chest, barely grazing his still sensitive nipples and making him shiver, “if this is the game you want to play, I’m really not against binging it. The rest of the dayーweekend, if you want.” Madara presses a kiss to Tobirama’s neck. “Make the playthrough as thorough as possible.” To his collarbone. “Unlock all achievements and, uh,” Madara trails his hand along Tobirama’s chest to his groin, past his length and to his ass, "explore every location.”

“If that was some thinly veiled euphemism,” Tobirama says, barely holding in laughter, “for you wanting to fuck me sideways...” Madara holds Tobirama’s gaze as his fingers hover just over Tobirama’s hole. “Then Madara, for fuck’s sake, stop trying to be subtle and get to work.”

Madara barks out a laugh.

“Whatever you say, Tobirama.”

Madara dips his voice low and deep, like he’s noticed Tobirama loves, and relishes the whimper it earns him. Relishes the way Tobirama arches against him, looking for friction, how delectable he looks, ready and responsive, so eager for Madara’s touch.

He knows then and there that if it’s up to him, Madara will do anything to make this last.

#madatobi #tobimada #modern au #youtuber au #lou writes #idiots in love #madara is in denial (and thirsting)#tobirama is laughing (and equally thirsting) from the sidelines #fluff and smut #humor #meow

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bush-viper-cutie · 5 years ago

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“The Leaky Cauldron” || YEAR 3 – Ch.6 (HP au)

Chapter List

<-- Last Chapter Next Chapter -->

Day posted: 7/28/2020

Word count: 3,206

Relationship: EVENTUAL severus X oc (slow burn)

Rating: E for everyone

Warnings: none

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A/N: This is my first fan fic I’m writing mainly as a way to practice. This is a retelling of the hp books with an inserted character. Although most every character will be written about, this is mostly for the pro snape fandom. Please do not fear, although this is a severus x oc story, it is an incredibly slow burn as I do not intend for them to get together at all until after the final book events. Chapters will be posted twice a week.

This derivative work follows the events of the Harry Potter books by Jk Rowling and is intended as a fun way to practice my writing. Thank you for reading :D

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~~~ * ~~~ * ~~~ * ~~~ * ~~~

Heather paced Harry’s room looking at the stack of books on his bed while he yawned and slouched over the headboard. She dragged her quill down the list she had made and checked off each box as she read the textbook names.

“Looks like that’s almost everything,” Heather smiled and folded up the parchment.

Harry sighed, “What are we missing, and can we go get it now? I’m bored.”

“We need the Divination book,” she headed for the door, “So let’s go.”

Harry jumped out of bed and ran in front of her, heading out the room first. Heather ran after him, taking the stairs two at a time and nearly passed him a few feet from the door. They touched the back door at the same time and gasped, trying to catch their breath.

“I won.”

“No you didn’t!”

The bricks were extra red that morning with the sun shining brightly on them. Harry tapped the bricks and they moved quickly, letting in to Diagon Alley where the morning bustle was filled with extra chatter as more students visited the shops for their materials.

As they walked to the bookstore, they looked over the bobbing heads to try to spot bright brown bushy hair or outstanding orange hair. Hermione and the Weasleys were nowhere to be seen yet. Heather had spent the last week helping Harry with his essays and now this last week was spent looking for their friends among the crowds and purchasing their materials extra slow in case they saw them.

The bookshop was not as busy as the other stores yet and the manager came over quickly to offer them help. Heather took out her list and looked for the missing book they needed.

“Er, two copies of ‘Unfogging the Future’ by – ”

“Cassandra Vablatsky, yes yes,” he led them to the divination section and pointed out the books on the shelf.

She took two and turned to follow the manager back but Harry stopped her with a hand on her arm.

“Look,” he stared at the misty image of a black dog with sharp black eyes.

“‘Death Omens: What to Do When You Know the Worst is Coming’?” She shook her head. They were definitely not purchasing that. Harry would probably carry that book around everywhere pointing out a bunch of death omens.

The manager chuckled, “Oh don’t worry about ever needing that. Those books always just scare people and very rarely do anything good.”

They followed the manager to the register and paid. They had been in Flourish and Blotts for a total of ten minutes and the rest of their morning, afternoon, and evening were now completely free. They walked back to the Leaky Cauldron and up to Harry’s room with the rest of their materials to be packed away in their trunks.

Harry sat down on the bed and tapped his fingers on the cover of his divination book, “Heather?”

She was closing the door after dragging her trunk into his room from hers. “Yes?”

“D’you think… What we saw that night was a death omen?”

“Saw what night Harry?”

“That thing coming out of the bushes before the Knight Bus arrived.”

She had a hard time recalling it but did remember something about a black blob-ish creature, “Oh… Well it was just a dog or something. A stray, Harry. Now please pack your things and forget about that omens book.”

The next few days were spent walking around Diagon Alley and looking through shop windows. She had forbidden Harry from taking any of their money with him and had to refuse his beggings for a new broom. On the last day they decided to go for some ice cream and sit outside watching as people went by with their bags filled with goods.

“Heather!”

“Harry!”

Hermione and Ron came running down the stream of wizards to hug them. They got some more ice cream and the four of them sat down.

“We heard why you were staying at the Leaky Cauldron,” Hermione crossed her arms.

Heather and harry looked at each other and then frowned at Ron.

His ears went red, “Dad mentioned it and I… might have let it slip.”

“I CAN’T believe you two blew up your AUNT!”

Heather pointed at Harry, “He did. Not me.”

Harry pushed her finger away, “I didn’t mean to. It just sort of… happened.”

“Ron stop laughing! This is serious! You could have gotten expelled Harry!”

Heather turned to him as well, “Actually apparently he could have gone to Azkaban.”

Ron snorted, “No one would send Famous Harry Potter to AZKABAN. Get real. Everyone else though would be mad to do what you did. I’d definitely be sent to Azkaban for that.”

Heather flicked Harry’s ear and turned to Ron, “Can we go home with you? Since it’s the last day?”

“No need, we’re staying at the Leaky and so is Hermione. Dad’ll take everyone to King’s Cross tomorrow.” Ron’s eyes widened and he almost reach in his robes with his ice cream hand. “Look at this!” he pulled out a long wand with his other hand, “My very own wand! Brand new too.”

Heather looked down at the large lumpy bag next to Hermione, “What’s all that?”

She patted it happily, “Oh, well I’ve been approved to take several more classes. Took all summer owling back and forth with Professor McGonagall. Apparently, it had to be approved by the school governors.”

Heather felt very ill suddenly, like her heart had dropped to her stomach and the flush on her face felt closer to embarrassment than anger but neither of those words described the feeling very well. “But-what-How did… How many new subjects? I don’t understand. Did they pick you? Did you ask?”

Hermione nodded, “Professor McGonagall talked to me about it after I asked if I could take them all.”

“How many more? Which classes?”

She shrugged, “All of them. Let’s see,” she started counting on her fingers. “Divination and care of magical creatures like you guys, plus Study of Ancient Runes, Muggle Studies, and Arithmancy,” she smiled.

The three of them just stared at her with annoyance.

“And when will you be blocking in sleeping and eating?” Harry laughed finally, half hoping it was a joke for her sake.

Ron still stared at her, “Heather I’m glad you haven’t decided to turn into a school zombie this year.”

Heather glared at him and quickly finished her ice cream, “Let’s go already.” She should have asked Professor Snape about taking more classes. Why did she think Hermione wanting to take them all was somehow a joke? Maybe she could still come in first in the classes that were the same…

Hermione jumped up, “Oh! I’m allowed to get a pet for school this year! Early birthday present from my parents.”

Ron wiped his hands on his shirt and pointed over to the top of the winding cobble street, “Magical Menagerie’s over there.”

Magical Menagerie was a small shop made even smaller by the dozens of cages covering the walls with squeaking, squawking, rattling, and hissing. Heather and Ron went immediately to check on the treats and snacks for toads and rats while Harry helped Hermione pick an animal.

“I don’t think any of these will help Scabbers,” Ron sighed and looked away from the assortment of magical treats.

Heather leaned in and squinted her eyes at Scabbers. He was looking very ill, with bald patches in odd places. “Ask the witch. She might give you something specific.” She followed Ron up to the register.

“Miss? My rat’s ill. He got like that a few days ago after we came back from Egypt.”

She took out thick round glasses that made her eyes as big as the sugar coated fat toad flies and took him in her hands. “Have you tried banging him a few times?”

Ron nodded, “But he won’t perk up.”

The witch held him upside down by his tail while he wriggled around, “He looks ancient. How old is he?”

“Er. Old. Very, very, old, I think. He’s been in my family for twelve years.”

“Well there are many reasons why a rat might do this. What powers does it have?”

Heather and Ron looked at each other and shrugged.

“None, I don’t think. He just is.”

She pointed at his bitten ear and missing toe, “Run him through the wash?”

Ron’s ears went pink and looked at both the witch and Heather defensively, “No! I’m not that forgetful. Percy gave ‘im to me like that.”

“Well, no normal rat lives longer than five years so it must be a mix. Don’t worry there’re hundreds of these things living throughout the cities. No ordinary rats but certainly not as hard-working or hard-wearing than pure wizarding rats.” She placed Scabbers on the counter and kept him trapped under her hand as she pulled out a cage from under the counter, “Like these. I can get you a discount on a replacement if you’d like. Pick from one of these.”

Ron shook his head and took Scabbers back, “No. He works just fine for now.”

“Is there nothing else he can do?” Heather watched the rats in the cage skip rope with their tails and show off their little furry arms, “Like a shot or pill or something?”

The witch sighed, “Here.” She produced a little red glass bottle from under the counter, “See if that’ll help.”

“Thanks – HEY!”

A giant orange cat with long matted fur jumped down from the tall shelf above the witch’s head and onto Ron’s. Ron threw his head forward and the cat landed on its back on the counter and swatted Scabbers out of Ron’s grip.

“CROOKSHANKS! COME BACK HERE,” the witch pulled on the cat’s tail as it jumped off the counter and chased Scabbers out the open door.

Ron and Heather ran after them, following the bright orange fur between people’s feet. Crookshanks had pinned Scabbers down between its paws and was about to bite his neck when Ron and Heather dived for them. Ron pulled Scabbers out while Heather picked a very heavy Crookshanks up like an enormous baby.

Huffing and puffing they made their way back to the Magical Menagerie to find Harry and Hermione waiting by the counter with no owl picked out. Heather placed Crookshanks back on the counter and held him down for the witch.

“Well. Here he is,” the witch said to Hermione.

“He’s perfect!” Hermione tried picking him up and groaned, “Oh! You made it look easy, Heather.”

“What do you mean he’s perfect? For what?” Ron looked to Hermione and the coins on the counter, “Whose are those?”

“Mine,” the witch took them and dropped them in her apron.

“Harry asked where you guys went and she told us about Crookshanks and about how he’s been here for YEARS so of course I had to take him,” Hermione hugged the floppy cat tightly.

“Yeah? Did she tell you how he tried to murder my rat just now?”

Hermione scoffed, “It’s just his instinct, Ron. It’s not murder.”

Ron looked to Heather and Harry but they just shook their heads, refusing to take sides. They walked out together but Ron refused to walk next to Hermione and Crookshanks. They made their way back to the Leaky Cauldron.

Mr. Weasley was sitting at the bar drinking and reading the Daily Prophet when they walked in. He smiled and waved them over, “Harry! Heather! Good to see you two.” He looked down at Crookshanks and nodded at him, “And your new friend.”

Hermione nodded and lifted him up higher before giving Ron a look and heading up the stairs towards her room.

“Black’s still on the loose?” Harry pointed at the man screaming on the front cover.

Mr. Weasley pressed his lips together, “Yes. Unfortunately. A lot of wizards have been tasked to assist in his capture. I’m even doing some patrols here in Diagon Alley.”

“Hope we’re the ones who catch him. The reward money’s big, isn’t it?”

Mr. Weasley shook his head, “No, no. He’s far too dangerous. If I find him I’m supposed to sound the alarm. He’s too dangerous for any Weasley or Potter,” he looked at the twins, “to catch. The Azkaban guards will do that. Understand?”

The three of them nodded and Mr. Weasley went back to smiling.

Mrs. Weasley came in followed by Fred and George, Giny, and Percy. Mrs. Weasley greeted them with a hug and Giny said hello to Heather but could barely look at Harry when she greeted him after. Percy stepped forward and extended his hand to each of them.

“Heather. Harry. How very nice to see you both,” he gave them a quick nod and straightened his shirt.

“Hello, Percy.”

“Hello,” Harry turned to Heather trying not to laugh.

“I see you are both doing well,” Percy motioned to them generally with his hands and folded them behind his back.

Heather nodded awkwardly, “We are – ”

Fred and George pulled Percy back and took his place.

“Mr. Potter, how very splendid a coincidence to see you in this exquisite establishment,” Fred bowed and tipped his fake top hat.

George followed suit, “Miss Potter, how have you spent this marvelous evening? I trust the day has treated you well?”

Everyone but Percy and his parents laughed.

“Alright, boys, move along. Harry! Heather,” she hugged them both really tight. “Did you get our presents? Can you believe we got to spend the summer in Egypt? How were your birthdays?”

“Yes, yes, and good,” Harry smiled.

“And Percy made Head Boy! Oh, another one in the family – ”

“The last one,” Fred interrupted.

“I’m certain,” she frowned at him.

Heather, Harry, and Ron went up to join Hermione for an hour before they all came back downstairs for dinner. The innkeeper had put several tables together for all seven Weasleys, Heather, Harry, and Hermione to fit comfortably. They enjoyed eating the special for that night, rotisserie chicken and biscuits, and enjoyed hearing about Egypt and Hermione’s week in France.

“How are you taking us all to the train tomorrow?” Fred looked at his mom, “You still have time to teach us how to apparate.”

“You’re not of age,” Percy scolded them.

“The Ministry is lending me cars, we’ll all fit just fine, don’t worry,” Mr. Weasley interrupted before another fight broke out.

“It doesn’t have to fit us all, Percy can apparate himself to school. He’s ‘of age’,” Fred took first scoops into the chocolate pudding.

Percy moved the pudding bowl towards Hermione right beside him, “Guests first.”

“We’re all guests,” George mumbled.

“Thank you, Percy dear. Fred. Enough of that,” Mrs. Weasley wagged her finger.

Percy gave Fred a winning smile and turned away, “Why are we getting cars?”

“Because we don’t have our old one anymore,” Mrs. Weasley turned to Ron who looked down at his pudding.

Percy turned to Ron too, “All your stuff is on my bed so you better pack before we sleep, Ron.”

Ron scowled at Percy who only rolled his eyes.

They passed around the bowl of pudding and everyone enjoyed second and third helpings. After dinner everyone went to their rooms to go to bed, and while Ron packed, Heather, Harry, and Hermione kept him company.

“Has the rat tonic done anything yet?” Heather poked the lump in Ron’s shirt pocket.

“No,” Ron jammed his clothes into his trunk and sat on top, trying to shut it.

“It’ll fit if you fold it,” Hermione pulled him off and started showing him how to fold.

“Fine then, everyone take a shirt.”

Harry and Ron folded while Hermione and Heather organized his trunk better, pushing all his books to one side and leaving the other side for clothes and other materials. Heather lifted a lumpy hat and a Sneakoscope fell out, twirling fast and glowing bright with a high-pitched whistle.

“It’s broken,” Ron grumbled. “Did yours stop spinning?”

“When we got them, they weren’t glowing or moving at all. Not like that,” Heather stuffed it back in his magenta hat.

“They probably got tired on the journey,” Ron stuffed the rest of the shirts in the empty spaces making Hermione sigh and place her hands on her hips.

“Percy was probably right about them being a rip off.”

Ron shut his trunk, “No he wasn’t. The man said they really work.”

“Yes, of course he would Ron. He was trying to sell them to you.”

Heather stood up and dusted off her knees, “Well maybe its relative to Ron. Is there someone here you don’t trust?”

Ron put his hands on his hips too, “Yeah. Percy to not remind Mum and Dad about the car and your bloody orange beast to not eat Scabbers.”

Harry stepped between Hermione and Ron before Hermione could respond, “Have you seen that book Hagrid got us?”

“Crookshanks is just a cat. He did something any cat would do. If you keep Scabbers in your room I’ll keep Crookshanks in mine and then there won’t be a problem. Will there?”

“‘The Monster Book of Monsters’ I think it was called?”

“Sure, until it gets loose and sniffs Scabbers out.”

“How do you even read it?”

Percy came in and set his Head Boy pin on the nightstand, “Alright, get to bed everyone. We’ll be up early.”

Hermione scoffed at Ron and turned to Percy, “You’re right, Percy. It IS time for bed. Also, congratulations on being Head Boy.” She turned and marched out of the room.

Harry and Heather waved goodnight to Ron and exited the room.

“You couldn’t have helped me?” Harry grumbled to Heather.

She shrugged, “They both kinda have points.”

They went to Harry’s room and both got to work packing his trunk. It was easier to help Harry because he wasn’t so picky about where things were going, not like Ron.

Harry picked up his unglowing and untwirling Sneakoscope, “It was definitely a rip off. I don’t trust Fred and George not to pull a prank on one of us on the last night here.”

“If I wake up with color-changing goo in my hair I’ll hex them,” Heather laughed. “If I were Percy, I’d lock the door.”

“Do you think our family would have been like them?” Harry rolled the Sneakoscope on the floor in front of him.

Heather tried to swallow the lump in her throat, but it wouldn’t go down. She stared at her hands for several minutes and stood up, kneeling on his trunk and shutting it tight. “Night, Harry. We’ll get to go home to Hogwarts tomorrow.”

Harry nodded and walked her to the door. “We’ll be home tomorrow.”

She watched him close the door slowly and quickly stopped it and hugged him, “You’re all the family I need so stop almost getting expelled.”

He smiled, nodded, and closed the door. She left to her own room, packed her things and fell onto her bed before remembering her nightly routine. She dropped to the floor and started doing her Quidditch exercises, barely reaching a fourth of what the book said and laid back down on the bed, exhausted.

“I WILL make it on the team.”

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#harry potter #pro snape #heather potter #severus snape x oc #severus x oc #snape x oc #severus snape x reader #severus x reader #snape x reader #snape fanfic #snape fanfiction #snape fan fiction #fanfic #fanfiction #fan fiction

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inkribbon796 · 5 years ago

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Days of Childhood

~::~ 10 Years Ago ~::~

Summary: 5+1, Visitation Day. Yancy palling around with his family. All taking place within the same week.

A/N: Bim and Yan are currently 21, making Yancy and Kay 22, and Illinois and Arthur 23. Meaning that here they are 11, 12, and 13 respectively.

5. Arthur- Bugs Alive:

“Come on, hurry up,” Arthur called out, his notebook clutched to his chest as he ran off, Yancy was struggling to keep up with all the rocks and tree roots.

The two boys were running around the spooky woods surrounding the Manor. No wild animals, except for insects and rats, could be found. Normally people who entered the woods became lost and died. Dark took great pains to hide the skeletons that could be found within the unhallowed woods.

Yancy only caught up when the young Author had stopped at a fallen tree that was covered in mushrooms and other fungi, moss covering the rotting wood in sickly patches. He looked giddy and excited, holding a large jar along with his notebook.

In later retellings, Yancy would admit to this being a huge red flag.

“There you are slowpoke,” Arthur shoved the jar into Yancy’s hands. “I need some bugs so I can study them for my stories.”

Unsuspecting, Yancy smiled, “Can I look at them too?”

The young author shrugged, “Sure, whatever.”

“Did you hear?” Arthur started, smiling mischievously, cracking his notebook open. “Dark gave me a nickname, like the kind his network have.”

“I thought we weren’t allowed to join,” Yancy reminded in confusion.

“Well I’ve got one, that means I’m better than Illy,” with a couple quick words, the entire tree trunk violently flipped over, exposing dozens of types of teaming insects out in the open. “No one else here has one but me.”

Yancy frowned at the snide look on his older adopted brother’s face, “Bim goes by Junior.”

“He doesn’t count,” Arthur snapped angrily, and ripped the jar away and started scooping up insects, uncaring if they crawled over his hands to get away from him. “Wil gave him that.

“So what’s your nickname then?” Yancy asked.

“Dark calls me “his little Author” neat huh?” Arthur smiled proudly as he screwed the cap on and smiled at the jar.

“Yeah,” Yancy leaned in to look at the bugs. “So where are you going to hide them? Dark’ll get mad if you bring them into the house.”

Arthur wrote another couple of words and his bat appeared at his feet, a smile on his face, “What do yah mean, Yanc?”

Yancy scurried back with his hands as Arthur brought the bat onto the jar, crushing many insects as others frantically tried to escape. The young author crushed one trying to flee, bringing up his notebook and making sure they all froze in place. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Sick to his stomach, Yancy tried to scoop up some of the insects, the little crawlers freed from Arthur’s powers when they touched his hand, and he flung them into the safety of the bushes.

“Hey, they’re mine!” Arthur shouted. “Don’t throw them away.”

“Run little bugs,” Yancy scooped up some beetles and a worm and threw them into the bushes.

With a couple flourishes of his wrist, an equal number of bugs that Yancy had saved, exploded. “I can kill them faster than you can take them.”

Yancy stuck out his tongue, scooping up another beetle, “You can’t stop me!

Their game continued, Yancy running back to the Manor with a bloody nose and Arthur more than a bit scratched up.

4. Illinois- Heroes and Villains:

Inside the Manor there were two young boys running around the house, one as, and the other who was in a kid’s brown fedora that tended to fall over his eyes was 13.

“Stop running,” Illinois yelled at Yancy. “You’re the hero, you’re supposed to chase me.”

“Youse always play the villain, I’s want a turn,” Yancy yelled back at him and tripped over the rug, crashing hard on the ground.

“Oww,” Yancy grumbled as Illinois jumped onto him and started tying up his feet.

“Gotcha!” Illinois cheered, “now it’s . . .”

The older boy paused for a bit, “You okay.”

“Yeah it just hurts,” he complained.

“Oh,” Illinois stopped and finished tying him up, grabbing a blanket that had been left on the couch. “You can be the villain for a little bit long if you want.”

“Youse gonna ta drag me ta jail?” Yancy asked, smiling and giggling when Illinois rolled him onto the blanket.

Illinois grabbed the blanket and began dragging it towards, “You’re going to jail for stealing a candy bar!”

“No!” Yancy yelled overdramatically.

Illinois picked up a corner of the blanket and began dragging him towards the nearest closet. They passed Dark who was outside his office and looking at them, unimpressed.

“You two aren’t playing that game again are you?” He asked.

Illinois adjusted his hat so it wasn’t over his eyes, “Yes?”

Dark groaned, “Play that outside, you’re going to break something.”

“OK, Dad,” both Yancy and Illinois agreed and Illinois began dragging Yancy and the blanket towards the door.

Because both of them were turned away they missed the scared look on Dark’s face at the title they’d give him. Fear that quickly gave way to a colder mask. “It’s Dark.”

Both the boys frowned,, correcting themselves before Illinois finished dragging Yancy onto the back patio and then carried him down the stairs to the lawn where he grabbed a couple croquet pins and made a little small fence around him. Both boys unaware that Dark was watching them from the balcony

“There,” Illinois said proudly, hands resting on his hips. “I won.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Yancy complained. “Whatever. Untie me already.”

Illinois tapped his chin, “Nah, untie yourself.”

“Noisy!” Yancy yelled. “Get back here!”

Then Yancy noticed a danger sticking out of the ground. Quickly Yancy rolled over and grabbed the knife and began cutting himself free.

“Hey!” Illinois began racing for the patio stairwell door as Yancy finished cutting himself free. Since the knots were tied by a thirteen-year-old and Illinois hadn’t actually meant to keep him trapped indefinitely, it didn’t take long.

However, now Yancy was chasing Illinois around with a knife in his hand as the boys ran up the stairs. Dark quickly snatched the knife out of his hand the first chance he got.

“Dark, he cheated!” Illinois called out.

The Entity was just sipping from his coffee cup as the two boys raced around him. “You’re the villain now, get away from him.”

Yancy and Illinois kept running around the backyard until they got exhausted and Dark brought them inside for a nap and a snack.

3. Kay- The King of the Squirrels:

Kay was arranging some of the stuffed animals he owned into a pile. The young boy had a red blanket tied around his neck. Dark and King were in a bit of an arms race. King always asked for a pet, every birthday, Christmas, and Thursday. Dark, sick and tired of always saying a two-letter word over and over again bet he could find any stuffed animal and if he was ever unable to, Kay could have that animal as a pet.

It was bet Dark had yet to lose, which led to an arms race of Kay finding different names for animals, and a very extensive stuffed animal collection.

Yancy jumped out of the pile, and raised a stuffed platypus above his head, “Found it!”

“Uh, they don’t hunt squirrels,” Kay reminded him.

“What do they eat then?” Yancy asked, trying to get out of the pile without knocking the whole thing over.

“Bugs, worms,” Kay shrugged and grabbed a leopard plushie. “Here, cats can eat squirrels.”

“But I’s like the platty-pus,” Yancy complained.

“Bring them both,” Kay shrugged, and Yancy took the leopard and held both of them in his arms in a warm hug.

Out of all of his siblings, Yancy liked spending time with Illy, but he always thought Kay was the nicest. The boys ran outside, to where Kay had hidden some of his favorite stuffed animals, his squirrels, up into a tree towards the edge of the tree line into the creepy forest. Wil had magicked them all up a treehouse. Dark had been less than impressed, only agreeing to keep the kids’ new “wooden death trap” when Wil demonstrated its sturdiness by getting up and jumping up and down on the thing and not fall through the wood.

King usually spent all his time up in the treehouse. And Yancy waited at the bottom until he could throw the toys up and climb up.

The afternoon was spent peacefully playing with the stuffed animals.

2. Bim- Starlight, Starbright:

Yancy and Bim were out on the front lawn, sneaking out late at night to catch fireflies. Normally Dark let them stay up late all summer collecting bugs and sleeping in the backyard. But for the last few days he’d been keeping them all inside, constantly watching them any time they went near the backyard. He promised them that whatever was lurking around the area would be gone soon and they could go back to enjoying the stars and bugs.

And if Yancy heard Dark screaming and fighting something in what he was pretty sure was a dead, haunted forest, the young boy was too nervous to talk about it with anyone else.

Bim jumped, his glasses almost falling off his face. He caught another firefly in his hands, cupping his hands around it, “Yes!”

Yancy was catching another firefly and carefully putting it in a jar where there were already a dozen fireflies buzzing around inside. After the fiasco with Arthur, he kept a tight grip on the insect jar, even though Bim had never ruthlessly tortured insects before.

The two boys kept putting little lightning bugs into their jar until Bim was finally satisfied. “Yeah, look at them,” Bim cheered. “Aren’t they cool, their little butts glow.”

“Yeah, ain’t they something,” Yancy agreed, before noticing that the fireflies were disappearing from their backyard, as if they were being chased. “I’s think Dark’s comin’ we should get inside.”

Bim frowned, “I didn’t even get my wish.”

“We’ll make it inside, come on,” Yancy began running inside, both boys missing the slowly gathering black mist that was in the treeline as the two boys raced inside and up into Bim’s bedroom. Only then did they giggle a little bit in the darkness, the only light was from the little bugs in their jar.

“Let me make the first one,” Bim reached for the jar.

“No, you’ll let them all go,” Yancy reminded, holding the jar away from him. “Come on, I’s never get the first one.”

He pouted, folding his arms like Wil tended to do, “Come on.”

Yancy moved over to Bim’s window and began to open it as Bim swiped the jar and grabbed one of the bugs, pinning it to his hand with his almost invisible aura. Yancy lunged for the jar to close it, but two glowing bugs escaped through the window. “Hey!”

“I want to be just like Daddy when I grown up,” Bim wished, blowing gently on the insect and allowing it to fly off.

Yancy was carefully getting another lightning bug on his own finger so he could make his own wish: “I’s wanna be a good person.”

Bim scoffed at that, but only ordered, “Give me another bug, I’ve got more wishes to make.”

Glaring at him, Yancy fought over the fireflies until they were all gone and Bim closed the window, all their troubles safely locked out of Manor.

1. Yan- Teddy Bear Picnic:

Yancy was sitting out in the back lawn with Yan, a little table between them and as many chairs as the little table could fit with a teddy on each chair. Each bear had on a bow tie and a frilly hat and a full tea party in front of them.

Yan was in a nice little red dress while Yancy was in a bow tie,

Two of the bears belonged to Yan and Yancy respectively, and the other three were politely and quietly “borrowed” from Kay’s collection.

Yan kicked her feet a little bit as she poured tea for the bear next to her.

“Why do you always give tea to her first?” Yancy complained.

“Because Ms. Talia is a lady,” Yan said.

“Youse been sittings’ there pouring her tea fer ferever,” Yancy reminded.

Then suddenly the whole table jolted, Yan and Yancy froze and leaned away from the table, Yan gasping in horror as her hard work was mostly tossed to the floor.

“Rawr! Rawr!” Artie began growling excitedly as he moved underneath the same tablecloth.

“Artie!” Yan got up and stomped her feet angrily. “You wrecked my tea party!”

“I’m not Artie,” Arthur said. “I’m a sea monster.”

“There’s no sea monsters at tea parties,” Yancy reminded sharply.

Arthur frowned, “Then you’re having a lousy tea party.”

“No,” Yan spat. “I don’t want sea monsters at my tea party!”

The young author frowned, before growing a bit and running off with the table cloth.

A chase ensued on the back lawn, the two kids chasing their older brother until they could rip the cloth away and slowly start rebuilding their little tea party. With Artie the sea monster in sea monster jail until the end of the tea party.

+1. Dark and Wil- Bruised Egos and Bloodied Knuckles:

It began simply enough. Arthur had brought a rat into the house, and Kay had been excited. A secret little pet to hide from Dark for a while.

Kay named him Pretzel.

The poor creature barely lasted an hour. It was in debate for the rest of Arthur’s existence on what had happened to the rodent. Whether he was jealous of the rat spending more time with Kay, or he simply got bored of it.

Either way when Kay snuck off to check on Pretzel, the rat was gone with only a couple specks of blood on the floor of its cage.

He angrily went to confront Arthur, who was watching a show with Wil and the other kids. Arthur feigned ignorance and Yancy jumped Arthur for killing another creature, trying to separate him from his notebook and hold him down.

The fight resulted in Arthur getting a black eye, Kay getting some scratches to the face, and Yancy getting one of the last of his baby teeth getting literally kicked out of his skull.

Wil was trying to separate the three boys with his aura, and looked relieved when Dark ran in and grabbed Arthur, the two porting over to the young boy’s room.

With Arthur gone Kay finally stopped fighting and just started crying, Yancy crying a bit at how upset he was.

Yancy was given a lollipop as Kay spoke through his tears. “He killed my rat, he killed Pretzel.”

“There, there,” Wilford waved another lollipop into his hand and did a little magic trick. “You’ll see Pretzel again. He didn’t die.”

“Wil!” Dark walked in, looking unhappy. “Don’t make it worse.”

“Kaylor if you wanted another rat toy I could have given it to you,” Dark reprimanded, summoning up a little rat plushie in his hands and holding it out to the boy. “You shouldn’t be fighting with Arthur over a rat.”

Kay glared at the toy and pushed it away, “I don’t want a toy, I want Pretzel.”

Dark took a deep, audible breath, and handed Yancy the toy instead. “We can’t have a pet, and this is why. Be lucky you got as long as you did with the thing.”

“Pretzel,” Yancy corrected.

Rolling his eyes, Dark corrected, “Pretzel, fine. Be lucky you got any time with Pretzel. No one in the house can control themselves, and any other pet will not last. Hopefully Pretzel escaped on his own.”

Dark picked Yancy up with his aura, setting the boys side-by-side as he talked to them. “Just imagine that Pretzel escaped and is living with the other rats. If that makes you feel better.”

Kay nodded and Dark smiled as he dried Kay’s eyes, “I’m sorry we can’t have the pet you want, and maybe one day you’ll get to actually own a pet.”

Giving a small smile, Dark smiled back and smooth out Kay’s slight curly hair.

Then he turned to Yancy, “As for you.”

“What?” Yancy argued back.

“What were you thinking?” Dark demanded.

“Artie killed Pretzel an’ might use his book ta hurt Kay,” Yancy accused.

“How do you know he killed it?” Dark quizzed.

“Because he smashed a jar a bugs an’ he hit me,” Yancy answered as Dark just stoically stared at him.

When Yancy finished, Dark summoned up his favorite candy bar and held it up in front of the young boy.

“Listen to me, Yancy, you need to always protect your siblings, even if sometimes you have to protect them from each other.” Dark had the softest look in his eyes that Yancy had ever seen. When Yancy reached for the candy bar, Dark’s looked hardened and he pulled it away.

“This isn’t a free license to beat up on your brother, do you understand me?” Dark demanded.

“Yes,” Yancy replied earnestly.

Dark smiled and gave him the candy bar. Turning back to Will he said, “Well hopefully Arthur’s calmed down a bit. Can’t leave him in his room all day.”

Dark ripped open a portal in the Void and walked through it, leaving Wil to take the kids back to the living room where then TV was waiting for them.

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morfinwen · 5 years ago

Note

10 Facts: Lauren, Ian, Aidan, Ash, Avery, Nate, and Elarin, please!

Here’s your 70 (!) facts:

10 Facts about Lauren

1. She gets along best with her oldest and youngest brothers. She doesn't not get along with her sisters (sometimes), but their relationship can best be described as tolerance, and her closest brother Justin enjoys provoking her.

2. At one point she wanted to learn the flute, as it promised to be easier to carry around than the guitar, or the piano. Her parents couldn't afford to buy one.

3. She tried running away from home once at age eight, and considered making another attempt at age ten. Ian talked her out of it.

4. Her entire family, including aunts, uncles, cousins, and her older siblings' spouses and children, came to her college graduation. Almost all of them made it to the party her parents threw afterward. She nearly cried.

5. Lauren is always uncomfortable around her nieces and nephews -- she has four or five of them -- but if anyone made them cry, she'd punch that person in the face.

6. Knows more about comic book characters than her comic-loving brother Justin, thanks to hearing Ian talk about them in grade school, all the time. All. The. Time.

7. Got a few part-time jobs in retail in high school. She hated it, but it meant she had enough money to buy clothes that weren't hand-me-downs or from a thrift store, so she grit her teeth and kept at it.

8. She still got fired twice for losing her temper with a customer.

9. She got started smoking because her dad is an occasional smoker. He got diagnosed with lung cancer a few years ago. It's in remission, but despite multiple attempts, he hasn't managed to quit yet.

10. Her mother's had three miscarriages, Lauren was old enough to know about two of them. It's a strange concept, having a sibling that didn't even live to be born.

10 Facts about Ian

1. He has a decided type: tall, confident blonde women of principle. He's fallen in love more than once, though he tends to get over it fairly quickly.

2. Thanks to his dad's need to travel for work, he has funky little souvenirs from 48 states. Lauren has none, though she actually traveled out of state in childhood more than once, and Ian only did once he was an adult.

3. Ian theorizes his terrible sense of navigation comes from his mother, after a fashion. She's perfectly fine with directions, she just has an abysmal grasp of time. She's forever arriving half an hour to two hours late or early to appointments, and she will either take half or twice as long doing something as she says she will.

4. He has fond memories of almost two weeks with just his dad at home, when his mom was helping her parents out after her dad had surgery. They ate out almost every night, thanks to his dad being a nightmare in the kitchen, and he never went to bed on time.

5. Her terrible sense of time aside, bedtime is sacred to his mother, and she's fanatical about her son eating his vegetables. She doesn't know about those two weeks.

6. He once tried to start a dog-walking business when he was twelve. It was a terrible idea. No dogs were lost, but it was a near thing.

7. He's the only child of his maternal grandparents' only child, so they -- particularly his grandma -- tend to dote on him. They also know nothing about any children other than their daughter, so it’s not as great a thing as it might sound.

8. He has several aunts, uncles, and cousins on his dad's side, but Ian's only met one of his uncles once. He doesn't know why, exactly, but he's picked up that his dad had a rough childhood.

9. He talked Lauren out of her second attempt at running away completely by accident: he thought it sounded really cool, but all his suggestions just made it clear to Lauren how unfun it would actually be.

10. Regularly listens to the top 40 in the car, more to keep abreast of what's popular than because he likes it, though it has introduced him to some songs/artists he enjoys. He always has to turn off the radio if Lauren's riding with him.

10 Facts about Aidan

1. A big factor in his identity crisis was that, growing up, he didn't fully recognize he wasn't human. It's obvious now, of course.

2. Tried to enlist in 1941, after Pearl Harbor. He ... doesn't know if he actually served.

3. For as long as he can remember, he's always had this sense of where his sister is. It makes him wonder if his mother is dead, or something like it, since he's never been able to sense her.

4. Aidan generally gets along with Nate pretty well. This is surprising -- or, maybe not? -- given that Aidan has a really hard time understanding the concept of death.

5. Aidan has a lot of trouble with certain concepts in general, like that other people need more than 4-5 hours sleep, he should really let people know before he disappears for a few weeks, and that rules about not touching personal property don't just apply to the things he wouldn't touch anyway.

6. Given the things he's willing to do, or has done, some people might think he has no sense of dignity. He does, he just doesn't care that much.

7. The second-least accepting of having Q in the house, mostly out of a sense of loyalty to Nate, the least accepting. It had nothing to do with Q personally.

8. Until he met Ash, he'd never met anyone who had any idea what species he was. It seems incredibly obvious in hindsight.

9. Considers himself a lapsed Episcopalian.

10. When he finally went back to his hometown, nearly fifty years after he'd left, there was almost nothing left of it. It left him with a greater sense of loss than anything had before. Which wasn't a lot -- very little makes Aidan sad for very long -- but it was notable.

10 Facts about Ash

1. Ash's mother did not know her father, grew up with three sisters, and her own mother had two sisters and no brothers. She fully intended on having a daughter. Having a son was a surprise, but one she adapted to quite well.

2. Until he helped his great-aunt with managing her finances, Ash didn't really know how money worked. As it is, he knows how to make the numbers come out right, but that's pretty much it.

3. His grandmother laid down the law in his house, and even her adult daughters were careful to follow every mandate. She was fair, but stern.

4. Appearance-wise, he takes after his father more than his mother's side of the family, though judging by his aunt Iris that's where his height comes from.

5. He's not as close to his aunt Lily as he is to his mother or aunt Daisy, but whenever he was having a bad day he'd sit in her parlor and listen to her play the piano.

6. He knows he has a few cousins on his father's side, but he's never met them. His dad never figured out how to explain to his family that he had a son with the woman that did "work" on his truck once a year, so they don't even know he exists.

7. Since he knows how to manage Lanzo, most people assume he knows him well. He doesn't. He really doesn't. Lanzo just listens to Ash more than others for some reason.

8. Ash gives the best hugs. Everyone agrees on this point.

9. It sometimes baffles him that someone as intelligent as Connie can forget to eat or sleep.

10. His aunt Iris taught him to read poetry and monologues/soliloquies from Shakespeare aloud. He doesn't do it often, but if he needs to distract himself or someone else, or in certain other rare circumstances, it's quite effective.

10 Facts about Avery

1. Despite all the negatives associated with Anders being a former Grey Warden, Avery is honestly relieved that it makes it unlikely they will ever have children.

2. Avery thinks of Merrill as a younger sister, Aveline as an older one, can't imagine a better drinking buddy than Isabela, and has a great deal of admiration for Fenris after everything he's been through. That said, every single one of them gets on her nerves sometimes, and there have been moments where she wished she had never met them.

3. There's a moment in the game where Fenris implies that Avery might feel negatively about mages, after one murdered her mother. I actually spun around in the game to see if i could yell talk to him after that -- no such luck. Fenris was sent home immediately afterward, and didn't hear from Avery for two weeks. He came very close to never hearing from her again.

4. She relives memories in her dreams, sometimes pleasant ones, sometimes not. It makes mornings difficult, either way.

5. She's not much of a reader, but even if she was she'd never touch Varric's novels about her. She knows they're dramatized, but the idea still makes her uneasy.

6. Isabela never came back after stealing the Qunari relic. Avery never would have handed her over to the arishok -- she respects them as intelligent beings, but no further -- but given everything that happened after that theft, she's not sure she could have forgiven Isabela for it.

7. Her Chantry attendance is not very good, and gets worse over time. She believes in the Maker and Andraste and all that, but not with any passion.

8. She knows nothing about healing, her bedside manner is lacking (unless all you want is witty comments), and she's nowhere near methodical enough to handle medicines and supplies, but she helps out Anders' clinic in whatever way she can.

9. Cats are obnoxious, aloof, oversized rats that make her nose run and her eyes water, but if things in Kirkwall had been slightly more settled at any point, she would have let Anders have as many as he wanted. That's how much she loves him.

10. Growing up, her younger brother Carver got on her nerves, constantly. Apart from the guilt she feels over his death, her biggest regret is that they were never able to forge a better relationship as adults.

10 Facts about Nate

1. His dad died when he was seven. He has no particular memories of the man.

2. Has contemplated probably more than a dozen careers, mostly as a kid -- action movie star, paleontologist, professional skateboarder, astronaut, etc. Didn't settle on audio engineering until his sophomore year of college.

3. Loves both of his younger siblings, but he always got along better with his sister (María) than his brother (Víctor). She's very much the sweet, friendly type, whereas his brother is much more competitive and rebellious.

4. Low-key resents both his father and stepfather for never really being there for him, his stepfather moreso, since he at least had a choice about the distance he kept.

5. His stepfather is a mage, which is why Nate's a ghost now. It takes extensive contact with the occult for a human to remain as a ghost after death.

6. He loves his mama, but she was always anxious, particularly about raising her children in a big city, and a bit smothering. That's part of the reason he moved away for college.

7. He's never been religious, and during college all his friends were calling themselves atheists so he did too. While he's angry with any god that would let him die so young, if an all-powerful deity spontaneously generated that bus specifically to run him down, that would be preferable to learning there's nothing after death, and that his afterlife means as little as his actual life.

8. Knows a bunch of random trivia from watching Jeopardy with his siblings -- there were always reruns when it was too early to go to bed but too late to be outside.

9. He's always made friends easily, made more evident by his ability to build relationships with everyone in the house even in the midst of post-death depression.

10. He and his friends were extras in a movie once, as it was filming at their school. If it's ever on TV, he makes sure to watch the scene where they're skateboarding in the background.

10 Facts about Elarin

1. Like her parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and likely even earlier ancestors, she was born in space, on the freighter her parents worked on: her father was a mechanic, her mother worked in security.

2. She had a lot of siblings, older and younger, but she was the only one to be taken by the Jedi.

3. While she never liked being lied to, it wasn't until she learned how much the Jedi had lied to her about who she was that she developed such a hatred for it.

4. People closer than acquaintances can call her Arin. Her childhood nickname was Ella, but only Bastila, Meaghan, and Carth can call her that.

5. She's always viewed orders by authority as "suggestions". It's caused a few problems.

6. Elarin has a very charismatic presence, drawing a lot of attention and winning people over very quickly. She uses it occasionally, but she's never understood why she has it.

7. She's made the attempt more than once, but she's never managed to fully understand why her previous self fell to the dark side. She isn't sure if that's a good or bad thing.

8. While she's brilliant at war strategy, tactics is one of the few things she's neither excellent or terrible at, and during the wars she had to rely on her advisors to help her with them.

9. She can't remember anything about Malak from before, so all she really knows of him is his Darth Malak self. She still feels guilty about her part in that.

10. Because canon is dumb (and not even canon anymore), Elarin did leave after the events of KotOR 1 to investigate things from her past, but she returned not long after the events of KotOR 2. As far as official records are concerned, however, the former Darth Revan never returned from beyond the Outer Rim, fate unknown.

Thanks for asking!

#ask #answer #OCs #lauren winston #ian grayson #aidan michaels #ash jackson #nate vasquez #avery hawke (dragon age 2)#elarin (knights of the old republic)#valiantarcher

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emybain · 6 years ago

Text

Renegades Titanic AU Part 6

me? writing? sorry, don’t know her.

part 1 part 2 part 3 part 4 part 5

A Real Party

The clock chimed nine times. Nova jiggled her leg nervously, hugging herself and avoiding eye contact with people that passed by her. She was standing on the middle landing of the grand stairwell, the one she had descended down earlier and into Adrian’s arms, leaning against the railing behind her. She had been much more confident when she had been around Adrian or one of his friends, able to pull off having money despite barely having any. Now she was alone, and her inferiority, or society’s idea of inferiority, she should say, was beginning to weigh on her shoulders.

She should never have given Adrian that note, never should have written it. He wasn’t going to come, and neither would his friends. They had better things to do than to be around someone like her.

Heels clacked on the steps behind her, and she turned, ready to apologize for being in the way to whoever was coming up. But as she was opening her mouth, she was met with Adrian Everhart. Behind him was Danna, Ruby, and Oscar. All were smiling at her, albeit looking somewhat confused.

Nova’s eyes glanced over the four of them, feeling something turn over in her chest.

“So,” she said, taking in a shaky breath, “do you want to go to a real party?”

_____

Sometimes Nova wondered if poor people were truly happier than those with money. They certainly partied like they did.

She had brought the others down to the third class quarters and to the general room where she knew there’d be some kind of celebration going on. There had been for the last two nights, Nova only knowing of it from passing by the room on her way back to her cabin and because the walls on that part of the ship were so paper thin she could hear the music and laughter from her bed. And tonight, as she guessed correctly, was no different.

There was a band settled on one side of the room, complete with multiple string instruments, drums, spoons, and an instrument that she was unfamiliar with. People danced where there was room, and in no sophisticated manner. They jumped and twirled and danced with multiple people at once. Some chose to listen to the music and watch the dancers, clapping along with enthusiasm. Others stood or sat, chatting with one another or joking or playing card games as they drank cheap beer. There was such a variety of people here, compared to what Nova had seen in first class. Much livelier, as well. No one seemed to care that the beer was bad or that their clothing had holes in them or that when they would return to their cabins in a couple of hours, there was a chance of there being a rat in their bed.

Nova had a plan, of course, other than to just party all night. She needed to make sure that Adrian and his friends trusted her more before beginning her interrogations. And what better way than bringing them into her world, or at least, what they needed to believe was her world. That being poor wasn’t always a bad thing.

She sat at a table with some northern Europeans, who didn’t speak English, and Danna, who sat beside Nova, looking just as out of place as Nova had felt in first class. Yet she was smiling and clapping, cheering on Adrian, Oscar, and Ruby, who were all dancing. Oscar and Ruby danced together, twirling around the room in pandemonium and without a care, flush against one another and visibly laughing. Adrian, on the other hand, found a partner in a little girl who had been eyeing him since they had all shown up. When Nova had mentioned it to him, he spent no time in hesitating to ask her to dance, to which she nodded shyly. Nova watched, sipping her drink and smiling slightly. He was so careful with her, but was also exaggerating every dance move. It was mostly just him spinning her around him, but she was in a fit of giggles nonetheless. He had taken off his coat jacket, leaving his upper body in just a white button up and suspenders. Somehow, the look suited him more than anything she had seen him wear.

A crash alerted Nova. Her back straightened, and her eyes fled to the source of the noise. Her hand was pointed down toward her ankle where she had placed a knife, just in case she needed to defend herself. But upon noticing the drunken man who had fallen be helped up and clapped on the shoulder, then started dancing once more, she couldn’t help but let a laugh escape her. Definitely not like the upstairs crowd.

“That’s one crazy son of a bitch.” Nova turned to Danna, who had apparently been watching the scene as well. There was humor in the other girl’s eyes, although Nova had expected judgemental ones.

“Welcome to third class,” Nova replied, unsure of quite what she could say. It wasn’t like she knew any of these people well enough to speak for all of them. “We’re all crazy sons of bitches here.” She raised her beer glass, and after a moment’s hesitation, Danna raised hers to clink it against Nova’s.

The song ended then, and just as people began clapping, another started up, this one even livelier and vibrant than the last, if that were possible. Nova clapped for Adrian, Oscar, and Ruby as they headed over to her and Danna. Adrian held the little girl’s hand, and upon reaching the table, knelt down to her height, although he had to bend over a little more to get to eye level.

“I’m going to dance with that pretty girl now, alright?” He pointed to Nova, and the little girl followed his hand. Her eyes dropped to the ground, shy, not one second after meeting Nova’s. But she nodded, and then she was gone, swept away by her mother who kissed her cheeks over and over. Nova watched the pair go, a slight pain over her chest.

And then Adrian was in front of her, pulling her up by the hand and away from the safety of the table and the northerners that Nova still couldn’t understand.

“Adrian,” Nova tugged on his arm, but he still dragged her to the center of the room, “Adrian, stop.”

“What?” There was such a brightness on his face, such happiness that Nova hadn’t seen until now. She suspected it had been a long time since anyone had seen it.

“I can’t do this. I-I...I don’t know this dance.” She didn’t know any dance, truthfully.

Adrian shrugged. “Neither do I.” The music began to intensify. “We’re going to have to get a little bit closer.” His hand went to her waist, pulling her closer to him until they were nearly chest to chest. Nova felt her face heat up, and not because of the dozens of sweaty bodies in the small room. She tried not to think of how she could feel his muscles under his shirt or how warm and fitting his hand in hers was. “Just go with it.”

Adrian’s ‘just go with it’ was very different than what Nova had in mind.

Nova screeched as he led them, practically hopping, around the room in all directions. She heard herself shout out “wait!” about a dozen times because he would change direction on her or they would almost run into a wall or a piece of furniture or another person or she lost her footing and nearly stumbled to the filthy floor. But soon enough, she found herself laughing. Every time they almost hit someone, she giggled, the cool air on her face from moving quickly was refreshing, every spin was enlightening.

Spotting Oscar and Ruby up on a raised level near the center of the room, Adrian led Nova over to them and pulled her up behind him. Immediately, the smile vanished from Nova’s face, and she started protesting. There were too many eyes on them now. Adrian just shook his head, the widest smile on his lips, and started doing a sort of jig dance beside Nova. She watched him, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. The corner of her lip started to curl up, and before she could tell herself how stupid she was acting, that it was the alcohol causing her to act this way, she lifted her dress up slightly and slipped her heels off, tossing them to a woman who was watching them and clapping. Nova kept her skirts up, just over her calves, and mimicked Adrian’s dance, at least to the best of her ability. It was his turn to watch her, and the look he gave her nearly made her snort. He did another little dance, to which Nova responded by kicking her feet out and spinning around.

They were both laughing now, and Adrian reached out to link arms with her so they were facing opposite directions. They spun around a few times before switching arms, and then Adrian let go and grabbed both of her hands, facing her now. When he started spinning them, Nova’s eyes widened.

“Adrian, no.” But he just laughed as always. They sped up, Nova feeling as if she were going to fall backwards and get hurt. Unable to take the spinning room anymore, she squeezed her eyes shut, a laugh that sounded more like a scream escaping her mouth.

A lightheaded feeling washed over her body, even as the song ended and people clapped and Adrian led Nova off the platform and to the table where Danna still sat, now speaking with a young lady. Beside them were a group of men, the northerners from before and some of their new friends. They were drinking beer and smoking and arm wrestling. Nova held back an eye roll. Another song started up, and Oscar and Ruby were still dancing. How they had so much energy, Nova had no clue.

Adrian reached over the men for their drinks, or what Nova hoped was their drinks, and handed Nova’s to her, which she gladly accepted. It wasn’t until the glass was placed in her hands until she realized how dry her throat was. She took a large swig, and had to bring the drink down after seeing the incredulous look on Adrian’s face.

She grinned. “What?”

He shook his head. “Nothing...it’s just you’re so-UMPH-” He stumbled forward then, spilling his still-full beer on Nova. She gasped, stepping back, but overcame her shock to push back the drunk man who had knocked into Adrian and telling him to get lost.

“Are you alright?” Adrian asked, eyebrows scrunched together as his eyes roamed her drenched body. Nova chuckled, pushing a wet strand of hair out of her eyes.

“I’m fine. Trust me, I’ve dealt with way worse.” She placed a hand on his arm, feeling bold. His muscles tensed underneath her fingers, but relaxed almost just as quickly.

A roar of cheers brought her attention to the table before them, where one of the men beat the other in the arm wrestling contest. The loser, cigarette between his lips, began demanding for a rematch, although he was grinning. Nova looked over at Danna, who met her eyes and shook her head, as if to say, “Men, am I right?” Nova quirked her lips up and returned her gaze to the men, who were about to wrestle once more. She purposefully reached over them, setting her drink down.

“So,” she cleared her throat and grabbed the loser’s cigarette, taking a short drag. He gaped up at her. “You think you’re big, tough men, huh? Move over.” She pushed the loser out of his seat, pulling him out of his astonishment enough to start protesting. The winner, a tall, broad-shouldered man with big hands looked at Nova as if she were joking. But Nova raised her elbow up onto the table, wet from spilled beer. She narrowed her eyes at the man in front of her until he sighed and gave in, reaching over to clasp hands with Nova. People gathered around to watch, clearly intrigued at the burly man willing to arm wrestle a girl half his height in a sparkly gown.

Behind her, she heard Adrian and Danna cheering her on, and eventually, the voices of Oscar and Ruby as well as the voices of strangers, mostly female. The man had had a cocky smile on his face before they began, but now, the smile was wiped from his face as he eyes burned a hole into the back of Nova’s hand, as if he were trying to get it to fall back and hit the table with his mind. He was strong, Nova would give him that, definitely stronger than her, but physical strength was only a minor obstacle when one was determined enough. She gritted her teeth, pouring every ounce of her weight and willpower into her arm, feeling the strain of her muscles start to fight back. The people cheering the man on got louder as her arm started tipping backwards, and his cocky expression returned. Nova glared at her hand, pushing more adrenaline and all her might into it until it was back at perpendicular to the table. Feeling a rush of cockiness herself, she grinned at the man as her arm started tipping the other way. A bead of sweat dripped down beside her eye. He was fighting back, but Nova didn’t want to entertain him any longer. Her heartbeat in her bicep, roaring in her ears, she mustered any remaining strength into her fight. The table shook as his hand slammed down onto it. Behind her, hands clapped her shoulders and shook her back and forth in excitement. The man stared in disbelief at his hand for a moment before turning his wide eyes to Nova, demanding that they go two out of three rounds, that he let her win. Nova shook her head, the corners of her lips at each ear.

“Losers don’t get second chances in war, my friend.” She stood and reached out to shake his hand, which he reluctantly accepted, avoiding looking at her. His friends all looked at Nova as if she had just grown a second head. The egos of men could be so fragile.

“How did you do that?” Nova turned, smiling widely at Ruby, who looked as if she had just witnessed God coming down from Heaven. Danna, Oscar, and Adrian all held similar expressions of awe.

Nova rubbed her arm, the soreness starting to kick in. “Sheer determination and a lot of alcohol?” She laughed, although the real reason was hours spent training to fight, training to defend herself, training to defeat the very people who stood before her now, amazed by her abilities.

The music then changed once more, and Nova’s feat was forgotten. A line of people passed by them, holding hands as they ran around the room. Ruby clapped and grabbed the hand of the last person in the line, which led to Oscar being pulled in, then Danna, who grabbed at Nova, and finally Adrian. They ran around the room in this line, sometimes stumbling, and Nova couldn’t hold back her laughter. It’s from the alcohol, she tried to convince herself.

And not because she was actually having fun in the company of her enemies.

______

Compared to the stuffy third class general room, it was chilly outside. But it was refreshing nonetheless. Nova breathed in the cool air, despite it hurting her lungs.

It was well after midnight, and Nova was walking back to the first class area with the others, upon their request. Due to the time, it would be indecent for her to appear inside with them, but she could still walk them back. And besides, it gave her a chance to actually talk to them, seeing as Nova hadn’t gotten the chance to in between dancing and drinking.

“I hope you all don’t get into any trouble because of me,” Nova said, in regards to the late time. “I had no idea those parties could go on for so long.”

“Have you never been to one before tonight?” Danna looked over at her, eyebrow raised.

Nova shook her head. “No. I only knew of them because I’ve heard them the past two nights through the walls. They aren’t very thick, you see. "Danna nodded, although there was still a suspicious look on her face. Nova licked her lips. “I’ve never been one for parties, but even I was bored out of my mind earlier, and I figured all of you would enjoy a bit of fun.”

“It was amazing,” Ruby exclaimed, letting out a big sigh and tilting her head up to the sky. She clutched the jacket, which Oscar had given her, around her arms. “Woah, look at the stars! They’re so pretty, right Oscar?” There was the slightest stumbling between words here and there, and Nova had to chuckle. Either the girl couldn’t handle her alcohol very well, or she was overly tired, or a mixture of both.

“Right. Beautiful,” Oscar agreed, although he was only looking at Ruby. They wandered a little from the group, opening up their own conversation. Nova watched them for a moment before turning to Adrian.

“Are they...:?”

“Nope.” Adrian shook his head. “Although they way they act sometimes, like tonight, you would think otherwise.” Nova hummed in reply.

A short wind from the water blew through, sending goosebumps up Nova’s bare arms. She rubbed at them in an attempt to warm up. Adrian started briefly, then shed his jacket quickly and wrapped it around her, blushing.

“I’m terribly sorry, I should’ve done this earlier.” Nova jolted at the sudden action, but welcomed the warmth he left in the jacket. It smelled like him, too. “Oh! Um, thank you.”

The trio were quiet after that, watching Oscar and Ruby ahead of them chatter away. Nova needed to be asking questions, but she had a feeling that with Danna around, she wouldn’t get much done. The girl seemed to see right through Nova McLain and right to Nova Artino, and Nova couldn’t give anything away to prove her suspicions. No, she would simply have to get Adrian alone at some point, or not at all.

Too soon did they arrive to the first class entrance door.

“I would like to thank you for having me at dinner tonight, Adrian.” Nova offered a kind smile, reserved in comparison to the many she exhibited not an hour ago. “And my thanks to the rest of you for making me feel welcome when I definitely did not fit in.” She meant it as a joke, but received only a soft chuckle from everyone.

“Thank you for having us,” replied Ruby, who was leaning into Oscar. She yawned loudly. “I don’t think I’ve had that much fun in years.” Oscar, Danna, and Adrian all nodded and agreed.

“I hope we get to see more of each other, Nova.” Oscar nodded at her. “You’re a pretty refreshing person to be around, amid all the nose pickers we know.”

Nova said goodbyes to all of them, going up to Adrian last. She opened her mouth, prepared to say the same thing as she had to the other three, when he turned to his friends.

“You guys go ahead and go in without me. I’ll catch up in a bit, okay?”

“It’s your funeral,” Danna replied, but nonetheless, she opened the door to first class and ushered Oscar and Ruby inside. Nova pretended not to see the wink Oscar shot at Adrian over his shoulder before the door closed behind him.

“Are you going to walk me back, or something, Mr. Everhart?” Nova was only teasing, but a small part of her hoped that was why he stayed behind.

“If that’s what you want, then yes.” The way he said it so seriously sent goosebumps up her arm. She turned from him and headed over to the railing.

“What a gentleman,” she mused. He came up behind her, and she turned to face him, back leaning against the rail. Her eyes widened suddenly. “Oh! I completely forgot about Ruby’s dress! How should I get it back to her?”

Adrian shook his head, chuckling. “I’ll bring it up to her and see what she wants to do, but knowing her, she’ll probably just let you keep it, insisting she has too many anyway.”

“And where, do you suppose, would I wear something like this?” Nova gestured down at the dress.

“Tea with the Queen?” She snorted at that, causing his smile to widen.

Focus, a voice in the back of her head snapped. Nova bit the inside of her cheek.

“So,” she crossed her arms over her chest, “what are your plans when we make it to the states?”

Adrian tilted his head to the side. “My plans, or my father’s plans?” Nova mentally kicked herself, having forgotten that he knew what she was. Who she was allies with. Fine. She would just have to play dumb.

Nova batted her eyelashes and pursed her lips. “Yours, of course. Unless you would care to share the latter.”

He eyed her suspiciously for a moment. Nova raised an eyebrow, refusing to break. “I’m not quite sure. My parents are planning something big, I know, on the east coast, but they refuse to share any knowledge with me or my brother. I would like to focus on my art, but Hugh believes it’s not a sustainable living.”

“You have a brother?” Nova leaned forward. This was new information, something not even Ingrid knew.

Adrian took the slightest step back, hardly noticeable, if it had been anyone besides Nova. “Yes. His name’s Max.”

“Why haven’t I seen him around? How old is he?”

“He’s ten, but you would think much older with his mind.” His eyes grew soft. “He’s sick, you see, and can’t risk being around other people. Even the slightest of coughs can put him on bed rest for weeks, you see.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” Nova dropped her eyes to the wood flooring of the deck. “Are the two of you close?”

Adrian chuckled. “Very, although with his condition, it’s not always easy to see him.”

“I hope I can meet him one day. He sounds wonderful.”

“He’d like that.” Adrian paused, then cleared his throat. “What about you? Why are you returning to America?”

To break her uncle out of prison and defeat her enemies. “Europe just didn’t have what I was looking for, I suppose.” She shrugged.

“And what might that be?”

“Something I can’t have.” Nova searched his face, heart skipping a beat in her chest.

“You know, I didn’t expect you to be the complete opposite of them.” Nova took note of how he inched the slightest bit closer, head tilting down only a little.

“You’re not like them either,” she murmured, voice catching in her throat. They both referred to vastly different ‘thems’, but they both understood what the other meant. “Completely and utterly not what I expected.”

Adrian closed his eyes and leaned down then. A surge of panic moved through Nova’s body, and she took a step back. She let this go too far, far away from her original plans. She took off his coat and pushed it into his arms, welcoming the cold air onto her bared shoulders. It helped knock her back into her senses. Adrian opened his eyes and blinked down at the jacket in confusion, then up at Nova.

Nova took a ragged breath. “I, um...I need to go. They’re waiting on me, I’m sure.”

She squeezed past him, but stopped when he grabbed her arm.

“Nova, wait I-”

“Goodnight, Adrian.” She slowly pulled her arm out of his grasp and turned, putting as much distance as she could between them. She refused to look back.

#renegades #archenemies #nova artino #Adrian everhart #nodrian #Oscar silva #ruby tucker #tuckva #danna bell #anarchists #my writing #this is so bad im sorry but also not sorry bc crack fics are never good #and that's the tea

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steve0discusses · 6 years ago

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Yugioh S4 Episode 2: Rebecca...She’s back, I guess?

So I got hella sick this week so it’s...just one update this weekend. The rest of the next update has the caps done but then the copy I was putting together got very distracted about which Founding Father was the hottest and I think that was the Dayquil? I barely know what day of the week it is rn. I think it’s Saturday, is it Saturday?

Anyway, we’re battling that Monocle guy. Gurimo? Yeah his name is Gurimo. I honestly can’t remember him saying his name even once, so thanks Google for the help.

It’s a new season so not only did we suck all the power out of God Cards but now you can’t use them anymore with the new glowing green mechanic. The writers really did just...a lot to make it so God Cards are no longer relevant. Like they buried them so far.

This guy repeats himself quite a lot about being soul hungry? Yeah I watched all of Sailor Moon so like, I’m super up to date on my soul energy anime. I’ve walked this path before I know it well.

(read more under the cut)

Such a shame we can’t read those stats which may just be Hebrew letters in lorem ipsum (note that when Pegasus makes you a card, you don’t get to have stats) but it’s nice to know that, if you wanted to, you could play Rex and Weevil in universe of the show and something would happen.

Anyway, Gurimo lost, his eyes went all glowy red at some point, and decided to go out throwing stuff because it’s Yugioh and you have to throw cards at least 3 times a season, its in the contract.

Don’t think about physics guys, just trust that cards can do this on a roof where there’s no wind for some reason.

And then he went up in a green ball of glory. It was nice of the green beam of soul energy to wait until the impossible card toss was over.

Lol this show and how it just kills people on screen just...all the time. All the freakin time. Can’t show a gun, but murder as many people as you like. It’s OK, his soul is in a paper card so he’s not *really* dead. That won’t terrify children under the age of 10.

So Pharaoh decides to do the tactic of telling a bunch of motorcycle gang edgy kids (adults? not sure about those three) that stealing is Wrong.

They also, youknow, are implicit in murdering Rex and Weevil but youknow, stealing is wrong and the God Cards don’t belong to them and Pharaoh is shook that these kids won’t keep their end of their bargain that whoever wins the card fight keeps the cards.

So basically Gurimo died for freakin nothing.

Welcome back to the fold, Rex and Weevil, apparently this show isn’t done with you yet. I was pretty much done with both of you 3 seasons ago but alas, you will be back, with your raspy as hell voice acting, at the beginning of S5. I am sure of it.

(PS I just noticed I spelled resurrect wrong and I know I should go back into photoshop but like...I’m too sick to care at this moment so maybe I’ll change it in the next week or so I dunno, I’m just gonna post this thing so I can feel like I did something productive today.)

And so these kids decide the police are never going to freakin show up to the rooftop brawl where a guy super died and several children were endangered and a huge beam of light you can see from space went out like a bat signal to the rest of the city of “ps, something bad is happening over here, if any of you adults feel like helping out these four high school drop outs? Nobody?”

First, they decide to keep this horrible thing:

(which second thought is not SO surprising, because Yugi clearly loves hoarding dead people)

And then this other horrible thing:

Why would you keep these? Why would you do this?

I mean Yugi’s got such specific dark tastes that I wouldn’t be half surprised if his closet is filled with dozens and dozens of rat skulls he collected from the subway station.

And then the next day, Yugi decided to just like watch Joey and Tristan dangle Rex and Weevil like puppets. It just seemed super unnecessary.

Like Yugi isn’t even Pharaoh right now but he’s absolutely fine with these guys getting shook around. Yugi is all sorts of gray area in this show and I’m glad that’s never changed although sometimes it’s like “Is Yugi slowly turning into a mob boss? Because I’m down, but also somewhat concerned?”

Anyway, the God Cards aren’t even here anymore so we say farewell to Rex and Weevil who seem just as confused at how the hell you can steal a God Card as we are.

*not entirely sure where Rex and Weevil are from. I’ve been assuming the UK or the US but like...maybe they live here? I don’t even know.

And then Chibiusa--I mean Rebecca showed up.

Ah, remember this plot point from S1? What if she shows up and (according to Bro) Just never leaves?

I’m coming to terms with this. Anyway, Rebecca’s only purpose seems to be as a part of a (love????) triangle (square????) between Yugi and Tea but like...

And maybe this is the Dayquil speaking but...

Is this even weird?

Seriously, they’re family friends, why is this weird? Maybe it’s because one of Rebecca’s core traits is that she’s American and I’m also an American so I don’t even see a problem with Rebecca and how she acts (since she’s a freakin child with a crush on a card-famous person) but like what small child see her friend she hasn’t seen in 2 years and is not going to hug him?

Anyway, Yugi was the worst to not remember this chick. Maybe his brain looks like a box of loose packing peanuts (I say as a metaphor remembering that his brain literally looks like an Escher painting screensaver), but he can’t remember this chick from just 2 years ago that he gave his rarest card to? The chick who’s grandfather had that blue-eyes he gave to Yugi’s Grandfather? The chick who’s grandfather helped his grandfather get that necklace around Yugi’s neck? The necklace he wears every single day and is super cursed by?

How do you forget the Hawkins when they are part of the reason everyone thinks you’re losing your mind?

But I guess she looks older now and got a pair of glasses (bifocals????). She No longer has her hair in pigtails but, I dunno, she looks basically the same to me since she’s still about the same size as Yugi but wtv.

And then Yugioh was like “Listen everyone, we’re very tired of all of your angry reviews, and I see y’all are saying we never do romance, well get ready, we know how to do romance really well, get ready for it, we can make things move faster than a snail in wet cement, just watch.”

Because somehow, after Yugi was the biggest asshole ever to Rebeca, I guess she figured like “well, at least you’re still card famous”

You know what? I have several girlfriends who I am not dating, but, if it’s been a couple weeks since they’ve seen me last, will give me a huge as drunk hug on my arm and go “MY LOVE MY GIRLFRIEND MARRY ME” and like...Again I’m American so maybe this is just my culture here in California?

I’d like to believe that Rebecca is just messing with these people because she can.

Ps I’m pretty sure this girl was 6 last time we saw her but they decided...we better age her up if it’s gonna be a romance but they only made her 12. OK show. Yugi’s pushing 17 at this point so like...barely even logical. I’d say legal but I’m thinking more of just logic at this point because the last time we saw this girl she was holding a teddy bear (which we can guarantee is probably still shoved into her luggage)

...OK, show...

Now listen listen listen. All ships are fine here. I’m not gonna go after shipping because like, c’mon, it’s 2019. If you stan Rebecca and Yugi, go for it, why not? I’ve said it before, and my feelings haven’t really changed, I’m immune to shipping, so I feel absolutely no different with Rebecca and Yugi than I do with Tea and Yugi. I think Tea makes more sense, but that’s not saying very much because literally anyone else on this cast who isn’t related to him could probably work. Go ahead and bring back Mako Tsunami. There’d be a fun pair.

Bro got very excited when I mentioned a MakoxYugi pairing just now ps.

But it really does feel like this ship has the dynamic of the Usagi/Chibiusa/Mamaru ship from Sailor Moon where Usagi was always jealous of small little Chibiusa spending time with Mamaru who was her OWN DAD. Why would you EVER be jealous of a 12 year old girl hanging with your boy...friend? Tea is a 17ish year old ballerina who never, ever wears full pants. She’d have this in the bag if she ever decided to like...do anything with...this. And I don’t blame Tea for never doing anything with “this” because like...look at “this.”

I just don’t think the writing team knows how to write a competent love triangle (square) but...this exists now. They even had Rebecca decide to dress nearly identically to Tea as a demonstration of her devotion but like...it honestly comes off more that this small child just admires Tea. Because she’s 12.

Yugi is just babysitting this girl for his Grandfather and it feels like the writing team just had to have the girls be all catty at eachother. Because it’s a kids show. Gotta have those girls all catty. Can’t let them be friends.

Anyway, back at this museum that these kids visit so freakin often, you’d think they’d change their home address, we meet up with the granddads in question.

Ah, now Ishizu is no longer with us, Exposition Grandpa is here to take the torch. Can’t wait for that.

And I made his font gray because I freakin give up. Grandpa Hawkins might change his font color every episode. I...I’m figuring it out.

And then, every helicopter in Domino shed a single tear.

Wow. I’ve been so mad for so many seasons that they never use a freakin seaplane to cross the ocean that when they actually do I’m like...kind of disappointed?

I mean it’s not shaped like a dragon, but I will take this perfectly acceptable seaplane.

I can’t believe they drew a normal ass plane. on this show.

*Waits patiently for it to turn into a blimp next episode*

Anyway, if you just got here, this is a link to read all the caps in chrono order. There’s over 3 seasons of this. Y’all I’ve done over 100 episodes.

#Yugioh #Ygo #episode recap #photo recap #Yugi Muto #Rebecca Hawkins #Tea Gardner #Joey Wheeler #Gurimo #The biker guys I think one is called valon or something #tristan taylor #grandpa muto #grandpa hawkins #so I found out only the first 5 tags are searchable so I don't know why Im bothering writing so many tags other than it's fun #S4 #Ep2

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manicpixiedreamgurl182 · 5 years ago

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A week before Christmas our family received devastating news. My step mother, the woman who has raised me since I was 11 when my biologic mother was not around, the woman who gave me a little sister, and a little brother- was diagnosed with stage 3 lung cancer. Ever since then it has been a world wind fight at which just a month later she has lost. It was quick, it was sudden, devastating and so very unexpected. My last conversation with her was on January 23rd, 2020 @ 750pm where I called to check on her as she had just completed her first round of chemo and radiation the prior day. Sadly in my line of work it is incredibly difficult to get time off when there are so many cases that need me....

I asked her how she was feeling and she replied "I actually feel really good, probably the best I've felt in weeks" as she went on for the next 10 minutes cracking jokes and acting like it was no big deal as she always did when it came to us kids.

I woke up the next morning to the text message that changed everything. Sadly due to the complications of her cancer type and surgery, my step mothers body struggled with blood clots and then losing blood due to her being on blood thinners. A ct reviled she had suffered a major stroke and we received the news as a family that our mama bear wouldn't be coming home with/to us.

My little sister was with her for every single step of the way, a position no child should ever have to be in but kayla reported for her mother through every single appointment, losing hours of work and sleep to stand by her mother's side with grace and selflessness.. She was not alone, and she knows how very loved she was as dozens came by to support our family and say their final goodbyes.

I don't want this post to be completely sad as it feels impossible to make it anything but that at this time. Hugged your loved ones, no matter what you have gone through- drop the grudge and tell them you love them.

I never got to properly thank her.

Thank you for making my childhood fun.

Thank you for teaching me how to French braid.

Thank you for always saying yes to sleepovers with dozens of my annoying friends, and helping kayla and I sneak them in - knowing that dad had said no.

Thank you for all the home cooked meals,before you came along dad's bachelor stage meant the only protein I ever got was from a pizza roll.

Thank you for taking me to get school clothes and coming to my choir and band concerts.

Thank you for evan and for telling kayla "she isnt that weird give her a chance".

Thank you for telling me what a period was and showing me how to utilize a tampon when I locked myself in our bathroom and cried because I thought I was bleeding from my ass.

Thank you for gossiping about which boy I should date and why for hours on end while we folded mountains of laundry.

Thank you for making the call that saved my life.

Thank you for coming to see me and pick me up every other weekend and hanging out with me while I was in foster care.

Thank you for standing by my side when I wanted to get married.

Thank you for being there at the airport when I left for germany.

Thank you for landing me my first real job and for helping to teach me how to drive.

Thank you for being the middle man when kayla and I were so mad at one another we couldn't speak and always helping to resolve it.

Thank you for climbing a snow covered hill when you were pregnant because I broke my ankle.

Thank you for picking me up from school when I got suspended and covering for me so I didnt get in trouble with dad.

Thank you for dying my hair when dad said I wasn't allowed, and for making me laugh when you ratted yourself out by not wearing gloves and staining your hands pink for a week.

Thank you for dragging me out of the house when my grandma died and pushing me around in a shopping cart for hours on end yelling dumb stuff to cheer me up.

I didnt know a love like the love I had for you, because I didnt know that kind of love before you. And I know I will never know a love like that again.

Melissa, my Maggie- endless thank yous from now and into the beyond for being the best mother I could have ever dreamed of.

I love you,

I miss you, I'll be seeing you

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alarawriting · 6 years ago

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Inktober 2019 #3 - Bait

TW for attempted child molestation, implication that it was more than “attempted” in the past.

This one was hard, and I feel like it kind of trails off rather than ending. Which probably means it wants to be a much larger piece, not a ficlet, but Inktober’s about doing the ficlets, so oh well. I may expand it at some point in the future.

Minna was very, very reluctant to let Jasmine come to her house for a sleepover; Jasmine had to work on her for most of the school year, despite Minna coming over Jasmine’s house over a dozen times. But finally, in May, Minna agreed. “My dad’s going to be out of town,” she said, “so you can come over this weekend.”

“I don’t understand why I can’t come over when your dad’s around?”

“Uh, my dad likes peace and quiet, that’s all.”

On the night of the sleepover, however, it turned out Minna’s dad was in town after all, his business trip apparently unexpectedly canceled while Minna was at school. “Oh,” Minna said. “We ought to cancel this, then. Maybe you should call your parents?”

“Don’t be silly!” Minna’s mom said. “It’ll be fine, won’t it, Jake?”

“That’s right. I’ve got no problem with you having a sleepover, sweetie. Who’s your little friend there, honey?”

“I’m Jasmine.” He didn’t seem like he was angry, or mean.

“Jasmine?” He laughed. “Is that old-lady name making a comeback now?”

“I was named after my grandma. My friends call me Jazz, though.”

“That’s great,” Jake said, grinning. “You like board games, Jazz? You even heard of board games? I know you kids, always playing on your VR sets, but did you ever play real games like we used to when we were kids?”

Jasmine happened to know that if Jake was the age he appeared to be, his childhood was probably spent playing video games on 2 dimensional screens, but she didn’t challenge him. “I like board games, sure!”

Minna looked unhappy, but she didn’t say anything. Minna’s mom wanted to join in, so they all played Monopoly. And when it was over and Jake had won, Minna suggested playing Risk. “You like Risk, right, daddy? I bet Jazz would like Risk…”

“Too late in the evening, honeybuns,” Jake said, ruffling Minna’s hair as she flinched. “You girls need to get some sleep! I’ve got the guest room all made up for Minna.”

“But daddy! It’s a sleepover! She was going to sleep in my room!”

“Don’t be silly,” Jake said. “You girls would be up all night talking then, and ruin yourselves for school the day after tomorrow!”

Nightgowns were put on. Teeth were brushed. Jake hovered, making sure they went through their bedtime routines. Jasmine could see why Minna wouldn’t want her over for a sleepover if this was the way her dad acted. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Minna having friends, it was that he was obsessively attentive, to the point where it was hard to actually just find time to hang out by themselves and play. Maybe that was why Minna had suggested playing Risk; playing with her friend and her dad wasn’t as good as playing with her friend, but it was better than being sent to bed separately.

When lights went out, Jasmine took her nightly meds with the glass of water she’d cajoled from her friend’s parents for her bedside nightstand, and then lay in bed on her side looking out the window. Half an hour later, she heard the door open, and rolled over. “Mr. Levesque?”

“Oh, you can call me Jake, Jazz,” Minna’s dad said. “Mind if I come in?”

“Well, I was trying to sleep…”

“Oh, that’s okay. You’re young, you can deal with a little lost sleep. You just have to count them up when you find it.” He chuckled. “You get it? Because ‘little lost sheep’, and you’re supposed to count sheep to fall asleep. Do they tell you kids to do that nowadays? They told me.”

“I know about it,” Jazz said.

Jake sat down on the edge of the bed. “You kids know all kinds of things nowadays, don’t you? With all this stuff on the Internet nowadays.”

“Didn’t they have the internet when you were a kid?” The Internet had been around for over a century, but for some reason, adults seemed to love behaving as if it was a brand new thing that only kids understood.

“Oh, yeah, but it wasn’t the same. We didn’t have VR, we didn’t have olfactory or tactile back then.” He leaned in. “I bet you spend a lot of time on the VR, right?”

“Um, I guess. I have a lot of homework most days, though.”

“You ever watch any porn, Jazz?”

Jasmine sat up. “Uh, wow. That, uh. That’s… not a question dads are supposed to ask sleepover friends of their daughters, is it?”

“It’s fine,” Jake said. “I know you modern kids are into all that kind of stuff.”

“Um, not really.”

“Oh, come on. I know all you girls nowadays watch that stuff. Not like when I was a kid. Back then, the boys were the only one who used to watch that stuff. But I know you kids nowadays don’t think there’s anything wrong with girls liking, you know. To do it.”

“I don’t think—”

“You ever thought about doing it with a boy?”

“I, uh—”

Jake leaned forward again. He was far enough into Jasmine’s personal space that she would have difficulty getting out of the bed. “It’s okay. I can teach you.”

“I really don’t want to—”

“You’ve got to learn sometime,” he said, and kissed her. With tongue. Gross, disgusting, grownup tongue.

Jasmine bit his tongue, hard, and as soon as he recoiled, she shoved the taser she’d been holding under the covers into his solar plexus. His face wasn’t in contact with hers anymore, so she was free to pull the trigger, and she did.

“You little—” Jake started to say, thickly, with his bitten tongue, and then he couldn’t speak again because he was convulsing and falling off the bed.

Jasmine threw the covers back and pulled out the badge and the ID card she’d been keeping under the pillow. “Detective Jasmine Sykes, Sex Crimes division. Jake Levesque, you’re under arrest for attempted solicitation of a minor, sexual assault—”

“You’re – you’re not a minor, bitch!” he gasped out. Good. So he knew what the color band around her ID meant.

“You’re right. I’m 53 years old,” she agreed. “But you thought I was a minor. And you did kiss me after I explicitly said I didn’t want to, which is sexual assault. Given the reports we have on you from some of Minna’s other friends, I think that’s going to be enough.”

The door opened. “Jazz! Are you all right?” Minna asked, and then took in the taser, the ID with the colored hologrammatic border, the badge. “Oh.”

“My backup’s just pulled up outside, Minna. Can you get your mom to let them in?”

“I… okay…” She looked down at her father, and her face twisted. “Serves you right! I hope you go to jail, you creep!”

“Minna – honey –” He reached toward her, from where he was lying on the floor, but she turned and ran.

“You have the right to remain silent,” Jasmine said. “Anything you say can and will be used against you. You have the right to a lawyer—”

Her partner, 6 foot two and solid muscle, came in, holding a real gun, with two other cops behind her. “Jazz! You okay? This scumbag didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“Naah. He kissed me. It was horrible, I don’t know what the fuck kind of aftershave he uses but he’d be better off moisturizing with a three day old dead rat. But I’ve dealt with worse, and that’s as far as it got.”

Jasmine let the grownup cops handle talking to Minna’s mom, filling out the paperwork for the arrest, cuffing the perp and dragging him off to the van. She had a traumatized ten year old to deal with.

“I thought – I thought you were my friend,” Minna said to her, eyes filled with tears.

“You are my friend.”

“But you’re a grownup! I saw your ID, I know you’re a child impersonator!”

Jasmine sighed. She hated that name, but in her particular case she really couldn’t dispute it. The Extended did not all have professions where they had to pretend to be children, but she did. “I’m not a grownup, I’m an adult. There’s a difference. And if I don’t have any friends who are actual kids, then I wouldn’t be able to do my job. I like you, Minna. I liked playing with you.”

“Did you just make friends with me to get at my dad?”

“I transferred to your school to get at your dad, but if you and I hadn’t been friends I would have gotten him to show his true colors some other way.” She took Minna’s hand. “He did this to some of your other friends, too, didn’t he?”

She choked on a sob. “He said – he said he’d never need to come to me again if I invited my friends over, but I didn’t know what that meant. I tried sleepovers twice. The first time I didn’t know. Kayde wouldn’t be my friend anymore after that, but she wouldn’t tell me what was wrong, what happened. The second time I heard him, with Myesha, I knew I couldn’t ever have another sleepover. But you kept asking, and he was supposed to be out of town! You were supposed to be safe!”

“It’s okay, Minna. I know you were trying to keep me safe. It’s all right.”

She hugged Minna, who sobbed again a couple of times before getting herself under control. “Is this – do you do this kind of thing a lot? Go over kids’ houses and prove their dads are…”

“I don’t always do it by making friends with the kids, no. Sometimes I take a class with the guys, or I get in their car, or something.”

“Isn’t that dangerous?”

Jasmine nodded. “But not as bad for me as for an actual kid. I’ve been doing this for 30 years.”

Minna shook her head. “That’s so weird. You look just like any of my classmates.”

“Yeah, it is weird.” Jasmine’s parents had been rich enough to make her one of the Extended, over 40 years ago. Anybody could be immortal – well, unaging, at least – as long as they started the treatment before puberty. The same treatment that kept her cells dividing and her body from breaking down with age, kept her from ever going through puberty or reaching an adult’s height. She was fortunate to be a cop – universal health care didn’t cover the cost of Extension, but Extended were so useful in the police force, with their ability to catch pedophiles in sting operations, get information out of child witnesses, go unnoticed by criminals, and anything else an actual kid could do but wouldn’t know how to, or couldn’t be exposed to the risk of doing, that most big-city forces paid for the Extension medications for their Extended officers. As few as five missed treatments and puberty would start, and once it did, Jasmine would age and eventually die the same as any normal human. She could be immortal, as long as she gave up her right to ever look like an adult.

Extended – usually referred to as “child impersonators” in the media, and by average people – could theoretically live forever. The oldest of them were only in their 60’s, but it was holding true so far. Enough people had made that bargain in their childhoods that Extended got specially marked IDs identifying them as Extended, granting them secure access to their full adult rights. No matter what age they looked, society had to acknowledge their true ages in any age-restricted activity. Such as drinking, or being cops.

“You are my friend,” Jasmine repeated. “I like making friends with kids. Adults don’t get to play. Who’d want to give that up?”

“Are you gonna stay? At my school?”

She couldn’t. She might find it very relaxing to impersonate a fourth grader, and she might enjoy having actual children for friends, but the department would want her to go somewhere else, especially now that her cover was blown here. “I’ll stay as long as they let me,” Jasmine said.

Notes: The “child impersonators” are an idea I’ve been kicking around for maybe 20, 30 years, and are inspired by “Child of All Ages” by P. J. Plauger. In that story, there is one child who’s been alive since before the birth of Christ, whose father was an alchemist who invented the formula that keeps her alive. My take on it was to have it invented at a more reasonable time, sometime in our near future, and have it implemented throughout society, not as a secret one child keeps, because I wanted to explore the impact on society of having people who look exactly like children but are not, are in fact immortal, and are dependent on having jobs that will pay for their treatments to continue. I will probably do some other things with child impersonators at some point besides having them catch pedophiles, but the prompt “Bait” made it obvious what the plot had to be.

#inktober 2019 #child impersonators (alara rogers)#tw: csa

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astro-neer · 7 years ago

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Day 1, Morning...

Ugh, idk why am i even doing this, maybe because i don’t have anything left in my life, and no one to talk to... I’ll talk to myself as usual... Slept 14 hours, had 3 terrible dreams, heared my parents arguing because of my school, they want to put me down to 4 points.. Yeah, Life fucked up even more. First dream.. Me and She with her friend are going by the street.. We’re not together... She goes a bit faster so i fuck up behind with her friend.. Then some guy comes to her, unknown guy for her, starts flirting, i am standing behinde and watching till im enough of this shit, i go in a say “She’s taken, back off!” She looks at me, says that we broke up, gives him hand and just walks away ... I’ve gone crazy , started running in the opposite direction.. Then i’ve just stopped. Looked at her direction, thought “nah man i can’t let it happen” Then started running toward them, but couldn’t find them. Came to some abandoned school, it was huge, with underground places... There were alot of punks, but i couldn’t locate Her. So i’ve started texting, calling her, begging her to answer, but she didn’t , one time i’ve called with camera, she answered and all i’ve seen is darkness... She ended the call, i wrote “Where the fuck are you??” Then she called again with camera... I’ve seen her going on the underground, with this guy behind her, they were holding hands.. Then she just stopped, putted the camera on some idk highway, and bended over, letting this guy tie her up... While she’s with skirt, bending over.... Then this dream ended. I was talking while sleeping, my mom told me... I was telling alot of shit, she is worried.. I am worried aswell. It was a fucking nightmare to see, it felt so real... Next dream... Idk it’s kinda strange , me and her, we have superpowers.. I am immune to death, i can’t die, and she has something she didn’t yet uncover, so they took her aswell. they took us into a Lab, like Lab Rats... There we met a professor who willed to help us get out, and he did. Her power was tolearn other powers, and know to use them... We ran away, with the professor, and we got to an edge, where we Jump, from a kilometers height, or we stay . A huge crew of soldiers were running towards us...So we’ve jumped. I took the professor, hugged him with my body , and jumped first, I saved him with my own body, and ofc came back to life, then She jumped , i catched her, we both stayed alive cuz of our powers. But suddenly we got surrounded with soldiers... Then outta nowhere appeared a guy, a guy with a wand, a good looking beard, good looking guy, high..he had unusual suit.. it was glowing a beat. So he casted some shit, and all the soldiers just lost their mind and fell on the ground. After that his right side of the suit started glowing .We kept running away, but suddenly some strange guy teleported infront of us... They could teleport.. (Really nigga?) this guy... He told us to run.. But we stayed. Then he said that he is Sorry, and casted that spell again... After he did so, his Left side of the Suit was glowing, then he just casted some shockwave, it took my powers for a little while, and fucked up everyones vision. We didn’t see the world as it is. We saw it in strange figures, like its a fucking Cartoon.. We could see normally only if we were close to him. So i took the risk, and just tried to fly away, see what happens. And i lost my mind and fell down, from a high height, and just fell in coma for 2 years. After i woke up.. I was in a hospital.. It was 2 years later... When i woke up, nobody knew.. Not even her.. Only few ppl that was with me in my hospital room.. They told me what happened, and told me im in the future, i didn’t believe at first. They showed me the look out of the window, they showed me their Phones, They were really different of mine, The future was so beatiful untill the moment i went out of the hospital. The streets were dark, blue - colored and empty... Empty of everyone. I’ve went home, to the home i once used to live in... Down there i’ve met my friend Stas, i’ve asked him what’s hes doing here and he told me he lives here so i was kinda happy.. Oh stas, usually with his seeds, eating them everywhere, he was happy to see me.. i was happy to see him. I’ve asked him if i still live here, he told me i do.. I’ve askedwhere is She, and he told me she moved away, to another city.. I went into my building , and on the intercoum i’ve heared my family talking, they enabled it so i could hear whats going on the house, they warned me not to get into the house, cuz there is some checkings, idk, i didn’t mind. I took stas on my, and Flied up to the sky, Asked him the direction, to find Her. When i got to her house, i’ve knocked.. She opened, wen’t away, first thing i did is trying to kiss her, she didn’t let me... So i hugged her. We started walking by some empty park, we were talking , she told me what happened, she told me we won the fight against the library, i asked what’s that War name, she had no answer... Then she told me .. That she and this “Magician” guy are together... For almost two years.. She said i was gone ,and she didn’t know what to do, and fell in love with him.. That killed me... Then this guy came out.. we sat down, three of us.. She didn’t tell him i know they’re together, i didn’t tell him i know, So i tried to touch Her, and he told me she’s taken. I was playing myself surprised.. And asked this Guy to come with me for a second, they were both afraid, but i said that it’s fine , and that i just want to talk tohim... So he came with me, and we started talking, i kept asking if she’s happy with him, he kept saying that they’re happy for almost two years.. I’ve asked him a dozen of times to take care of her, protect her and so on.. He sweared to do all of that.. I’ve said that i’ll be gone of their life, but i’ll be fine, i’ll be the “protector” of this fucking city, and that’ll be alone , but fine.. Here our talk ended, I wanted to fly away, And he told me he can’t fly.. I asked what happened to his powers, and he said Nothing, and that he can Fly and use them only when she’s close to him... She said that he just got attached to her, obsessed with her.. Just as i was... Then i understood how strong their love is, and just flew away. Here my dream ended.... My next dream was.. Ugh .. I can’t talk to her in reality , so i fucking dreamed how i talk to her, in my dream, i how i tell her all of these two dreams about us, i ask her how is she, we talked alot.. But then i woke up and realized... Then a mini dream came in.. In which i tell her “in reality” that i’ve dreamed of myself talking to her cuz i can’t talk to her in real.. These are my dreams.. Right now i’m sitting, drinking a cup of tea , listening to depressive music, eating the Bamba she bought me, ate just 1 slice so there is enough for next Days.. And , Writing all of this ofcourse for 30 minutes already.. Depressed, Lonely, Empty...

#Me.. That's my life.

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thestoryweneededtowrite · 8 years ago

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Javid Titanic AU - Part 26

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15 Part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19 Part 20 Part 21 Part 22 Part 23 Part 24 Part 25

When they stepped out onto the boat deck, Davey’s first instinct was to shy away. It was chaos plain and simple and he just wanted it to all be over. He wasn’t even sure he cared how it ended anymore, he didn’t have the mental capacity to visualize beyond sunrise; he just wanted to stop running from water that didn’t care who it killed and men who wanted to kill him just because he was happy.

There were people everywhere, more people than Davey had ever seen aboard, all scrambling and falling and pushing to get towards the back of the ship. Still women, still children, not in lifeboats but here, fighting for their lives along the men who outnumbered them. He heard a cacophony of screams and turned to see a life boat still unlaunched down where the ship now met the sea, passengers spilling out as the water caught up with it and people desperately trying to cut it free. He didn’t even want to imagine the horrors below decks as people were trapped in areas filling fast with water.

Jack looked around at the mayhem that the ship had dissolved into and tried to think through this logically. The life boats were gone and, from the looks of their lights, they were already too far out to swim for. He wasn’t even sure they would have let them on board had they made it there. It was clear no other ship was coming to help anytime soon, so it was a matter of surviving for the longest time possible. Which meant they had to be out of the water until the very last second.

“Come with me,” he said, grabbing Davey’s hand. “Where?” Davey asked, happy to go but wanting to be in on any grand idea Jack might have to get them out of this alive. It wasn’t looking good.

“I have… A plan might be too generous,” Jack sighed. It was hardly fully thought through. “An idea. This ship is sinkin’, no doubt about it. And we’re goin’ down with it. We just gotta survive as long as we can out there, until someone comes to help.”

Davey stopped in his tracks. Freezing temperature. Pain beyond imagination. That’s what Jack had said a lifetime ago. It had talked Davey back from the edge of a precipice then, and right now it was making him regret ever getting on a ship. “It’s cold. You told me, it’s so cold,” he frowned, clasping Jack’s hand tighter. They didn’t even have coats on, not that it would help in the water. The floods that had spilled into the ship had been bad enough, brutal but brief and probably warmed slightly by the residual heat of the boilers that Davey had to assume were long extinguished. The ocean itself would be even colder and he had no idea when, or if, they’d ever be getting out of it. “It is,” Jack grimaced, confirming all of Davey’s fears. “But we ain’t got another choice.”

They joined the rat race away from the water, a hive mind swarm that was all heading up. The listing of the ship was so bad that Davey was staggering along the deck. It had become a contest for survival and in order to win it, someone else had to lose. People were pushing and shoving, barely taking notice as they knocked others out the way and over the edge. Jack kept him close, refusing to be separated in the crowds as they wove through, ducking into any available gap. There would only be room for so many people on the back deck where he was heading and they had to get there before everyone else.

“We’ve got to stay on the ship as long as possible,” he explained, dodging around an elderly man and his wife.

Davey just nodded, not wasting his breath on the words.

When they reached a rail, they had no choice but to stop and look down. The Third Class promenade deck was between them and the ship’s stern and they had to get down to cross it. The tiny ladder that usually lead down was backed up with people, no one forming an orderly queue and everyone shoving to get to the front. But even when they did, the First Class ladies climbing down who had clearly never been on a ladder in their lives were taking time that they didn’t have.

“Here,” Jack said, climbing up onto the railings and helping Davey over and down onto a platform just below. He followed afterwards, clambering down onto the deck and reaching up to grab Davey’s waist until they were both on the base of one of the electric cranes than swung over the Third Class promenade. There were no steps down from here either and Davey leapt down the metre or two fall, stumbling as he was shoved on the decent and landing on his knees. A stranger helped him quickly to his feet, rushing away as fast as they’d arrived and leaving Davey on his own. “Jack?!” he shouted, turning round fast in the crowd as it pushed against him, looking for that face he’d come to know so well. His heart was thumping fast in his ears. He couldn’t do this alone.

Suddenly there was a hand on his wrist and he found himself looking into Jack’s concerned eyes. With a nod of I’m fine, they started running again.

When he heard whipping noises behind him, Davey couldn’t help but turn. The cables that had been holding up the funnels were snapping, lashing across the water and whoever was unfortunate enough to be in its way. He closed his eyes to turn away, unable to watch, only to open them again to look for the source of a dull creaking, sounding loud and low above the enduring din of screams. The now cable-less funnel was buckling under its own weight, the metal bending like thin wire as the whole thing slammed into the water, crushing those below and sending out a tidal wave.

There was no time to mourn the already dead when you were fighting not to join them. The crowds on the promenade were body to body, all probably doomed to die but none of them willing to just sit there and accept it. Davey followed the path Jack carved through the pack, never letting go of his hand. He despaired at those who had packed suitcases and were still desperately clinging to them as if they were going to be any use to a corpse. All they were doing was getting in the way.

When all the lights on the ship faded to black for a moment, a fresh scream echoed round the deck.

“Nobody panic!” one man’s voice sounded above the rest and Jack just rolled his eyes and glared as they shuffled round him in the crowd. If there was ever a time fit for one to panic, they’d found it alright.

They made it to the stairs the other side of the deck and Jack pushed Davey up first, making sure he was okay. The single file system that had to be enforced on account of how narrow the steps were wasn’t really working out.

“- Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,” the man in front of them recited, looking up to the stars. “You want to walk a little faster through that valley there?” Jack asked impatiently, wriggling past Davey to force the man up the stairs faster.

They’d made it up onto the rear deck and Jack had to breathe a sigh of relief, but it wasn’t over yet. Not by a long shot. They hurried to the edge of the ship to look back and Davey fought the urge to cry out. They were dozens of metres in the air, with the propellers now up out of the water as people fell that long, long way down into the ocean below as they were pushed overboard by someone who wanted their space just a little bit more. Jack winced but there was no point dwelling on the people he couldn’t save. Davey was his priority now. Turning to lead them further towards the back of the ship, Jack came face to face with a minister holding on to a railing as he recited prayers, his other hand extending to a chain of people all crying and crossing themselves. It was useless, Jack knew, there was no way any god was saving anyone now. He pushed past them and kept running up the steep deck, using railings and poles to pull both him and Davey up as gravity started to fight against them. Davey felt his shoes start to slide underneath him as they got towards the very back of the ship, but Jack never let go.

“Come on! Come on,” he encouraged, until they were at the rear railings.

There were already people clinging on and Jack fought for the last space. Now was the time to be selfish. He hooked his arm around the railing, making sure Davey did the same before pulling him closely to him to make up for the lack of room and to ensure he was safe.

The lights on the ship flickered again, sparking the same wave of noise, as the ship got closer and closer to vertical, Davey’s feet slipping beneath him as he grabbed Jack tighter.

“It’ll be over soon. It’ll all be over soon,” a voice whispered softly beside them, and Davey turned to see a young mother, barely older than himself, cradling a child to her chest as she clung into the railing. They were both crying.

Davey turned away, not able to bear the sight, and buried his face against Jack’s shoulder. They were surrounded by people who were going to die. They were probably going to die themselves. He might be hearing the last words people ever said, sharing their last breaths, and it was a lot to handle. Looking up to take in Jack’s face, something occurred to him.

“Jack?” he said, smiling through the beginning on tears. “This is where we first met.” He managed a small laugh. It was all so long ago.

Looking back with a conflict of emotions in his eyes, Jack hugged Davey tighter and pressed a kiss to his forehead. He was determined for this not to be the last place they met too.

#newsies #newsies fanfiction #javid #Jack Kelly #davey jacobs #Jack/David #Titanic AU

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iruka-2013 · 8 years ago

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Fanfic: Winds of Change - Red Lotus, Part 2 (9/11)

Summary: Book 3 AU in which Asami becomes an airbender and goes with Tenzin to the Northern Air Temple, while Kuvira joins Team Avatar. Approx. 50,000 words so far. (Based on this post by Ikkinthekitsune.)

Previous Chapters:

Prologue: New Airbender Chapter 1: Thief

Chapter 2: Captain of the Guard Chapter 3: Traitor

Chapter 4: Level Zero Chapter 5: Earthly Tethers

Chapter 6: The Crew Chapter 7: Red Lotus, Part 1

Chapter 8: Airbending Master My fanfiction master post

The metalbender’s name was Eun Hwan, and he was a descendant, as he often boasted, of one of Toph Beifong’s original students. He had other skills besides bending—he was a fine archer, played a mean game of Pai-Sho, and sported an impeccable pencil mustache—but the four masters had particularly wanted a metalbender for this mission. Eun Hwan had been promised the honor of poisoning the Avatar with his own hands.

Like most Red Lotus recruits, he had joined in the vague expectation of “changing the world,” little realizing the dullness of life as a deep-cover operative, especially with most of the organization’s leadership locked in prisons scattered across the world. The work he’d gotten to do since being activated, though, had more than made up for the years of tedious waiting.

He knew there were individual agents stationed around Four Nations, but for this operation Grand Master Zaheer had summoned one of the largest groups of Red Lotus operatives ever assembled. Besides the four masters and Eun Hwan, there was Jing-Gui the firebender and the earthbender Guozhi and his two nonbender acolytes, who had labored for months to convert the old airbender cavern into the Red Lotus base in these remote mountains.

Grand Master Zaheer’s plan had been to trick the Avatar’s allies with Master Ming-Hua’s false hostages, bury them in the disintegrating Air Temple, and capture and transport the Avatar to the caverns where the airbenders would be held. There Eun Hwan would help the masters dispatch her.

Something had gone wrong. The Grand Master had promised them a nation to barter for the Avatar, but Master P’Li arrived in Eun Hwan’s Air Temple tower room carrying a single scorched, unconscious airbender slung over her shoulder. She dropped the woman to the ground and turned to go.

Eun Hwan heard a faint clattering noise and squinted at the floor. “What’s that?”

P’Li stopped and looked back. A small, round object had been jarred out of the unconscious airbender’s pocket. She knelt and picked it up.

“I recognize that,” said Eun Hwan. “It’s Guozhi’s lotus tile. He’s been missing it for weeks.”

“The airbenders have found the Lotus Cave,” Master P’Li murmured.

“We should tell the Grand Master immediately. Our base is compromised.”

“Not necessarily,” P’Li said. “The airbenders don’t know about our organization. If that’s where the boy and Tenzin’s siblings have fled, we may be able to regain a few of our hostages.” Taking the tile, she turned to go.

“Wait,” called Eun Hwan. P’Li looked back again and raised a silent eyebrow.

“Forgive me, Master,” he murmured, suppressing a nervous desire to stroke his mustache, “but the Grand Master gave me instructions to put two dozen airbenders in chains and move them to the Lotus Cave. What should I do with this one?”

P’Li faced him, her mouth twisted into a scowl. “The plan has changed. Ghazan and Ming-Hua are dead and the other airbenders have escaped, thanks to this little spider-rat.” She gave the prisoner a kick. “If we make careful use of her, we can still lure the Avatar into our trap. Keep her in this room, but put her in chains and gag her.”

Eun Hwan bowed his head. “Yes, Master P’Li.”

Soon after he had finished carrying out P’Li’s instructions, Grand Master Zaheer arrived with the portable radio set. He nodded, satisfied, to see the prisoner properly secured. “Good. The Avatar will be calling soon, and we need to be ready.”

“You think she’ll bargain her life for only one airbender?”

“For this one, yes.” The expression in Zaheer’s eyes made Eun Hwan shiver.

There was no warning. Zaheer moved too quickly for Eun Hwan to block the heavy hand that pushed him back against the wall, its fingers splayed against his chest. The Grand Master closed his eyes in concentration, and Eun Hwan froze with horror as he felt something alive reach inside him, to the very center of his body.

The living force of Zaheer’s chi pooled in Eun Hwan’s lungs and began to expand sickeningly—sharpening, filling his chest with knives—until it cut off his breathing with a strangled gurgle.

Zaheer’s lips pulled back in a slow, ghastly smile that carried more than a hint of madness. He opened his eyes. “Tenzin was killed before I could finish with him. I’ve discovered the ideal way to finish off the Avatar. We may not even need your poison.”

Eun Hwan stared into the Grand Master’s calculating eyes, his mind a welter of panic. Every Red Lotus knew what would happen to someone Zaheer considered a loose end. He was about to die.

The moment lasted an eternity. Then Zaheer narrowed his eyes and unclenched his fingers. Eun Hwan found—to his own astonishment—that he was still alive. As his lungs resumed their normal function, he began to hyperventilate.

Zaheer cocked his head. “However… perhaps we can still use a metalbending archer.”

Eun Hwan could only gulp in response. Zaheer crossed to the other side of the room and settled into a meditation pose, waiting for the Avatar’s call.

The metalbender massaged his aching chest with a trembling hand. If what he had just felt was the Grand Master’s ideal way to destroy the Avatar, it was almost enough to make Eun Hwan pity the girl.

Shan poked his head onto the bridge of the Zaofu airship. “Captain—lookouts report a herd of sky bison heading our way.”

Kuvira exchanged a look with Korra. “How many?”

“A dozen at least. With passengers.”

Korra smiled for the first time in hours as they raced to the airship’s upper deck. The first bison had hardly settled when one of its passengers airbent herself down from its back and leaped into Kuvira’s arms.

“Kuvira!”

“Opal,” Kuvira gasped, hugging the younger girl back. “How did you get away? Where’s Zaheer?”

“He captured the Air Temple and tried to take everyone hostage. Asami and Kai managed to knock out their combustionbender’s powers so the bison could get away. They stayed behind to help Tenzin fight. Kya and Bumi were with them.”

Kuvira, her eyes blazing, held Opal at arm’s length. “Were you the last to get out?”

“I think so.”

The rest of the Metal Clan had arrived on deck, and Opal ran to embrace her mother and Bolin. Jinora edged through the crowd of airbenders toward the Avatar. “Korra, we heard an explosion from behind us. It could have been the gas lines.”

Korra exchanged a look with Kuvira. “That could mean Asami and the others found a way to fight back.”

“Or that something has gone horribly wrong,” Kuvira said. “The mass escape will weaken Zaheer’s hand, but we have to know how many hostages he still has. Are you ready to try talking to him?”

Korra took a deep breath. “I’m ready.”

“I’m coming too,” said Jinora, straightening her back.

“And us,” Mako added, glancing at Bolin.

Kuvira didn’t look entirely pleased, but she nodded. “Very well.”

The airship’s radio officer already had the transmitter tuned to the Air Temple’s frequency when the five of them entered the radio room. Bracing herself for a confrontation, Korra picked up the handset.

“Hello? Zaheer?”

The answer came immediately. “I’m here. I’ve been waiting for your call.”

I’ll bet you have, thought Korra with a smirk. “I hear the airbenders were more trouble than you bargained for, Zaheer. In fact, I’d guess Tenzin and the others have escaped by now too.”

His reply shocked her to the core. “Tenzin is dead, and his siblings as well. I finished them myself, as a sign of our seriousness.”

Stunned, Korra looked at Jinora’s ashen face, then at Kuvira, who pursed her lips and shook her head. He’s lying.

She couldn’t entirely banish the quaver from her voice as she called Zaheer’s bluff. “Then it sounds like you’ve got nothing left to negotiate with, and I’ve got no reason to keep talking to you.”

“You’re wrong, Avatar. You’re forgetting your friend Miss Sato. She is still in our hands. I’m willing to bet you’ll trade your life for hers.” The gloating in his voice made Korra’s heart sink; this was no bluff.

“Why should I believe anything you say?” she countered.

“Miss Sato is enjoying her beauty rest at the moment, but if you call back in ten minutes I’ll provide you with proof that’s she’s here. Meanwhile, I want you to listen carefully. I have a procedure for your surrender.”

Korra saw that Kuvira was ready with her notepad. Any details Zaheer provided would be valuable in planning their attack. “I’m listening.”

“You will fly your glider at noon to the top of Laghima’s Peak. You can send two of your allies in an airship to the southeast landing of the Air Temple to get Miss Sato. You’ll find her in the bathhouse. I assume you have some means of communication?”

“We have some handsets, yeah.”

“So do we. I’ll leave two of my men concealed at the Temple to watch and make certain your side follows the rules. Once you receive confirmation from your people that she’s there, you’ll drop your staff and the radio, then stand still while we shackle your hands and feet. If you resist, she dies. When we have you secured, your friends will be allowed to remove Miss Sato, and we’ll take you aboard our ship.”

“And what happens then? We all go hang out at your summer home on Half-Moon Bay?”

“You’ll have to wait and see. I’ll talk to you in ten minutes.” Zaheer severed the communication from his end.

Korra looked over her shoulder. “Did you get all that?”

Kuvira nodded, pencil poised over the notepad. “I don’t have to be a truth-seer to tell he’s planning to double-cross us. At least now we have some information to work with.”

Jinora had recovered some of her composure, though she still looked shaken. “You think he was lying about my dad and the others?” she asked Kuvira.

“Since he wants leverage over Korra, it wouldn’t make sense for him to kill his own hostages. He may simply be hiding the fact that they escaped after the bison were gone, gambling that we won’t find out until it’s too late.”

“He sounded pretty confident,” said Mako, “but why didn’t he mention Kai? If Zaheer doesn’t have him, and he didn’t get away with the rest of you, where is he?”

Jinora’s expression hardened into determination. “I know how to find out.”

Asami floated on a sea of pain that rose and dipped sickeningly. She couldn’t localize the discomfort; it was everywhere, inside and out, as if a fiery tendril had coiled down her throat and seared her lungs. Her mind worked sluggishly to interpret individual sensations—the painful pressure squeezing her chest, the wrenching in both her shoulders, the roll of cloth wedged between her teeth…

“Wake up, little spider-rat.” She opened her eyes to the sharp noise of a slap. The flare of pain that engulfed one side her face told her that the sound had come from a blow to her head.

She forced her eyes open. The heat of the explosion had reached her after all, and her skin—especially her arms and face—stung as if she’d been immersed in an acid bath. She was lucky to be alive.

Or perhaps not so lucky. Her body felt crushed against the stone pillar at her back; she blinked away stars and looked down to see her torso crisscrossed by at least half a dozen chains. Another chain wound around her lower legs, stretched out on the flagstones before her. Her arms had been pulled around the column behind her and fastened with a few more links between her manacled wrists. The combustionbender crouched over her, her back against the nearby wall.

“That’s enough, P’Li,” said Zaheer’s calm voice from the shadows. Asami squinted into the darkness and made out his shadowy form, seated in a lotus position near Tenzin’s radio set, a uniformed attendant at his side.

He turned to the other man and asked, “Have you found Tenzin’s corpse?”

“The airship crew spotted it with binoculars on one of the cliffs, where the buzzard wasps are gathering,” the man answered. “There’s no way we can reach it before they do.”

P’Li smirked at Asami’s horrified expression. “Just what your master would have wanted. A traditional airbender burial.”

“Understood,” said Zaheer. “Watch them and notify me when they’re finished.”

The henchman clasped his hands and bowed. “Yes, Grand Master.”

“P’Li, loosen her gag.”

P’Li, her lips pressed together, knelt and rolled the cloth gag out of Asami’s mouth, letting it drop around her neck.

Zaheer spoke directly to her. “By embracing the principles of the Old Air Nation, Tenzin forged his own chains. You and I are innovators, Miss Sato, not meant to be tied down by antiquated traditions. I knew how alike we were when I saw what you’d done to Ghazan.”

Asami squeezed her eyes shut, shuddering with sick rage.

“I believe we understand each other,” said Zaheer quietly. “As the world’s foremost airbending master, I’m assuming leadership of the Air Nation. I intend to mold it into the most powerful revolutionary force this world has ever seen.”

Asami raised her head and squinted at him, seeing the change in his eyes since their last confrontation. Her stomach twisted with the realization that the retort on her lips was not a baseless insult, but the truth. “You’re insane.”

Zaheer raised his eyebrows. “I am the future of airbending, Miss Sato. Because I am also a just man, I leave it to you to decide whether your rediscovery of voidbending merits punishment under the laws of the Old Air Nation, or advancement to the rank of master under the laws of the New Air Nation. My Air Nation.”

Tenzin… A sob caught in Asami’s throat, and she forced it down.

When she spoke her voice came out clearly, though it sounded thin and brittle in her ears. “I already answered you, Zaheer. I’ll never join you, and I’ll never help you.”

“You’re about to help me a great deal. But if you wish to die under the heel of the old laws, so be it.” As Zaheer stood up, the mustached metalbender handed him a foot-long iron rod with one end bent and flattened.

Zaheer examined it. “Your former master was too weak and hypocritical to give you the true ancient airbender punishment for the forbidden art. Consider yourself fortunate that we will administer only part of it.”

He stood up and passed the rod to P’Li, who extended two fingers and began firebending the flattened end. Asami read the reversed character molded into the flattened metal: danger.

A hideous premonition struck her. “What are you—”

She never finished the question. With one hand, the nearest Red Lotus henchmen twisted her neck to the side and pinned the right half of her face against the column. At the same time his other hand seized her shoulder and pushed her back harder against the stone.

Panicked, she strained every muscle against her bonds. The chains scraped horribly against the column, but they had no slack. In response the henchman tightened his grip until his fingers friction-burned her skin through her tunic.

Past the hissing of her breath and the dizzying pounding of her heart, Asami heard a new voice from the radio. A voice from another world, another life.

“Zaheer, are you there? Time’s up.”

Instinctively Asami started to call out Korra’s name, then choked back the cry. No—they’re trying to trap her, they want you begging for help…

P’Li, a smile on her face, stepped into Asami’s peripheral vision. Waves of heat poured from the glowing white iron in the woman’s hands; it seemed to scorch Asami even before the metal comet streaked in front of her face and struck hard below her left eye, sizzling and bubbling against her skin.

The stench of burned flesh filled the air, and a fiery flood of agony drowned the pain of her older wounds.

Asami screamed.

The sound hit Korra like a physical blow. Instantly she was on her feet.

“Zaheer!”

“Your proof, Avatar,” said his crackling voice. The radio link dissolved into static.

She would have thrown the Spirits-cursed radio across the room, but Kuvira stepped between her and the table, shaking her head.

Korra turned away and sank down onto the bench. She was breathing hard, her gorge rising, her skin like ice. Asami hadn’t escaped. The Red Lotus had her, and they were torturing her.

Thankfully, Jinora had gone elsewhere to meditate. For a few moments the three friends sat in stunned silence, Mako and Korra exchanging helpless looks, Bolin’s breath coming with a noise somewhere between a whimper and a sob.

“What’s our ETA for Laghima’s Peak?” Kuvira asked the radio operator.

“Oh-six-hundred, Captain. About six hours.”

“Korra,” Mako said quietly, “you know how much I care about her, but someone has to say this. Asami wouldn’t want you to risk the safety of the world for her. Don’t surrender yourself to these people.”

Kuvira turned to him, shoulders stiff and arms folded behind her back. “We can minimize the risk. Su and I are formulating on a plan to turn Zaheer’s double-cross back on him. We’ll make this work.”

“I have to try,” said Korra thickly. She swallowed and forced some lightness into her tone. “Anyway, after what she did, the Air Nation would probably stage a revolt if I let those rat-vipers keep her.”

“You bet we would,” said Meelo. He stood in the doorway, his small jaw sticking out like an angry catgator’s, and Korra wondered uncomfortably how much of Zaheer’s communication he had overheard. He raised a fist in the air. “No airbender left behind!”

Despite everything, Korra almost smiled. “Right, Meelo. We’ll get Asami back, and we’ll fix whatever they’ve done to hurt her. I promise.”

Canyon winds. Buzzard-wasps hated them.

The treacherousness of ground travel over these subarctic mountains and canyons was part of what had attracted the airbenders to this place thousands of years ago; any creature that tried to reach the Northern Air Temple on foot was likely to wind up as food for scavengers. On the other hand, a carcass that failed to drop all the way to the valley floor, lodging precariously on some crumbling ledge or wind-scoured cliff, would be nearly impossible to reach for a creature with a light body and even lighter wings.

Good thing, thought Bumi as he army-crawled across an exposed boulder hundreds of feet above the ground. Travel by airbending was great if the means were handy, but sometimes good old-fashioned United Forces infiltration tactics were the only way to go. I’d hate to have to tangle with those stingers…

He spared a glance up at the dozen stymied buzzard-wasps jockeying for position against the winds, and the enemy airship hovering beyond them; hopefully the deepening twilight and the screen of winged predators would hide his rescue attempt from the airship’s crew. Somewhere up there, as well, was the tottering Air Temple, its lower levels blown apart by a gas explosion that had shaken the mountain to its roots.

Night vision wouldn’t be a problem for the buzzard-wasps, of course. He would deal with them once he got a little closer. In the meantime, they had one more obstacle to contend with. Bumi felt rather than saw Bum-Ju holding his ground at the center of the snapping swarm, his Spirity glow dimmed almost to invisibility.

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” Bumi panted.

He dragged himself up and over the final ledge, and his goal came into view—the bloodied, broken body of his younger brother, sprawled head downward on a narrow ledge of rock, barely visible through the jostling bodies of the buzzard-wasps struggling to get close enough for a bite.

As he crawled closer, Bum-Ju’s light brightened enough to give Bumi some idea of Tenzin’s injuries. The master’s robes were blackened, several broken bones were obvious, and a stream of blood from an ugly head wound obscured much of his arrow tattoo. Still, the Spirit bunny hovering over him gestured urgently, as if it still mattered whether Bumi or the buzzard-wasps reached Tenzin first.

How could he possibly be alive? Bumi’s heart was in his throat as he crawled the remaining distance and air-punched a few scrabbling beaks out of his way.

“He’s not yours yet! Get off him, you scavengers!”

The cross-winds that scoured this bit of the rock face tore at him, just as they had the buzzard-wasps, but his weight was too great to be shifted so easily. Concentrating, Bumi let go of the cliff and flung out his arms, creating a whirling sphere that stabilized the winds at its center and pushed back the squawking insect-birds.

“See, Tenzin?” he gasped to the fallen figure. “I wasn’t such a bad student, was I?”

He considered performing a field first-aid evaluation on the spot, then decided that getting down had to take priority. He clenched his teeth and tried not to think of what additional harm he might be causing as he grabbed Tenzin’s arm and hauled his brother’s body onto his own aching shoulders. Then he jumped off the cliff.

It took several terrifying minutes to reach the valley floor. Bumi air-blasted his way down the cliff-face, not trying too hard to control their direction, but using only as much chi as necessary to keep himself and Tenzin from being smashed to pieces against the rocks. Bum-Ju kept even with them during the precipitous descent, sometimes helping Bumi against gravity by tugging on the back of his tunic, sometimes bounding ahead down the mountain to show him the safest path to the bottom.

Kai was waiting where Bumi had left him, in a hidden hollow at the bottom of the canyon, looking after Kya.

One baby bison had left the herd and rejoined them after Kai had dragged him and Kya to safety; the boy had named him Lefty. Kya, her eyes closed, rested against the bison’s side, and Bumi carefully lowered Tenzin to the ground beside her.

“Good boy, Lefty,” Bumi grinned, patting his head.

“I don’t think he can carry us all,” said Kai, “but at least he can help us get these two somewhere safe.”

“I’ll take all the help we can get right now.” By Bum-Ju’s faint light, Bumi searched for Tenzin’s vital signs. Thankfully, he found them—a faint pulse in his brother’s neck, and a fainter exhalation of breath from his lips, a barely visible mist on the face of Bumi’s United Forces pocket watch.

“Dad!”

Bumi nearly jumped out of his skin, and had to clamp both hands over his mouth to keep from letting out a cry of alarm. Before him floated a ghostly life-size version of his eldest niece.

“Jinora!” Kai grinned, jumping to his feet.

The girl’s eyes were fixed on Tenzin. “Zaheer told us he was dead—you and Aunt Kya too, Uncle Bumi.”

“Zaheer was wrong. Aang’s kids aren’t so easy to kill.” Bumi stood up straight and stuck out his chest, only to double over, gasping with the pain of his bruised ribs. Trying to look casual, he lowered himself onto a rock. “Your dad’s the worst off, but we’re taking him someplace safe until Korra gets here with help. Korra is coming, isn’t she?”

Jinora nodded. “With Chief Tonraq, and the Beifong family, and a whole bunch of metalbenders. Where can we find you?”

Bumi scratched at his scraggly beard. “Hadn’t thought that far ahead. Kai, any ideas?”

“I know a safe place—the old airbender cave with the giant red flower painting on the wall. We found it with Asami. Remember, Jinora?”

Jinora hesitated, as if she felt uncomfortable with that idea but couldn’t explain why. “Just be careful. We’re working on a plan to rescue Asami and capture Zaheer and the others. Don’t let them find you again before we get there.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll keep out of Zaheer’s way.”

[To be continued...]

A/N: Only one chapter and the Epilogue (or about 18,000 words) left to go, to be posted Saturday and Monday respectively.

Thanks for all the likes and reblogs so far!

#Legend of Korra #Fanfics #My fanfiction #Winds of Change #Airbending #Asami Sato #Korra #The Red Lotus

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