#anyways i‘m back and better (more insane) than ever

[bpdamn]

hi they have released me back into the wild

[awake-my-oceans]

Kaito as the detective and shin as the Kid (shrinking optional)

(Send me an AU and I’ll tell you five headcanons about it)

Robin, you‘ve talked about how the Phandom makes you write like you‘re possessed, and I‘m starting to get what you mean. Literally nothing in DCMK comes to me without it turning into A Monster. Anyways, roleswap Kaito and Shinichi!

Ok so the thing is this could actually work with canon backstories. Kaito’s whole thing is about honoring his dad and catching the guys who killed him, which translates fairly easily into detective work—particularly if he doesn’t know about the Kaitou Kid bit right away. Shinichi is……a bit harder, but he canonically rolls with the weirdest stuff. If you get the right setup, him being Kaitou KID isn’t that much of a stretch.

I know it’s headcanon time but shhhh this is an interesting premise and I have to figure out how we got here.

Ok, so Kaito doesn’t always pick up nuanced crime scene clues, but he reads people really really well. So when he accidentally runs into Jii, and the mention of his father comes up, Jii winces, pained, and Kaito goes “what do you know you absolutely know something and I won’t drop this” and doesn’t let Jii rest until Jii admits that Kuroba Toichi was murdered. Boom, off we go. Nakamori Ginzo half-raised him ever since Toichi died, so it’s a reasonable jump to go straight into detective work. Kaito can’t always read a crime scene, and frankly, the bodies are unsettling to the point of nausea, but he sure can read everyone’s reactions to the body, and, well, some people are only pretending to grieve. What does this madlad do? Does he teach himself to carefully examine all evidence for clues? Well, yes, but that comes later. Right now, he jumps straight into impersonating the deceased’s voice and mannerisms and accusing everyone and, well, people do tend to have nervous breakdowns and confessions when suddenly confronted with their victim’s ghost. Good, Kaito thinks, remembering how much he’s mourned his father. They deserve it.

Off he goes. He’ll get more and more relevant information over time, but that’s about as slow-burn as canon. Meanwhile, he’s making a name for himself as a medium for the dead.

Meanwhile Shinichi’s come across the reports of Kuroba Toichi’s death, and, well, this is definitely a cover up. A few too-close runs later, he realizes it was a cover up from inside the legal system, and that those people are still very much in power. He has a crisis for all of like two days before realizing that Sherlock Holmes took a legally “flexible” approach to confronting in-house corruption, and, well, if Sherlock Holmes can do it then he can too. Sufficient off-the-record digging, plus talking with his dad (who is also, ah, legally flexible), brings up the whole Kaitou Kid thing and look, playing Kaitou Kid was supposed to be a one-time thing to bait people out of the woodwork, but one thing led to another, and here Shinichi is, moonlighting as a dead thief.

Shinichi isn’t more than competent at magic tricks, but he has a few things in his favor here. 1) both Agasa and Jii are helping him, and their team up is a force to behold. Jii keeps the ideas practical, and Agasa makes the ideas work. 2) Shinichi’s dad absolutely knew the last Kaitou Kid inside out, and he’s giving Shinichi helpful pointers. 3) Shinichi may not be good at doing magic, but he’s absolutely incredible at reading and anticipating the police, having a flawless alibi, and leaving no evidence on-scene. Plus, he’s still working his “day job” as a detective, so he also gets stupidly easy access to department gossip, security layouts, and other classified information.

Headcanon time!

Kaito has his beginning of canon meltdown of “EXCUSE ME, this thief is claiming to be the best magician around and he’s WRONG because my DAD was the best.” This is even more vehement because his dad is a more painful topic overall, given that he was murdered. That said, he’s not going to give this thief the time of day because he’s got more important things to do, like catch the murderers. However, Shinichi-in-disguise is casing a building when someone gets murdered there, and Kaito’s like “what is up with this guy.” Shinichi does pause and lend a hand when Kaito gets stuck, because murder is murder no matter what face he’s wearing. After the case is solved, Kaito’s trying to figure out who on earth this is when he realizes it’s Kaitou Kid. But the guy did just help solve a murder. And when he snarls that his father was the better magician, Kaitou Kid just bows his head and agrees. So Kaito has no idea what to make of this dude. Meanwhile Shinichi’s inner dialogue is just “it’s Toichi’s kid, does he know—NOPE HE SURE DOESN’T, UH, WHAT DO I DO??!”

Kaitou Kid respecting Toichi and admiring Kaito’s magic is a recurring thing, much to Kaito’s bemusement. Like. He can tell that it’s genuine, not a way to throw him off guard, although it’s sure doing that, too. One time Kaitou Kid pauses a heist to help with a case, which leads to Kid almost getting caught. Kaito’s still got a lot of complicated feelings around Kid, but it’s not fair that Kid’s getting arrested just because he had the decency to help stop a murderer. So Kaito covers for Kid with a rather good magic trick that “Kid” performs. Kid escapes, but not before giving Kaito the strangest layered look Kaito’s ever seen. He doesn’t even know what was in all those layers, just that there was a lot of grief and that there were upwards of ten layers in there.

Kaito and Shinichi catch onto each other faster than in canon. This is mainly because their weak spots are more obvious to an expert—Kaito’s definitely not talking to ghosts to solve cases, thinks Shinichi the Savior of the Police Force, and Kid’s definitely got a hidden agenda that’s only almost perfectly covered up, thinks Kaito the Undisputed Expert of Poker Face. Kaito has a very rough go of things when he finds out in rapid succession that 1) Kid’s trying to hunt down murderers via a system that might actually be stranger than talking to “ghosts,” 2) Kid’s looking for who killed Kuroba Toichi specifically, and 3) Kuroba Toichi was actually the original Kid. After that, Kid being a teenage detective is just—whatever. Sure. Why not.

There’s a huge police betting pool on what will happen when Kudou “everything has a rational explanation” Shinichi, and Kuroba “I literally talk to ghosts” Kaito meet. Everyone’s sure there will be conflict—people are just trying to work out how it will go down. Turns out that they get on like a house on fire, but to everyone’s great surprise, the houses they set on fire are all criminals, and they don’t try to set each other’s houses on fire at all. Except for Megure. Megure makes bank.

Turns out that when you have two detectives and two phantom thieves on hand, things get done with furious efficiency. Kaito and Shinichi take turns being Kaitou Kid, depending on whose skill set is most useful. Kaito’s better at dodging bullets and at doing insane magic. Shinichi’s better at forcing the snipers to reveal themselves and at getting the police to notice exactly the right things about the snipers. On a detective front, half the Organization’s convinced that 1) their dead victims are actively sabotaging them and 2) if their victims don’t get them, Kudou Shinichi certainly will.

Honestly, from an outside POV, the back third of this series would just be “there are GHOSTS and we are going to DIE and also reality is bending anytime Kaitou Kid shows up—“

RIP to all the undercover agents in the Organization. They’re about to have a Ride.

[kyouxa]

Diabolik lovers Chaos Lineage: Shu Sakamaki (Story 15)

In terms of the gameplay: The black choices lead up to a bad ending, the white choices lead up to a good ending. Please no reposting onto other sites, ask me before translating this into another language too!

Place: Scarlet mansion — Living room

Shu: I’m going to be the one ending this idiotic battle right now… !

Kino: It doesn’t matter if your younger brothers suddenly got their memories back or not, the situation won’t change anyway.

Isn‘t it already taking up all your strength to merely stand up with this magical spell on? How do you even think of fighting me in those circumstances?

Yui: (The magical barrier spell… this might really put Shu-san in a huge disadvantage right now)

(However, in this case Shu-san will undoubtedly… !)

Choices

1) Don’t worry, we’ll stay behind (white) ♡ ♡ ♡

2) Everyone’s going to be okay back here! (black)

— Don’t worry, we’ll stay behind♡

Yui: Don‘t worry Shu-san, we’ll stay behind you!

Subaru: Even if he might come up with a trick again, I’ll be there to have your back!

Ayato: Wrong! Yours truly would be the only one making a counterattack without fail!  

Subaru: Hah!? Are you trying to complain about my plan!?

Laito: Ah, yes, yes. I don’t mind either of you supporting, as long as you actually help out.

Shu: Fufu… it’s surely not bad to hear you all being worried about me.

— Everyone’s going to be okay back here!

Yui: Shu-san! Now that everyone has their memories back, you can go against him problem-free!

Ayato: No need to worry about me here! Just keep fighting with all your strength!

Kanato: That‘s right. If you won’t be able to finish him off, I‘ll be the one to stab him with a fork and make fondue out of him in the end.

Reiji: Stop this. You will end up getting food poisoned after that.

Yui: (T-That‘s not even the real problem here!)

Shu: For real… those guys aren’t feeling nervous at all. However, I might end up being able to concentrate better knowing that.

end Choices

Kino: Every last one of you, you’re all seriously pissing me off!

*Kino throws dagger*

Shu: Ngh!

Kino: Hahaha! You can do no more than open your mouth anymore. With all your remaining strength you even tried removing the daggers I stabbed you with!

Shu: Yes… I was only waiting for this. Like this I have a weapon in order to throw it if I have to shut you up.

Further than that… I won’t let you have your desired ways any longer… !

*Shu throws dagger*

Kino: Agh!

*Shu runs to Kino*

Shu: Aghhh!

Kino: Kch!

Yui: (Shu-san tried slashing him with his sword!? They both ended up crossing swords with each other, it seems as if neither of them will give up…)

Kino: Nn, aghhh… !

Shu: While having this barrier around me… you didn’t get closer to me, because it would affect you too if you did, right?

If I caught up to you, you‘d have to experience the equal conditions as I am!

Kino: Kch… Ngh… just because you’re the eldest… doesn’t mean you’ve got the right to go back to your spoiled home...

I will never… lose to some cheap guy like you are...

Shu: ...I’ve got not a single idea of how you’ve lived your life until now. Neither am I interested in it, but...

I, myself, have also lived a life filled with regret until now—

But I won‘t give up on moving on so easily!

*Shu stabs Kino*

Kino: Aghhhh!

*Shu broke free*

Yui: The barrier is gone… !

Reiji: It appears as if the blockade could not bear the power of both of your strengths suddenly colliding.

Kino: Ngh… Kch…

Yui: (Nn, Kino-kun kneed down…)

Shu: This match has officially ended.

— Your Status (Black)

Place: Scarlet mansion — Living room

Yui: (At last the point of his sword captured Kino-kun)

(It‘s finally over. I’m really happy… that it’s done with this)

Reiji: ….. ? Does it smell burnt? No way—

Yui: Eh?

(Nn, h-he‘s lying… !)

No... the mansion is seriously burning… !

Ayato: Hah!? What does this mean!?

Kino: Maybe this is the work of those guys from the other families.

They set the fire in order to bury each and every one currently staying inside this mansion.

Yui: Such...

Kino: Hahaha! Serves you right! Now that all you beloved siblings are together in here, you might as well end up committing a family suicide!

Bye!

*Kino runs off*

Ayato: Don’t run away! Fuck, that guy… even at the end he got his righteousness.

Subaru: Hey, leaving him aside, we also somehow need to get out of here!

Reiji: We will leave this place this instant as well!

Kanato: Before that, go ahead and untie us from these ropes already!

Laito: Like this we wouldn’t be able to flee, even if we wanted to run away!

Shu: I know! Just stay still while I untie you from it.

Yui: I will help out too!

Place: Scarlet mansion — Hallway

Kanato: ….. !? The corridor is already covered in a sea of flames too… !?

Reiji: If we run through this etage in one go, we will be able to make it outside in time.

*they start running*

Shu: ….. !

Yui: Shu-san? What’s wrong?

Shu: I can’t go… not when I know Yuma is still inside here!

Yui: (..... ! He‘s right… we can’t leave Yuma-kun, who’s still laying in his room, behind like that…)

Shu: You must go ahead and escape with Reiji and the others together!

Yui: Shu-san!

*Shu runs off*

Yui: (I can‘t possibly let Shu-san go around alone as injured as that!)

I will go in there too… !

Reiji: Ngh… wait, both of you!

*ceiling collapses*

Reiji: ….. ! The roof tile… I cannot go any further anymore… !

Shu: Haa… Haa… shit, the flames are spreading way too fast… !

Ngh…

*Shu leans against wall*

Shu: Fuck… the wounds he made me suffer with are...

Yui: Shu-san!

Shu: ….. ! You, why are you… didn’t I tell you to go ahead with the others earlier!?

Yui: Even if you told me so, do you really think I’d be able to leave you alone in this sort of tough situation!? What if you may get burned… !?

Shu: You’re wrong… as for this...

Yui: (..... ! The wounds Kino-kun gave him in the fight started to bleed again...)

Shu-san… it’s completely absurd going through this with these wounds…

Shu: I’m a vampire, so I’m fine. I’d be able to simply survive this with my body, while you wouldn’t.

That’s why you should escape from here as long as you still can.

You know that I don’t want to lose anyone right in front of my eyes ever again… !

Yui: Shu-san...

After all, I… I‘m completely useless and can‘t do anything without you too, Shu-san...

So please hold onto my shoulder! Let‘s go in and get Yuma-kun out there together!

Shu: You...

Yui: You promised that we‘d never get separated again, didn’t you? We’ll go through this together, right?

Shu: Yes… you’re right.

Yui: Let’s go and get out of this house with everyone together then!

(The room Yuma-kun is laying in is nearby now… we need to get in there quickly)

Ahem... Ahem...

(Breathing is getting harder… but Yuma-kun is right on the other side of the door before us…)

*Yui opens door*

Yui: (It’s open! Yuma-kun!)

Shu: I’ll definitely...

Yui: Eh?

Shu: I’ll definitely never leave your side. After all, you’ll always stay near me… don’t forget that.

Yui: O-Of course. Why would I suddenly—

*ceiling collapses*

Yui: (The ceiling… the roof tiles are falling down!?)

Kyaaaaaaa!

Shu: ...Don’t worry. I promised it to you. I’ll protect you no matter what.

↳ Labyrinth END

— Your Status (White)

Place: Scarlet mansion — Living room

Kino: ...Nn! This is not over yet… kch.

Shu: You can‘t even stand properly anymore. Even if you did try moving any further, this sword would immediately pierce through your body.

Getting injured by one would only cause vampires to receive a fatal wound. But it‘s different if it goes through your heart.

Kino: ...Shit...

...I‘ve been defeated.

Yui: Kino-kun...

Ayato: Hooray! Shu won!

Subaru: Geez, what a way to make someone feel nervous.

Reiji: ...Well done.

Yui: (Shu-san… he won. We‘re safe now)

(I actually want to run up to him right away. But, for now—)

Shu-san… you were really cool out there.

Shu: ...I wasn‘t particularly trying to look like that.

It‘s only important to me that you‘re safe now.

Yui: Yes… thank you.

Monologue

We finally tied up Kino-kun, and he surprisingly didn‘t even try resisting.

While I was giving Shu-san some brief medical treatment, Reiji-san started to untie Ayato-kun and the others.

After finishing doing so, we decided to once again surrender Kino-kun and interrogate him about this situation.

But as we did that—

We figured he didn‘t know anything either.

Place: Scarlet mansion — Living room

Shu: Does that seriously mean you‘re not the responsible one who made up this world?

Kino: ...It‘s pretty different from that. But it was honestly quite funny to pretend being the mastermind and have you believe it.

I used to be no different from you guys. I was merely another victim who was brought along to this place.

If I was already stuck in this situation, why not use it as an advantage then?

Subaru: Looks like he‘s not the mastermind… but can we actually believe that guy‘s not lying to us?

Laito: He‘d get nowhere even if he was lying to us right now, wouldn‘t he?

Yui: Yes… it feels as even if he really was the mastermind who set up all of this, he probably wouldn‘t get arrested by us this easily.

Ayato: But you know, didn‘t he say he knew details about us beforehand already? Isn‘t this our first real meeting with him?

Even after my memories came back to me, this guy‘s still a mystery to me.

Yui: You‘re right… if Kino-kun really experienced the same as we did, wouldn‘t that mean his memories must‘ve gone insane too?

How have you returned to normal before tonight?

Kino: Why don‘t you search through my pocket and look for yourself?

Yui: Your pocket?

Reiji: Pardon me… this is...

Yui: ...Your smartphone?

Kino: I‘ll explain it to you. At the beginning I was the complete same as you guys, I‘ve lost all of my memories.

It wouldn‘t give me a signal at first, so I merely started playing around with it every now and then until I discovered something.

With the information I discovered, I was therefore able to get back to my usual self.

Yui: Eh, but despite that being our first meeting you seem to be really well informed about Shu-san‘s brothers and even Carla-san‘s sibling...

Kino: Yes, I was in fact planning on killing everyone here from the very beginning. For that reason I already did my preliminary investigation.

Subaru: That guy, he‘s really the most outrageous person I‘ve ever met...

Wouldn‘t it be better to get rid of him either way then?

Yui: Ah, please calm down.

Reiji: Well, you may be the same as us and not the main cause of this project… but does that therefore truly mean you are merely another participator in this game?

Kino: That summons it up nicely. It‘s exactly as you said. I‘m not the game master. I‘m just another player in this.

Ayato: Tch, what the? That doesn‘t make sense.

Kanato: It honestly doesn‘t matter anymore. If he continues irritating me, I‘ll simply cut him into pieces.

Yui: Ah, calm down!

(If Kino-kun is without doubt not the one causing everyone to lose their memories and lose their minds, who else is it… ?)

(I do have the feeling as if he has no reason to lie now that we‘re close to finishing this game… if so, who‘s the real mastermind?)

Kino: I‘m satisfied, you know. If you want to kill me, why not do it now?

Shu: ...I have no intention of doing that.

Ayato: Hah!? Why not!?

Subaru: Wasn‘t he the one who tried killing all of us!?

Kanato: If we leave him alone, he might go ahead and decide to do something again.

Laito: Wouldn‘t it honestly be better if we settle things now before he might go off trying to attack us again?

Shu: ...That‘s not the end of this talk yet. He has been in the same position as we were the entire time after all.

He surely had no intention of being manipulated, and only wanted to have his wish granted by that old man himself.

Just a little while ago, even we had similar thoughts. Someone killing somebody else wouldn‘t have been a surprise at this point.

Ayato: That‘s… um...

Shu: It would be wrong dealing with this guy. If we seriously want to bring this all to an end, we first of all have to grab our old man by the nape of his neck.

Laito: By any means, I‘m not willing to take this guy along.

But well, if our older brother decides to do so, I won‘t protest against it.

Subaru: Tch… I‘d be more refreshed if he died.

Yui: Shu-san...

Shu: Moreover, it doesn‘t matter if you hate each other by now.

Yui: I agree… it‘s now all about stopping brothers from trying to kill each other.

Shu: Exactly. It would get even more troublesome if we didn‘t… so we have to do this.

Reiji: We are having a poor endgame, as usual.

However, I do approve your opinion on this matter this time.

Shu: Heh, how rare. So miracles do happen.

Reiji: It appears like that. Be careful in case you bump into another one in the future.

Yui: (It really feels as if the tie between Shu-san and him has sort of untied itself for the first time in a while…)

Shu: ...What‘s it? What are you smiling for?

Yui: Don‘t worry, it‘s nothing to be concerned about.

(There actually were a lot of things I was able to smile about, despite being in this awful situation)

(It kind of feels as if everyone gained something out of being here… I almost have a certain feeling about that)

Kino: Haa… we haven‘t achieved anything.

Your face looks as if this case is closed for you, but the fight for becoming the supreme ruler isn‘t done yet, you know?

Yui: Nn, I know. The killing will only stop once all of them have their memories back… !

Laito: Have them regain their memories, hm? I should know since I was staying in the same mansion, but Carla doesn‘t even seem as if he wants to regain them.

In order to become the king, he even said he would kill his own siblings if it was necessary.

Kanato: Ruki wouldn‘t bother listening to us either. This man had such unpleasant manners of speaking, except when asking about the goal he has.

Shu: It‘s almost kind of a miracle these guys haven‘t even experienced their memories coming back even slightly. It might be difficult to get those guys out of here like that.

Reiji: They would have to come hither. Perhaps if we could persuade all of them, we could come up with a profitable plan...

Yui: Well then, why don‘t we try that… ?

Kino: Ahha, you‘re dawdling… as if they‘re indecisive people coming upon request like you guys.

Ayato: Hah!? What was that!?

Yui: Ayato-kun, calm down!

Kino-kun, do you know what we could do next then?

Kino: I do. Unlike you, I straightforwardly collected information about this place.

Those would be the results of my own investigations, but this surely must be a space created by someone. It seems to be a miniature garden that‘s built by magical powers.

Subaru: Miniature garden… ?

Yui: If I got this right, then this is supposed to be a closed space? Does that mean it‘s impossible to get out of here… ?

Kino: It would seem like it.

Kanato: This is not funny if it‘s supposed to be a joke. I certainly have no intention of overstaying longer in this space, and I will reject staying here.

Kino: I‘m probably not able to endure a life with only some sort of half-baked entertainment either. Therefore I‘m willing to tell you something.

We participated in this game in order to have a king being chosen. If so, there clearly must be some sort of method to get out of here, don‘t you think?

Yui: Nn, does that really mean there must be a way to get out of here?

Kino: I‘d say so. Only if my predictions are right, that is.

Shu: And what sort of method did you think of?

Kino: ...The legend of the sleeping beauty.

Yui: Eh… ?

Kino: The sleeping princess must be awaken with a kiss. Did you already forget about this legend?

Yui: I do remember it… but how is this supposed to help us?

Kino: Who knows? I might‘ve just looked too deep into it.

Yui: S-Such...

(The legend of the sleeping princess? Does he really mean the way the sleeping Eve was supposed to be woken up in the church?)

(If that‘s true, it‘s definitely worth investigating)

Shu: The sleeping princess… she was sleeping in the church, and supposed to be awaken with a kiss—

...Hey, we‘re heading to the church right away. Just you and me.

Yui: Eh, why so suddenly?

Shu: I think I‘ve came up with an idea. Reiji, I‘ll entrust these guys to you once again.

Reiji: Understood. Please be careful on your way there.

Shu: Let‘s go!

Yui: Y-Yes!

Place: Church — Inside

Yui: (This place has a calm atmosphere. It somehow feels as if it only has this sort of special feeling in here)

Shu: So this is the church...

Yui: Ah, this is the first time you‘ve come inside here, right? I mean, this is only the second time I came to this place too.

After I woke up in this world, everything started...

Shu: I know you already told me about that, but nobody woke you up with a kiss, right?

Yui: A-As I said, nobody did that. I woke up naturally, and after I did that Reiji-san and everyone else rushed in.

Shu: If that‘s the case, I‘ll immediately try out the value of your words.

Say, if all of us really had fake memories planted in our heads, and all of this only in order to have someone become the supreme ruler.

If it‘s really like that, wouldn‘t you say that‘s unnatural?

Yui: Eh? What exactly is unnatural?

Shu: If everything in this world was set up to be fake, why create a legend about a sleeping princess as a necessary motive?

Yui: Talking about this… how come people are able to fight for the supreme ruler position without even knowing this story?

There must be a specific reason for everyone to have transplanted these sorts of memories in their minds.

Shu: It was said that Eve would be sleeping in this church, and could only wake up by a kiss.

What if all of this is supposed to merely be a bad dream we have to wake up from like this?

Yui: Ah… !

Shu: It‘s worth trying it out. We have no choice but to try this method in order to get out of this place.

Yui: No, you‘re right… we won‘t be able to know for sure unless we try it out.

It‘s just as Kino-kun told us. The one who became the supreme ruler also became Adam… this is merely another fight to question if Adam and Eve will stay together.

As long as we can prove that the both of us were able to stay together, we will undoubtedly be able to end this fight.

Shu: If so, let‘s wake up.

*Shu comes closer*

Yui: (I can clearly see my reflection in Shu-san‘s eyes)

(He seriously has tender eyes… I can tell how loveable he is only by looking at his eyes—)

Shu: ...There‘s no particular need for soliloquy anymore. You‘re the only one able to hear me saying this after all.

Yui: Eh?

Shu: The role and responsibilities I bear as the eldest son, they‘ve been gravely troublesome to accept.

However, my body seemed as if it indelibly ingrained the fact that my way of life is for me to protect them as eldest brother.

I must‘ve understood it ever since I came here.

Good grief, how troublesome. It was awfully tiresome and difficult to protect them, although they gave off quite the speech.

Yui: That must‘ve been because Shu-san has a strong sense of responsibility. You tried to manage all of this by yourself.

But I‘m greatly willing to carry half of the burden you‘ve carried with you. From now on, the whole time...

*Shu blushes*

Shu: What, is this supposed to be a proposal? Isn‘t that kind of a thing supposed to come from the man?

Yui: Fufu… you can still say it.

Shu: Unless you tell me to do so, I‘d never let myself get separated from you either.

Continue staying near me after this. Whatever happens, come along with me.

Yui: Yes, of course… Shu-san.

Shu: Promise it… Yui.

*Shu kisses Yui*

[91percentpynch]

lonely heart - kevaaron au pt 4

oh look it‘s me, coming out of my dark hole to make you suffer with a super sad chapter with a nasty cliffhanger:) so get your tissues ready and enjoy!! okay first of all sorry that i didn‘t update this in a g e s and that it‘s rather short and for the cliffhanger, but i‘ll try to update it more regularly now:)

check this out for the other parts:)

trigger warnings: drug abuse, mention of suicide, mention of mental health issues, very sad aaron, mention of blood

“You were too good for me”, Aaron whispered into the void. “You were way too fucking good for me. You made me a better man. And I fucked up”

Aaron got up as he felt the tears burning in his eyes. He knew he wouldn‘t be able to sleep alone tonight. Like every single goddamn night since he left Kevin. Like every single goddamn night since he made the biggest mistake of his life.

„Taylor?“, the blonde haired boy murmered, „You up?“

„Babe, you know I‘m up. My girlfriend lives three states away, we talk every single day at the same time as you call your man. Not that I would be able to sleep when you call him, cause a) i love Day and b) you‘re always sad and high and end up in my room anygays, so did he take the phone darling?“

Taylor was Aaron‘s roommate and the closest thing he had to a best friend. She had been there for him every single day, cuddled him, held him while he cried and dried his tears afterwards. And Aaron did the same when she misssed her girlfriend too much.

„You do realize he is not my man anymore, I fucked that up. Big time. He did actually take the phone just to tell me to fuck off and stop calling“

„You could always go over there and say it in his pretty face. Didn’t say you can’t come over did he?Pro point: Might lead to making out“, Taylor said while taking him in her arms. „Plus another pro point: you‘d get sober again. And you‘re less moody. No offense but a Kevin-less Aaron is hardly managable, like you‘re either a whiny little bitch or you‘ll give me the death glare of the cenutry. Legit worse than Andrew‘s and I called him a cute little baby boo once when I was drunk and he almost stabbed me right there with a look on his face like I just murdered Neil in front of him“

„Tay, I take that as a compliment. And we both know Kevin’s a bit of a dumbass so he did not exactly tell me Not To Come over just stopp calling. Anyways I don‘t even know where he lives. And stop talking about me getting high, you do the same shit“

„Yeah but I know my limits and I have not the same history as you. And for the i DoN‘t EvEn KnOwS wHeRe He LiVeS, phone number. Now“

„O- okay“, Aaron said and told her Kevin‘s phone number while Taylor calmingly stroked his back.

„Neat, got him“, Taylor said after a while. „He‘s with the scary big dude and his adorable little boyfriend I think? I have their address right here, I think we‘re gonna visit them tomorrow cause it‘s like 4 am right now and we don‘t wanna rob him his beauty sleep plus we don‘t want to wake the scary big dude. And I‘m pretty sure the adorable small golden retriver boy could and would stab us“

„Did you just stalk my ex and located his phone at 4 am like fucking Garcias in Criminal Minds?“, Aaron said confused.

„Anything for you big guy. And as I said I miss Day‘s pretty face, preferably in your pretty face so you shut the fuck up about how stressed and depressed and lonely you are.“, Taylor chuckled as Aaron looked at her shocked.

„Well I miss Casey, preferable in your face so YOU shut up“, Aaron was never as good in witty remarks as his brother. Especially high Aaron.

„Babe I think it‘s time for you to go to bed, you‘re not fun when you‘re sad, high and tired. Come here, let me cuddle you, while you whiney little bitch sleep“

Aaron slowly went over to Taylor and into her loving arms, laying down, trying to fall asleep.

After a long while aaron drifted into sleep, just to be greeted by familiar smaragd eyes. In his dream Kevin and he never broke up. Kevin was on top of him, his hands gently discovered Aaron‘s body, touching him as if he was sacred, something to worship. Kevin‘s lips were at Aaron‘s ear whispering sweet nothingness. Aaron‘s hips moved against Kevin‘s loving touch. „Stress release“ Kevin called these holy moments in dawn. „Highlight of my day“ Aaron called them.

The dream was as beautiful as it was cruel. It was as if his body, his mind were as much refusing as able to believe that Kevin was gone. It was his own fault, Aaron knew it. But the ever present voice of his mother, disapproving and disgusting, in his head was just too much for him to handle. He thought - foolish as Aaron was - that the pain of living without Kevin would be better, less cruel, less painful. But he never knew real love and therefore never experienced its lost. Until that faitful day. Until Kevin took his bags and left.

Aaron was used to pain. The hot one after an extraordinarily vicious hit. The cold one when his mother died. The numbing one when the hunger was growing more and more unbareable. But nothing was even slightly as hard to handle as the loss of Kevin in his life.

Kevin was the first good thing Aaron had. He gave him a will to stay, to try, to give this stupid sport everything he got. And Exy turned into more mundane things like getting his eating routine under control or getting a more or less acceptable sleeping schedule. The dark days were still there, for both of them, and they would probably never leave them completely alone, but they got less. And when they did happen they would hold each other together.

Ever since he fucked up things with Kevin, Aaron had more and more dark days. The voice of his mother telling him he‘s a failure, the bored stare of his brother and Aaron convincing himself Andrew wouldn‘t even bet an eye if he died, the voice telling him the world would be a better place without him growing louder and lourder every passing day.

Logically he could say that the death of a single person wouldn‘t change much for the over all world population, expect maybe it‘s some kind of insane mademan dicator or someone important, but still. It made sense. All he did after all was fucking up, being a failure, never good enough, never perfect.

His lonely heart only screamed Kevin‘s name and he knew if Kevin didn‘t take him back, his life wouldn‘t make much sense anymore. Well he would definetly not tell Kevin that. He would not manipulate Kevin into loving him, because that wouldn‘t be much better than not having him at all.

Aaron woke up the next day around noon. He didn‘t really feel like getting up, like getting up was simply too much. But Aaron knew he had to. He didn‘t want to worry Taylor more than he already did. And it would end today. One way or the other.

So he got up, put on the first pair of black jeans he could find and the first sweater his hands could find. Ironically it was one of the sweaters Kevin gave him, on the third of december last year. It was one of Aaron‘s favourites as well.

„Ready for the big Day, small guy?“, Taylor said winking at him.

„Not really? What the fuck am I supposed to do there anyways?“, Aaron replied on his way to the coffee maker.

„Talk to him? Deliver one of those borderline cringe big speeches. Get im flowers. Break into his bedroom and say ‚Draw me like one of your french girls‘, naked of course“, Taylor laughed at the face Aaron made, listening to her suggestions.

„I think I like the big speech. I mean I‘m shit with words, but I‘m sure you want to help your boy getting ‚his man‘ back, right? Also what kind of flowers would you give someone you dumped cause the voice of your dead mother told you it was wrong and disgusting, which you never told him for obvious reasons?“

„Honey, you‘re so fucked up sometimes, I love you but you should go to a therapist or something. Also I‘d say sunflowers or roses? I don‘t speak flowers man, I‘m the tech nerd. Not the romantic one, the nerd. But we‘re gonna make a snazzy speech and you‘re gonna get your man back“

After their typical breakfast - if Aaron didn‘t forget to eat again - they sat down together on the living room floor, paper and pen ready, trying to write the world changing speech.

„Why is this so fucking hard? Why can I only tell him how much I love and miss him when I‘m high off my ass“, Aaron complained.

„What about you don‘t think about him that much. Just tell me what you love about him and then we write that down?“, Taylor suggested.

Aaron took a deep breathe and closed his eyes. „I loved him because he was the first one who saw me. Aaron Minyard. And not just the other Minyard, the lesser twin, the shadow of Andrew. He looked at me and somehow chose me. Even if he could have had everyone else. He chose me, even though I‘m not special. Kevin chose the failure when he could have had the first prize. He looked at me and saw something worth loving, worth keeping around. Hardly anyone could tell Andrew and me apart. But it took him less than a day to do so. Kevin is strong, so so strong and somehow chose the most fragile thing he could find, took it and made it worth soemthing. Kevin made me feel something. Not numbness. Not pain. Something warm and beautiful and living. He gave me a reason to stay alive. Kevin made my life bearable, he made my life beautiful. We were both broken and we would probably still be broken if we were together but we softened each other‘s edges. Kevin believed in me when no one else would. He knew how I felt, knew what I needed and when I needed it. Kev gave me love and safety and I kicked it with my feet. This man is like a god who fell for whatever reasons for a homeless man. And I know I don‘t deserve him but I also know I cannot live without him. And I know that I must tell him that before it‘s too late. If it‘s not too late already“

Taylor wipped a tear out of her eyes. „That‘s it. You tell him that and we‘ll get him back“, she said. „Can I hug you?“

„Sure you loser“

„Ah there is my boy“

They spent the rest of the afternoon writing down the speech, making edits here and there. In the end Aaron collected the pages and went to his room to change. He replaced Kevin‘s sweater with a simple black jumper, put on his Docs, got his keys and left.

Aaro did feel a little uncomfortable, stalking Kevin like that. But he knew this was his chance to fix things. This was his chance to get Kevin back, to make his life worth living again. Which to be fair was a bit selfish, but you are allowed to be a little selfish sometimes, aren‘t you?

Jean and Jeremy‘s apartment complex was a 15 minute drive away from the flat Aaron shared with his three roommates. Theirs was fanzier, obviously. After all Jeremy was a professional Exy player and Jean was some kind of semi famous artist or fashion maker or whatever. They could give Kevin the world. They could give him what he desereved. All Aaron had to offer was an apology and his love. No money. Not yet anyway. Just anxiety, depression and stress.

But if Kevin was willing to take his love, to give Aaron one more chance, he promised himself Aaron would make it count. He will tell Kevin how much he loves Kevin every single god damn day. Aaron will get therapy and work on his issues. Sober up and this time for good. He will do anything to be worth of god‘s love. Just that god in his case was a twenty two year old boy with black hair, forming soft waves at the end and a smile that will make the sun jealous. Eyes made out of smaragd. Lips so sinful and kissable.

Aaron sat down in front of the door, waiting for his courage to come back to him. He could do this. He would get his man back.

Hours passed, or maybe it were only minutes or seconds after all before someone came closer. Ever so slowly Aaron lifted his head, just to look in the ever so familiar green eyes, big with shock.

„You said to stop calling. You never mentioned face to face conversations“, Aaron said, his voice hoarse.

Kevin stared at him as if he was a ghost, a reminder of his past life, something he rather wanted to forget.

„Look I know I fucked up. I know I‘m not good enough for you. I know you deserve the world and I cannot give it to you. And when you look me in the eyes and tell me you don‘t feel anything for me anymore, no love or hate or affection or whatever humans feel, I will turn away right now and go and never come back. Never bother you again. But if you allow me to apologize, if you however decide to gieve me one last chance, I prepared this whole ass speech for you“

Aaron was sure they could hear his heart beating against his chest, roaring, screaming to return home. To return to Kevin where it belonged.

Kevin‘s eyes wandered to the floor, his fingers automatically closed around his left wrist. A nervous habit. Just another little part that makes Aaron‘s heart ache.

Slowly, almost painfully slowly, he lifted those unbelieveable beautiful eyes and met Aaron‘s golden ones. Kevin studied him and the world around them stopped.

Out of the corner of Aaron‘s eyes he could see Jean going still, his breathing too calm, too even. It‘s the same thing Andrew does when someone fucks with Josten. At least his death would be fast. Or slow. Whatever. Aaron didn‘t really care, without Kevin it wasn‘t worth anygthing anyway.

„Why“, Kevin said after what feels like forever, „Why would I forgive you? Why would I give you another chance? Why would you think you can come back here just to fuck me over again? Aaron I loved you, I really did. I always will. You were my first love and maybe, yeah maybe, my last one. But right now I can‘t. I just, I just can‘t. Please leave. Please leave me alone. For now. Maybe, one day we can talk about it. But right now I cannot handle the thought of you to leave me. To tell me all these beautiful lies, to cut me open and leave me to bleed out. I love you“, tears were running down Kevin‘s cheek. Tears Aaron one day, a long time ago, promised himself he would never let Kevin feel again. Pain. Sadness. Everything because of his failure, because of his weakness, because he‘s a fucking piece of shit.

„Thank you for giving me a reason to stay. Jusst remember that you were my light, my warmth, my happiness and I never stopped loving you. Never will. Please just be happy“, Aaron replied as he turned around to walk to his cars.

When he was sure he was out of ear shot, he let himself feel. Feel the pain. Feel the loneliness. Feel the numbness and the cold and the hatred. It was in that moment, that moment where he was alone and nothing more to lose, that he decided that it was enough. He would end it. End it tonight.

„Thank you“, he texted Taylor. „I‘m glad I didn‘t eat you in the womb“, he texted Andrew. „You were not so bad after all“, he sent to Neil. And lastly „Thank you for taking me under your wing“, to Nicky. They would understand. It would take them some time but in the end they would feel better. They would be happier without them. Because at the end of the day he caused them pain and wasn‘t really worth a thing.

So when he got in his car, tears running uncontrallably down his cheeks, he knew what he had to do.

[slashnatic]

May I request Jason, Bubba and/or Thomas losing their s/o by maybe them leaving or getting kidnapped. And lets say it's been a few months and they find them! What do our big bois do?

uhmm, so i divided this into two separate headcanons for each slasher, but the kidnapping one turned out different than it should. i only noticed when i was done writing it so i‘m sorry :) anyways, i like the request a lot and i possibly will write another actual imagine about this :)

Jason Voorhees Headcanons

How does Jason react when his s/o leaves him?

When he wakes up one morning without you there he immediately starts worrying, but he tries to calm himself down by telling himself that you probably only went for a “morning swim“ in the lake or something of that kind. He knows you’re strong and capable of taking care of yourself so he waits for you.

After he waits for a couple of hours without you returning he starts searching. His actions are calm but his mind is racing.

He knows the camp like the back of his hand so he knows something isn‘t right when he doesn’t find you. He doesn‘t care that he‘s been searching the forest for hours, he‘ll go on a second search.

Once he is certain that he won‘t find you he goes back to the cabin and just sits around numbly. He doesn‘t know what to do now, how he should react, how he‘s feeling. He only knows he wants you back.

When the sun rises again the realization actually hits him. He has mixed emotions, but he‘s mostly angry at himself and scared for you. His primary feeling is sadness though. He starts crying with the first thing he‘s doing which he usually would do together with you and it will happen a lot more times throughout the day.

He makes it a part of his schedule to look for you once a day. He always searches for you with the same determination.

After a few months go by without you he is almost completely back to his old self, acting like some kind of emotionless robot, but he never stops searching for you. He still loves you and he misses you everyday.

When he finds you one morning he doesn‘t believe it at first. Is he going completely insane now? He stares at you for a couple of minutes, no matter if you’ve noticed him or not, before he reacts. Then he suffocates you in a hug. He‘s overwhelmed by his emotions and starts to cry again. Without you being there to take care of him he‘s kept his emotions locked up and they all break free when he feels you in his arms.

He doesn‘t ask questions. If you went away because you wanted to be alone, if you needed a break, if you simply got lost on your way to your “morning swim“, he doesn‘t care. You‘re back now and that‘s all that matters.

Afterwards he always keeps an extra eye on you, making sure you‘re one hundred percent satisfied with your living situation in any way, shape or form and also making sure you don‘t get hurt or lost. If he didn‘t devote his whole existence to you before, he will now.

How does Jason react when his s/o gets kidnapped?

He knows something‘s wrong immediately. Jason knows you and the camp better than anyone else, so when you‘re not where you’re supposed to be he comes to your rescue right away.

He doesn‘t have any issue finding you. He‘ll track down whoever kidnapped you in less than an hour for sure. He‘s skilled and smart.

He is worried the whole time. He is scared of why they kidnapped you, what they want from you, what they might do to you. He beats himself up over this because he thinks he should have been there to protect you. Nevertheless he stays calm and he honestly believes he‘s going to find you.

Once he did find you he goes kinda crazy, but it won‘t last long. He makes short shrift of whoever dared to take you away from him. It‘s quite the carnage, actually. He basically rips them to shreds, but only takes a few minutes to do so. After he‘s done he takes care of you, going from maniac killer to romance novel boyfriend in the matter of seconds. After inspecting and most importantly hugging you he simply scoops you up and carries you all the way back to the cabin, stroking your hair, cheek, arm or really any body part of you he can reach.

He won‘t let you leave the cabin without him by your side for quite a while after...forever, actually. It‘s annoying sometimes, but he does it because he loves you. Because he is scared to lose you, because he can‘t live without you. He needs you. If he has to take extra care of you to make sure you‘re alright he‘s more than glad to do so.

Bubba Sawyer Headcanons

How does Bubba react when his s/o leaves him?

Panic. Absolute panic. Bubba and you have a routine for everything. And you do most parts of your routines together, so the moment he notices you are not there he freaks out.

He doesn‘t consider that you actually left at first, he rather thinks something happened to you, that you got hurt. When you don‘t return after a day his brothers start giving him shit for it, or at least declaring that they strongly believe you left him. Bubba understands. He understands what they mean and he understands you.

He thinks he did something wrong, but he doesn‘t think it‘s specifically about him as a person. It‘s not that he is extremely confident but rather that that‘s just his mindset. He believes he did something that upset you in some kind of way.

He searches for you often, not daily but around two times a week. He thinks about you the whole time. He doesn‘t believe that you will come back, but he hopes you wil come back and that feeling completely overpowers the thought of living without you forever. He basically tries to ignore that you decided to leave and just lives in his head, in his little wonderland which is built on the thought that you just went for a walk or something of that sort and will be back soon.

He spends a lot of time with making presents for you or cleaning your shared bedroom, really anything he can come up with which he thinks you would be happy about. After all he thinks he did something wrong and wants to make it up to you like that.

There are nights though when he lies awake thinking he wasn‘t good enough and you finally left. That he‘s going to die alone, craving your love until the day of his death. He cries a lot thinking about that, but when he wakes up in the morning he decides to just go back to his little wonderland.

When you come back his wonderland falls completely apart. He is confronted with every thought he tried to ignore when he sees you and he cries again, a lot. It‘s actually you who has to comfort him. He doesn‘t even have the chance to say hello to you because he breaks down before he could. When you hug him to comfort him he clutches you as if his life depended on it. He decides when the hug ends, not because he wants to force you to hug him, but because he is so lost in the feeling of your body embracing his, that he simply forgets to let go and he is too strong for you to get free.

He wants an explanation but he is too shy to ask for it. What matters most is that you’re back though, you can give him the explanation later anyway. Now, presents. He is very proud of everything he did for you while you were away and will patiently watch you unwrap every single piece (just pretend he didn‘t use human skin to wrap your presents).

For the next months you constantly receive gifts, but he will eventually go back to normal over the time. He‘ll make sure you‘re happy all the time though, he can‘t risk losing you again. When you are there his little wonderland is real.

How does Bubba react when his s/o gets kidnapped?

As mentioned before, Bubba and you have your routines. If something is different than usual he‘ll notice it immediately and he‘ll immediately think you‘re hurt.

There is basically zero need for you to worry, as he will grab the chainsaw and search for you. Sure, maybe you’ve only fell down the stairs and need a few minutes to recover, but he wants to make sure.

It‘s very unlikely that a kidnapper would get very far. Due to your routines you’re barely ever far apart, so he’d most likely find them almost immediately. It‘s pretty simple from there too, he kills them, takes care of you and for the rest of your lives there won’t be a single minute of your routines which you don’t spend together. Sure, he beats himself up over what happened, but he‘s also very eager to do what needs to be done to prevent that this will ever happen again.

If your kidnapper were to actually take you away though he‘d be a complete mess. He thinks it‘s his fault only, that he didn’t go after his responsibilities as your lover and caretaker right and will become super depressed. He sleeps less than usual, when he does he has nightmares, but when he‘s awake you‘d think he‘s actually sleeping. It‘s like he is a robot whose battery needs to be changed and now he‘s on low power mode, shortly before shutting down.

Of course he searches for you too, but he‘s more busy mourning than actually acting on it. That doesn‘t mean he doesn‘t search at all though. When he finds you he acts similar to how he‘d react if you left. He will kill your kidnapper first but he won‘t pay too much attention to them. All his attention is on you. He cries for what feels like hours to both him and you, he‘ll hug you and he won‘t let go. He also definitely carries you back to the house bridal style.

Thomas Hewitt Headcanons

How does Thomas react when his s/o leaves him?

He is broken, absolutely destroyed, but not surprised. It doesn‘t take long for him to put the pieces together and he honestly saw it coming.

He is sad, cries a few times, but forces himself to move on. It doesn‘t actually work, he still thinks about you every damn second of the day, he even dreams about you almost every night, but he is good at pretending to be alright. Or at least at pretending he isn‘t heartbroken.

He is also angry. If you think his past victims were suffering you don‘t want to know what happens to the people who came after you were gone. He is not actually a bad person. He started killing people at some point, he didn‘t stop and he doesn’t have a hobby, so this is the only way to cope with his feelings for him.

He doesn‘t blame you though. This isn‘t your fault, you did nothing wrong. You are perfect and it was just a matter of time until you‘d decide you wanted someone else. He understands you and he forgives you the second he realizes you are gone. Although he is sad and angry he still wants you to be happy.

Because of the mindset he has he won‘t search for you. You wanted another life and you deserve it. Who is he to stop you?

When you come back he has mixed emotions and is very distant towards you. Honestly, at first he thinks you just forgot something and came back to get it. When you declare that you are back because of him he just stares at you. Then he starts shaking. It‘s barely noticeable at first, but when he gasps you realize he is crying. It doesn‘t take much to convince him to let you back in from there. When he feels your arms around him and your lips on his forehead he is all yours again.

He wants to know why you left but he‘s also scared of your answer. Nevertheless Thomas confronts himself with his fears, always, at least when it comes to you. He‘ll only ask after a few months have passed though.

Once you‘re back he needs time to process everything and you definitely need to repeat some steps which you took before you left (concerning your relationship). He is happy that you‘re back though and he gets very handsy. He was shy about that before, but now you‘re back here and feeling you is proof to him that it‘s real. That you actually want him. He unknowingly becomes a bit better at being in a relationship.

How does Thomas react when his s/o gets kidnapped?

In all honesty, he doesn‘t notice it at first. Relationship or not, he is busy with work almost all the time and you have to work too since you‘re now officially a part of the family. Not seeing you for a few hours is nothing special.

When you‘re not waiting in bed for him at the end of the day he knows something‘s wrong though. He knows you’re strong and independent, so he asks the family first if they have seen you. Then he searches for you. When he can‘t find you he knows something happened. As mentioned before he is able to put the pieces together, in this case there are a lot of reasons for him to know that it wasn‘t your choice to leave (mostly visitors from earlier and the family‘s statements after he asked if they had seen you).

He won‘t let them get away with you. There isn’t really any chance for them to actually kidnap you. He takes the chainsaw and runs. It will definitely get messy. He doesn‘t care about anything but your safety in that moment. But he is fucking pissed. It‘s definitely an unpleasant scene.

He carries you home bridal style, no matter if you‘re hurt or not. Although Thomas isn‘t an extremely sexual person, he will make love to you once your safe back at home. Don’t even try to repay him for his actions, he makes love to you, this isn’t about him. Feeling your body reacting to whatever he does is a sign that you’re alive and well, he can be extremely affectionate without talking and he can make you feel like heaven good.

But before that happens he needs to be calmed down, he needs to be comforted. And he needs to comfort you.

The event does change quite a lot. You will work less and spend more time with Thomas. He has an eye on you for one, and two, he can also show you affection more since the lack of that due to him always working is something he feels guilty about. Luda Mae makes sure that you work less and even if you wanted to help she wouldn‘t let you. You are part of the family and ever single member takes care of you.

[i-just-love-spop]

I was just going to make a short post to explain why Glimbow/Glow makes sense. Then I somehow ended up writing more than a thousand words about their relationship and my own experiences. Whoops.

I‘m not even sorry😂

I came across a YouTube-comment recently, which was claiming that Glimmer and Bow ending up together made no sense because “Why would they never have talked about their feelings for each other considering how close they are?”

But there is at least two major reasons why this actually does makes a lot of sense, which I put under the cut because I started writing and then it escalated and turned out to be... way too long.

For the record: If you ship either of them more with anyone else, that’s your call to make, not mine. If you headcanon either of them with a sexuality that doesn’t fit the ship, or if you like them better as friends, that’s fine, too. I’m not trying to attack anyone. I do not want to start a fight with anyone, either. I just had to get this out of my system.

So, if Glimmer and Bow had feelings for each other, why didn’t they talk about it sooner?

Well, first of all: talking about romantic feelings is hard. Especially when it comes to friends. Especially especially when it’s your best friend, the person you care more about than anyone else in the entire universe. The thought of messing that relationship up because you have romantic feelings for them that they might not reciprocate is downright terrifying, and the thought of just staying friends with someone forever and not risking your relationship because even when you can’t be with them romantically, you can still have them in their life, and even if that’s not what you want, that’s still great, right? That’s still everything you could ever want, right? Right?

I‘m speaking from experience here. I ended up telling my best friend that I was in love with her, despite knowing that she’s probably straight and likely doesn’t see me like that. Hearing “you’re like a sister to me” from a person you could imagine marrying sucks, a lot. It’s painful, and difficult, it takes time to come to terms with it and it changes your relationship, even if your best friend is not awful enough to say “this is too weird, I don’t want to be friends anymore”. (Mine didn’t, thankfully, but also, if anyone’s best friend acts like this they never deserved your love or friendship in the first place.)

Sometimes, it’s easier to just stay close to someone and not tell them how you feel, because you can always imagine what being with them would be like in your head, and nobody can take that away from you. Telling them and being rejected seems more terrifying than never telling them, because as long as you don’t tell them, your hopes will never be completely crushed. And, worse, telling them might take the close, affectionate hugging and cuddling and handholding away from you that you currently have because that person doesn’t want to get your hopes up again after rejecting you, so it’s better if they never know, right?

This equation is stupid and illogical, because while you’re being afraid of rejection and what will never happen if you get rejected, never telling the other person how you feel still leads to the same result. It still means hoping for something that never happens (maybe with some more cuddling than you would have if you got rejected, but without everything you could have if the other person actually reciprocates your feelings), but love isn’t logical and easy in that way. I used to think that way, too.

And falling out of love after being rejected takes time, and it is especially hard when it’s your best friend that you see and talk to every day, because most advice for falling out of love with someone suggests distancing yourself from the person that rejected you. These are the kind of things you want to talk and cry about to your best friend, but you can’t, and that’s insanely difficult.

Saying “I love you” and hearing “I love you, too” back, but knowing you’re speaking of two different kinds of love... it’s awful, and it hurts, and it leaves you with a feeling of “why am I not good enough, I will never be good enough for anyone if not even my best friend can love me.”

This is something Glimmer struggles with anyway, to a point where she’s afraid Bow might now want to leave her behind because he’s finding new friends and they are all better than her. This is something she’s extremely insecure about (which I relate to a lot), so it makes sense that Glimmer would not want to risk losing her best friend, the only friend she had for such a long time, over something like this, which could potentially cause a massive rift in their relationship (not that Bow would ever let that happen even if he didn’t reciprocate her feelings, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t something she’s afraid of, anyway).

Like Netossa put it in season five, one of Glimmer’s biggest weaknesses is crippling self-doubt, and that also expresses itself in her relationships and her fear of losing her friends because she’s not good enough and they might find someone better and leave her for them – which is also part of the reason why she is so hurt by Adora and Bow “doubting” her in season four, despite that having absolutely nothing to do with her personally. (I like this part a lot, because loving someone means calling them out on their nonsense, but that’s kind of beside the point.)

Princess Prom was, arguably, as much about Catra’s and Adora’s relationships it was about Bow’s and Glimmer’s. Sure, you could argue that she really was just jealous of him hanging out with Perfuma because of her own insecurities when it comes to losing him as a friend, and that’s definitely part of it. But the way she sees Bow and Perfuma definitely suggests that there’s something more there. This feels a lot more like romantic jealousy than friend jealousy to me.

And all of this combined is why it takes the likely possibility of dying and the end of the world for Glimmer to finally tell Bow how she feels – because the only thing that is more terrifying to her than ruining their relationship over her feelings for him is losing him and regretting everything she’s never told him afterwards.

But there’s another reason why they didn’t talk about their feelings sooner – which is that, very likely, they took a long time to realize that they were actually more than friends.

Here, it plays a huge role that, like Glimmer puts it in season one, “it’s always been just the two of us”. Glimmer has never been a person with a huge friend group before the rebellion, and this suggests that Bow didn’t, either, probably because there weren’t a lot of other children/teens at Brightmoon castle.

And when you only have a single person as a friend, you assume how you interact with them is how everyone interacts with their friends. That the way you feel for them is the way you would feel about any other friends you make in the future, and that all of this is just... completely normal. All friends cuddle this closely and touch and cling to each other and hold hands all the time. All friends get this warm, fuzzy feeling in their stomach when they spend time with each other and immediately feel happier when they look at each other. And don’t want to be separated from each other and hate being away from each other for too long. And laugh at even the other person’s dumbest jokes.

This is just how friendship works.

And then, they start making more friends and hanging out with other people more often, and they figure out it just... isn’t.

Interacting with Perfuma and holding her hand feels nice, but somehow, it doesn’t feel the same way it does with Glimmer.

Frosta is cool, even if she does get annoying at times, but her spending time with other people doesn’t lead to the same soul-crushing fear and jealousy as Bow going to Princess Prom with Perfuma did.

Learning Entrapta is on Beast Island is terrifying, but somehow, it’s nothing compared to how Bow’s blood runs cold at the thought of Prime hurting Glimmer.

And then, someday, they start to question why that is. Why is my friendship with my best friend so different from all of my other friendships? This isn’t normal, is it? This is not just a stronger friendship.

Why do I think about someone else dating Bow, and why does it hurt so much?

Why does Glimmer holding my hand make my heart beat faster?

We‘re also best friends with Adora, aren’t we? So why does her hand in mine not make my heart beat faster? Why do we end up clinging to each other instead of her most of the time?

Is it just force of habit? And if it isn’t... what is this?

What are we?

Why does no one else on the planet make me this happy, no matter how awesome they are and how much I like them?

And they only realize this is what they’re actually feeling over time.

[whatwouldnarutodo]

Sentaku - Chapter Two

Pairing: Tobirama Senju x Sarutobi!OC

Rating: Mature (smut in later chapters, description of violence)

Chapter One

~~~~~~~~~~~

Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.“ - Oscar Wilde

After you had hurried up to follow your new boss to his office, Tobirama suddenly turned around, making you almost run into him. You stood inappropriately close to each other, but neither of you had the intention to back away.

“Let‘s make one thing clear“, he said growling, his eyes narrowed. “You are neither wanted nor needed here. I don‘t care about who your father is or how qualified you think you are for this job. As long as you are here, I want you to be one thing: quiet. And whatever you do, do not interfere with my work, or else you will regret it.“

The air became heavier with every word he said, like a suspenseful calmness before a storm breaks loose. Staring up at him with clenched teeth and fists, you desperately tried to restrain yourself from doing something you would regret later.

It was bewildering. Sure, dealing with your family, male friends and clan members had made you used to some rough language, but this level of conceitedness was definitely something new. You quickly weighed the pros and cons of punching him in the face right then and there, but came to the conclusion that he wasn‘t worth the trouble.

Does he want to intimidate me? Or is he hoping for a fight so he can run to his big brother to get me fired?  Whatever it was, one thing was certain: He wanted some kind of reaction, one which you decided you wouldn‘t give him.

Trying to appear as indifferent as possible, you finally took a step back and just shrugged your shoulders.

“Sure.“

Tobirama furrowed his brow in surprise, irritated by your response, and took a step back himself. You had to suppress a smirk at his reaction. That‘s right, I won‘t let you get to me. Complacent about your recent level of self-control, you watched him how he quickly caught himself and entered his office with you right behind him.

The “office“ could barely be recognized as one. It had more resemblance to a neglected study room in the furthest corner of a library; only the opened scrolls next to the mountains of closed ones and the still steaming cup of coffee on his desk gave away that the room had been used of late.

I doubt he holds meetings in here. How can he work in this mess? And with closed curtains? I get why Hashirama is so concerned now.

He gestured to a smaller desk next to the door with only a pen on it, your new workplace for who knows how long.

Well this is going to be fun, you sighed internally.

And so it began.

Dealing with a grumpy Senju was one thing, but the indescribable boredom made your “work“ almost unbearable. You spent most of the day sitting on your desk and staring at the wall. Every time the tedium made you play with the pen, you were immediately rebuked.  

“Stop it, woman.“

Sometimes these three words were the only ones you heard all day. No greeting in the morning, no “thank you“ when you decided to be the better person and bring him something to drink or eat. Like that wasn‘t enough, he didn‘t even touch the meals you brought him, instead he walked to the trashcan to blatantly throw everything away. After a few days you stopped trying, it was just a waste of food anyways.

By this point it was more than clear that he didn‘t trust you in the slightest, and he made sure to let you know that every single day. You were right about the meetings, he would either hold them in the Hokage‘s office together with his brother or in one of the conference rooms in the building. In a normal situation the assistant would either stay in the office to work or attend the meeting to take notes or something.

Your situation however was everything but normal. Every time Tobirama had to go to a meeting, he would lock you out of the office, because again, he didn‘t trust you. You used those times to get out for a walk, which you felt was the only thing that kept you from going insane slowly but surely.

Finally some fresh air,  you thought as you stepped outside the Hokage Tower and looked up at the grey sky a week later. Tobirama had a meeting with his brother and Madara Uchiha, which meant that his mood would be especially good afterwards. Great. One of the worst things about this job was knowing that you could use your time so much better, either training or doing literally anything else.

Maybe I could go train right now, but I would lose track of time and get in trouble for sure. Okay, so what if I ask Hashirama if I could do some of his paperwork to feel at least a little more useful? But snitching on the douche bag would probably make our relationship even worse. But how much worse can it even get?

When you felt the first raindrops falling onto your skin, you turned around to make your way back to the big red building with a small sigh. If there was one thing you hated, it was feeling as helpless as you did now, without a real chance of escaping that situation. Who knows how long you‘d have to endure this? Weeks? Months? ….Years?

Your pace quickened after the light rain got heavier, soon turning into a heavy autumn storm.

The Senju already sat back at his desk when you entered the office completely drenched.

“How was the meeting, Tobirama-sama?“

“None of your concern“, he snapped back. So it went that well. huh?

~~~~~~~~~~

“I just don‘t know what his fucking problem is.“ You threw two kunais at once, both hitting the target. Sachiko shrugged her shoulders helplessly. “I mean it was still nice of him to let you go home earlier today, wasn‘t it?“ You snorted and filled up two shots of sake and gave her both.

“Yeah right, maybe it _would _have been a nice gesture if he didn‘t convey it with ‘Go home, I don‘t want to hear your pesky sneezes, missy.‘“

Sachiko sighed and downed both of the shots.

“Remember me to never never ever agree to play a drinking game with you agian, nee-san.“ She said before she hiccuped, which made you chuckle. “Oh come on, don‘t be such a little crybaby. I think it‘s fun, isn‘t it?“

“Reeeeeally fun“, she said rolling her eyes playfully. “Kami, I‘m starting to see more than one target.“

“Well good for you Sachi, now you have more to choose from“, you replied laughing.

“Oh I see, someone swallowed a clown today.“ She took a stance and closed one eye, trying to focus.

“That‘s all the alcohol, baby.“

Sachiko threw her two kunai, of which one missed the target by a few inches.

After drinking one shot, you walked up to her and put an arm around her shoulder. “Hmm not bad, but maybe you lack the right motivation. Just imagine the target as a person you don‘t like. It does wonders, believe me.“

“I think I lack the right soberness“, she mumbled before turning her face towards you, smirking mischievously. “So who are you thinking of, father or Tobirama-sama?“ Now it was your turn to roll your eyes. “At the moment it‘s the spiky douche bag, thanks for asking.“

“But now seriously, it has only been like a week since you started working for him, and from what you‘ve told me, I think maybe you‘re not that different from him. I mean you both have this love for improving your skills and developing new jutsus, right? And full offense nee-san, but you can be grumpy and a pain in the ass too.“

“Well okay then, full offense taken, I‘m absolutely nothing like that guy. But funny that you mention it, I was just thinking about how you are like Hashirama in a way. At least when you‘re your sober polite self instead of the sarcastic little shit I‘m talking to right now.“ Sachiko‘s eyes widened and she started to smile from ear to ear, completely ignoring your last sentence. “You think that I‘m like the Hokage? Really?“

“Absolutely. Oh and now that I think of it, he‘s single too. Maybe I should tell him to ask you out or something.“ You teased her with an evil grin, well knowing how much she hated that. Her cheeks turned into a deep shade of crimson as she looked down.

“I don‘t think that will be necessary“, she mumbled, trying to avoid your gaze.

“Hmm interesting, and why is that? Don‘t tell me you already have a boyfriend, Sachi!“ Normally she would just deny it or immediately tell you to shut up, but instead her face took on a new, even darker shade of red.

“Wait wait wait, do you actually?“ She started to play with a strand of her long brown hair nervously, still looking down.

“Well...I...y-yes, but it‘s still really fresh. I‘m sorry I didn‘t tell you immediately, but you were so busy...also nobody knows yet, so please don‘t tell father, okay? I want to do it myself when I‘m ready to talk about it.“ She said quietly, indicating that she wouldn‘t answer any questions now.

You just smiled and pulled her into a bone crushing hug. “I‘m so happy for you, you know? And I‘m sure the old man will be too, even if it takes some convincing, but that‘s what I‘m here for.“ She pulled away with a big smile on her face. “Thanks.“ Then her smile suddenly faded.

“Oh by the way, does father know that you actually work for Tobirama-sama, or does he still think you work for the Hokage?“ You frowned, thinking about how he will react to your position.

“Hmm, good question. I would have definitely heard something from him if he knew, so I guess he doesn‘t know yet. Can‘t wait to tell him though.“

~~~~~~~~~

After you somehow made it to bed in your tipsy state, you stared up at the ceiling, waiting that the room stopped spinning.

“Maybe you‘re not that different from him“

Your little sister‘s words reverberated in your head.

Okay maybe I am grumpy and a pain in the ass sometimes, so what? I‘m never arrogant or pretentious and I would never try to provoke somebody who I know is helpless. No, I‘m better than that, and that‘s why I won‘t let his teasing get to me.

I won‘t let you get to me.

I won‘t let you get to me.

I won‘t let you get to me, you bumptious asshole.

Oh look at me, I paint red stripes on my face to look sooo dangerous. But the only ones I‘m scaring are the family members of the ferret I killed for my fierce neck fur. My brother is the all-mighty Hokage, so I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. I‘m so important, and if something doesn‘t go my way I have to sit at my desk and pout all day, because I‘m oh so mature. Everybody bow down to me, because I invented a few jutsus, which obviously makes me a genius and therefore better than everybody else, especially Uchihas and -kami forbid!- female specimen. That‘s why I‘ll probably die as a lonely virgin.

You turned to the side with a smug grin. It felt good to get this off your chest, even if it was just a silly monologue.

Yeah that‘s right, he doesn‘t get to me at all.

~~~~~~~~~~

“You are late, Sarutobi.“ Another week later, the situation still hadn‘t improved. Quite the contrary, actually.

Civilized people would say good morning, but guess he‘s hopeless. You hung your coat over your chair and took a seat at your desk.

“What do you mean, Tobirama-sama? It‘s 5:25. The time you told me to arrive at.“ You tried to sound as little irritated as possible, but you weren‘t fooling anyone. It was early, it was cold, and you really weren‘t in the mood for this right now.  

He crossed his arms and snorted, knowing that he was slowly winding you up with his behavior more and more.

“No. I told you to be here at least five minutes prior to me, so that you wouldn‘t interrupt my work with your noisy arrival. Was that too difficult for you to understand, woman?“

By now, you knew this procedure all too well. For your clan‘s and your own reputation‘s sake, you swore to yourself that you wouldn‘t give in to his teasing, but right now you weren‘t so sure of how long you could bear this anymore. As much as you wanted to be unaffected by his words, he always got to you, but why? Was it the blatant sexism and depreciation that made you affronted? No not just that; it was the fact that he underestimated you and your abilities so greatly, and you didn‘t even get one chance to prove him wrong. It was the fact that you were so naive to believe you‘d be finally freed from the cage that was the Sarutobi compound, only to find yourself trapped in another.

You considered yourself as a person with a lot of patience, but even the most patient person has its limits.

And yours was almost reached.

[thelanguageoflovers]

A Study in Fate - Chapter 6

Lucy took a deep breath, leaning against the door of Emily’s car and closing her eyes. Cool air swirled around her, calming her heartbeat as she pulled her phone and earbuds out of her pocket. Sighing, she put them in her ears, subconsciously moving along to the song flooding through her earbuds.

When her hands stopped trembling a few moments later, she opened her eyes to find Buffy and Amber standing in front of her.

“There she is,” Amber said, smiling gently. Lucy nodded, gathering Amber into her arms in a warm hug. “You scared me, Luce.”

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled into Amber’s shoulder. “Where’s Teej?”

“Told him to take the other car home.”

“And Buffy’s here because…?” Lucy glanced over Amber’s shoulder, watching as Buffy’s eyes widened at the use of her first name. Lucy winked, smiling as Amber opened her mouth.

“She-”

“-Can speak for herself, I imagine?” Lucy teased, pulling away from the hug and looking to Buffy.

“I’m here to apologize,” Buffy supplied, stepping forward. “So, um, here goes. I’m...sorry. For everything. You’re here for what? 6 hours? And I was awful to you, and you didn't deserve that. At all. You’re more talented than I thought,” she admitted.

“That is how one apologizes, yes, good job,” Lucy chuckled, offering Buffy her hand. “I appreciate it.”

Buffy grinned, taking her hand and shaking it.

“...But I‘m still not joining the dance team,” Lucy said, grinning maliciously.

“Damn,” Buffy huffed.

“I’m just not a big ‘school dance team’ person. Cheerleading? Already in the works. Studio dance team? Already on it. But school dance teams? No thank you.”

“How the hell are you going to fit all that into your schedule? Maya told me you signed up for a 25 hour dance week,” Buffy said, eyebrows furrowed.

“Cheer is before school, with games on the weekends. I can make games after dance. And competition team will be during dance hours- I pulled some strings, and now it replaces strength and conditioning in Maya’s eyes. I guess that’s because it meets every day- also I now only have a 22 hour week- and I keep up with workouts. So anyway, I still get the key to the studio, and competitions will replace classes- shit. I forgot- I’ll be right back!”

With that, she was rushing back into the studio. They watched her go for a few moments before turning back to one another.

“Is she just...Permanently renouncing sleep?” Buffy asked, leaning against the car.

“She already has,” Amber said casually. “And yes, she’s always like this.”

“Hmm. Fair enough.” Buffy smiled as Lucy stepped back out of the studio. “What’d you do now?”

“Got Maya to let be choreograph the team’s numbers for the competition in two weeks,” Lucy said, smirking smugly.

“All of them?” Buffy asked.

“Mhm, why not?”

“That’s insane! How did Maya Beck let you do that? Her own son wasn’t even allowed to when he asked two seasons ago. Granted, Jonah Beck is awful. Should definitely just stick with his guitar. But he is her son. Like- the literal and actual continuation of her family. They’re not flesh and blood, but-”

“They’re family, we get it.” Lucy rolled her eyes in amusement as she and Amber slid into the car. “You getting in?”

“I- what?”

“Don’t you want a ride home?” Lucy asked, smiling like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“...Please don’t kill me,” Buffy mumbled, sliding into the backseat. “Jesus Christ, this thing is worth more than three times my mother’s entire pregnancy of American medical bills. And that woman needed an emergency C-section.”

“Interesting yardstick you’re using there,” Lucy chuckled, pulling out of the parking lot.

“Yeah, yeah. You still haven’t answered my question, though.”

“It’s like you said, Buffy.” Lucy briefly made eye contact with her in the rearview mirror. “I’m more talented than you might think.”

“...You are so fucking cocky, Kippen number 1,” Buffy said, gesturing for Lucy to take a right.

“So are Kippens 2-3,” Amber responded. “So what are you going to do for the competition?”

“I don’t know yet. But I do have a hell of an idea for a duo and one for a group routine. We don’t have nearly enough people for the group though, there are only seven girls including me. And no boys.”

“What are you gonna do?”

“...Probably some bullshit ‘7 Rings’ piece for the group. A duo to ‘Ghost of You’? That one’s gonna take a hell of a lot of work. Maybe a trio to ‘Hold On’-”

“Which one?” Amber interrupted.

“Extreme Music.”

“And you’ll be performing in all of these, I imagine?”

“Well, yeah. Maya said I’m probably best off taking the reins for a few competitions until I can get my girls in shape.

“Good. Anything else?”

“A solo. My solo.”

“Wait, are you going to-”

“Yup.” Lucy cut Amber off, hands tightening on the wheel.

“I thought you said you’d never perform that one again, no matter how much we liked it.”

“What? No! Not that one! That solo can rot, it’s awful. I mean ‘War of Hearts’.” Amber let out a low whistle, eyes wide.

“What’s ‘War of Hearts’?” Buffy asked from the back seat, leaning forward in interest. Amber waved her off, manicured acrylics dismissing her.

“Hang on. You’re going to pull out that solo on your first competition?”

“I don’t see why not.” Lucy shrugged.

“Because you almost died last time!”

“I did not ‘almost die’! I broke my leg and ankle, calm down. Plus, it’s never been performed in front of an audience, the choreo is done, and I only need one prop,” she bargained, rolling her eyes at Amber.

“A prop that almost paralyzed you last time!”

“I was not- okay I was almost paralyzed,” she conceded. “But it wasn’t the table’s fault! I just, uh, screwed up the fall. A little.”

“A little? Lucy, you had like three surgeries because they couldn’t figure out what the hell to do all at once!” Amber argued.

“What the hell is this routine?!” Buffy yelled. “It sounds like she has to like jump to her peril.”

“Not much better! She has to fucking fouetté off a table!”

“I do not fouetté off the table! I fouetté to the edge of the table and then fall off!” Lucy defended. She slowed to a stop at a red light, glancing at Buffy in the rearview mirror. “Very different experiences. Trust me, I’ve done both. Why are you so worried about this, anyway?” She drummed her fingers against the wheel, waiting for the light to turn.

“Lucy! You came back home a little banged up last time. But if you’d fallen a little further onto your neck? You wouldn’t have come home at all.”

Amber squeezed her eyes shut, pointing to the green light in front of them to distract from the fact that she was crying. Lucy sighed, waiting for the traffic in front of them to start through the light before she followed.

“Okay, I won’t-” Lucy was cut off by a flash of dark blue metal crossing her peripheral vision. Someone was about to run their light and kill them all. She’d always imagined she’d know what to do in this situation. Maybe she’d hit the breaks, maybe she’d turn out of the way. And yet somehow, she was on autopilot. She swerved to avoid the car, but it was too late. A loud shatter of glass signaled the car smashing into the passenger side of theirs.

Lucy paced back and forth in the hallway, phone pressed to her ear.

“Goddamnit TJ, pick up!” She nearly threw her phone across the hallway, but Buffy’s hand on her forearm stopped her. “Hey! You’re okay!”

“Just needed some stitches. Thank God I was sitting behind you, not Amber.”

“I am so sorry, Buffy. If I hadn’t offered you that ride…”

“If you hadn’t offered me that ride, maybe it would have been me and my mom in that accident. It wasn’t your fault, Lucy.”

“Is she on her way? Your mom?”

“Yeah, but it’s not her I’m worried about. Any word from TJ?” she asked, sitting down in a chair against the wall. Lucy sat down next to her, shaking her head and burying it in her hands.

“Nothing yet. I’m gonna try Aunt Em.” She put her phone to her ear, reciting the same word over and over. Please.

“Hello?”

“Emily? Oh thank God,” Lucy sighed. “Listen, is TJ with you? He’s not answering his phone.”

“No, he headed to the park to play some basketball, what’s going on?’

“I’ll explain later. Just get TJ and come to the hospital. Amber’s in a coma.”

“What?!”

“Just get down here!”

“On my way.” Lucy sighed, hanging up and running her hands through her hair.

“Em’s coming. She’s gotta run by the park to get TJ.”

“How many cars does that woman have?”

“How many billions was my family born into?” Lucy retorted.

“Do I want to know?”

“Nope,” she laughed, popping the ‘p’. “The Kippens are neither humble nor poor, though I wish we were the former.”

“You know, your lack of humility? It’s kind of your most signature characteristic in my mind to date. Care to change that?”

“...You do know that ‘to date’ is literally just one date to you, right? You met me this morning, Buffy.”

Buffy simply nodded in defeat, leaning back into her chair.

“...But, we are more complex than lack of humility,” she said.

“Alright, give me a rundown,” Buffy said, grinning. “I want the full out, ever present narrator in a teenage romcom description.”

And who was Lucy to say no to that?

“You ever seen Heathers?”

“...Yes? Do I want to know where this is going?”

“The Kippen triplets are kind of...that.” Lucy put on her best narrator voice, a dramatic expression on her face as she readied herself to speak about herself in the third person.

“Really?” Buffy asked. “Like- felony arson and all?”

“No,” Lucy laughed. “Like- they’re the Heathers. Chandler, Duke, and McNamara.”

“Then who’s who?”

“Well, there’s TJ, or Heather Duke in our case. Kind of seems like your classic white douchebag jock, but he’s actually a really sweet guy. He’s the baby of the triplets, but packs a hell of an angry punch. Don’t get in his way unless you absolutely have to. That goes for all three of them though; they’re a bit of a feisty trio.

“Um, then Amber, the middle triplet. And our Heather McNamara. She’s… A bit of a popular girl cliche. She and Lucy were co-captains of the cheer squad in New York. She, TJ, and Lucy are best friends, and together… They’re kind of a murderous group. Amber knows how to throw a punch pretty damn well for a rich girl with stiletto shaped acrylics- she’s just as good as TJ. Maybe better. If she wants something, she knows how to get it.”

“And that leaves…?” Buffy prompted.

“Heather Chandler. Lucy Kippen. In our case, one and the same. Lucy’s pretty much the head bitch of her life.”

“Fascinating,” Buffy said, propping her chin up on her hand. “Does that make you a mythic bitch?”

“Yeah alright, that’s over now,” Lucy said, reverting to her natural voice. “Listen, I’m just a normal person, Buffy.”

“You’re a Kippen.”

“Okay, I’m like… 70% a normal person.”

“Alright, but I’m only really concerned for your whole 100%?” Buffy said slowly.

“Alright fine. I’m a dancer. 100%.”

“One hell of a cop-out you’ve got there.”

“Ugh, fine! My favorite color is red, I get all A's in school, my favorite subject is math, my lucky number is 28, I am 6’1”, I weigh 127.8 pounds, my favorite animal is a cat. Anything I missed?”

“Hold up, you only weigh 128 pounds and you’re 6’1”? Alright, not my business. I know.”

“Good. Don’t criticize a ballerina’s weight, idiot,” she teased, knocking her shoulder into Buffy’s.

“I know, I realized it the second I said it,” Buffy apologized sheepishly.

“Don’t sweat it, Driscoll. It’s all good.”

“Have you met me? On the outside, totally good. But definitely gonna sweat it, Kippen. You will actually never hear the end of this apologetic tirade.”

“Please don’t bore me with that.”

“Ms. Kippen?” Lucy turned her attention to the doctor standing in front of her.

“Yes?”

“Your sister is still unconscious, but you’re welcome to see her now,” Dr. Lawrence said gingerly.

“Oh- thank you so much. Is- is she…?”

“We can’t be sure of anything right now, Ms. Kippen.”

“Okay, thank you. Um, Buffy, stay here and tell TJ and Emily where I am? Please?”

“I’m not going anywhere, Kippen. I’ll tell them.”

“Thank you,” Lucy whispered, turning to follow Dr. Lawrence.

She stepped into Amber’s room, breath catching in her throat. She’d never seen her sister like this; she was covered in bandages and stitched up cuts. Lucy pulled a chair up to Amber’s bedside, sitting down with a heavy sigh.

“Hey, Ambs. I don’t know if you can hear me, but, you know. I’m still going to talk to you. God, I’m so sorry. I don’t even know what to say, Amber. I’m supposed to have this eloquent speech about how you’ve changed me as a person and I miss you so much and please come back, but… I don’t know what there is to say. You’re my best friend, Ambs. TJ and I would be lost without you. But you already knew that. And I’m not- I’m not going to tell you to wake up. Because, if you have to go, Ambs, I get it. I’ll cry and scream and I’ll break down and probably resent you a little bit, but I’ll get it. If you need to go, I want you to know that I understand. However, I am definitely going to plead with you here a little bit. Please, please wake up, Amber. I can’t do all of this without you. TJ relies on us for fucking everything, and I rely on you two, too. There have been three of us since the very beginning, Amber. And there will be three of us until the end. So just- God, just wake up.”

“You think that works?” Lucy turned around to find TJ leaning against the doorframe.

“Teej,” she breathed, looping her arms around his neck and pulling him into a hug.

“How’s our girl?”

“She’s… Alive. Somehow.”

“She’s a fighter. Learned from the best, I guess.”

“Who?” Lucy asked, meeting TJ’s eyes.

“You, dumbass,” he teased. “You are by far the strongest person we know.”

“I’m strong and a dumbass?”

“You’re a multitasker. Hell of a good one, too.”

“Well, if a girl an be a strong dumbass, there’s nothing else to want!” Lucy said with a roll of her eyes and a shove of TJ’s shoulder.

“My point exactly. Listen, do you mind if I…?” he gestured to Amber. Lucy nodded, squeezing his forearm.

“I’ll go find Buffy. And maybe also a coffee. Want anything?”

“Um… I could really go for some chocolate.”

“On it,” Lucy promised. “Be back soon.”

As Lucy stepped out of the room, TJ sat down in the seat she left behind. She gently let the door click closed, turning down the hall toward the waiting room.

“How’s she doing?” Buffy immediately asked, standing up when Lucy stepped out of the hallway. “Um, this is my mom.”

“Ms. Driscoll,” Lucy said, extending a hand to the woman next to Buffy. “It’s so nice to meet you.”

“You too, Lucy. Please, call me Pat. How’s your sister?”

“She’s good. I guess. She’s alive. Comatose, but well and truly alive.”

“I’m so glad.”

“Lucy!” Emily exclaimed, rushing forward to hug Lucy tightly. “I’m so sorry, honey.”

“It was awful, Em,” Lucy sobbed into Emily’s chest. “And it’s all my fault.”

“Hey. This is not your fault, okay? You didn’t do anything wrong, kiddo.” Emily’s voice was measured and careful as she pulled back to squeeze Lucy’s hand. “In fact, you did everything right. You tried to avoid the accident, you were quick to call 911. Hell, you have Amber’s blood on your leotard because you kept her conscious until the EMT came. You’re basically a damn superhero, Lucy Eleanora Kippen.”

“Eleanora?” Buffy hissed, eyes wide.

“I didn’t choose it,” Lucy defended, glancing down at her outfit. “Holy shit. That’s actually Amber’s blood.”

“You didn’t notice?” Pat asked.

“Not really. I- I’ll change… at some point. But for now, I am on a coffee and chocolate run.”

“Coffee… and chocolate?” Buffy asked.

“Long story. Come with me?” Lucy asked quickly.

“Uh, sure?” Lucy tugged her down the hall without a second thought, only stopping when they found a coffee machine.

“What’s going on? You good?”

“Yep,” Lucy said, pulling Buffy forward and kissing her. Buffy’s hands tangled in her hair as she stood on her toes to reach Lucy’s lips. They pulled apart after a few moments, and Lucy nodded decisively.

“Uhh…” Buffy said slowly. “What was that about, exactly?”

“Thank you.” Lucy nodded again, as if confirming something, before disappearing back down the hallway.

“...Any time.”

[mcrmadness]

Insane how tired one can suddenly be right before/around midnight. I can barely keep my eyes open. I really hope this ends soon because I literally have been feeling extremely tired for the whole week every day right after waking up. It’s just not fun when my body feels like it’s in the middle of some melatonin storm all day every day and I can’t even make myself to go into shower because I feel like napping 24/7.

I’m not sure if I just have so much energy from the spring time that it feels overwhelming and makes me overtired. Or if this is because for a few weeks I was in this... weird hyperfocus mood with my art.

For 2-3 weeks straight I did almost nothing else but kept drawing comics and other stuff, came up with even more ideas and I wrote SO MANY ideas into my sketchbook, and when I was finally finished with that pencil/marker project I had been thinking about for months AND those 3 die ärzte comics, that that all just wore me so out and now I’m totally out of energy and sleeping enough at nights but apparently still not enough. I wonder if I should still sleep for 12 hours, normally 7-8h is an okay amount but now I feel like I am so sleep deprived even after that amount. My head just won’t let me stay asleep for longer than that, now. The pro is that I can actually fall asleep at night, but the con is I’m so tired I can’t get any chores done because I just wait for the day to end so that I can get back to sleep. I‘m at home 24/7 doing nothing.

I’m looking at my sketchbook now and over this short time I have got this many new ideas:

3 x self-comics

2 x die ärzte related comics

2 x something to do with my old old OC comic and I got super excited over that one

And now as I look at this list where I write down all my comic ideas to keep track of them and what I have already done - I just added those previous ones to the list and it looks something like this:

11 x self-comics

2 x dä, + 2 x potential comics that I don’t know yet if they would work as comics or better just as short fanfiction drabbles

2 comics for the OC

Like, it’s so weird. I like this BUT it’s also weird and apparently whenever my brain becomes this hyperactive with creativity, it just overheats and ends up making my whole body way too tired. And like, my brain is not tired at all. It’s doing something 24/7. Today I have written 7 pages of a fanfiction. Another thing that I came up with over the past week, the beginning, or actually just the idea of that story, was an old one but I hadn’t even written that down, just some weird intro for that that I ended up abandoning and writing 7 more pages instead.

ALSO another thing I have been thinking about here: my inner clock does not follow what society thinks is the correct one. Mine has always been delayed and also affected by the nature a lot. I’m naturally a night owl so having this super weird 1-9am schedule is very unnatural for me. 3-12 would me more natural. So now as my head has again been waking me up way too early AND every time this has happened before, I have had the exact same thing - I’m just so tired throughout the whole day.

And it made me wonder that when I was still working and studying, I used to be extremely tired every day and pretty much every day when I had come home and was sitting in front of my computer, I almost fell asleep. Like, couldn’t control it, I was staring at the screen and then felt like my head’s gonna hit my table soon, and pretty often I actually leaned back in my chair and had a snap while sitting here. Very very often I passed out on the sofa, sometimes I fell asleep in the evening and slept all night without waking up to anything. My work days always started at 7:45am and school days usually at 8am, I did sleep too little every night too but just now I startd wondering... I was like chronigally exhausted during my work time. Always tired and I think it was actually a lot like what I’m not feeling, I just got so used to it that I no longer knew how it felt like to be well rested and just had to survive and cook and shower and do the dishes no matter how tired I would have been. And I did skip all of those things very many times, I usually cooked just once a week but made just so much food that I could eat it the whole week. On weekends I was also always tired and sleeping a lot and it just felt that I never fully recovered from the week and then it already was yet another monday (plus I often did saturday or sunday so sometimes I worked 6 days a week).

It’s possible that it never was ONLY the amount of sleep I got at night but the fact I had to force myself to wake up before 7 in the morning every day, and on my free days I never ever woke up that early. Usually 9-10am was the earliest and if I had 2 free days in a row, then on the second day I easily slept all the way to 10-12 even. Which then made it hard to get to bed early enough in order to not be tired on Monday. And then also, if I slept e.g. 9h in one night, then I was not tired at all the next EVENING and that made me get even less sleep for the night. So I had to sleep so few hours enough that I surely was gonna be tired in the evening if I wanted to sleep more than 3 hours the next night.

Anyway. It’s now half past midnight and I’m so exhausted again my whole body is shaking and I feel like I’m floating here. Very lightheaded. I need to get some sleep asap so I’m gonna brush my teeth and then go to bed. I hope this time it’s gonna be easier, I don’t remember anything from last night, I just remember it was so hard to fall asleep because I was so overtired and overstimulated that I saw some extremyl distressing dreams. I can’t remember anything from those dreams but I think I once even woke up from them because they were some stress dreams and almost nightmares. I normally never have nightmares.

[fate-grandorder-imagines]

O Holy Grail , can I wish to witness your opinion on a relationship between Atalanta and Achilles ? Either platonic or romantic is fine. //because I ship them both ways

Soo this is going to be a little long, sorry for that but I have so many thoughts on the Greeks - feel free to ignore this. I’ll put it under the cut for everyone who wants to scroll past this.

So to start my little rant, my feelings for Atalante are kind of mixed tbh, sometimes I admire her for sticking to her principles and wishes even if she knew they couldn’t be fulfilled, that takes a lot of willpower and strength. And sometimes..well being so stubborn that it drove her insane.. idk it seems kind of unreasonable and unfitting but that’s just what I think.

And Achilles.. oh Achilles.. strong, self-confident, honourable and frightening, yet not enough to mask his irresistible, undeniably attractive way of a raptor who’s going to hunt you down if you’re not fast enough - I’m very weak to this type of man.

I’ve always been a great fan of Greek Mythology ever since I was child, Achilles being one of those I admired the most, so seeing him getting animated like that.. I had no chance but to fall in love with him. (Though at first I was thinking to myself ‚nah he doesn’t look that good‘ i really don’t know why I used to think that 😂)

But the ship itself just makes me sad, because it was bound to be doomed from the start, although I rarely even ship and on my opinion, those two don’t fit together very well. At least not romantically. I love them separately and I think they had great dynamic as warriors having each other’s back in combat but them being a couple? Sadly I just couldn’t see that work out, and the end of Apocrypha didn’t prove me wrong on that..

I mean, first of all, Atalante was a huntress who had sworn to the goddess Artemis to keep being a virgin and refrain from men (which wasn’t that hard for her, I hc that she didn’t like them much anyway, starting with her father who abandoned her just because she was a girl) and growing up in the wild where there were no men around. If anything, men were just a hindrance to her, and this certainly didn’t change for her, even after becoming a Heroic Spirit.

And then we have Achilles, who was cursed by the Amazoness queen Penthesilea  a long time ago to kill someone he found beautiful (in this case, Atalante), not to forget that he was constantly running against a wall whenever he tried to flirt with Atalante.. not really a great start to a healthy everlasting relationship. I’m not so sure about the depths of his feelings for Atalante either, it was definitely much more than a simple crush and seeing how he sacrificed everything to save her from herself, it‘s clear that he deeply cared for her, but it didn’t seem like real love to me as well. More like he wanted her to stay the heroine that he had admired so much, even when he was still a child,  and not just stay there and watch her downfall into madness and not really because of his feelings, but again, that’s just what I think.

I‘m sure Atalante held some respect for Achilles, he was a great hero after all, but I just can’t see her having feelings for him since her mind was set on trying to create a happy world for children and that alone. And even though I think this strong conviction of hers is exactly what drew Achilles in so much, he was only running against a very thick wall with this one-sided attraction. Even when they were both dying I don’t think Atalante suddenly developed feelings for him, but it’s more like she was thankful that he brought her back even if it cost both their lives.

I could talk about this much longer, but I think I should end it with the note, that I do love them as individuals (Atalante sometimes more, sometimes less), but just can’t bring myself to ship them romantically. Both were great and strong-willed warriors but it was kind of obvious that they had to meet another tragic end. 

And Achilles deserved much much better. Actually I didn’t like how they had to throw in some ‘romances’ in Apocrypha like for Jeanne and Sieg and Achilles & Atalante, Semiramis and Shirou being an exception, those two fit, so I’m kind of salty about them anyway.

- Mod Silver

[annebrontesrequiem]

Hello! I was wondering if you could maybe do the RFA+ Minor trio reacting to MC getting her wisdom teeth removed

OH MY GOD I THOUGHT THIS HAD BEEN DELETED AND I ALMOST CRIED! THANK GOD IT’S RIGHT HERE! Okay, now that my panic is over, it’s time to redo this! It deleted before, this is why I wish Tumblr would let you save answers, but whatever. anyway, let’s begin because I need to post something soon!

Zen

He was super worried, but you weren’t nearly as nervous

You had already had surgery for your knee when it was fractured badly, how bad could this be?

that was the last time you’d ever look kindly on getting wisdom teeth pulled

When he was allowed back to see you, you were off the walls emotional

You cried at every single thing, no matter how small

“It’s so emotional!”

“Hakuna Matata?”

“Yes!”

IfyousaysoMC

It took him about two hours after surgery to get the doctors to release you

Zen wasn’t sure what to do, since you were still super emotional, and it was going to last for at least a few more hours

So he did what anyone would do

Bribe Ask Jumin to let him use Driver Kim and Elly to make you feel better and get home quickly

It was a good thing that no one saw you two because Zen dragging around a crying girl with bloodied swabs in her mouth might be hard to explain to the paparazzi

Thank God he wasn’t that famous yet, it could’ve been a lot worse

He took you to your apartment, and despite your teary insistence that he could leave he was staying

You weren’t allowed to eat for another hour, but he did turn on “Cabaret”

Yeah, he forgot how depressing and creepy the movie was

“Wilkommen, Bienvenue, Welcome!”

I swear MC started bawling within the first five minutes

You two ended up mostly ignoring the movie and cuddling, you still crying a bit, but calming down

For dinner it was just Campbell’s Soup, but you felt so much better

Zen decided to stay over and you thanked him profusely

“MC, it’s nothing, you would do the exact same for me.”

You definitely would

He kept cuddling you, and eventually you fell asleep, not as teary as before, dreaming of money, white powdered faces, and Zen’s beautiful voice

Yoosung

The most innocent bean you’d ever met when it came to this

He didn’t understand that side effects included three possible main effects; loopiness, emotional roller coaster, and sleep

You were definitely sleep

He came into the outpatient room

And you were completely knocked out

“MC! are you okay!”

“Yoosung, I’m so-ahhh-so tired.” You yawned sleepily, ignoring the blood in your mouth and the concerned look of the blonde in front of you

You couldn’t talk very well, but it didn’t matter, it was too much of a hassle, you were too tired

Yoosung was besides himself, asking what was wrong with you to the nurse, and when she said it was just the medicine and the IUD he nearly began crying

The nurse couldn’t be sure who was the one who just had the surgery

LikecomeoneYoosunglol

This is why you didn’t want him to accompany you

He drove you home, asking you the whole way how you were feeling, but you were asleep halfway through

When you two got home he changed your swabs, the ones in your mouth, and looked at what kind of broth you had

“Y-Yoosung, what’s that great smell.” You breathed in the lovely smell of chicken broth and carrots

“Oh, it’s just dinner, what do you want to do now?”

“I want to sleep.”

“Please, wait for dinner!”

You ended up watching Fantasia, something that confused you quite a bit in your sleepy state

After you guys ate dinner Yoosung put you to bed and went to wash the dishes and clean, but you grabbed the back of his shirt

“Hey, Yoosung,”

“Yeah?”

“Can you stay, just a little longer”

“Okay MC”

He ended up falling asleep around the same time you did

It was one of the most peaceful sleeps he’d ever had in his life

Jaehee

Momhee activated like nothing before

Research, research, and more research

“MC, what are you allergic too?”

“It says this hospital has best results”

“You should probably go early around 11, when people are most awake.”

She had everything planned out

Everything, that is, except how you’d be after surgery

Not that she thought you’d be perfectly sound, she expected tiredness or something

But not the crazy emotional state you were in now!

Yeah not equipped for this kind of thing

You were an emotional mess, listening to LOTR on repeat over and over

“IT’s-it’s so sad!”

“Then why don’t you stop listening?”

“NO!”

NevergivingupLOTRyoucan’tmakeme!

It was a nightmare driving you home

You were very distracting, bloodied pieces of swab kept falling out of your mouth, you couldn’t speak very well because of the numbness, and you kept distracting Jaehee, so the ride was slow and painful to say the least

Whne you got home she sat you down with ice for your quickly sore-ing gums, and turned on a Disney movie

It was “Brave”, your absolute favorite

You guys were wrapped up in the movie, snuggling, her checking your bandages and ice every once in a while

Eventually you two nodded off to the song of the highlands, forgetting dinner and your beds

But even though your necks were a little sore the neck day, it was definitely worth it

Jumin

He hired the best possible doctors, and for three days before the operation he was being super over protective of you

“Jumin, it’s fine, it’s just my wisdom teeth!”

“No, MC, we can’t take any chances! It has to be planned out perfectly!”

The one thing he couldn’t plan out would be your reaction when you were done

He also wasn’t quite aware how much blood there would be

He was quite shocked to see the amount of blood in your mouth, and the already bloodied cotton on the steel table next to you

“Oh my God MC! Are you okay!”

He was going insane you would’ve sworn, had you not been snoring away in your chair

The chair was nice, not cheap plastic, or like that of a school desk, so it was quite easy for you to fall asleep

Jumin didn’t want to wake you up, so he scooped you in his arms and carried you to where Driver Kim was waiting

You slept the whole ride, and only woke up once you two were in the apartment and he was shaking you slightly

“Oh, hi Jumin, I’m, I’m pretty sleepy.” You garbled through the cotton

Jumin changed your cotton as he talked to you

“I understand, the whole thing is quite tiring, you did a great job though, yes?”

“Yeah, can I sleep now?” You mubled and he smiled a bit at your childlike behavior

You clambered on him as he rocked you back and forth, stroking your hair softly as you drifted back to sleep

“rest, peacefully MC, you deserve it.”

Saeyoung

You weren’t particularly scared of the pulling teeth out part

What you were scared of however was the Novocain shot

You hated any sort of needle, and Saeyoung definitely knew that

The whole way there he tried the best he could to make you crack up, even though you felt dread pitting in your stomach, as you ddi with every doctor’s appointment

And when the doctor called you in you gripped his shirt and whispered

“I’m sorta scared Saeyoung!”

He looked you in the eyes and smiled

“I understand, but you’ve fared worse, you’re strong, so what If it scares you, so what if they say it’s just a prick and you know they’re wrong? You can be scared, that’s your right, but just remember that there’s a light, and that it will be over sooner rather than later.”

He wasn’t sure if it was the right thing to say, but you just kissed him, gave him another squeeze, and walked towards the room

When he saw you again you were off the walls loopy!

Talking to all the nurses about sort of ridiculous things, like movie productions and random Romanov facts

He hugged you tightly when you started crying over the deaths of thee Romanovs

“How about we talk about something like, Disney! Or books!”

You brightened up at the prospect, and started talking about Tolkien, and Percy Jackson, and all sorts of other book things

He was happy when he asked about the shot you shrugged it off

“It’s sore” Was all you said, and he kept it at that

It was actually pretty late, about five pm, but you were so loopy he couldn’t just put you to sleep

You two ended up marathoning LOTR

It was awesome

Even though you fell asleep halfway through Rreturn of the King”

He just smiled and turned off the screen to carry you to bed

The movie would have to wait

That’s all for now guys, sorry it’s really late and I still am sick. But I‘m happy to have gotten this out, I will finish tomorrow, and I hope you enjoy!

[lucanogis]

fanfic: paths that lead home

Title: paths that lead home Fandom: Gakuen Alice Length: 3.3k Summary: When Natsume’s friends make him go on a road trip, he thinks they’ve collectively lost their minds. Crossing Japan in 24 hours with the Alice Academy hot on their heels? Only crazy people could come up with that. As it turns out, Natsume Hyuuga is friends with a lot of crazy people. Set before Ch. 179, for day 1 of ga-party’s May challenge.

{ao3}

Natsume isn’t into the idea the first time his friends tell him about it. Actually, Natsume isn’t into the idea the second, third or fourth time it’s brought up either, but then he has felt lethargic ever since he woke up after essentially dying to find out the girl he loves is gone. But his friends are suddenly adventurous and excited and more than a little bit stubborn and they just won’t let him boycott the whole thing. 

It’s a compromise, Luca says, diplomatic and relentless at once. They get to go on their insane, more than a little bit dangerous and frankly, illegal, road trip and Natsume gets to come along to keep them out of trouble. The problem is of course that Natsume doesn’t want to come along and can’t exactly provide protection in his current condition, but somehow he still gets overruled, because apparently the gang is a democracy now. His position as de facto leader of Class 2B has vanished along with large parts of his Alice, he thinks. There’s also the fact that Luca pulls him to the side and tells him about Yuu’s little sibling and how their friend hasn’t gotten to see him in months and really, why fight for a more open school if Yuu, the definition of a good student, doesn’t feel the benefits?

Natsume does wonder why Yuu Tobita is suddenly so keen on breaking Academy rules but then the world has changed during the time he was unconscious, in ways both good and bad. The sting of losing Mikan hasn’t quite subsided yet and some days that sting makes it difficult to notice anything else that is happening around him but he knows, God, he knows she would not want him to be morose and broody. If what Luca says is right then her best friend, the girl no one remembers, risked everything to give him another shot. Perhaps really living again starts here and now, with this damn road trip and his friends. (”You don’t have to go”, Luca tells him, “if you don’t want to. But maybe this will be good for all of us.”) Maybe, yes maybe - and he never was good at saying no to his best friend.

Luca’s borrowed barrier Alice and Natsume’s well honed ninja skills are still functioning well enough to sneak six of them out of the school in the middle of the night. Koko insists on wearing a ridiculous dark hoodie - “Guys, I’m blending in” - and Sumire can’t stop laughing at him. Yuu’s white as a sheet and gnawing on his bottom lip but deeply determined, too, determined enough to crawl through the small hole they made in the Academy’s barrier before all the others. Tsubasa’s coming along because, well, Natsume doesn’t really know why. Mostly because Tsubasa has gotten really protective as of late and is also a little bit into the whole road trip idea, as most maniacs apparently are. Luca keeps giggling nervously, a little bit like he did all that time ago when he got accidentally drunk in the woods. “Oh Gods,” he says as they’re half-running, half-sneaking towards Tokyo’s central train station. “Oh Gods. This is it.”

“If by ‘it’ you mean our impending doom, sure,” Natsume mutters. Koko begins singing “Breaking Free” from High School Musical under his breath, because of course he does.

They manage to sneak onto a train, hiding in a compartment that is transporting potato chips, which naturally leads to way too many eaten potato chips on their part. At some point someone throws up but it’s better than starving to death. The train’s going west, looks about a hundred years old and makes so much noise that their conversations are reduced to hand signals. Natsume is silently relieved because that just means he no longer has to listen to communal singing, which is another habit his friends apparently picked up. They go through Queen’s entire discography as though Narumi made them memorize the lyrics for a test.

The whole thing is...strangely serene. The constant noise reminds Natsume of the days he spent running from the school, forever on the road. Strange, how something so tumultuous can seem so peaceful now. He has his family back now, his father and his sister, but the innocence he had then is forever out of his reach. Natsume wonders whether this was the true reason he agreed to this road trip: The youthful exuberance in his friends’ eyes. Their desire to do a crazy thing, to take a risk, to not care about adulthood or consequence, even though all of them have experienced both.

They’re all a bit more bent and broken than they were. He can see it in Sumire’s face whenever she flinches because the train’s loud noises remind her of getting knocked out during the Uprising. He sees it in the way Tsubasa’s eyes scan the train compartment, as though some unnamed danger will, at any moment, leap out from behind the chips. He sees it in his best friend, who doesn’t smile quite as easily as he used too, who doesn’t quite want to leave his side out of fear that death will part them again, as it has before. But somewhere, in between all that Natsume still manages to fall asleep with his head on Luca’s shoulder while Yuu describes his little sister to their friends. Outside of the train, city buildings give way to meadows, street lights give way to stars. He dreams of Mikan Sakura smiling at him and feels warmth, despite the biting cold of the wind whipping past the moving train.

When they get ready to leave, sometime before dawn because the train pulls into a station Yuu recognizes, Luca leaves a few rabbits behind to replace the stolen chips. It’s not technically currency anyone outside the school can use but hey, they’re also not technically meant to be there so no one cares enough to say something. (Natsume does snicker about the whole thing, none too subtly, but Luca gives him his patented “I haven’t slept and I‘m going to feed you to an animal” look, so he shuts up). It’s still dark outside when the train stops and they tumble out, all ruffled hair and chips stained faces.

Koko uses the magical gift of mind-reading to find them a bus and Tsubasa uses the magical gift of Tono’s credit card (”Did you steal a credit card?!” -”Relax, guys, I borrowed it.”) to buy them tickets. The other passengers are far older them then, retirees going on a trip to the other side of the country over the weekend. They give them weird looks but let them stay, maybe because Tsubasa does his best “responsible adult” impression and talks up some old woman as though he’s known her all his life.

Natsume thinks the bus is a significantly more comfortable mode of transportation but then again, they didn’t really have a choice before. Boarding a train legally would have meant train station cameras and camera footage would have led the Academy straight to them. This way at least they have approximately 24 hours until they’re unceremoniously hauled back.

Koko spends their time on the bus playing cards with Sumire. She beats him almost every time. Natsume briefly wonders whether Koko ever feels the urge to cheat throughout the hours they play, but the class clown doesn’t seem to want to. Perhaps playing with Sumire is entertaining enough or perhaps there is something far better than winning hidden away in the corners of the smile she wears whenever her cards beat his.

At some point, the bus is stopped at a red light, Natsume walks over to where Yuu’s sitting. His friend is staring at the little drops of spring rain that are splattering against the window. Without his Academy uniform he looks different, both less and more himself. Natsume nudges him with his elbow. “Hey,” he says.

Yuu glances at him. “You know,” he says. “You really didn’t have to come.”

“I’ve heard that one before,” Natsume comments.

“But you came anyway,” Yuu notes. He turns around to face Natsume. “Why? You’re smart enough to know this idea makes no sense.”

Natsume shrugs. He doesn’t quite know how to put into words that reason has started to mean less and less to him over the past few months. He was dead and then he wasn’t, he loved someone and that person still left. They freed a school and still have to run from it to see their families. “I wanted to see whether your little sister is as much of a know-it-all as you are,” he says eventually. It’s a lie, but Yuu knows him well enough now not to push. They sit there in silence and watch the weather outside.  

Hail and lightning join the rain and the bus driver announces that they have to camp out until the storm passes. It’s afternoon and Natsume can practically see what’s going to happen next. They’re going to file into some small-town restaurant to wait out the rain and the Academy is going to find them and drag their rebellious asses back to the school. Their adventure, as fun as it was, will have been for nothing all because a bunch of old people and their driver are scared of lightning. He almost suggests stealing the bus but since none of them can drive that plan will hardly work.

As the rest of the bus’ passengers make their way into a small the restaurant to have their afternoon biscuits (or whatever old people eat, Natsume hardly knows any) he walks up to the front desk and puts on his most imposing face. Luca grabs his arm before he gets one word out. “Please don’t tell me you want to threaten someone into driving us somewhere,” he hisses.

“No,” Natsume says. “I want to ask them nicely while looking angry.”

“Natsume!,” his best friend exclaims, before lowering his voice again. “You have to use charm here. If we pretend to be adorable children they have to help us out!” Tsubasa, nods, as though the whole thing makes perfect sense. “Luca's right. The adorable children card is more effective than your demon impression.” Natsume almost uses the last shred of his Alice to burn him for that comment.

‘Pretending to be adorable children’ apparently means telling the waiter some sad and entirely made-up story about how all six of them are looking for their long-lost mother who lives in a town two hours over. They need to get there today because “bad people” are after them and it’s all quite urgent, really. Or something, Natsume doesn’t spend the entire time listening though he does certainly appreciate his best friend’s acting. Sumire helps out, too, and the two of them put on quite the show. There’s tears, lengthy explanations and apparently enough theatrics to cover up the fact that the six of them hardly look alike enough to be siblings. But playing Snow White and Sleeping Beauty in the Alice Academy prepares you for just about anything, so the waiter, wide-eyed and visibly touched, agrees to drive them “home”. He also gets his friend, a young woman currently writing her thesis and probably just looking for an excuse to stop, to help him drive the six of them over. Luca, Natsume and Tsubasa end up in one car, Koko, Sumire and Yuu take the other. This time it’s Luca who falls asleep on Natsume’s shoulder. The two hour ride consists of a lot of awkward questions (”So....you six are all siblings? Did you have different fathers?”) and the waiter telling them his life story. Natsume mostly zones out.

The waiter and his friend drop them off two hours later but insist on waiting in their cars, perhaps to see their reunion with their “mother”. In Yuu’s case, that reunion is a real one and he leads them to the front of his family’s house. It’s a small place, traditionally Japanese place with a tiny garden and a cherry tree right in front of it. The blossoms weren’t in bloom the day before, when they left the school, but now they are. They dance in the wind like tiny pieces of cotton candy. Yuu doesn’t seem to notice them.

He knocks and they all stand back to wait in silence. It doesn’t take long until the door is flung open and a woman greets them, her hair brown and her eyes wide and blue. She hugs her son without saying a word, crying and laughing at the same time and not long after a man appears behind her and falls to his knees to do the same thing.

In the end they are fed cookies and tea and get to meet Yuu Tobita’s young sister, who is inquisitive and annoying and reminds Natsume of Aoi in a way that makes him smile. It doesn’t take more than two hours before the Academy sends Narumi to pick them up but their former teacher doesn’t have the heart to berate them in front of Yuu’s happy parents. He just sends them a look that is equal parts exasperation and fondness and sips tea. Before leaving, they all huddle together and make their teacher take a picture using Sumire’s phone. Natsume tries to get out of the whole thing, but Luca just grabs him and that ends the discussion before it begins.

“I knew you wouldn’t be mad at us, Narumi-sensei,” Koko says with a bright grin, as they’re walking towards the car the Academy has sent. Yuu is behind them, saying goodbye to his family alone.

“If you think I’m not mad Koko, then you’re not as good a mind-reader as you think.” Narumi opens the door of the car and gestures for them to climb inside. It’s a strange moment of Deja Vu, Natsume thinks. He remembers getting in a car more than five years ago, blinking back tears only to find his best friend waiting for him inside. He climbs in now and scoots over to make room for Luca. Somehow, nothing has changed but everything is different.

Sumire sits down next to him. “It was a good trip,” she says softly.

“Did it live up to the one time you went after Natsume’s kidnappers when we were ten?,” Luca asks her.

Her green curls bounce up and down as she tilts her head to ponder the question. Eventually, Sumire smiles. “Don’t get me wrong, seeing Natsume all heroic was great and I loved the extra dose of nightmares I’ll carry with me until I die but...This trip was better.”

Koko, sitting one row behind them, snickers at that. “Just admit it’s because I let you win when we played cards.” Sumire tries to whack him with a clawed hand and Tsubasa leans neatly out of the way just as Yuu raises his hands to placate the two. There’s an aching familiarity to the scene that startles Natsume enough to make him avert his eyes. How strange that he has come to know these people, even though he told himself to never get close to anyone. How strange that their mannerisms are the same, even after they fought for their lives and faced a common enemy and lost so very much.

The trip back is uneventful. They don’t awkwardly tumble out of a train and they don’t lie to a kind waiter to catch a ride. They don’t talk much either, mostly because whenever they do Narumi reminds them of the trouble they’re in, as if any of them are scared of the Academy’s tactics at this point. As it turns out, the car can make the journey from Yuu’s parents to the school in just 10 hours. Unlike the train they took before, it doesn’t have to stop to unload potato chips so they get back to the school early on Sunday morning, the next day. Their classmates greet them at the front gate, cheering as the car passes them even though Jinno, who’s with them, looks about as icy as a human being can without freezing over. They’re slapped with detentions - Yuu’s very first, they’re told - a couple of months worth of cleaning duty and a stern talking to. But kind of saving the whole school does come with advantages and so they soon huddle up in Natsume’s room to share their story with their friends. Pictures get passed around, Koko makes the whole thing seem thrice as exciting as it was and Sumire gushes about Yuu’s little sister. Somewhere in the middle of it all, Natsume finds his feet carrying him outside, to the small balcony attached to his room.

The cherry trees are still in bloom, even here at a place that usually seems so far removed from the rest of the world.

“Should we go see Aoi next?,” a voice asks from behind him. Natsume doesn’t bother turning around.

“You’re pretending that Aoi and my dad haven’t practically moved to Tokyo at this point,” he says. “I think they’re scared that I’ll turn to dust if they leave”.

Luca leans against the railing next to him. “It’s a valid concern,” he says softly, before shaking his head. “Anyway...It was fun, wasn’t it? To for once go on an adventure that wasn’t about saving the lives of dozens of people and freeing our friends?”

“It was stupid,” Natsume corrects, before adding, after a few seconds of silence: “And...fun. I guess. If you call hanging out with a few crazy people all night and all day ‘fun’. Though I don’t think I want any potato chips anytime soon.”

Luca laughs. “Yeah, I can do without those, too.” Then, he frowns. “Though speaking of fun, I did notice you never sang along with us.”

Natsume snorts. “Damn right I didn’t. What are we, the Alice Opera troupe or something?”

“But Natsumeee,” Luca half-whines, half-complains. “We do singing now. It’s a thing, it makes people happy, it affirms our friendship and stuff. It’s like karaoke, except everyone wins.”

“Except whoever’s listening,” Natsume mumbles under his breath. Luca shakes his head at him and links their arms together to lead him back inside.

“One day,” he says, “I will get you to sing with us on a road trip.”

“If there’s one thing I can promise you,” Natsume declares, letting his best friend drag him back into the warmth of his room, from which the laughter of his friends is echoing still, “Then it’s that I will never again go on a road trip. Never. Planes exist for a reason.”

Luca rolls his eyes and Sumire, seeing the two of them, gets up and pushes her phone in front of their faces.

“Look, look,” she says. “The pictures came out great.”

There’s Yuu holding his sister with a proud smile, Tsubasa looking like an exhausted older brother, Koko sticking out his tongue and Sumire doing her best model pose. Natsume finds himself off to the side a bit, standing next to his beaming best friend with a gloomy expression on his face. It’s a ridiculous picture of ridiculous people. It makes him remember something else he once promised, a long time ago, much like he promised to never go on road trips again just a few seconds ago. He promised not to make friends, because one day, having friends would mean losing people. And he’d been right, too - he had lost people. Except that isn’t quite right, is it? He gained a small role in a stage production, a few pieces of badly made Valentine’s Day chocolate, an impromptu birthday party and more, much more than he ever expected to have.

So yes, he’s promising himself to never go on a road trip again. But judging from past experiences, that promise is going to be broken one day and then, well then - Then, Natsume Hyuuga will go on another adventure, as ridiculous as this one, with the people he is thankful to call friends.

[i-just-love-spop]

At the end of the world

‘If you really want to protect me so badly, why don’t you protect me from her?’

But she wouldn’t do that even if she knew the truth about everything, would she? Because Adora loved the praise she was getting from that awful woman. She wouldn’t risk that just because Shadow Weaver was hurting her best friend, right?

Catra felt sick and disgusted at herself for thinking that way a few seconds later.

There it was again – the awful, dumb resentment that was eating away at her sometimes, that had shown its ugly face time and again over the last few years, its appearances becoming more and more frequent the older she grew.

It turned Adora’s kind words and gentle touches to poison in her head.

—

Written for the prompt “you hurt her, you die”, requested a total of three times by different people: @altheaudaku @whoufflewhovian200311 and @brenda4082

I contemplated using the prompt for something that takes place during the final season of the show or after the show, but I always ended up going back to the idea of it taking place when Catra and Adora are in their young teens.

Heads up, this got pretty long and also really, really angsty. There is some fluff later on, though, I promise.

[There is an additional line at the end that makes the angst even worse, it’s not in here in case anyone wants the story to end on a lighter note. I’m going to add said line in a reblog.]

I really need to write more fluff with these two instead of making everything even more angsty than it already was in the show.

TW: Child abuse, mental and physical.

If you are in a situation like this in real life, please don’t keep it to yourself. Tell someone so you can find a way out of the situation. You deserve better ❤️

I’ll probably rate this mature on Ao3, just to be safe.

—

Summary: In which Adora protecting Catra in training gets the latter in trouble, and Shadow Weaver’s words haunt Catra to a point that she doesn’t dare (or want) to talk to her best friend about what is really going on.

—

Catra had her back against the wall. The robot‘s deadly eye was pointed directly at her. Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.

She hadn’t been careful enough and the damn thing had laid a snare that she had fallen right into. Even worse, now that she’d lost her weapon she had no real way to fight the robot.

The teen covered her face protectively. She had merely seconds to think of a way out of this situation before-

“Hey princess!” That was Adora’s voice. Catra looked up to see that her best friend was now standing in between her and the bot, her staff raised. “That’s my best friend you’re targeting right there!” She hit the robot once, twice, three times, and growled. “You hurt her, you die!”

A moment later, she’d stabbed the robot right through the deadly eye and it sunk to the ground, crackling with electricity one more time before all light in its eye disappeared completely – and with it, so did the simulated princess.

Adora wiped sweat off her forehead.

“Whew, that was close.” She offered Catra a hand to help her up. “I think that was the last one.”

The brunette was about to take her best friend’s hand when a voice rang through the room, cold and menacing with a calm, terrifying angry undertone.

“Good work, cadets!”

Shadow Weaver’s voice made Catra’s blood run cold.

Her outstretched hand turned into a clenched fist as she got up herself, her knees weak.

Despite the fact that she was taller, stronger now, the woman that had less raised than barely tolerated her throughout her childhood still made her feel small and vulnerable just by being present.

“Especially you, Adora. You will truly make an exceptional leader one day.”

The blonde flinched a bit when the older woman touched her face in a gentle gesture. It wasn’t that she wasn’t proud of the praise she was getting... but despite everything, she was still scared of Shadow Weaver.

“I- thank you,” Adora replied, gulping a bit. “I was just doing my best. We all were.”

“Of course.” The blonde relaxed a bit when finally, the older woman let go of her face. “It just so happens to be that your best is a lot better than everyone else’s.”

Catra could practically feel the woman glaring at her. The brunette felt herself shrink smaller and smaller.

This wasn’t fair.

She had beaten almost as many robots as Adora had – and that was saying a lot, especially since this was one of the rare occasions that they were practicing with real lasers... but none of that seemed to matter in the wake of the mistake she had made in the last few minutes.

“Go now or you’ll be late for dinner. We’ll discuss your performances more in the morning.”

Catra got up immediately. She just wanted to get out of here before- but everyone else was closer to the door. Before she could reach it, her body froze in the air and the door slid close behind the last of the others as if by an invisible hand, and Catra was trapped inside... alone with the woman that she hated and feared more than anything in the entire word.

“Not you, Catra.” Her body was lifted into the air, surrounded by a chillingly familiar red glow as she was turned around by force to face Shadow Weaver. The woman’s voice was hateful, menacing, and Catra dreaded what would come next. “That was a poor performance, even for you.”

“T-that’s not true! I took down three robots! Adora just had one more! I was good today!”

The young girl’s voice was shaking. Shadow Weaver was looming over her, the older woman’s eyes narrowed to slits.

She was livid, and that Catra tried to defend her behavior made her even angrier.

“Don’t try to vindicate your shortcomings, your failures.” Catra felt her body tense when the grip the red glow had on her became stronger, more powerful, and started to hurt. “I would say that I‘m disappointed in you, but that would imply that I had actually expected anything else, anything better from you in the first place. I didn’t. We all know you’d be nothing without Adora here to save you.”

That hurt.

Shadow Weaver had years of practice. She knew which areas to target for it to hurt the most.

Adora was Catra’s best friend, and she was the only good thing in her life... but being reduced to the girl’s helpless, useless sidekick was degrading.

Shadow Weaver loved reminding Catra that Adora was like one of the moons that lit up the world, while Catra herself was barely a firefly in comparison that the older woman could crush between her fingertips at any given moment without it being a big loss to her or the Horde. That the brunette was practically worthless, and that her only worth was directly connected to Adora.

Catra felt sick.

“T-that’s not true! I don’t need her! I never needed her!”

For all the defiance in her words, her voice was squeaky and quiet.

She was terrified.

“Oh, but you do.” The shadows closed around her, separating her from the rest of the world, and Catra once again felt like a frightened little girl instead of the young skilled teen that she actually was. “The fact that she has taken a liking to you for a reason beyond my understanding is the only reason I keep you around here in the first place instead of throwing you back to the thrash that you crawled out of.”

Her voice was cold and monotone, and that just made everything worse.

Shadow Weaver made Catra feel small and helpless and useless.

She heard more than what was being said, and despite the fact that the words she did say were already hurtful enough, the threat that loomed behind them made it so much worse.

‘You’re not a person. You’re barely a broken toy that we don’t throw away because my favorite child still likes you for whatever reason. Should she ever cease liking you, that will be the end of your existence.’

Catra wanted to jump at Shadow Weaver, to hurt her the way she was hurting, to yell all of her cruel words back into her face, but instead, the teen just stood there, frozen in fear and terror, her words getting stuck in her throat.

She closed her eyes and braved herself for what she knew would come next.

One blow, then a second, then a third, accompanied by more demeaning, spiteful words.

The teen bit her lip so hard it drew blood, barely managing to keep herself from crying out in pain and desperation. She swallowed the tears that were forming in her eyes bravely. She would not give this woman the satisfaction of hearing her scream and seeing her cry anymore.

—

“Catra, are you okay?” They were sitting in the lunchroom now, Adora across from Catra. While the former was shoving the food into her mouth at an insane speed, the latter was just picking at the ration bars instead of eating them. The blonde glanced at her best friend worriedly and lowered her voice. “Did- did she hurt you again?”

Catra flinched.

So her best friend had realized what was going on, after all?

Did she know how bad it was?

What did she assume was happening?

...should Catra talk to her about it?

“I-” The brunette started, but she never finished the sentence.

She wanted to ask all of these questions, so badly. She wanted to ask Adora for help, to ask her to talk to Shadow Weaver and stand up to her and help Catra. ...but Shadow Weaver’s words kept repeating at the back of her mind.

‘We all know you’d be nothing without Adora here to save you.’

That wasn’t true. She didn’t need Adora to save her. She could do this on her own.

Catra didn’t need anyone to protect her when she could just become strong enough to protect herself.

Adora didn’t make Catra who she was.

Catra wasn’t worthless.

She’d prove that to everyone.

...so she just shook her head.

“I’m fine. And she isn’t hurting me. I just hurt my shoulder a little during training and then stayed behind to patch myself up. Her shadows just creep me out, that’s all.” The words came out surprisingly convincing. She sounded almost indifferent. Catra pushed her plate away. “I’m just not very hungry.”

That wasn’t true, exactly, but she was pretty sure that whatever she would eat she’d throw back up instantly anyway. She was pretty sure her stomach was currently in her chest instead of her belly after the blows it had taken.

Her entire body ached... but at least nothing was bleeding this time.

She’d just end up with a couple of bruises.

She’d live.

She always had.

Adora cocked her head to the side. She knew something was up, even if her best friend didn’t tell her what it was. The blonde girl was a bit ditzy, but she wasn’t stupid, and she wasn’t blind. She’d known Catra long enough to be able to tell that much. If only Adora could get her best friend to open up to her somehow...

“Come on. You have to eat something.”

First things first. That was what was most important right now.

They didn’t get that much to eat around here. Skipping a meal meant going to bed hungry and possibly not being able to appease one’s hunger in the morning when they got their next meal. Catra needed to eat, or she would regret it later.

“I said I’m not hungry!”

Catra got up.

Her voice was harsh and cold, and she pushed the table so hard that the plate flew off it, splintering into a thousand pieces, the food splashing all over the floor.

There was a second of regret within Catra... but she felt too sick to eat, anyway. She wouldn’t have been able to keep anything down.

The room went dead silent for a moment and the two were just stared at – then everyone continued to go about their day.

Fights were a daily phenomenon around here.

As long as nobody got killed, nobody bothered to interfere.

The brunette couldn’t stay here any longer. Not with all these people, not with the other cadets from her squad, and especially not with Adora.

She stormed out of the room.

“Catra!”

Adora sighed, took one last bite of her meal, then ran after her.

—

“Catra wait!” The younger girl stopped short. She felt a pang of guilt form in her stomach. She hadn’t wanted Adora to miss dinner because of her. Adora took a moment to catch her breath when she was finally next to her best friend again. “Can... can you please tell me what’s going on? Did I make you upset? I’m sorry...”

Her best friend didn’t even look at her.

“It’s just- I can’t believe you stole my kill like that!” Catra hissed.

That wasn’t it. Not really. But it was close enough to be believable.

Adora looked at her in shock.

“That’s what this is about? Catra, this wasn’t a game! You almost got really hurt!”

There was a reason they rarely trained with actual laser fire, and why only cadets that passed certain tests were allowed to do it in the first place.

People got hurt occasionally, and, albeit very rarely because their instructors usually managed to stop the training simulation before it happened, someone died.

It was necessary to remind them that this wasn’t a game every now and again, to keep them in their toes and to make them aware that, when they finished training, they would be fighting in an actual war.

People got hurt in wars. People died in wars. What was now an occasional training session would be their day-to-day life in a few years.

Adora always looked out for Catra, but in the training sessions that were actually dangerous, her protectiveness reached a whole new level.

She couldn’t help it... especially in situations like earlier, where her best friend had looked so genuinely scared.

“I know that. I’m not stupid. I could have handled it.”

Catra’s voice was monotone. She still didn’t look at Adora. She rather eyed the floor instead.

She didn’t want her to see how badly she was hurting.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to say- it’s just- You just kind of looked helpless, and I thought-”

Adora bit her lip and hanged her head. She’d just wanted to help her best friend, but that had backfired massively, and now Catra was mad at her... and her apologetic rambling just made things worse.

“Well, I wasn’t!” The brunette hissed.

...alright, maybe she had been helpless. A little. But she would have found a way out.

She always did.

She didn’t need Adora for that. She didn’t need Adora for anything.

Shadow Weaver’s words had really gotten to Catra.

“I was just trying to protect you!” The blonde defended herself, trying to get through to her best friend’s thick skull. Adora didn’t like fighting with Catra. She just wanted to get this over with. ‘It’s not because I think you’re weak, or that you can’t protect yourself. I know you can,’ she wanted to say. ‘But the thought of you getting hurt... I can’t take it. It drives me completely crazy.’

She reached for her friend, wanting to take her hand to comfort her a little, but she never actually got to touch her or to say anything else.

“WELL, YOU’RE DOING AN AWFUL JOB OF IT!” Catra snarled, in a tone that made even herself a bit taken aback by the poison in her words.

Adora’s shoulders sagged a little as she let her hand sink.

Catra felt awful. She wanted to break down into Adora’s arms and cry while she held her... but that would have been weak, and Catra wasn’t allowed to be weak, especially not in front of Adora. They weren’t supposed to be weak or vulnerable at all. It made them a liability in battle if they were. Adora would have hated her if she‘d known the truth about everything – if she‘d known how weak Catra truly still was, even after all these years.

...and then there was this tiny, spiteful voice whispering in the back of her mind that Catra tried to tune out so badly.

‘If you really want to protect me so much, why don’t you protect me from her?!’

But she wouldn’t do that even if she knew the truth about everything, would she? Because Adora loved the praise she was getting from that awful woman. She wouldn’t risk that just because Shadow Weaver was hurting her best friend, right?

Catra felt sick and disgusted at herself for thinking that way a few seconds later.

There it was again – the awful, dumb resentment that was eating away at her sometimes, that had shown its ugly face time and again over the last few years, its appearances becoming more and more frequent the older she grew.

It turned Adora’s kind words and gentle touches to poison in her head.

For a moment, Catra almost hated her best friend... and then her anger turned to desperation, and she hated herself for even thinking like that for a single second.

Adora was the only good thing about this awful place. The only thing that kept her sane. How dare she even so much as think something like that?

...how dare she let Shadow Weaver’s words get to her to an extent that it influenced her friendship with Adora?!

‘What is wrong with me?!’

She couldn’t look at Adora anymore, so she turned around and ran away again, back to the room they all shared to sleep that was currently pretty abandoned since dinner was barely over.

—

Catra curled up in bed; Adora’s bed, to be more specific – because it smelled like her and that helped her calm down a little –, and she just sobbed silently for a couple of minutes.

Then she heard the door open and close again, and when she looked up, Adora was sitting next to her on the bed and offered her her hand.

“I don’t want to talk to you,” the brunette mumbled, glancing over her shoulder instead of actually turning around to face her friend.

Catra was more upset than she was angry, and she didn’t want Adora to see her cry, despite the fact that the blonde was probably able to hear her sobs anyway.

Adora hanged her head, but she pulled herself together and smiled weakly.

“You don’t have to. But you’re obviously upset, and I’m not going to leave you. Not now, not ever.”

Catra’s heart melted. She sat up and moved closer towards her friend until her back touched Adora’s, and they sat like that for a long while, Catra still sobbing silently, but now, each of her sobs was accompanied by a comforting squeeze of her hand.

—

Eventually, their peaceful togetherness was rudely interrupted as the door opened once more.

“Rogelio?” Lonnie called out as she stuck her head through the door. “Okay, no, he’s not in here, either.” Then she spotted Catra and Adora and walked up to them. “Hey, have you guys seen-” She cut off in mid-sentence and coked her head to the side at the fairly weird image of the two girls sitting back to back in the bunk. “Why are you two sitting like this?”

“We had a fight, and now she won’t talk to me,” Adora replied, scratching the back of her head with the hand that wasn’t holding Catra’s, a weak smile plastered on her face. The fact that she was still very upset was unmistakable in her voice.

Their fellow cadet raised an eyebrow.

“Then why are you holding hands?”

“Catra gets sad when we fight,” the blonde replied without thinking.

Her best friend blushed and let go of her hand immediately, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

“I do not.”

...yes, she did.

She hated fighting with Adora.

Lonnie just shook her head and groaned.

“Why are you guys so weird?”

“We’re not weird,” Catra growled.

“Yes, you definitely are.” Lonnie rolled her eyes. “Adora, when you’re done being a weirdo about Catra, you can come play with us in the locker room if you want. Kyle invented a game that sounds pretty fun. It involved something with spinning a bottle, I think? I don’t know, I kinda forgot.”

“I’d love to.” Adora bit her lip. “But only if Catra can come, too.”

Lonnie shook her head.

“Adora, I know you’re nice and all, but none of us actually understand why you hang out with her so much in the first place. Catra’s mean, and she doesn’t like us. And, quite frankly, we don’t like her, either.” Lonnie had had her less bad moments with Catra – moments where she’d felt sorry for her, moments where she almost felt like they could be friends... but Catra had always gone back to her usual cold, rude demeanor immediately afterwards, and Lonnie was incredibly tired of that. Either the girl wanted to be her friend, or she didn’t. And if she couldn’t keep being nice to Lonnie and her friends, Catra obviously didn’t. Lonnie wouldn’t play this game any longer. “Even if we would allow her to come, she wouldn’t want to, and if she did, she’d ruin our evening... so sorry, but no thanks.”

The blonde growled.

“Don’t talk about my best friend like that!”

“But she’s right,” Catra mumbled. “I don’t like them, and I wouldn’t want to play their stupid game anyway. Feel free to go without me if you want to.”

She had a very hard time not breaking down in tears, but the last thing she wanted right now was to be vulnerable again, especially in front of this stupid girl that was always trying to steal her best friend from her. ...the same stupid girl that she’d hit in a fit of jealous rage back when they were kids, and that had patched her up after a particularly bad training session that one time. And that Catra had then snapped at as a ‘thank you’ the next day.

...the more Catra thought about it, the more certain she was that, had she been anyone else, she wouldn’t have wanted to be friends with herself, either.

“No. I won’t. I’m staying with you,” Adora replied.

Catra almost managed a smile.

Damn it, how was this girl so perfect?

Lonnie shrugged.

“Whatever, suit yourself. Have you guys seen Rogelio?”

“No, sorry. I think I saw him at dinner, but I have no idea where he went afterwards,” Adora replied. “He’s definitely not been in here since we finished dinner.”

“Okay. Thanks anyway. I’ll find him, probably. You guys have ...fun?... with whatever the heck you’re doing. See you later.”

—

As soon as the door closed behind her, Catra’s hand found Adora’s again.

“You didn’t have to stay, you know.”

“Yeah. But I wanted to,” the blonde replied with a smile. “Besides, I didn’t want to go play with her after that anyway. I like Lonnie, and I like hanging out with her, but I don’t like the way she talked about you. You’re my best friend. Nobody is allowed to speak to you that way.“

“I... thank you.”

The brunette was still facing the wall, her voice was extremely quiet.

“Catra, listen, I...” Adora started, trying her best to find the right words. “I’m sorry about earlier. I know you can take care of yourself. It’s just... the thought that that robot could hurt you, or worse...” She gulped. “I couldn’t just stand by and watch. I had to do something.” Adora squeezed Catra’s hand again. “I’d never let anyone hurt you. Especially not a princess. I promised I would look out for you, remember?” Adora smiled at her softly. “I’m intending to keep that promise for the rest of my life.”

“I don’t need you to protect me,” Catra replied without missing a beat... then flattened her ears. “But thank you. I don’t want anything to happen to you, either.”

She gulped. She was being hurt... but it wasn’t Adora’s fault, and there was nothing she could do about it – not without putting herself in danger. And Catra didn’t want that.

The one thought she could bear even less than having to take these blows all her life was the thought of Adora taking them for her.

...the resentment was gone now, replaced by warmth and worry.

“I can’t lose you,” the brunette whispered. “Meeting you was the best thing that ever happened to me. I don’t know who I’d be without you.”

It wasn’t an apology, exactly... but Adora didn’t blame her.

Catra had never been good at apologies. Most people here weren’t. This was as good as it got, and she appreciated it.

Besides, at least part of the situation had been Adora’s fault, after all, so she didn’t really blame her.

Catra finally turned around to face her best friend again, allowing the blonde to wipe the tears off her cheeks. The brunette just let her do it without complaint, even enjoying the touch.

It made her feel warm inside.

Maybe being weak for once was okay, after all.

“Yeah, me either.”

Adora shrugged and pulled her best friend close. She was just happy they weren’t fighting anymore, and that she could finally hug her again to properly comfort her.

Catra snuggled up to her, her head nestling against the crook of the blonde’s neck.

“Good think we’ll never have to find out, right?”

“Never,” Adora emphasized. “I’m never going to leave you. You’re my best friend. I don’t want to be anywhere without you, ever.”

She stroked Catra’s head, making the girl purr happily. The blonde liked Catra’s purrs, especially when she so close to Adora’s chest. They made her feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

“And even if you leave... wherever you go, I’ll go. Yesterday, today and tomorrow. Forever. One day, it’s going to be you and me, together at the end of the word,” Catra added.

The thought made her a weird amount of happy. She hadn’t thought she would be able to smile again after the day she’d had, and the memories still made her shake, and the bruises still hurt... but she was smiling now.

Because Adora made her happy.

“Exactly. Nothing can separate us.” Adora beamed as she touched the picture they had carved into the bed when they were kids, shortly after they‘d first met. “Just like nothing can separate tiny Catra and Adora. They’ll be there on the bed frame together until the end of time.” She squeezed Catra’s hand. “Come on, we should get some sleep now so you don’t accidentally sleep in again tomorrow.”

Catra stayed silent for a moment, then breathed a silent “Okay.”

The two of them fell asleep arm in arm, the brunette sprawled out over her best friend.