#and also i barely remember ideating it so :D

[angelpuns]

RAAAAAAAAAAAAH CASEY JR BEING SO SWEET--- Ranting anon DID see your post abt the commentary stuff btw and IM SO GLAD YOU APPRECAITE THESE!! (ngl was starting to feel like it'd get annoying soon lol-) but INTO ANALYZING! Omg Casey Jr being so sweet in the new update! He's so understanding and kind and actually asks Leo "Hey, what's up, what are you doing" and asking him stuff instead of telling him things like the bros tried to do I just KOIJHUGY- Lil Leo is so sweet! He just wants his family back man and the fact that he's already so open with CJ proves that it isn't hard to get him to talk, you just have to prove you're trustworthy! And CJ did! Lil man just wants to go home and the fact that his reasoning for trying to unbrainwash his dad is always that someone else needs him, not that Leo needs him! That little detail just shows off how bad he wants to be a hero and how he wants his real family back and I just K,MNJHBG MY HEART!!!! Plus that he just wants to go home, man he's a tiny little kid he's gonna get tired and frustrated so quickly and now at least he can rely on Cj for just a little! I love everything so much- K,,JMNHGBV you've stolen my heart, thief- /pos

IT'S NEVER ANNOYING IT MAKES ME V V V HAPPY

oh you just wait until later NO SPOILERS BUT YOU JUST WAIT CAUSE!! I am so excited about CJ and Leo's lil arc here it is so so so so important-

CJ: what are you doin

Leo: OBVIOUSLY TRYING TO FIX EVERYTHING

CJ: makes sense makes sense

I def feel like if he'd had more time to talk with Leo, Mikey would be in a similar situation of at LEAST being able to have Leo explain to him how he's feeling. like Mikey will never fully get it and I think Leo knows that to some degree. KIDS ARE P EMOTIONALLY INTELLIGENT OKAY

[north-blue-hearts]

Heart of Gold

CisFem Reader x Trafalgar Law

CW: ptsd, trauma, depictions/implications of suicide and suicidal ideation, language, violence, blood, canonical character death, mature themes and events 18+

Chapter 9: Reason

Law sits at his desk, watching your steady breathing. He had woken up a few minutes ago and had found you asleep in the chair again. Your sleep was at least peaceful this time, and he carefully moved you into the bed before reclaiming his seat at his desk. His ears tuned into your breathing as he opened a drawer on the desk and pulled out a heart in its own container.

Vergo’s heart wasn’t beating anymore. The morning light reflected off it oddly due to the power that put it in his care in the first place.

The Coo News hadn’t a word of his betrayal, but that wasn’t unexpected. The World Government – and the Marines themselves – wouldn’t have undermined their own authority by admitting to such an infiltration. Working under Donquixote Doflamingo, a government sanctioned Warlord, was probably why Vergo wasn’t imprisoned.

The man’s death was as much a warning to Doflamingo as it was a statement to the other Warlords, and the Warlords were probably the only ones aware of the execution. Law imagined it had taken the combined might of all the other Warlords in order to keep Doflamingo from attempting to rescue Vergo in the first place.

All the man’s flaws aside, Doflamingo was recklessly loyal to his family. Especially for those that were recklessly loyal toward him.

It was a wrinkle in the original plan, but nothing that was insurmountable. At least, that was Law’s hope. There were too many things he couldn’t be sure of, and it was a risk no matter what he did. If he disappeared off the map entirely then Doflamingo would get suspicious with the timing. He probably had no idea who was on the island that had (Y/N) entombed – Vergo hadn’t had a way to contact him after running into Law.

His best option was to carry on like nothing was unusual. Law traveled, and so he would travel. There was no reason to keep an extra low profile, but he also couldn’t overtly advertise himself either. He sighs softly.

Acting natural would be a lot easier if he wasn’t trying to act natural.

“Is that a real heart?” Law barely hears the question as he nearly falls out of his chair. He steadies himself and glares at you. “Sorry.”

Your eyes find his in the morning light of the room, before you look back at the heart. “If it is a facsimile, it is unnervingly accurate.”

“… You know what my devil fruit can do.” There’s irritation in his voice, but you’re sure it has nothing to do with your question.

“I do. It was an enemy then?”

“Vergo.” He says. “He works for Donquixote Doflamingo, one of the Warlords. He was pretending to be a marine without admitting his connection to Do- are you okay?”

You had sat up at the mention of the name, and your wide eyes were fixed on Law. “D-Donquixote?”

“Yeah… what’s wrong?”

“My… I mean…” You try to settle yourself, sitting upright on the bed and looking away from Law. “I just remember that family name.” You admit. “I hadn’t expected to hear it after so long.”

“… As far as I’m aware, the major families that become Celestial Dragons during the war have survived unbroken in their lineage since then.” He explains. “Most people don’t know their family names anymore though, there’s no reason to. Celestial Dragons are always surrounded by guards, slaves and grand processions when they travel, you can’t miss them.”

“That sounds…” You make a disgusted expression trying to think of the right word. “Useless.”

“It isn’t useless; there is a function to it. Impeding the path of a Celestial Dragon will get you executed. Speaking up against them, harming them, considering harming them, interfering with their tributes, generally anything other than prostrating yourself in the dirt can be seen as an act of aggression.”

You rankle, inwardly and outwardly if Law’s small smile is any indication. “Truly?”

Law nods. “Doflamingo’s family – well, his father more precisely – gave up their Celestial rights and joined the rest of us mere mortals when Doffy was a kid. We’ll keep the long story short for now, and just say that things didn’t go so well for them.”

“I… would imagine not.” You admit, and notice Law quirk an eyebrow at you. “I… I was royalty. My father fell from power for hiding my ability. Civil war, spurred on by noble factions, led to disastrous ends.” You explain, your face and tone are pained and weary and you’ve barely begun. “It was the beginning of The Fall. The catalyst that led to, well, today – your Celestial Dragons, the lost century, the prophecy… I daresay I wouldn’t be surprised to learn this One Piece is tied into it all.”

You shake your head. “I digress. War… war hurts the people more than those who cause it, and rightfully so, the people were angry. It mattered little that I was barely thirteen at the time. Mattered little that we lost while trying to defend them.” You lower your gaze in shame. “I was angry at first. Indignant. With time I learned better.”

You swallow hard, but Law doesn’t stop you or interrupt you. “Eventually, my family and I were taken in by a family in a different kingdom. We were useful, and fully aware of that fact. It didn’t matter that my kingdom had fallen, I was still of royal blood. I became friends with the daughter of that family, and became something of a socialite. I required power and support, so I had to, as Lami used to say, play the-.”

Law sucks in a sharp breath, nearly standing up from his chair. “Who?”

“L-Lami, I – I’m quite sure it’s not someone you would know, she…” You point to him. “She had your devil fruit.”

“… She was one of your friends that died.” He says it almost in relief, but something in his tone nearly breaks your heart.

“Yes. She was.” You’re both quiet for long moments until you hesitantly break the silence. “Did you… know someone with that name?”

Law nods, or so you assume, the gesture is very slight. “It was…” He takes a deep breath and puts a hand over his face. “It was my sister’s name.”

“My condolences.” You offer the words softly. “I can refrain from-.”

“No, it’s… it’s fine. I just hadn’t expected to hear that name.” He offers you a small smile. “What was your other friend’s name? You mentioned there were two.”

“Banchina,” you say with a warm smile. “She didn’t have a family name. A commoner who had been pulled into the world of nobility. She was… quietly fierce. Very bright too, she learned everything she needed to know quickly, and thrived in her position.

“Well… until everything went to hell again.” You stretch, seated on the bed. “From thirteen to twenty-two things went relatively well for me. Lami married, so did Banchina, both had loving partners and healthy families. Around the time I was twenty-three the world began to shift again.”

“The beginning of The Fall.” Law prompts, and you nod.

“I don’t know precisely what caused it, but the political field shifted over the next couple years. My benefactors were on the side of forming the Celestial Dragons. Considering my disdain for such an idea, it put me in a tight spot. Lami shared my disdain, despite being a part of… um… Of that family.” You say, swallowing hard. “Her, Banchina and I began to make plans. We’d get their families out safely and without raising suspicion, and then flee ourselves, if we could do nothing to change the course of things.”

“Sounds like a desperate time.”

“It… was. I had amassed a solid following, but most of that following was also loyal to my benefactor, and that support withered on the vine as things progressed. In the end I was provided with an ultimatum. One I imagine was the entire goal even before we had been provided protection.”

You’re both quiet for a moment and realization dawns on Law. “The marriage.”

You nod. “I was meant to… be used.” You hug yourself involuntarily, the emotion makes you uncomfortable. “As a means to manufacture funds.”

“… So you removed your emotions.”

“No emotions, no tears. No tears, no… well, anything.” You admit with a sad smile. You breathe deep and let out the breath slowly, trying to relax. “Relief from the plan itself produced the necessary gold. Lami removed my emotions, Banchina manipulated the gold. She fled with the heart.

“For a year or so, Lami and I evaded capture.” You look up at the ceiling trying not to break into tears. “I remember it all so clearly, but… I…”

Law moves closer to you, sitting down beside you on the bed. “I don’t have a handkerchief on me, but you can cry into my shirt if you need to.”

You laugh softly, the idea of a pirate captain offering his shirt like this strikes you as a little absurd. Law and his crew were certainly kind though, you had learned as much long before your emotions had been returned. Heart pirates indeed.

“I am a bit out of practice, but I can hold them back.” You say, patting his thigh a little. “Would it be too forward of me to rest my head on your shoulder?”

Law adjusts a little, moving his arm until it’s against your back, hand resting on your waist, as you set your head on his chest. The warmth and the contact are comforting. Maybe it was because they had a mink among their number, but the crew was certainly very close with one another.

“I remember the moments,” you say as the warmth helps to ease your emotions. “Clear and objectively, but it’s almost too clear. I should be scared, exhausted, or frustrated. Instead, I am often prompting Lami to continue to move, ‘we cannot stay’, ‘we cannot linger’.” Your voice shifts to something flat, almost devoid of emotion, but Law can hear the twinge of sorrow in the mockery of your own remembered emptiness.

“I could not hate it then, but I can now.” You lean into Law a little more, feeling the tears threaten your eyes again. “I could do nothing for her, or Banchina. I could not even offer comfort or support.”

Law’s hand rubs against your back in slow circles. The action is soothing, the warmth is comforting. You focus on the action, trying not to think about the memories that swirled in your mind like cruel specters.

“My apologies.” You say after a few long moments. “All I seem to be doing lately is lamenting a past that is some centuries gone.”

“Were you aware during your imprisonment?” Law asks.

You shake your head. “I remember,” you hesitate. What you remember was throwing yourself from a cliff because you preferred death to capture. “The moment before… After that I remember a voice, saying something about a completed sequence.”

Law flinches a little, but relaxes quickly. “What do you remember exactly? About what the voice said?”

“Sequence completed… um.. Proceed to step two and begin the event.” You replay the memory in your head a few times, trying to grab onto the words. “I think after that it was talking about me, saying the golden idol was stable, alive, intact.”

“It said something about releasing a notification.” Law prompts.

“Seelfloo iack ca pomhwoom.” You recite.

“Yeah, something like that.”

“It’s the king’s tongue, or was.” You explain. “Contact sent to the gods, is what it means. It usually was meant that one was in prayer, but after the fall -.”

“It probably means the Celestials.”

You nod.

“They’re… not really in any position of power though.” He states. “At least not collectively. The five Elders oversee pretty much everything, but the majority of the Celestials simply exist.”

“The likelihood that a single family maintained control of such a…” You stop, you nearly referred to yourself as a resource. “I can’t imagine anyone maintaining a secret for so long.”

“If they even maintained it.” Law suggested. “We’re assuming someone was on the other side of things to receive a notice, but if that tech hadn’t survived the centuries, then the notice could’ve ended up going nowhere. Vergo was informed by a newer alarm on the doors themselves.”

“It’s… possible. It’s not like the system was as sturdy as the poneglyphs.” You admit, trying to relax. “It would be easier to be at ease if we knew.”

Law snorts, and you hum questioningly.

“I had a similar thought earlier about a different matter.” He answers. “Different, but similar enough.”

“We are in a sticky situation, aren’t we?” You question.

Law hums in affirmation. “So far it doesn’t change anything I already had planned.” He says the words almost sharply.

Your brows knit and you lean back to look up at him. “Are you attempting to comfort me?”

Law shrugs, getting up from the bed and going over to the desk. He puts his fingers on the still heart and then looks back at you. “I only mean that we were already in opposition to the World Government. Finding you, and offering protection, hasn’t forced us into anything new.”

“You are.” You smile as Law clears his throat. “You are quite kind, captain, for a-.”

“-Pirate?” Law interrupts gruffly.

“I was going to say, ‘sleep deprived grumpy young doctor’.” You clarify evenly. “But I suppose, pirate, is sufficient.”

“I’m not…” Law growls, letting the sentence drop. He’s been grumbling at you since you startled him earlier and he’s realizing he can’t argue with your assessment. “Sleep deprived.” He says curtly.

“You are the definition of,” you stop, catching Law’s sour frown. “I mean, a picture of health, I’m sure.” You don’t hide the teasing tone from your voice as you step off the bed and walk toward the desk. Breathing in deep you let out a sigh as your smile fades.

“If anyone is going to know, it’s going to be this Doflamingo you mentioned.” You admit, placing your fingers on the still heart and letting them slide over the smooth edges of the ope ope no mi’s functions. “An unbroken family connection like that… Makes me nervous. It’s like being haunted by a dragon, only to find it’s still alive centuries later.”

“Donquixote was your benefactor, and Lami’s family then.” Law says and you nod. “Names bubbling up from the past like this makes me uncomfortable.” He grumbles, crossing his arms and regarding the research on the table. “Especially since you mentioned a seer.”

“Prophecies, and poneglyphs.” You sigh. “And me.” You shake your head. “Is the world at war?”

“Not in the strictest sense. Pirates search for the One Piece, an activity that’s illegal in and of itself. The World Government sends Marines to stop us, and there’s a Revolutionary Army that stands against the Government without concern for the One Piece.” He explains. “But their tactics are small scale. We’re not talking about a war between equal nations where resources would be a deciding factor.”

You smile sadly. “We’re on the same page then.”

“Sorry.” Law sighs and you shake your head.

“No, you’re not wrong, that was my concern.” You admit quietly. “If…” You lick your lips. “If I have less practical value, then I should be, objectively, safer.”

“Theoretically.” Law agrees.

You shrug and nod at the same time. “May I ask a difficult question?”

Law huffs, almost a snort. “We haven’t exactly been having easy conversations.”

You hum in agreement, looking down at the still heart for a moment before looking at Law and catching his gaze. “Who died for you?”

[magioftheseas]

Everything

Summary: In which Goro is stressed and overwhelmed about a lot of things, and he ends up lashing out at Akira for saying the wrong thing. He and Akira then have a lot to talk about.

Rating: T

Warnings: Swearing, suicide ideation, and references to past traumatic injuries.

Notes: Yes, I’m posting this fic too. I was possessed and wanted a shuake fic where they fight and then talk things out before making up. 

***Alternate Ao3 Link*** Commission? Donate?

Here’s the thing.

He’s definitely done stuff he regrets, putting it mildly. He’s said plenty of things he wishes he could take back, be it to people he actually cared about or just to save face.

If he had been a more honest person, would things be different? Does it even matter to wonder that?

He can’t change anything, and he knows he’d hate being changed in any other situation.

But at the end of it all, he keeps coming back to this one thing.

On the morning of his boyfriend’s twenty-second birthday, he made said boyfriend cry.

--

What had caused it? Did that question matter?

He was studying for some stupid exam. He repeated the bullet points until his voice broke. Akira had, of course, pulled him aside to take a break. Calm, easygoing, so very dependable Akira.

His first mistake: still envying Akira so much that he wanted to hate him.

“You need to drink some water first, but I’ll brew you some coffee, alright?”

While sipping said water, he had taken in Akira’s flexing shoulders. His irritating hunching posture. He had wondered how such a sloppy individual could be so...everything.

“You should take a break,” Akira was saying. “You’re going to collapse at this rate, Goro.”

He couldn’t help but sigh at that, ever so painfully aware of his shortcomings. “I can’t retain the information no matter what I do, and to make matters worse, I can’t beat the time limit. I’m a disaster with the virtual labs. I’m going to fucking fail, Kurusu.”

“The professors understand that you’re trying,” Akira said. “You’re not going to fail.”

“No... I suppose they wouldn’t fail me.”

And at the time, he thought—didn’t that make it so much worse?

“I want to prove myself, to pass on my own merits, not because—because... Because my professors pity me for getting shot in the fucking head and losing almost a year of my life to a coma.” He ran his fingers through his hair, and the oiliness of the strands made him want to gag. “I want to show that I’m still capable—even if I’m not because I still have these stupid fucking memory problems.”

He’s not sure what he wanted Akira to say. Knowing Akira, he must have given it good thought—but nothing was ever enough for a greedy bastard like himself.

Akira had paused in his work and had stepped away from LeBlanc’s counter to come to Goro’s little booth of misery. As always, Akira wore a gentle smile and his hands were so painstakingly careful as he took Goro’s own and squeezed.

“I believe in you, Goro. I know you can do this.”

Ever the perfect boyfriend, and at that time—Goro couldn’t stand it.

“How?!” he snapped, lacking even the strength to recoil. Pathetic. So pathetic. “Kurusu, you’ve seen what a wreck I am!”

“I’ve also seen how strong you are,” Akira countered. “You’re strong enough to figure something out. You’re the guy who beat death twice, remember?”

He did remember.

He remembered—how happy Akira had been when he found out Goro was alive. How much that must have put his stupid hero complex at ease. His regrets, his everything...

“I didn’t survive because I wanted to. I put myself in those situations thinking I’d die.”

Akira’s desire to do right by his peers no matter how awful or wretched they are was just another reason why Goro was a worse person than him.

“It wouldn’t have happened if I just hadn’t been so foolish, to begin with. How is it strength that I got lucky when I made mistake after mistake?”

Another mistake was getting so caught up in the ways things should’ve been...

“I survived because that palace spat me out while I could barely think. I survived because doctors worked around the damn clock to make sure I wouldn’t waste away. I didn’t ask for any of that.”

...that he didn’t stop to consider just how things were.

“There are still times where I wish they hadn’t fucking bothered! I don’t... I’m not...!”

“Goro,” Akira had pleaded with him, and he still couldn’t take it.

“You believing in me doesn’t make any sense,” he spat. “You being with me doesn’t make sense either. Is it pity? Or just regret? The poor fucking orphan you hadn’t been able to save...”

“That’s not true...”

“W-Who just...would’ve turned out fan-fucking-tastic if not for senseless tragedies. Like his mother dying or his dad being a scumbag—!”

“I’m sorry,” Akira had said. “That came out wrong, I just meant...”

“You’ve seen what a wreck I am, and you’re tormented by thoughts of what could’ve been,” he hissed. “You can’t possibly be impressed by who I am. You’re impressed because I’m still here in spite of who I am. You’re interested in an illusion and a seeming impossibility, not...not...”

A wreck of a person, who only seemed to know how to make shit worse.

“I’m sorry.” Akira still hadn’t let go of his hands. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. Honest. Please, just let me...”

“Stop. Just stop.”

He had been so exhausted.

“I can’t...deal with this right now. I don’t have the time or energy. I should leave.”

He had been so embarrassed.

“Goro, I...”

“Stop.”

At the time, he just needed to escape.

“You’re distracting me. I’m just—I’m gonna take my coffee and go. We’re not continuing this conversation.”

He gathered up his things and tried to keep his hands from shaking so much. Akira poured the coffee into a travel cup without another word—because he really was the perfect boyfriend. He was the perfect boyfriend.

And when his fingers brushed against Goro’s while handing him that cup...

“I’m sorry. Please...take care.”

There had been a glimmer of brimming tears in that dark gaze.

Goro had fled, frantic and distraught.

--

I’ll deal with it later. I’ll talk to it later. I’ll make things up to him later. I need to focus. I need to focus. I need to focus.

It had only been the afternoon, because of course that day had to start with his big blowup.

Need to focus, need to focus, I...                                                                              

In a moment of weakness he hadn’t been surprised by, he ended up scrolling through Akira’s social media. The usual stupid pictures of coffee, of coffee art attempts, of the stupid not-cat... Except there were balloons fluttering about.

He checked Takamaki’s account, and sure enough—a picture of a party at LeBlanc. A picture of Akira’s plastered smile as he sits in front of a tacky cake.

Seems our Aki’s got the Birthday Blues!

The party could still be ongoing. The post was only from an hour ago. He could still go—and maybe his birthday present to his boyfriend will be throwing himself at the mercy of his no doubt furious band of former thieves.

His birthday present.

He hadn’t even known.

I can’t study like this. I need to take a break.

He sets the materials aside and clicks out of the tab on his laptop. He’s already clicking open his email and getting ready to compose the most repentant message the world has ever seen.

I’m sorry, he types out. I’m so very, very, very sorry. I was being an asshole.

...he should probably start with something like, Dear Akira.

Dear Akira,

You’ve been so kind and wonderful, and you have such a big heart. I understand if you never want to see me again.

Just talking is...so difficult. Even now, I’m terrified of all the discussions we need to have... And I know that’s ironic, considering our history, but...

I’ll be honest. I’m scared of how you might react. I’m scared out of my wits to think that we won’t work out. I wish I was as strong as you seem to think, but I’m actually so much weaker than you. I always have been.

You’ve handled less than fortunate matters so deftly. You’ve stood tall so impressively. As agonizing as it is to watch, I still found you so admirable. Which is why...

I just can’t bring myself to actually talk to you. It’s easier to just type this stuff out and keep it to myself.

But I really, truly am...sorry. For ruining your birthday.

Unsurprisingly, he still doesn’t feel much better after all that. Shutting his laptop with a hint of finality, Goro went to tie up his hair and fetch his coat. He wasn’t going to return to LeBlanc, but getting a bit of fresh air might help him feel less miserable about himself.

Yeah, right, he thinks as he slips on his shoes. Like it could ever be that easy.

Case in point: his boyfriend flinches from where he had been lingering when Goro opens the door. Akira’s eyes went comically wide and his head quickly ducked. He played with his hair—the way he always did when sheepish. There weren’t any glasses on his face to hide behind. Akira hadn’t worn those in years.

Goro has no idea why he thought of that just now.

Akira’s just always been good about throwing him off-guard, he supposed.

“H-Hey, Goro.” This idiot, who gives him a dorky smile, is the one person Goro had once refused to lose to. “Can we talk?”

Had once refused.

“Sure...thing.”

--

The roof was a cliché choice, but a practical one. It was empty due to being locked, but Akira picked it open without any questions asked, and it had the best view of the campus.

It didn’t have much else, but Akira was admiring all the same.

“The roof on Ryuji’s dorm was much sadder,” Akira said. “Although for Haru, she like had this garden that she was growing on hers, and it’s really impressive, she...” His cheeks color more beautifully than any flower. “I’m rambling.”

“If you call that said string of words a ramble then I’m a wordsmith,” Goro mumbled, and he wanted to smack himself. “Urgh, no. That’s not what I wanted to say, so—just keep up with your insipid babble so I can stop...”

Akira laughed. It was a nervous little bout, and it was quick. Goro would kill to hear it again if he didn’t kill himself first.

Right.

He probably shouldn’t think like that.

“...what about your party?” he asked before the question could burn the tip of his tongue. “I can’t...imagine waiting in the hallway was all that...invigorating.”

“You found out, huh,” Akira droned, and his smile winced at its corners. “Well, they could tell I wasn’t...super in the mood. No hard feelings. We agreed to celebrate later.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” It shouldn’t have sounded like an accusation. “If I knew...”

“I didn’t want to distract you from studying,” Akira said, shrugging. “So much for that. I’m sorry you had to find out that way.”

“I should be—!” He buried his face in his hands. Breathed in. Breathed out. “Urgh.”

“I should have told you sooner.” Akira’s voice was quiet yet clear. “And I shouldn’t...have said what I did. I really am sorry, Goro.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, and it sounded so weak. “I shouldn’t have lashed out. I wish I could take it all back.”

“...but?” Akira prodded, because of course he knew better.

“Even if I’m sorry and even if I didn’t mean to unpack on you, those feelings came from somewhere.” He sighed. “It’s important that we...discuss things properly, as a therapist or a not shitty counselor with a god complex would say.”

“You’re still angry at Maruki-sensei?”

“I’m fucking furious that you still call him sensei.”

“Maruki-san,” Akira amended.

“That’s better, but it’s beside the point.” The view didn’t distract him much from his thoughts, nor did it distract him from Akira’s warm shoulder pressed to his. That gentle breeze, the sky above... It was going to be dark soon. “Akira, I’m still not in the mood to talk. I don’t want to shout at you again, so... You can just leave. We can continue this later.”

“Is that really okay?” Akira asked. “Is it really fine to just...leave this hanging over your head when you have exams to worry about? I really don’t mind you shouting at me.”

“...seriously?”

His temper flared up before he realized it.

“How the hell can you not mind?! You can’t seriously tell me that your friends would be okay with you coming up here to get yelled at on your FUCKING BIRTHDAY!”

His voice hit a pitch that hurt the back of his throat, and he coughed. Akira rubbed his back, and he didn’t slap that offending hand away. But he was still beyond irritated.

“...I don’t want to be someone you accommodate to such a degree,” he grumbled. “The last thing I want is you acting like my behavior is either justifiable or just...water under the bridge, so to speak. Even if you feel sorry for me, that doesn’t mean I’m not a shitty person.” Shaking his head, he added, “I’m still petty. Vindictive. Aggravatingly insecure. I still hate feeling like a loser. I still don’t even feel that bad for all the horrible things I’ve done...not just to you, but...to people you care about. You brought up Okumura...”

“She named a succulent after you.”

Goro sputtered.

“W-What?”

“A succulent,” Akira repeated. “It’s like...a cactus. It was really prickly...”

“I know what a succulent is! That’s—also beside the point!”

“So is what you were about to just bring up,” Akira said, and shockingly, his voice was downright frosty. “Goro, do you really think I don’t know what kind of person you are?”

“Y... Maybe?”  Goro thought about curling up in a ball and screaming. Maybe just screaming. “Look, I’m sorry. I just...can’t meet your expectations. I can’t stand being on a pedestal anymore.”

“I understand... I do,” Akira said, more forceful once Goro opened his mouth. “I don’t like being on a pedestal either. I really do just think you’re cool and inspiring. Intelligent and ambitious. Sexy and mysterious. Like all the things there is to like...” He trailed off, and that brilliant red of his blush is flaring. “Aah. Yeah. Sorry.”

“I don’t hate being praised.” Quite the understatement. He could get off to Akira complimenting him, as mortifying as that would be to admit. “You can be foolish, but... You have a lot to like, too. Which must be why so many people love you...” Goro sighed again. “But, I can’t help but feel like you’re hung up on my near-death experiences. I’m someone who survived twice, and that’s inspiring. It’s incredible to keep on living... Except that’s not how I feel. I know I should be grateful, but instead, everything hurts. Physically and emotionally. All the time. I don’t feel close to strong, Akira, and it hurts more that you don’t see that.”

“You’re still trying,” Akira argued, firm but a little uncertain. “If anyone’s lucky, it’s me. I was surrounded by a lot of good people, and if I had been in your situation, I don’t think I’d fare nearly as well. You don’t even have to work as hard as you do, but... You do. Shouldn’t I...praise and admire that?”

Goro scowled at him.

“So I should be praised for doing more than just wallowing in my own misery?”

“That’s a cruel way to put it,” Akira mumbled, playing with his hair again. “I just... I wanted to acknowledge your effort... I wanted...to acknowledge you...”

...

...and wasn’t that all he ever wanted?

“Sorry,” Akira said. “I’m just making excuses. I do want to do better with you, and I don’t want you to feel like I don’t see you. I...want to know more about you, actually.”

They couldn’t get any closer without embracing, but Akira still leans into him.

“I’ve noticed a couple of things. Like that you get your coffee completely black when you’re studying. That you still enjoy chess and pool. That your voice gets raspy when you laugh. That you do worry about my friends even as you refuse to get close to them. That...you have a lot that you’re dealing with, and you get overwhelmed.”

“I didn’t even know your birthday, Akira,” he muttered. “I’m a huge hypocrite. I’ve put you on a pedestal, and...”

“You recognize your flaws before I point them out,” Akira finished for him. “I really should be more open with you. I want to be equals with you like before.”

“Before? When I tried to kill you?”

“When we were rivals, Goro.”

His eyes burn, and Goro hurriedly wipes at them.

“...I made you cry. On your birthday. I’m...sorry. I’m glad...that you were born, Akira.”

Akira doesn’t remark on any further tears, but he does gently kiss the top of his head.

“Is it okay?” he can’t help but ask. “Will we really be okay, Akira?”

“I want us to be okay,” Akira says against his hair. “More than anything.”

With a soft exhale, Goro leaned in to press a soft kiss against Akira’s throat. Akira jumped, ever the sensitive one, and Goro couldn’t help but smile against his neck.

“Well, it is your birthday...”

“R-Right...”

He couldn’t help but laugh, even as the sound was raspy and almost painful.

“Let’s get back to my dorm and get some rest. I’m exhausted and could use a bit of sleep.”

“Honestly, me too,” Akira mumbled. “I love the others but... I’m not good with parties. I’d rather just cuddle with you all day.”

“It can’t be all day, I still need to study. Unfortunately.” Goro paused, pursing his lips for a moment before deciding, “But after exams... I’ll be at your cuddly mercy, Akira.”

“If you pass, I’ll reward you with praise and kisses,” Akira immediately promises.

He really is such a dork.

He’s so adorable. So unbearably, intolerably cute. And he’s currently wiping Goro’s tears away and saying nothing, he’s just smiling sweetly and adoringly.

Despite the promise, Akira still kisses him now like there’s no place on earth where he’d rather be, and nothing in this world that he’d rather do.

“...I-I’ll do my best,” he squeaks out before Akira kisses him once more.

[bubonickitten]

Summary: Jon goes back to before the world ended and tries to forge a different path.

Previous chapter: AO3 // tumblr

Chapter 14 full text & content warnings below the cut.

Note: There are text messages in this one. The AO3 posting uses a custom work skin to format them. I’m going to upload them as images for the Tumblr post. Might be easiest to read on AO3, though. (Particularly if you use a screen reader or have difficulty reading white text on green backgrounds and need to highlight those portions of text.)

Content warnings for Chapter 14: Buried-typical elements (claustrophobia, inability to breathe/move, etc.); mention of past suicidal ideation; some anxiety/panic symptoms; brief description of a past depressive episode; relatively mild blood/injury; swears; some Unsettling Spider Trivia (personally I think it’s fascinating but if you don’t like spiders maybe just skip a bit ahead when you get to that part). SPOILERS through Season 5.

Chapter 14: Up and Out

Much like the ebb and flow of the Buried, that sensation of being pulled vacillates. A few times now, it’s disappeared almost entirely, leaving Jon disorientated and suddenly doubting whether he’s headed in the right direction despite being certain only moments before. It always comes back before long, but each time it’s happened, he’s had to pause to fight down the knee-jerk influx panic.

Right this moment, he’s stopped – both because that sensation is dwindling again and because he’s simply winded. They’ve been in a particularly tight squeeze for quite some time now, and he’s aching and exhausted from the struggle.

“Jon?” Daisy prompts, panting even more heavily than he is. Nearly eight months of muscular atrophy and restricted lung capacity haven’t done any favors for her stamina. “A-are you okay?”

“Yeah. Just – just taking a break. Getting my bearings.”

“Anchor f-fading again?” He has a feeling she was aiming for casual, but the trepidation creeps into her voice anyway.

“Yes. But don’t worry, I’ll find it again. I just need to catch my breath.”

Daisy laughs. It comes out as some combination of a wheeze and a whimper.

“I d-don’t think I’ve been able to catch my breath in… I – I don’t know how long.”

“You will soon,” he promises, rubbing circles on the back of her hand with his thumb.

“I – I c-can barely remember what that’s like. F-feels like I’ll never know it again –”

“I know,” he says gently, “I know. I – I know it’s worse for you – you’ve been here longer – but I do remember that feeling. I promise I’ll get us out of here.”

“And – and then what?” she says in a near-whisper. “The – the Hunt, it – it’s going to come back, isn’t it?”

“Yes. I’m sorry. But – but you’ll still be you, and I’ll still be me, and we’ll – we’ll both fight to keep it that way.”

“I – I never thought about it, b-but – I’m prey too, aren’t I?” Daisy makes a noise that straddles the line somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “It – it’ll always chase me down, and it’s – stronger, f-faster –”

“Maybe, but I think you might be more stubborn.” Daisy gives a weak chuckle. “We all are, aren’t we?” Jon continues, emboldened by her reaction and intent on distracting her from her burgeoning panic. “Wonder if it’s somewhere in the job requirements: must be stubborn, curious, and preternaturally unlucky.”

This time, Daisy actually does laugh – clipped and wet with barely-contained tears, but a laugh all the same. For a minute she’s quiet, before sniffling once and clearing her throat.

“Can you tell me what happened last time? Did I – was I able to…”

“You fought it, yes,” he says slowly. “The call of the blood was always in the background. Distractions helped to take the edge off, sometimes. You spent most of your time with Basira. You and I spent a lot of time together, too. Tried to listen to the quiet. Both of us.”

“It sounds like there’s a ‘but.’”

“There is,” he admits.

“It caught up to me,” Daisy guesses, sounding resigned.

“It did. But… you refused it right up until the point where it was your last resort. The Institute was under attack, and Martin was in danger, and the two of you stayed behind to deal with the threat to buy me time enough to find him. A pair of Hunters cornered you. Basira couldn't take them both, and you… were too weakened from resisting the Hunt to stand a chance against either of them. You let the Hunt back in because it was the only way you could protect Basira. You made her promise to find you and kill you when it was over, and you told her to run.”

“Do you – do you think if not for that, I would have kept resisting? Or was I just – using that as an excuse to give in?”

“I don’t know,” Jon says truthfully. He hesitates, attempting to balance honesty with tact. “You were wasting away. We all thought that refusing to feed the Hunt might kill you eventually. But whenever the subject came up, you said you were willing to die rather than let it back in. You were – adamant. And I… think you would have followed through on it. Resisting, I mean. Even if it meant dying.”

“I see,” she murmurs.

“Actually, it’s – probably morbid to say, but I envied your resolve. You didn’t want to be a predator again. You thought death was preferable to being lost to the blood. Right up until the end.” He shakes his head. “But – but maybe we can find a – a different way. Me coming back has already changed some things that I thought were inevitable. Just – don’t give up hope?”

Daisy makes a noise of acknowledgement, but Jon can’t glean anything else from it.

“I know it sounds bleak, and – and maybe it is. But for what it’s worth, I’ll be right there with you. I’m not taking live statements this time around, and it – has similar effects on me that refusing the Hunt does for you. Reading old statements takes the edge off, sometimes, but based on past experience, it… won’t be sustainable, and I’ll – have to cross that bridge when I get to it, I suppose. It’s not exactly the same, obviously – our patrons operate in different ways – but it did… help, last time, having someone nearby who knew what it was like.”

“You… know things now, right?”

“It’s… complicated. There are a lot of constraints and” – he huffs – “I don’t have as much control over it as everyone wishes I did, but… yes.”

“Any educated guesses on our chances?”

“None,” Jon says with a grim half-smile. “The Beholding tends to be uncooperative when it comes to concepts like escape and recovery. I won’t lie – marks don’t fade, and as far as I can tell, once someone is fully an Avatar, there’s no undoing it. You embrace it, or you wither away. You feed it, or it feeds on you.”

“Sounds about right.”

“But,” Jon says emphatically, “you should also know that no one had ever escaped the Buried before we did. And we’re about to do it again. So… who knows. Maybe there’s a third option and we just haven’t found it yet. I can’t promise there’s another way, but if there is… we’ll find it.”

“Or die trying?” Daisy replies, a wry edge to her tone now.

“Suppose so. But not without making a nuisance of ourselves first. I still don’t Know if the Fears are sentient, but on the off chance they are, I find that spite is a decent motivator.”

“Naturally.” Daisy snorts. “I wonder what annoys the Hunt?”

“Don’t know. Fraternizing with someone who was marked as prey, maybe. You told me once that on bad days, my blood was the loudest thing in the Archives. We theorized the Hunt wasn’t too keen on you letting me go.”

“You… weren’t you afraid I’d turn on you?”

“No.”

“Is that because you were suicidal, or because you honestly thought I wouldn’t kill you?”

“I wasn’t –” Jon sighs. “My mental state aside, I trusted you. You were as stubborn as I was. Maybe more. Even if we weren’t friends, I imagine you’d have snubbed the Hunt anyway, just on principle.”

Before Daisy can reply, the earth around them begins to shake again, soil coming loose and raining down on them from above. They both hold their breath, waiting for the impending crush – but it doesn’t come, and after a few seconds, they exhale simultaneously. Jon’s comes out as something of a cough, jolted out of him by the now-familiar sensation of an insistent upward pull.

“Anchor’s back,” he gasps out. “Ready to move?”

As they move forward – up, Jon assures himself, we’re making progress – the perpetual squeeze begins to open up into a narrow passageway. Sometimes they need to dig to bypass blockages and widen their tunnel, but the closer they draw to the surface, the hard-packed earth gradually gives way to looser soil.

Between one moment and the next, Jon’s fingertips – already raw and bleeding from burrowing through the debris – scrape against something much harder and rougher than packed earth. Solid rock, hidden by a few inches of soil. He hisses as he feels another layer of skin peel away at the abrasive texture, but he brightens at the memory of the stone steps and walls at the entrance to the Buried.

“We’re getting close, Daisy,” he says excitedly, tugging on her hand. “We’re almost there –”

The Buried compresses in a blink, crushing them up against one another.

“Shit,” Jon hisses. “Shouldn’t’ve said anything.”

“Jon?” Daisy says, her voice pitched higher than usual, shot through with barely concealed panic.

“It’s okay, Daisy. This happened the last time, too. Just” – the earth contracts further, forcing a whine out of him – “wringing one last bit of t-terror out of us before we leave.”

“Th-that’s – greedy of it,” she rasps with a nervous chuckle.

“I find that – a-all the Powers tend to be – like that. Needy, spiteful things, all – all of them.”

So do their Avatars, for that matter. He thinks of how Helen couldn’t resist frightening him one last time before parting ways at Hill Top Road; of how Jude Perry knew she was going to die and chose to spend her last moments pulling him down to her level; of how Manuela Dominguez knew she had failed, but still wanted to take someone out with her; of how Peter Lukas couldn’t lose a bet gracefully, how he dragged Martin into the Lonely and tried to trap Jon there as well; of how Jonah wasn’t content to just have Jon read out his ritual, but had to hijack Jon’s voice to monologue first.

And Jon himself isn’t all that different, is he? Didn’t he force himself to confront Jonah in the Panopticon, even though he knew it would have no impact on anything? Doesn’t he regularly provoke the Eye with small acts of rebellion? How many times has he mouthed off to an assailant threatening his life? He just said it himself: spite can be a decent motivator. Failing that, sometimes it just feels satisfying.

“It’ll – let up,” Jon says, for himself as much as Daisy. “J-just – give it a minute.”

As if to be contrary, it actually takes several minutes before the pressure begins to withdraw. Slowly, so very slowly, the collapsed tunnel begins to expand again, releasing another downpour of dirt in the process. The passage is still tight and they have to squirm through in small increments, but after some of the squeezes they passed through on their way, even a few extra centimeters of wiggle room feels like a luxury.

That said, Daisy’s breathing is increasingly labored, punctuated by soft whimpers.

“You doing alright, Daisy?”

“Y-yeah, ‘m fine.” Her breath catches and comes out as a pained groan. “Chest hurts,” she says brusquely, before Jon can express concern.

“Your lungs aren’t accustomed to having this much room to expand,” he says instead, striving for a bland tone.

“W-well, they’ll just h-have to – get used to it.”

“They will, but – take it slow? Last time, you had a fair amount of bruising. A few cracked ribs as well. We both did.”

In fact, he thinks they might just be the exact same ribs he injured last time, if the pain is anything to go by.

“Listen,” he says, “I – I think we’re coming up on the exit soon.”

“Soon soon?”

“Fairly certain, yes. Before we leave, I should tell you – Elias doesn’t know that I’m from the future, doesn’t know how much we know, and I’d prefer to keep it that way as long as possible. He can’t See us while we’re in here, but as soon as we’re out – the only safe place is the tunnels, like before.”

“Got it.”

“And also, I…” Not much for it, he tells himself. Make your peace with it now. “I might lose my voice again as soon as we’re out. Maybe – maybe even before then.”

“Again?”

“I – I mean, I’ll be able to talk, just – not in my own words.” Jon tries to wet his lips and immediately regrets it, succeeding only in drawing more dirt into his mouth. He grimaces and sputters a bit, to no avail.

“Jon?”

“Y-yeah, sorry. I, ah – remember what I said, about – about the Archive? I’ve – outside of here, I’ve only been able to speak using the statements in my… library, I suppose.”

He says the last part with distaste, all but spitting the words out as if they’re poison.

“Huh.”

“It started partway through the apocalypse, and it followed me when I came back. Being in the Buried’s domain has cut me off from the Archive for now, but once the Eye can reach me again, I – there’s a chance it’ll take over again.” He sighs. “More than a chance, it’s – probably more of a certainty. I just wanted to let you know now, I – I’m still me, it’s just – the Archive puts limits on how I communicate, and it can be – off-putting. And annoying. And… abhorrent.”

“Abhorrent?”

“I mean… appropriating other people’s trauma any time I want to speak? It’s…”

There’s no succinct way to capture just how – how perverse it is, exploiting the words of the people who lived through the horrors retold in the statements. Some of them, Jon himself victimized. More than some, if he considers the billions he condemned in his future. Claiming their terror for his own use doesn’t feel all that different from actually taking statements: dehumanizing, objectifying, degrading. It’s all on the same ghoulish spectrum of monstrosity, just… slightly different shades of wrong.

All he says aloud, though, is the last part: “It’s wrong.”

And yet, you do it anyway, he thinks, disgusted with himself.

“Like going from one hell to another, isn’t it?” Daisy says after a pause. “Getting out of here, only for the Eye and – and the Hunt to be waiting on the other side.”

“Yeah. As much as I want to get out of here, I’m… not looking forward going back to – to that.” He sighs, then rallies himself. “But fresh air and a drink of water do sound nice, don’t they?”

“And a bath,” Daisy says, as if it’s the most beautiful word in the world. Jon laughs quietly.

“The Institute only has the one shower, I’m afraid. No tub, terrible water pressure, occasionally –”

“– occasionally runs cold without warning mid-shower,” Daisy finishes, an audible grin in her tone. “I recall. You won’t hear me complaining, though.”

“Nor me. Not for the next couple weeks, anyway.”

“Mm. Yeah, I’m sure you’ll hear me swearing up a storm at four in the morning about water temperature at some point.”

“Assuming that trivial detail hasn’t changed since I was last here, yes, I will,” Jon says with an amused chuff. He readjusts his grip on her hand and tugs gently. “Come on, we’re getting closer.”

Martin sits in his office, head in his hands and the heels of his palms pressed to his eyes.

Eight days. It’s been eight days since Jon went into the Coffin, there have been no signs of when – if – he’ll return, and there’s nothing Martin can do to reach him.

Stupid, he thinks fiercely, to think that sitting there and talking to a – a box of dirt would do anything.

Keeping vigil at Jon’s bedside at the hospital for months had done nothing to bring him back. Why would this be any different? When Martin’s predictions panned out, he felt almost vindicated that he was right – comforted by the confirmation that he is still all alone in the world, relieved by the reassurance that nothing will disturb his solitude after all.

There’s a part of him that still has the decency to feel ashamed at that impulse, but it’s small and distant and shrinking by the day. And yet… it’s still there, withered though it may be: a sentimental sliver of attachment that stubbornly refuses to die, both to his dismay and – to a lesser but nonetheless undeniable extent – his relief. No matter how pessimistic his outlook has become these days, he had still hoped against all the odds that reaching out to Jon would have some sort of effect.

It didn’t. Of course it didn’t. That sort of hopeless romanticism is for fairytales. Sure, given the existence of extradimensional fear entities, it isn’t inconceivable that some sort of… long distance psychic bond, or link, or – or whatever could exist. But Martin has yet to see any evidence pointing to the existence of powers like hope and love to balance out the existence of Smirke’s Fourteen.

That admission alone is enough to whittle away at that stubborn sentimentality of his just a little further.

And that’s for the best, he tells himself.

He can feel a bitter smile flicker at the corner of his mouth. The Lonely’s really got its hold on him, hasn’t it?

But no matter how well-suited he is to the Lonely, no matter how resigned he is to the idea that he’s destined to be alone, and that that’s exactly as it should be… Martin still cares for Jon. His emotions feel dulled most days, as if they’re happening to someone else, but the act of caring… he doesn’t have to feel in order to go through the motions. It takes effort and thought, certainly, but the impulse is second nature.

Peter tells him that he’ll be free of it before long. Martin doesn’t know how he feels about that. Nothing, usually, or something adjacent to it.

Apparently he hadn’t cauterized his feelings as much as he’d thought, though. For the past week, the sense of detachment he’s built up over months of practice and resignation and goal-oriented focus has been interrupted. The calm and quiet that have become so comfortable to him have been punctuated by windows of raw, wild emotion and sensory overload and sharp, racing thoughts, and it’s too much – especially all at once – after months of fog and cold and single-minded resolve.

He still doesn’t know what he feels, but it’s something rather than nothing, and it hurts.

“Brooding, are we?” comes a voice from right behind Martin, sending an icy chill through him.

“Peter!” Martin nearly snarls, glaring over his shoulder at him. “I told you to stop doing that –”

“So, Martin,” Peter continues, smoothly overriding Martin’s complaints, “I can’t help but notice you’ve been quite… distracted recently.”

Martin looks away, clenches his teeth, and says nothing.

“Oh, I’m not upset, Martin. I’m simply curious to know where we stand. To gauge the magnitude of this… little setback.”

“Setback?” Martin whips back around, incensed. “You really think I care about – about my progress right now?”

“Judging by your tone, I imagine not.” Peter smiles, that customary aloof smirk that doesn’t reach his eyes. “Not very reassuring, but I thank you for your honesty. It shows that we do still have our work cut out for us.”

Martin should keep his composure. He should keep his mouth shut. He should feign indifference and continue playing the long game to which he’s committed himself, but he can feel his heart hammering in his chest and he can hear his blood rushing in his ears and all the words he cannot – should not – has to say are brimming in his throat and –

He almost doesn’t recognize his own voice when the outburst claws its way out.

“I don’t care, Peter. You promised –”

“That I would protect your coworkers from external threats,” Peter says mildly.

“You don’t think one of the Circus’s monsters just – waltzing unnoticed into the Archives hauling a bloody gateway to the – the literal manifestation of claustrophobia counts as an external threat –”

“By the time the intruder’s presence came to my attention, it had already been dealt with. Quite handily, in fact. As for the Coffin itself, our agreement did not extend to saving a self-destructive Archivist from his own foolhardiness. There’s only so much that I can do.”

“Then apparently I need to pick up your slack.”

Once again, Peter ignores him and steers the conversation to his liking.

“I will say, I was pleased to see that the Coffin’s call has no effect on you. It shows that your connection to the Forsaken is still intact.” Peter begins to pace slowly, hands folded behind his back. “I am interested to know why you’ve been spending so much time so close to it in the first place. Why you were… speaking to it.”

Martin huffs irritably. “I thought it might help.”

“I wonder where you got that idea.” When Martin doesn’t reply, Peter stops his pacing and sighs. “I don’t mean to be invasive” – Martin snorts derisively; Peter continues without pause – “but I notice you’ve spoken to that – woman quite a few times.”

“She’s no one,” Martin says hurriedly, hoping that Peter doesn’t notice his momentary nervous flinch.

“Is that so?” Peter gives a contemplative hum. “If she’s trespassing on Institute property and interfering with day-to-day operations, perhaps I should have her… removed.”

All at once, the world around Martin rushes into focus: clearer, sharper, brighter, louder, more real – every sensation more immediate, every thought more acute. He feels his spine go rigid as he sits up straight and locks eyes with Peter.

“Peter,” he says, balanced on a razor’s edge between firm and furious, “we talked about that. You agreed to let me handle –”

“Workplace disputes and employee conduct,” Peter says. “Not interlopers.”

‘Interlopers’? Martin thinks. Really, Peter?

“Here I thought you might be glad to have someone like her around,” he says, forcing calm back into his voice. “Give me some practice pushing people away.”

“Perhaps. But if she’s posing a distraction in the workplace –”

“Like the Archives aren’t a distraction all on their own,” Martin seethes, his impassivity quickly teetering into agitation again, “what with the – the spooky murder tunnels, and monster attacks, and clandestine coffin deliveries, and the watching –”

“You know what I meant. If she’s distracting you from your work –”

“When have I ever left any administrative tasks unfinished, hmm?”

“Martin.”

“Yes?” Martin says, meeting Peter’s eyes with a level stare. There’s a muscle twitching almost imperceptibly in the other man’s jaw. It’s not easy to provoke that sort of response from Peter, and Martin would be lying to himself if he said he didn’t feel just a bit gratified.

Peter takes a breath and when he speaks again, he’s regained his usual mild manner – but Martin can still detect just a hint of tension underneath.

“As I have told you before, you are the only one who can do this. The plan –”

“Which you have yet to explain –”

“– requires a servant of the Eye, imbued with the power of the Lonely. And the cultivation of that power depends on your voluntary isolation. I can’t force you to cooperate, Martin. I can only tell you of the consequences should the Extinction emerge – and if it emerges because you choose not to act, then, well…” Peter shrugs. “You can’t keep anyone safe from that sort of power, and that includes the Archivist.”

“You still haven’t convinced me that your theories regarding the Extinction are true.”

If anything, Martin is less convinced than ever. Jon didn’t exactly elaborate on what he knows, but he seems certain that the Extinction isn’t a threat. If that’s the case, the only other reason for Martin to cooperate with Peter is to keep Jon safe – or, barring that, to at least keep Peter away from him. And if Jon is gone, then… what’s the point of any of this?

Peter takes a step closer and slides a folder onto Martin’s desk. Judging by how thin it is, Martin doubts there’s much follow-up or supplementary material within.

“Then you’d best get reading,” Peter says amiably, backing away again.

“Peter,” Martin says, stopping him before he can take his leave.

“Hm?”

“If she disappears,” he continues, mirroring Peter’s faux-pleasant tone, “you can count on my non-cooperation going forward.”

“Come now, Martin. We both know you wouldn’t allow the Extinction to emerge over a single life.”

Martin lifts his chin defiantly and gives Peter a hard look.

“I’d do it for Jon.”

“And he’s gone.” There is an almost hungry glint in Peter’s pale eyes. The temperature plummets a few degrees as thin tendrils of fog begin to unfurl from around his feet. “You’re alone.”

“Exactly.” Peter’s smug expression wavers at Martin’s non-reaction. “You’re a gambler. Shouldn’t you recognize when you’ve shown your hand?” Martin shakes his head with a thin, humorless smile. The mist creeps closer: wispy eddies and grasping coils stretching across the floor to pool at Martin’s feet. “If Jon’s gone, you’ve lost your best bargaining chip. I’ve nothing left to lose. At this point, you really should be thankful for whatever leverage you can find.”

“You’re bluffing.”

“Try me.”

Peter simply chuckles, but Martin can detect the faint uncertainty laced through it.

“I mean it. If my work performance is unsatisfactory, just feed me to your patron now if you can’t resist. Seems a waste to do it before you’ve gotten what you need from me, but it makes no difference to me; I’m Forsaken either way.” He leans back in his chair. “The only one who stands to lose anything is you.”

“And the entire world, should the Extinction evolve unchecked.”

“In that case, let her – let everyone connected with the Archives be. And don’t disappear any more staff, either.” Almost as an afterthought, he adds: “Or statement givers.”

There is a long silence in which Martin stares into Peter’s eyes, willing himself not to blink or falter. Eventually, the fog recedes and Peter’s fake, plastered-on smile reappears.

“Well, I think I’ve kept you from your work long enough.” Peter nods at the statement folder. “I’ll leave you to it.”

The moment the telltale static of Peter’s departure fades, Martin lets out a heavy exhale and rests his head in his arms on his desk. Every encounter with Peter tends to leave him feeling drained, but that one was more intense than usual.

“Prick,” Martin mutters to the empty office.

It takes a few minutes for him to register the low whirring coming from underneath his desk.

“Were you listening the whole time, then?” Martin scoops up the tape recorder from the floor. “Or,” he sighs, his eyes flicking to the waiting statement, “are you just hungry?”

Martin still doesn’t know what to make of the recorders. On the one hand, supernatural artefacts never bode well. There’s no telling what’s they are, what’s listening on the other end, what controls their spontaneous appearance or why. Eavesdropping and surveillance are on brand for the Eye, but Jon had a point when he said that the Beholding would have no need to use tape recorders to listen in, especially within its own temple. They weren’t Elias’s doing – apparently all of his spying is done through eyes. The Web, maybe? But to what end?

On the other hand, Martin has grown so accustomed to their presence that he was actually unsettled by their absence while Jon was – away. When they started manifesting again, Martin was… relieved, almost. It isn’t the same as having Jon nearby, but it feels like having a connection to him all the same. They’ve almost become a welcoming, comforting sight – at least for the first few seconds after their appearance, before they start making their usual demands.

Sometimes, Martin wonders whether Jon might be subconsciously manifesting them himself. Even before his paranoid episode, he seemed keen to document and catalog the world around him, as if it was the only way for him to make sense of it all. It made Martin's heart ache, how Jon could never seem to relax, to let himself just be in the moment. His hypervigilance was exhausting by proxy, and it’s only gotten worse as time goes on.

In any case, ever since Jon’s coma – half-death? – proved that the recorders’ existence is dependent on his, Martin has started to see their regular appearances as decent indicators as to whether Jon is alive at any given moment. And here they are, still showing up. Which means… what? Martin already knew that Jon is still alive. The Coffin doesn’t let its victims die; death would be a release, and it's incompatible with a realm predicated on unending pressure, on the experience of being trapped with no hope of escape. But if Jon was entirely cut off from the world, lost and unreachable, wouldn’t his connection with the recorders be severed as well? So, if they’re still here, does that mean Jon isn’t gone yet? That there’s still a lifeline tethering him to the surface?

If so, it’s a useless lifeline, isn’t it? The tapes always make their way to Jon in time, but what good does that do in this situation? It’s not like they’re two-way radios; Martin can’t communicate with Jon in real time.

Unless…

No. No unless. It’s not even a long shot, it’s just – daft.

But hasn’t he already been treating them as stand-ins for Jon for the last few weeks? And is it really any more foolish than talking to a coffin?

Martin sighs as he eyes the tape recorder, its reels still insistently spinning. It isn’t going to leave until it gets a statement. He waits it out for another minute or so, but in the end he gives in, just like it knew he would.

“Hi again, Jon,” he starts, picking at his cuticles as uncertainly as he picks through his words. “I doubt you can hear me. At least not right now. But I know you listen to all the tapes eventually. Don’t know if you’ll ever get to hear this one, though. If not, I suppose this is rather pointless, isn’t it? You’re always so diligent about listening to them, too.” Martin huffs. “Well, if you want this one, you’ll have to come back and get it. I’m very cross with you, and I’d prefer to tell you in pers-”

Shut up, shut up, what are you saying?

The recorder lets out a short burst of static, as if protesting the break in his confession.

“Oh, shut it,” he grumbles. “Not – not you, Jon. Sorry. I mean, not like you’re hearing this anyway, right? Whatever, just – you’re needed here, alright? It’s been too long. It’s time to come home.” Martin shakes his head and smiles weakly. “Funny, I – I remember when I used to have to nag you to go home at night. The more things change, the more they stay the same, right? Don’t know what good a persuasive argument does in this case, though. It’s not like you need convincing –”

Martin stops short, a sudden thought crystallizing cold and heavy in the front of his mind. For all he knows, Jon’s gotten it into his head that he needs to stay in there to keep the rest of the world safe. It sounds like the sort of conclusion Jon would reach.

“I mean, I – I – I hope you’re not willingly staying down there out of some misguided belief that it’s – safer, for everyone? Jon?” Martin laughs nervously, on the edge of hysteria. “I – I don’t know why I’m talking like I’ll get a response. Anyway, it’s – it’s probably more likely that you want to come back and you can’t, right?” He chuckles again, and realizes too late how teary it sounds. “I don’t even – I don’t know which of those options is worse, but – but it’s not like there’s anything I can do in either case, so – what’s the point of this, of any of this?”

Martin clamps both hands over his mouth to stifle his abrupt, stuttering intake of breath – the precursor to sobbing, if he isn’t careful. He takes a long moment to compose himself, swallowing back tears and slowing his breathing.

“W-well, in case you do need to hear it… things are not better with you gone, okay?” His voice still sounds thick with emotion. In an attempt to steady it, he ends up overcorrecting, his next words coming out far more vehemently than he had intended. “They aren’t. And I don’t know how to make you believe that, but – but – if you don’t come back, you’ll never get a chance to learn, and it’s not like you to pass up a chance to learn something, right, so – so just get back here, will you?”

He stops again. After months of suffocating, deadening quiet, raising his voice even slightly feels like shouting. He finds himself leaning closer towards the tape recorder, as if he’s sharing a secret. Despite the conscious effort to lower his volume, it does nothing to temper the intensity of his speech.

“Jon, you’re late, and everyone’s waiting. Georgie’s worried. Basira spends most of the day camped out in front of your office, just… listening for any change. I – I don’t think she’s been sleeping much. And Melanie, she –” Martin flounders. He hasn’t spoken to Melanie in weeks, but he has no reason to assume her feelings towards Jon have changed. “Well, she – she’ll be angry if you break a promise to Georgie, yeah? And I’m – I…”

Martin doesn’t know what he is.

“Look, Jon, you – you need to come back now,” he says, more softly. More like a prayer than a demand. “Come home, and we’ll… we’ll figure things out.”

He wracks his brain for more, but comes up speechless. There was a time when he could have spoken volumes about what Jon means to him, and the words would flow from him easily. Now, anything he could possibly say feels shallow and jumbled and meaningless. Absolutely useless. But since when did words make any difference anyway? Jon has always been resistant to an outstretched hand. He rarely accepted any offers of help or invitations to talk; could barely handle a kind word or comforting gesture some days. He seemed to be opening up in the weeks prior to the Unknowing, but then –

Martin lets out a sigh and shuts the tape recorder off. Almost immediately, it clicks back on.

“Seriously?” He stares daggers at the thing. “That wasn’t enough for you?”

He depresses the button again, perhaps a little harder than necessary. The moment he removes his finger, the reels resume winding.

“Can’t you just – piss off and let me have some quiet for five minutes?”

It can’t, apparently. After several more foiled attempts to stop its droning, Martin gives an aggravated groan. As tempting as it is to hurl it at a wall, all the archival staff know from experience that the recorders are practically unbreakable, taking only superficial damage regardless of the attempted means to destroy them. Martin could toss it into a bonfire and at most it would come out a bit worse for wear; the casing would never melt or warp so badly as to render the buttons entirely nonfunctional.

More than once, Martin has caught himself wondering whether they get their durability from Jon. It’s a morbid thought and Martin is always quick to shut it down, but, well – there it is again.

At least Jon’s persistence is – charming. Martin glares at the tape recorder some more. Unlike –

The recorder crackles with another impatient uptick of static.

“Fine!” He flips open the folder on his desk, seizes the statement roughly, and gives himself a papercut in the process. Another hiss erupts from the recorder when he swears. “Yeah? Well, I don’t care if personal commentary is unprofessional,” he snaps at it. He doesn’t know who he’s talking to.

When he finally turns his attention back to the statement in his hands, he makes no effort to hide his foul mood.

“Yet another statement about – I don’t know, but I’m sure it’s bleak and horrifying, or else it wouldn’t be so keen for me to read it. Recording by Martin Blackwood, Assistant to Peter Lukas, Head of the Magnus Institute…”

Daisy draws in a sharp breath and stops short.

“Daisy?” Jon tugs lightly on her hand. “You alright?”

“Jon, I – I feel something, like a – like a pull, I –” Daisy laughs breathlessly. “There’s an up.”

“What,” Jon says, grinning to himself, “didn’t you believe me?”

But Daisy isn’t listening to him, instead continuing in an awestruck tone: “I’m – I – I’ll get to – to see Basira again.”

Her voice pitches up ever so slightly towards the end, making the statement sound almost like a question – as if she didn’t believe until this moment that seeing Basira again was even a possibility, as if she still doesn’t quite dare to believe it.

Jon has repeated the same promise dozens of times now along their trek to the surface. Once more can’t hurt: “She’s waiting for you.”

“I know,” Daisy whispers, almost reverently. Then, louder, her mounting anticipation crowding out the remnants of disbelief: “I can feel it.”

So can Jon. For quite some time now, that feeling of being pulled along – almost like he’s an anchor being reeled in, oddly – has been relatively consistent. The strength of the sensation still fluctuates from time to time, but it’s been awhile since it last disappeared entirely.

Of course, now it’s also shot through with a far more unwelcome pull. He swears he can feel the Archive drawing closer the more they near the exit. Maybe it’s simply his imagination, increasingly overactive as his dread intensifies, but the outcome is the same either way: the Eye will have him again, and soon.

“Come on, then,” Jon says, suppressing the grim edge threatening to creep into his tone. There’s no point in worrying Daisy just when she’s started to feel hopeful. “Almost home.”

Not long thereafter, the passage widens again. They still have to walk single file with their shoulders angled, forced to sidle through a few tight spots sideways, but the soil has finally transitioned entirely to solid stone walls and there is a noticeable upward slant to their path. All the while, Jon doesn’t let go of Daisy’s hand.

He grits his teeth against the lancing pain surging through his leg with every step as the incline grows steeper. From the sounds of Daisy’s labored breathing behind him, she’s having a far worse time of it. He’s just about to reassure her again that they’re almost there when his foot connects with something and he stumbles, pitching forward and nearly pulling Daisy down with him. His free hand flails in front of him to break his fall, and that’s when he recognizes –

“Stairs,” he whispers, feeling the shape of them, their flat surfaces and angles.

“What?”

“Stairs, Daisy.” After pushing himself to his feet, he places his free hand against the wall as a guide. It’s still pitch dark, and it will be until they manage to lift the Coffin’s lid. “Not much further now. Watch your step, and go slowly. They’re uneven.”

Despite an abundance of caution, they both end up tripping several times on the way up. The steps are all different heights and depths: some short and wide shelves, some steep and narrow ledges nearing two feet high – which may seem negligible were they both not so weakened, winded, and wounded. Occasionally, a step that felt solid moments before would crumble underneath them, giving way like gravel; a few times, Jon could swear a step disappeared entirely just before he put his foot down.

He’s so focused on keeping his footing that he forgets to be wary of his head. When he places a foot on one particularly sheer step and propels himself upward with the other leg, his head collides violently with something just above him. The pain races through his skull, his neck, his spine, and he nearly topples backward in the momentary daze of the impact. He has just enough presence of mind to throw his weight forward so that when he loses balance, he collapses against the stairs instead of tumbling down them.

For a few seconds, all he knows is a high-pitched ringing in his ears and fireworks in his vision. He’s dimly aware of Daisy’s hands patting at him blindly, frantically; her voice is muffled, but he can detect the urgency there.

“‘M’fine,” he slurs. He tries to tell her to just give him a minute, that he recovers quickly from this sort of thing, but he’s pretty sure it comes out something more like gim’nit.

When he finally starts to come around, Daisy’s words, once fuzzy and indistinct, start to break through the haze: “Jon? Jon, are you alright?”

“Will be,” he groans. He pushes himself up with one hand and reaches up with the other, groping blindly. Either it’s closer than he thought or he put too much force into the gesture in his disorientation, but his knuckles collide with rough wood and he hisses when he catches a splinter.

“Jon?”

“Lid’s right above us,” he says unnecessarily. “Watch your head.”

Daisy snorts. “Noted.”

“I – I might need some help lifting it,” he says, his vertigo gradually fading. He places both palms flat on the underside of the lid. “Last time, it was a lot heavier on the way out than it was going in.”

“Got it.” Daisy crawls up a few steps to kneel next to Jon, and he can feel her hands brush against his as she reaches up to find a grip.

“Feel it?”

“Yeah,” she says. “Ready?”

“On three. One – two – three –”

As expected, it offers more resistance than it should, as if a force is pressing down from the other side. For a terrifying few seconds, it refuses to budge. Then, with a prolonged creak of protest, it starts to give. Even just the dim light of Jon’s office filtering through that first tiny crack is enough to hurt. Judging from the startled yelp next to him, Jon assumes Daisy is shutting her eyes as well.

Jon can hear the low chatter of the tapes he left behind, as well as something louder and clearer cutting through the white noise.

“I don’t know how much longer I can do this on my own.” Basira’s voice, overlaid with the crackle of radio static. “I’m here, Daisy. I need you to be here, too. I need –”

As soon as the opening is wide enough to stick a hand through, the pressure lets up all at once and the lid swings up the rest of the way. Jon scrambles over the side and grabs both of Daisy’s hands, dragging her up and out. He winces sympathetically when she cries out – she hasn’t properly stretched those muscles in months, and it must be agony.

The moment she’s completely cleared the lip of the Coffin, Jon drops her hands and eases her to a kneeling position on the floor. Rising unsteadily to his feet with a pained groan, he takes hold of the lid and drags it back into place. He stumbles the short distance to his desk for the key and hastens to replace the chains and reaffix the padlock. On the way, he kicks a tape recorder and it goes sliding across the floor; an instant later, the knowledge comes to him: Not a tape recorder. A two-way radio.

His hands are shaking so badly that he fumbles the key four times before he manages to fit it into the lock. He’s so absorbed in that simple, seemingly insurmountable task that he barely notices the swearing and clattering coming from just outside the office as someone on the other side goes through the exact same struggle to unlock the door. Just as Jon turns the key, the office door swings open to reveal Basira, panting and wide-eyed, the radio in her hand dropping to the floor as her eyes rest on Daisy, shivering and gasping for air.

“You’re back,” Basira murmurs, frozen in place.

“Hi,” Daisy says with short, almost giddy laugh, before promptly collapsing forward onto the floor. It’s enough to spur Basira into action, lurching forward and going to her knees next to her.

“Daisy,” she says urgently, shaking her shoulder. “Daisy, please –”

“She’s – she’s alright,” Jon says breathlessly, on hands and knees in front of the Coffin, gulping for air to fill his screaming lungs. “Just – needs to –”

He freezes.

“Jon,” Basira says, disbelieving. “Your voice?”

“I – I – I thought I would – I would lose it again,” he stammers. He begins to move his hand up to his throat, but stops when his other arm trembles violently, unable to hold up his weight on its own. “I don’t – I don’t know, I – I might still, it – it –”

The thought turns to static and the words dissolve on his tongue.

“…it barely even sounded human as it – as it spoke in a strange monotone –”

Jon shakes his head frantically, bringing the lingering pain from his earlier head injury back into the forefront.

“…it was then that I became aware of them – hundreds of glossy dead eyes staring at me from all directions –”

“– a tremendous eye – turning to focus upon me –”

“– staring into me, acutely scrutinizing my reaction –”

“Jon!” He stops and looks up at Basira, suddenly realizing that she’s been repeating his name for several seconds now. “You’re hyperventilating. Just – breathe?”

He latches onto Basira’s voice, forcing himself to breathe – oh, god, he can breathe again –

“Good,” she says after a few moments, calm and steady. “Okay. Can you try talking again? No, Jon, listen – look at me,” she says when he shuts his eyes and starts shaking his head again. “Try talking again.”

“…but my inability to speak –”

“Humor me.”

“…it’s still there, still watching me. There’s nowhere I can go, a place I can hide that it doesn’t keep looking at me – I can’t sleep because they’re watching me – those unseen eyes that hover everywhere and won’t let me rest –”

“– I’m sorry – it won’t let me say the words –”

“Yes, you can,” she says. Firm, but not cruel. Authoritative, self-assured, decisive – a solid presence to fixate on. “You’re just – too in your own head. Focus on me and try again.”

“I –” he begins, then stops short. Not the Archive. He gives Basira an uncertain, panicked look.

“Keep going. Try – try something simple. Tell me your name.”

“My name is…” His voice quivers as he forces the words out one syllable at a time.

“Go on. Who are you?”

“The Arch –”

The Archive, he almost says, before a fearful part of him remembers that Jonah might be listening. Besides, right now it would be inaccurate, wouldn’t it. The Eye does not typically dispense outright falsehoods, and its Archive has no use for fictions. Deception is for the Stranger, for the Spiral, for the Web –

“Try again,” Basira says patiently, drawing his attention back to her. “Who are you?”

“The Archivi –”

“No. Who, not what.”

There is a long pause in which he cannot parse the instruction.

“Full name.”

“Jon,” he says slowly. The sound feels strange on his tongue. “Jonathan Sims. The Archivist.”

“Could’ve done without that last bit, but good enough.” Basira relaxes her posture. “You alright?”

“I – I don’t understand.” Lightheaded and trembling, Jon releases a shuddering breath and leans back on his heels, slightly hunched over with his hands on his knees. “How did you know that would work?”

“I didn’t. But you were spiraling, and I imagine that’s exactly what the Eye wants.”

“R-right. I, ah –” Jon runs a shaky hand through his hair. “I don’t know how long it will stay away, the Buried severed the connection temporarily, but now it –”

“Don’t dwell on it.” At his blank stare, Basira sighs. “Yes, I realize that’s not quite your speed, but try anyway.”

“But –”

“We’re dealing with things that feed on fear and can rewrite reality as they please, right? You said yourself that the feeling is all they care about. Maybe feeding it your fear just makes it easier for it to write your reality – in which case, accepting a hypothetical bad outcome as an inevitability is just creating a self-fulfilling prophecy for yourself.”

“That’s… certainly a theory,” he says cagily.

But it’s a theory that Basira must be invested in, because she leans forward, her eyes as bright and interested as when she’s engrossed in a good book or pouring over some compelling research.

“Yes, it is, but I don’t think it’s too far-fetched. Georgie and I have been pooling ideas, and – I don’t think ‘mind over matter’ is a panacea, but mental state does seem to factor in. I was studying the statements you left for me, the ones involving anchors, and – I’m still not sure about the exact mechanics, but would an anchor help someone survive one of the Fears if state of mind wasn’t a key variable? It might not be the most important aspect, but it does seem significant enough to affect the outcome. Not all the time – not even most of the time – but in some cases, at least. Under the right circumstances.”

“And the Fears wouldn’t even exist without minds to experience them,” Jon says, brow furrowed. It’s uncanny, hearing some of the same ideas he bounced off of Daisy to pass the time in the Buried parroted back at him by Basira now.

“Exactly,” she says excitedly, then closes her mouth just as she’s taking a breath to start on her next thought. She clears her throat, looking slightly self-conscious. “I’m getting sidetracked. We can talk more about it later. For now – priorities.” Her expression turns sharp and focused again. “What should we do with the Coffin?”

“Artefact Storage. Tell them – tell them about the compulsion, make sure they take special precautions. Maximum security. No interaction or hands-on research.” He forces the words out rapid-fire, still expecting the Archive to take over any moment. “Store the key separately, same restrictions. No public cross-referencing, keep the link between the two on a need-to-know basis, preferably restricted to the head of the department. In – in fact, refer them to case number 9982211. Joshua Gillespie had a rather – creative way of containing the key. Simple, but” – Jon laughs, shaking his head – “incredibly effective.”

“That’s…”

“The best we can do without –” Jon huffs. “Well, burying it. Sealing it in concrete.”

“Not a bad idea,” Basira says thoughtfully. She raises an eyebrow when Jon doesn’t reply. “Is it?”

“I – I don’t know. We got out, and it seems – wrong, to completely eliminate that possibility for all the other people trapped in there.”

“You think you can help them?”

“I… I doubt it,” he admits, voice dripping with guilt.

He could try, but he suspects he was only able to reach Daisy because he had a personal connection to her, plus the recording of her voice to help him navigate. Finding anyone else in there would mean wandering around aimlessly until he eventually crossed paths with someone by chance, hoping he could reach them before the Buried whisked him away again.

“But if someone else does make it this far,” he says, “I – I don’t want to be the one responsible for the moment they try to lift the lid and find it cemented shut. The chains will still be there, but at least there’s a chance of someone hearing them, helping them? Probably not, but – sealing it off entirely feels… I don’t know, final? Like we would be condemning them personally.”

“Yeah, okay.” Basira sighs heavily, absentmindedly stroking Daisy’s hair. “Point taken. Can you stand?”

“Not yet. Give me a few minutes. I’ll – I’ll be fine here, though, if you want to move Daisy. Put some distance between her and the Coffin. It’s a good idea.”

“Don’t read my mind, Jon.”

“Sorry.”

“Are you sure you’ll be okay? I don’t feel right leaving you alone after…”

Jon meets her eyes again, tilting his head to the side slightly. Last time, she had no qualms about ushering Daisy away from the Coffin the moment she got a chance. She didn’t leave him alone for long – she wasn’t cruel – but still, he was undeniably a lower priority. He clears his throat and tries to look less stunned.

“I’ll be alright, I promise. Go ahead.”

Basira watches him shrewdly, frowning as she considers her options. Eventually, her shoulders slump and she relents.

“If you’re sure. I won’t be gone long.”

“Careful moving her,” Jon says. “Sorry, that – probably goes without saying? But just – mind her left side. She has cracked ribs on both sides, but two on the left are broken.”

A flash of sympathetic pain and vicarious anger crosses Basira’s expression.

“Thanks for the heads up.” Her voice is clipped, but not unkind. She’s simply trying to keep a tight rein on her emotions: deal with the situation at hand first, break down later – in privacy – if at all. “As soon as I have her settled, I’ll come back and – and help you move.”

He nods tiredly.

“Jon.” Basira waits until he looks back up at her. “Thank you – for… I really thought I’d never – I…”

“Basira, it’s okay,” he says as she fumbles for words. “I understand.”

“You know, or you Know?”

“Oh, uh…” Jon grimaces. “Maybe both? I’m sorry –”

Basira snorts and begins to gently position Daisy to be moved. “I was teasing, Jon.”

“O-oh. Right.” He shifts awkwardly. “Still, though, I – I apologize. I realize the Knowing can be – invasive, and – I don’t have as much control over it as I would like, but I should –”

“Jon, it’s fine.” Basira says it with an air of finality, but she doesn’t sound angry. “I’ll be back soon.”

“Sure,” he says, not quite knowing what to do with her lenience. “Thank you. I’ll just – I’ll just wait here.”

“Yes, you will. You’ve met your self-sacrifice quota for the month. No more pocket dimensions. In fact –” She stands and swipes Jon’s phone off his desk where he left it, handing it down to him. “Call Georgie, let her know you’re home. Keep you occupied until I get back.”

As Basira leaves with Daisy, Jon does exactly that. Georgie picks up on the first ring.

“Jon? Jon, is that you?”

Jon closes his eyes and smiles at the sound of her voice.

“Yeah, Georgie. It’s me. I’m back.”

“You got your voice back?”

“Seems so,” he says tentatively. “For now, anyway.”

Something about the tone of Georgie’s sigh tells him that she’s rolling her eyes at him.

“Why are you such a pessimist?”

“I’m not, I’m a –”

“Don’t you dare say ‘realist.’” He keeps his mouth shut. “Does Basira know you’re back?”

“Yes –”

“Are you hurt?”

“No – well, I mean, yes, but – nothing too serious. Nothing unexpected. I’m alright.”

“Okay. Did you find Daisy?”

“Yes. She’s with Basira now.”

“Good.” Georgie breathes a sigh of relief. “I was worried, Jon. Do you know how long you were gone?”

“I –” Jon pauses as the knowledge comes to him. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m – I’m sorry, Georgie, I really didn’t expect it to take – and it’s impossible to tell time in there, so –”

“It’s – it’s alright, I’m just – glad you’re back. Did you let Martin know?”

“Not – not yet, I – I’m not sure how he would feel about me contacting him.” Jon bites his lip. “Do you think I should?”

“Don’t know. He doesn’t seem to know what he wants. But I’ve spoken to him a few times now, and he seems to be – I don’t know. Thawing, I guess? Seems less cold. Easier to get through to him than it was that first time. Or – easier to get a rise out of him, at least. He’s actually got some fire in his eyes now.”

Jon smiles to himself again.

“Georgie Barker, are you annoying him out of the Lonely?”

“I –” She pauses, considers, and then chuckles. “You know – maybe? In my defense, it’s not difficult to do. He’s very moody.”

“O-oh. That’s…”

“Not necessarily a bad thing, Jon. I mean, it can’t be comfortable for him, but – at least he’s feeling something, interacting with the world around him? It’s like – well, he sort of reminds me of…”

“What?”

“Me, at certain points in my life? I think I’ve told you before, but – the lowest low of a depressive episode for me has always been when nothing can reach me. Feeling nothing, wanting nothing, being unable to envision any sort of future at all and not even caring about it.”

“You did, yes. I – don’t think I fully understood then, but now, I – I think I have an idea.”

“Well, when I start to get better, it can look like I’m getting worse to other people, because they can see the hurt, where before it was – quiet, subdued. All the things I couldn’t feel before, they all come out at once, and it’s – overwhelming, after so much nothingness. But it’s part of the healing. At some point, you have to let yourself feel again, even if it hurts. I know it’s not a perfect analogy, but – this might not be a bad sign, is what I’m saying. Sometimes recovery is messy. It helps to have someone to lean on for support.”

“But if he’s determined to be alone –”

“The thing is, I don’t think he is. But that’s something he needs to figure out for himself. I’m not saying you can’t remind him from time to time that he isn’t alone, but…” She exhales heavily. “You can’t force someone to accept help. You reached out to him. Give him the space to reach back.”

“So… don’t contact him? Because – because I want to respect his boundaries, but –”

Georgie gives an exasperated but fond-sounding sigh.

“Jon, if you want a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, I can’t help you there.”

“But – but what do you think –”

“I think it’s your call. He might not respond, but… he’s been worried, and I do think he would appreciate knowing you’re back.”

Jon makes a noncommittal noise.

“Well, you think on it,” Georgie says. “Listen, I’m walking out the door now, okay? Be there soon.”

“Oh, uh – right. I’ll – see you then, I suppose.”

“You’d better.”

When the call ends, Jon stares fixedly at a speck on the wall, debating whether or not to… what, send an email? That seems too impersonal, but a phone call might be too much. He could always text, but…

Glancing at the screen, he notices that he has several missed text messages. His thumb hovers uncertainly over the icon. It’s unlikely that any of them are from Martin, but he has an irrational need to prolong the confirmation one way or another, to put off knowing as long as –

The Eye informs him that they’re all from Naomi, and Jon heaves an agitated sigh. Not at the knowledge itself – he enjoys his interactions with Naomi, however sparse his side of the conversation tends to be these days – but at having the option of knowing removed from him. When he starts to read her messages, though, his sour mood rapidly evaporates.

“There,” he says with a private little smile. “One for each day I was gone. To start with.”

Once he sends the reply, he sets the phone aside. His mouth is dry, the taste of dirt clinging to his tongue. Luckily, he thought ahead and stored some water bottles here for when he got back, knowing it would take some time before he was ready to drag himself to the breakroom for a drink. Unluckily, he’d been so preoccupied with all his other preparations in the half-hour prior to entering the Coffin that he hadn’t had the foresight to put them within easier reach. As it is, they’re still stored in the hollow under his desk.

He’s still sore and stiff and lethargic, but the prospect of washing the grit out of his mouth is enticing enough to get him moving. Gingerly, awkwardly, he shuffles around to the other side of the desk. It’s slow going; he practically has to drag himself, and he spares a moment to be glad that no one is here to watch him.

Well. Except the Eye, he supposes. And possibly Jonah.

A noticeable chill shivers through him and his breath catches in his throat. Jon shakes his head to rid himself of the thought. He really needs to stop giving Jonah Magnus real estate in his head.

Just as Jon gets a grip on one of the bottles, his phone dings from where he left it on the floor. He bumps his head on the underside of the desk when he starts – not as hard as he did in the Coffin, but enough to send a new wave of pain coursing through him from head to toe. The phone dings several times more in quick succession.

“Okay, alright, give me a minute, Naomi,” he grumbles, rubbing the sore spot at the top of his head. No blood, but there’s definitely a bump. It won’t be there for long. He should be glad for his healing abilities, he supposes, inhuman though they may be.

The text messages continue pouring in as he makes the return journey to his previous spot.

“Guess she really is sending a photo per emoji,” he says to himself. The alert goes off once more just as he reaches for it. “Or more than one.”

When he glances at the screen, it’s not Naomi’s name that he sees.

Martin is typing up the new rota that Peter requested when it happens.

Seemingly out of nowhere, a tape recorder drops onto his desk with a loud clack. Before he can think on its sudden appearance, another comes plummeting down, smashing two of his fingers against the keyboard.

“Ow! What the –”

Another collides with the top of his head, and on impulse he covers himself with both arms. Four more fall – one glancing his elbow, three clattering to the floor around him – and then there’s a lull. Cautiously, he brings his arms down and looks to the ceiling, half-expecting more to come raining down. When none do, he relaxes somewhat.

“Huh,” he says to himself, bewildered. “That’s new.”

He’s used to the tape recorders materializing, of course, but usually it’s only one or two at a time, and they don't drop from the ceiling. They just appear – sometimes within plain sight, but more often slightly hidden from view: under his chair, behind his computer, once in a potted plant in the breakroom. They always click and whir to announce their presence – as if they want to be found, as if to reassure him that they aren’t trying to spy unnoticed.

Martin rolls his eyes at himself. Why is he always anthropomorphizing them, assuming they have intentions?

In any case, being pelted with a tape recorder shower is unprecedented. He rubs his hand where the second recorder hit him, then his head. He’s bound to have bruises, and his fingers are already swelling up.

“What the hell, Jon?”

Before he even realizes what he’s doing, he has his phone in his hand and he’s tapping out a text message.

He briefly contemplates taking shelter under his desk. When no more fall, he turns his attention back to his phone.

Martin leans back with a sigh, dragging one hand down his face. What is he doing? It’s not like Jon is waiting by the phone for him.

Maybe that’s exactly why he’s doing this. It certainly highlights the loneliness. He probably wouldn’t be texting Jon if there was any chance of him answering, would he?

In the span of a blink, that loneliness turns to frustration. For months, his emotions have been dulled, almost to the point of numbness. Things were quiet. It felt comfortable; it felt right; it almost felt safe, the fog blanketing the world and muffling all of its sharp edges, shielding him from all the things that used to leave him hurt and grieving and wanting.

Then Jon went and ripped that blanket off him, leaving him exposed all over again. Ever since, it's been nothing but sensory overload and raw emotion that doesn’t even have a name. All he knows is that it’s too much and it’s all at once and he has nowhere to put it, and it’s manifesting as irritability and mood swings and a pervasive, indistinct sense of hurt that he thought he’d left behind.

He feels everything after months of feeling next to nothing, as if all the things he wouldn’t allow himself to feel are being regurgitated all at once in a nebulous chaotic tangle, and he isn’t equipped to handle it –

“Alone,” he says aloud. That’s it, isn’t it? It’s too much to cope with on his own. He is alone, and for the first time in what feels like forever, that scares him.

Biting his lip until he tastes blood, he picks up his phone again.

He blinks back tears. It feels wrong, unloading all of this onto Jon, but he’ll never see it, so what does it matter? It has to go somewhere or Martin is going to shatter.

Martin stops mid-rant, mind going blank when the typing indicator pops up. For a seemingly interminable amount of time, he holds his breath, watching as it stops and starts and hesitates before finally –

And before Martin realizes it, there’s a tearful, slightly manic laugh bubbling up in his chest and out through his mouth and he’s crying, when did he start crying? He's giving himself whiplash with his own erratic mood swings, but it doesn't matter, because he can just picture how frantic Jon is right now, stumbling over his words, mussing up his hair and muttering to himself. Martin probably shouldn’t find it so endearing, but when has that ever stopped him?

Martin rubs furiously at the tears streaking down his cheeks, sniffling. He’s debating on responding to save Jon from his own self-consciousness when another few messages come through.

Martin can’t help it: he starts laughing again. Then immediately feels a bit bad about it. He doesn’t have much time to dwell on it before the next message comes through.

“Jon,” Martin says, shaking his head in fond amusement.

This is a side of him that Martin has always adored: how easily he gets sidetracked and carried away with his rambling, his tendency to trip over his words when he’s excited, the informational diatribes he launches into at the drop of a hat.

And now Martin’s tearing up again.

“God, what’s wrong with me,” he sniffs, rubbing at his eyes with his sleeve again.

It’s the heart that does it. Martin doesn’t know why – it’s such a little thing – but that last ounce of doubt evaporates and his reticence crumbles, just like that. The transition is unexpectedly gentle: an easy slip from one state into another, like stepping into a well-worn shoe, a stark contrast to the dramatic, jarring shift he would have anticipated.

He begins typing out a response.

Martin smiles into his hand, pressed to his lips. He’s always found it cute, if a bit silly, how stilted Jon can be sometimes, even when speaking through such informal medium.

And the idea that an emoji is somehow more forward than an overt declaration of love is just…

Martin’s heart glitches at the reminder of what Jon must have just gone through. If he really is more receptive to help now, maybe he can be persuaded to actually rest and recover for once, but Martin doesn’t have his hopes up.

Martin can feel the flush creeping up his neck and onto his face.

“Wait,” Martin says, squinting down at his phone screen. “Is he still…”

“Unbelievable.” Martin huffs an incredulous laugh. “He is unbelievable.”

Martin groans when the three dots repeatedly disappear and reappear.

“That’s a lot of typing for just fixing a typo,” Martin says, tapping his foot impatiently. “Go on, Jon, spit it out.”

Martin rubs the back of his neck and tries to ignore the heat pooling in his cheeks, on his neck, along the tops of his ears. One good thing about the Lonely: it all but eliminated his embarrassing tendency to broadcast his emotions to the world with a blush. Or maybe it just made it so that there wasn’t much to broadcast in the first place.

“So much for that,” he mutters sheepishly.

By necessity, Martin has learned to be adaptable. If circumstances have changed this drastically, he needs to reconsider his trajectory. Steeped in some disorientating mixture of emotion – mortification, giddiness, fear, relief, regret, and so much else he still can’t put a name to – he watches the clock and quietly starts to review his options.

End Notes:

hhhhhh hopefully you’re all okay with a slow-moving plot bc I have a feeling I’m going to continue drawing out the character-focused stuff?? (I know where the story’s going but my outline is extremely loose, which means my pacing has a personality of its own.)

Citations for Jon’s Archive-speak: MAG 144; 054/020/083; 002; 060/019

re: Archive-speak – I do plan on explaining the newest development more, I just didn’t get to it in this chapter. But expect more original dialogue from Jon from here on out, with some Archive-speak mixed in.  

I used this lovely guide to help me puzzle through creating an AO3 workskin so I could format the text messages properly. (On which point, I hope the texting isn’t OOC. I admittedly had a bit too much fun with it. Especially Jon’s. He said ADHD!Jon rights and I agreed.)    

Fun fact: Naomi and Jon have a system wherein any cat emoji translates to “Duchess status update, please”. It’s good she takes a lot of photos, because Jon makes judicious use of the cat emoji. Having a bad time? 🐱 Can’t sleep? 🐱 Bored? 🐱 Just looking for something to distract himself from the mortifying ordeal of Knowing and being Known? 🐱 Of course, she sends a lot of photos unprompted, too, as any new Enthusiastic Cat Parent is wont to do.

[whimperwoods]

Arms of the Enemy (D&D Whump) - 8

This is Part 8!

Here are part 1, part 2 , part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, and part 7!

Castor is a warlock, in service to the Great Old One and the Dark Emperor, in that order. Ed is a fighter, a knight and battle master in  the service of the True King of Lumenea. They have always been enemies.  In the space between the Old One and the Emperor, they might be able to become something else.

(Also Ed has emotions and Castor has a plan b.)

tw: panic attack (maybe?), tw: aftermath of torture, tw: feelings of shame and self-loathing, tw: brief suicidal ideation, tw: powerful mood swings, tw: Ed’s general bad time coping,

taglist: @redwingedwhump, @fanastywhump, @insanitywishes @bluebadgerwhump,@burtlederp, @newandfiguringitout, @kawhump

Side note: The d&d mechanics stuff is more a fun challenge for me than necessary for world-building, but I DO feel I should mention I only just realized warlocks get their spell slots back on a short rest and not only a long one? On the one hand I now understand why it’s an actually playable class, on the other hand, I have already established that Castor only gets his back on a long rest, so I’m beefing up all his invocations to compensate.

***************

Castor felt deeply, deeply foolish. He was on the ceiling, but now both of them were visible and Amara was shouting “Hey,” and they were in big trouble. He muttered an invocation under his breath and flung a wave of magic behind him, slowing down everyone on the stairs, and kept running. Hopefully, it would take their pursuers longer to look up than it took him to get out of the line of sight of the stairs and up into some kind of dark corner.

<<Do you trust me?>> he asked Ed.

The other man was silent, his presence a mental weight against the edge of Castor’s awareness, but just as Castor was ducking into an embrasure and trying to keep both of them out of the dim light that seeped through the arrow loop inside, he got an answer.

*****

<<Do you trust me?>>

Ed wanted to vomit. Of course he didn’t. Of course he didn’t. He couldn’t. But of course he did. He had to. He thought, all of a sudden, of his hand in the mage’s, last night. “Squeeze my hand if it’s ok to move you,” as if he’d had any choice then, as if he had any choice now. But he’d done it. He’d done it. A contract. It was done.

Ed was still trying to breathe when they stopped moving and he realized he hadn’t been focusing his eyes, hadn’t seen a thing as they slipped into a tiny space that, he realized a long moment later, was meant for an archer. Did he trust Castor?

<<Yes>> he answered, his voice a whisper even in their minds. His face flushed with shame. He was a disgrace. He was either lying or telling the truth and he didn’t know which was worse. Why had Castor asked him? Why was he pretending Ed got to decide? Ed had decided one thing, and now they were visible and hiding and he didn’t have any more plan than the warlock did.

He realized he was shaking, so hard he was sure Castor could feel it. They were visible. They were visible, and Castor had no plan because Castor was a planless idiot. But he had no plan, either, so apparently he was, too.

He could feel Castor’s presence in his mind even as the man stayed silent, a gentle pressure he could feel even though he suspected he shouldn’t, and it was almost comforting. His breathing eased slightly.

<<Ok>> Castor said, <<So, technically I can be a little bit invisible any time? Only a little bit invisible. And only in shadows. But the problem is it’s only me. So I’m gonna need to uh - well. This is the best place I could think of to leave you. It’s uh - it’s hidden, mostly, and it’s safer than the ground.>>

Ed instinctively tightened his arms around Castor’s neck and shoulders. <<No!>>

He could feel Castor almost-answer, could hear him almost-speak, and anger washed over him. His words came out hollow, ringing empty between their minds because the flood of emotion running through Ed was too big to fit into them.

<<No,>> he told the mage, <<No, you’re the one who brought me out here. You’re the one who started all this. You brought me out here. I could have been - could - have been - >> He knew what he could have been. He could have been dead, or much farther on his way to it, and he didn’t want to be dead, and he didn’t want to be dead, and he was still rambling in Castor’s mind in spite of himself.

<<It’s your fault I’m alive. It’s your fault I’m alive and not in my cell and they’re going to punish me for it. They’re going to punish me for it.>> His stomach felt cold and solid, and he wasn’t sure if he was afraid of his captors or himself, saying things he meant and didn’t mean and couldn’t mean. He was shaking. Oh gods, he was shaking.

<<They won’t.>> Castor’s voice was soft. Gentle. Ed only half heard it. <<They won’t. I have . . . things. There’s more I can do. I’ll be with you the whole time, if you’ll let me in. And I won’t let them hurt you. I’d been planning to hide you here in the fortress, but the game’s up for both of us so now we’re onto plan B and I’m getting you out of here. I just need you to hold on. I just have some things to steal first, and I’m the only one who can be invisible this way. And then I’ll be back. I promise.>>

Ed felt hot where he was angry and cold where he was afraid, and a great sucking tornadic hole in the middle, tearing him apart. Sir Edmond of Lumenea was not this. He was not so small. So afraid. So dependent. He wasn’t. He wasn’t. And he didn’t want to die. He couldn’t want to die. He wanted to be alive. He wanted to be alive.

Castor stood on the side of the wall and rearranged both of them awkwardly, laying Ed down on the tiny patch of floor and tucking his legs in as tightly as they would go. Ed almost cried out at the pain, but forced himself to hold it in, keeping the noise down to a soft grunt he had to hope no one heard under the chaos of low, slowed-down voices shouting several yards away.

Oh. Sounds. That was right. Sounds. Sounds. He hadn’t been listening to the head-sounds, and he had to not make real sounds. At least, he had to not make them here. <<Help me look out,>> he demanded, off topic and with his head still reeling dizzily, <<Help me see, I need to know where we are.>>

*****

Castor’s spine felt electric, prickling with the sense that something was wrong with Ed. He knelt on the wall, making the most of his spider climb as he adjusted himself within the tiny space to lay a hand on Ed’s cheek and turn the man’s face toward him. He looked deeply into the knight’s eyes, trying to pick apart what was fear and what was something else - whatever it was that wasn’t right.

Instead, he suddenly felt awash in a wave of confused emotions, fear and anger and despair flooding out of Ed and almost overwhelming him.

<<No,>> he said gently, trying to keep his voice even and not let on that he’d felt unasked-for reverberations that strong. <<Just stay. It’ll be ok. I promise.>>

The wave of anger that crashed across Castor’s mind was purer and clearly intentional, a mental shove that drove him backward in surprise, making him let go of Castor’s face and sit back into his heels.

<<So that’s it, then,>> Ed said bitterly, <<All that and in the end you think I’m useless. I can’t help. You don’t want me. You’re just going to leave me here with nothing like I’m useless.>>

This was so not the time for a big argument. Especially not when he remembered all the things that weren’t anger that he’d felt before Ed started lashing out.

Castor breathed deeply, centering himself, and then leaned forward and pressed his forehead to Ed’s, pushing as much calm, care, and intent through their mental link as he could. <<Ed, I’m coming back for you. I swear. I - I swear by my master, I’m coming back for you. I just can’t steal things with you on my back.>>

Ed shuddered underneath him, another reverberation from Ed’s mind washing over Castor’s again, the same confusing blend, but with the anger leaking out, leaving a flash of cold and sorrow before it faded away again.

The knight’s hand wrapped around Castor’s wrist. <<Let me help you. I just need a view of what’s below us. And an idea where you’re going.>> His voice was sad, now, thrumming with something that hurt to listen to.

<<Alright,>> he answered, not sure he had any other real option, against that kind of hurt. <<But we have to be careful.>>

<<Alright,>> Ed agreed.

Getting a good peek outward took some doing, but they managed, and Castor was surprised to hear a loud clattering noise a good distance away from their hiding place. Their pursuers were still slowed, but barely, the spell on the edge of running out. It was a relief to hear the people below shout slowly about following the noise. He pulled Ed back into their arrow loop.

<<There.>> Ed sounded exhausted. <<Done.>>

Castor didn’t know what to make of that. He didn’t know what to make of any of this, really. Any time he tried to think it through, things all got tangled, both because this was complicate and because he never seemed to be able to get a bead on Ed’s mind, or perhaps his feelings. <<Thanks,>> he answered, after a moment’s adjusting to what had happened.

<<I'm, uh. I’m a little bit magic.>> Ed was starting to sound more himself, and Castor wasn’t sure if it was because of or in spite of his clear exhaustion. Either way, it was a relief, if a small one.

<<I noticed.>> Castor wasn’t sure whether he should ask about it or not, but he was sure he needed to get his supplies and get them out of here, so he saved the question for later.

<<Sorry about not mentioning before,>> Ed added.

<<Well, at least I know you have that trick if something happens. And I can keep an eye on this place while I’m gone, if you’ll let me.>>

<<What do you mean?>>

Castor found himself suddenly unable to look the knight in the eyes. <<If you’ll let me, I can see and hear what you see and hear. As long as we keep the link going, I can blink out of my own senses and into yours. It’s uh - I don’t do it a ton. But I can check in every couple of minutes to make sure you’re still alright.>>

A twinge of surprise pulsed through their mental link and Castor wondered, passively, whether their unusually strong link might mean some day Ed could look through his eyes, too. The surprise backed off into silence, but Castor let Ed think through it, just listening to the footsteps below and waiting for an answer.

<<Yeah, alright,>> the knight finally said, <<How do I know when you turn it back off?>>

<<I dunno. But we both have to be willing for it to work. So if you don’t want me to see what you see, you can shut me out. I just won’t be able to reopen from a distance so if you do that before I get back, I won’t be able to get to you unless you’re still here.>>

<<Got it.>>

<<I have to touch you.>>

The knight’s fingers wrapped around Castor’s wrist again. <<Done.>>

Castor twisted his arm until he could hold Ed’s wrist, too. Then he focused on the half-prayer that would open the link, whispering the invocation under his breath as quietly as he could.

*****

Ed had expected to feel it when the connection between the two of them changed, but instead he was alerted to it working by a deep gasp from Castor. The mage let go of Ed’s arm and slapped his hand over his own mouth to keep from crying out, and when his voice started up in Ed’s head, it sounded tense and pained.

<<I’ve got your skin, too. The senses of it, I mean. Touch. I’ve got your sense of touch. Gods.>>

The hand Castor had against the wall, stabilizing his disorienting sideways kneel, was quaking faintly, and when he moved the other hand away from his mouth, it was shaking much harder, shaking visibly, like Ed was sure his own did, these days.

For a moment, he felt pity for the mage, but then a wave of anger came behind it. Why should he feel bad? Why should he pity a man for suddenly sharing in the pain of what his own people had done? Why should he feel bad for his old enemy when he’d never asked him to climb into his mind and body, when he’d never asked for any of this.

Pity and anger warred in his chest as he listened to Castor’s body take deep, gasping breaths, like he was trying to steady himself against the pain.

<<Sorry,>> the mage gasped again, <<Sorry, I didn’t mean to - fuck. I think while I’m in there - we both have to calm down together. I can feel your heart racing in there. That’s. I’m not. It’s just supposed to be sight and sound. It’s. I hate it. I see me but don’t feel me. That’s new. Fuck.>>

Ed timed his breaths to Castor’s body’s breathing, feeling his tangle of emotions start to fade again, unsustainable. He was tired. Gods, he was tired. They’d only just woken up and come here and he was already so tired. Slowing his breaths just made it harder to fight it, harder to focus on anything but the pain and the exhaustion and his presence in his own body.

<<Ok,>> Castor said, <<Ok. Ok. Back in a moment. Gotta make sure it works.>>

He hadn’t felt Castor get closer before, but now he felt him leave, the feeling of surprise he hadn’t realized was coming from Castor easing and the mage’s voice quieting just slightly as he rambled more <<Ok. Alright. Ok>>s.

Castor’s return was announced by another deep, pained gasp of air from the mage’s body, but this time Ed felt Castor’s presence solidifying in his mind.

He felt no particular sensation that told him Castor was on his left side, but sensed it somehow regardless, moving his right hand almost instinctively to clasp his own left shoulder comfortingly.

<<Oh,>> Castor whispered, right there and so, so quiet, <<Oh, Ed. I’m. I knew, but - I didn’t.>>

Something about this, about holding his own shoulder to touch Castor, about the half-daze of knowing things he couldn’t know, sensing things that weren’t there, cut through him to the core. <<I need you to come back soon,>> he answered the mage, <<I need you. I can’t stay here. It’s too small. It hurts. We have to go.>>

Castor moved fast this time, out of Ed’s mind and into his own body again before Ed had finished realizing what he’d said. A moment later, Ed had processed the fact that he’d begged and not begged, said what he shouldn’t and meant it and felt nothing bad in the moment of it, and Castor’s hand came down gently to rest over his own, warm and comforting.

<<I know. I’m sorry. I’ll go. I won’t be long. Just stay quiet, and the moment I sense any trouble, I’ll come to you instead of the mission. I’ll be checking back in. I’ll be - I’ll be checking.>>

Ed couldn’t possibly answer. He couldn’t. Something had broken open again, something real was obvious and aching and right there in the open where Castor couldn’t miss it. He shoved against the other man’s presence in their little arrow loop, but he knew without asking that whatever his mind or heart or soul had managed of a shove hid nothing of the whatever-it-was this extra closeness had cut its way down to.

Castor straightened up, peeked around the edge of the embrasure, and hurried outside and away, into the shadows where he’d be invisible, apparently.

Ed laid where he’d been left, feeling like a crab cracked open, the meat inside exposed to the open air. It ached, but it was a good ache, and he didn’t have the energy to hate it. Tears slipped from his eyes and he didn’t stop them, letting them flow silently down his cheeks and leaving alone the question of where they were coming from. It was dangerous, with him like this. Too dangerous. He breathed, and cried, and wondered when he’d feel Castor’s mind drawing closer again.

*****

Castor’s body ached faintly in all the places Ed hurt, a ghost of the way it felt to look through the man’s eyes. It wouldn’t let Castor go. He moved as fast as he could without alerting anyone, the ache lingering somewhere underneath the skin it didn’t belong to. He moved. Shadow. Shadow. Ache. He planned each move as he made the one before it, hurrying from shadow to shadow, where he’d be invisible, disappearing into the blind spots of the universe. He needed to hurry.

Lost in the shadows, he ached.

[blackfemmecharacterdependency]

34. Ivory

Previous Trigger Warnings for mentions of underage/revenge porn, mentions of eating disorder Word Count: 8388

Between Grace making that post of her rapping along to Captain Hook, her saying "aye aye" to Simon in comments, and this photo of Simon's D print in the gray sweatpants, I'm starting to think he's packing a curve 👀

Simon Laurent "liked"

Commenter: He is! Did you never see the old sex tape?

Poster: The WHAT? No… But, wait… I thought that they dated in school. You mean like something that happened after that?

Commenter: They were in school, but it was online for the longest time before she snitched, so I’m sure somebody still has it out there…

Poster: That’s gross. I’m not that desperate to see it that I wanna look at some kids doing it. No thank you.

Simon Laurent “liked”

Commenter is blocked by Simon.

.

Grace was in the grocery store with her mother and brother, and Zasha, a white samoyed puppy that Mrs. Monroe had purchased from a breeder… to potentially train to be in competitions, and Zasha’s handler. Why did Mrs. Monroe bring Zasha into the store, just to have someone else hold her? For the same reason that the nanny was also there, tending to Montanus. “Because, that is literally what I pay them to do.” But… we’re at the grocery store and didn’t even have to BRING them! Grace didn’t argue.

However, she did wonder if she was suffering from some type of weird mid life crisis, or just a rich, bored woman whose husband was working more and more all of the time, despite supposedly getting closer to retirement. Then, she wondered if they weren’t doing so well. But, she kept those wonders to herself, as it would frighten her to know whatever the truth was if it was anything other than her mother did whatever she wanted because she could afford to. 

Plus, she wanted to get out of the house, and apparently that had been reduced to tagging along with Grace at the grocery store, in case she needed help. “You’re almost 6 months, correct? How has it been? Online, one would swear that you’re Diahanne Caroll in her prime. You’ve rarely broken a sweat. Is that for your fans?”

Grace shook her head and read the label of something before putting it into her cart, “I haven’t had any problems, except for eating way more than I used to and getting gas, but those calcium chews usually help with that and I bounce right back. You know, I’ve always taken really great care of myself, think things through and pay top dollar for the finest self care. I guess that the baby is pleased with their temporary temple.” She smiled at her mom and noticed the woman looked leery. “I know… you had a very rough pregnancy with me. Believe me, I remember this fact, but I haven’t been having that experience, personally. In fact… Did you know that I’ve gained THOUSANDS of new followers since they’ve seen that I was pregnant. Pregnant people have been asking me what I use for this and for that and I’ve been plugging my brand, since we’ve got the pregnancy line now. It’s been sensational. I’ve had a blast!” 

Grace had been working on a blog about her pregnancy, which she began with a video addressing all of the questions to all of the people who were not her. 

“Hey, Those That Are Graced!” She’d cheered into the camera, “Happy New Year! I know that I’ve been unavailable to reach out too, and believe me, I do miss interacting with fans and followers, but I am currently not working on my career, to focus on other things in my life. Just to touch base with everyone, I feel like we’ve had this discussion before and those of you who actually respect me would definitely not need it repeated, but there have been so many new faces of possibly unfamiliar followers that I am revisiting notes that I have in all of my bios… 

First, my professional life is one thing, my private life is another. I extend myself professionally, and over the past few months, even though I have not actually been working, I’ve still been spending time providing everyone with content. Please do not send messages, comments, or questions for me to any of my friends, and especially not to my family members, Hazel in particular. She is 12 and shouldn’t have adults bothering her for information that not only isn’t her concern, but isn’t your concern. She wants to be able to enjoy the limited hours of screen time that she’s allowed. That becomes difficult for her when people are asking her hundreds of questions that literally are related to her mother’s sex life. 

Second, my professional life is offered at my discretion, as well. Whenever there is product that I think you should try, I will announce it. If I’m not familiar with a product or no arrangements have been made for me to try a product or I’m unaware of a product… my comments is not the place for said product. That is including everything from your all natural care supplies, book recommendations, your demos, your dance videos… Like… I LOVE receiving those things, but whenever I open my comments back up, that is not where those things go. 

I have links for email addresses for avenues of business, entertainment, etc on my website, and if nothing else, my website is featured on every form of social media that I have. I am the person who goes through those emails. I am NOT the person who checks my social media messages, so you will never get a response from me through those and run the risk of me not seeing something if you send it there instead. 

Third, my spaces have boundaries and moderators to enforce those boundaries. Whenever you’ve been allowed to be a guest in any of my spaces or my child’s spaces, you treat that shit like Afropunk - “No sexism, no racism, no ableism, no homophobia, no fatphobia, no transphobia, no hatefulness.” And then, since I’m not Afropunk and I have even greater needs, and can’t believe I have to say this much else: No pedophilia, no inappropriate interactions with a minor, no incestuous ideation, and no nudity. My moderators are quick, but not perfect. Your fellow guests and neighbors in my spaces should never have to see jokes about my mother and I engaged in sexual acts together, or worse, my UNDERAGE daughter, and no - Hazel and I posting a dance video is not an invitation for someone to make comments that because she might be fluid in her movements that it is sexually suggestive and if ever we find one of those headass posts where you put a photo of my beautiful daughter up, say something obscene or rude or ask, “Thoughts?” Simon finds out your IP address, sometimes more than that and he doxxes your ass. Ask around. If threats of violence or suggestions of harm are given… he might show up at your house and I don’t know what to even tell you about that one, because I’m not at liberty to say, according to the lawyers.” 

She smiled, relaxed, unclenched her teeth that she realized had been clenched since she began her greater needs. 

“Fourth, leave Hazel alone. She isn’t going to add you, because she is not allowed to add adults that she does not know. If you follow her public figure pages, those are for her poetry, her brand, her rapping, her artwork, her theater program, and whatever announcements she wants to share with her fans about her personal life, which is usually vague and innocent. If Hazel posts that she had a great time at the premiere of some movie, that is not the place to ask her personal questions. The place to ask her personal questions is nowhere! We don’t have a space created for strangers to ask her personal questions. She sometimes will be allowed to grant an interview, in which she will answer a professional about appropriate questions that have been approved.

Fifth, shut up about Simon! Shut up about Simon! I swear to you… In the past few years that Simon and I have been in communication and the ones that we’ve been in close communication, I KNOW that you realize that we are communicating, but that falls under my private life, which I have not created a space in the public for.

Now… you may speak with Simon about whatever things he speaks about in his private life, I can’t control that, but what I can control and do control is what he will or won’t say about me, even in HIS space. Yes. I got it like that, and what will happen, is Simon will be seeing this, and he is very good at remembering details and he will memorize everything that I’ve said here and he will respect that and enforce it, even in HIS space. 

Which leads me to my last thing… There’s a lot of Esmoroth fanfolk in my spaces now and you all act a certain way in your little Esmoroth corner of the Internet… but in here, in Grace’s space, you better act like you’ve been tossed to the feet of the Idol Princess when her pheromones are igniting the internal flame of servitude. Because, we stan the Idol Princess in this space, and you’d better act right.”

After the release of the 3rd book and return of the Idol Princess aka the Future Queen, several fans were disappointed and had called Simon out for “pandering.” But, several MORE fans came around. He was competing for top spots with the YA novel greats after the 3rd book. But… that also meant more fans to be in Grace’s business. 

Her New Year’s announcement remained pinned at the top of her page and the next post was text, “Oh, yeah. Last but not least, you may have noticed that I’m pregnant. I’ll be featuring some of my favorite findings on my maternity journey here, so please stay tuned if you’re pregnant, expecting, or planning, for what I think and hope will be some helpful tips for your journey!”

Most of the Esmoroth fandom didn’t like her very much, but they also “just couldn’t stay away. Aside from the Grace in Maternity blog, she still didn’t have social media open for commentary, though she did sometimes pass through Simon’s or Hazel’s comments and engaged a little bit with them. She pinned the video to other sites and then just didn’t really visit them again much.

“I could barely walk whenever I was six months pregnant. I had the finest of everything, too,” Mrs. Monroe broke into her thoughts. “Then again, I had what they now call an eating disorder for several years. I… wasn’t completely… well whenever you were announced…” she looked guilty, like she did whenever she faced her own failures as a mother. “We had to get a 24 hour nurse to keep me… healthy. By seven months, I could hardly get out of bed.”

Grace furrowed her eyebrows, “Mom… you’ve never told me that you had an eating disorder. Did you ever get help for it?”

“Help? Oh… like… whenever I had to be rushed to the hospital multiple times? Yes. I got help.”

“MOM… Did you ever heal?”

“Wait, are you asking me if I have disordered eating now? Heaven’s no, Grace. I was trapped with your father by the time you were born. I eventually realized that I had to be more… alive and well than I did flawless. We hired a nutritionist and personal chef.”

“Mom… a lot of people need psychological help for something like that.”

“And I come across to you as ‘a lot of people’? Hmph. It’s pathetic enough that I allowed myself to be so weak. I wasn’t going to beg someone to give me the strength I needed.”

“That’s not what it’s like at all…” Grace cupped her mother’s face and said, “There may be things that people need to help you with, Mom. That doesn’t make you weak or whatever else you’ve convinced yourself of. It didn’t make me weak when I needed to get help. It doesn’t make Hazel weak when she needs help…”

Mrs. Monroe waved Grace’s hands off of her face, “As long as you’re fine, have no other concerns.”

“Mom…”

“Were you done with the shopping?” Grace sighed and continued moving. 

.

Simon was pacing, clenching and unclenching his fists. Several of the message boards, every one of his social media platforms, and even at least one of Hazel’s. He’d taken her devices away, but now she was angry and he certainly couldn’t find the words to explain beyond, “You can’t be online right now.” She was scribbling aggressively in one of her paper journals, and fuming. They both were fuming from different but related reasons.

Grace came in with her little shopping entourage and Hazel rushed to her, furiously. 

“Your BOY TOY took my devices DURING screen time and REFUSES to give them back!” Grace’s eyes went wide and she turned to look at Simon, who was pacing and didn’t even seem to hear the accusation, notice that she came in or to see Monty. Something was absolutely wrong here. 

“Help get the groceries and I’ll get your devices, okay?” Grace said and cupped her chin. Hazel was still breathing heavily as she stormed out towards the groceries and Mrs. Monroe settled on the couch. Grace took Simon’s hand and he was startled by her sudden touch. But, the moment he realized it was her, he let out a deep breath and wrapped her up in a tight hug. “Hey. Let’s go talk, okay?” She suggested, rubbing his back. He nodded his head, but didn’t move from the spot or lessen his hold on. She squirmed a little bit and said politely, “Oxygen, Gray Eyes..” He let up and rushed out of the room. Grace followed and watched him flop on the bed and cover his face with his fists. “Whenever you’re ready.”

“We’ve been doing SO well…” He said, shaking his head. 

“We have.” So, this is something that he did wrong? “And the only way that we continue doing well is to be open and caring with each other.” He slicked back the wild hairs that weren’t pulled into his ponytail. He appeared to be in a lot of pain, but she had to get whatever this was settled. “Should I go online? Will I see what happened, if I do?” She pulled out her phone, mumbling, “I’m guessing that’s why Hazel’s stuff was confiscate-” He snatched the phone from her hands and she let out a yelp, both at the audacity and the fact that she didn’t even see him get up. 

“No. I have to tell you. You can’t find out on the Internet. SHE can’t get on. She CAN’T!” 

“Why can’t she? Because, she’s pretty pissed and it IS her screen time…”

“Because, the internet is relentless and unkind, and she’s too young to have to deal with how much. Not today. She’ll… I’ll… give her extra time once it's died down.”

“Tell me what’s going on, Simon.”

He frowned, “Someone brought the tape up.” At first, she was confused. Was this something about the movie? Why would he be so upset as to take Hazel’s… “And it’s recirculating again. I’ve been reporting it and fans have been reporting it and it gets taken down, but more and more people have seen it now and it’s just… too much. I don’t want her to run into it…” NOW, she understood. That tape… which… technically… it was done with a webcam, so it was never a tape, it was a recording, but… “I saw it again… not watched it, but you know, saw a portion of it whenever I was reporting it… God…” He sat down on the bed, “You’re a kid, Grace. You had the rounded face and everything…”

“Ummm… You’re a month and a day older than me, Dude.” she said, sitting down, trying to pretend that she was more calm than her heart was allowing. She could barely breathe, thinking about the feelings that just mentioning that used to bring up for her. She wasn’t sure how she might react to seeing it come up somewhere. But, maybe she should try…

She gently took her phone back, despite his struggling. One stern look and he let it go, realizing that she was determined and he was probably already in a lot of trouble, if something had been triggered. She nodded, “Yep, looks like a few people have tagged me, asking me if I saw that somebody posted it…” She went to the video and he clenched the bedspread, moving his legs uncontrollably and looking straight ahead. “You know, a lot of people used to say that you couldn’t see your face in it, that it was out of frame, but it does come into frame a few times…” she said. She paused, “See?” He shook his head. “Simon, you’re not even gonna indulge me a little bit at a time like this?”

His frown deepened and he took another long breath. She was right. SHE was the victim in this. The least he could do was take a look at his disgusting handiwork. He saw himself and he recoiled. “You were a kid, too,” she said. “Sure, at the time, this hurt more than anything my brain can recall. But… I do know, as a grown ass woman, you were wrong and also were a child. Both of those things can be accurate.”

“We’re only a few years older than Hazel, there. If some kid did something like this to her… I would…”

“I would hope that you’d remember that you were their age once and just as bad.”

“Is… is that how you would react?”

“Oh, hell no. I’ve never done anything like this. I’d kill that fucking kid. But, you would have to be the adult that fucking pulls me off of him…” She laughed and scratched at his beard, “But, nothing like this will happen to Hazel. She’s a good judge of character and we know all of her friends.”

“Your parents knew me too, and I think that they’re pretty good judges of character. Your mom at least. She always knew that I was rotten.”

“No she didn’t! She knew that you weren’t rich, and in her head those two things were the same thing. She knew that you were controlling, and she thought that I was going to sacrifice myself for you, but she didn’t think that you were going to straight up try to assassinate my entire character.” He looked away from her, “And NOW, you are very diligent in making sure that you aren’t crossing any lines, with me and with Hazel, my mother, my father, and I think people in general. This wasn’t long enough ago that it’s not hurtful to think about… but it was long enough ago to not beat yourself up over. But… It is a burden that you designed. So, it’s only right that you explain to Hazel exactly why she shouldn’t be online right now.”

Hazel took it so much better than she had taken him taking away her computer and phone. “Are you serious? I’ll just avoid social media. You KNOW I don’t wanna see anything like that, myself, but I already knew that it existed out there somewhere.” She shook her head, “I don’t like the way you look with clothes ON, think I’d run the risk of seeing you without them?” 

Grace suggested, “Is there anything else you want to say to him? Maybe about how you broke the news to me when I got home?”

“Oh..” Hazel flared her nostrils and rolled her eyes, “Sorry I called you Mom’s Boy Toy… You kinda are, but I shouldn’t say it…” 

Simon laughed, mostly because he was relieved that she wasn’t scarred by him having to talk to her about this video resurfacing. “You kidding? I’m gonna put that on a t-shirt.”

“No cap? Because I have SO many where that came from.”

“We’ve gotta brainstorm.”

“Simpsona T-shirts can be your new thing…” And just like that, Grace watched them be best friends again. Hazel could get mad and stay mad for a long time, but she didn’t like to argue, so even whenever she got mad, she tended to stay to herself until she wasn’t. The two of them left to go sit on the swing set outside of the house they were renting, and Grace sat by her mom on the couch. 

“I don’t even want to know what that was about.”

“Cool, because I wasn’t gonna tell you.”

“You don’t have to. One of your “boy toy’s” fans will.” Grace laughed and then threw her head onto her mom’s shoulder. The woman gasped at first, taken aback by the show of affection, but then placed her hand on Grace’s. “You’re a very good mother to both of them. You’ll be a good one to that one too.” she pointed her free hand at Grace’s belly.

“Did you just…?”

“Come on, you’ve been raising yourself a man since you met him and I’ll stand by that forever. Might get it engraved on my headstone.”

Grace cackled, “I absolutely AM NOT raising him!”

“He is literally a life sized puppy that went through a rebellious phase where he kept biting you!”

“Well, I finally realized that I have the power to curve that behavior… and trust me, Mom… It’s not something you’d do with somebody you’re raising.” Grace stuck her tongue out.

“Get off of me you scoundrel!” Her mother joked. Grace just laughed and held on tighter. The woman put her arm around her. “Are you okay, Darling?”

“Whenever I was hurt or scared as a little girl, I was more afraid of admitting it to you and Daddy. I would be more hurt by the thoughts of how little you would think of me if I openly showed imperfection. Not feeling that way took a long time and a lot of work. So, now, if I have a hard day, I’m not too proud to lay on my mommy and say so.” She looked to gauge her mother’s reaction. She was always speechless whenever Grace got emotional. 

She’d never learn past those suppressing ways and it amazed Grace that her mother didn’t realize how much her and Simon were alike in that way. Simon had to work really hard at it and her mother was too proud and pampered to put in such effort. But, whenever Grace booped her nose, the woman’s eyes flickered amusement, ever so slightly. Now, she pushed Grace off of herself and opened her arms to receive Montanus. “Take a photograph of me with my children,” She told the nanny. “One with the two human ones, then we’ll add the new fur baby…”

.

She still hadn’t made any announcements about her status with Simon, nor had she spoken about her pregnancy outside of the maternity blog by the time Valentines’ Day rolled around. But, one thing that she did was allow for Simon to share maternity photos. That was her “gift” to him. 

There. Were. Tons. 

Simon took photos of everything. He had a copy of every ultrasound. He had an electronic journal of every detail that came up. So, whenever he posted the album “Countdown to Ivory’s Arrival,” he had more photos than most of the fans were probably going to look through. Therefore, he left many of them private, with only close friends able to view, and the ones that were public were his favorites of the candids of Grace being pregnant and gorgeous, some of the ones from photoshoots that she would post, and the professional maternity photos that they had taken so far. They took some each trimester, as a family. 

The ones at her three month mark were taken in New York, early November (around their anniversary, whenever he was in town. They had fall colors and all three of them were absolutely stunning. Hazel was impressed with how well that Simon cleaned up, so much that whenever he showed her older photos of himself, she thought he was a different person. She had no idea how right about that she was. Simon being both subservient and also a mega diva himself was absolutely salivating every time Grace did something, but also, it was him who insisted, "We have to have a photoshoot each trimester, each with a different theme.” She agreed on the trimesters, but wasn’t feeling the theme part so much. She told him that they could simply have the season be the theme.

They had three changes of outfits for each set. Grace had a gown made much like the one that she had worn to the fall festival in 9th grade (the one that the Idol Princess’ gown was very heavily based on, the one that Simon had taken photos of her in, getting her first beauty deal underway), one that Simon saw her in and immediately began crying. “You’re… gonna ruin the photos,” Hazel told him. 

There were candid ones of him crying. Her favorite was one where he was crying, Grace was trying to comfort him and Hazel dropped in front of them, bombing it with a prison pose and her tongue out. She had on a yellow pantsuit with fall leaves in her hair, her signature look being wearing leaves in her hair. Simon’s yellow suit was similar to hers, but way more expensive and the red accents, instead of the orange ones that Hazel elected. 

The orange outfits were Hazel in orange overalls, Grace in a romper and Simon in a jumpsuit that Hazel insisted was “the most expensive prison wear in the world.” The red ones were regal matching dress attire, Grace in a two piece dress to show off her belly, Hazel in the same floor length evening gown, but one piece, and Simon in a red suit, made of the same material. Hazel’s hair was down and flowing. Grace’s was gathered up, with most of her afro pulled forward, cascading out of the jeweled red head dress she wore, and Simon’s usually (these days) flowing hair was pulled into a ponytail, with the undercut showing. He was generally self conscious about it, but Hazel put little red jewels over his scar, so even though he was still anxious about his hair, he was proud of her accessorizing enough that he wanted to confidently show it off.

The six month ones were taken in January, and done in all white, which Hazel said, “Looks fabulous on mom and me, but you look like the abominable snowman,” to Simon, on the day of. They were in California by that time, but took a little trip to the mountains because the Monroes had property there that Simon remembered had beautiful scenery that he wanted to have family photos at. 

They did all white shots and winter blues. 

Whenever Simon posted them on Valentines’ Day, Hazel joked in the comments, “I still say that we need to crop your face out.” 

People loved the maternity photos, noticed that Grace did NOT have any on her page and she didn’t comment or react to any on Simon’s page. (Yes, these people pay entirely too much attention to the lives of celebrities that they didn’t even KNOW), but someone did some investigating and found Grace’s pregnancy blog. So… even though that was mostly a completely different following, others stormed into the space, thinking that FINALLY, some place where Grace has actually been interacting and will interact with us. She literally ignored anybody that wasn’t asking about helpful tips for their own pregnancy or giving her helpful tips and the title changed from, “Grace in Maternity” to “Y’all Can See This is a Mommy Blog, Right?”

A few people were seething, but funny enough, Grace’s faithful mommy following were more along the lines of, “Wait… You’re FAMOUS, Monroe Mommy???” After that, she had a hoard of moms check out her other life. She enjoyed having more of them in her fan base, though she also had a lot of ones who had always known being like, “Y’all seriously didn’t know Grace Monroe?” and her favorite quote ever on that blog, “Hell, her album is the reason I AM pregnant!!!”

Meanwhile, Simon had been less likely to play around with any of the fans ever since the video thing. He’d made that very clear, and then sort of stopped interacting with them. He didn’t even go through to like people’s comments anymore. Some of them would say things like, “Whoever resurfaced that video, if we find you, it's on sight for making Simon hate speaking with us!”

Sometimes a person would “Lol” and contend, “He’s too busy working on the Esmoroth movie. He’s not here because of the movie not some fuzzy sex tape from years ago.” 

Those were the only ones that he’d respond to just to say, “No, they’re right,” and nothing else. 

He wasn’t as busy on the Esmoroth movie as he intended to be. He was working on more tech and models for the movie than any other movie things. For one thing, the script was being adapted, and casting was hard. The casting director wanted to get a different type for the Idol Princess, but Simon was extremely firm and clear that the Idol Princess HAD to look exactly as described in the book. “There are parts of the story that are directly related to her looking the way that she does.”

“We can adjust those parts,” the director had said, hoping to appease him. 

“The Idol Princess looks like my childhood best friend. Her look is non negotiable,” he had told them. They didn’t believe in non negotiable, apparently, because the girls that were being considered were all much too light. Whenever Simon had rejected them all, they informed him of those girls’ filmographies and their agents and other people said agents represented.. “Maybe they have that type of record because people are hiring them for roles that were meant to be for someone else. Just… give me all of the call sheets for girl characters who auditioned.” 

He went through and disqualified half on looks alone (not to say that they weren’t pretty children or whatever, but they didn’t look like the Idol Princess). Whenever he had the stack of dark skin girls, he went through, checking their filmographies and auditions.

He asked Hazel for her opinion and she suggested a name that he recognized from his rejected stack. He pulled it back up and looked at the light skinned girl in the photo, "Do you mean this girl, Hazel?" He wondered.

"Yes! She's a really good actress!"

He furrowed his eyebrows and pointed out, "But she doesn't look like the Idol Princess. The Idol Princess has dark brown skin, tightly coiled hair, full nose and lips, and dark brown eyes. This girl has none of those things."

Hazel shrugged her shoulders, "She's really good though."

"Well… maybe some of these other girls are really good and people just don't want to see them in stuff like this." 

Hazel frowned and she asked, "Are you accusing me of favoring her because she's got features like mine?"

"No. I'm just saying that she doesn't look the part. You're usually really good about that kind of thing, Haze."

"Well… I don't know anybody in the age range that looks like the description of the Idol Princess." She folded her arms, "But like you said, maybe that's because people take the easy way out and just get the pretty Black girl that they know of to play a part instead of being true to characters. I've definitely read more books with dark skinned girls than I've seen in movies…"

"Here are some of my choices," he said and spread the sheets out before her. "I think this one has the look, but I think this one had a better audition. BUT, she was auditioning for a background character and this one was auditioning for the Wicked Heiress. Maybe she just didn't have that role in her and should audition for the Idol Princess, so we can know for sure.."

"I think that maybe they should all audition for the Idol Princess again. What if they just didn't believe it would be realistic that they'd get offered a job like this, especially if bigger stars are being considered? Sometimes, I have to talk kids into auditioning for our productions because they're worried that the same actors will win out anyway."

He gave her a side smile, "I think you're onto something, Haze."

.

Hazel sent out the invites for Grace’s baby shower. Unfortunately, all of Grace’s friends lived elsewhere, so it would be an expensive trip. Fortunately, they had money, so the Monroes could foot the bill for everyone who didn’t just have the means to travel across country for an event. 

Meta flew in with Damita from New York the previous week, but he made some business plans to collab with a Cali artist that week, so he was working, as well. Meanwhile, Damita and Grace were spending the week reconnecting and chilling. Shana and Iza came in from Atlanta the night before. Gharrisahn was already in LA for work, so she would swing by the day of. Grace’s parents arranged for Mikayla and Tulip to come down. They were in coach on the same flight that Lucy’s and Lindsay’s moms and they were in first class, so they’d all meet the driver upon landing.

Hazel had on a headset, along with Simon’s assistant and Grace’s assistant, because Hazel had arranged the shower and she wanted to make sure that things went how she meant for them to. 

Grace was in a custom made gown that was inspired by Book 3 of Esmoroth and Simon had been at her side simply staring at her for the entire time she had it on. It had been a surprise. A very nice one that he apparently loved. She hired the costume designer for the movie to make her several pieces, but this one was like the one that the Idol Princess resurrects in. Grace was now hip to the lore enough, mainly from paying attention to Hazel’s ravings, and her and Simon’s movie chat. 

For the most part, Grace didn’t want to have a shower. All of her friends lived elsewhere, the baby was due sort of close to Hazel’s birthday and she still wanted Hazel to be able to have a party - which she doubted would be able to happen if she waited until after they were born, so she wanted to have Hazel’s birthday party, INSTEAD of a shower and Hazel said, “How about you just worry about slaying everybody in your peak perfection pregnancy, and I’ll take care of the shower?” 

With the financial backing of GlamMother, her dad’s big brain, and her own penchant for moments and aesthetics, Hazel tended to be very good at making things come together. She even produced some choreography (Doereography, as she called her pieces), for her and her mother to perform, because, yes, Grace was good and swollen by May, but she also could still do mostly everything that she was doing before with that additional bundle. It did throw her balance off a little and she couldn’t lift Hazel at the moment, but she kept up with every step of the Irish step dancing that Hazel put into the choreo, and she absolutely could still nail every Haitian movement. Hazel wanted to make a birthday choreo with ties to her heritage, and Grace was always very supportive of her doing anything that made her feel connected to her identity. 

For good measure, Hazel looked up cultures from Grace and Simon’s heritages too. She was most accustomed to American jazz/hip hop and ballet. She started at 6, with Grace and when they were apart, Grace used to make instructional videos and post them just for Hazel. Whenever she was 10, she started to tap, and all of the other things in between, she and Grace perfected, and whenever she really wanted to nail something, they’d call in a world class trainer. 

Hazel felt that a world class trainer was needed for the baby shower. Grace very much so disagreed. So, Hazel got her grandmother to get them. “Next time, simply come to me first,” the woman had said. 

Hazel opened up with one of her raps. Her mom’s friends (as always) got their entire lives whenever she would flow - which was possibly the reason that she honed her talent, if she thought about it - and even Simon would be into the groove with things. He didn’t have the best rhythm, but he certainly always looked way taken up with her talent. Grace bouncing around with a round belly was everything in the world to Hazel, and when she was done, she waddled over to hug her. 

They played games, did some traditional shower things and some new things too, that Hazel consulted with celebrity event planners for. When it was time for gifts, Grace froze, looking at the way that everything flowed. It was like her 16th birthday again and she felt like she might have a panic attack. “Grace… It’s okay,” Simon said. She looked at him on the other side of the tete a tete and he smiled, “I learned my lesson. This is straight up simply tribute.” He kissed her on the forehead and she calmed down to receive gifts and cry about everything, but manage to not look ugly doing so, because no matter how comfortable she had gotten over the years, that was still engrained in her as a huge no-no.

Winding down from the party, she found Hazel and her friends at the photo booth, having switched out their baby shower outfits for their birthday party outfits. “Where’s Simon?”

“Bullying people about their gifts,” Hazel said nonchalantly. 

“Oh God…” Grace raced over and smiled, “Hey… what’s uh… what’s going on?”

Mrs. Monroe stood behind Simon with her arms folded and Mr. Laurent was in front of them. Simon answered, “Well, I’m giving people things back that went against the specifications for the list.”

“I don’t remember making specifications for the list.”

“You wouldn’t, because you didn’t, I did. You aren’t particularly great at meticulous things and you don’t pay attention whenever I’m telling you plans like these,” Simon said.

“We’re not gonna send a gift back with the person who gave it to us.”

“What are we gonna do, donate it to charity? Because I am not putting this together for our baby. This company uses…”

“Thank you, Mr. Laurent. Thank you for coming and thank you for this gift.” She gave the man a pat on the hand and smiled at Simon. He was still frowning, along with her mother. “You’re backing him up, now?” She got flashbacks of whenever they used to gang up on her and she was very salty that she had to defend MR. LAURENT of all people against the devastating team and Simon and her mother could be.

“He specifically said nothing from that company ON THE LIST,” her mom said, beginning a tirade against this man, with her and Simon taking turns on letting him know exactly how he’d fucked up.

“Their product is cheap and substandard.”

“They’ve decimated the supply of the people in the area they harness things from TO make cheap product.”

“And they use slave labor!”

“Child slaves.”

“OKAY! Okay… That’s a good company to boycott. But hear me out… Mr. Laurent is a simple man who shops at like three places and definitely doesn’t look up things like that,” Grace said.

To which Simon and Mrs. Monroe both reminded her, (loudly) “It was on the list!”

“I made it clear which companies we weren’t accepting gifts from!”

“It’s already bought.” Simon was going to continue complaining, but Grace took his hands and placed them on her belly and he immediately softened up and stared at it. “This is the most important thing, right?”

He looked up at her and cupped her face, shifting himself to touch foreheads with her. Hazel appeared out of nowhere to bomb the photo that they weren’t even expecting Lucy to take. 

.

“Wait, that was it?” Grace wondered. Let’s be clear… she did go through a lot of pain and it was a tough time in the birthing house, even with Simon right beside her and Hazel, her mother and her best friend nearby. But… it felt like there should be something else happening or that something was missing, that she had neglected something, or like something didn’t happen that was supposed to. 

She supposed that she had simply set her expectations so deeply into the thought of pain, struggle, blood, sweat and tears, that when it came… her imagination had actually run wild. Simon had kept telling her she was doing well and how he was proud of her and other affirmations. He was holding the baby now while she was being cleaned up. 

“Did everything happen?” Grace asked. 

Hazel went over the checklist with her. Yes. Everything happened. “Did I pass out?” No. She was awake. She was there for every grueling minute. It just was a different experience for her than what her mother described, than what she read and interpreted. 

The professionals explained to her how her birthing went relatively well, what to do next, etc. Charlotte, from the center, even talked to her about how it’s not only different for everyone, but how all four of her own pregnancies and births were different from the last. Grace was expecting something terrible to happen within the first few days, just because it didn’t seem like everything had happened! The paranoia died down on day 3 and she simply was back to cuddling with her new baby.

They looked like her, so far. Hazel made them a stuffie of a potato in a diaper… the baby just looked like a potato. She didn’t know how else to express that. Simon worshipped them. He was constantly holding them whenever Grace wasn’t. He was close by whenever she fed them. He took so many photos on his phone that within days, he surpassed all of the ones he had of Monty from the past several months.

NONE of those were going online any time soon. Grace had only posted a few days after giving birth her experience with having done so. She bounced back so quickly and looked so effortlessly beautiful that some people were claiming that she had been trolling and was never actually pregnant. She found that funny, but it also was her cue to duck away from the Internet for a while again. 

The first month of Ivory’s life, they were for the most part a quiet baby. Simon frequently worried that something was wrong, checking, rechecking, then coming back and checking again that they were breathing, awake, happy, etc. Grace was more like, “You’re so gross. Look at you! Drooling all over everything. Little slobbery monster!” She spoke in a high pitched voice that made Ivory smile and kick their little legs around.

“GRACE! Don’t say that!” Simon insisted. “You’re gonna make them feel bad.”

“No way! Ivory’s a tough little cookie, like their Mama. I gonna bite you, Cookie! Mama gonna bite you!” Then she playfully nibbled at their feet and hands. 

Simon studied the baby for a while and determined, “They seem to be enjoying it.” He would then relax a little. 

Hazel was the only person allowed to post photos of Ivory, and comments were always closed. The first one was on Hazel’s birthday. She was in a sundress, tanned a little more than usual and Ivory and she had on matching rompers and sunhats. “Ivory came 13 days before my 13th year. They really said, “I’ma be 13 too, Sis.” Look at them. Tiny. Tiny Potato. Sis has your back for life. #taurustribe #jk #idcboutthat #MonroeSibs #Doetography #HouseLaurent 

And there it was. All that anyone needed to see. You honestly couldn’t tell what the baby looked like, but how could anybody doubt Hazel’s hashtag “House Laurent?”

Simon sort of liked having a private family. He wasn’t sure why he had been so eager to have people acknowledge things before. Even one year ago, he needed for somebody, anybody to know that he slept in the same bed with Grace Monroe. He needed for her to say “I love you.” He needed to hear Hazel call him “dad.” He still loved those things, but he had everything he could have ever wanted… it just looked different than he thought it would. 

Why did he want to “take care of” Grace for so long? She was caoable of taking care of herself, probably better than he was of himself. She had talents (was ALREADY back to working on new dances with Hazel and new music), qualities… God… that smile made him weak… She had several other things too, but if he sat there making a list, he’d be there for a while, and he COULDN’T be there for a while, because Ivory was six weeks old and Grace told him that he could take them with him to work. 

He began strapping the baby into the stroller… “Are you… where are you trying to take my baby?” Grace asked.

“My calendar says that they’re six weeks old. I can take them to work with me.”

 Grace put her hands on her hips and Simon frowned. “You said it. I have a recording of you saying it.”

“Well, I said that we shouldn’t take them anywhere before six weeks…”

“And I set my calendar,” Simon completed the thought and pulled the diaper bag onto his shoulder. “Abigail is bringing Monty, so they’ll have a play date.”

“Oh, she is?” Grace asked, toweling herself down. “Hold on. I’m coming.”

“Grace, I’m gonna be late!”

“I’m not letting you go be a Daddy sized snack with TWO cute babies on you with a cute, perfect bodied nanny with no friends!”

“I don’t think she’s all that cute and I have no idea what her body looks like!”

“It doesn’t look like she pushed a baby out of it six weeks ago!”

“NEITHER DOES YOURS!” 

She came into the room, changed up and smiling, “Awww. That’s so sweet.”

“How did you?” She looked perfect. She looked perfect and she couldn’t have taken any longer than five minutes. And she thought she had anything to worry about? But, he wasn’t complaining. If he had Grace and the baby around, that was just better, all around. 

“I’m staying here,” Hazel told them and continued dancing in the mirror.

Grace was standing on the scooter, with Simon behind her, sporadically kissing her on the neck every now and then, making her smile and gush. Whenever they pulled into the studio Simon took the baby out, which Grace noticed was wearing an oversized heather gray, “Proof he got lucky with Grace Monroe” onesie. “Simon! What did you…?” She gasped and saw that he had a shirt, the same color that read, “I got lucky with Grace Monroe.”

“In my defense, you weren’t supposed to be here today!” Simon told her. 

“How many shirts and onesie sets did you buy?”

“Not a lot. I bought WAY MORE t-shirts than I did onesies.” She fell behind a little and the back of that man’s shirt said “Grace’s Babydaddy.”

“Simon…”

“In my defense… You were right there whenever I walked out of the house wearing it.” She laughed. “It’s just in the studio. I’m working on some mechanics. There’s not gonna be cameras on me or anything.” She was still pouting. “I know that you’re super secretive, but I’m sure that most of the people who give a damn about what we do already know that this is indeed my baby…”

“It’s not that.”

“Well, what is it?”

“Ugh. I wanted to do this whole reveal thing for you on Sunday! I was gonna make this long, sweet post and open my comments and EVERYTHING. Now, I feel like it won’t have the same effect…” His eyes were already all watery, just from her THINKING about doing so.

“Sunday is Father’s Day…”

“Yeah. I can keep my own secrets. Not tell people about my pregnancy or who I bone or how I share time with my daughter or whatever, but I didn’t plan on making you stay in the shadows of my spotlight for the rest of our lives, especially when it comes to this. You’ve been an immense pain in the ass, but you’re a wonderful father and I figured it’d be a good… coming out of sorts for me to acknowledge that on that day.”

He cradled Ivory closely, “You can still do that.”

“Well, you’ve announced it all over your clothes and also… I just told you the entire plan!”

“I love knowing plans!” Simon said. “Here.” He took off the shirt and threw on his hoodie, which it was too hot for and then they changed the baby’s onesie too. “I sort of want to eat it up whenever people actually find out from you that I am indeed, who you bone.” She laughed. “This is the best spoiled surprise that I’ve ever had!”

“Well… I didn’t tell you ALL my plans, so there’s still stuff to look forward to.”

“Yeah?” He asked, casually as they walked inside.

“Mmm hmm.”

“Can I have a hint?”

“Something that starts with the letter P.” Simon turned red and she smiled brightly.

“Uh. Didn’t put THAT on your calendar, did you?” 

His lip dropped, “I DIDN'T!” He frowned, “In my defense… we don’t really do that enough for it to have been something I was counting down to.” He smirked, “But every time we do…” He raised his eyebrows and smiled at her. She bit her lip and shook her head, “Nope. Sunday. You aren’t gonna beard break me, Mr. Laurent.”

Next

[wipbigbang]

Signs of Life (Person of Interest)

Story Title: Signs of Life Fandom: Person of Interest Link(s): On AO3 Summary: The Man in the Suit and Detective Riley died on that rooftop, but somehow, the man who was once both is still kicking. Barely. And as John lies around in a hospital bed alone after saving Harold and the world from Samaritan, he struggles to come to terms with the fact that his life isn’t over and that it will never be the same. Then Harold shows up, as weary and heartbroken as John, and John starts to wonder if he might have a future after all. Or, a “return 0” fix-it that doesn’t fix everything, but it just might be a step in the right direction. Warnings: Hospitalization (John is in the hospital for the entire fic), disabling character injury, internalized ableism, John Reese-typical suicidal ideation/thoughts, canon character deaths Characters: John Reese, Harold Finch Pairings: Harold Finch/John Reese, mentions of past relationships When I Started: Sometime last year? Scrivener says the file was created in June 2019. I’m not sure if that’s the first file or not, but it was definitely last year. How I Lost My Shit: I don’t know? I wrote a rough draft of this thing, finished it, started editing it, and then just…stopped. I don’t even remember why I stopped. It was about 5k. It had potential. I probably got distracted by an exchange deadline or something. But it sat around collecting dust for a while, and every now and then, I’d think, ArgylePirateWD, you should really finish that one. Then I’d just…not do that? How I Finished My Shit: With lots and lots of editing and rewriting and new writing. I was originally going to work on another project for this, a sequel to a fic I wrote last year, but that thing was simply too big for me to finish in time. I had this one lying around, though, needing to be polished properly, so I dove in. Slowly, Signs of Life ballooned to over 15k words. I fought with it a bunch. I thought about quitting a lot. I don’t know why it was so hard to get it to finally come together and become what it needed to be, but I’m proud of how it turned out. And I couldn’t have pulled it off without the fabulous talkingtothesky and stingalingaling betaing this thing—thank you. You rock. And, also, thank you to the people who liked and reblogged the snippets of this thing that I posted on Tumblr. You also rock.

Finally, be sure to check out greygerbil’s fantastic art for the fic! :D

[onthevirgeofdestruction]

Dreaming While I Wake

Sanders Sides Foster Care AU - Roman-centric Angst & Hurt/Comfort & Abuse Recovery

Roman tries to be upbeat and hopeful despite all the shit that’s happened to him. And a lot of shit has. Luckily, his new foster home is with two literal rays of sunshine (and a sarcastic asshole).

Words: 4,059 Warnings: Death Mention, Doctor Mention, Suicidal Ideation, Foster Care Issues, Anxiety Attack, Bad Self-Image, Bad Self-Talk, Self-Hatred, Stealing/Theft, Desire to be Punished, Food Issues Characters: Roman, Patton, Thomas, Virgil Universe: Dreaming While I Wake Genre: Angst/Family

Chapter 16 

chapter 1 for new readers - ffn mirror

   “Are you doing okay, kiddo?” Patton asked, sitting across the couch and looking at him with those damned kind eyes. Roman didn’t respond. He didn’t feel like he could even form the words without breaking apart. He didn’t even want to think about how not all right he was at the moment, much less articulate it. Patton seemed to get the picture after a lengthy pause, because he changed the subject. “So what were you looking to buy that you wanted a job for?” Patton asked politely. “If you need to sign it, just hold up the letters long enough that I can read it,” Patton added after a prolonged moment of silence. Roman held up his hand to sign the letters, but kept a hold of the glass of water between his legs with the other hand and didn’t look away from focusing on the melting ice cubes in the water.

   “D…S…? Is that right?” Patton said, sounding very confused. After a moment it seemed to click with him. “Like the Nintendo? Kiddo, I think Tomathy had one in his office he doesn’t use,” Patton said plainly, sounding like he shifted on the couch. “I don’t think he’d care if you wanted to borrow it. What game did you want to play on it?” Roman looked up and scrunched up his face, trying to remember that one what had dragons and farming one of his old friends really liked. It took a minute, but he eventually raised his hand to sign the letters. “R-u-n-e-f-a-c-t-o-r-y? What’s that? F-a-r-m? Oh, one of those farming games? Did you want to play something relaxing?” Roman nodded and signed yes. Patton smiled lightly, but his eyes were still laced with concern. As long as he didn’t vocally acknowledge it right now. Roman signed why he wanted to play it. “B-e-d? Not in bed, I hope. B-4? Oh, before. I don’t think Thomas has that one,” Roman shrugged. He was intending to save up for a DS in the first place, buying the game was assumed.

   “Thomas doesn’t have what?” Thomas asked, coming back down the stairs. He didn’t look too distressed, so hopefully that meant Virgil was okay. Part of him wanted to ask, but that meant that meant he had to acknowledge it as his fault and that he also wasn’t okay and Roman wasn’t capable of doing that at the moment.

   “Run-e… factory, I think? Roman wanted to play it to calm down before bed,” Patton explained and nodded to Roman.

   “Runny Factory?” Thomas asked, making a baffled expression and looked to Roman. Roman spelled rune again for him. “Oh! Rune Factory! No, I don’t have that. That’s a fantasy game, right? I’ve heard good things about it, the storyline and music are supposed to be superb,” Thomas said and Roman nodded silently. He just liked the fantasy element and thought breaking up the farming with monster murder would be more interesting than just farming. Breaking up the monster murder with something laid back also seemed cool. He took a deep breath and sipped his water again. His throat was still so tight it hurt a little going down, but he was feeling like maybe he could continue to be okay as long as nobody made him think about himself. “Hey, uh, Roman, did you know?” Thomas asked a little awkwardly and Roman looked up at him in confusion. “About… Virgil?” Thomas finished. Roman put the glass of water between his legs to free up his hand.

   ‘What about him?’ Roman signed.

   “Are you having trouble talking? I’m not any further than learning the alphabet yet, I’m sorry,” Thomas said, sitting next to Thomas. Roman motioned for him to come closer and Thomas complied and leaned in.

   “Know what?” Roman whispered. He could mange whispering right now. He was just trying his damnedest not to break down again. He was not stuck in the shitty boat Virgil was. He picked back up his water cup and held it with both hands.

   “That maybe he also has PTSD from… other homes?” Thomas asked softly, looking disconcerted.

   “What do you mean also?” Roman whispered.

   “The ER doctor thinks you have it. Do you remember being in the ER?” Thomas asked, sounding concerned.

   “Not much,” Roman said under his breath. This was going into territory Roman wasn’t so comfortable in.

   “There’s stuff about PTSD I guess we didn’t realize until now, I guess. Like that it wasn’t just about certain triggers,” Thomas clarified. “Did he say anything to you?” Thomas asked with concern.

   “He might have mentioned it,” Roman whispered. “He noticed I was… worried about you guys hitting me and he told me I was safe. Then explained that it’s why he noticed. He implied he didn’t like talking about it. I kind of agree with him,” He admitted. He didn’t want to talk about it right now, for sure, but talking about it any time wasn’t ideal.

   “I wish one of you would have told us, but I can’t fault you for not wanting to think about it,” Thomas looked frustrated for a moment, but his face softened again when he saw Roman back up slightly. “Have you heard of age regression?” Thomas asked. That seemed out of the blue. It baffled Roman enough that he no longer was shying away from Thomas.

   “That’s that thing perverts do, isn’t it?” Roman asked quietly and raised an eyebrow at Thomas, a little confused on why he would bring it up.

   “What?” Thomas looked just as bewildered as Roman felt. “Oh, I hate having to google these things,” He muttered. “Not that. This is medical,” Thomas said more clearly and sighed, shaking his head. Oh, well, that’s good, maybe? “Sometimes certain triggers can cause age regression in PTSD patients. Do you know how I know how I know you had a gun pulled on you?” Thomas asked, looking like he was examining Roman now. It unnerved him a bit.

   “No,” Roman muttered, watching Thomas nervously in return and gripping the cold glass firmly.

   “Because you told me. You were a very mouthy 13-year-old. You also thought I was Satan for a bit,” Thomas said, sounding kind of amused. Roman stared at him for a moment while he processed what Thomas said. When he realized he that he might have cussed out Thomas, his eyes widened and he shut them tight, trying to to freak out. Thomas didn’t deserve his defensive bullshit. He had to put up an aggressive front or people wouldn’t take him seriously. It didn’t pay off for him in the end, though, and he regretted ever doing it.

   “Sorry,” Roman choked out and tensed up.

   “No, no, it was kind of cute,” Thomas chuckled weakly and looked to Roman reassuringly. Roman took a deep breath and tried to settle down. Cute wasn’t exactly what Roman was going for, but at least he didn’t hurt Thomas’s feelings or anything. “Well, Other than the fact that you were disappointed you didn’t die. You don’t still feel like that, do you?” Thomas asked softly, sounding sad. Roman’s shoulders flinched, and he swallowed hard.

   “Doesn’t everybody?” Roman whispered, joking weakly. The small broken laugh that accompanied it wasn’t the most convincing thing he’d ever done.

   “No, Roman, that’s not normal,” Thomas said, putting his arm on the couch over Roman’s shoulder’s without touching him. Roman could feel the heat from his arm but appreciated not being touched. He was even closer to breaking down now, and he wasn’t sure how much longer he could hold out. “You got a referral for a psychiatrist at the ER and I’ll be making you an appointment, okay?”

   “No, Thomas, please! I’ll be good, I’ll try not to-” Roman started babbling loudly, shooting a desperate look up to him.

   “Hey, kiddo, it’s okay!” Patton held his hands up and cut Roman off. Roman held his lips closed tight in a thin line.

   “Why are you scared of the psychiatrist?” Thomas looked pointedly at Roman.

   “My… They’ll know- The foster people. That I’m a bad kid. And then they won’t be able to place me, and then I’ll be stuck in one of those holding centers, they’re worse than the group homes, they’re really awful and that’s… I just can’t,” Roman rambled choked on a sob. He sniffled and dropped back against his cup, a tear breaking loose despite how hard he fought against it.

   “Why are you worried about going to a holding center?” Patton asked, sounding concerned.

   “’Cuz having mental health record is bad and harder to place since I’d be special needs,” Roman mumbled between his legs, starting to cry.

   “Do you still think we’re sending you back on Friday, Roman?” Thomas sounded sad.

   “Maybe,” Roman breathed.

   “I missed that,” Thomas said. Roman looked up and glanced at Thomas.

   “You should! I don’t belong here! I belong somewhere crappy where I’m too busy trying to survive to have to think about things. I never… I never struggled like this. At least not until I got used to not having Remus around,” Roman sighed, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. He and Remus had a shitty time when the memories were fresh, but losing Remus was worse.

   “Actually, sometimes people who have been in a hard situation for a long time usually struggle in more positive environments because they’re not sure how to process love and support. Did getting separated from your brother really hurt?” Patton piped up, sounding very compassionate when he suggested an explanation. Roman barely understood what he meant, but he could follow the question easily.

   “It was like they took half of me away when they tore us apart,” Roman grumbled.

   “Maybe because it was the last bit of stability and support you had, you closed off and just tried to deal with the situation, and you’ve been doing that ever since,” Patton offered, continuing his explanation. Roman couldn’t completely follow, though.

   “What?” Roman asked. His head hurt and he didn’t comprehend a lick of that. Some more tears broke free, and he sniffled again.

   “I think you belong here,” Patton said resolutely. Roman could follow that much easier. Wait, what the fuck? No, he couldn’t!

   “What?” Roman asked more incredulously, wiping his eyes.

   “You love Disney and The Princess Bride and books and you’re kind and considerate and quick and Lita loves you. And Virgil’s opened up more since you got here, so I think he likes you, too,” Patton said, holding up a finger. “You fit in just fine! All the other stuff isn’t you. It’s what you’ve been through,” He smiled brightly, looking confident. That didn’t make sense, though. He was a fuck up for a castle keep full of reasons.

   “I wasn’t able to sleep or keep track of time or sit still or do well in school before everything else. There’s plenty of stuff that I’m bad at, that’s all me,” Roman grumbled in objection.

   “And there're ways you can learn to cope with all of that when you’re somewhere safe,” Patton provided.

   “I can’t stay here,” Roman rested his chin on his legs and stared forward, feeling despondent. He couldn’t stop the stray tears, but he was too empty to freak out anymore. Thomas looked bewildered and sad out of the corner of his eyes, but he said nothing.

   “And why is that?” Patton asked evenly, though his eyes looked sad.

   “I’ll…” Roman dropped his head into his legs again. He couldn’t bring himself to say it.

   “You’ll what?” Patton urged him to continue.

   “It’s selfish, and it’s unrealistic,” Roman grumbled, shifting to sip his water. A timer in the kitchen dinged and Thomas got up. Roman flinched from the motion and sighed. He was so on edge it physically hurt. He was buzzing with restlessness but too tired and sad to even start figuring out how he could fix it.

   “How about I decide that?” Patton asked softly.

   “I have to get to go to a home that’s willing to take two kids when Remus also needs placement. I’ll never see him again until we turn 18 if I don’t. If he doesn’t hate me by then, anyway,” Roman sighed again and looked up to the ceiling.

   “I promise we’ll take you to see him when we can, Roman,” Patton said, and he sounded like he meant it, unlike most other times he’s heard it. Though he could never really trust adults meant it when they offered, though. He’d been burned too many times before. Patton probably only meant it at the moment, but it would be too much when the time came, just like always.

   “But I won’t get to be his brother again,” Roman said despondently. “Whisper nonsense words and have him completely understand me. Play fight like the fate of the world depends on the outcome. Write stories with him that turn into whole universes. All the stuff we used to have. The brother stuff you can only have when you’re a kid and you live together,” Patton looked somber but didn’t say anything. There really wasn’t anything to say.

   “I hope you’re hungry, Roman,” Thomas called from the kitchen.

   “You know I’m not,” Roman groaned loudly.

   “Too bad!” Thomas called back. Roman sighed and sipped his water again.

   “I would miss you guys… I’m not trying to say I don’t… appreciate you being nice and stuff. As much as it drives me up the wall,” Roman chuckled weakly and Patton pouted at that. “I just… I’ve been going this long on the hope I’d get him back. I got through everything I did because I never let go of the hope of being reunited, you know? I just can’t let go of that. And I don’t want to make it harder to be placed and then lessen my chances even further of getting to be with him again. I’ll be good, I promise, okay? I just can’t have that go on my records,” Roman begged him.

   “How about I talk to your caseworker about it when we see him Friday? See what we can do without it going on your state records?” Patton offered gently, looking strangely conciliatory for someone who did nothing wrong.

   “I’m a ward of the state who is just staying at your house. They own my ass,” Roman bit, though there was very little energy or aggression behind it, mostly just tired frustration with his situation.

   “Roman, I know you’re upset, but you don’t have to be mean,” Patton chided, frowning slightly.

   “Sorry,” Roman sighed heavily. “Right after I said I’d be good and everything,” Roman muttered to himself sourly. Roman wished he knew how to stop being a bastard already.

   “It doesn’t hurt to ask,” Patton said. “And I’m going to either way as your guardian, but I’d much rather you be on board with it,” Patton said gesturing with his hand.

   “Thanks for your honesty, I guess,” Roman rolled his eyes. “I’m on board as long as it doesn’t hurt my chances,” It was just asking, not acting in it. Roman leaned back again and put his cup down on the side table. He was so fucking itchy still. Thomas couldn’t see him, though, it was just Patton in the room. He probably wouldn’t freak out at a little itch. Roman scratched at the edges of the bandages and exhaled in relief as he itched at the adhesive, which stung slightly.

   “No scratching!” Thomas called from the kitchen and Roman froze in complete and utter bafflement.

   “What the actual fuck, Thomas?” Roman groaned loudly enough to project into the kitchen.

   “Dad powers,” Thomas said seriously. “Apologize for cursing,”

   “Sorry for saying fuck,” Roman huffed and dropped his arms in defeat to the couch with a light thud.

   “Roman,” Patton said firmly, furrowing his eyebrows at him.

   “Sorry for saying it again,” Roman rolled his eyes and saw Virgil come back down the stairs. He looked pretty okay other than kind of tired, which was relieving.

   ‘Saying fuck in front of Pat twice?’ Virgil signed. ‘Props,’ He fingerspelled.

   ‘Nice to see your dumb face again,’ Roman signed back.

   ‘Can’t say the same to you,’ Virgil signed and smirked at him before sitting back down at his controller and starting to play again. He glanced over to Patton, who mostly just seemed to be considering something. Roman was just glad the conversation was over. He turned his eyes back to the TV screen to watch the game again. He slowly loosened back up as he watched Virgil play. The long scarf physics were really eye-catching, and he just let himself drift to that.

   “Dinner’s ready!” Thomas called after an interminable period of silently watching the cloaked guy running through the level. Patton smiled at them and got up and headed to the kitchen. Virgil looked Roman up and down after he paused the game.

   ‘You don’t look capable of crime,’ Virgil signed and looked at him disbelievingly. Wow, Virgil didn’t beat around the bush.

   ‘Thanks?’ Roman signed, raising an eyebrow. Maybe that was a good thing?

   ‘Can you do anything other than sell drugs?’ Virgil signed.

   ‘You cut right to the point,’ Roman made a face at him. He wasn’t sure what Virgil was getting at, but it was weird to straight-up ask.

   ‘Can you?’ Virgil signed again.

   ‘I can pick pockets and pick locks,’ Roman fingerspelled. He could do other things, too, but he wasn’t as ashamed of those things as the others.

   ‘No shit?’ Virgil signed and some excitement in his eyes leaked into the disbelieving expression.

   ‘Seriously,’ Roman signed back and nodded.

   ‘You’re lying,’ Virgil frowned. Fucker. Roman wasn’t lying.

   ‘I’ll prove it,’ Roman signed, getting up from the couch. He had to talk carefully and tenderly to the kitchen on his fucked up feet, but found a stride.

   Thomas was still at the stove getting things on to serving dishes and Patton was putting water cups at the table. This was too freaking easy. Roman picked Thomas’s wallet as he passed and nonchalantly slid it in his pocket. He sat down and smiled at Patton, who smiled back and sat down. Virgil joined them at the table and stared at Roman, clearly waiting for him to do something. Roman smirked and pulled Thomas’s wallet out, throwing it at Virgil. He caught it and looked between the wallet and Roman. Patton looked up from serving himself food and saw them.

   “Virgil, why do you have your wallet at the table?” Patton asked, peering closer. “Actually, isn’t that Thomas’s? Did you find it somewhere?” Patton asked, taking it from Virgil’s hands. “Virgil found your wallet, Thomas,” Patton said as Thomas walked over with the last of the food and placed it down on the table, looking confused.

   “What? I don’t remember taking it out. Thank you, Virgil,” Thomas said, taking the wallet back from Patton and sliding it back in his back pocket before sitting down. Roman leaned on the table and smirked, raising his eyebrow at Virgil in anticipation.

   ‘You absolute bastard,’ Virgil signed, looking extremely impressed. Roman took a bow.

   ‘Careful, it’s not all I can do,’ Roman sat back in his chair, looking concernedly at all the food now.

   ‘Don’t threaten me with a good time,’ Virgil signed back before reaching over to serve himself a giant pile of tater tots. He served a single tater tot to Roman with a smirk before reaching out to grab a piece of chicken.

   “I’m not beyond serving you food and sitting here until you eat it,” Thomas eyed Roman. Roman sighed and grabbed a small piece of chicken and a single scoop of vegetables. “That’s half as much as Virgil is eating, Roman,” Thomas said critically.

   “I’m 100% positive he’s powered by a black hole,” Roman objected sourly, motioning to Virgil.

   ‘Thanks,’ Virgil smirked and started eating.

   “Teenagers are biologically hungry, and you are not exempt,” Thomas corrected him.

   “It’s fine,” Roman huffed.

   “I think we’ve successfully established you don’t have the best impression of what fine is, Roman,” Thomas said critically and leaned back in his chair.

   “Thomas, sassing Roman isn’t nice,” Patton chided him. “Just take a tiny bit more, okay, kiddo?” Patton looked at him pleadingly. Virgil served Roman another single tater tot.

   ‘There. More,’ Virgil signed and Roman laughed. This fucking guy.

   “Thank you,” Roman smiled and signed as he spoke.

   “Virgil, don’t encourage him,” Thomas frowned and chided Virgil.

   ‘Sure. You suck, Roman,’ Virgil signed with a lopsided grin.

   “Oh, I’m wounded,” Roman put his palm to his forehead and leaned back dramatically. It did actually start to smell good, at least. Roman began eating slowly, trying to get it over with, but the more he ate the easier it finally felt and the more his stomach woke up. It stopped hurting when he ate, and he ate more comfortably. “Thanks for dinner, Mr. Sanders,” He said absentmindedly as he reached out for another serving of vegetables.

   “Um, you’re welcome, Roman,” Thomas sounded a little confused, but the food was good and Roman didn’t bother looking up from eating. He grabbed a second piece of chicken, as well, after finishing the first one. Virgil knocked on the table and Roman looked up at him.

   ‘Are you going to tell them you stole his wallet?’ Virgil asked. Roman put down his fork and swallowed.

   ‘Why?’ Roman signed back, confused. Tell them he stole from Thomas? That was dumb.

   ‘Because they won’t be mad and I want to see their faces,’ Virgil signed. Maybe they wouldn’t and everything would be chill. But if they did get mad, maybe he’d finally get punished and fell right in the freaking world again. It seemed like a win-win scenario with a bonus of amusing Virgil.

   ‘Fair,’ Roman shrugged. He finally felt awake and feeling impulsive. Virgil laughs, well, as much as he does, and Roman gets sent to his room without dessert or something assuredly way too tame for what he did.

   “You didn’t lose your wallet, Thomas. I picked your pocket,” Roman said flippantly, eating one of his two tater tots. They both stared at him dubiously and exchanged a look before looking back at Roman. Virgil leaned forward to watch, looking amused already.

   “…Why?” Patton asked after a quiet moment of confusion. Virgil did that silent laughing thing behind his hand.

   “He didn’t believe me,” Roman pointed to Virgil. “I didn’t take anything. I don’t think it’s right to steal money. I just wanted to prove I could,” Roman explained with a smug smile and a little shrug. Roman had enough money stolen from him that he genuinely couldn’t bear to do it to anyone else anymore.

   “Why can you…” Patton started to ask but trailed off. He probably answered his own question as Roman raised his eyebrow and leaned on his arm.

   “I learned how to do lots of things,” Roman passed his hand over the tater tot on his plate and it disappeared. Roman passed it quickly behind his back and popped it in his mouth while they were all looking at the plate. “Magic!” He announced. Stoners fucking loved sleight of hand. He once got a fifty dollar tip from a guy who was completely blasted.

   Lita weaved under his feet and he shivered from the dog fur through his sock. His feet were still feeling raw from his run this morning. Roman pulled them up and went back to eating his vegetables. Thomas looked shocked and Patton beamed in delight. Virgil looked unimpressed as usual and returned to going to town on the pile of tater tots.

   “Do you know any other magic tricks, Roman?” Patton asked with a sparkle in his eye.

   “I know sleight of hand and card tricks, not any magic-magic tricks,” Roman shrugged. “Nothing fancy,”

   “Well, will you show me one after dinner?” Patton smiled, returning to cutting up his chicken.

   “Do you know the four kings in the tower?” Roman asked, interested in getting to show off.

   “No,” Patton shook his head, looking invested already.

   “Then that it shall be,” Roman declared regally, twisting his fork in the air. He rolled his eyes at his own idiocy and returned to eating.

Personal Taglist: @bunny222 @elizabutgayer @prinxietyforever @kanene-yaaay-o-retorno @the-sympathetic-villain @croftersjam15

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[5typesoftrash]

Good Morning, Darkest Secrets

For @specialagentrin because goddammit, she has inspired me to write so much fic recently. It isn’t even funny. I loveeeeeeee youuuuuuuuuu

RATING T RELATIONSHIPS Dean/Cas, Sam/Cas FANDOM Supernatural Words 2,715 Comments/Warnings angst, pining, unrequited love (I’ll let you see which side), tw: suicidal thoughts/actions/ideation, depression, tw: abuse

***

A boy climbs through his window. “Ow!” he says when he hits the floor.

Dean sits up in bed and looks at him. “Who are you?” he asks. The boy sits up.

“Huh,” he says instead of answering, peering at Dean’s face in the dark. “I must have overshot. I’m looking for Sam Winchester.”

Dean closes his eyes in exasperation. “Wrong bedroom,” he manages. “Sammy’s down the hall. Why are you breaking into our house?”

The kid shrugs. “Felt like it. Which door?”

Dean watches him. He moves weird, kinda like Sam and Dean themselves do, and Dean wonders what that means. He’s almost got it, it’s on the tip of his tongue-

“First on your right. If he hits you, I wasn’t here.”

The kid glances over his shoulder and flashes Dean a grin that makes his knees weak. “I’ll remember that.”

Dean is ten years old.

--

The boy’s name is Castiel. He’s in Sam’s class. He’s seven. (Sam is eight.)

Dean learns all of this the next morning at breakfast, after his dad’s yelling wakes him up. Something about Sam having a boy in his bed and how John refuses to let his sons be homos. Whatever that means.

Mary calms him down with a soft voice and a hand on his arm and invites Castiel to breakfast. Dean’s eyes follow this mysterious new boy the whole way down the stairs.

Castiel’s shoulders still shift awkwardly under his coat (which Dean can see in the light of day is a trench coat. He didn’t know those came small enough for seven-year-olds) and Dean still burns to find out why that looks so familiar. But he refrains.

There are things he can’t blurt out at the breakfast table.

Mary gives Castiel three slices of toast and almost half their jam. He stares at it with wide eyes for almost thirty seconds. “It’s food,” Dean says helpfully. “You eat it. Are you okay?”

Castiel looks up at him with blue eyes free of guile or blame. “Are you sure you can spare this much?” he asks of the entire room. “I wouldn’t want to be a bother.”

“Dude, nobody talks like that,” Dean tells him, laughing. Mary smacks the back of his head.

“Yes, of course we can. I wouldn’t give it to you if we couldn’t scrape by.”

Castiel looks down at his plate in shame. “This is more food than I’ve gotten at one meal in three years.”

Dean’s mouth drops open. “No way.”

Castiel turns red and takes a bite of his toast. No one says anything else. Mary tells Dean off later for being rude and insensitive.

Dean is still fascinated.

--

Castiel is new in town, but he stays for a long time. He starts coming home from school with Sam every day. They’re obviously best friends.

Dean is… Dean is jealous.

Of Sam.

That’s never happened before.

He hangs out in the same room as them a lot of the time, but they are always very obviously hanging out with each other. He’s just the weird big brother who’s also there.

And Cas – Dean has no idea when he became ‘Cas’ – seems to avoid him at all costs, if he can. Dean tries not to push. He just doesn’t know why Cas is so uncomfortable around him. But it doesn’t matter, because it goes away after a few months. By July, they’re all hanging out together, playing Mario Kart and marathoning Star Wars.

But Dean is still jealous.

--

Dean’s a freshman when Sam starts middle school. He and Cas have three of six classes together, and Cas comes over to study every chance he gets. Dean stopped being jealous of Sammy around the end of seventh grade, but he thinks he’ll always be bitter that Cas seems to prefer Sam to him.

Especially at night, when he opens the little box that he keeps locked in the back of his mind. It sits on a shelf, gathering dust, and inside are all the feelings, the thoughts, the little things Dean catalogued in those first two years. Dean shoved them all in their when he realized what it was, and he never lets them out, except when he’s miserable and alone.

He’s spent the last two years since then praying that it would go away. He needs it to go away. He can’t be like this, he can’t be a freak, he can’t be that thing that his father was so scared of when Dean was just ten years old. He can’t.

He is.

One day, he lays on the floor of Sam’s room with his giant-ass AP World History textbook wide open on his face when Sam says it.

“I kissed Cas today.”

Sam is on his bed, on his stomach, flipping through his Alg-one notebook, trying to make sense of the notes he took in class. He says it nonchalantly, out of the blue, and Dean almost does a spit take.

“Um.” Dean’s voice is muffled by the college ruled pages above him. He sits up and closes the book. “You did what now?” he asks incredulously.

Sam looks at him evenly. His hair is a little bit too long – he’s been growing it out this year. Dean tried to talk him out of it, but he wouldn’t listen. “I kissed him,” he repeats.

There’s a pause, then Dean says, “well, what happened?”

Sam scoffs. “See, this is why I didn’t want to tell you! Nothing happened. I liked a guy, I kissed him, he kissed back, end of story.”

“He kissed back?” Dean doesn’t know why he can’t seem to process any of the information that’s being thrown at him. (That’s a lie; it’s because he’s so fucking blindsided by all of this that he can barely register Sammy likes guys, let alone Sammy likes the guy that I like or the guy that I like likes Sammy back.) “So what now? Are you like… boyfriends?”

Sam shrugs. “We haven’t gotten that far. It was at lunch break and we haven’t seen each other since.”

Dean rolls his eyes. “Don’t you have fifth together?”

“Yeah, we sit on opposite sides of the room and we were doing a lab today so we couldn’t even email back and forth like we usually do in that class.”

Dean lets out a whoosh of air and collapses back onto the floor. “Alright then. Well, good luck.” He doesn’t know what else he’s supposed to say.

Sam makes a derisive noise. “Right. Thanks, Dean.”

“Whatever, bitch.”

Sam flips him off without looking away from his notes. “Exactly, jerk.”

Dean is miserable now.

--

They are boyfriends.

Dean discovers this six days later. It’s Tuesday, which is a cursed day in his opinion, because it’s the day he dies every week. (Tuesdays are inspection day. He has to wear his uniform into school and he’s not allowed to touch anybody or wear a hat.) And now it’s more cursed because it will forever be the day that Castiel Novak told him he was dating his brother immediately after spilling iced coffee on him.

“Okay, asshole, it is on,” Dean snarls, only kind of playing. “This is my ROTC uniform. How fuckin’ dare you.”

Cas just laughs when Dean shoves him. “Dean, I apologized. I’ll get it dry cleaned for you.”

Dean grumbles as he wads up napkins and dabs at it. “You don’t have the money for that,” he says finally. “I’ll do it myself.”

Cas closes his mouth, then opens it again to say, “are you going to kill me if I date your brother?”

Dean’s head snaps up. “Why would I kill you?”

Cas can’t meet his eyes. “Well, you’re incredibly protective of him, and when I first moved here, you didn’t seem to… like me very much.”

Dean scoffs. “Fuck me,” he sings under his breath. “Nah, man, you’re great. I’m just a dick like that. But don’t worry about it, okay? No, go ahead and date Sam. He’s been crushing on you for like, ever.”

Cas looks incredibly relieved. “Great,” he says quietly. “Good. Thank you.”

Dean just nods his acknowledgment and waves Cas away. He needs to hit the road in the next fifteen minutes if he’s gonna get to the school on time, and Cas and Sam have to catch their bus.

(Dean fails his inspection that day.)

--

Cas is a freshman when Dean finally finds out why he moves funny.

Dean is a junior, and he’s about .3 GPA away from dropping out of high school, and he goes to pick Cas up one day because he is the one chaperoning Cas and Sam’s dates. Because their parents don’t even know Sam’s gay.

(Bi? He mighta said he was bi. Dean really has no idea, all his tiny brain has room for is Sam likes Cas.)

He walks into Cas’s house and the first thing he hears is the wet smack of flesh on flesh. The second thing he hears is something thwip-ing through the air. The third thing he hears is crying. The fourth thing he hears is Cas’s voice, and Cas is begging.

“Please stop,” he cries. “Please, Luci, I’ll do anything, please! Just stop!”

Dean pushes the door open and there are three boys inside it. One looks about a year older than Dean, with pale hair and evil-looking eyes. One is Castiel, who looks terrified, like a deer in headlights as he stares wide-eyed at Dean. And one is shorter, sandier, unconscious, and bleeding.

“Did you kill him?” he demands the tall one. He assumes this is Luci, especially considering the bloody gashes on Cas’s exposed back – holy shit, Cas isn’t wearing a shirt and Dean has only just registered that – that match the bloody metal end of the belt Luci’s holding.

Cas kneels, in Luci’s moment of distraction, to press two fingers to the short one’s throat. “He’s alive,” he whispers, and his voice wavers and breaks. Dean glares at the tall guy.

“Get the hell out of here,” he commands. Luci looks confused and defiant but leaves the room. Dean pulls out his phone and dials 911.

“Who was that?” he asks when they’re riding in the back of an ambulance. Cas doesn’t look at him.

“One of the twins, the two oldest. Lucifer. He likes to hurt the rest of us. He does it for sport.”

Dean purses his lips. “Right,” he whispers. “I should’ve known.”

Cas does look at him then. “Why should you have known?”

Dean meets his eyes with sorrow. “Cause I’m an abuse victim too.”

--

Somehow, Sam and Cas are still going strong by their sophomore year, celebrating 3 years in October. On their anniversary (the fourth), Cas stands outside of their house with a big sign. Dean sees him through the open front door.

He stands in the doorway to read it. It says “HOMECOMING?” Dean grins.

“Yeah!” he shouts. Cas shakes his head, laughing.

Tell Sam, he mouths. Dean turns his head and shouts up the stairs.

“Sammy, I’m taking your boyfriend to homecoming!”

“Whatever, jerk!” Sam yells back.

“You won’t be saying that when we’re doin’ it in a limo, bitch!” Dean declares, then drops a wink at Cas and disappears back into the house.

--

Sam still seems happy by junior year. Dean has long since dropped out by now and is working part-time with their uncle Bobby. He never sees Cas anymore, and that’s probably for the better, considering that every time he does, he is in desperate need of a cold shower.

Sam still raves about him obliviously, and Dean still listens with a straight face – a talent he’s mastered after years of hiding his own stupid bullshit. Dean doesn’t let on. He’s gotten very, very good at not letting on.

He breaks down, once, and Sam finds him. It’s embarrassing and humiliating, and it’s made more so by the fact that he can’t even explain to his brother why he’s crying on the floor of the bathroom. Sam doesn’t seem to care, though. He just grabs Dean and pulls him close to his chest and doesn’t let him go for a very, very long time.

Dean hates everything.

--

Dean hates how amazing his little brother is. Sam is such a great person, and he deserves the kind of happiness he’s found with Cas. They’ve been together for six years and they’re both so much happier than they were before. Dean’s seen the change happen firsthand.

He hates how much he resents it. He hates how much he wishes he could ruin it for them. He hates how terrible a person he is, for wanting to destroy this beautiful thing that Sam managed to create for himself out of the ashes of their old life.

He hates himself.

Dean has Castiel’s phone number. He’s used it a grand total of once.

He uses it now.

You and Sam deserve each other is all his message says. It doesn’t say any of the other hundreds of things he wants it to say. It doesn’t say that Dean’s a coward. It doesn’t say that Dean is a terrible person who doesn’t deserve Cas’s friendship. It doesn’t say that Dean hopes Cas and Sam are happy together. It doesn’t say that Dean hopes everyone’s happier without him.

It doesn’t say that if all goes well, Dean will be dead before Cas reads that text message.

He almost jumps out the fourth-story window. He manages to stop himself.

He spends the night in the hospital with a pump in his stomach.

Sam is the only family member who waits with him.

--

Shit hits the fan when Sam comes home for Christmas break. He’s been off at Stanford for three months – and Cas with him, because Cas swore to follow Sam anywhere – and they both come home for two weeks in the end of December.

Mom’s dead; she killed herself eighteen months ago. Dad was killed in a drunk driving crash. Sam and Dean are all alone, just the two of them and Cas and uncle Bobby.

Bobby pays for the house, the upkeep, the water and electric; he takes care of everything so that Dean can keep living there, in Lawrence, in a huge fucking house that he doesn’t need, all on his own.

He should just sell the place, move to Palo Alto to be near his brother, and get a tiny apartment for less than a thousand dollars a month if he can hack it.

He doesn’t sell it because it’s the last place their mom was alive.

Sam and Cas come home and they all get a tree together. They decorate it on the nineteenth. On the twenty-second, Sam asks Dean why he’s been avoiding them all break.

“I’m not avoiding you guys,” Dean denies, even though he is.

“Then why won’t you look at me? Why haven’t you said more than five words to Cas since we’ve been here? Why do you spend all your time holed up in your room?”

Dean rolls his eyes and tries to shrug it off, but then Sam says something that cuts deep.

“Do you still not approve of me dating him?”

Dean freezes.

“What?”

Sam’s face looks broken. “He’s tried so hard to win you over, to make you like him. Do you still hate him that much?”

Dean can’t hold it in anymore. He can’t.

“No, I don’t!” he screams. “I never hated him! He’s my best friend, man, and I care about him as much as you do! But no, I don’t approve of you dating him.”

“Why not?” Sam asks. His cheeks are glistening and his face is broken. His eyes look hopeless.

“Because I’m in love with your boyfriend, Sammy!” Dean yells.

There’s silence for fourteen seconds before someone speaks.

“I should leave.”

Dean glances around. Cas is standing in the doorway. He presses his eyes closed.

“You weren’t supposed to hear that,” he whimpers.

“Yeah, well, I did,” Cas replies. He pushes past Dean and leaves the front door open when he walks through it. Sam shoots Dean a look and follows him.

As they walk away from him, Dean thinks he’s just ruined the only thing he had left that was actually important to him.

Good going, Dean.

[inevitably-johnlocked]

Any new “Doctor John” type stories, O Great One?

Hi Nonny!

I certainly do! :D Here you are!

DOCTOR / CARETAKER JOHN Pt. 3

See Also:

Doctor / Caretaker John

Doctor / Caretaker John Pt. 2

New World, Old Words by thedeafwriter (G, 641 w., 1 Ch. || Deaf Sherlock, Sherlock Whump, Pining Sherlock, Marriage Proposal, Fluff, Always John) – It was disconcerting to experience. One second, he was laying on the table, breathing in the gas that would make him sleep, the next, he was dragging his eyes open to look around the bright room, trying to wake up.

Promise of Sussex by LittleLongHairedOutlaw (T, 705 w., 1 Ch. || First Person POV Sherlock, Sherlock Whump, Angst, Pining, Ambiguous Ending) – John tries to keep Sherlock conscious after he’s been shot on a case.

Idiot by Anesthesiologist (T, 1,229 w., 1 Ch. || Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Alternate TGG / Explosion, BAMF John, Sherlock Whump, Inner Monologue, John Saves Sherlock, POV Sherlock) – What the heck happened? He remembered the pool and Moriarty, but then what? Had he been dying?

Angel by MrsNoggin (T, 1,513 w., 1 Ch. || Winglock, Friendship, Chromoesthesia, Drugging) – John is an angel. That can be the only explanation. A response to the challenging request for a realistic wingfic one-shot.

They’re Taking My Wisdom by whitchry9 (K+, 1,939 w., 1 Ch. || Hurt/Comfort, Drugging, Dentists, Friendship, Anxious Sherlock, Humour) – Sherlock goes to the dentist. Of course, being Sherlock, things have to be complicated. Oh and drugs. They’re always fun.

Stay by sussexbound (M, 2,067 w., 1 Ch. || Post TAB, Suicidal Ideation Mention, Implied / Referenced Drug Use, Kissing, Love Confessions, Frottage, Coming in Pants) –  “Why? Why did you do it? Hmm…?” He takes a deep breath, waits, lets it out again. “Look at me.” There’s no denying him when he takes this tone. “Why did you kill him? Hmm…? For her? After…” A muscle twitches in the corner of John’s eye, and he clamps his jaw down tightly, swallows and sniffs a little before continuing. “For her? After everything she’s done?” “For you.” Before he can even stop himself. Just like that.

The Rational Machine by Solstice Zero (K, 2,924 w., 1 Ch. || Hurt / Comfort, Malnourishment / Fainting, Doctor / Minder John) – Sherlock passes out. John muses on the reasons why. Containing an absorbing case, two bags of shopping, and a few apples.

Better Late Than Never by sussexbound (NR (T), 3,021 w., 1 Ch. || Post-S4 / TFP Doesn’t Exist, Sherlock POV, Love Confessions, Drunk Sherlock / Sober John, John Takes Care of Sherlock, First Kiss, Jealous Sherlock, Emotional Turmoil) – He suddenly wants John Watson out of his bedroom, out of his flat, out of his life, because he has been lying to himself these last few months, he realises. He doesn’t want John here, not with the way things are. He doesn’t want 221b Baker Street to be nothing more than rest stop John returns to on his journeys between women. He doesn’t want to play co-parent if Rosie is going to be snatched away from him and placed in the arms of whatever nameless woman du jour John lands on next. He doesn’t want to keep being so careful, so generous, so, so…

The Oolong Disaster by unicornpoe (T, 4,151 w., 1 Ch. || John’s Beard, Fluff, Humour, Frustrated Sherlock, John Takes Care of Sherlock, Case Fic-ish, Pining Sherlock, First Kiss, Possessive Sherlock) – John has a beard. Sherlock has a panic attack.

Experiment by Gwen’s Blue Box (K+, 4,222 w., 3 Ch. || Non-Con Drugging, Hurt Comfort, Friendship) – Of course John has always known about his flatmate’s irregular sleeping habits, especially when they’re on a case. This time, however, the case is taking longer and longer, and soon John starts to worry. But there’s not much he can do, is there? Because drugging Sherlock isn’t an option. Not yet, maybe, but will it be soon? {{CW: John drugs Sherlock without his consent}}

Welcome Home, John by slashscribe (G, 5,504 w., 1 Ch. || Post-S3, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Awkwardness, Stabbed Sherlock, Protective Sherlock, Panic Attack (Sherlock), Self Esteem Issues, Love Confessions, First Kiss) – When John moves back to 221B, he thinks he’s the broken one, but after a while, it becomes clear that he might not be correct.

He’s Not Paid Enough to Deal with This Shit by janonny (T, 9,828 w., 1 Ch. || Personal Assistant AU || Humour, First Meetings, Snarky John) – One of the first things John did was to write up step-by-step instructions on how to conduct a proper job interview before handing it over to Mycroft for his perusal. There were no kidnapping, deserted car parks or stolen therapy notes anywhere on that list. (Or the one where John returned from the war and ended up working for Mycroft as his personal assistant slash doctor on retainer. Everything was fine, until he was sent to post bail for one Sherlock Holmes.)

And Here We Are by J_Baillier (T, 12,416 w., 2 Ch. || ASiP Fic, Alternating First Person POV, Drama, Friendship, Mild Case Fic, Autism Spectrum Sherlock, Insecure Sherlock, Protective John, Pining, Homophobia, Loneliness, Angst, Humour, Domestics, Morbid Fluff, Kidnapping) – All the little things we never got to see when an army doctor and a consulting detective were adjusting to sharing a flat. And a life.

Shuteye Shenanigans by Ayakae (K+, 13,263 w., 8 Ch. || Post-TRF, Friendship / Epic Bromance, John’s Nightmares, Angsty Fluff, Bed Sharing, Humour, Cuddles, Taking Care of Each Other, Domestics) – John Watson has never slept with Sherlock Holmes. Never ever ever. And never will, thank you very much. Well, there was that one time, but John didn’t count that. It was completely different, just like the second time it happened. And the third. And the fourth. Epic bromance, but it can be read as pre-slash if you wish.

First Response by Arwen Jade Kenobi (T, 13,516 w., 8 Ch. || Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Five and Ones, Whump / Injury) – Five times John had to perform first aid on Sherlock and one time Sherlock had to perform it on John.

Pattern Behaviour by SilentAuror (E, 14,835 w., 1 Ch. || POV First Person Sherlock, Jealous Sherlock, Pining Sherlock, Introspection, Stroppy Sherlock, Light Humour, Friendship, John Takes Care of Sherlock, First Kiss/Time, Wall Kisses, Fluffy Angst, Happy Ending) – Sherlock doesn’t even know why he resents John’s dates so much. Until the day he does know. Slight angst, unrequited feelings (but don’t let that scare you off!)

Software Malfunction by tiger_in_the_flightdeck (E, 16,679 w., 1 Ch. || PODFIC AVAILABLE || Android Sherlock, Love Story, Unhappy Ending, Angst, Suicide, Jealousy) – “You think I can’t love you? Just because you’re made with metal, and detailed programming?” The doctor propped himself on his elbow, and looked down at it. “I am nothing but blood and bone, and tissue. Things just managed get mashed together in a manner that made me like this. Just like you were put together to make you how you are. When I kiss you-” he did so, briefly, to prove his point. Then more deeply, and lingering, because he could. “When I touch you, or smile at you, does it make you feel different from when others have done it in the past?”

Turn Left at the Park by Glenmore (NR (E), 37,409 w., 28 Ch. || Alternate First Meeting / ASiP Divergence, Case Fic, Depression, Suicidal Ideation, Loneliness, No Mary, Possessive Sherlock, Fluff & Angst, Nightmares/PTSD, Sherlock Saves John, Sherlock Whump-ish, Doctor John) – So what would have happened if John hadn’t walked through the park and met Stamford?What if, instead, he walked around the park and just went home?

A Hundred Crimson Sols by elldotsee (E, 55,536 w., 16 Ch. || Astronauts AU || Mars Exploration / Space Travel, Slow Burn, Shy Sherlock, Scientist Sherlock / Biomed Engineer John, Alternating POV, Mutual Pining, UST, Angst with Happy Ending, Domestic Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Injuries, Suicidal Ideation, Zero-G Sex) – Will Holmes is a chemical researcher recognized widely for his contributions to the new Mars exploration program. Thanks to his ground-breaking developments, the IMMC (International Mars Mission Corporation) is one step closer to Martian colonization. Will and his team of scientists are headed out on the first of three manned missions before the first group of settlers arrive. Three days before launch, one of the crew has to be replaced. Will panics because…new people. The replacement is of course one John Watson, biomedical engineer and space hottie who was pretty sure he had retired from actual space exploration and was now content to work in the nice, quiet research lab. Can the crew survive this TOTALLY ROUTINE trip? Will they be able to endure each other for the looooooong trip in close quarters? Gonna be a wild ride… prepare for blast off. Part 1 of the SpaceBois go to Space series

The Vapor Variant by 88thParallel (CanadaHolm) (M, 72,684 w., 18 Ch. || PODFIC AVAILABLE || Post-THoB, John Whump, Protective Sherlock, Guilty Sherlock, Anxious/Worried Sherlock, Virgin Sherlock, Angst with Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, PTSD John, Slow Burn, Mutual Pining, Suspense, Virus, Sickfic, Big Brother Mycroft) – They stood face to face in the middle of a clearing. The dim light of the moon barely allowed Sherlock to see the glassy terror in John’s eyes and the sweat that glistened off his forehead. His nose was bleeding again, blood dripping in a slow stream from his right nostril. They were both gasping for air, John’s eyes locked on Sherlock’s. There was no recognition there, just wild animal fear. Time stood still for an eternal few seconds, and Sherlock took a shaky breath. “John—”Spell broken, John spun and bolted back into the woods. Still heaving for air, Sherlock took off after him.

Summit Fever by J_Baillier (M, 78,802 w., 18 Ch. || Mountain Climber AU || POV John, Angst, Tragedy, Suicidal Ideation, The Himalayas, Mountain Guide / Doctor John, Mount Climber Sherlock, Loneliness, Drama, Suspense, Slow Burn, Injured Sherlock / Sherlock Whump, Pining John) – After graduating from medical school, John Watson followed his heart to the Himalayas. Ten years later, he’s a haunted cynic working for his ex-lover’s trekking and mountaineering company. Will leading an expedition to Annapurna I—the most lethal of all the world’s highest mountains—shake John out of his reverie, and who is the mystery client added to the group at the last minute?

The Wedding Garments by cwb (E, 105,390 w., 36 Ch. || Alternate Future AU || Alternate First Meeting, Dating / Arranged Marriages, Romance, First Kiss/Time, Heavy Petting, Cuddles, POV Sherlock, Virgin Sherlock, Idiots in Love, Slow Burn / Falling in Love / Dev. Rel., Nervous/Anxious Sherlock, Jealous/Cranky, Hiking, Vacation Homes / Honeymoon, Sherlock’s Family, Horny John/Sherlock, Patient John, Massages, Hand Jobs, Assassination Plots, Hand Jobs / Oral Sex, Case Fic, Emotional Love Making, Bath Time Fun) – This is the story of a young consulting detective who wants nothing to do with marriage and an army doctor who wants to find true love. It’s 2020 post-Brexit England and the British government is encouraging arranged marriages. Candidates meet through state-run agencies and date in hopes of finding love (and tax benefits). Sherlock doesn’t need or want a spouse, at least not until John Watson shows up. Hesitant to give in to his more carnal urges because of the way they derail his mind, how will Sherlock progress toward the more intimate aspects of a relationship? The answer lies in a very special wedding gift.

[signoraviolettavalery]

strategist-scientia replied to your post “I know Carina is bringing Malex into the light and I am infinitely...”

Kinda scared now tbh because Carina said "Yes" when someone suggested that Michael is probably reminded of Jesse Manes's hand in causing the deaths of his people whenever he looks at Alex. ������

I hope it’s ok that I use your response as the jumping-off point for some meta, because I’ve been wanting to write this since i saw Carina’s tweets, and the inevitable Malex panicking that ensued. There’s a couple tweets about Michael’s headspace that she made that I want to get into, as I consider where Michael’s character will go next season and what that might mean for Malex. 

Now, my immediate response to this is: Yes?? Good?? Carina is saying Michael is going to have a character arc next season, and this is a good thing. Characters need arcs, and frankly, I’ve been frustrated that most of his “arc” this season has just been taking care of other people. Equally frankly, I’m glad that this will be the arc, because Michael is completely traumatized right now. He not only lost his family right after finding them, but he’s witnessed the genocide of his race. I’m glad the show is going to deal with that instead of sweep it under the rug. That’s what Michael s a character deserves. And I know it sucks to put queer characters through trauma and misery and suffering, because it seems like that’s the only thing they ever get to experience in narratives. But in a well-written story, you can’t shield your characters from the world and have nothing bad ever happen to them. There need to be low points in order for there to be development, as long as there are high points. 

The other tweet that people have been worrying about is this one, about how Michael will react to Alex and how their relationship will changed, based on the fact that Alex’s family is responsible for literally all of the suffering of Michael’s: 

This is where people start worrying that Malex will crash and burn, or that Michael will blame Alex for what happened even though it’s not actually Alex’s fault. 

So, first of all, I’m going to point out the obvious: it doesn’t sound like English is this person’s first language (which isn’t a dig at them, but just the observation that there may be a language/communication barrier here). Carina’s “yes” is vague af, and twitter is a really shitty medium to sort-of-but-not-really hint at character motivations and what’s coming. 

Moving on from that, my  thoughts are that Michael isn’t going to outright blame Alex - after all, Alex didn’t do anything. In fact, Alex has literally shut down project Shepard and blackmailed his father to protect Michael, and if Michael knows about project shepard he knows this. Logically, he understands this. But I do think that Michael will pull away from Alex - just as he’ll pull away from Max, Isobel, Maria, and even Liz. He’s going to need space, and he might get self-destructive in all his relationships, not just the one with Alex, because he’s going to blame himself for what happened. It’ll be difficult to watch, but I think that Alex, who himself has extensive experience sabotaging his own relationship as a result of fear and trauma, will understand where he’s coming from and try to help. 

I do also think Michael will have a hard time with Alex specifically. Again, it’s not that he’ll blame Alex, because he clearly didn’t blame Alex for his hand, if his desire to rekindle a relationship ten years later is any indication. But Alex will be a living, breathing reminder of the Manes legacy, which has taken literally everything from Michael, starting with his hand and ending with his family. It’s going to get complicated, because just last episode, Michael was telling Max that he believes that there’s no place for him here (on Earth) - something that Jesse made him believe, and something of which his hand serves as a reminder. And now he has even more proof, painful, heartrending, visceral proof, that there is no place for him on this planet, in the sense that humanity as a whole does not accept him for what he is. And the Manes legacy is largely responsible for this. 

But. The irony is that while the Manes family has destroyed his family, his life, his home, and his hope, Alex has been all of those things for him. Alex offered him a home when he had none. Alex told him “you’re my family.” Alex, as Michael said in 1x11, made him believe there’s is a place for him here on earth. Home can be a person, and Alex has been his. 

And I think Michael will realize that. If Liz can get over the fact that Max covered up her sister’s murder and was responsible for her family suffering hate crimes for ten years, then Michael can get over Alex having a legacy that he has completely and utterly rejected. But it will take time, because trauma isn’t rational, and because Alex did enlist in the military and become a “Manes man” before he ultimately chose Michael. So Michael will have to reconcile those two things - what Alex’s family took from him, and the fact that Alex himself gave back all those things to him. Honestly, I think it’s going to be the culmination of the arc that they’ve been planting the seeds of this season - that home can be a person. Michael Vlamis also hinted that Micheal probably won’t be deciding whether to leave the planet this season, so perhaps this will be a decision he’ll have to make next season. Alex will give him the spaceship piece and set him free, understanding that Michael has never felt like he belongs on Earth and that now he feels like he belongs even less, and that his family is responsible for it. And Michael will have to realize that despite Alex’s legacy, which he has outright rejected, Alex is his home. 

It’ll be a long journey, but I honestly think it’ll be fine in the end. Think of it this way: ships, just like characters, need arcs. I know we all say we’d happily watch an entire season of them just cuddling in bed, but come on. None of us actually would. We’d like an actual story. That’s why we tuned in. We want to see characters facing challenges and overcoming them. And yes, just like with queer characters, we don’t want queer pairings to just keep suffering endlessly. But we do want them to have actual, meaningful storylines. And what Carina is hinting at above sounds like an actual storyline. It’s Michael working through legitimate trauma instead of sweeping it under the rug, and Alex learning to live with the legacy of his family. If done well, this is a good storyline. The alternative is either no storyline, or contrived relationship drama, and no one wants that. Remember when, on The Vampire Diaries, Damon and Elena finally got together and the writers had to come up with a dozen reasons to break them up (the sire bond, Katherine possessing Elena, Damon temporarily dying and Elena erasing her memories of him and about a dozen other “plots’)? We really, really don’t want that. We want an actual arc. 

Of course, how much you believe Carina and the writers will do justice to this arc depends on how much you trust them to actually meaningfully write it, and that’s up to each viewer to decide on their own. Based on my own personal experience, I think it’ll be fine, because whatever the various flaws of season 1 of Roswell (and they definitely exist), the emotional beats have rung true to me. I understand why characters behave the way they do, their fears, their traumas, and their progress (with some exceptions). So, I think we’ll be fine. 

Part of the reason I’m so confident is because every other time we panicked because of a tweet, a promo, or a promo photo, we turned out to be pretty wrong to panic. Let’s recap: 

1x09 This is the OG throwback episode, and when Shiri leaked that photo of Michael and Maria naked in the desert, we panicked. We thought Michael and Maria would have a full-blown romance and Michael would leave behind Alex and forget about him, or that Maria would sleep with Michael while knowing about Alex, or any number of worst-case scenarios. 

What actually happened: Alex ended things, with finality. Previously, he’d walked away - and we’re led to believe he’s done this multiple times, which means that he’s also come back multiple times, because to walk away again, he had to come back first. But now, for the first time ever in ten years, probably, he said “we’re definitely over.” The love of Michael’s life broke his fucking heart by making him believe they could never have a future together, and Michael’s response was literal suicidal ideation. That line about “I’m just wishing a meteor would strike me down and end my suffering”? That’s suicidal ideation, y’all. 

So yeah, he hooked up with Maria because he needed comfort and a connection with someone - but one that he was 100% certain wouldn’t get romantically complicated and messy. He picked Maria because he had a connection with her but thought there wasn’t a chance in the world that she’d catch feelings. 

And then Alex came back to him and he took him back and bared his fucking soul and revealed every single one of his deepest secrets. 

1x11 This was the UFO emporium re-opening episode, and everybody panicked that Michael and Maria would talk and kiss and/or hook up in the place of Malex’s first kiss. Come on, guys. Like, I get panic, but this was a bit much. 

What happened instead: Michael misses Maria, who was pretty much his only friend, and tries to get back onto the same page they were (flirty banter that meant nothing), but which is pretty hard to do once you’ve slept together. Michael believes he and Alex are completely over, and....he skips the Emporium reopening (probably because it’s too painful). Then, Maria, the person he pretty much considers his only friend, gets roofied and possessed by an alien serial killer. So yeah, he’s concerned, and he watches over her, because Michael Guerin is, at heart, a protector who takes care of people, and frankly, if he wasn’t worried about Maria, I’d like him slightly less as a person. Maria drunkenly indicates potential feelings for him, which he shows absolutely no indication of actually reciprocating (he looks concerned and frustrated at best). 

1x12 We all thought Malex was going to break up in this episode, despite the fact that they were already broken up and Michael thought they were “over.” We knew there was a tear-inducing Malex moment and we listened to Tyler’s song and I saw no end of posts going around saying Malex was going to break up. 

What happened instead: Alex confessed his love for Michael, called Michael family, stayed by him in the face of literal certain death, and physically and emotionally supported him during a moment of devastating heartbreak. 

So yes, I get the worry. I especially get the worry because apparently The Magicians fucked over their queer viewers just last night. Believe me, I understand, and I’m not a person to have faith easily. I’ve been through Supernatural fandom and the great Destiel queerbait that was season 8. I’ve been through Sherlock fandom and The Johnlock Conspiracy of seasons 3/4. I am intimately familiar with the nonsense shows pull on queer viewers, and I understand the context in which queer viewers are wary of trusting and investing emotionally. I’m a queer viewer as well, and I get it. I really do. But my personal experience of Roswell has been one of the fandom panicking (because we’ve been burned so many times), followed by us getting literal fanfiction on our screens, with actual love confessions and words like “cosmic” and all the tropes. So in this particular case, I choose to trust, because thus far, I think the show has done well by Malex for the most part, and because so far, almost all of our worries have turned out to be for nothing. And I’m also excited for Malex to have meaningful storylines and things to work through. 

That’s my two cents. Thanks for letting me ramble. Feel free to reblog if you think we could stand to spread some positivity. 

[ais-n]

hey ais! i was wondering if you had any idea on how hsin would react if boyd had like, the flu or something? i am amusing myself right now imagining boyd being all sickly and hsin offering to fight the sickness out of him lol. i guess that depends on what kind of patient boyd would be as well

LOL the funny thing is I feel like we talked about this one time, but I can’t remember what we concluded XD I feel like it could go either way. 

Going based on my thoughts now because I can’t remember our thoughts then:

To be honest, Boyd is probably a really annoying patient - not because he wants everything done for him, but the exact opposite. He probably keeps trying to do shit himself. He’s probably the sort of person who, if you turn your back on him,  he’s groggily trying to roll out of bed thinking he can make himself chicken soup when the dude can usually barely make toast without lighting it on fire. Which would probably exasperate Hsin who would probably be like JUST LAY DOWN GODDAMNIT. Only nicer. Thus would begin Hsin trying to do actual useful tasks like making food or getting ice or running a bath, and Boyd constantly being super counterproductive to his own health by being too stubborn to let anyone else help him because he can do it himself, goddamnit! He’s capable! He spent most of his life alone, he can figure this out! Except if he’s sick enough, he actually can’t - and who knows how long Hsin’s patience would last lol

I mean, I don’t know exactly how it would go down, but I could see it being something like that. And if it were, that would be hilarious to watch XD Like, suddenly Hsin turns into a babysitter of the most precocious child - roles which neither of them would like XD

Since I can’t remember what we decided, this isn’t a canon answer btw... so you can imagine whatever you’d like :) I just think it would be funny this way. 

Oh but PS: if this were happening with the Boyd of around 1/27 era, Hsin would just have to be like bro, let me fucking help you, legit you’re just making this shit worse rn - and if he was insistent enough, Boyd would relent and be like ok I trust you know what you’re talking about so I’ll just take a nap, and things would work out. Early Evenfall Boyd, meanwhile, would not listen to that for pretty much forever because trust issues + depression + fatalism + suicidal ideation do not make for a healthy-minded patient able to trust that Hsin isn’t put out but also really cares. And, most importantly, can be trusted to be around him and make decisions for him when he’s vulnerable. 

Which is ultimately what it comes down to for Boyd, tbh. He’d have an automatic need to do everything himself so no one can take advantage of his vulnerability when he’s sick and not able to defend himself mentally or physically, but the older Boyd would know Hsin could be trusted with that, so it’s okay to lay down and rest. Hsin won’t hurt or betray him.

Jesus, I managed to make what started out as a cute scene into something depressing.... UR WELCOME :D

[writersindigestion]

tipped | edward nygma x reader

“what goes up, must come down.”

reader gender: female

words: 2536

warnings: SUICIDAL IDEATION, mention of gore, violence, abuse, paranoia, trauma, ed didn’t stopped being evil while i was gone. he’s not dark!ed, he’s just ed, and edward is a villain.

notes: hey there, kiddos. sorry it took me so long. i’ve had this part done for a while, but i’ve got another bajillion words to add. i cut it in half once again for your ease of reading. please leave a comment or shoot me a message! gonna try my best to get back into writing!

PART ONE | PART TWO | PART THREE | PART FOUR | PART SIX

also available on: AO3

The next morning, she put on a plain dress that extended just past her knees, made her hair appear presentable, and made way to the church. [Y/N] had used the phone just for a few minutes yesterday, attempting to find the cathedral’s number from the directory. When she got the information she needed, she made contact and asked when confession was.

Lucky for her, it was sooner than she’d hoped.

The confession booth was small and claustrophobia-inducing, and her paranoia rang vicious bells all around her psyche. She swallowed her fear, however, and crossed herself. “Forgive me, father, for I have sinned,” Her tone was low, quivering, “It’s been… Probably close to a decade since my last confession.” Was it doubly wrong to lie to a priest?

She interrupted herself, “Pardon me, father… That wasn’t honest.”

“Take your time, daughter. I am listening,” The priest calmly replied, his age-wizened voice spreading over her like a warm breeze.

“I’m not Catholic. I have never been,” [Y/N] breathed, trying vainly to soothe her nerves, “I’ve never been to confession, nor would I know how to give confession…”

He did not speak, and so she continued.

“I’m am guilty of a great many things, father, and I don’t know that I’d ever personally been able to atone for them, but I need help,” She said, fighting through the strangle of tears, “I wrote down what I have to say… It might not be safe to say such things out loud. Forgive me.” Her fingers pressed a well-folded piece of paper through the decorative gaps in the confession booth, hoping beyond hope that he would accept it.

The priest took the note from the woman, taking just a few short minutes to read it in its entirety. He made a small sound of grief, of pity, and received a small sob in return for his acknowledgment. “Is this what you need me to do, my daughter?

[Y/N]’s cries became ugly, sloppy, but she couldn’t help it. Her heart was so shattered, so suffocated beyond repair. It seemed like a century had passed since a stranger had so easily offered their assistance. “Please, please - it’s all I could ever ask for. I’m so scared, I’m so-”

“You need not plead any longer. It shall be done as you have asked,” He interjected softly, and she heard him rise from his place, and step quietly from the booth.

She did not follow. She didn’t want to leave the sudden comfort of the tiny room that protected her from unwanted stimuli. She didn’t want to leave the little box of forgiveness for a world that was tinged with green.

When the priest returned, he extended his hand towards her and guided the woman from her hiding place. His expression was grave, and he could barely stand to look at her.

Her blood went cold. She’d been so close. She could’ve tasted freedom only seconds ago, just to have it snatched from her needy grip.

The father undid his collar, frustration in hands that had been so peaceful for so long. He gripped the cross that rested around his neck, and gracefully removed it, before turning to place it around the head of [Y/N]. It pained him to see the look of confusion, of loss in her eyes.

“God has forgiven you, daughter, and I must ask that you forgive me in return,” The priest lamented, before turning away from her, “It seems it is no longer my place to offer advice - but may you also forgive yourself.”

He would not make a return to his place in the Catholic church.

An old, feeble nun gripped her by the elbow, gently leading her into a side room, away from all the stained glass and overused pews. She sat her down at a table; a simple, landline phone lies in its round center. The nun’s hands grasped [Y/N]’s shoulders just moments before she left her alone.

With bated breath, the isolated woman awaited his call. When the phone finally rang, she still hadn’t fully prepared herself, listening to the ring for several seconds more, her teeth gnawing at the skin of her knuckles until her lips were painted with blood. There would be no ignoring him. She picked up the phone and did not speak.

“Once again, you color me surprised, Miss [L/N]. Using a priest to do your dirty work? Terrible. I hope you don’t mind that I took a page out of your book, then,” Edward began, sounding quite like a man who had just won the jackpot, “Don’t bother responding. Just follow my instructions, and no one will be hurt. You have God as my witness.”

She couldn’t breathe. She wished that she wouldn’t.

His voice was crisp, commanding, “Turn around. There is a set of stairs - take them to the top. When you get to the balcony, wait for further direction.”

[Y/N] didn’t move - she didn’t want to, certainly, but her legs felt like gelatin just sitting down, how would they ever carry her all that way?

Edward didn’t relent, barking into the receiver, “Move - now!”

She scrambled to her feet, dropping the phone on the table and beginning her ascent. Flights passed her by, and she peered out of the windows as she marched towards whatever fate was sure to meet her. The people below were busy - probably content, and absolutely oblivious to her peril. In one of her frequent moments of morbidity, she saw her intestines decorating the cathedral spires, painting the church’s outside walls with the blood of a sinner.

This isn’t your fault, you didn’t deserve this. This isn’t your fault, you didn’t deserve this. This isn’t your fault, you didn’t deserve this.

In the middle of the balcony sat another telephone, its winding cord disappearing off towards a distant wall. When it rang this time, she didn’t hesitate to pick it up.

“Nicely done - you’ve proved you can follow instructions, imbecile,” Ed vibrated, the sick sound of joy clearly evident in his words, “What I will ask you to do next is very simple. When I hang up, you will climb onto the balcony ledge. I hope your balance is good, [Y/N], but you won’t be there for long.”

She spoke lowly into the phone, “Do you want me to jump? Is that what you’re looking for? Cause... I’m not exactly afraid of heights…”

“Did I tell you to jump? Clearly, I’ve overestimated your ability to listen. I would say that insubordination deserves punishment, but we’ll have plenty of time for that later,” He chattered, hardly able to contain his excitement.

“Just looking out for you, Eggma. I know you want this to be as painful as possible.”

“It’s adorable to see you pretend to know anything about me,” Ed teased, completely ignoring her jab before his tone grew serious again, forceful, “Get on the ledge, or people will die.”

He hung up before [Y/N] had the chance to ask who he planned to hurt. She placed the phone lightly back in its place and smoothed out the wrinkles in her dress. In her overwhelmed state, she nearly forgot to be afraid, but the knocking of her knees together reminded her that she was still wasn’t as strong as she needed to be. Could she not be like Jim Gordon? Or Chryssie? Or Kristen? Or the priest? Why did she crumble when it mattered most? Why couldn’t she stand her ground? Tears rampaged down her face for the zillionth time in the past months, and she pressed her hands to the stone ledge, pushing herself up onto it.

Her eyes were immediately trained downwards, the safety of the confessional booth was now light years away. She calculated that the balcony was roughly over one-hundred feet in the air and that a nice tumble onto the thin rug below would effectively kill her. The prospect of death was tempting, tantalizing, and the urge rested against the small of her back. [Y/N] stared at the pews, all aligned in perfect little rows for the masses to gather in during sermons. She imagined, like she always did, that none of this had happened to her. Kristen hadn’t died, Jim Gordon never went to prison, her sanity was never stolen, and Edward Nygma was never born.

The fantasy had yet to fail at comforting her.

An acronym was what broke through her daydream, an acronym that she’d heard for a generally happy several months of her life. In any other situation, perhaps it would have been a blessing to hear those four letters.

“G-C-P-D!” A strong, booming voice cracked the foundations of her reverie, bringing the woman back down to Earth with a figurative splat.

Jim Gordon gazed up from the ground floor of the church, seeing the teetering form of [Y/N] [L/N], a former coworker that he’d known so little of during her time at the precinct. Cursing to himself, he started for the stairs, his partner taking the lead in coaxing her down.

“Miss [L/N], we are here to help you!” Harvey Bullock called upwards, raising his voice despite the silence of the cathedral, “Suicide is not the answer - please step down from the ledge, and we will get you the assistance you need!”

Typical Harvey. He was well-meaning, but not completely helpful. She couldn’t help but roll her eyes at his words, fighting the urge to laugh out loud. No one appeared to notice, however, thanks to the distance between them. She put her hands up in surrender, turning just slightly to step back onto the level ground, when she spotted the slithering form of Edward Nygma, winding his way between the officers behind Bullock.

Suddenly, she remembered why the implications of suicide had been so tempting. He stared up at her, his expression unreadable regardless of her vantage point. What alarmed her most was the curling of his right arm through the crook of her girlfriend’s elbow.

She let out a cry of frustration, of exasperation - would [Y/N] never be free of this man? Would her friends ever be safe? Would she ever have control of her life again?

While she would have loved to continue her turmoil over taking a leap, the strong arms of James Gordon wrapped around her middle, tugging her, unwilling, from the balcony ledge. Having just breached the boundaries of hysteria, she let out a deafening shriek, catching the marble rim with the tips of her fingers, stopping Jim from tearing her away from what felt like the only escape she had left.

The detective’s brow furrowed at her resistance, but he knew he shouldn’t be surprised. She was a woman in distress - distress that reached the point of wanting to die. Inwardly, he tried not to think about how close he’d been to the same position in the recent past.

Granted, he’d been hypnotized by a psychotic madman, but it didn’t mean the impulse wasn’t there. A part of him considered her reasons, to which he’d collected just a few, and wondered if she was being coerced as he was.

He pushed the thought into the back of his head for later, pulling firmly on the woman’s waist until she lost her grip on the ledge. What really surprised him, however, was how rapidly her hands went from the stone to his eyes. Jim let out a grunt of pain, his face pinching together in an attempt to avoid the assault, his arms still wrapped around her to keep the woman from jumping. What hurt more than her fingernails against his face, was how goddamn loud she was screeching.

“You can’t do this to me. I have nowhere else to go!” [Y/N] screamed, battering around the man’s head, frantic in her attempt to get him off of her. This would likely be the last chance she got in a long, long time - if she had any idea where she was headed.

The struggle didn’t last much longer. A few more officers joined Gordon’s side, one of them making an executive decision to tase the suicidal woman. She immediately dropped, stiff like a board, but the cop held it for almost fifteen of the thirty recommended seconds before Jim reprimanded him.

“Officer, stand down,” He bellowed, lying [Y/N] on the ground before she could get hurt during the fall. When he was sure his colleague had stopped, he leaned down to check on the female who’d been so keen on dying just moments before. With help, James pulled her back to her feet, letting her use him as a crutch.

As they started to lead her downstairs, she grappled with her feelings, with her body, with her tongue - mostly unable to form words. This was the only time she’d be separate enough from Edward to tell them what was going on. But was he listening? How would she know? Was his plan still to hurt innocents if she didn’t cooperate, as she’d done thus far (she assumed)? Had she even cooperated at all? What was for dinner?

[Y/N]’s teeth were clicking and chattering far too much for her to even attempt to speak in the first place. She didn’t quite feel herself getting tased - or at least didn’t feel the electricity coursing through her - but she definitely felt the effects. Her muscles locked up all over her body - head to toe, and back again. Screams of pain, of terror, of confusion - they tore up her throat and sat, paralyzed, underneath her tongue. She had said so many things, asked so many questions, pleaded for them to stop hurting her, but she was dumbstruck, and in reality, said nothing at all. Now that the tasing had ceased, she felt around her cottonmouth for the syllables that had been so deeply swallowed.

This wasn’t the first time she’d been tased. Curious fifteen-year-olds tend to do stupid things around unsupervised stun guns. One that was used for public defense, however - it was a little more effective. Consciously, she knew that it didn’t particularly hurt, but the sensation was so very, very uncomfortable. And while she would never go out of her way to get electrocuted again, if the opportunity arose in a social situation, [Y/N] probably would. Stupid? Yes, but she enjoyed playing devil’s advocate for the sake of experience.

Maybe that made her a little like Edward, she thought, but there was an incredibly fine line between playing devil’s advocate, and just being the devil.

Was it appropriate to think about the devil in God’s house?

In her mental limbo, she’d missed her chance entirely to tell the cops what was going on. If the walk had taken any longer, the battered woman probably would’ve forgotten what was happening in the first place. They rounded the corner, coming back into the central chamber of the church, and [Y/N] was greeted with a new perspective on the place that she’d nearly jumped from. Suddenly, ghostly images of her fallen corpse spread across her cerebrum, painting the wooden benches with her blood. She promptly bent in half, her vomit narrowly missing Jim’s shiny combat boots.

[burnssouls]

this is going to be a bit all over the place, but i’m going to talk about takeru’s time after the incident like his time before he left for den city. or well...what i think it was like considering the anime only gave us so much information. also it’ll be under the cut cuz it’s a lot. 

tw: mentions of suicidal thoughts/ideation

first of all, i don’t think he underwent any form of therapy unlike other lost kids (like yusaku or jin). his grandparents wanted him to. they asked him if he wanted to, but he refused. he was stubborn and scared and just wanted to be alone. he didn’t think anyone would understand what he went through. how could they? only other victims of the incident would be able to. he denied medical help and decided to instead isolate himself. his grandparents never pushed him into anything, they didn’t want to overstep a boundary. they could see how unstable he was. they didn’t want to force him to do anything he didn’t want to do in fear of pushing him over the edge. 

he spent the majority of his time inside, in his room to be exact. flame did say he was a neet before coming to den city after all. takeru kept the blinds in his room closed and was known to lay in bed all day, scrolling through things on his phone. he had a pile of snacks near his bed so he would always have something to eat. if he grew hungry, it would send him into a panic causing him to recall the nights (sometimes even days) he went without food. his grandparents also made him meals of course and brought them to him. he always appreciated that.

there was a time when he attempted to go to school, for his grandparents’ sake. however, it ended up being too much for him to handle. he hated being around so many people at once. there was too much noise, too much stimulation. on top of that, he could only eat at a certain time. this caused him to have panic attacks abruptly at times and cause a disturbance in the middle of class. he quickly became the outcast of his class and soon the entire school. they made fun of him behind his back, called him names, claimed he was overdramatic and exaggerating. he knew what was happening of course. he heard them. they never talked quietly enough and he knew it was on purpose. he was broken. he wasn’t normal. he never could be normal. as time went on, takeru started skipping school before he stopped showing up altogether in favor of isolating himself once more.

though during his time at school, he made a friend. a girl his age named kiku. she was kind to him, but takeru was unable to tell if this was her true nature. it wasn’t like he wanted to distrust her, but he couldn’t help it due to the way everyone else was treating him. he would talk to her, but she was always kept at a distance. he talked to her occasionally, but only about mundane things. 

after leaving school and falling into his old habits, he rarely ever left his home for the following years. as a result of this, he had a severe vitamin d deficiency and it served to make his depression even worse. he barely had the energy to move out of bed. he didn’t want to do anything. there were many days where he felt he was better off dead. some nights he prayed he would die in his sleep. he thought of ways to kill himself, but when it came down to it, he was too afraid to go through with such a thing. but if he were dead, he wouldn’t have to deal with the nightmares, he wouldn’t have to remember the electrical shocks, he wouldn’t have to be a burden to his grandparents. if he were dead, he wouldn’t have to deal with any of this and many days that seemed like a great alternative to “living” (if you can even call it that, he barely felt alive, he just existed.)

what finally helped him to start coming out of the darkness was meeting flame. he told him about what was happening with link vrains and playmaker, go onizuka, and blue angel. he explained so much to him and it became takeru’s small glimmer of light. he began researching all about the trio, keeping track of what they did. he cheered them on. in particular, he admired playmaker. this was due to the fact that he was a fellow victim of the lost incident. despite this, he was able to fight. he was able to take matters into his own hands and search for the truth. he was so much stronger than takeru. takeru wished he had that kind of strength. he looked up to him as well as go and blue angel. grasping this wish of his along with the desire to find himself, he made up his mind to leave his hometown and go to den city.

[ko-neko-san]

You ever meet someone and it's great bc you're kids. And their home life isn't stellar, but the only thing you're going off of is your own parents and your best friends parents, and sure they're both happy but everyone has issues and you won't find out abt your own parent's for a few more years. But this person's mom is like. Certifiable. But dad is great, tbh classic white middle class dad, love that man, but god does he make excuses for mom like it's cool.

Y'all are friends through middle school, few bumps but what relationship doesn't have arguments or tiffs. You move away before high school, only four hour's drive, but then they move even further south that you did, eight hours now, and the relationship becomes more digital/over the phone than in person. This is fine though, you're still good friends, still helping them through shit with their mom, random shit their sisters do.

She graduates first, but more like on time, bc you're an idiot and couldn't get your shit together on time, no big deal, you still finish the same year. She meets some guy on whisper (y'all remember that, anonymously post shit, most of it ended up being cheating or kinks), apparently finds the D she was apparently looking for, all seems well. He's older, but we're adults now, right? So it shouldn't matter, everyone we'll be interested in should be older at this point.

Turns out, mans is ten to fifteen years older than us, has a wife and at least two kids, and is with your friend on the side, allegedly with wife's permission/open relationship. With the addition of your friend in a steady relationship with him, wife decides that since she's not having luck with her side, no one can. Personally, you dont agree with any of it, but you understand that not everyone has the same issues with jealousy that you do, and that its not your business what other people do behind closed doors.

Few years go by. The couple gets divorced, citing infidelity, considering that the side stuff started before they'd reached any agreement. She gets the kids, and the house, but he's military anyway so he goes to the barracks until his next station, where your friend officially moves in with him. Mom is still not totally there emotionally, still manipulative and likely emotionally abusive. You don't say anything after the first two years of being argued with, but you still don't agree with the relationship your friend is in. Speaking from experience, you say, if he cheats to be with you, what's to stop him from cheating on you, but you've been excommunicated before for saying that so you hold your tongue now.

You've both had a history of self harm, you're not sure if she uses a reason or just does, but you haven't done it since you started seeing people about it, and her therapy/med combo just barely worked. But you've been together through it anyway. Takes one to know one, right? Still, neither of you have done it in years, she just got help a little later than you did, so she's always a little closer to falling off the wagon than you, but you look out for each other and it keeps you both accountable.

You dont realize this until the last year or so, but you give a lot in this relationship, and have since you were both in high school, and have gotten only her own drama back. Somehow everything you're going through, be it a nasty break off of an engagement or your parents nearly killing each other/someone else, she's got a story that she needs to tell, regardless of the fact that she's been with the same person going on six years and before that the same person for four, or that her parents ignore their problems and always have. You start to think it's just a lot of emotional work to be friends, and you feel guilty as fuck about it because you've been together since you were 12 and 11 and you're 25 and 24 now and you're not sure you can break it off without pushing her into the deep end, and you don't necessarily trust that her partner will help her. So you stay anyway, you air your grievances to your mom, who knows her, and your best friend, who doesn't know her but knows you, and you hope that it's enough to keep you from falling with her when she inevitably does every time, and it works for a while.

But then you ignore calls late one night, and find out the next morning that she did fall off the wagon, straight into a bathtub. She's not gone, but she is absolutely not safe to be alone, and for once you're thankful she's with him, because he's staying with her. You find out she was assaulted years ago, that she'd repressed it until a recent therapy session brought it back up, that that was the catalyst for last night. You immediately ask your mom, is this my fault, bc I ignored her calls yesterday, but you also know if she was gonna do it nothing you could say would stop her, you've been in that situation, you should know better than to think it was your fault, and your mom says as much. But it turns out, she was calling after she'd done it anyway, so even if you'd answered it would've been damage control at best. You can't help but think if she'd have just stuck with the therapy she'd be better off, but you also find it hard to make that argument bc you yourself haven't done that, but you also always had the safety net of "my mom at least understands the emotional aspect, even if she can't relate to the self harm/ideation part" and she's never had that support at home.

I don't know what to do anymore. I can't keep doing this cycle with her. It's not actually helping either of us when I'm so guarded with what I talk about with her, when I can't bring myself to be more emotionally involved than I already have been, when the only thing she brings to the table anymore is actions I can't help her with and decisions I don't agree with. How can I help someone who won't help themselves?

[gaiatheorist]

The drugs don’t work. (For me.)

This is a weird one. Awake at midnight last night, I did what I do, and browsed the news. My disrupted sleep is partly due to the brain injuries, and partly ‘just’ the situation I find myself in. There’s the potential for some well-meaning but insensitive soul to suggest warm milk, no screen-time, ‘meaningful’ breathing, and the plethora of other things you ‘should’ do when you can’t sleep. Nobody has suggested sleeping tablets to me, yet, but there’s a whole internet out there, is it my melatonin, my seratonin, my magnesium? (I don’t know if magnesium has anything to do with anything, apparently it can impact on the binding of the vitamin D I’m probably deficient in, though.) 

Can’t sleep? Take a ‘Kalm’, or a ‘Nytol’, or Valerian root, or Mankuna honey in warm milk, or something from Gwyneth Paltrow’s weird range. Lavender worked really well for someone’s auntie Gladys, and so-and-so swears by chamomile tea. I’m making fun of myself, there, because if there’s a herbal/holistic remedy, I’ll try that before the ‘chemical’, synthesised alternatives. (’Chemical’ in quote-marks, as a nod to Tim Minchin, who rightly points out that ‘Everything is chemical, EVERYTHING.’) That tendency to stick to herbs, essential oils, and food-based medicine, rather than prescribed medicine infuriates my son, it would do, he’s studying Chemistry, he understands the ‘hard’ science stuff that baffles me. He’s 20 in a few weeks, and he’s been to the doctor four times in his entire life. Fucithalmic acid drops for conjunctivitis when he was a baby. I finished the course, and then treated with eyebright and breastmilk, he’s never had a re-occurrence. Septic tonsillitis in 2010, treated with Amoxcycillin, of course he couldn’t tell the doctor whether he was allergic to Penicillin, that was his first course of antibiotics, ever. Back down, I didn’t home-school him, and he was allowed to watch TV, he’s had all of his routine immunisations, and the optional extra Meningitis one. (That the doctor didn’t know whether he’d had, but I did, because I knew which year it started being offered as a routine school-age immunisation.) 

The kid implicitly trusts ‘modern’ medicine. Most people, who don’t run around in tinfoil hats, calling consumer conspiracy on everything, trust modern medicine. That’s what I’m wrestling with this morning. (Not literally, I’ve pushed the patient information leaflet to the side of my pack of antihistamines, so I don’t get frustrated about opening the box at the ‘wrong’ end. Apparently they’re set that way for right-handed people, and you can avoid opening the ‘wrong’ end of the pack by feeling for the braille, I don’t know.) What I’m over-processing is the “Antidepressants work!” news stories. There’s no reason at all for me to over-process it, the first line in one of them was something along the theme of “Antidepressants work for patients with a diagnosis of depression.” Case closed, I don’t have ‘depression’, my current ‘unfit for work’ certificate states “Stress related problem, previous SAH.” (I’ve abbreviated ‘Subarachnoid Haemorrhage’, because my GP spelled it wrong, I don’t suppose he’s written it as many times as I have in the last 3 years.) 

What I’m pre-planning butting heads against is that DWP, PIP, and ATOS are highly likely to point out that I’m not ‘on’ anti-depressants. That’s fine, they can do that, there is no diagnosis of depression anywhere in my last 3 years of medical notes, I can point to the page where the Workplace Well-being doctor has reported “Gives a clear account of herself, and, to her credit, is not depressed.” (If they’re referencing the ‘Depression?’ on my admission notes following the haemorrhage, I’ll politely point out that what the ex actually said to the medics was “I think she’s got depression, but I don’t know if she’s on anything.” I tore into him about that, when I was in my angry/confrontational stage, and he was in his confused/traumatised stage. Unkind.) 

It’s great that antidepressants work for some people, I wish those people all the goodwill in the world, dragging oneself through the mire of poor mental health is draining, if there’s a chemical lift that helps, use it. What I’m mindful of is that the medics have never found a dosage of this-or-that that worked for me. I have episodes of low mood, sometimes very low mood, but they pass. I make them pass, because I cannot exist in that state, in that state, I’m barely functional, forcing myself to ‘go through the motions’, it’s soul-sucking. There are lots of days when I just-don’t-want-to, I know my own pattern, and, although I’ll allow myself the odd ‘off’ day, three-in-a-row is my trigger-point. I had three-in-a-row a couple of weekends back, so presented to the GP, because ‘failure to seek or follow medical advice’ is also a flag-of-concern in me. If he’d prescribed, I would have taken the pills, I had the proof of low-income entitlement to free prescriptions in my bag, just in case. 

He knows me, he’s been my GP since I was about 14, as much as I’m just one more in a sea of faces to him, he actually remembered that they’ve tried me on pretty much every SSRI and antidepressant, with very limited effect. A bit like the dodgy Johann Hari, I ‘revert to baseline’ within months on any antidepressant, and they either have to increase the dosage, or, once they hit the median lethal dosage bar, switch me to another variant. Antidepressants don’t work on ‘me’, because, for the majority of the time, it’s not depression. (Yes, there’s the resistance-in-me to being in that foggy-vague don’t-care state, but, if he’d prescribed, I would have taken them, and tried to monitor myself closely, through the “I can’t feel my leg, but it will probably be fine in an hour or so.” episodes, that are scary enough when you ARE fully lucid. The third, inoperable aneurysm is sitting in an area of brain governing the majority of my motor function, as well as the blood supply to my retinas being impacted upon my the surgery to the second aneurysm, sucks to be me.)

‘On paper’, I probably ‘should’ be depressed. That being the assumed-case, a year on antidepressants ‘should’, theoretically, stabilise me, maybe they’ll throw in a bit of CBT, to make me magically forget that, on top of everything else, I nearly died, and now have brain injuries? Yeah, I’m pulling my socks up, and person-ing up, but I do still have lumps of metal where there used to be functional brain cells, that’s not going to go away, or ‘get better.’

At some point, I don’t know when, I’ll be called in for a DWP ‘work capability assessment.’ I’m not looking forward to that one bit, and I expect that the same person who ticks the box to say I can lift an empty box will also query why I’m not on antidepressants. I need to not be a smart-arse at that point, and question how they’re a qualified doctor AND a manual handling of loads assessor. I also need to remember to state verbally, and ensure it is recorded, every time an action or activity causes me distress or discomfort. I’m going to end up losing my voice. Have that, CBT practitioners, one of my ‘behaviours’ is not-disclosing discomfort or distress, so I don’t upset other people.

I’m rambling. I’m awaiting my PIP tribunal date, where I will likely be asked why I’m not on antidepressants. I’m awaiting my DWP ‘work capability assessment’, again, I’m likely to be told, by a box-ticker that I’d be ‘all better’ with a dose of Prozac. (Prozac brand-name now expired, it’s generic fluoxetine, and my last experience of it had me on 60mg/day, with little impact, they can’t put me on a higher dose than that, due to my BMI.) I’m also waiting on an appointment with Neuro-psychology, I have tried very hard to self-manage the brain injuries, but the cognitive fatigue and disturbed sleep still persist, there’s an ironic chuckle, there, because a lot of the side-effects of my brain injuries are also consistent with depressive traits. I know the difference in me, and ‘trying’ me on antidepressants would be similar to bashing a ganglion with the family bible, just a distraction technique, and a fairly dangerous one, at that.

What I’m wary of is the powers-that-be taking the headlines and research about the efficacy of antidepressants as a one-size-fits-all silver bullet against all-that-ails-everyone. Antidepressants have limited effectiveness on me, I have no diagnosis of depression, they’d be as well giving me sugar-tablets, or something to prevent testicular inflammation. If I had a diagnosis of depression, I would have given up on the systems-and-processes already, as a demonstrable number of people have, some permanently. Not-all-antidepressants are suitable for ‘all’ people, I had to advise my own GP that one variant he was ‘trying’ me on, nearly 10 years ago, was linked to suicidal and self-harming ideation. That’s specific to me, I’m a historical self-harmer, standard ‘not all’ disclaimer here. There are myriad noted side-effects with antidepressants, I’ll throw in ‘weight gain’ as an example, even if there’s no underlying eating disorder, whacking on 3st in 2 years, like I did is hardly a confidence-boost for a person who is already experiencing low mood. The side-effects are probably under-reported, between the depressive state of there being no point, and the cloudy sheep-sleep of ‘it does not matter’, some people just won’t report. Throw in the dismissive “It could be worse!” lines some doctors are still fond of when people who do report are sent away as neurotic, and the reporting is further compromised.

Antidepressants DO work, very effectively for some people, and I’m genuinely pleased that a bit of a chemical crutch helps them to live, rather than just existing. My concern is that these articles will be taken out of context, and that the flavour-of-the-month SSRI will be seen as a magic wand. (No, head, ‘they’ are not going to fortify the tap-water with fluoxetine, to make us all immune to depression, that’s silly.) Mental health services are stretched way beyond capacity, and ‘modern life is rubbish’, the fabled increase to MH services is a nonsense, it’s superficial, the new intake of ‘Improving Access to Psychological Therapies’ practitioners will probably start going off sick themselves very soon. (I have a friend who’s VERY disturbed, recently allocated for talking therapy with a girl just out of college, that would have been potentially harmful for both of them, so he discontinued. The intervention has probably been recorded as completed and successful.)  Antidepressants are very effective for some people, but, in others, they’re a sticking plaster over an arterial wound, I’m worried that some people, who really do need more than a pat on the head, and some ‘magic medicine’ are going to be very badly treated. If there’s a perception that  Prozac is panacea, some people will be very badly harmed by it.

If the drugs work for you, that’s great, I’m not here to demonise them. There is nothing wrong with taking the right medication for the right condition, nothing at all. My worry is that it becomes a blanket-catch-all, a first-resort, and that some people will slip through the net, disappear off radar, and not have different, underlying conditions, that depressive symptoms coincide with addressed.